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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Mere Chance, Vol. 2 of 3, by Ada Cambridge
+
+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: A Mere Chance, Vol. 2 of 3
+       A Novel
+
+Author: Ada Cambridge
+
+Release Date: November 22, 2011 [EBook #38084]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MERE CHANCE, VOL. 2 OF 3 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Darleen Dove, Shannon Barker, Matthew Wheaton
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
+generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
+Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+    A MERE CHANCE.
+
+    A NOVEL.
+
+    BY ADA CAMBRIDGE,
+
+
+    AUTHOR OF "IN TWO YEARS TIME," &c.
+
+    IN THREE VOLUMES.
+
+    VOL. II.
+
+
+    LONDON:
+    RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON,
+    Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen,
+    NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
+    1882.
+    _Right of Translation Reserved._
+
+
+
+
+    CONTENTS OF THE SECOND VOLUME.
+
+
+    CHAPTER
+
+       I.--Another Rash Promise
+      II.--The Beginning of Troubles
+     III.--"Where there was never Need of Vows."
+      IV.--After the Ball
+       V.--Rachel's First Visit in Melbourne
+      VI.--In Mrs. Hardy's Store-room
+     VII.--"He Has Come Back"
+    VIII.--"The Light that never was on Sea or Land"
+      IX.--Eleven p.m.
+       X.--Mrs. Reade's Advice
+      XI.--Until Christmas
+     XII.--"The Ground-Whirl of the Perished Leaves of Hope"
+    XIII.--Rachel on the Philosophy of Marriage
+
+
+
+
+A MERE CHANCE.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ANOTHER RASH PROMISE.
+
+
+Mr. Kingston, as soon as he received Mrs. Thornley's invitation, sent a
+telegram to her nearest post-town, to tell her he would start for
+Adelonga on the following day, and await at the inn where he left the
+railway the buggy she was kind enough to say should be sent to meet him.
+
+There was much amusement at Adelonga over this unwonted promptitude on
+the part of an idle and self-indulgent man, who had never been known to
+hurry himself, or to go into the country willingly; and Rachel was
+teased in fun and congratulated in earnest on the strong hold she had
+gained upon his erewhile erratic affections.
+
+The buggy was ordered at once--Mr. Thornley's own pet Abbott buggy, that
+floated over the rough roads--and a pet pair of horses were harnessed
+into it, and another pair sent forward to change with them on the way,
+and Mr. Thornley himself set forth to meet his guest.
+
+Next day Lucilla ordered one of her best rooms--usually reserved for
+married ladies--to be prepared for him, and had great consultations
+with her cook on his behalf; and at about five in the afternoon he
+arrived, wrapped in a fur-collared overcoat, like a traveller in bleak
+and barren regions, and had a royal welcome.
+
+Lucilla, followed by her mother, went out to the verandah to meet her
+old friend--though, indeed, she never willingly omitted that graceful
+act of hospitality, whoever might be her guest--and was delighted to
+receive again the same old compliment on her charming appearance that
+had pleasantly befooled her in her maiden days. Mrs. Hardy was likewise
+greeted with effusion, and responded cordially; and then they all looked
+round.
+
+"Where is Rachel?" inquired Mr. Kingston, with anxious solicitude;
+"isn't she well?"
+
+Rachel was found in the drawing-room, nervously rearranging the cups and
+saucers that had just been brought in for tea. Lucilla ushered him in
+with a smile, and discreetly retired with her mother, upon some utterly
+unnecessary errand.
+
+The lovers met in the middle of the room, and Rachel went through the
+ordeal that she had been vaguely dreading all day. It was worse than she
+had expected, for she felt, by some subtle, newly-developed sense, that
+she had been greatly missed and ardently longed for, and that they were
+truly lover's arms that folded her, trembling and shrinking, in that
+apparently interminable embrace.
+
+She had not yet come to realise the magnitude and the ignominy of the
+wrong that she was doing him, but a pang of remorseful pity did hurt
+her somewhere, through all her stony irresponsiveness, for the fate that
+had driven him, the desired of so many women, to set his heart at last
+upon one who did not want it.
+
+For a brief intolerable moment she felt that she had it in her to
+implore him to release her from her engagement, but--well, she was a
+little coward, if the truth must be told.
+
+And, moreover, she had not quite come to the point of giving up her pink
+boudoir, and her diamond necklace, and all her other splendid
+possessions in prospect, because she could not love the contingent
+husband as was her duty to him to do.
+
+She did not know as yet that she loved another man.
+
+"And you never came to meet me?" said Mr. Kingston, with tender
+reproach, as he led her by one reluctant hand to a sofa that was wheeled
+up comfortably to the fireside. "And I was straining my eyes all across
+the paddock, to see you on the verandah looking out."
+
+"I was looking out," said Rachel; "I saw the buggy before it reached the
+woolshed. But----"
+
+"But you thought it would be nicer to have our meeting here, with no one
+to look on? So it is, darling; you were quite right. I could not have
+helped kissing you, if all the servants on the place had been standing
+round; and one doesn't like to make a public exhibition of one's self.
+Oh, my pet, I _am_ so glad to get you again! And how are you? Let me
+have a good look at you. Oh, if you are going to blush, how am I to
+tell whether you are looking well or not?"
+
+"I am not going to blush," said Rachel; "and I am quite well. I never
+was better. The country air is doing me ever so much good."
+
+"I am not so sure of that," rejoined Mr. Kingston, rather gravely,
+stroking her soft cheek. "You look fagged, as if you had been knocking
+about too much. I didn't like your going to those rubbishy little
+races--I told Thornley so. Have you been sitting up late at night?"
+
+"No--I have been doing _nothing_," pleaded Rachel; "I am really as well
+as possible. How is the house getting on?"
+
+"The house is not doing much at present. They are still pottering at
+the foundations, which seem to take a frightful lot of doing to. Not
+that they have had time to make much progress since you were there--it
+is not much over a fortnight yet, you know. Oh, but it has been a long
+fortnight! Rachel, now I have got you, I don't mean to lose sight of you
+again."
+
+"How did you leave Beatrice?" inquired Rachel, hastily.
+
+"Beatrice is quite well--as sprightly as ever. I told her I meant to
+bring you back to town, by force of arms if necessary, and she said I
+was quite right. We can't do without you in Melbourne--I can't, anyhow;
+and what's more, I don't mean to try."
+
+"How is Uncle Hardy?"
+
+"Uncle Hardy? I'm sure I don't know--I was very nearly saying I don't
+care. Of course he is quite well; he always is, I believe. Is there
+anybody else you are particularly anxious about, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"Yes," said Rachel, smiling and blushing; "I am anxious about Black
+Agnes. How is my dear Black Agnes? _Does_ William attend to her
+properly?"
+
+"I don't leave her to William," said Mr. Kingston. "I have taken her
+away to my own stables. And there she is eating her head off--wanting
+you, like the rest of us. If you have no more questions to ask, I'll
+begin; may I? I have some _really_ important inquiries to make."
+
+Rachel gasped. But to her immense relief Lucilla was heard approaching,
+talking at an unnecessarily high pitch of voice to her mother, who
+responded with equal vigour; and the two ladies entered, followed by
+Mr. Thornley, all wearing a more or less deprecatory aspect.
+
+The men and the matrons grouped themselves round the fire, and plunged
+into an animated discussion of the latest Melbourne news. Rachel poured
+out the tea, and insisted on carrying it round to everybody, regardless
+of polite protests; which charmed her lover very much.
+
+He was rather cold, and a little stiff and tired after his unwonted
+exertion; his seat was soft and restful; and he liked to see the slender
+creature gliding about, with her sweet face and her deft hands, and
+picture to himself with what meek dutifulness she would serve her lord
+and master when the time came.
+
+Rachel hoped they were in for a pleasant gossip till dinner time, but
+she was much mistaken.
+
+"I must go and see after my baby, Mr. Kingston, if you will excuse me,"
+said Lucilla at the end of half-an-hour, setting down her empty but
+still smoking teacup, and rising with an air that implied a pressing
+duty postponed to the very last moment. Mr. Kingston expressed an ardent
+desire to make the baby's acquaintance, which flattered the young mother
+greatly, but otherwise led to nothing. Lucilla went out, promising to
+introduce her son under favourable auspices in the morning; and as she
+disappeared, Mrs. Hardy jumped up and followed her with apparently
+anxious haste.
+
+"Oh, Lucilla, I _quite_ forgot that aconite for Dolly's cold!" she
+exclaimed; "shall I come and look for it now?"
+
+Mr. Thornley, left behind, stood on the hearthrug, shifting uneasily
+from one leg to the other. He cleared his throat, remarked that the days
+were lengthening wonderfully, moved some ornaments on the chimney-piece,
+and looked at his watch.
+
+"Dear me," he muttered briskly, as if struck with a sudden thought, "a
+quarter to six, I do declare! Excuse me a few minutes, Kingston."
+
+"Certainly," replied Mr. Kingston. And then _he_ went out.
+
+"How stupid they are!" cried poor Rachel to herself, almost stamping her
+foot with vexation. But there was no help for it. The affianced couple
+were once more left to themselves--as affianced couples should be, and
+should like to be--in the pleasant firelight and no less pleasant
+twilight shadows that were filling the quiet room.
+
+Mr. Kingston rose, took his reluctant sweetheart's hand, and led her
+back to the sofa by the hearth.
+
+"What time do they have dinner here?" he asked.
+
+"Seven o'clock," said Rachel, with a sinking heart.
+
+"Then we shall have nearly an hour to ourselves, shan't we? Come then,
+and let us have a good long talk. But first, I've got something for
+you."
+
+He began to fumble in his pockets, and presently drew forth a little
+square packet, neatly sealed up in paper, which he laid on Rachel's
+knee. Wise man! he had not had his long and varied experiences for
+nothing.
+
+The girl in smiling perplexity turned the mysterious parcel over and
+over, broke first one seal and then another with much delicate
+elaboration; cautiously stripped off the paper wrappings, and revealed,
+as she expected, a morocco jewel-case.
+
+"Oh, how kind!" she murmured, stroking it caressingly with her white
+fingers.
+
+"Open it before you say that," said he; "you don't know that there is
+anything in it yet."
+
+"Ah, but I know your ways," she rejoined; "I know it is sure to be
+something lovely." And then she lifted the lid, and exclaimed "O-o-oh!"
+with a long breath. There lay, on a bed of blue velvet, a beautiful
+little watch, thickly set on one side of the case with tiny diamond
+sparks, which on examination proved to illuminate the flourishes of a
+big R; and a chain of proportionate value was coiled around it.
+
+Rachel was in ecstacies. She had longed for a watch all her life, and
+had never yet had one, except an old silver warming-pan of her father's,
+which would not go into a lady's pocket.
+
+It was only lately that Mr. Kingston had discovered this fact; and he
+had immediately had one prepared for her, such as he considered would be
+worthy of her future position in society, and of his own reputation for
+good taste. He felt himself well repaid for his outlay at this moment.
+Of her own accord she put up her soft lips and kissed him, pouring out
+her childish gratitude for his thoughtfulness, and his kindness, and his
+goodness, in broken exclamations which were charmingly naive and sweet.
+
+"You are always giving me things," she murmured, shyly stroking his coat
+sleeve.
+
+"Dear little woman!" he responded, with ardent embraces, from which she
+did not shrink--at least, not much; "it is my greatest pleasure in life
+to give you things."
+
+And from this substantial base of operations the astute lover opened the
+campaign which was to deliver her, a helpless captive, into his hands.
+
+"And now," he said, when the watch having been consigned to its pocket
+in her pretty homespun gown, and the chain artistically festooned from a
+button-hole at her waist, a suggestive silence fell upon them--"now I
+want to know what you mean by saying you won't be married till next
+year? Naughty child, you made me very miserable with that letter. Though
+to be sure it was better than the other one, which was so horribly, so
+really brutally, cold that I had to go to the fire to get warm after
+reading it. Oh, Rachel, you are not _half_ in love yet, I fear!"
+
+"Don't say that," she murmured, with tender compunction.
+
+"And I believe that is why you wish to put off our marriage."
+
+"Oh, don't say that!" she repeated, weakly anxious to re-assure and
+conciliate him, and to postpone unpleasantness--woman-like, afraid of
+the very opportunity that she wanted when she saw herself unexpectedly
+confronted with it. "I don't wish to put it off--only for a little
+while."
+
+"Do you call till next year a little while? Because I don't."
+
+"Of course it is. Why, here is August!"
+
+"And there are five long months--double the time we have been engaged
+already. And it wouldn't be comfortable to be travelling in the hot
+season."
+
+"You said spring would be a nice time," suggested Rachel. She was
+touching his sleeve with timid, deprecatory caresses, and she was
+desperately frightened and anxious.
+
+"Yes; _this_ spring--not twelve months hence. Oh, my pet, _do_ let it be
+this spring. There are three lovely months before us, and I should like
+to get that Sydney house. I have the offer of it still for a few days; I
+got them to keep it open till I could consult you. You _must_ remember
+that I am not as young as you are, Rachel; a year one way or the other
+may be of no account to you, but it is of very great importance to me."
+
+There was a touch of impatience and irritation in his voice, which
+helped her to pluck up courage to cling to her resolve.
+
+At the same time she heard the soft ticking of that precious watch at
+her side; her heart was touched and warmed by what she called his
+"kindness;" and she was anxious to do anything that she _could_ do to
+please him.
+
+"Won't it do when the house is built?" she asked, in a wheedling,
+cowardly, coaxing tone, as she laid her cheek for a moment on his
+shoulder. "I will come back to Melbourne as soon as you like--I can stay
+with Beatrice, if aunt likes to remain here. We can be together almost
+as if we were married. We can ride together every day, and watch how the
+house goes on; and you know aunt doesn't mind _how_ much you are with us
+at Toorak. Only if you would consent to put off the wedding till then--"
+
+"Will you promise to marry me then?" he asked quickly.
+
+"Yes, I will, really," she replied, without any hesitation, thankful for
+the reprieve, which she had been by no means sure of getting.
+
+"As soon as the house is built?"
+
+"As soon as the house is finished."
+
+"No--not finished; that mayn't be next year, nor the year after. As soon
+as the roof is on?"
+
+Rachel paused.
+
+"How long does that take?"
+
+"Oh, a long time--ever so long."
+
+She paused again, with a longer pause. And then,
+
+"Very well," she sighed, resignedly.
+
+"It is a bargain? You promise faithfully? On your solemn word of
+honour?"
+
+"Oh, don't make such a terrible thing of it!" she protested, with a
+rather hysterical laugh, that showed signs of degenerating into a
+whimper. "I _can_ only say I will."
+
+"And that is enough, my sweet. I won't require you to reduce it to
+writing. Your word shall be your bond. It is a long while to wait, but I
+must try to be patient. At any rate, it is a comfort to be done with
+uncertainty, and to have a fixed time to arrange for. And now, perhaps,
+we ought to go and dress. Tell me how much it wants to seven, Rachel;
+you have the correct Melbourne time."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLES.
+
+
+It was in the afternoon that Lucilla again expected her guests, on the
+day of the ball given at Adelonga in honour of the coming of age of her
+absent stepson; and the hospitable arrangements characteristic of bush
+households on such occasions, were made for their reception on the usual
+Adelonga scale. All the visitors were to be "put up" of course; and from
+the exhaustless piles of material stowed away in the ample store-rooms,
+bed-rooms were improvised in every hole and corner, and beds made up
+wherever beds could decently go--in the store-rooms themselves, in the
+school-room, in the laundry, in the gardener's cottage, as well as in
+the numerous guest-chambers with which this, in common with other
+Australian "country seats," was regularly supplied.
+
+Bright log fires burned on every hearth; bright spring flowers adorned
+all the ladies' dressing-tables; stupendous viands piled the pantry
+shelves and filled the spacious kitchens with delectable odours.
+
+Servants bustled about with a festive air.
+
+Mr. Thornley, in shirt sleeves, brought forth treasures from the remote
+recesses of his cellar that no one but he was competent to meddle with.
+
+Mrs. Thornley moved complacently about her extensive domain, regulating
+all these exceptional arrangements with that housewifely good sense and
+judgment which distinguished all Mrs. Hardy's daughters.
+
+Rachel found her sphere of action in the ball-room, where with Miss
+O'Hara and the children, a young gardener to supply material, the
+station carpenter to do the rough work, and Mr. Kingston to look on and
+criticise from an arm-chair by the fire, she worked all day at the
+decorations, which had been designed in committee and partly prepared
+the day before. The great Japanese screens had been carried away (to be
+made very useful in the construction of bed and bath-rooms) and the
+carpets taken up; and now she feathered the great empty room all about
+with fern-tree fronds--hanging them from extemporised chandeliers, and
+from wire netting stretched over the ceiling, and from doorless
+doorways, rooted in masses of shrubs and blossoms that made a bower of
+the whole place. It was just such a task as she delighted in, and she
+was considered to have completed it successfully at four o'clock, when
+she put her finishing touches to a trophy over the chimney-piece, which,
+though rather complicated as to symbolism, being arranged on a
+foundation of breech-loaders and riding-whips, had a bold and pleasing
+effect.
+
+At four o'clock the guests began to arrive. She was directing her
+attendants to sweep up the last of her litters from the newly-polished
+floor, when the Digbys' waggonette drove in at the wide-standing garden
+gates, and rattled up to the house.
+
+After them came other buggies in quick succession. Grooms and house
+servants poured out to receive them; doors banged; confused voices and
+laughter rose and fell in waves of pleasant sound through the maze of
+passages intersecting the rabbit-warren of a house.
+
+Rachel ran to a window and looked out in time to see Lucifer led off to
+the stables blowing and panting, and jangling his bridle, but stepping
+out still with unconquered spirit, as became a brave old horse of noble
+lineage, whom such a master owned.
+
+Mr. Kingston, the only other person just then in the room, came behind
+her and laid his hands with the air of a proprietor on her shoulders.
+
+"Whose hack is that?" he inquired, with languid curiosity. "Looks a good
+sort of breed, something like your mare in colour, only much bigger."
+
+"Mr. Dalrymple's," murmured Rachel.
+
+"Dalrymple?--that brother of Mrs. Digby's you spoke of? I've heard of
+that fellow. I was curious to know who he was, and I made inquiries at
+the club. He is a rather considerable scamp, if all tales are true."
+
+"All tales are not true," replied the girl, with majestic calmness.
+
+"And pray how do _you_ know?" he retorted quickly, a little amused and
+a great deal irritated by her highly indiscreet behaviour. "I don't
+suppose that you have heard all that I have--at any rate, I _hope_ not."
+
+"I know enough," she stammered hurriedly; "I know the worst anyone can
+say against him."
+
+"I hope not," repeated Mr. Kingston, with ominous gravity.
+
+"And I know he has done wrong--done very wrong, indeed; but he has had
+such terrible provocations--he has been, oh, so dreadfully unfortunate!"
+she went on, wishing heartily that she had not undertaken her new
+friend's defence, yet finding it easier to go through with it now than
+to turn back and desert him. "And, whatever he may have been once, he
+is doing nothing to harm anybody now; and it is cruel of people to be
+always raking up the past, when it is done with and repented of, and
+throwing it in his teeth. Any of us would think it hard and unfair--you
+would yourself."
+
+"Never mind me, my dear; my past is not being called in question that I
+am aware of."
+
+Mr. Kingston's not very placid temper was rising.
+
+"He is doing nothing wrong now," she repeated, frightened but reckless;
+"if he were, Mr. Thornley would not invite him here--he said so himself.
+And Lucilla, though she does not like him--nobody likes him,
+indeed--says he would never do a mean action, and that he has perfect
+manners, and that he is a thorough gentleman every way. I think they
+all agree about _that_."
+
+"And yet don't like him. That is rather inconsistent. And what about
+yourself, Rachel? If it is not a rude question--are you an exception in
+this respect, or not?"
+
+He had taken his hands from her shoulders, and was standing sideways in
+the embrasure of the window, so that he could see her face; and he was
+smiling in a most unpleasant manner.
+
+Rachel had never seen him like this before, and the first seed of active
+dislike was sown where as yet there had been nothing worse than
+indifference. The familiar colour rose and flooded her white brow and
+her whiter throat. She clenched her hands to still the flutter of her
+heart. She shut her teeth and struggled in silence against an
+ignominious impulse to cry.
+
+But Mr. Kingston continued to watch her with that sardonic curiosity;
+and presently, like the traditional worm, she turned on him.
+
+"Yes," she said, "I am an exception. I like Mr. Dalrymple very
+much--what little I know of him. I have seen no reason to do otherwise.
+I do not pay any attention to vulgar gossip."
+
+A timid woman, trying to be defiant, generally fails by overdoing it;
+and so did she, poor child. Mr. Kingston heard the emphasis of strong
+emotion, that she would have given worlds to keep back, vibrating
+through her tremulous accents, and it drove him beyond those
+considerations of policy and politeness which he made a boast of as his
+rule of life and action--especially in his dealings with women. Rachel,
+however, in the category of women, was exceptionally placed with respect
+to him; and I suppose one must do him the justice to concede that this
+was an exceptional emergency.
+
+"I'll tell you what," he said, smiling no longer, and speaking with a
+rough edge to his voice that betokened the original rude nature, usually
+so carefully clothed, and that she instinctively resented as an
+indignity, "Thornley can do as he likes about the people he brings here
+to associate with his wife, but I won't have you making acquaintance
+with a vagabond like that."
+
+"I have already made his acquaintance," she said quietly.
+
+"Then I beg you will break it off."
+
+"How can I break it off while he is in the same house with me?"
+
+She was surprised to find how strong she was to withstand this incipient
+tyranny; and yet her heart contracted with a pain very like despair.
+
+"There will be so many people that one--and he a man--may be easily
+avoided, if you wish to avoid. And you _will_ wish to do what would
+please me, wouldn't you, dear?" he demanded, perceiving that he was
+bullying her, and trying to correct himself.
+
+"Yes," she replied; "certainly. But I hope you will not ask me to be
+rude to one of my cousin's guests. I don't mind what else I do to please
+you. And when I am married, I will of course know nobody but the people
+you like."
+
+"You are as good as married to me already," he said, putting his arm
+round her shoulder as she stood before him, with all sorts of changes
+and revolutions going on within her. "And of course I don't want you to
+be rude--I don't want you to be anything. Simply don't take any notice
+of Dalrymple--he will quite understand it; don't dance with him, or have
+anything to do with him."
+
+"Not dance with him!" she broke out sharply.
+
+Her evident dismay and disappointment, together with her unconscious
+efforts to evade his embrace, exasperated his already ruffled temper
+afresh.
+
+"Certainly not," he said, with angry vehemence. "I shall be exceedingly
+annoyed and vexed if I see you dancing with that man."
+
+Rachel did not know until now how much she had secretly set her heart
+upon doing this forbidden thing; as her exigent lover did not know until
+now that he had it in him to be so horribly jealous.
+
+"He will be sure to come and ask me," she said, with a despairing sigh.
+
+"Very well. If he does, I beg you will refuse him."
+
+"Then I must refuse everybody."
+
+"Not at all. He will quite understand that there are reasons why he
+should be exceptionally treated."
+
+"And do you think I will make him understand _that_?" she burst out,
+with pathetic indignation that filled her soft eyes with tears. "Do you
+think I would be so--so infamously rude and cruel? Oh, Mr.
+Kingston"--she never called him "Graham" except in her letters, though
+he tried his best to make her--"you don't want to spoil all my pleasure
+to-night, which was going to be such a happy night?"
+
+"Your pleasure doesn't depend on dancing with Mr. Dalrymple, I _hope_."
+
+"No--no; but may I not treat him like all the rest, for Lucilla's
+sake--for common politeness' sake?"
+
+"No, Rachel. I don't want to be unkind, my dear, but you must remember
+your position, and that now you belong to me. A lady who understands
+these matters can quite easily manage to get off dancing with a man if
+she wishes, without being rude. You must learn those little social
+accomplishments, and this is a very good time to begin. Now let us
+change the subject. Kiss me, and don't look so miserable, or I shall
+begin to think--but that it would be insulting you too much--that you
+have fallen in love with this disreputable ruffian."
+
+Mr. Kingston tried to assume a light and airy manner, but his badinage
+had a menacing tone that was very chilling.
+
+Rachel, strange to say, did not blush at all; she quietly excused
+herself on the plea that she must go and arrange her dishevelled
+costume, and (having no private bedroom to-night) went a long way down
+the garden to a retired harbour for half an hour's meditation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+"WHERE THERE WAS NEVER NEED OF VOWS."
+
+
+When Rachel came back to the house it was nearly five o'clock.
+
+There was to be a great high tea at six, for which no dressing was
+required, in place of the ordinary dinner; and as she did not feel
+inclined to meet the crowd of company that was assembling in the
+drawing-room sooner than was necessary--to tell the truth, she had been
+crying, and her eyes were red--she returned by a back way to the
+ball-room, which she knew would be to all intents and purposes, empty.
+
+As an excuse for doing so she carried in her arms some long wreaths of
+spiraea which she had discovered on a bush at the bottom of the garden,
+with which she intended to relieve the masses of box and laurestinus
+that made the groundwork of her decorations.
+
+Lightly flitting up a stone-flagged passage at the rear of the house,
+she suddenly came upon Mr. Dalrymple. He emerged from the door of the
+laundry, which had been assigned to him for sleeping quarters, just as
+she was passing it.
+
+"Oh!" she cried sharply, as if he had been a ghost; and then she caught
+her breath, and dropped her eyes, and blushed her deepest blush, which
+was by no means the conventional mode of salutation, but more than
+satisfied the man who did not know until this moment how eagerly he had
+looked for a welcome from her.
+
+"How do you do?" he said, clothing the common formula with a new
+significance, and holding her hand in a strong grasp; "I was wondering
+where you were, and beginning to dread all kinds of disasters. Where are
+you going? May I carry these for you?"
+
+He saw by this time the traces of her recent tears, and the cheerful
+cordiality of his greeting subsided to a rather stern but very tender
+earnestness.
+
+Silently he lifted the white wreaths from her arm, and began to saunter
+beside her in the direction of the ball-room, much as he had led her
+away into the conservatory on that memorable night, which was only a
+week, but seemed a year ago.
+
+All the time she was thinking of Mr. Kingston's prohibition, and
+dutifully desiring to obey him; but she had no power in her to do more.
+
+They passed through the servants' offices, meeting only Lucilla's maid,
+who was in a ferment of excitement with so many ladies to attend to, and
+had not a glance to spare for them; they heard voices and footsteps all
+around them as they entered the house; but they reached the ball-room
+unperceived and unmolested, and found themselves alone.
+
+The great room, with its windows draped and garlanded, was dim and
+silent; the gardener's steps stood in the middle ready for the lighting
+of the lamps; nothing but this remained to be done, and no one came in
+to disturb them.
+
+For ten minutes they devoted themselves to business. Mr. Dalrymple
+mounted the steps, and wove the spiraea into whatever green clusters
+looked too thin or too dark; he touched up certain devices that seemed
+to him to lack stability; he straightened some flags that were hanging
+awry; and Rachel stood below and offered humble suggestions.
+
+When they had done, and had picked up a few fallen leaves and petals,
+they stood and looked round them to judge of the general effect.
+
+"It is very pretty," said Mr. Dalrymple; "and it makes a capital
+ball-room. I have not seen a better floor anywhere."
+
+"It was laid down on purpose for dancing," said Rachel, who knew she
+ought now to be making her appearance elsewhere, yet lingered because he
+did.
+
+"Are you fond of dancing?" he asked abruptly.
+
+"Yes," she said; "very."
+
+"Will you give me your first waltz to-night?"
+
+He was leaning an elbow on the piano, near which he stood, and looking
+down on her with that gentle but imperious inquiry in his eyes, which
+made her feel as if she had taken a solemn affidavit to tell the truth.
+
+"I--I cannot," she stammered, after a pause, during which she wondered
+distractedly how she could best explain her refusal so as to spare him
+unnecessary pain; "I am very sorry--I would, with pleasure, if I could."
+
+"Thank you," he said, with a slight, grateful bow. "Well, I could hardly
+hope for the first, I suppose. But I may have the second? Here are the
+programmes," he added, fishing into a basketful of them that stood on
+the piano, and drawing two out; "let me put my name down for the
+second, and what more you can spare; may I?"
+
+She took the card he gave her, opened it, looked at the little spaces
+which symbolised so much more than their own blank emptiness, looked up
+at him, and then--alas! She was a timid, tender, weakly creature when
+she was hurt, and she had not yet got over the effect of Mr. Kingston's
+harshness; and she had been crying too recently to be able to withstand
+the slightest provocation to cry.
+
+She tried to speak, but her lip quivered, and a tear that had been
+slowly gathering fell with an audible pat upon the piano. He drew the
+card from her in a moment, and at the same time swept away any veil of
+decorous reticence that she might have wished to keep about her.
+
+"What is the matter?" he asked, with gentle entreaty, which in him was
+not inconsistent with a most evident determination to find out. "_I_ am
+not distressing you, asking you to dance with me, am I?"
+
+"Oh, no--it is nothing! Only please _don't_ ask me," she almost sobbed,
+struggling against the shame that she was bringing on herself, and
+knowing quite well that she would struggle in vain.
+
+He watched her in silence for half a minute--not as Mr. Kingston had
+watched her, though with even a fiercer attentiveness, and then he
+said, very quietly,
+
+"Why?"
+
+But he had already guessed.
+
+"Because--because--I have promised not to."
+
+"You have promised Mr. Kingston?"
+
+Scarlet with pain and mortification, in an agony of embarrassment, she
+sighed almost inaudibly,
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Not to dance with me? or merely not to dance waltzes?"
+
+"Must I tell you?" she pleaded, looking up with appealing wet eyes into
+his hard and haughty face.
+
+"Not unless you like, Miss Fetherstonhaugh. I think I understand
+perfectly."
+
+"Oh, Mr. Dalrymple, I want to tell you about it, but I cannot. I am
+saying things already that I ought not to speak of."
+
+"I don't think so," he replied quickly, suddenly softening until his
+voice was almost a caress, and set all her sensitive nerves thrilling
+like an AEolian harp when a strong wind blows over it. "It is in your
+nature to be honest, and to tell the truth. You are not afraid to tell
+the truth to me?"
+
+"I would not tell you an untruth," she murmured, looking down; "but the
+truth--sometimes one must, sometimes one ought--to hide it. And I hoped
+you would not need to know about this."
+
+"Why, how could I help knowing it? Did you think it likely I might by
+chance forget you were in the ball-room to-night?"
+
+What she thought clearly "blazed itself in the heart's colours on her
+simple face." But she did not lift her eyes or speak.
+
+"I am very glad I know," he continued, in a rather stern tone. "If you
+had done this to me, and never told me why----"
+
+"I should have trusted to you to guess that it was not my fault, and to
+forgive me for it," the girl interposed, looking up at last with a flash
+in her soft eyes that, as well as her words, told him a great deal more
+than she had any idea of.
+
+"It was really so?" he demanded eagerly. "It was not your own desire to
+disappoint me so terribly?"
+
+"Oh, _no_."
+
+"If you had been left to yourself you would have danced with me?"
+
+"Yes, of course."
+
+"Quite willingly?"
+
+"You _know_ I would!"
+
+Mr. Dalrymple drew a long breath. It was rather a critical moment. But
+he was no boy, at the mercy of the wind and waves of his own emotions,
+and Rachel's evident weakness of self-control was an appeal to his
+strength that he was not the man to disregard. Still it was wonderful
+how actively during these last few minutes he had come to hate Mr.
+Kingston, whom he had never seen.
+
+"I suppose," he said presently, "I must not ask the reason for this
+preposterous proceeding?"
+
+"Do not," she pleaded gently. "There is no reason, really. It is but Mr.
+Kingston's whim."
+
+"And are you determined to sacrifice me to Mr. Kingston's whim?"
+
+She did not speak, and he repeated his query in a more imperious
+fashion.
+
+"Are you really going to throw me over altogether, Miss Fetherstonhaugh?
+I only want to know."
+
+She looked up at him piteously, and he softened at once.
+
+"Tell me what I am to do," he said, in a low voice. "_Do_ you wish me
+not to ask you for any dances? It is a horrible thing--it is enough to
+make me wish I had gone to Queensland on Monday, after all--but I will
+not bother you. Tell me, am I not to ask you at all?"
+
+"If you please," she whispered with a quick sigh, full of despairing
+resignation. "I am very sorry, but it is right to do what Mr. Kingston
+wishes."
+
+"That is not my view in this case. However, it is right for _me_ to do
+what _you_ wish. And I will, though it is very hard."
+
+Here Rachel, feeling all her body like one great beating heart, moved
+away to the door, driven by a stern sense of social duty.
+
+Her companion did not follow her, and she paused on the threshold,
+turned round, and then suddenly hurried back to him.
+
+"Mr. Dalrymple," she said, putting out her hand with an impulsive
+gesture, "do not wish you had gone to Queensland instead of coming here
+to-night. If you do I shall be _miserable_!"
+
+He seized her hand immediately, and stooping his tall head at the same
+moment, brushed it with his moustache. Then, looking up into her scared
+face, he said--like a man binding himself by some terrible oath:
+
+"_That_ I never will."
+
+Once before in that room they had touched the point where not only mere
+acquaintance but warmest friendship ends. Then it had been to her a new,
+incomprehensible experience; now she could not help seeing the reason
+and the meaning of it, though, perhaps, not so clearly as he.
+
+In a moment she had drawn her hand away, and like a bird frightened from
+its nest, had vanished out of his sight, leaving him--thoroughly aroused
+from his normal impassiveness--gazing at the empty doorway behind her.
+
+When they met again, ten minutes afterwards, it was in the drawing-room,
+which was crowded with people; and through all the crush and noise, she
+was as acutely conscious of his presence as if he alone had been there.
+
+She moved about with tremulous restlessness and downcast eyes; afraid to
+look at him--afraid he should look at her; paying her little civilities
+mechanically, and conducting herself generally, to her aunt's extreme
+annoyance, more like a bashful schoolgirl and a poor relation than
+ever.
+
+Mr. Kingston, doing his best to fascinate Miss Hale, who stood beside
+him, giggling and simpering and twiddling her watch-chain, looked
+anxiously at his little sweetheart when she entered, thought he saw
+signs of his own handiwork in her disturbed and downcast face, called
+her to him, and until the great tea-dinner was over, and they all had to
+disperse to dress, compassed her with devout attentions, intended to
+assure her of his royal forgiveness and favour.
+
+But he did not remove the prohibition, which made her more and more
+resentful as she continued to think about it, and less and less
+responsive to his ostentatious "kindness;" and he treated Mr.
+Dalrymple--when he condescended to acknowledge his presence at
+all--with a supercilious rudeness that Mr. Thornley, in conjugal
+confidence, declared to be "very bad form," and that prompted the gentle
+Lucilla to be "nicer" to the younger man than Rachel had ever seen her.
+He was so open in his hostility that it was generally noticed and talked
+of (and the cause of it more or less correctly surmised).
+
+The only person who seemed absolutely indifferent to it and to him was
+Mr. Dalrymple himself; and in his secret heart he was much more glad
+than angry to have earned such pronounced dislike from such a quarter,
+though as impatient of what he called "impudence" as anybody.
+
+That Adelonga ball was a memorable event to most of the people that it
+gathered together--as what ball is not? Mr. Thornley celebrated the
+coming of age of his son and heir, to begin with. Mrs. Thornley appeared
+for the first time, "officially," after the birth of her baby, who was
+the hero of all occasions to _her_, and inaugurated a great "county"
+reputation as a charming hostess and woman.
+
+Mrs. Hardy got her best point lace irretrievably ruined by catching it
+on an unprotected corner of the wire-netting upon which Rachel had
+worked her decorations; and she also saw the lamentable frustration of
+several wise plans that she had made.
+
+Two young people became engaged; others, male and female, fell in love,
+or began those pleasant flirtations which led to love eventually.
+
+Miss Hale on the other hand, quarrelled with Mr. Lessel, who took upon
+himself to object to her extravagant appreciation of Mr. Kingston's
+rather extravagant attentions; and their engagement was broken off.
+
+Mr. Lessel at the same time captivated the fancy of a charming young
+lady, only daughter of the Adelonga family doctor, resident in the
+township close by, who was destined in less than twelve months to be his
+wife.
+
+Mr. Kingston, surfeited with balls, had a deeper interest in this one
+than in any of the hundreds that he had attended in the course of a long
+and gay career.
+
+Never before had he admired a pretty woman with such ferocious sincerity
+as he admired his little Rachel to-night; never before had he used such
+rude tactics to make the object of his affections jealous--thereby to
+subdue rebellion in her; never before had he been so defied and
+circumvented by a being in female shape as he was to-night by this
+presumptive little nobody, whom he had singled out for honour, and who
+was bound to honour him, and his lightest wish.
+
+As for Mr. Dalrymple and Rachel--they must be classed together in this
+catalogue of special experiences, for they shared theirs between
+them--the Adelonga ball marked a new and very memorable departure in the
+history of their lives. For half the evening they danced decorously
+apart.
+
+Mr. Dalrymple justified Mrs. Thornley's expectations, of course, and
+distinguished himself above all the dancing men assembled; Rachel, who
+had had but little teaching, was a dancer by nature and instinct, as
+light and effortless, as airy and graceful as a bit of wind-blown
+thistle-down.
+
+She loved it, as she loved all pleasant and poetic things; and though
+she could not have the partner she wanted, and had to take whom she
+could get, she felt to-night, and more and more as the evening wore
+away, that she had never heard and felt, in the strains of mere
+senseless instruments and in the thrill of responsive pulses, music of
+mundane waltzes and galops of such inspired and impassioned beauty.
+
+There was a young artist from Melbourne who played lovely airs on a
+violin to a piano accompaniment, and he seemed literally to play upon
+her, spiritually sensitive as she was to-night to the lightest touch of
+that divine afflatus which makes poetry of certain passages in the most
+prosaic lives.
+
+Now rapturously happy, now tragically miserable, and tremulously
+fluctuating up and down between these two extremes, she was blown about
+like a leaf in autumn wind by the subtle harmonies of that magical
+violin. At least she thought it was the violin. We know better.
+
+At about twelve o'clock she went into the house on an errand for
+Lucilla, and came back by way of the conservatory, as the first bars of
+a Strauss waltz were stealing through the fern-roofed alleys, with
+nameless tender associations in every liquid note.
+
+For a few seconds she paused in the shadowy doorway, a slight, white
+figure against the dim background, with hair like a golden aureola, and
+milk-white neck and arms--a gracious vision of youth and beauty as
+prince could wish to see.
+
+But the Sleeping Princess now was acutely wide awake; the life that ran
+in her quickened pulses was almost more than she could bear. Her eyes
+shone restlessly, her breath fluttered in her throat, her heart ached
+and swelled with some vague, irresistible passion, as the waves of that
+delicious melody flowed over her, like an enchanter's incantation.
+
+A few paces off, within the ball-room, Mr. Dalrymple stood with his
+back to the wall watching her; his dark face was lit and transfigured
+with the same kind of solemn exaltation. She turned her head, and they
+looked at one another, mutually conscious of the supreme moment that had
+unawares arrived.
+
+He held out his hand--she almost sprang to meet him; and then, oblivious
+of betrothals, and promises, and houses, and diamonds, she floated down
+the long room, under the very noses of her aunt and Mr. Kingston, lying
+in a reckless ecstasy of contentment in her true love's arms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+AFTER THE BALL.
+
+
+Whatever might have been Rachel's confusion of mind as to the nature and
+consequences of her escapade, Mr. Dalrymple, from the moment that he
+took her in his arms, understood the situation perfectly. It was
+sufficiently serious to a man in his position, who, whatever his faults,
+was the soul of honour; but it was never his way to dally with
+difficulties, and he left himself in no sort of suspense or uncertainty
+as to how he would deal with this one.
+
+Whether right or wrong, whether wise or foolish, in any sudden crisis
+requiring sudden choice of action, he obeyed his natural impulse,
+subject to his own rough code of duty only, without an instant's
+hesitation, and followed it up with unswerving determination, totally
+unembarrassed by any anxiety as to where it might lead or what it might
+cost him, or as to any ultimate consequences that might ensue.
+
+In nine cases out of ten a man of honour, placed as he was now, would
+have regretted an unconsidered act of folly, and have cast about for
+means of extricating himself and the girl who was behaving badly to her
+affianced husband from the position into which it had led them--even,
+perhaps, to the extent of using
+
+         "Some rough discourtesy
+     To blunt or break her passion."
+
+But he was the one man in ten who, equally a man of honour, felt himself
+under no obligation to do anything of the kind. If she loved him--and
+now he knew she did; if he loved her, or was able to love her--and he
+allowed himself no doubt upon that point from this moment of her
+self-revelation, though he had not _meant_ to permit anybody (least of
+all a mere child like this) to supplant the dead woman on whom the
+passion of his best years had been spent--then the thing was settled.
+They might waltz together till daylight, and no one would have any
+right to interfere.
+
+The social complications that surrounded them, and which a conventional
+gentleman would have considered of the last importance, were to him mere
+matters of detail. They must manage to get out of them as best they
+could.
+
+So he carried her round and round the room, the most perfect partner he
+had ever danced with, who moved so sympathetically with all his
+movements that she might have been his shadow--but for the electric
+current of strong life that her hand in his, and her light weight on his
+shoulder, and the subtle sense of her emotion, sent thrilling through
+his veins; and in the teeming silence his brain was busy making rapid
+plans and calculations for effectively dealing with the many
+difficulties that would come crowding upon both of them as soon as this
+waltz was over.
+
+Clearly, the first thing to do was to dispose of ambiguities between
+themselves.
+
+"Come into the conservatory," he said, in a quick under tone, when five
+silent, delicious minutes had passed; "I want to say something to you
+before these people begin to spread all over the place again."
+
+But even as he spoke, as if a spell had been broken, the light and
+rapture died suddenly out of her face, her limbs relaxed, her airy
+footsteps faltered, she seemed to melt away in his arms.
+
+"Oh," she whispered, looking up at him with tragic eyes, full of fear
+and despair, "how wicked I have been! What _will_ he say to me?"
+
+"Never mind _him_," replied Mr. Dalrymple; "you must not let him have
+any right to dictate to you any more--you must break off your engagement
+at once, and get out of his hands. Wicked!--the only wicked thing would
+be to deceive him any longer. You _know_ you don't love him. Come into
+the conservatory, and let us talk about it. _Do_ come--there is nobody
+there now!"
+
+But Rachel, being a woman, and a coward, and only eighteen years old,
+would not come. She knew what she wanted, but she dared not do it--she
+dared not even think of it.
+
+"I must not--I must not!" she protested, in a childish panic of terror.
+"Let me go, Mr. Dalrymple, _please_--I have done very wrong--I am afraid
+to stay----"
+
+And slipping out of his arms, which did the utmost that courtesy
+permitted to hold her, she fled through a doorway near and disappeared;
+and thus threw away an opportunity the loss of which was to cost them
+both long days and nights of suspense and suffering--as she foresaw with
+agonies of regret, even while she did it.
+
+Mr. Dalrymple danced and talked, and sauntered about, proud and cool as
+usual to the superficial observer, but raging with impatience in his
+heart, and watched for her return; but he saw her no more until supper
+time, when she was led into the dining-room, looking very pale and
+quiet, on Mr. Kingston's arm.
+
+The whole night passed, and he never had a chance to get near her again;
+though as may be supposed, it was from no lack of effort on his part;
+and he went to the laundry at last, hours after she had gone to bed, to
+change his clothes preparatory to taking a morning walk up the hills,
+without even having had the satisfaction of one look from her eyes,
+which, however timid and terrified, he felt sure would have told him the
+truth.
+
+She did not come into the drawing-room before breakfast; and at that
+irregularly conducted meal she sat again by Mr. Kingston's side, the
+whole table's length from him. But glancing round her as she took her
+seat, she met his fixed gaze, and bowed with a subtle, wistful
+impressiveness that reassured him completely as to the state of her mind
+towards him, let her outward actions be what they might.
+
+It was very tantalising; all his habitual calmness was upset; his very
+hand trembled as he took his coffee from Lucilla, and once when his
+gentle hostess spoke to him, he did not hear her.
+
+The fret of this state of things, it is needless to say, chafed his
+incipient passion into flame; and the flame was kept up thereafter, at a
+more or less fierce heat and brightness, by the winds of adversity that
+ought to--and in nine cases out of ten would--have put it out.
+
+After breakfast the company began to disperse in a desultory manner by
+installments. Some of the guests lingered until the afternoon; some until
+the next day.
+
+The Digbys were the first to leave--partly because they had so far to
+go, partly because Mrs. Digby was anxious about her children--and of
+course Mr. Dalrymple had to go with them.
+
+He hunted in vain for Rachel when the breakfast party broke up. She
+_knew_ he was hunting for her, and she longed to go to him, and
+therefore as a matter of course, she hid herself.
+
+Only at the last moment, as he was about to ride gloomily away, she
+appeared on the threshold of one of the inferior front doors, pale and
+shrinking, but desperate with vague despair--thinking to solace herself
+with one more glimpse of him when he would not know she was looking. But
+he saw her in a moment, flung himself from Lucifer's back, and caught
+her before she could steal away again.
+
+It was not the sort of farewell he had hoped for--several of the ladies
+came straggling about them before they could exchange half a dozen
+words--but it was infinitely better than none.
+
+"Are you going to Queensland?" Rachel asked, in a tone which said
+plainly--"Are you going away from me?"
+
+"I must go," he replied; "but I shall not stay--I shall come back as
+quickly as possible. And you--what will you do?"
+
+She flushed scarlet and dropped her eyes, and her lips began to quiver.
+The rustle of Mrs. Hardy's majestic skirts was heard approaching. It was
+too late for confidences.
+
+"I hope, when I come back, I shall find you free," he whispered
+hurriedly, emphasising the significance of the words with the crushing
+clasp of his hand over hers and the eager desire in his eyes; and then
+he took off his cap, included all the ladies in one last silent adieu,
+remounted his horse, and departed.
+
+As he rode through the bush this lovely spring morning, near enough to
+the waggonette to open the gates for it, but far enough away to indulge
+in his meditations undisturbed, he pondered many things; and
+particularly he wondered, with a devouring anxiety, what Rachel had been
+doing and thinking of since she left him so abruptly at midnight, after
+practically giving herself to him.
+
+If he could have known it is doubtful if he would have felt so certain
+of her as he was, though nothing would have deterred him now from making
+the best fight in his power for the possession of her.
+
+When, in terror of the consequences of what she had done, she broke away
+from him and escaped out of the ball-room, she rushed to her own room,
+forgetting until she dashed into the middle of an untidy litter of open
+boxes and portmanteaus which Miss Hale had left on the floor, that it
+was not hers to-night; and then she turned and sped down one of the
+innumerable passages into the quiet starlight outside, and sought refuge
+in that lonely arbour at the bottom of the garden, which already, not
+many hours before, had given sanctuary to these new emotions.
+
+That she courted bronchitis and consumption, exposing her bare warm arms
+and bosom to the chill of a frosty night, was a trivial circumstance
+quite unworthy of consideration.
+
+In this arbour she abandoned herself to the full luxury of that passion
+which was neither joy nor grief, and yet had the pain and ecstasy of
+both in the sharpest degree.
+
+She knelt on the damp floor, and leaned her arms on the dusty bench,
+regardless of panic-stricken ants and enterprising black beetles, and
+she shook from head to foot with sobs.
+
+"Oh my love!" she murmured to herself. "Oh, my love!"
+
+And then presently lifting herself up and appealing to the star-worlds
+far away, and the immutable universe in general:
+
+"Oh, what shall I do? Oh, what can I do?"
+
+By and bye she sat down on the bench, clasped her hands on her knees,
+and tried her best to compose herself.
+
+The keen air made her shiver, and perhaps it did something to cool her
+agitation and brace her nerves as well.
+
+Slowly she gathered her wits together, made tremulous efforts to school
+herself to be womanly and courageous, and at last crept back to the
+lighted and crowded house, hugging a brave but terrible resolution.
+
+She went to the nearest fire to warm herself. It was in a little room
+adjoining the dining-room, where the last preparations for supper were
+going on.
+
+As she knelt on the hearthrug, extending her white arms to the blaze,
+Mr. Kingston came behind her and laid his hands on her shoulders, so
+silently and unexpectedly that she gave a little startled cry.
+
+"Did I frighten you, my pet?" said he, gaily; "I beg your pardon. I
+couldn't think where you were gone to. I am afraid you are tired. You
+have been waltzing too much. That fellow Dalrymple does go round at a
+killing pace with his long legs. Poor Miss Hale couldn't stand him at
+all--she nearly fainted. Ah, naughty child! Didn't I tell you not to
+dance with him? And you never paid the least heed! If this is how you
+defy me now, what am I to expect after we are married, eh?"
+
+She looked up in his face with guilty, bewildered eyes. He was not by
+any means so cool as he assumed to be, but it was evident that he
+intended to ignore her offence, and was not going to scold her.
+
+_He_ was not young and rash, if she was; and the few minutes he had
+taken for reflection, during her absence in the garden, had shown him
+where the path of wisdom lay. Her first sensation was one of extreme
+relief; and then she became slowly conscious of a vague sinking at her
+heart.
+
+Once more she sighed to herself--feeling discouraged and overpowered,
+and unequal to the formidable vastness of her resolution--"Oh, what
+shall I do?"
+
+It would have been much better--much easier--if he had scolded her.
+
+Before the revels of the night were quite over, Mrs. Hardy sent her to
+bed, noticing that she was looking unusually quiet and pale. She was
+very glad to go, and made haste to hide herself in the little impromptu
+nest that had been prepared for her on a couch in her aunt's room,
+before that lady should require the use of her apartment.
+
+She was wide awake, however, when Mrs. Hardy joined her, and too
+restless to disguise it; and the elder woman, who knew nothing of the
+girl's entanglements with her two lovers--who had, indeed, congratulated
+herself on the prudent abstinence which had been unexpectedly practised
+with reference to "that objectionable young man" who was such a
+dangerously delightful dancer--gossiped and grumbled over the little
+events of the evening, chiefly of the accident to her lace and the
+absurdities of Miss Hale and Mr. Lessel, who were publicly known to have
+had a serious misunderstanding, unaware of her listener's
+pre-occupation, until the candles were finally extinguished.
+
+About an hour later, as she was anxiously cogitating what steps she
+should take towards the repairing of her own mishap, Mrs. Hardy thought
+she heard a suspicious sound in the silence of the room.
+
+"Rachel," she called, softly; "is that you, child?"
+
+No answer. Only a rustle of drapery, indicating that Rachel had turned
+over in her bed. She listened a few minutes, and the suspicious sound
+was repeated. Raising herself on her elbow, she called more loudly.
+
+"You are not _crying_, Rachel, are you?"
+
+The girl flung herself out of bed, ran across the room, a little white
+ghost in the faint dawn, and threw her arms round her aunt's neck. She
+had no mother, poor little thing, to tell her troubles to; and she
+wanted a mother now.
+
+"Oh, dear Aunt Elizabeth," she sobbed passionately, "do help me--I am so
+miserable! I don't want to marry Mr. Kingston! I don't love him--I have
+made a mistake! I didn't think enough about it, and now I know we should
+never suit each other. Won't you tell him I was too young, and that I
+made a mistake? Won't you--oh, please do!--help me to break it off?"
+
+On what a mere chance does destiny depend.
+
+If Mrs. Hardy's evening had been triumphant and prosperous--if she had
+not torn her best lace, and torn it in consequence of Rachel's
+carelessness--she would probably have received the girl's touching
+confidence as a tender mother should. As it was, she felt that after all
+her fatigues and worries, this was really too much.
+
+"What nonsense are you talking, child?" she exclaimed angrily. "Is it
+any fault of Mr. Kingston's if Miss Hale behaves like an idiot? She is
+nothing but a vulgar flirt, and he knows it as well as you do--only it
+is his way to be attentive to all women."
+
+"Miss Hale!" repeated Rachel vaguely; "I'm not thinking of Miss Hale. I
+am not blaming anybody--only myself. I was very wrong to accept Mr.
+Kingston at the first--oh, aunt, you _know_ we are not suited to each
+other! He ought to marry somebody older and grander, and I--I thought I
+should like to be rich, and to live in that house--and I thought I
+should come to love him in time; but now I know it was all a mistake.
+Do--do let me break it off before it goes any further! Let me stay with
+you--I shall be _quite_ happy to stay with you and Uncle Hardy, if
+you'll only let me!"
+
+"You are dreaming," replied her aunt, giving her a slight shake in the
+extremity of her dismay and mortification; "you talk like a baby. Do you
+think a man is to be taken up one day and thrown away the next? And it
+is worse than that to jilt a man--and Mr. Kingston of all people--after
+being engaged to him for months, as you have been, and after leading him
+into all sorts of preparations and expense. The bare idea is monstrous!
+And all for nothing at all, but some ridiculous sudden fancy! You may
+have seen things of that sort done amongst the people you have been
+brought up with, but no _lady_ would think of disgracing herself and her
+family by such conduct."
+
+"Oh, aunt!" moaned Rachel piteously, as if she had had an unexpected
+blow.
+
+"I don't like to speak harshly to you, my dear," Mrs. Hardy proceeded,
+in a rather more gentle, but still irritated tone. "Only you _must_ not
+vex me with such absurd and childish notions. I know it is only a
+passing whim--you are over-tired, and you are hurt because Mr. Kingston
+paid Miss Hale so much attention, though it is only what he does to all
+women, without meaning anything whatever; but still it is a serious and
+horrible thing--breaking an engagement, a really happy engagement, as
+yours is--jilting a kind, good man, after giving him every
+encouragement--even to _think_ of! Don't let me hear you mention it
+again, unless you want to break my heart altogether. And after all I
+have done for you--I don't want to boast, but I _have_ been a good aunt
+to you, Rachel, and you would have been in a poor place but for me--the
+least you can do is to respect my wishes, especially as you know I wish
+nothing but what is for your real good and welfare."
+
+Rachel wandered back to her bed, laid her head gently on the pillow, and
+closed her eyes. Mrs. Hardy in the dead silence that presently ensued,
+was relieved to think that she had "settled off" at last; but it was not
+sleep that kept her so quiet--it was the calmness of defeat and despair.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+RACHEL'S FIRST VISIT IN MELBOURNE.
+
+
+In the last week of August, when the place was looking its
+loveliest--the rustic gables of the pretty house all hung with wistaria,
+and the shrubberies full of fragrant bushes of purple and white
+lilac--Mrs. Hardy, Mr. Kingston, and Rachel took their departure from
+Adelonga. It was to one of them a truly heart-breaking business.
+
+Rachel stood on the verandah while the horses were being put to,
+clasping Lucilla and the baby alternately to her heart, and wept without
+restraint, until her eyes were swollen, and her delicate colour resolved
+into unbecoming red patches, and there was scarcely a trace of her
+beauty and brightness left.
+
+No one but herself was at all able to realise what this moment cost her.
+She was not only leaving a place where she had spent the happiest period
+of her youth; not only parting from friends with whom she had
+established the most tender and sympathetic relations; she was closing a
+chapter, or rather a brief passage, which was the one inspired poem of
+her life; and she was saying good-bye to Hope.
+
+As long as she was at Adelonga, there was the chance that Mr. Dalrymple
+might come back--at any rate, notwithstanding the Queensland
+arrangements, there was a constant impression that he was near. And as
+long as she was at Adelonga she had felt bold to strive, by various
+feeble and ineffectual devices, to extricate herself from her
+engagement.
+
+Now she was going where it seemed to her her lover would never be
+allowed to reach her, and where in a hard world of money and fashion,
+and under the terrible dominion of "the house," she would be a helpless
+victim in the hands of Fate.
+
+"Good-bye, darling Lucilla!" she sobbed; "thank you so much--I have been
+so happy here--I am so sorry to go away!"
+
+The gentle woman was inexpressibly touched, and of course cried for
+company. Mrs. Hardy had her own maternal reluctance to face an
+indefinite term of separation from her daughter. And altogether Mr.
+Kingston was not without justification for his unusually irritable frame
+of mind.
+
+He did not like to see women crying; he was particularly annoyed that
+Rachel should exercise so little command over herself, and that she
+should have red eyes and a swollen nose; and he was uneasy about the
+untoward episode which had been the first hitch in the smooth current of
+his engagement, and wondered whether it could be possible that a
+lingering fancy for that Dalrymple fellow was making her so unwilling to
+return to her Melbourne life.
+
+Moreover, he hated country travelling--long drives over rough bush
+roads, and bivouacs at country inns, where the food was badly cooked and
+the wine detestable; and he was suspicious about the behaviour of the
+Adelonga horses, whose little traits of character came out rather
+strongly in the invigorating air of spring; and he had a nasty touch of
+gout.
+
+However, the day was fine, and the drive was lovely. As she was carried
+along, with the soft air blowing in her face, full of the delicious
+fragrance of golden wattle, Rachel ceased to cry--becoming calm, and
+pensive, and pretty again--and took to meditation; wondering, for the
+most part, what Queensland was like, and how it was she could ever have
+thought Melbourne, as a place of residence, preferable to the bush.
+
+They passed a charming little farmhouse, more picturesque in the simple
+elegance of its slab walls and brown bark roof than any Toorak villa of
+them all, set in its little patch of garden, with fields of young green
+corn and potatoes, neatly fenced in, behind it. It had its little rustic
+outbuildings, its bright red cart in the shed, its tidy strawyard, its
+cows and pigs and poultry feeding in the bush close by.
+
+The farmer was working in his garden; the farmer's wife, on her knees
+beside him, was weeding and trimming the borders of thyme that ringed
+the little flower beds. They both paused to gaze at the imposing
+equipage crashing along with its four strong horses, and at the ladies
+and gentlemen perched so high above them; and Rachel, looking down from
+her box-seat, thought she had never seen such a picture of rural and
+domestic peace. She had suddenly ceased to regard material wealth and
+splendour as in any way essential to happiness.
+
+To live in some such home as this (provided one had enough to live on
+and to pay one's way), working with one's own hands for the man one
+loved--that seemed to her at this moment the ideal lot in life.
+
+Having started from Adelonga an hour before noon, the horses were taken
+out at two o'clock to be fed and watered, and the little party camped
+beside a shady water-hole for lunch.
+
+Lucilla had put up a bounteous basket of good things, and all the
+materials for afternoon tea; and the fun of arranging the grassy table
+first, and of making a fire and boiling the kettle afterwards--not to
+speak of the very satisfactory meal that intervened--had its natural
+effect upon our impressionable heroine of eighteen.
+
+Her _fiance_, much revived by a tumbler of dry champagne, carefully
+cooled in the water-hole, was also in improved spirits and temper, and
+he set himself to be very kind to his little sweetheart, and forgave her
+all her misdeeds.
+
+Between three and four, having had their tea, the horses were put to,
+and they started on their way again; and just at nightfall they arrived
+at the railway, and at the inn where they were to spend the night.
+
+Here they found dinner awaiting them, of which Rachel partook in sleepy
+silence; and she went to bed soon afterwards, and slept too soundly even
+to dream of trouble.
+
+In the morning they parted from Mr. Thornley, and started by the first
+train to town; at noon they lunched in a railway refreshment-room; and
+in the middle of the afternoon they found themselves once more in
+Toorak, being helped out of the family brougham by good-natured Ned, and
+welcomed into the green satin drawing-room by his bright-faced wife.
+
+"And so you are back again at last!" exclaimed Beatrice gaily, as she
+took her young cousin into her arms. "And how are you, dear child? Why
+you look quite pale. Take off your hat and sit down at once, and have
+some tea. Mr. Kingston, I don't think this country air that they talked
+so much about has done anything very wonderful after all. Rachel is not
+looking so well as she was when she left."
+
+Rachel blushed a lovely rose-colour immediately, of course, and Mr.
+Kingston looked up at her with vague anxiety.
+
+"I don't think she is, myself," he said; "I noticed it as soon as I got
+up there. But she will be all right now she is home again."
+
+"I am only tired," murmured Rachel.
+
+"A girl like you has no business to be tired," retorted the little
+woman brusquely.
+
+It did not escape her sharp eyes that something was the matter, and she
+determined to take the earliest opportunity to find out what it was.
+
+"I do hope to goodness," she said to herself, "that it is not her
+engagement that she is tired of--and everything going on so nicely!"
+
+And then she took off Rachel's sealskin cap and jacket, settled her by
+the fireside, furnished her with a cup of fragrant tea and some thin
+bread and butter, and left her to herself while she attended to her
+mother's wants.
+
+Beatrice and her tea had a generally cheering and invigorating effect.
+
+Mr. Kingston, making himself comfortable in a very easy chair, grew
+talkative and witty upon the news of the day and the latest items of
+fashionable gossip; in the society of this charming little woman of the
+world--_his_ world--the satisfaction of being in town again began to
+creep over him pleasantly.
+
+He stayed for half an hour--outstaying Ned, who retired modestly at the
+end of twenty minutes; then he led Rachel into the hall, kissed her,
+told her to go to bed early and come out with him for a ride in the
+morning, and went off to his club--sorry to leave his little lady-love,
+but glad to be able to get his letters, to hear what was going on in
+Melbourne, and to read his "Argus" on the day of publication again.
+
+After his departure Mrs. Hardy and Beatrice plunged fathoms deep in
+talk. Mrs. Hardy wanted to know how her husband and her servants, and
+her neighbours and her friends, had been conducting themselves during
+her absence, and Beatrice wanted minute particulars about Lucilla and
+the baby.
+
+Rachel had no occasion to feel herself _de trop_; at the same time she
+saw she was not wanted. She sauntered softly round the room, laid some
+music scattered about over the piano in a neat pile, re-arranged some
+yellow pansies that were tumbling out of a green Vallauris bowl, and
+then stole noiselessly into the hall and out of the house.
+
+The grounds of the Hardy domain were more beautiful with flowers now
+than she had ever seen them; but she did not stay amongst the flowers.
+She went down little lonely paths, intersecting vegetable beds and
+forcing-frames, to a gate at the bottom of the kitchen-garden, where she
+was within speaking distance of the workmen engaged on the new house,
+with nothing to impede a full view of their operations.
+
+She was feverishly anxious to know how they were going on--whether they
+were still "pottering at the foundations," or whether the stage of walls
+had set in.
+
+The working day was not yet over, and the well-known chinking and
+clinking of the stonemason's implements smote her ear. She thought,
+when she began to count them, that there were a great many more men than
+there used to be, and she wondered why this was.
+
+The young man who was sent out by the architects to supervise the
+builders, and whose acquaintance she had made with Mr. Kingston, was
+walking about the dusty enclosure, and presently recognising her, he
+lifted his hat, and then seeing that she still lingered, came up to the
+gate to speak to her.
+
+"How are you getting on, Mr. Moore?" she asked pleasantly. "Are you
+still doing the foundations?"
+
+Mr. Moore assured her that they had completed the foundations, and that
+they were getting on splendidly.
+
+"Won't you come out and have a look at what has been done?" he inquired.
+
+She thanked him and said she would; and he opened the gate with
+alacrity, and escorted her through a labyrinth of bricks and stones,
+over ground strewn thickly with sharp-edged chips that cut holes in her
+boots, very well pleased to be the first to show her the progress that
+had been made in her absence.
+
+She could see for herself that a great deal had been done. The trenches
+were filled up; great square blocks of stone ridged the outlines of the
+ground-floor rooms--little bits of rooms they looked, and not at all
+like the stately and spacious apartments of the architect's design; but
+it seemed to her that what had been done could not be a tenth or
+twentieth part of all that there was to do.
+
+"I suppose," she said, "it takes a long time to build the walls and make
+such a quantity of windows?"
+
+"Oh, dear, no," responded Mr. Moore cheerfully. "All the worst of the
+work is over now, as far as the shell is concerned; the walls will run
+up in no time. It is a big house, but there are plenty of men on it, and
+all materials ready. It is after the shell is done that the real tedious
+work commences."
+
+"You mean after the roof is on?"
+
+"Yes. The interior decorations are the chief thing about this house.
+The outside is not much."
+
+"When do you expect the shell will be finished?" asked Rachel, in fear
+and trembling.
+
+"Some time in the course of the summer--within the next two or three
+months probably."
+
+"And the roof on?"
+
+"Oh, yes; of course the roof on," he replied.
+
+There was a pause; and then she said in a very small, thin voice:
+
+"Thank you, Mr. Moore. I think I must go back now."
+
+He escorted her back to the garden gate, lifted his hat, and bade her
+good evening; and it struck him suddenly--with far more force than it
+had struck Beatrice--that she was looking extremely unwell, and not at
+all like the bright and blooming creature that she was when she went
+away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+IN MRS. HARDY'S STORE-ROOM.
+
+
+Rachel was very young, no doubt, but she was growing rapidly. To all
+intents and purposes she was at least five years older when she came
+home from Adelonga than she was when she went there; and the process of
+development by no means ceased or slackened at that point.
+
+The blossoming of her womanhood had come suddenly, like the blossoming
+of the almond trees, in one warm burst of spring; but the inner heart,
+that budded in secret, continued to swell and ripen, in spite
+of--perhaps because of--the absence of sunshine in her spiritual life.
+
+The physical change in her was noticeable to everybody. Her constitution
+was much too sound to be easily injured by mental wear and tear; but her
+health was necessarily affected in a greater or less degree,
+temporarily, for the better or for the worse, by the more powerful of
+those mental emotions to which her body was peculiarly sensitive and
+responsive at all times.
+
+So she lost some of her delicate pinky colour, and her large eyes grew
+heavy and dreamy, and she looked generally faded and altered, in the
+dulness of these empty days. She had no more enthusiasm for Toorak life
+and Melbourne dissipations. She went into no raptures over jewels and
+dresses, or any pretty things; she had none of the old zest for operas
+and balls.
+
+She was quiet, and silent, and preoccupied, moving about the house with
+a strange new dignity of manner (resulting from the total absence of
+self-consciousness), a sort of weary tolerance, as if she had lived in
+it all her life, and was tired of it.
+
+After watching her for a few days, secretly, and in much perplexed
+anxiety, Mrs. Reade made up her mind that something was seriously wrong,
+and that it was time for her to interfere to set it right. She went to
+her mother in the first place for information.
+
+It was eleven o'clock in the morning, and Mrs. Hardy was in her
+store-room, counting out the day's allowance of eggs to an aggrieved and
+majestic cook.
+
+The little woman stood by silently, watching the transaction with a
+smile in her brilliant eyes, thinking to herself what a great mistake it
+was, if poor mamma could but see it, to insist on an inflexible morality
+and economy in these petty matters; and when it was completed, after a
+little acrimonious discussion, she quietly shut the door, and addressed
+herself to her own business in her customary straightforward way.
+
+"I want to know what is the matter with Rachel," she began, spreading
+her handkerchief on a keg of vinegar, and sitting down on it
+deliberately.
+
+Mrs. Hardy mechanically sought repose in the one chair of the apartment,
+which stood in front of the little table where she was in the habit of
+making out her accounts.
+
+"I'm sure that is more than I can tell you, my dear. What an insolent
+woman that is!--if she thinks I am going to let her have the run of my
+stores, as Mrs. Robinson did, she is very much mistaken."
+
+"Something is wrong with Rachel," proceeded Mrs. Reade calmly; "and I
+want to find out what it is."
+
+Mrs. Hardy made an effort to smooth her ruffled feathers down.
+
+"I think the child must be fretting for Lucilla and the baby, Beatrice.
+She and Lucilla were bosom friends, and she just went wild about the
+baby--it was quite ridiculous to see her with it. And when she left them
+she cried as if she were completely heartbroken; and she has never been
+like herself since. I can't think what else ails her--unless she is out
+of sorts, and wants some medicine. I did give her some chamomilla
+yesterday, but it does not seem to have done her any good."
+
+"No," said Mrs. Reade, with a sudden smile, "I don't think it is a case
+for chamomilla. She is not ill; she is unhappy--anyone can see that.
+_You_ can see it, can't you?"
+
+"I'm sure no girl has less cause to be unhappy," protested Mrs. Hardy
+evasively, in a fretful and anxious tone. "It is very ungrateful of her
+if she is."
+
+"But what can have caused it? She was all right when she went to
+Adelonga. Something must have happened while she was there. She is not
+merely fretting after Lucilla and the baby--oh, no, it is a deeper
+matter than that. I am afraid--I really am seriously afraid, by the look
+of things--that it has something to do with Mr. Kingston." Her mother,
+though silent, was so obtrusively conscious and uneasy that she felt
+assured, the moment that she looked at her, of the correctness of her
+surmise. "Oh, do tell me what has happened!" she continued, eagerly.
+"Something has, I know. It is what I have been dreading all along--with
+these tiresome delays! They ought to have been married out of hand, and
+then there would have been no trouble."
+
+"If there _is_ anything wrong between them," Mrs. Hardy reluctantly
+admitted, "it is--I must say that for Rachel, though she is very trying
+with her silly childishness--it is Mr. Kingston's doings."
+
+"Of course," assented Mrs. Reade, promptly.
+
+"It was on the night of the ball. He rather neglected Rachel--the first
+time I ever knew him to do it--and he flirted in that foolish way of
+his--with Minnie Hale. You know Minnie Hale?--a great, fat, giggling
+creature--quite a common, vulgar sort of girl--not in the least _his_
+sort, one would have imagined. I don't wonder that Rachel was offended;
+I was extremely vexed with him myself, for he did it so
+openly--everybody noticed it. It was so bad, really, that the man that
+horrid girl was engaged to, Mr. Lessel, broke off with her on account of
+it. That will show you. She was a great deal worse than he was, of
+course. But he went great lengths. Perhaps he had been taking too much
+wine," she sighed, plaintively.
+
+"No," said Mrs. Reade. "He has plenty of faults, but _that_ is not one
+of them."
+
+"Rachel was deeply hurt and shocked," Mrs. Hardy proceeded. "Naturally,
+for it was not a thing she had been used to, poor child. She took it
+very much to heart--so much that she wanted, like Mr. Lessel, to break
+off her engagement there and then." Here Mrs. Hardy went into details
+of poor Rachel's unsuccessful struggle for deliverance. "But of course I
+reasoned with the foolish child," she added conclusively; "I talked her
+out of _that_."
+
+Mrs. Reade sat very still, tracing patterns on the floor with the point
+of her parasol.
+
+"And did they have a quarrel?" she asked, vaguely. She was evidently
+thinking of something else.
+
+"No. There was a coolness, of course, but--oh, no, I am sure they did
+not quarrel. He has seemed anxious to make up for it, and she has not
+shown any temper or resentment. But things have been uncomfortable if
+you can understand--very unsatisfactory and uncomfortable--ever since. I
+think she was disappointed in him, and cannot get over it. I have been
+hoping that it was all right, and that she was only unsettled and
+dispirited about leaving Adelonga. But now you mention it--yes, now I
+think of it--I'm afraid she is brooding over that other trouble still.
+Foolish child! she lives in a world of romantic ideals, I suppose."
+
+"_Why_ did Mr. Kingston flirt with Minnie Hale?" asked Mrs. Reade,
+looking up at her mother impressively.
+
+"Oh, my dear, you know him as well as I do."
+
+"You think he was worn out with being good?"
+
+"He _has_ been good, Beatrice--very good--ever since his engagement."
+
+"Yes, he has. But if he had had a mind to misbehave, I don't think his
+duty to Rachel would have stopped him. The fact is, since his engagement
+he has never wanted anyone but her. I have watched him closely, and
+wonderful as it seems, he has never shown the slightest disposition to
+flirt beyond the stage of pretty speeches--not even when she was
+away--not even with Sarah Brownlow."
+
+"It is a great pity," sighed Mrs. Hardy. "I wish they were safely
+married."
+
+"And at the worst of times," the younger lady proceeded thoughtfully,
+regardless of the interjection, "he was fastidious in his choice--he
+liked someone who was either pretty or clever, or decidedly attractive
+in some way. I never knew him take any notice of a girl of _that_ sort
+before."
+
+"There is no accounting for men's tastes, my dear."
+
+"Oh, yes," Mrs. Reade replied promptly; "I know that Minnie Hale is not
+_his_ taste. I know he did not go on with her as you say he did, merely
+for the pleasure of it to himself. I think it must have been to spite
+Rachel."
+
+"Beatrice!"
+
+"Yes, mother--that is what I think. It is the only reasonable motive he
+could have had."
+
+"But why on earth should he wish to spite Rachel?"
+
+"That is what I want you to tell me. You were in the house with
+them--try and think of all that happened just before the ball. I'm
+certain something was wrong between them, to begin with. Perhaps you did
+not notice it at the time, but you might remember little
+circumstances--" Mrs. Reade broke off, and watched her mother's
+disturbed face with bright attentiveness. "_Rachel_ did not flirt with
+anybody, did she?"
+
+"Now, my dear, you know the child is incapable of such a thing."
+
+"Oh, I don't mean deliberately, of course. But she might do it
+accidentally, with those sentimental eyes of hers. And she _is_ so
+charmingly pretty!"
+
+"No, she certainly did not flirt," said Mrs. Hardy; "she has never
+given him any uneasiness on that score, pretty as she is, and never
+will, I am quite sure. But there was a man----"
+
+"Ah!" sighed Mrs. Reade, laying her parasol across her knees, and
+folding her hands resignedly.
+
+"Why do you say 'ah,' Beatrice, before you hear what I am going to tell
+you? There was a man there whom Mr. Kingston disliked very much. He gave
+himself airs, and they somehow came into collision, and Mr. Kingston was
+in rather a bad temper. That was all that went wrong before the ball,
+and Rachel had nothing to do with that."
+
+"Do you think so? I am certain she had," the young lady replied
+deliberately.
+
+"Well, if you think you know better than I do, who was there to see----"
+
+"Go on, dear mamma. Tell me all about him. Who was he? What was he
+like?"
+
+Mrs. Hardy, pocketing her dignity, proceeded to describe Mr. Dalrymple,
+with great amplitude of detail, as he had appeared from her point of
+view.
+
+The result was a kind of superior Newgate villian, of good birth and
+distinguished presence, whom Mrs. Reade regarded with a sinking heart.
+
+"Oh, dear me!" she sighed, blankly, "what a pity! What a grevious pity!"
+
+"I _can't_ see why you should look at it in this way, Beatrice. I tell
+you she had little or nothing to say to him, and she only danced with
+him once the whole evening. I took care to point out to her the kind of
+man he was, and to warn her against him."
+
+"You ought not to have done that."
+
+"My dear, you will allow me to be the best judge of what I ought to do.
+She was very good and obedient, and she acted in every way as I wished
+her."
+
+"But she liked him, didn't she?" asked Mrs. Reade.
+
+"Yes," Mrs. Hardy admitted, with evident reluctance, "I am afraid she
+did like him."
+
+"I am sure she did," said Mrs. Reade, decisively. "And there is more
+than liking in the matter, unless I am much mistaken. I have never been
+in love myself," she remarked frankly, "but I fancy I know the symptoms
+when I see them. I feared from the first that it was something of that
+sort that was the matter with her. At any rate--" putting up her hand to
+stay the imminent protest on her mother's lips--"at any rate, if he has
+not made her love him, he has made her discontented with Mr. Kingston."
+
+"Well, Beatrice," the elder woman exclaimed, with an impatient sigh,
+rising from her chair, "if such a thing should be--if such a misfortune
+should have happened after all my care--we must only do the best we can
+to mend it. Thank goodness he's gone. He is not at all likely to give
+her another thought. If he does--" Mrs. Hardy shut her mouth
+significantly, and her Roman nostrils dilated.
+
+"You can't help his thinking what he likes," said Mrs. Reade, with a
+gleam of mockery in her bright eyes.
+
+"I can help his doing anything further to disturb her. I can see that he
+never meets or speaks to her again."
+
+Mrs. Reade continued to smile, looking at her majestic mother with her
+bird-like head on one side.
+
+"I hope so," she said. "I'm sure I hope so, if you can do it without her
+knowledge. But if you should have to act, whatever you do, don't make
+martyrs of them."
+
+"Don't talk nonsense," retorted Mrs. Hardy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+"HE HAS COME BACK."
+
+
+Mrs. Reade, being satisfied that she had found out Rachel's
+complaint--as indeed she had--put her under treatment without delay.
+
+On the very day of her interview with her mother in the store-room, she
+sought and obtained permission to take the patient home with her for a
+week's visit, in order to try the experiment of change and a new set of
+dissipations, and to make her preliminary investigations undisturbed.
+
+She had a charming house of her own at South Yarra, which she "kept"
+admirably, and where, in an unpretensious manner, she had established a
+little _salon_ that was a fashionable head centre in Melbourne society,
+and well deserved by virtue of its own legitimate merits to be so.
+
+She was not severely orthodox in these matters, like Mrs. Hardy, who
+weighted her entertainments with any number of dull people, if they only
+happened to be in the right set; though she was quite ready to
+acknowledge the propriety of her mother's system in her mother's
+circumstances.
+
+There was no want of refinement in her hospitality, but there was a
+delicate flavour of Bohemianism that, like the garlic rubbed on the
+salad bowl, was the piquant element that made it delightful--to those,
+at any rate, who were sufficiently intelligent to appreciate it.
+
+If men and women were uninteresting, she could have nothing to do with
+them, though they were the very "best people;" that is to say, she
+limited her intercourse to those ceremonial observances which rigid
+etiquette demanded.
+
+If they were clever and cultured, and otherwise respectable and
+well-behaved, and were capable of being fused harmoniously into the
+general brightness of her little circle, she was inclined to condone a
+multitude of sins in the matter of birth and station.
+
+Artists of all sorts, travellers and politicians, distinguished members
+of every profession (so long as their own merits and accomplishments
+distinguished them) were welcome at her house; where they would be sure
+to meet the most interesting women that a judicious woman, superior to
+the petty weakness of her sex, could gather together.
+
+So it was that Mrs. Edward Reade's afternoons and evenings were
+synonymous with all that was intellectually refreshing and socially
+delightful to those who were privileged to enjoy them.
+
+But so it was, also, that Rachel, in consideration of her youth, her
+impressionable nature, and what were supposed to be her democratic
+tendencies, had not been allowed to know much about them hitherto.
+
+"Now, however, the case is different," said Beatrice, authoritatively,
+as she sat in her little pony carriage at the front door, waiting for
+her cousin to come down stairs. "It will do her good to shake up her
+ideas a little, and draw her out of herself. And if she does take an
+undue interest in people of the lower orders"--looking at her mother
+with mocking bright eyes--"it will be so much the better. Perhaps Signor
+Scampadini, with that lovely tenor of his----"
+
+"Oh, no, Beatrice. Mr. Kingston would very much dislike anything of that
+sort."
+
+"Anything of what sort?" laughed Mrs. Reade. "Mr. Kingston can trust
+me, mamma. And we must counteract Mr. Dalrymple somehow."
+
+"Mr. Kingston himself ought to counteract him--if there is any
+counteracting necessary."
+
+"Ah!" sighed Mrs. Reade, shaking her head slightly. She said no more,
+but in her own mind she put that argument aside as useless.
+
+There had been a time, indeed, when she had believed Mr. Kingston
+sufficient for all purposes, on the basis of Rachel's apparently modest
+spiritual needs; but now she knew she had been mistaken.
+
+The girl had grown and changed since then, and the old conditions no
+longer fitted her. The little woman was disappointed, but she was too
+wise to make a fuss about it. Difficulties had come that she ought to
+have foreseen and provided for, but since they had come, they must be
+dealt with. "Ah!" she said, with a sigh and a smile; and that was the
+extent of her lamentation.
+
+So Rachel went away with her to South Yarra, and had a brilliant week of
+it. The weather was warm and lovely, and the soft air full of the
+delicate intoxication of spring time, to which she was peculiarly
+susceptible.
+
+She basked in sunshine as she rattled about Melbourne streets and
+suburbs in Beatrice's little basket-carriage, and as she sat in
+Beatrice's bow-windowed drawing-room, gossiping over afternoon tea.
+
+She had a month's allowance of society dissipation of the most seductive
+description in that week--music, dancing, _tableaux vivants_, dressing,
+shopping, sightseeing, swarms of gay and witty company from noon till
+midnight, every conceivable kind attention from her cousin, and the most
+flattering homage from everybody else--all in an easy and cosy way that
+was very charming and luxurious. It certainly cheered her up a great
+deal.
+
+We _do_ get cheered, against our intention and desire, against our
+belief almost, by these little amenities that appeal to our superficial
+tastes, even when we seem to ourselves to be full of trouble.
+
+It is well for us that we are so susceptible to light impressions, to
+the subtle influences of the daily commonplace, which are like delicate
+touches to a crude picture in their effect upon our lives; if we were
+not, our lives would hardly be worth having sometimes, crippled as they
+are with great sudden griefs and disappointments, and wasted with the
+lingering paralysis of spiritual loss and want.
+
+Mrs. Reade, watching the effect of her prescription day by day, thought
+things were going on very nicely, and took great credit to herself. She
+could plainly perceive that the disturbing element in the family
+arrangements was no trifling ball-room fancy; but she had great faith in
+the girl's youth and gentle character, and in the efficacy of judicious
+treatment, and it seemed to her that her faith had not been misplaced.
+
+At any rate, she justified her reputation as a clever woman by the tact
+she displayed in the management of her self-imposed task. No one could
+have done more, under the circumstances, to further the desired end. She
+did not have Mr. Kingston about her house too much; she thought Rachel
+would appreciate him more if she had time to miss him a little. Nor did
+she force the girl's confidence with respect to Mr. Dalrymple, or even
+invite it in any way--that is to say, not in any way that was apparent
+to _her_.
+
+She took no notice of the obvious indications of her cousin's anxiety to
+extricate herself from her engagement, though secretly they caused her
+acute uneasiness. She was a kind little soul, and though quite content
+with a _mariage de convenance_ herself, did not like to see another
+woman driven into it against her will.
+
+It was for Rachel's good that she should be tided over those temptations
+to squander a substantial future for a romantic present, which were
+peculiarly dangerous to a girl so undisciplined in worldly wisdom as
+she, and it was absolutely necessary to guard her against the
+machinations of profligate spendthrifts; but if she _could_ have fallen
+in with the excellent arrangements that had been made for her, without
+repugnance and suffering, what great cause for thankfulness there would
+have been!
+
+So, although she never wavered in her determination to do what she
+considered her duty, she did it, not only with judgment, but with the
+utmost gentleness and consideration.
+
+She took Rachel to call on certain shabby and faded women who had made
+rash marriages with poor or unsteady men, that she might see the
+consequences of such imprudence in the sordid tastelessness of their
+dress and their household furniture.
+
+She likewise presented to her notice the charming spectacle of a young
+bride of fashion, as she "received" on her return from her honeymoon,
+surrounded by all the refinements of wealth and culture in a
+perfectly-appointed home.
+
+She spoke incidentally, but often, of the habits and customs of fast
+young men, in general and in particular, drawing picturesque
+illustrations from her own experience, which tended to show that they
+invariably made love to every girl they came across, and forgot all
+about her the moment her back was turned. She showed her poetic
+photographs of foreign cities; she taught her the value of old lace and
+china.
+
+And by these and other insidious devices, she really contrived to do
+something towards weakening the impression that Mr. Dalrymple had made,
+and strengthening the antagonistic cause.
+
+But when the week was over, and she took her young charge back to her
+mother, intending to apply for an extension of leave, that she might
+pursue the treatment that had proved so beneficial, alas! all her
+patient work was undone in a moment, like the web of the Lady of
+Shalott, when she left off spinning to look at the irresistible Sir
+Lancelot riding by.
+
+They arrived at the Toorak house rather late in the afternoon, after a
+visit to the Public Library to see the last new picture, and one or two
+entertaining calls; and they were told that Mrs. Hardy was out, but was
+expected in every minute.
+
+Rachel jumped down from the carriage first, and ran lightly up the white
+steps into the hall, with a pleasant greeting to the servant who
+admitted her; and there she stood a few seconds, to look round upon all
+the familiar appointments, as people do when they return home after an
+absence.
+
+And as she looked, her eye fell upon a card on the hall table, which she
+immediately picked up.
+
+"John," she called sharply, wheeling round upon him with a sudden
+fierceness of excitement that Mrs. Reade, a dozen yards off, understood
+to mean disaster of some sort; "John, when did this gentleman call?"
+
+"About half an hour ago, miss."
+
+"Oh, _John_--only half an hour!"
+
+"He said he would call again to-morrow, miss."
+
+Mrs. Reade came softly into the hall, carelessly adjusting her long
+train behind her.
+
+"Who is it, dear?" she asked. But she had already guessed who it was.
+
+Rachel held out the little slip of pasteboard with an unsteady,
+shrinking hand. She could not speak. There was a great light and flush
+of excitement in her face, which yet was as full of fear as joy.
+
+"Roden Dalrymple," murmured Beatrice, reading hesitatingly, as if the
+name were unfamiliar to her. "Is not that one of Lucilla's friends?"
+
+"Yes," said Rachel, drawing a long breath and speaking softly. "He was
+at Adelonga when we were there. He went away to Queensland, but--he has
+come back."
+
+"Evidently he has. What a pity we missed him. He may have brought us
+some news from Adelonga. Oh, dear me, don't you want your tea very
+badly? I do. John go and get us some tea, will you?"
+
+Mrs. Reade did not intend to commit herself to any course of action
+until she had time to think over this new and most embarrassing
+complication, so she dismissed Mr. Dalrymple from the conversation.
+
+Rachel turned the card about in her hands, reading its inscription over
+and over again. She was going to carry it away; but she reluctantly went
+back and laid it where she had found it. Then she followed Beatrice into
+the drawing-room like one in a dream.
+
+The little woman watched her closely from the corner of her bright eyes,
+and she was terribly alarmed. She had had no idea until now what a
+formidable person this Roden Dalrymple was. The girl was in a quiver of
+excitement from head to foot. She wandered restlessly about the room,
+vaguely fiddling at the furniture and ornaments; she could not control
+her agitation.
+
+John brought in the teapot, and Mrs. Reade peeled her gloves from her
+small white hands, and rolling them into a soft ball, tossed them down
+amongst the cups and saucers. She began to pour out the tea in silence,
+wondering what in the world she had better do.
+
+The silence was broken by the sound of carriage wheels crunching up the
+drive. Rachel came to a standstill in the middle of the room, and
+listened with a rigid intensity of expectation that was quite as painful
+to her companion as her more demonstrative emotion had been.
+
+They heard the bustle of Mrs. Hardy's arrival, heard John open the front
+door, heard the sweep of silken draperies in the hall. And then they
+heard a familiar voice, raised several notes above its ordinary pitch.
+
+"John!"
+
+"Yes'm."
+
+"When did this gentleman call?"
+
+"About an hour after you left'm."
+
+"Did you tell him we were all out?"
+
+"Yes'm. And he'll call again to-morrow, he says."
+
+"Oh, indeed--will he! You'll just tell him, _whenever_ he calls, that I
+am not at home, John--that _nobody_ is at home. Do you hear? That
+gentleman is not to be admitted."
+
+"Oh, you stupid woman!" Mrs. Reade sighed to herself, not meaning to be
+disrespectful, but grudging to see delicate work marred by inartistic
+hands.
+
+And then she looked at Rachel, and realised the catastrophe that had
+occurred. All the colour had gone out of the sensitive face, all its
+agitation, all the soft, submissive tenderness that had characterised
+it hitherto. She looked straight before her, with stern eyes full of
+indignant passion, and with her lips set in a hard, thin line.
+
+The meek little child, who had been so easy to manage, was going to
+assert the rights of womanhood, and to take the conduct of her affairs
+into her own hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+"THE LIGHT THAT NEVER WAS ON SEA OR LAND."
+
+
+Mr. Dalrymple was in Melbourne for almost the whole of the time that he
+had intended to spare from his partner and his property in Queensland,
+which was nearly three weeks, and he never once succeeded in
+communicating with Rachel, which was the special mission on which he had
+come down.
+
+He called at the Toorak house again and again, and was always told that
+the ladies were not at home.
+
+There was not much else that he could do at this stage of courtship,
+knowing nothing of Rachel's circumstances in connection with Mr.
+Kingston, and having had no definite assurances of her disposition
+towards himself; but he did this persistently, until he became suddenly
+aware that Mrs. Hardy did not mean to admit him.
+
+Then he wrote a short note to Mr. Gordon, containing certain
+instructions in the way of business, and an intimation that he might
+have to stay in town longer than he had anticipated, and, therefore, was
+not to be calculated upon at present.
+
+Having despatched which, he addressed himself to the matter he had in
+hand, with a quiet determination to carry it through, sooner or later,
+by some means.
+
+It was not his way to plot and scheme clandestinely, but being driven to
+do it, he did it promptly and with vigour.
+
+He wrote a long letter to Rachel, reviewing with delicate significance
+the position in which they had stood to one another on the day of their
+parting at Adelonga, and formally offering himself for her acceptance;
+and he begged her to appoint some time and place where, if she were
+willing, she could give herself and him an opportunity for coming to a
+mutual understanding.
+
+This letter he did not put into the post, being naturally distrustful of
+Mrs. Hardy, but he carried it in his pocket ready for any chance that
+might enable him to deliver it with his own hands--for which chance he
+began to search with diligence in every place of public resort where
+Rachel would be likely to appear.
+
+Rachel, in the meantime, was distracted with suspense and misery. She
+saw all possibilities of a legitimate meeting relentlessly and
+effectually circumvented.
+
+She was kept under such strict surveillance that she did not even see
+her lover's face, except on one occasion, when she was at the opera, and
+when, sitting between her aunt and Mr. Kingston, she was afraid to lift
+her eyes to look at him.
+
+She could do nothing in her own behalf, while she was uncertain of his
+intentions. She felt herself more and more hopelessly in the toils of
+her engagement, as day by day, Mr. Kingston--who yet had mysteriously
+changed somehow--became more and more obtuse to the state of her mind
+towards him, and more and more persistently affectionate and amiable,
+and as day by day, Mrs. Hardy, grown hard and unsympathetic, impressed
+more and more strongly upon her the fact that she was a penniless and
+friendless orphan who owed everything that she had to her.
+
+And all the time she loathed the very sound of Mr. Kingston's voice and
+the very touch of his hand, with an unreasoning passion of repugnance
+that she had never thought it possible she could feel for one who had
+been so kind to her; and as a natural consequence--or cause--she was
+consumed with a sleepless fever of expectation and longing for that
+other lover whom she loved.
+
+But such a state of things could not last, and after all it came to an
+end much sooner than either of them expected.
+
+There came a night when Mr. and Mrs. Hardy had to go to a stately dinner
+party which did not include young girls. A most lovely night it was, in
+perhaps the loveliest month of the year, when there was no need to put
+candles in the carriage lamps, and no need for a fire in the big green
+drawing-room, where between seven and eight o'clock Rachel was left to
+amuse herself, in apparent safety, until bed time. A young moon shone in
+at the open windows before the mellow daylight was gone, as Mrs. Hardy,
+in rustling silk and tinkling jewels, entered to say good-night.
+
+The evening wind went whispering round the house, ruffling a thousand
+tufts of bougainvillea that embossed the outer wall, and breathing into
+the dim room the sweetness of early roses and the fresh fragrance of the
+sea.
+
+To Rachel, ever afterwards, it was the most beautiful night that the
+world had known.
+
+"Now, my dear, John will light the gas for you--two burners will do
+to-night, John--and you can practise your music undisturbed. Don't leave
+the windows open any longer; it will be chilly by and bye. And don't sit
+up late. Good-night."
+
+"Good-night, auntie," responded Rachel.
+
+She proffered the regulation kiss in an absent manner, nodded with a
+smile to her uncle, who was waiting outside, and stood on the threshold
+of a French window to watch the carriage until it passed out of the
+gates and disappeared.
+
+Then instead of going to practise her music, she went out and sat down
+on the top of one of the square pedestals that flanked the steps of the
+terrace upon which the window opened, and clasped her hands about her
+knees.
+
+John left the window open for her, lit the gas and the piano candles,
+returned to find her still sitting in the same place, as if she had not
+stirred, and went away to make his own arrangements for a pleasant
+evening.
+
+Half an hour later she was wandering about the garden, heedless of the
+chill that was creeping on with nightfall, and looking before her with
+eyes so full of dreams that they did not see where she was going
+to--gliding up and down the level terraces like a ghost in the dusky
+twilight, with the silver of the moonshine on her golden hair.
+
+And then, by mere mechanical submission to the force of habit, she found
+herself presently at that back gate which overlooked "the house,"
+leaning her arms upon the upper rail, and staring at the low ridges of
+gleaming wall a few dozen yards off, which were rising as it seemed to
+her, with the rapidity of magic from the foundations that had taken so
+long to do, the stony embodiment of a relentless fate.
+
+It was very quiet there to-night. No swarms of carpenters, and
+bricklayers, and stonemasons; no idle boys gaping at them over the
+fence; no people walking and driving about the road.
+
+She tried the gate, and found it locked; then she climbed lightly over
+it, and holding up her skirts, stole across the strip of arid waste that
+lay between it and the nucleus of the building which was once to have
+been her palace, and now could only be her prison-house, eager to
+discover anything she could that would indicate the real progress that
+was being made.
+
+She threaded her course daintily through heaps of brick and stone and
+broken _debris_; she entered the skeleton house by its gaping porch, and
+she wandered about the labyrinth of its passages and vestibules, feeling
+her way with cautious feet and outstretched hands, until she came to her
+own boudoir; and there she sat down on a joist of the flooring, and
+laid her face on her knees and cried.
+
+The sweetness of the solitary night, quite as much as the sight of all
+those permanently-adjusted ground-floor door and window frames, melted
+her into these sudden tears, full as she was of the aching rapture of
+her love and trouble, which needed but a touch to overflow. The
+possibility of a human spectator of her emotion never for a moment
+occurred to her.
+
+However, Mr. Roden Dalrymple had also taken it into his head to have an
+after-dinner walk in the moonlight, and happening for a very good
+reason, to be prowling about in this neighbourhood, he had seen the
+slender little figure gliding across the open space between the back
+gate and the new building, and he had guessed in a moment whose it was.
+
+And so, as Rachel sat with her feet in subterranean darkness, her hands
+clasping her knees just above the level of the floor that was to be, and
+her face hidden in her lap, she heard a sound, suggestive of midnight
+robbers and murderers, that for a moment paralysed her timid heart; and
+then a voice, calling her softly,
+
+"Miss Fetherstonhaugh! Do not be frightened. It is only I--Roden
+Dalrymple."
+
+He came in through the gap of the doorway, while she stared at him and
+held her breath; he stepped swiftly and lightly from joist to joist
+until he reached the corner where she was sitting.
+
+Then he sat down beside her quietly, as if he were taking a place she
+had been keeping for him; and the next moment--with no question asked
+and no explanation given--they were sealing the most sacred of all
+contracts irrevocably, in the silence of the solemn night.
+
+It was well for Rachel that, with all his faults, Roden Dalrymple was
+not the reprobate he was supposed to be, but a man of stainless honour,
+in whose keeping the welfare of an ignorant and imprudent girl was safe;
+for--from the day when she went into the conservatory with him in the
+first hours of their acquaintance, stranger as he was, and she the most
+modest of girls, simply because he asked her--she had laid herself,
+metaphorically, at his feet--too simple and single in all her aims and
+impulses not to love unreservedly when she began to love at all, too
+strong in her young enthusiasm for her own ideals to be hampered by
+doubts either of herself or him, too thoroughly natural and ingenuous to
+disguise her heart or to bend it to the yoke of conventional law and
+order.
+
+Now she gave herself up at once, turning to meet his outstretched arms,
+lifting her face to his strong and eager kisses with a passionate
+responsiveness and abandonment that, while it infinitely quickened his
+love and gratitude, showed him plainly that all the responsibility of
+her future happiness would rest with him.
+
+"Oh," she said, with a long sighing sob, "I have wanted you so!"
+
+"Have you, indeed?" he replied, tightening his arms about her with a
+gesture that was more significant than speech. "My little love, you
+shall never want me any more, if I can help it."
+
+These were the terms of their "initial marriage ceremony."
+
+And it is just to Mr. Dalrymple to say that he not only never took the
+slightest advantage of the irregularities that she innocently allowed,
+but--at any rate, not until long afterwards--he never even saw them.
+
+That they were candid and truthful in themselves and to one another was
+from the first the essential bond between them, otherwise unlike as they
+were; and to him the absence of the usual maidenly reticence and
+reluctance displayed on these occasions indicated, all circumstances
+considered, rather a finer delicacy of nature than the ordinary, and
+never the faintest suspicion that she held the treasures of love and
+womanhood cheaply, even for his sake.
+
+Feeling no need of further explanation--understanding one another, by
+that subtle sense which defies analysis, that instinctive recognition of
+spiritual kinship which, in its early development, was to them what is
+called "love at first sight," but which had in it the germs of a true
+companionship and comradeship that might defy all the accidents of time
+and chance--they sat for a few blessed silent moments side by side, she
+with her young head leaning trustfully against his worn brown face, not
+wanting to speak, unwilling even to think of all the difficulties that
+lay in ambush around them, ready to break into this ineffable peace with
+the breaking of the silence; looking over a low window-sill before them
+into the quiet night, with grave and happy eyes--at Melbourne, lying in
+a glorified haze of twilight beneath them, and at the silver of the sea
+beyond.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+ELEVEN P.M.
+
+
+"Rachel," said Mr. Dalrymple presently, speaking her name as if he had
+had it in familiar use for years, "I suppose you have broken off with
+_him?_"
+
+Rachel did not reply for a few seconds; he felt her trembling in his
+arms.
+
+"Oh, forgive me," she whispered, turning her face a hair's-breadth
+nearer to his as he stooped to listen.
+
+And then she told him all the story of her engagement, as far as her new
+experiences enabled her to read it, and all the circumstances which had
+combined to keep her still in captivity so long after she should have
+been free.
+
+The simple narrative gave even him, who was rather inclined to make
+molehills of mountains, a sense of the difficulties of the situation,
+that kept him silent for a few minutes in unwonted perplexity of mind.
+
+"How old are you?" he asked abruptly, at last.
+
+"I shall be nineteen in three weeks," she answered.
+
+"You are sure you won't be twenty-one?"
+
+"I'm sure I shan't. Why?"
+
+"Because if you are only nineteen, I cannot carry you off and marry you,
+love, which would have been the simplest way out of it."
+
+"I should not like that way," whispered Rachel. "It would be a wrong
+way."
+
+"Yes, dear--except as a last resource. Of course we would try all the
+other ways first. But we must have our rights, you know. If they won't
+give them, we must take them--we must get them as we can."
+
+"Cannot we be married until I am twenty-one?" she queried timidly.
+
+"Not without your guardian's consent. Is there any chance of my getting
+that, or any kind of toleration even, if I call on him at his office
+to-morrow and use all the eloquence at my command?"
+
+"No. Aunt Elizabeth won't let _him_ have anything to do with it."
+
+"If I call on her, then?"
+
+"Oh, no--not the slightest. In the first place, she won't see you. And
+if she did--oh, no, you must not try--not yet! I think it would make
+everything worse than it is already."
+
+"Then you see the alternative?--a separation for perhaps two whole
+years."
+
+"If I know we are going to be so happy at the end of it----"
+
+"Ah--at the end of it! It will be a fine test for you, Rachel."
+
+"Why for me, any more than for you? Oh, don't talk of tests!" she
+pleaded; "I only want to feel sure I shall never lose you, and I don't
+mind waiting two years. If only----"
+
+"If only what?"
+
+"If only Mr. Kingston would go away!"
+
+"Now listen to me," he said gently, but with his grave peremptoriness,
+"you must not let another day pass without breaking off with him. You
+must _send_ him away, Rachel. I am sorry for him, poor devil, but you
+couldn't do him a worse wrong than let him go on deceiving himself about
+you."
+
+"Oh, do you think I would do that? Of course I will not. I can do it
+_now_--now that you have come. For now I shall feel strong, and now I
+can tell them why. I shall write him a letter before I go to bed, and I
+shall tell Aunt Elizabeth as soon as I have sent it. But what will they
+say to me? It will be dreadful."
+
+"Poor little woman! Can't I take the dreadful part of it for you? _I_
+shan't mind it."
+
+"You can't. I know it will be better for us both if you will not have
+anything to do with it just yet."
+
+"I think I _must_ see your uncle, dear, before I go away again."
+
+"Well--if you think it best. But it will do no good with Aunt Elizabeth.
+He leaves it all to her."
+
+Mr. Dalrymple gazed thoughtfully at the distant horizon, where little
+points of yellow twinkled in the silvery obscurity of the moonshiny bay.
+
+He was deeply troubled and perplexed about this tender little creature,
+and the idea of leaving her to bear the brunt of unknown trials for his
+sake, seemed too preposterous to be taken seriously. And yet what else
+could he do?
+
+"Tell me," he said presently, stroking her silky head as it lay on his
+breast, "tell me what is the worst that can happen to you, Rachel?"
+
+"The worst," sighed Rachel, "will be hearing Aunt Elizabeth tell me that
+I have repaid all her generosity and kindness to me with ingratitude and
+treachery."
+
+"That will be very bad. But you will have to try and make her understand
+the real right and justice of it, love. She must see it, unless she is
+stone blind. She can't expect us to outrage all the laws of nature to
+suit her narrow schemes. You don't think there will be anything still
+worse?--that she will make your life wretched by making you feel your
+dependence--that kind of thing?"
+
+"I am not sure," said Rachel. "She has been very, very good to me; but
+lately--since she has got suspicious about you--she has been hard.
+However, if the worst comes to the worst, I can go and be a governess or
+companion somewhere until you are ready for me."
+
+"No, Rachel, no; you must promise to tell me if you are persecuted in
+any way--if you are miserable in your aunt's house--and my sister Lily
+will take care of you. You are not to let the worst come to the
+worst--do you hear? You must let me know of anything that happens, and
+I will come at once and see about it. Oh, my poor little one, I begin to
+realise what sacrifices you will have to make for me! Will you think the
+game was worth the candle, I wonder, when you are as old as I am?"
+
+"Yes," said Rachel; "I know I shall--if you will be as contented with me
+then as you are now."
+
+"Do you _really_ think you have counted the cost?" he persisted
+anxiously. "Remember, you were going to marry Mr. Kingston, because you
+thought it would be nice to be rich and to live in a grand house and to
+wear diamonds."
+
+"That was before I had seen _you_. I don't want to be rich now. Indeed,
+I would rather not."
+
+"Has anybody told you how poor I am?"
+
+"Yes," she whispered, stealing a timid hand to his shoulder. "I have
+been thinking of it. Beatrice says it is a mistake for poor men to
+marry--that they cripple their career. But I hope--I think--_I_ shall
+not be any burden to you. Once I was poor, too, and I know all about it,
+and I can manage with a very little. I think I could help you in lots of
+ways, and not be a hindrance."
+
+"A hindrance, indeed!" he interrupted. "My darling, if I had you for my
+companion, life would be sweet enough for me, under any circumstances.
+It was your comfort and happiness I was thinking of."
+
+"I only want to be with you," she said, under her breath. "I don't care
+where--I don't care how."
+
+"_Really_, Rachel?"
+
+"Really, indeed."
+
+"You are so young! Think what a number of years you have before you, in
+all probability. If you should lose the colour out of your life too
+soon, if you should have to drudge--but I won't let you drudge," he
+added, with a sudden touch of fierceness, "I will take care of you, and
+you shall have all you want. It _won't_ be a sacrifice--not even all
+this"--looking round him--"if you give it up for a man you love, who has
+health and strength to work for you. It would make you miserable if you
+had it. You know it would?"
+
+"I do know it," she responded, without a moment's hesitation.
+
+She had finally made up her mind that after all material poverty was not
+the worst of life's misfortunes. Indeed, provided the element of debt
+were absent, she thought it might in Roden Dalrymple's company, "far
+from the madding crowd," in the lonely wilds of Queensland, be rather
+pleasant than otherwise; for it would mean the delight of working for
+and helping one another, and a blessed freedom from interruption and
+restraint in the enjoyment of that wonderful married life which would be
+theirs.
+
+"But I should like to know what made you take to me," he went on, in the
+immemorial fashion, stroking her soft face. "I should like to know why
+you chose, for your first love--I am your first, am I not, Rachel?"
+
+"You _know_ you are. And it was no matter of choice with me--you know
+that, too."
+
+"A man who made shipwreck of his fortunes for another woman almost
+before you were born----"
+
+"Hush!" interrupted Rachel. "I have no rights in your past, and I don't
+want any. This present is mine, and that is enough for me."
+
+"A battered old vagabond----"
+
+"No," she persisted; "I won't allow you to call yourself a vagabond. It
+is bad enough to hear other people do it."
+
+"After seeing him under what one would be inclined to consider, well,
+anything but favourable auspices--for how many days, Rachel?"
+
+"Oh," she said, hiding a scarlet face, "don't remind me of that! It was
+too soon--but I could not help it."
+
+"The sooner the better, my sweet--if it lasts," he responded, kissing
+her with solemn passion; "and I will _make_ it last."
+
+"Do not be afraid of that," she whispered eagerly. "I know I am young--I
+know one ought not to be too positive about the future--but I _feel_
+that it will be impossible to help loving you always, even if I try not
+to, which I certainly shan't. I am sure I began it when I saw you riding
+across the racecourse that day--I am sure I shall not stop any more as
+long as I live. I don't think there can be another man in the world like
+you."
+
+And so they talked, until it occurred to one of them to wonder what the
+time was. Mr. Dalrymple struck a match and looked at his watch, Rachel
+shielding the small flame from the wind with her hand.
+
+"Oh," she exclaimed in dismay, "what would Aunt Elizabeth say if she
+knew I was sitting out here at eleven o'clock at night!"
+
+"Call it eleven p.m.," he suggested, looking at her with his slow smile;
+"that sounds so much better."
+
+"Did you think it was so late? The time has flown."
+
+"I _felt_ it flying," he replied. "But I did not think it was so late.
+I'm afraid you must go home, little one. Oh, dear me, when shall we have
+such a time again! Will you come here to-morrow night, and tell me how
+you have got over your day's troubles?"
+
+This was not a proposal that Rachel could accept comfortably, nor that
+he could bring himself to press upon her. But when they came to
+reconsider their position and necessities, it was hard to find an
+alternative.
+
+"You see, I must go back to Queensland in a day or two," Mr. Dalrymple
+explained, when, having taken her out of her hole and dusted her skirts
+with his handkerchief, he led her through the labyrinth of walls into
+the open moonlight, and they paused, hand in hand, for a few last words.
+"We have an immense deal to do up there, and Gordon wants me. I must
+look after getting things together for you too. There is not even a roof
+for your head yet. But I can't bear to leave town without knowing first
+how matters are likely to go with you."
+
+"If you _should_ be obliged to do that--if I _cannot_ see you again,"
+said Rachel, "when will you come back?"
+
+"I will come back in--let me see, this is October--in two months. I will
+be back at Christmas. I should have liked to see your uncle to-morrow,
+just that there should be no mistake about what I mean to do; but if you
+think it will make things harder for you, I won't, of course. You shall
+just tell Kingston what you like, and the rest of them I will enlighten
+when I come. By that time he will be out of the way and done with, and
+we shall have a straight road before us."
+
+"Yes," said Rachel, sighing; "I think that will be best. And perhaps, by
+that time, Aunt Elizabeth will let you in."
+
+"If she doesn't, I shall bombard the house."
+
+"You will be _sure_ to be back at Christmas?"
+
+"If I am alive, dear, and a free agent--certainly. And I shall find you
+ready for me then?"
+
+"Oh, yes!"
+
+With this compact between them, and the giving to Rachel of her lover's
+town address, and very explicit directions as to where she might find
+him at any given hour when she might happen to want him until the day of
+his departure, they kissed one clinging, lingering kiss in motionless
+silence, and bade one another--though they did not know it--a long
+farewell.
+
+"Which is your window, Rachel? Can I see it from here?"
+
+She pointed to it in silence, it was very distinct just now in the
+moonshine, between two dark pine trees. She was crying a little, and she
+could not speak.
+
+"I will be here to-morrow night," he said; "and if you _can't_ come out
+to me, have a light in your room at twelve o'clock, darling, to let me
+know you are all right."
+
+And then they separated; and Rachel felt rather than saw her way home,
+so dazzled with tears was she, while Roden Dalrymple at her desire
+remained behind and watched her.
+
+She went straight into the house and upstairs to her room, to gather
+together, in a feverish hurry of renunciation, all her diamonds and
+jewels, which like Dead Sea apples, had suddenly become dust.
+
+And he, long after she was gone,--long after Mrs. Hardy's carriage
+returned, and all the chimes in the city had rung the midnight
+hour--lingered where she had left him, leaning his arms on a convenient
+wall, watching a lighted window, and thinking. He was very happy. He had
+come unawares upon his happiness, when he was most in need of it, and it
+seemed to him that it was the best he could have had.
+
+Anything sweeter than this fresh and simple heart, which was satisfied
+to invest all its wealth in him--anything brighter than the future she
+had spread before him--he did not want or wish for. It was the amplest
+compensation that he could imagine for the mistakes and disappointments
+of his wasted past.
+
+And yet, though he was hardly conscious of it--though he would not have
+owned to it if he had been--he had a vague misgiving about her. He did
+not wish that she had been less easy to win; he had no fear that she was
+mistaking a sentimental girlish fancy for love; he did not for a moment
+apprehend that she would forsake or wrong him.
+
+But there was a suggestion of untried and untested youth about all the
+circumstances of this sudden betrothal, as far as she had influenced
+them, and there was an intangible suspicion that somewhere she was
+weak.
+
+He did not recognise, and therefore did not formulate, the sentiment
+that infused that touch of grave and sad anxiety into his happy
+meditations; but, nevertheless, it was there, and the time came when it
+was justified.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MRS. READE'S ADVICE.
+
+
+Rachel was not a heroine. She was simply a sweet and interesting girl;
+except that she was unusually pretty, by no means above the ordinary
+level of nice girls. She was better than a great many that we are
+acquainted with, no doubt, but she was not so good as some.
+
+And she had, as has been already indicated, that fault which, of all
+faults, perhaps, is most common to girls, whether nice or
+otherwise--that amiable weakness that is more disastrous in its
+consequences than many a downright vice--she was, if not quite a coward,
+cowardly.
+
+She was afraid to meet difficulties in the open, as it were--to attack
+the main body and scatter them, and have done with it; she sheltered
+herself in ambush, and made desultory attacks on flank and rear with
+temporary compromises, hating the thought of duplicity and longing to do
+right, yet most of all dreading the violent, harsh hurt to tender
+sensibilities (whether her own or other people's) that was inevitable in
+the shock of a pitched battle.
+
+It is a defect in a woman's character very much to be deplored, of
+course, and it is one that seems unpardonable to a strong-minded person.
+
+Nevertheless, it is much more of a misfortune than a fault (and we may
+as well say the same, while we are about it, of all our constitutional
+defects, from red hair to kleptomania, since we did not choose our
+parents nor the social conditions to which we were born); and to Rachel,
+whose instinctive truthfulness and high sense of moral rectitude
+prompted her to struggle hard, if vainly, against it, it was purely a
+misfortune, and at no time in her life more so than now.
+
+For, after turning the question over and over in her mind through all
+that feverish and wakeful night, she finally decided that in breaking
+off her engagement with Mr. Kingston she would not mention, either to
+him or to anyone else, the place that Mr. Dalrymple now occupied in her
+affections and affairs.
+
+As no one was aware of their having met, and as he was coming back
+himself so soon to clear up everything much better than she could, she
+persuaded herself that it would be not only unnecessary, but in the
+highest degree inexpedient, to aggravate the inevitable pain and
+difficulty that was before her and all of them.
+
+Hating his very name as they did, would she not expose her lover to
+insult, and his motives and actions to misconception, and probably
+prejudice their chances of happiness irrevocably?
+
+And at the same time do no good whatever, but only add an element of
+unspeakable bitterness to the disappointment of her aunt, and to the
+mortification of her already ill-used and much-wronged _fiance_, and, as
+a matter of detail, an incalculable amount of difficulty to her own
+sufficiently formidable task? She was certain that she would, and she
+felt that she could not, and need not do it.
+
+It took her all night to mature her course of action, but having finally
+brought herself to believe that it was not only so much the easiest to
+herself, but in every way the best for all concerned, to ignore Mr.
+Dalrymple for the present, she committed herself to it by writing a
+long letter to Mr. Kingston--a tender, penitent, self-accusing letter,
+in which she begged him to forgive her for having discovered so much too
+late that they were unsuited to one another, and prayed that he might
+some day be happier with a better woman than it was in her power to make
+him, and that he would ever believe her his attached and grateful
+friend, without suggesting the existence or possibility of any other
+lover, present or to be.
+
+The natural results followed. Mr. Kingston, seeing no sufficient reason
+for these sudden strong measures, refused to treat them seriously.
+
+He was quite aware, and it troubled him deeply, that she was not happy
+in her engagement, and he was very jealous and suspicious of Mr.
+Dalrymple, whom he had seen once or twice about town; but he had set his
+heart upon her, as we say, with the perverse obstinacy of a fickle man
+who had been spoiled by women's flattery, and the more she seemed to
+shrink from him the more he wanted to have her, and the more he was
+determined not to let her go if he could possibly help it.
+
+His love not only lacked reciprocity--without which love is never worthy
+to be spelt with a capital L--but it was so diluted with all sorts of
+vanities and egotisms that, though its flavour was there, the potent
+spirit was absent, and he was incapable of making a sacrifice for her
+happiness at the expense of his own.
+
+When he solemnly assured himself that he loved her as he had never loved
+anyone before, and that he could not and would not give her up--when he
+declared, moreover, that he was ready to spend his future life in her
+service, and would take his chance of making her care for him--he not
+only told the truth, as far as he understood it, but perhaps he touched
+the highest point of heroism of which his selfish nature was capable.
+
+All the same, the strong necessities of the case were the carrying out
+of the great enterprise which was symbolised by the half-built house,
+and the realisation of his schemes for his own enjoyment; the possession
+(and the securing from other men) of the most attractive, the most
+admired, and to him most loveable woman of his set, who had so to speak
+given him a legal lien upon her person; the maintenance of his social
+position and dignity, and the avoidance of ridicule and embarrassment.
+
+So when he had read Rachel's letter, with a great expense of bad
+language in the first place, and of wise reflection subsequently, he
+made up his mind that it was merely the result of their Adelonga
+differences, which had been rankling in her sensitive heart, and not the
+formal resignation that he would be required to accept.
+
+"No, no, young lady," he said to himself, as he made a careful toilet
+before setting forth to see her, "I have not sacrificed my liberty and
+all my comfortable habits, at your instigation and for your sake, to
+take my _conge_ at the eleventh hour in this way."
+
+And then he cast about in his mind anxiously for ways and means whereby
+he might meet and overcome this strange reluctance, which not only
+seemed to him a cruel injury and injustice after all he had done for
+her, but really distressed him acutely, and made him extremely unhappy.
+
+Was there anything amongst Kilpatrick's glittering treasures that would
+tempt her to smile and kiss him, and be sorry that she had given him
+this heartless blow?
+
+He felt to-day that he would spend a thousand pounds cheerfully for
+anything that would please her.
+
+But at the same time he was uneasily conscious that even the largest
+and purest diamonds would not appreciably affect the situation.
+
+She was no longer open to these fascinations, as she used to be; several
+little circumstances had convinced him of that.
+
+It was a bad sign, he feared; but he hoped it indicated nothing more
+serious than that the novelty of wealth and luxury had worn off.
+
+He recognised its existence so far that he went on his delicate mission
+to Toorak, trusting to his own merits and eloquence, with no bribes of
+any sort in his pocket.
+
+After all, he did not see Rachel that day. She was weeping hysterically
+in her bedroom at the top of the house, and therefore was not
+presentable.
+
+Mrs. Hardy, much excited and discomposed by the shock she had just
+received (on being told by Rachel that she had not only written a letter
+to her _fiance_, to break off her engagement, but had _sent_ it),
+received him in the drawing-room, and did the best that wisdom, at such
+short notice, suggested to repair the catastrophe which she had been
+powerless to prevent.
+
+She tried to smile and joke, in a considerate and well-bred manner; she
+rallied him upon his misconduct in the matter of Miss Hale, which had
+evidently been at the bottom of all the mischief, gently pointing out to
+him that a sensitive nature like Rachel's, and a tender heart that loved
+and trusted him, could not be played with, even in the conventional
+fashion, with impunity.
+
+And then she hastened to explain the suddenness and unexpectedness of
+this "freak;" how sure she was that it had been perpetrated under the
+influence of a fit of temper or dejection, or some other unhealthy
+condition of mind; how equally sure she was that it was already repented
+of--though, of course, it was not for her to give an opinion or to
+interfere. All of which would have been very proper and sensible, but
+that the effect was marred by a bubbling under-current of angry
+excitement that her utmost efforts could not hide.
+
+Mr. Kingston watched and listened, with smiling self-possession. Finding
+that he was not to see Rachel, nor to get any fresh information, he did
+not prolong the interview. He had no confidence in Mrs. Hardy--few men
+had, in matters of this kind. He received her communications in a
+friendly manner, as one receives an embassy under a flag of truce; he
+never thought of allowing himself to be influenced by them one way or
+the other, or of asking her assistance and advice.
+
+As soon as courtesy permitted, he bowed himself out of her presence,
+with magnanimous expressions of good-will and a request that nothing
+might be be said or done to distress or embarrass Rachel. And then he
+got into his cab thoughtfully, and went to South Yarra to call on Mrs.
+Reade.
+
+It was not one of this young lady's reception days, as no one knew
+better than himself; nor had she left her house in pursuit of tea and
+gossip at other people's "afternoons," as he half expected would be the
+case.
+
+The sprightly maid-servant (all Mrs. Reade's servants were maids, and
+all of them sprightly), who opened the door to his thundering knock,
+recognising a privileged friend of the family, admitted him with
+alacrity; and he walked into the drawing-room and found his hostess
+sitting there alone, nestling in one of her seductive low chairs with an
+open letter on her knee.
+
+She, too, had just received the news of Rachel's escapade; the letter,
+full of dashing and incoherent sentences, was in Mrs. Hardy's
+handwriting, and had arrived half an hour ago from Toorak. But there
+were no signs of excitement and discomposure about this little person,
+who rose to meet him, looking cool and bright, with even the suspicion
+of a twinkle in her eyes.
+
+"Have you come for a gossip?" she asked, looking up at him with friendly
+frankness. "Because if you have you had better send your cab away. I am
+going out at five o'clock, and I'll drive you into town."
+
+The cab was sent away; and Mr. Kingston, with a feeling of comfort and
+safety about him, sat down in a bow-windowed recess, in his favourite of
+all the cunningly-devised chairs, and with his elbows on his knees,
+began to fiddle with the top of a silk sock, at the toe of which his
+companion was now knitting industriously.
+
+"Is this for Ned?" he inquired, after a pause.
+
+"Now, isn't that a superfluous question?" she replied, holding it up.
+"Look at the size of it. Could any foot but his fill out that enormous
+bag? Of course it is for Ned. Don't you know it is the new fashion for
+wives to knit their husband's socks? One must be in the fashion, even if
+one's husband is a giant."
+
+"Very nice for one's husband. It seems beautifully soft; pretty colour,
+too." Then, after a pause, "Does Rachel know how to knit?"
+
+"Yes," said Mrs. Reade, calmly; "we both learned together while she was
+staying with me, and she does it much quicker than I do. I suppose you
+are thinking you would like to participate in the benefits of the
+fashion too?" she added, lifting her face suddenly, with a quick look in
+her bright eyes that was like the opening of a masked battery.
+
+"If I thought that Rachel would ever knit socks for me, for the pleasure
+of it----" He paused with a change and break in his voice, regarding her
+wistfully.
+
+Mrs. Reade immediately made a sheaf of her needles, wound them up in the
+sock, and impaled her ball of silk upon them. "Tell me," she said,
+folding her hands on her knees in a business-like manner, "tell me, what
+has Rachel been doing?"
+
+"Don't you know? She has written to me to break off our engagement."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I can't imagine--she doesn't say. I thought _you_ might be able to help
+me to find that out."
+
+Mrs. Reade looked at him in silence for a few seconds, kindly and
+gravely. Even she felt herself a little at a loss as to what course to
+pursue.
+
+"What have you done?" she asked abruptly.
+
+"Nothing. I went up to see her just now, but I was disappointed. She
+could not, or would not, come in. I rather fancy your mother had been
+scolding her."
+
+"I have no doubt she had. She doesn't approve of independence on the
+part of young people."
+
+"I won't have her scolded," Mr. Kingston broke out, with sudden
+vehemence. "If I like to blame her, that is another matter. I won't
+have her set against me by other people. Nothing would make her hate me
+more than that kind of thing."
+
+Mrs. Reade felt the justice of this protest, but she did not see fit to
+discuss her mother's little mistakes. "What are you going to do?" she
+inquired.
+
+"Do you mean am I going to take my dismissal in this off-hand way? No,
+certainly not. After all the time we have been engaged--after all that
+has come and gone between us--after all the preparations that have been
+made--it would be _too_ preposterous! I should be the laughing-stock of
+the colony."
+
+"That would be very sad," said Mrs. Reade, with her head on one side.
+
+"Now be a good little woman, and don't jeer at me--I didn't come to you
+for that. You know--or you ought to know--that I am horribly upset and
+miserable about all this business, and that I want you to help me."
+
+"I don't see how I can help you," she said.
+
+"Tell me about Rachel. What is the matter with her? What does she mean?"
+
+"Well, evidently she means that she doesn't want to marry you," sighed
+Mrs. Reade. "Tiresome child, why didn't she think of it before?"
+
+"Why should she think of it now? Oh, yes, I know she has not been keen
+about it for some time, as she should have been. But she has not seemed
+to _dislike_ it; she has looked forward to it as much a matter of
+course as--as it has been to all the rest of us. And I felt so sure it
+would be all right--that I could make her as happy as possible--when we
+were once married and she had settled down!"
+
+It was not often that Mrs. Reade was perplexed, but now--between her
+duty to her family, her strong affection for Rachel, and her desire to
+assist her friend--she really did not know what to do. While she was
+silent, struggling with the dilemma in her active mind, Mr. Kingston
+went on.
+
+"It is since she went to Adelonga that she has changed so much. Haven't
+you noticed?"
+
+"You did not behave very well to her at Adelonga, you know."
+
+"Who told you that? Did she?"
+
+"Never mind who told me. There is never any secrecy about your
+proceedings--I will give you that credit. You treated her very badly at
+Lucilla's ball."
+
+"Not worse than she treated me," he began, impetuously; and then he
+paused and looked at his hostess. He was gentleman enough to shrink from
+discussing Rachel's misdeeds in connection with "that Dalrymple fellow,"
+but he longed to find out how much her wise cousin and late companion
+knew. Mrs. Reade fingered her knitting with a placid and impenetrable
+face.
+
+"Tell me--you know Rachel so intimately--do you think----"
+
+"Do I think what?"
+
+"That there is anyone she cares for--more than she cares for me?"
+
+He was impelled, against his better judgment, to ask this awkward
+question. Mrs. Reade gathered herself together, so to speak; it was one
+of those sudden emergencies that inspire a brave woman.
+
+"If I thought she cared for anyone who was a better man, and could make
+her happier than you," she said deliberately, looking him straight in
+the face, "she should have him, or it would not be my fault."
+
+"But she does not?"
+
+"So far as I know she does not. But," she was an honest little woman,
+and it gave her a pang to mislead him, even though she did it for what
+seemed to her a good end, "but, at the same time, no doubt she does not
+care for you as she ought to do."
+
+"I hope that will come," he said cheerfully.
+
+If only Mr. Dalrymple did not stand in his way, he felt all difficulties
+manageable.
+
+"It is a great risk; you ought to think well before you take it."
+
+"I have thought well."
+
+"And I will be no party to making _her_ take it against her will."
+
+"But I think she will be willing if she is treated properly. Of course I
+don't want to marry her by force. I want to bring her round to like it
+as she used to like it. If there is nobody else, why not? And you _will_
+help me, won't you?"
+
+Mrs. Reade looked at him with bright and friendly eyes. He was really
+taking it very well considering how badly he had been treated, and how
+extremely susceptible he was to indignities of this, or indeed any
+description. He certainly must be strangely in love with that perverse
+child, she thought--much more in love than she had ever expected to see
+him--to be able to put his wrongs in the background like this. He
+deserved to be helped.
+
+And as far as human judgment was to be trusted, to help him would be to
+play Providence to Rachel.
+
+"I will do what I can," she said kindly. "That is to say, I won't
+interfere, but I'll give you good advice whenever you do me the honour
+to ask for it."
+
+"Thank you; I ask for it now. What do you advise me to do?"
+
+She pondered a few moments, watching him thoughtfully.
+
+"You are quite sure, once for all, that you think it worth while to
+throw yourself away on an ungrateful little monkey who doesn't
+appreciate you?"
+
+"I'm quite sure I want to marry Rachel. I hope she will appreciate me,
+but if she doesn't--well, I want to marry her all the same."
+
+"And are willing to take the consequences?"
+
+"Oh, yes; I'm not afraid of consequences--once the wedding is over."
+
+He smiled as he made this almost sacrilegious assertion, which implied a
+marital control of consequences that was offensive in the ears of the
+little woman, who liked to see husbands kept in their proper places.
+
+"Don't boast," she said sharply, "you might find yourself in a very
+unpleasant position when the wedding was over. And you will, too, if you
+don't mind."
+
+The dialogue was interrupted at this point. A little brougham rattled
+past the window on its way from the stable-yard to the front-door, and a
+servant came in with tea.
+
+Mrs. Reade looked at her watch, and her guest's face fell.
+
+"Is it five o'clock?" he exclaimed testily; "and you have not given me
+any advice!"
+
+"Will you have a cup of tea?" she inquired, coolly.
+
+"No, thank you. _Must_ you go out this afternoon?"
+
+"Well, I could hardly countermand the carriage now, because you are
+here, could I? We'll have a drive somewhere before we go in to town, and
+I'll give you advice as we go along."
+
+She drank her tea standing in the middle of the room, and then leaving
+him to fret and fume by himself, went away to dress, and in the
+retirement of her own apartment to concoct a definite scheme of action.
+
+In a few minutes she came back alert and bright, in a very charming
+French bonnet, and with yards of silken train behind her. She was ready
+for him in every sense of the word.
+
+As soon as they were out upon the road, and she had finished buttoning
+a refractory glove, she said gravely, with an air of having solved all
+doubts,
+
+"Now I will tell you what you must do."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"You must accept Rachel's dismissal."
+
+"_What!_ I'm sure I shall not do anything of the kind."
+
+Mrs. Reade laid herself back in the carriage and folded her hands.
+
+"Very well," she said, calmly.
+
+"No, but really--I beg your pardon--I don't understand you. Do you mean
+I must just give her up and have done with it? Because you know it is
+just that that I can't do."
+
+"Not at all. But don't ask my opinion----"
+
+"Oh, yes, _do_ tell me what you mean."
+
+"Well, I was going to suggest that you see or write to Rachel and tell
+her you will do what she wishes rather than distress her; but that,
+while leaving her free, you will consider yourself still as much bound
+to her as ever, and wait in hope that she will come back to you someday.
+That kind of thing, you know."
+
+"Oh, yes, that is all very well. And in the meantime I shall be getting
+old--that is to say, I shall be losing time--and she will be sure to be
+run after by other men the moment my back is turned."
+
+"It will be better to lose a little time than to worry her now," said
+Mrs. Reade. "If you draw off from her a little, she will miss you, and
+then probably she will want you, and provided you left her assured of
+your faithfulness, and didn't go flirting with Miss Hale and people, it
+would be just the kind of delicate and chivalrous consideration for her
+that she would appreciate. Yes, I know Rachel; it would touch her heart
+deeply."
+
+"But some other fellow might get hold of her--finding she was free, you
+know."
+
+"I think," said Mrs. Reade, smiling slightly, "that we may safely leave
+my mother to look after that."
+
+Upon consideration Mr. Kingston thought so too. He began to see
+glimmerings of wisdom and reason in this proposed course.
+
+"But your mother will have to be looked after herself," he said,
+breaking a little pause abruptly. "If _I_ am not to worry Rachel,
+nobody else shall."
+
+"Of course. I will look after my mother."
+
+"And suppose," he continued presently, deep in troubled thoughts,
+"suppose she never renews the engagement after all?"
+
+"Oh, well--suppose the world comes to an end to-morrow--we can't help
+it!"
+
+"Do you think she will?"
+
+"I do think she will--honestly, I do--if you are patient and gentle, and
+do as I tell you. She will be dull and lonely; she will miss you about
+her, and not only you, but many pleasant things that are associated with
+you; she will bethink herself that she has treated you badly--as indeed
+she has--and she is so tender-hearted that it will fret her. And if she
+sees you occasionally, not in season and out of season, but now and
+then, at opportune times, and you do her little voluntary services in a
+delicate and unobtrusive way--then some of these days, seeing you still,
+she will suddenly think that she loves you, and--well, then it will be
+all right, you know."
+
+"Oh, I hope so!" he broke out, with a deep, impatient sigh--though it
+was not a great deal to hope for when it came to be reckoned up. "But
+how long will she be reaching that point?"
+
+"It depends."
+
+"And we were to have been married in a couple of months--three at the
+most. Upon my honour, it _is_ too bad!"
+
+"I shouldn't be surprised if you were married quite as soon as you
+arranged to be," Mrs. Reade proceeded calmly, building this comfortable
+theory upon the conviction that Mr. Dalrymple, in spite of his
+persistence in calling at Toorak, was not the kind of man to remain
+faithful to a ball-room fancy, nor to undertake anything so expensive
+and so respectable as matrimony under the most favourable conjunction of
+circumstances; and feeling sure that Rachel, with her clinging,
+impulsive nature, finding her desires frustrated in this direction,
+would be under an imperious necessity to seek--or, at any rate, to
+accept--support elsewhere. "If I had her with me for six weeks, I think
+I would not mind risking a small bet----"
+
+"_Can't_ you have her with you?" Mr. Kingston interposed eagerly.
+
+"No, I fear not. My mother would not consent to let her go from home
+just now. The situation is too grave. But even as things are, if you
+manage the child properly, I don't at all despair of seeing you
+married--or, at any rate, engaged again--before the year is out. Very
+far from it."
+
+"I would give a thousand pounds at this moment if I could be certain
+that that would be," sighed Mr. Kingston, plaintively.
+
+"Only you must do what I tell you. I assure you, if you _want_ to
+succeed, that is your best, if not your only chance. Will you do what I
+tell you?"
+
+"I will see Rachel first."
+
+"Of course. See her and give her plainly to understand what a pain
+and disappointment it is to you to give her up, and that you only do it
+for her sake. Perhaps, if you talk it over with her, she will cancel her
+letter, and it will be all right at once; in which case you had better
+arrange for your marriage as quickly as possible. But if it should be
+otherwise--if she should still press for a dissolution of her
+engagement--let her go for a little while. It need not be for long."
+
+"I think I will," said Mr. Kingston, thoughtfully. And he did.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+UNTIL CHRISTMAS.
+
+
+Mrs. Reade was accustomed not only to give advice and to see it taken,
+but to see the wisdom of it justified in the success of its practical
+application.
+
+Nevertheless, she was more surprised than Mr. Kingston himself at the
+great and good results which apparently followed her interference in his
+affairs. Matters were a little critical for a week or two.
+
+Of course he "saw" Rachel, and attacked the position which she had taken
+up with all the forces at his command. He was, in his Mentor's judgment,
+indiscreetly zealous and persevering; and the almost fierce obstinacy of
+Rachel's resistance, which neither science nor brute force could
+overcome, being an altogether anomalous demonstration of character, was
+even more portentous.
+
+But when presently Mr. Kingston, in a dignified and graceful letter,
+accepted his defeat, while at the same time clearly intimating that the
+withdrawal of his former pretensions in no way indicated any change in
+his affections and fidelity, then everything seemed to go well.
+
+The girl _was_ touched and grieved to the depths of her tender heart
+for the wrong and the trouble that she had inflicted upon him, and was
+in agonies of anxiety for his welfare.
+
+"Do you think he will go back to Miss Brownlow?" she inquired one day of
+Beatrice, with pathetic eyes full of tears; "and, oh, _do_ you think she
+will make him happy?"
+
+She was terribly taken aback when her cousin with much asperity
+upbraided her with the heartlessness of the suggestion.
+
+For a little while, having received her aunt's grudging acquiescence in
+the dissolution of her engagement, having sent back all her jewels,
+having surreptitiously despatched a note to her lover in Queensland
+(which she implored him not to answer) to tell him that she was
+honourably free, and living in the anticipation of his return, Rachel
+began to blossom in beauty and brightness again, like a flower that
+night had chilled in the warmth of morning sunshine.
+
+It was, perhaps, a little discouraging to see how very much relieved and
+refreshed she was in her freedom--that she did not even hanker after her
+lost diamonds, and the riches and luxuries that had once been so
+desirable and so precious; but Mrs. Reade, as was her custom, looked
+below the surface of things, and found her compensations.
+
+That the girl had recovered her balance, so to speak, and was in sound
+health, mentally and physically, was of the first importance in this
+sensible young woman's view of the case; and her eager friendliness to
+Mr. Kingston whenever she met him--eager in proportion to the modesty of
+his demands of course, and sometimes warm with impulsive tenderness such
+as she had never voluntarily manifested in the days of her
+engagement--seemed to foreshadow the most hopeful possibilities. Indeed,
+if Mr. Kingston behaved well, Rachel, apart from her specific
+misdemeanour, behaved even better.
+
+Mrs. Hardy, outwardly conforming to her daughter's scheme, would not, or
+could not, disguise her resentment at the failure of the original
+enterprise, and visited it upon the girl, as perhaps was natural, more
+roughly than she would have done had Rachel been her own child or less
+deeply indebted to her.
+
+She was ostentatiously cold and indifferent, or she was sarcastic, and
+harsh, and rude; she was rigorous to the verge of tyranny in her
+determination to allow no other man the smallest opportunity for
+improving the occasion in the manner that Mr. Kingston had
+indicated--withdrawing her niece from all the gay assemblies where she
+had hitherto disported herself with so much enjoyment and _eclat_, and
+keeping her to a petty routine of study and household duties that was
+made as dull and irksome as possible.
+
+Yet Rachel, always so sensitive to both kindness and unkindness, and as
+much hurt by a snub as she would have been by a blow, took it all with
+the sweetest patience and temper.
+
+She devoted herself to her aunt's service as she never had done before,
+compassing the sombre woman with every possible delicate attention that
+tact and thoughtfulness could devise; and she not only persevered in
+this amiable conduct, but kept a certain placid and gentle brightness
+about her, under all discouragements, for weeks and weeks together.
+
+Mrs. Reade, as a matter of course, was greatly touched and pleased; for
+it was evident--as far as her sharp eyes could see--that Mr. Dalrymple
+was not the source of inspiration _now_, seeing that he had been
+effectually circumvented on his first attempt to renew her acquaintance,
+and had never been seen or heard of since. It seemed to the anxious
+little woman that the girl had only wanted her freedom for awhile, and
+that, by and bye, by the mere drift of the current, she would be borne
+back to the arms that were waiting for her.
+
+Things seemed to be going on so well that Mrs. Reade, when the gaieties
+of the "Cup" season were over, thought she might venture to leave town
+for a few weeks. She wanted very much to pay a long-deferred visit to
+Adelonga.
+
+She had not been there since Lucilla was a bride, and of course she had
+not seen the baby. She was also anxious to find out for herself "the
+rights" of the story that her mother had told her concerning Rachel's
+conduct and experiences while sojourning under her sister's roof, and
+if possible to make the acquaintance of some of Mr. Dalrymple's people.
+
+So, with customary promptitude, she made her preparations. She sent for
+Mr. Kingston and gave him judicious advice and encouragement to direct
+and uphold him in her absence.
+
+Then she interviewed Mrs. Hardy, and expressed herself so strongly on
+behalf of her own views as to what was right and proper in the
+management of Rachel's case, that they nearly came to "words."
+
+And, finally, having fortified the position to the best of her power,
+she sought out Rachel herself, and, in the privacy of that little
+chamber at the top of the house, bade her an affectionate and reluctant
+good-bye.
+
+"I don't know if my mother has told you, dear, that Lucilla wanted me
+very much to bring you with me," she said, when they were sitting
+together by Rachel's window, hand in hand.
+
+"Did she? Dear Lucilla, how I should like to see her!" ejaculated
+Rachel, but not in the tone of voice that Mrs. Reade had expected.
+
+"And I begged very hard for permission, but mamma thought it better not
+to interrupt your music and painting lessons again so soon. It is a
+great disappointment to you not to go, isn't it? At first I thought I
+would not tell you anything about it."
+
+"Ah, but I am glad you told me," said Rachel; "for I must send a
+message to Lucilla to thank her. She knows how I loved to be at
+Adelonga--I think it is the sweetest place in the wide world."
+
+"I wish I could take you," said Mrs. Reade; "but----"
+
+"Oh, no, Beatrice, I cannot go, I know. Indeed, I would rather not. I
+would rather stay with Aunt Elizabeth, and go on with my lessons."
+
+Mrs. Reade was considerably astonished and disconcerted by this
+evidently genuine sentiment. There was _something_ in so ready a
+relinquishment of the pleasures of Adelonga, which had always been so
+great, and also in the tremulous eagerness with which the girl put the
+proposal from her--a proposal which Mrs. Reade had feared would be
+cruelly tantalising at this time; but it was not immediately apparent.
+
+Rachel could not stand the silent scrutiny of her cousin's brilliant
+eyes. Blushing violently, she rose from the couch on which she had been
+sitting, and rested her arms on the window-sill, and looked out upon the
+sombre pine trees that stood perfectly motionless in the golden summer
+air.
+
+"Do you see how that house is getting on?" she said, breaking an awkward
+pause. "The walls are simply _rushing_ up. They will be ready for the
+roof directly."
+
+Mrs. Reade stood on tiptoe and peeped over her shoulder.
+
+"I wonder you have the heart to look at it," she replied.
+
+"Oh, Beatrice!"
+
+"I do, when you think what a wreck you have made of all the hopes and
+plans that that poor dear man has been building with it."
+
+"He will build some more, and better ones, by and bye, I hope."
+
+"Not he. Men don't do that so easily at his age."
+
+"Oh, yes," she persisted, imploringly, "I think he will, indeed. He did
+it very easily with me."
+
+"For an exceedingly good reason--because he loved you from the first.
+Oh, you ungrateful little monkey, it's to be hoped you'll die an ugly
+old maid!"
+
+"That would be better than being the wife for years and years of a man I
+did not love."
+
+"Rubbish. As if one could have everything all at once in this world. You
+girls think of nothing but yourselves. You don't take into account that
+it might be worth while to make somebody else happy."
+
+"How could I make him happy unless I loved him, Beatrice?"
+
+"Oh, don't talk about it. You have pleased yourself, I suppose, and he
+must do the best he can. He is terribly miserable as he is, poor fellow;
+but I daresay he'll get over it."
+
+"Is he miserable _now_?" inquired Rachel anxiously. "Have you seen him
+lately?"
+
+"I saw him yesterday, and he told me that his life had no value for him
+now that he had lost you, and that he should never live in his house
+unless you were the mistress of it. I shouldn't imagine he felt
+particularly jolly under those circumstances. However, it is no use
+worrying ourselves on his account," the little woman added cheerfully,
+seeing tears in her cousin's gentle eyes.
+
+"But I am so sorry for him!"
+
+"That won't help him much, my dear. And if _you_ are happy, I suppose
+that is all we need care about."
+
+"Oh, no, Beatrice!"
+
+"We haven't time to fret over other people's troubles," Mrs. Reade
+proceeded, in what Rachel thought an exceedingly heartless manner; "life
+is too short."
+
+"But, Beatrice----"
+
+"Now, I can't talk about Mr. Kingston any more. I have all my packing to
+do yet, and I must run away and see after it. Good-bye, dearest child.
+Mind you write often. I wish you were going with me--I can't bear to
+leave you behind."
+
+Rachel flung her arms round her small cousin with characteristic
+fervour.
+
+"When do you think you will come home again?" she inquired tremulously,
+almost in a whisper.
+
+"I can't say, dear, exactly."
+
+"Before Christmas, won't you?"
+
+"I think so; it will all depend on circumstances."
+
+"Oh, _do_ be back by Christmas," Rachel pleaded, with an almost tragic
+eagerness. "It would be dreadful if Christmas came and you were so far
+away!"
+
+"Am I so necessary to the festivities of the season?" laughed Mrs.
+Reade, much touched and flattered. "Well, I'll see what I can do.
+Suppose I try and bring Lucilla and the children back, and make a
+regular family gathering of it?"
+
+"Oh, if you _could_!" sighed Rachel.
+
+All the terrors of her time of trial would be gone, she thought, if she
+could have these two faithful cousins beside her.
+
+So Mrs. Reade went off by the morning train, tolerably easy in her mind.
+She took her big husband with her, "to keep him," as she said, "out of
+mischief;" and she stayed away much longer than she had intended to do.
+She was delighted with Adelonga, and with her sister's companionship.
+
+Ned, also, while being kept in order, enjoyed himself excessively; and
+as long as he was "good" in the matter of his besetting sin, his lady
+and mistress liked him to enjoy himself. There were plenty of bush
+gaieties in the shape of sporting meetings and balls, and the time
+slipped away rapidly, as time at Adelonga usually did.
+
+A dance at the Digbys' gave Mrs. Reade the desired opportunity for
+making the acquaintance of Mr. Dalrymple's people, and she learned a few
+facts with respect to that gentleman which, while considerably
+aggravating her alarm, tended to modify and dignify the impressions of
+him that her mother had given her.
+
+Lucilla showed her a fine photograph of his powerful, melancholy,
+highbred face, and she was quite overcome by it.
+
+"Oh, dear me!" she said to herself, with a sort of angry dismay, "it is
+no wonder that Rachel was infatuated. If _I_ had had attentions from
+that man--little as I am given to falling in love--I think I should have
+been as bad as she."
+
+When Christmas came the sisters were still at Adelonga. Lucilla could
+not leave home, and persuaded Beatrice not to leave her. They contented
+themselves with sending pretty presents and many loving messages and
+excuses to their relatives in Melbourne, and plunged into a series of
+festive entertainments that lasted for several weeks.
+
+Then suddenly, as she was dressing for a ball, Mrs. Reade was startled
+to receive a letter from her mother, begging her to return to town at
+once, as Rachel was very ill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+"THE GROUND-WHIRL OF THE PERISHED LEAVES OF HOPE."
+
+
+Mrs. Reade lost no time in obeying her mother's summons. In two days she
+was back in Melbourne, and having given ten minutes to the inspection of
+her domestic affairs, and refreshed herself with tea and bread and
+butter, she went on to Toorak in the carriage that had brought her from
+the station, without even waiting to change her travelling-dress.
+
+At Toorak she found things in a most discouraging and deplorable
+condition--as they never would have been, she told herself, had she
+remained in town.
+
+Mrs. Hardy, who met her in the hall, and took her to her own room for
+elaborate explanations, was herself a most puzzling and unsatisfactory
+feature in the case, for she made it evident to her daughter's keen
+perception that something more had happened than was accounted for in
+her rather disconnected narrative, and that she did not intend to
+disclose what it was.
+
+There was a touch of nervous recklessness and defiance in the way she
+spoke of Rachel's illness--as if the poor child had crowned a systematic
+series of misdemeanours by falling ill on purpose--and of her hearty
+regret that she had ever had anything to do with such a perverse and
+ungrateful girl, which conveyed to Mrs. Reade the impression that her
+cousin had in some way been persecuted, or had at any rate, been
+subjected to more heroic treatment than her own judgment and advice had
+sanctioned.
+
+Under such circumstances it was, perhaps, natural that her mother should
+be somewhat reserved, since to be fully confidential would be to confess
+that she had made mistakes; but this sudden reversal of old habits,
+occurring at this important crisis in the family fortunes, was a
+serious aggravation of the already sufficient difficulties that the
+little woman had to deal with.
+
+What complicated her task still further was the discovery that Mr.
+Kingston was again a frequent visitor at the house, and a strong
+suspicion that he was cognisant of those unauthorised measures--whatever
+they were--which she was not to hear of. The only thing she could hope
+for was that Rachel would make a clean breast of all her secrets.
+
+"And if she trusts me, I will stand her friend against them all,"
+declared the baffled conspirator to herself, as she sat and listened to
+her mother's tangled story.
+
+It appeared that Rachel's first signs of illness had become apparent
+very soon after the Reades had left town. She began to fade in colour
+and to fail in appetite, and grew nervous, flighty, and restless; and,
+upon investigation, it was discovered that she had lost the habit of
+sleeping as a healthy girl should sleep at night.
+
+The family doctor was called in, who, amongst other remedies prescribed
+a return to horse exercise, which, since the breaking-off of her
+engagement, had been abandoned; and Mr. Kingston thereupon begged so
+earnestly that she would ride Black Agnes again, that she reluctantly
+consented to do so to please him.
+
+Mr. Kingston behaved most delicately, it was explained, and did not
+force himself upon her in her rides. She always went out with William.
+"Always," however, turned out to be only twice, and on both occasions
+the carriage had accompanied her with Mr. Kingston in it.
+
+Just before Christmas she refused to ride any more, and she behaved in
+the most rude and ill-bred manner to Mr. Kingston. On Christmas Day she
+was _very_ aggravating--in what way did not appear--and Mrs. Hardy had
+to "speak" to her; and the result was that she flew into a violent
+passion, and then had a fit of hysterics, and then fainted dead away,
+and did not come round for nearly five minutes.
+
+"I don't recognise Rachel in any of those performances," remarked Mrs.
+Reade. "Why did you not send for me then, mother?"
+
+"Because I thought it was nothing but a temporary attack. The weather
+was sultry--she was full of whims and fancies. What could you have done
+if you had come? And she was better again next day."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, then, when I was doing all I could to nurse and take care of her,
+she went out of a warm room one night, and rambled about the garden or
+somewhere in a heavy dew, and got her feet wet. Wasn't it _too_ bad? I
+could have _shaken_ her when I saw her come in, with a face as white as
+ashes, and chilled to her very bones!"
+
+"She caught cold, I suppose?"
+
+"Of course she did. And then she had a touch of fever--what else was to
+be expected? Her pulse was very high, and she was excited, and inclined
+to be delirious--indeed, we had as much as we could do to manage her. It
+did not last long, and it was really nothing but the consequences of her
+imprudence, the doctor said--and there was a little low kind of fever
+going about just now--and he did not think her constitution was very
+strong. He says she will soon be all right, with care; and indeed, the
+fever is quite allayed since I wrote to you, and any little danger that
+there might have been is over. But she keeps low. She doesn't seem to
+gain strength--and no wonder, considering we can't get her to eat
+anything. I am glad you have come back; perhaps you will have more
+influence with her than I have."
+
+"I suppose I may go up?" Mrs. Reade inquired, after a pause. Her mother
+gave her permission readily; it was a great surprise and relief to her
+to find herself spared the searching cross-examination which she had
+rather uneasily looked forward to.
+
+"You had better put on your bonnet and have a drive," the young lady
+proceeded, pausing with her hand on the door. "It will do you good,
+after being in the house so much. I don't want the horses taken out, and
+they will only scratch holes in the gravel if they stand here doing
+nothing. I am not going away till dinner time."
+
+"Thank you, my dear, I think I will," said Mrs. Hardy. Mrs. Reade went
+upstairs to Rachel's room, and without knocking, opened the door softly.
+
+It was a bright January afternoon, but the heat of the day was over, and
+a sea breeze was springing up. The window was open, and the chintz
+curtains softly rustling to and fro. There was a magnificent bouquet on
+a table at the foot of the bed; the air was full of the perfume of
+roses; a few flies were buzzing over a plate of strawberries set on a
+chair at Rachel's side.
+
+The invalid was lying on a sofa, in a white dressing-gown, in an
+attitude of extreme languor, asleep. One hand holding a fan had dropped
+beside her; the other was under her head. Her dark gold hair was loose
+and tumbled, and curling in damp rings on her temples; her face was
+flushed and thin; there were hollows and shadows under the tired closed
+eyes. She looked as if she had been ill for months.
+
+Mrs. Reade, examining her attentively as she knelt by the sofa, was
+deeply shocked and concerned. Never would she have gone away to Adelonga
+if she could have foreseen this! And never should the poor little thing
+be harried and worried, as she had evidently been, again, if _she_ had
+any power to prevent it--no, not though twenty Mr. Kingstons and all
+their twenty fortunes were at stake.
+
+A mosquito settled upon the girl's white arm, and the light brush of the
+finger that removed it wakened her. She drew a deep breath, and opened
+her eyes languidly; then seeing her visitor, she stared at her for a
+second in a dazed and startled way; and then to Mrs. Reade's great
+embarrassment and distress, she suddenly flung herself into her arms,
+and broke into the wildest weeping.
+
+"Now, Rachel! Now, my dearest child----"
+
+But it would have been as hopeless to try and stop the Falls of Niagara
+as this tide of passion at the flood; seeing which, Mrs. Reade waited
+for the ebb in silence. By the time it came the girl was completely
+exhausted; she seemed to have the merest fragment of strength.
+
+"Now," said Beatrice, when she had sponged her face and hands and
+otherwise taken steps to revive and soothe her, "now tell me what all
+this is about. I know you are in some great trouble, and I have come
+home on purpose to help you."
+
+"No one can help me!" Rachel cried, despairingly, tears rushing afresh
+into her hot eyes.
+
+"Oh, nonsense. Just tell me what is the matter, and see if I can't. Are
+they trying to make you marry Mr. Kingston? Because I can soon send
+_him_ about his business."
+
+"No; Mr. Kingston is very kind _now_. He sends me flowers every day. He
+does not worry me. He is very considerate and thoughtful. For I think
+he--knows."
+
+"Well, and now I want to know. Is it about--someone else? Is it about
+Mr. Dalrymple?"
+
+"Who told you?" the girl demanded, with sharp entreaty. "Oh, Beatrice,
+what have you heard? Did Mrs. Digby tell you anything about him? Is he
+in Queensland? Is he alive? What is he doing?"
+
+Mrs. Reade replied that she had heard nothing of Mr. Dalrymple beyond
+the fact that he was believed to be in Queensland, and doing well.
+
+"If he had not been, they must have known," said Rachel. "Oh, my love,
+if I could see you for myself just once."
+
+She began to cry again, more bitterly than before, and to wring her
+hands. There was a fierce excitement in her grief and despair that for a
+moment stunned the little woman who had never known what it was to be in
+love.
+
+And then Rachel told all the story of her clandestine engagement, as the
+reader already knows it, without any reservations. The _denouement_ was
+exactly what Mrs. Reade expected--"And he never came!"
+
+"Poor little thing!" she ejaculated pitifully.
+
+"I was as certain that he would come as that Christmas would come," said
+Rachel, reckless in her confessions now that she had begun to open her
+heart. "And there _was_ a strange gentleman here, and he was shut up a
+long time with Aunt Elizabeth, and I thought it was he--"
+
+"Are you sure it was not he?"
+
+"Quite sure. When he was going away I ran out into the garden and
+watched for him; he was an ugly _little_ man. And if it had been Roden,
+and he had wanted to see me, _he_ would not have allowed himself to be
+sent away."
+
+"That would have depended on mamma; wouldn't it?"
+
+"Oh, no. He would never have let her send him away; and Aunt Elizabeth
+says, solemnly, that he never came."
+
+"You told _her_ about him then?" asked Mrs. Reade.
+
+"Beatrice, I was nearly mad--I don't know what I said. She was very
+angry--she always hated him. But I did not care--I was too miserable to
+care. And I made her _swear_ that he had never come; and now--it is
+nearly February--now I know he didn't. I don't want anybody to tell me."
+
+Mrs. Reade put all these revelations into her mental crucible, and in a
+few seconds she had the product ready. On presenting it to Rachel,
+wrapped up in the gentlest language, it came to this simply--that "it
+was always the way with men of that kind."
+
+"He is not like other men," said Rachel. "I do not blame him. I have
+thought of it, over and over and over, every night and every day, and I
+know why it was. I _ran after him_, Beatrice--I took him before he
+offered himself to me--I had only seen him once or twice when I showed
+him I loved him, and made him think I wanted him--he did not ask me to
+be his wife until I had given myself to him already! I did not think of
+it then, but I see it clearly now. I dragged him into it--I gave him no
+choice. And now he is away, and he thinks about it, and he knows I am
+not enough for him. How should I be enough--_I_ for such a man as that?
+Oh, that happy woman, who died in his arms! Oh, how I wish I had been
+she!"
+
+"Well," said Mrs. Reade, after a pause, trying to speak cheerfully, but
+feeling profoundly disheartened; "you ought not to have had anything to
+do with lovers and marriages at your time of life, and you must just
+give up thinking of such things until you are older and wiser."
+
+"I shall never give _him_ up," said Rachel quietly; "never, if I live
+to be a hundred. I have told Aunt Elizabeth--I told her to tell Mr.
+Kingston--that I shall never love any other man. It would be impossible,
+after loving him. When I am well I shall ask her to let me go out and be
+a governess, and earn my own living. I don't want to be rich, I want to
+be poor, like him. And some day, perhaps, I may see him again, and be
+able to do something for him--if it isn't till he is an old, old man, I
+don't care. If only God lets him live and lets me live, so that we are
+both in the world together--I'll take my chance of the rest. But--but,"
+and she turned her head from side to side, and began to tremble and cry
+in a weak, hysterical abandonment of all self-command, "if I have to
+wait for years and years, without a sight of his face or a sound of his
+voice, how shall I be able to live? The longing for him will kill me!"
+
+Mrs. Reade went away when her carriage returned, more humble-minded than
+she had been in her life. She wanted very much to stay and nurse her
+cousin until she was better, but she could not do that, because she
+could not trust Ned to keep house and keep sober by himself; so she set
+off to see the doctor to get a confidential report of the "case,"
+meaning to intimate her suspicions that there was a touch of fever on
+the brain, and to gain his sanction to a scheme for removing the invalid
+to her own cheerful abode at South Yarra as soon as she became
+moderately convalescent.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+RACHEL ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF MARRIAGE.
+
+
+Probably no girl of nineteen--probably no man or woman of any age--ever
+died of a broken heart, unless when that complaint was complicated and
+aggravated by the presence of physical disease of some sort.
+
+Rachel's constitution was sound, albeit her nervous organisation was
+extremely delicate, and she did not die, neither under this bitter first
+blow, nor later on, when she had still sharper provocations.
+
+A little tender petting and coddling at the hands of her cousin
+Beatrice, who was now her devoted ally and friend, did more to restore
+her than all the doctor's medicines and all her aunt's jellies and
+broths.
+
+The very talking of her troubles eased and soothed her, and gave her a
+sense of refreshment and rest, and though Beatrice offered her no
+encouragement on Mr. Dalrymple's behalf--and indeed hinted pretty
+broadly that the terrible thing which had happened was an inevitable
+sequel and corrective to a lapse of reason that partook of the character
+of temporary insanity, to say the least of it--she was heartily if not
+demonstratively sympathetic.
+
+Within a fortnight of her cousin's return she reached that stage of
+convalescence which made the removal to South Yarra justifiable, and in
+the doctor's opinion expedient.
+
+Mrs. Reade had great difficulty in carrying out this little enterprise.
+Her mother had never shown herself so impracticable.
+
+She was determined not to let Rachel out of her sight, she said; and she
+stuck to that determination against many artful manoeuvres so steadily
+that the powerful small woman, little accustomed to be thwarted, and
+still less to own to it, nearly made up her mind to confess herself
+beaten, and to break the disappointment to Rachel.
+
+Mrs. Hardy, however, relented in a sudden and unexpected manner. She
+received a consignment of furniture and _bric-a-brac_ from her
+travelling daughter, together with most interesting and bewildering
+advices.
+
+Laura wrote to say that the Toorak House, if it had any respect for
+itself, must immediately get rid of its pierglasses, its whitewash, and
+its aniline colours; and poor Mrs. Hardy, who had ever walked with the
+complacent dignity of a priestess and oracle in the sacred regions of
+household art, was too much excited and disturbed by the humiliating
+discovery that she was old-fashioned and behind the times, and by her
+agonising desire to recover her proper position, to pay the customary
+attention even to Rachel's business.
+
+While she was absorbed in beginning the mighty task of re-adjusting her
+ideas of taste and the details of her domestic environment, which, after
+a few years of painful struggle with the impracticabilities of Eastlake
+mediaevalism, was to result in the existing combination of Chippendale
+and the Japanesque, she felt that it would be a relief to divest herself
+of superfluous cares.
+
+So she laid her daughter under solemn obligations to protect Rachel's
+interests and the honour of the family, and allowed her to take the
+invalid away with her for a week or two, that so she might give her
+undivided attention to the choice of new coverings for the drawing-room
+furniture, and the question what should be done to the ceiling.
+
+The two young women were very grateful for the chance which set them
+free to follow their own devices. Mrs. Reade brought her new brougham--a
+propitiatory offering from Ned after he had scandalously disgraced
+himself by going to a public dinner and coming home in a dishevelled
+condition at noon next day--and conveyed her charge to South Yarra in a
+nest of soft cushions, and laid her on a pillowy sofa in the brightest
+of homely boudoirs, where they discussed the situation and afternoon tea
+with much content and cheerfulness.
+
+Rachel was strangely peaceful and amiable at this time. She puzzled her
+companion excessively. She had, indeed, a sort of exalted
+transcendentalism about her that was almost aggravating to that
+practical and most unsentimental person. Her way of moralising upon love
+and lovers, after such an experience as she had had, was very naive and
+touching, but eminently preposterous, Mrs. Reade considered--and she did
+not at all mind saying so.
+
+"A lover who is unfaithful does the deadliest dishonour that is possible
+to love, in _my_ opinion," said she, with her customary air of decision.
+"To break _any_ pledge is bad enough, but to break _that_ pledge ought
+to disqualify a man from ever again calling himself a man."
+
+"I do not think there should be any pledges in love, either given or
+asked for," said Rachel softly. "Love is not a thing to be tied and
+bound. Fancy a man feeling that he _had_ to keep a promise if he did
+not wish to do it! And, oh! fancy a woman letting him--being deceived
+into letting him make a sacrifice for her! It would be an outrage and a
+degradation to both of them. I think Roden--Mr. Dalrymple--is above
+that, Beatrice."
+
+From all she had heard, Mrs. Reade was decidedly disposed to think so
+too.
+
+"He says that they are a curse upon people's lives--those engagements
+that are kept," continued Rachel, looking solemnly out of the window
+with her pensive eyes.
+
+"Did he tell you that? Dear me, he must be a most extraordinary man."
+
+"I understand it perfectly--I know what he means. When we love one
+another we are not responsible; something in us makes us do it. When we
+leave off loving--when we get dissatisfied--we can't help it either. It
+is nature that tells us to do the one as well as the other; and nature
+should be obeyed, Roden says."
+
+Mrs. Reade made no comment upon this, but thought to herself that it was
+a remarkably wise provision of nature--under the circumstances--that her
+devotee was endowed with the courage of his convictions.
+
+"It is very hard for me now, but it is the truest kindness and
+gentleness on his part," the girl went on, with a tremor in her quiet
+voice. "He knows we understand each other better than any one else can
+do. I think some day he will come and tell me all about it--when he
+thinks I can bear it; how he could not help it; that that other woman's
+memory was more to him than any new love a few days old could be, and
+how he was true to her and to himself, and to me, not to wrong any of us
+any further to gratify my foolishness. It will be something of that
+sort, I know; it will be nothing that is a disgrace to him. Ah,
+Beatrice, you think I am talking childish nonsense, I see it in your
+face."
+
+"I certainly do, my dear. I think you are fully qualified for admission
+into the Yarra Bend, if you wish for the candid truth."
+
+"No; you don't know him, and I do. I am puzzled, I don't deny that I am
+puzzled a little; but I _trust_ him. He may do what he likes; I shall
+never think that he will do anything wrong. Some day it will be
+explained, and I shall see that he was right. I shall love him the more
+for not being afraid to break off with me when he felt it was a mistake.
+Under any circumstances I love him too well not to be thankful I am
+spared the misery of seeing him suffer from an irksome marriage that
+could not satisfy him. And love--as he and I understand love--would be
+degraded by vulgar efforts to keep it under lock and key."
+
+"I don't know whether it occurs to you," remarked Beatrice, with her
+head on one side; "but it is a very dangerous doctrine that you and Mr.
+Dalrymple seem to believe in. Logically worked out, it leads--goodness
+knows where it _doesn't_ lead to."
+
+The blood flew over the girl's pale face. She was the most sensitively
+delicate, the most maidenly, of girls; and she scented a meaning in her
+cousin's words that shocked her terribly.
+
+"I am sure that cannot be," she said, with a majestic gentleness that
+was full of severe reproach.
+
+"You don't imply that husbands and wives, when they are tired of each
+other--or even when only one is tired--are at liberty to make fresh
+combinations?"
+
+"You _know_ I am not alluding to married people, Beatrice. They are like
+nuns who have taken the veil; they have nothing to do with--with--such
+things as we have been speaking of."
+
+"Oh, indeed--haven't they?"
+
+"They are in a sacred place. They are out of the common world--out of
+the arena, so to speak. They have taken their prizes, and gone to sit
+with the spectators. Even if they do marry wrongly, and do not love each
+other afterwards, in the fullest way, after such a dedication as they
+have made--with such ties and confidences, and intimacies between them,
+so sacred, and so close, and so delicate, and so--so--oh, Beatrice,
+don't look at me like that! You know what I mean."
+
+"I am trying to follow you, dear."
+
+"You are married yourself, and you know how it is--better than I do. Yet
+_I_ know, too. If I were married--if I were Roden's wife----"
+
+"You would lie down at his feet and let him clean his boots on you, if
+there did not happen to be a door-mat handy--oh, yes, I quite
+understand _that_."
+
+"I would never make demands upon him that he should love me always," the
+girl proceeded, with a gentle solemnity that this kind of flippant
+witticism could not discompose. "I would never even ask him if he loved
+me. It would seem to me a coarse and insulting question, and it would
+tempt him to doubt whether he did. If he went away from me, I would
+never say to him, 'Write to me often--write me long letters.' It is so
+stupid of people to do that! Of course, if he wanted to, he would; and
+if he did it because he was asked, his letters would be valueless, and
+worse. He should never have to think of me as a mortgage on his life and
+his happiness--he should do as he liked--he should love me as he liked.
+And if ever he left off loving me, I should know he could not help it--I
+should not blame him--I should not ask him why. I should _feel_ it in a
+moment--I am sure, long before he did--as one feels a chill in the air
+when the sun goes in, even if one's eyes are shut; but I should never
+say a word about it. And yet----"
+
+"And yet it would never occur to him, you think, to provide himself with
+a more congenial companion?"
+
+"Beatrice, I cannot talk to you, if you make those suggestions."
+
+"I am only making your own suggestions, my dear. You said it was a
+degradation to love to keep it under lock and key."
+
+"And I said I was not speaking of married people. You _know_ there is
+something--whole worlds of things--besides love to be considered in
+their case."
+
+"Married people are just as human as single people--and so, for the
+matter of that, are nuns who have taken the veil, I suppose. Vows, if I
+understand you rightly, are immoral; and the dictates of nature should
+be obeyed. Nature is uncommonly likely to dictate to man who is not in
+love with his wife that there might possibly exist a more desirable
+woman."
+
+"I don't know how to explain myself," said Rachel, who felt herself in a
+distressing entanglement, and yet was conscious that her principles were
+being utterly misconstrued; "but I know that _that_--what you allude
+to--would be an impossibility."
+
+"Well, I daresay it would," said Mrs. Reade, after a pause. She was
+suddenly struck with the impropriety of insisting upon strict logic in
+the discussion of these delicate matters, all things considered. Yet she
+was not quite content to leave off at this point.
+
+"Put Mr. Dalrymple aside, Rachel. Suppose you were yourself married, not
+to him, but to someone you did not particularly care for?"
+
+"That could never be," the girl replied quickly.
+
+"Oh, I don't know. It was very nearly being, I may take leave to remind
+you. None of us can forsee what will happen, and 'never' is a ridiculous
+word for a child like you to use. You will not live an old maid for
+fifty or sixty years because you are disappointed in a lover whom you
+have known for a few days--don't you believe it."
+
+"I will make no vows," said Rachel with a faint smile; "but I express to
+you my sincere conviction that I shall never marry anybody. If I do--and
+I can't say I _wish_ to be an old maid--I shall tell the person, whoever
+he is, all about Roden, frankly."
+
+"Of course you will. And very probably he will like you the better for
+that frankness, and be quite willing to take you on your own terms. But
+then, suppose after years of married life Mr. Dalrymple turned up again,
+and you found you felt towards him as you do now--what then?"
+
+"What then?" repeated the girl, much disturbed and a little affronted;
+"I should not recognise that I felt so."
+
+"But suppose--for the sake of argument--that you could not help
+yourself?"
+
+"I hope I could help it, Beatrice. I should not allow him to remind me
+of the past."
+
+"Would not the past suggest itself sufficiently? Ah, my dear, he is a
+very strong man! And you are as weak as--well, we needn't say anything
+about that. If he wanted your love back, and you had it in your
+heart----"
+
+"If he did," interposed Rachel; "but I know he never would--I should
+love him no more."
+
+"Would that be in accordance with the terms of your philosophy?"
+
+"Yes, it would. For nature makes us with many capacities. Some of them
+counteract the others. Don't talk of these things any more, Beatrice--I
+don't like it."
+
+"Very well, dear; I won't."
+
+The little lady got up from her seat on the floor, opened a window, put
+the teacups on the table, and asked her cousin if she had seen the
+beautiful Persian tiles that Mr. Kingston had just had sent out to him
+for one of the dados in the new house.
+
+Rachel responded absently, gazed for a little while in silence upon the
+sleepy garden full of flowers and humming bees, and as Mrs. Reade had
+expected, returned herself to the abandoned topic.
+
+"At any rate," she said thoughtfully, "there is one thing I would always
+do. I would tell the truth. I would never have secrets. I would sooner
+do the wrongest thing, the wickedest crime, than hide it. If I _feel_
+things in my heart--well, my husband, if I have one, shall know all
+that I know. And I will never do anything that he--that the whole
+world--may not see."
+
+"Does that seem to you so easy?" inquired Beatrice, settling a top-heavy
+rosebud in a slender Venetian vase. "Did you never have any secrets that
+you were afraid to tell?"
+
+The girl was silent for several minutes. She was crimson to the throat,
+and her face was turned away from her companion.
+
+"I will do what is sure to be right and--safe," she said at last,
+falteringly; "I will never marry anybody, if I do not marry Roden."
+
+
+THE END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's A Mere Chance, Vol. 2 of 3, by Ada Cambridge
+
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