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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41636 ***
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustration.
+      See 41636-h.htm or 41636-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41636/41636-h/41636-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41636/41636-h.zip)
+
+
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      http://archive.org/details/ravenshoe00kingiala
+
+
+
+
+
+RAVENSHOE
+
+
+[Illustration: CHARLES IN THE BALACLAVA CHARGE.
+
+_Drawn by R. Caton Woodville._
+
+_Ravenshoe._ _Page 355._]
+
+
+RAVENSHOE
+
+by
+
+HENRY KINGSLEY
+
+New Edition--Third Thousand
+
+With a Frontispiece by R. Caton Woodville
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+London
+Ward, Lock and Bowden, Limited
+Warwick House, Salisbury Square, E.C.
+New York and Melbourne
+1894
+
+[All rights reserved]
+
+
+
+
+To
+
+MY BROTHER,
+
+CHARLES KINGSLEY,
+
+I DEDICATE THIS TALE,
+IN TOKEN OF A LOVE WHICH ONLY GROWS STRONGER
+AS WE BOTH GET OLDER.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The language used in telling the following story is not (as I hope the
+reader will soon perceive) the Author's, but Mr. William Marston's.
+
+The Author's intention was, while telling the story, to develop, in the
+person of an imaginary narrator, the character of a thoroughly
+good-hearted and tolerably clever man, who has his fingers (as he would
+say himself) in every one's pie, and who, for the life of him, cannot
+keep his own counsel--that is to say, the only person who, by any
+possibility, could have collected the mass of family gossip which makes
+up this tale.
+
+Had the Author told it in his own person, it would have been told with
+less familiarity, and, as he thinks, you would not have laughed quite so
+often.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                                                    PAGE
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+AN ACCOUNT OF THE FAMILY OF RAVENSHOE                                  1
+
+CHAPTER II.
+SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE FOREGOING                                        10
+
+CHAPTER III.
+IN WHICH OUR HERO'S TROUBLES BEGIN                                    14
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+FATHER MACKWORTH                                                      20
+
+CHAPTER V.
+RANFORD                                                               23
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+THE "WARREN HASTINGS"                                                 34
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+IN WHICH CHARLES AND LORD WELTER DISTINGUISH
+THEMSELVES AT THE UNIVERSITY                                          44
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+JOHN MARSTON                                                          50
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+ADELAIDE                                                              57
+
+CHAPTER X.
+LADY ASCOT'S LITTLE NAP                                               63
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+GIVES US AN INSIGHT INTO CHARLES'S DOMESTIC RELATIONS,
+AND SHOWS HOW THE GREAT CONSPIRATOR
+SOLILOQUISED TO THE GRAND CHANDELIER                                  69
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+CONTAINING A SONG BY CHARLES RAVENSHOE, AND ALSO
+FATHER TIERNAY'S OPINION ABOUT THE FAMILY                             79
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+THE BLACK HARE                                                        86
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+LORD SALTIRE'S VISIT, AND SOME OF HIS OPINIONS                        92
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+CHARLES'S "LIDDELL AND SCOTT"                                         99
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+MARSTON'S ARRIVAL                                                    104
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+IN WHICH THERE IS ANOTHER SHIPWRECK                                  107
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+MARSTON'S DISAPPOINTMENT                                             114
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+ELLEN'S FLIGHT                                                       121
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+RANFORD AGAIN                                                        124
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+CLOTHO, LACHESIS, AND ATROPOS                                        131
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+THE LAST GLIMPSE OF OXFORD                                           139
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+THE LAST GLIMPSE OF THE OLD WORLD                                    142
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+THE FIRST GLIMPSE OF THE NEW WORLD                                   146
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+FATHER MACKWORTH BRINGS LORD SALTIRE TO BAY, AND WHAT CAME OF IT     152
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+THE GRAND CRASH                                                      160
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+THE COUP DE GRACE                                                    167
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+FLIGHT                                                               176
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+CHARLES'S RETREAT UPON LONDON                                        180
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+MR. SLOANE                                                           185
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+LIEUTENANT HORNBY                                                    190
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+SOME OF THE HUMOURS OF A LONDON MEWS.                                194
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+A GLIMPSE OF SOME OLD FRIENDS                                        200
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+IN WHICH FRESH MISCHIEF IS BREWED                                    203
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+IN WHICH AN ENTIRELY NEW, AND, AS WILL BE SEEN
+HEREAFTER, A MOST IMPORTANT CHARACTER IS
+INTRODUCED                                                           211
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+THE DERBY                                                            219
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+LORD WELTER'S MÉNAGE                                                 227
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+THE HOUSE FULL OF GHOSTS                                             235
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+CHARLES'S EXPLANATION WITH LORD WELTER                               242
+
+CHAPTER XL.
+A DINNER PARTY AMONG SOME OLD FRIENDS                                246
+
+CHAPTER XLI.
+CHARLES'S SECOND EXPEDITION TO ST. JOHN'S WOOD                       252
+
+CHAPTER XLII.
+RAVENSHOE HALL, DURING ALL THIS                                      261
+
+CHAPTER XLIII.
+THE MEETING                                                          270
+
+CHAPTER XLIV.
+ANOTHER MEETING                                                      275
+
+CHAPTER XLV.
+HALF A MILLION                                                       285
+
+CHAPTER XLVI.
+TO LUNCH WITH LORD ASCOT                                             288
+
+CHAPTER XLVII.
+LORD HAINAULT'S BLOTTING-BOOK                                        302
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII.
+IN WHICH CUTHBERT BEGINS TO SEE THINGS IN A NEW LIGHT                309
+
+CHAPTER XLIX.
+THE SECOND COLUMN OF "THE TIMES" OF THIS DATE, WITH OTHER MATTERS    317
+
+CHAPTER L.
+SHREDS AND PATCHES                                                   320
+
+CHAPTER LI.
+IN WHICH CHARLES COMES TO LIFE AGAIN                                 327
+
+CHAPTER LII.
+WHAT LORD SALTIRE AND FATHER MACKWORTH SAID
+WHEN THEY LOOKED OUT OF THE WINDOW                                   335
+
+CHAPTER LIII.
+CAPTAIN ARCHER TURNS UP                                              343
+
+CHAPTER LIV.
+CHARLES MEETS HORNBY AT LAST                                         349
+
+CHAPTER LV.
+ARCHER'S PROPOSAL                                                    358
+
+CHAPTER LVI.
+SCUTARI                                                              369
+
+CHAPTER LVII.
+WHAT CHARLES DID WITH HIS LAST EIGHTEEN SHILLINGS                    374
+
+CHAPTER LVIII.
+THE NORTH SIDE OF GROSVENOR SQUARE                                   379
+
+CHAPTER LIX.
+LORD ASCOT'S CROWNING ACT OF FOLLY                                   391
+
+CHAPTER LX.
+THE BRIDGE AT LAST                                                   400
+
+CHAPTER LXI.
+SAVED                                                                411
+
+CHAPTER LXII.
+MR. JACKSON'S BIG TROUT                                              415
+
+CHAPTER LXIII.
+IN WHICH GUS CUTS FLORA'S DOLL'S CORNS                               420
+
+CHAPTER LXIV.
+THE ALLIED ARMIES ADVANCE ON RAVENSHOE                               423
+
+CHAPTER LXV.
+FATHER MACKWORTH PUTS THE FINISHING TOUCH ON
+HIS GREAT PIECE OF EMBROIDERY                                        427
+
+CHAPTER LXVI.
+GUS AND FLORA ARE NAUGHTY IN CHURCH, AND THE
+WHOLE BUSINESS COMES TO AN END                                       438
+
+
+
+
+RAVENSHOE.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+AN ACCOUNT OF THE FAMILY OF RAVENSHOE.
+
+
+I had intended to have gone into a family history of the Ravenshoes,
+from the time of Canute to that of her present Majesty, following it
+down through every change and revolution, both secular and religious;
+which would have been deeply interesting, but which would have taken
+more hard reading than one cares to undertake for nothing. I had meant,
+I say, to have been quite diffuse on the annals of one of our oldest
+commoner families; but, on going into the subject, I found I must either
+chronicle little affairs which ought to have been forgotten long ago, or
+do my work in a very patchy and inefficient way. When I say that the
+Ravenshoes have been engaged in every plot, rebellion, and civil war,
+from about a century or so before the Conquest to 1745, and that the
+history of the house was marked by cruelty and rapacity in old times,
+and in those more modern by political tergiversation of the blackest
+dye, the reader will understand why I hesitate to say too much in
+reference to a name which I especially honour. In order, however, that I
+may give some idea of what the hereditary character of the family is, I
+must just lead the reader's eye lightly over some of the principal
+events of their history.
+
+The great Irish families have, as is well known, a banshee, or familiar
+spirit, who, previous to misfortune or death, flits moaning round the
+ancestral castle. Now although the Ravenshoes, like all respectable
+houses, have an hereditary lawsuit; a feud (with the Humbys of Hele); a
+ghost (which the present Ravenshoe claims to have repeatedly seen in
+early youth); and a buried treasure: yet I have never heard that they
+had a banshee. Had such been the case, that unfortunate spirit would
+have had no sinecure of it, but rather must have kept howling night and
+day for nine hundred years or so, in order to have got through her work
+at all. For the Ravenshoes were almost always in trouble, and yet had a
+facility of getting out again, which, to one not aware of the cause, was
+sufficiently inexplicable. Like the Stuarts, they had always taken the
+losing side, and yet, unlike the Stuarts, have always kept their heads
+on their shoulders, and their house over their heads. Lady Ascot says
+that, if Ambrose Ravenshoe had been attainted in 1745, he'd have been
+hung as sure as fate: there was evidence enough against him to hang a
+dozen men. I myself, too, have heard Squire Densil declare, with great
+pride, that the Ravenshoe of King John's time was the only Baron who did
+not sign Magna Charta; and if there were a Ravenshoe at Runnymede, I
+have not the slightest doubt that such was the case. Through the Rose
+wars, again, they were always on the wrong side, whichever that might
+have been, because your Ravenshoe, mind you, was not bound to either
+side in those times, but changed as he fancied fortune was going. As
+your Ravenshoe was the sort of man who generally joined a party just
+when their success was indubitable--that is to say, just when the
+reaction against them was about to set in--he generally found himself
+among the party which was going down hill, who despised him for not
+joining them before, and opposed to the rising party, who hated him
+because he had declared against them. Which little game is common enough
+in this present century among some men of the world, who seem, as a
+general rule, to make as little by it as ever did the Ravenshoes.
+
+Well, whatever your trimmers make by their motion nowadays, the
+Ravenshoes were not successful either at liberal conservatism or
+conservative liberalism. At the end of the reign of Henry VII. they were
+as poor as Job, or poorer. But, before you have time to think of it,
+behold, in 1530, there comes you to court a Sir Alured Ravenshoe, who
+incontinently begins cutting in at the top of the tune, swaggering,
+swearing, dressing, fighting, dicing, and all that sort of thing, and,
+what is more, paying his way in a manner which suggests successful
+burglary as the only solution. Sir Alured, however, as I find, had done
+no worse than marry an old maid (Miss Hincksey, one of the Staffordshire
+Hinckseys) with a splendid fortune; which fortune set the family on its
+legs again for some generations. This Sir Alured seems to have been an
+audacious rogue. He made great interest with the king, who was so far
+pleased with his activity in athletic sports that he gave him a post in
+Ireland. There our Ravenshoe was so fascinated by the charming manners
+of the Earl of Kildare that he even accompanied that nobleman on a
+visit to Desmond; and, after a twelvemonth's unauthorised residence in
+the interior of Ireland, on his return to England he was put into the
+Tower for six months to "consider himself."
+
+This Alured seems to have been a deuce of a fellow, a very good type of
+the family. When British Harry had that difference we wot of with the
+Bishop of Rome, I find Alured to have been engaged in some five or six
+Romish plots, such as had the king been in possession of facts, would
+have consigned him to a rather speedy execution. However, the king seems
+to have looked on this gentleman with a suspicious eye, and to have been
+pretty well aware what sort of man he was, for I find him writing to his
+wife, on the occasion of his going to court--"The King's Grace looked
+but sourly upon me, and said it should go hard, but that the pitcher
+which went so oft to the well should be broke at last. Thereto I making
+answer, 'that that should depend on the pitcher, whether it were iron or
+clomb,' he turned on his heel, and presently departed from me."
+
+He must have been possessed of his full share of family audacity to
+sharpen his wits on the terrible Harry, with such an unpardonable amount
+of treason hanging over him. I have dwelt thus long on him, as he seems
+to have possessed a fair share of the virtues and vices of his family--a
+family always generous and brave, yet always led astray by bad advisers.
+This Alured built Ravenshoe House, as it stands to this day, and in
+which much of the scene of this story is laid.
+
+They seem to have got through the Gunpowder Plot pretty well, though I
+can show you the closet where one of the minor conspirators, one Watson,
+lay _perdu_ for a week or so after that gallant attempt, more I suspect
+from the effect of a guilty conscience than anything else, for I never
+heard of any distinct charge being brought against him. The Forty-five,
+however, did not pass quite so easily, and Ambrose Ravenshoe went as
+near to lose his head as any one of the family since the Conquest. When
+the news came from the north about the alarming advance of the
+Highlanders, it immediately struck Ambrose that this was the best
+opportunity for making a fool of himself that could possibly occur. He
+accordingly, without hesitation or consultation with any mortal soul,
+rang the bell for his butler, sent for his stud-groom, mounted every man
+about the place (twenty or so), armed them, grooms, gardeners, and all,
+with crossbows and partisans from the armoury, and rode into the cross,
+at Stonnington, on a market-day, and boldly proclaimed the Pretender
+king. It soon got about that "the squire" was making a fool of himself,
+and that there was some fun going; so he shortly found himself
+surrounded by a large and somewhat dirty rabble, who, with cries of
+"Well done, old rebel!" and "Hurrah for the Pope!" escorted him, his
+terror-stricken butler and his shame-stricken grooms, to the Crown and
+Sceptre. As good luck would have it, there happened to be in the town
+that day no less a person than Lord Segur, the leading Roman Catholic
+nobleman of the county. He, accompanied by several of the leading
+gentlemen of the same persuasion, burst into the room where the Squire
+sat, overpowered him, and, putting him bound into a coach, carried him
+off to Segur Castle, and locked him up. It took all the strength of the
+Popish party to save him from attainder. The Church rallied right
+bravely round the old house, which had always assisted her with sword
+and purse, and never once had wavered in its allegiance. So while nobler
+heads went down, Ambrose Ravenshoe's remained on his shoulders.
+
+Ambrose died in 1759.
+
+John (Monseigneur) in 1771.
+
+Howard in 1800. He first took the Claycomb hounds.
+
+Petre in 1820. He married Alicia, only daughter of Charles, third Earl
+of Ascot, and was succeeded by Densil, the first of our dramatis
+personæ--the first of all this shadowy line that we shall see in the
+flesh. He was born in the year 1783, and married, first in 1812, at his
+father's desire, a Miss Winkleigh, of whom I know nothing; and second,
+at his own desire, in 1823, Susan, fourth daughter of Lawrence
+Petersham, Esq., of Fairford Grange, county Worcester, by whom he had
+issue--
+
+Cuthbert, born 1826;
+
+Charles, born 1831.
+
+Densil was an only son. His father, a handsome, careless, good-humoured,
+but weak and superstitious man, was entirely in the hands of the
+priests, who during his life were undisputed masters of Ravenshoe. Lady
+Alicia was, as I have said, a daughter of Lord Ascot, a Staunton, as
+staunchly a Protestant a house as any in England. She, however, managed
+to fall in love with the handsome young Popish Squire, and to elope with
+him, changing not only her name, but, to the dismay of her family, her
+faith also, and becoming, pervert-like, more actively bigoted than her
+easy-going husband. She brought little or no money into the family; and,
+from her portrait, appears to have been exceedingly pretty, and
+monstrously silly.
+
+To this strong-minded couple was born, two years after their marriage, a
+son who was called Densil.
+
+This young gentleman seems to have got on much like other young
+gentlemen till the age of twenty-one, when it was determined by the
+higher powers in conclave assembled that he should go to London, and see
+the world; and so, having been cautioned duly how to avoid the flesh and
+the devil, to see the world he went. In a short time intelligence came
+to the confessor of the family, and through him to the father and
+mother, that Densil was seeing the world with a vengeance; that he was
+the constant companion of the Right Honourable Viscount Saltire, the
+great dandy of the Radical Atheist set, with whom no man might play
+picquet and live; that he had been upset in a tilbury with Mademoiselle
+Vaurien of Drury-lane at Kensington turnpike; that he had fought the
+French _émigré_, a Comte de Hautenbas, apropos of the Vaurien
+aforementioned--in short, that he was going on at a deuce of a rate: and
+so a hurried council was called to deliberate what was to be done.
+
+"He will lose his immortal soul," said the priest.
+
+"He will dissipate his property," said his mother.
+
+"He will go to the devil," said his father.
+
+So Father Clifford, good man, was despatched to London, with post
+horses, and ordered to bring back the lost sheep _vi et armis_.
+Accordingly, at ten o'clock one night, Densil's lad was astounded by
+having to admit Father Clifford, who demanded immediately to be led to
+his master.
+
+Now this was awkward, for James well knew what was going on upstairs;
+but he knew also what would happen, sooner or later, to a Ravenshoe
+servant who trifled with a priest, and so he led the way.
+
+The lost sheep which the good father had come to find was not exactly
+sober this evening, and certainly not in a very good temper. He was
+playing _écarté_ with a singularly handsome, though supercilious-looking
+man, dressed in the height of fashion, who, judging from the heap of
+gold beside him, had been winning heavily. The priest trembled and
+crossed himself--this man was the terrible, handsome, wicked, witty,
+Atheistical, radical Lord Saltire, whose tongue no woman could
+withstand, and whose pistol no man dared face; who was currently
+believed to have sold himself to the deuce, or, indeed, as some said, to
+be the deuce himself.
+
+A more cunning man than poor simple Father Clifford would have made some
+common-place remark and withdrawn, after a short greeting, taking
+warning by the impatient scowl that settled on Densil's handsome face.
+Not so he. To be defied by a boy whose law had been his word for ten
+years past never entered into his head, and he sternly advanced towards
+the pair.
+
+Densil inquired if anything were the matter at home. And Lord Saltire,
+anticipating a scene, threw himself back in his chair, stretched out his
+elegant legs, and looked on with the air of a man who knows he is going
+to be amused, and composes himself thoroughly to appreciate the
+entertainment.
+
+"Thus much, my son," said the priest; "your mother is wearing out the
+stones of the oratory with her knees, praying for her first-born, while
+he is wasting his substance, and perilling his soul, with debauched
+Atheistic companions, the enemies of God and man."
+
+Lord Saltire smiled sweetly, bowed elegantly, and took snuff.
+
+"Why do you intrude into my room, and insult my guest?" said Densil,
+casting an angry glance at the priest, who stood calmly like a black
+pillar, with his hands before him. "It is unendurable."
+
+"_Quem Deus vult_," &c. Father Clifford had seen that scowl once or
+twice before, but he would not take warning. He said--
+
+"I am ordered not to go westward without you. I command you to come."
+
+"Command me! command a Ravenshoe!" said Densil, furiously.
+
+Father Clifford, by way of mending matters, now began to lose _his_
+temper.
+
+"You would not be the first Ravenshoe who has been commanded by a
+priest; ay, and has had to obey too," said he.
+
+"And you will not be the first jack-priest who has felt the weight of a
+Ravenshoe's wrath," replied Densil, brutally.
+
+Lord Saltire leant back, and said to the ambient air, "I'll back the
+priest, five twenties to one."
+
+This was too much. Densil would have liked to quarrel with Saltire, but
+that was death--he was the deadest shot in Europe. He grew furious, and
+beyond all control. He told the priest to go (further than purgatory);
+grew blasphemous, emphatically renouncing the creed of his forefathers,
+and, in fact, all other creeds. The priest grew hot and furious too,
+retaliated in no measured terms, and finally left the room with his ears
+stopped, shaking the dust off his feet as he went. Then Lord Saltire
+drew up to the table again, laughing.
+
+"Your estates are entailed, Ravenshoe, I suppose?" said he.
+
+"No."
+
+"Oh! It's your deal, my dear fellow."
+
+Densil got an angry letter from his father in a few days, demanding full
+apologies and recantations, and an immediate return home. Densil had no
+apologies to make, and did not intend to return till the end of the
+season. His father wrote declining the honour of his further
+acquaintance, and sending him a draft for fifty pounds to pay
+outstanding bills, which he very well knew amounted to several
+thousands. In a short time the great Catholic tradesmen, with whom he
+had been dealing, began to press for money in a somewhat insolent way;
+and now Densil began to see that, by defying and insulting the faith and
+the party to which he belonged, he had merely cut himself off from rank,
+wealth, and position. He had defied the _partie prêtre_, and had yet to
+feel their power. In two months he was in the Fleet prison.
+
+His servant (the title "tiger" came in long after this), a half groom,
+half valet, such as men kept in those days--a simple lad from Ravenshoe,
+James Horton by name--for the first time in his life disobeyed orders;
+for, on being told to return home by Densil, he firmly declined doing
+so, and carried his top boots and white neckcloth triumphantly into the
+Fleet, there pursuing his usual avocations with the utmost nonchalance.
+
+"A very distinguished fellow that of yours, Curly" (they all had
+nicknames for one another in those days), said Lord Saltire. "If I were
+not Saltire, I think I would be Jim. To own the only clean face among
+six hundred fellow-creatures is a pre-eminence, a decided pre-eminence.
+I'll buy him of you."
+
+For Lord Saltire came to see him, snuff-box and all. That morning Densil
+was sitting brooding in the dirty room with the barred windows, and
+thinking what a wild free wind would be sweeping across the Downs this
+fine November day, when the door was opened, and in walks me my lord,
+with a sweet smile on his face.
+
+He was dressed in the extreme of fashion--a long-tailed blue coat with
+gold buttons, a frill to his shirt, a white cravat, a wonderful short
+waistcoat, loose short nankeen trousers, low shoes, no gaiters, and a
+low-crowned hat. I am pretty correct, for I have seen his picture, dated
+1804. But you must please to remember that his lordship was in the very
+van of the fashion, and that probably such a dress was not universal for
+two or three years afterwards. I wonder if his well-known audacity would
+be sufficient to make him walk along one of the public thoroughfares in
+such a dress, to-morrow, for a heavy bet--I fancy not.
+
+He smiled sardonically--"My dear fellow," he said, "when a man comes on
+a visit of condolence, I know it is the most wretched taste to say, 'I
+told you so;' but do me the justice to allow that I offered to back the
+priest five to one. I had been coming to you all the week, but Tuesday
+and Wednesday I was at Newmarket; Thursday I was shooting at your
+cousin Ascot's: yesterday I did not care about boring myself with you;
+so I have come to-day because I was at leisure and had nothing better to
+do."
+
+Densil looked up savagely, thinking he had come to insult him: but the
+kindly compassionate look in the piercing grey eye belied the cynical
+curl of the mouth, and disarmed him. He leant his head upon the table
+and sobbed.
+
+Lord Saltire laid his hand kindly on his shoulder, and said--
+
+"You have been a fool, Ravenshoe; you have denied the faith of your
+forefathers. Pardieu, if I had such an article I would not have thrown
+it so lightly away."
+
+"_You_ talk like this? Who next? It was your conversation led me to it.
+Am I worse than you? What faith have you, in God's name?"
+
+"The faith of a French Lycée, my friend; the only one I ever had. I have
+been sufficiently consistent to that, I think."
+
+"Consistent indeed," groaned poor Densil.
+
+"Now, look here," said Saltire; "I may have been to blame in this. But I
+give you my honour, I had no more idea that you would be obstinate
+enough to bring matters to this pass, than I had that you would burn
+down Ravenshoe House because I laughed at it for being old-fashioned. Go
+home, my poor little Catholic pipkin, and don't try to swim with iron
+pots like Wrekin and me. Make submission to that singularly
+_distingué_-looking old turkey-cock of a priest, kiss your mother, and
+get your usual autumn's hunting and shooting."
+
+"Too late! too late, now!" sobbed Densil.
+
+"Not at all, my dear fellow," said Saltire, taking a pinch of snuff;
+"the partridges will be a little wild of course--that you must expect;
+but you ought to get some very pretty pheasant and cock-shooting. Come,
+say yes. Have your debts paid, and get out of this infernal hole. A week
+of this would tame the devil, I should think."
+
+"If you think you could do anything for me, Saltire."
+
+Lord Saltire immediately retired, and re-appeared, leading in a lady by
+her hand. She raised the veil from her head, and he saw his mother. In a
+moment she was crying on his neck; and, as he looked over her shoulder,
+he saw a blue coat passing out of the door, and that was the last of
+Lord Saltire for the present.
+
+It was no part of the game of the priests to give Densil a cold welcome
+home. Twenty smiling faces were grouped in the porch to welcome him
+back; and among them all none smiled more brightly than the old priest
+and his father. The dogs went wild with joy, and his favourite
+peregrine scolded on the falconer's wrist, and struggled with her
+jesses, shrilly reminding him of the merry old days by the dreary salt
+marsh, or the lonely lake.
+
+The past was never once alluded to in any way by any one in the house.
+Old Squire Petre shook hands with faithful James, and gave him a watch,
+ordering him to ride a certain colt next day, and see how well forward
+he could get him. So next day they drew the home covers, and the fox,
+brave fellow, ran out to Parkside, making for the granite walls of
+Hessitor. And, when Densil felt his nostrils filled once more by the
+free rushing mountain air, he shouted aloud for joy, and James's voice
+alongside of him said--
+
+"This is better than the Fleet, sir."
+
+And so Densil played a single-wicket match with the Holy Church, and,
+like a great many other people, got bowled out in the first innings. He
+returned to his allegiance in the most exemplary manner, and settled
+down to the most humdrum of young country gentlemen. He did exactly what
+every one else about him did. He was not naturally a profligate or
+vicious man; but there was a wild devil of animal passion in him, which
+had broken out in London, and which was now quieted by dread of
+consequences, but which he felt and knew was there, and might break out
+again. He was a changed man. There was a gulf between him and the life
+he had led before he went to London. He had tasted of liberty (or
+rather, not to profane that Divine word, of licentiousness), and yet not
+drunk long enough to make him weary of the draught. He had heard the
+dogmas he was brought up to believe infallible turned to unutterable
+ridicule by men like Saltire and Wrekin; men who, as he had the wit to
+see, were a thousand times cleverer and better informed than Father
+Clifford or Father Dennis. In short, he had found out, as a great many
+others have, that Popery won't hold water, and so, as a _pis aller_, he
+adopted Saltire's creed--that religion was necessary for the government
+of States, that one religion was as good as another, and that, _cæteris
+paribus_, the best religion was the one which secured the possessor
+£10,000 a year, and therefore Densil was a devout Catholic.
+
+It was thought by the allied powers that he ought to marry. He had no
+objection and so he married a young lady, a Miss Winkleigh--Catholic, of
+course--about whom I can get no information whatever. Lady Ascot says
+that she was a pale girl, with about as much air as a milkmaid; on which
+two facts I can build no theory as to her personal character. She died
+in 1816, childless; and in 1820 Densil lost both his father and mother,
+and found himself, at the age of thirty-seven, master of Ravenshoe and
+master of himself.
+
+He felt the loss of the old folks most keenly, more keenly than that of
+his wife. He seemed without a stay or holdfast in the world, for he was
+a poorly educated man, without resources; and so he went on moping and
+brooding until good old Father Clifford, who loved him dearly, got
+alarmed, and recommended travels. He recommended Rome, the cradle of the
+faith, and to Rome he went.
+
+He stayed at Rome a year; at the end of which time he appeared suddenly
+at home with a beautiful young wife on his arm. As Father Clifford,
+trembling and astonished, advanced to lay his hand upon her head, she
+drew up, laughed, and said, "Spare yourself the trouble, my dear sir; I
+am a Protestant."
+
+I have had to tell you all this, in order to show you how it came about
+that Densil, though a Papist, bethought of marrying a Protestant wife to
+keep up a balance of power in his house. For, if he had not married this
+lady, the hero of this book would never have been born; and this greater
+proposition contains the less, "that if he had never been born, his
+history would never have been written, and so this book would have had
+no existence."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE FOREGOING.
+
+
+The second Mrs. Ravenshoe was the handsome dowerless daughter of a
+Worcester squire, of good standing, who, being blessed with an
+extravagant son, and six handsome daughters, had lived for several years
+abroad, finding society more accessible, and consequently, the
+matrimonial chances of the "Petersham girls" proportionately greater
+than in England. She was a handsome proud woman, not particularly
+clever, or particularly agreeable, or particularly anything, except
+particularly self-possessed. She had been long enough looking after an
+establishment to know thoroughly the value of one, and had seen quite
+enough of good houses to know that a house without a mistress is no
+house at all. Accordingly, in a very few days the house felt her
+presence, submitted with the best grace to her not unkindly rule, and in
+a week they all felt as if she had been there for years.
+
+Father Clifford, who longed only for peace, and was getting very old,
+got very fond of her, heretic as she was. She, too, liked the handsome,
+gentlemanly old man, and made herself agreeable to him, as a woman of
+the world knows so well how to do. Father Mackworth, on the other hand,
+his young coadjutor since Father Dennis's death, an importation of Lady
+Alicia's from Rome, very soon fell under her displeasure. The first
+Sunday after her arrival, she drove to church, and occupied the great
+old family pew, to the immense astonishment of the rustics, and, after
+afternoon service, caught up the old vicar in her imperious off-hand
+way, and will he nil he, carried him off to dinner--at which meal he was
+horrified to find himself sitting with two shaven priests, who talked
+Latin and crossed themselves. His embarrassment was greatly increased by
+the behaviour of Mrs. Ravenshoe, who admired his sermon, and spoke on
+doctrinal points with him as though there were not a priest within a
+mile. Father Mackworth was imprudent enough to begin talking at him, and
+at last said something unmistakably impertinent; upon which Mrs.
+Ravenshoe put her glass in her eye, and favoured him with such a glance
+of haughty astonishment as silenced him at once.
+
+This was the beginning of hostilities between them, if one can give the
+name of hostilities to a series of infinitesimal annoyances on the one
+side, and to immeasurable and barely concealed contempt on the other.
+Mackworth, on the one hand, knew that she understood and despised him,
+and he hated her. She on the other hand knew that he knew it, but
+thought him too much below her notice, save now and then that she might
+put down with a high hand any, even the most distant, approach to a
+tangible impertinence. But she was no match for him in the arts of
+petty, delicate, galling annoyances. There he was her master; he had
+been brought up in a good school for that, and had learnt his lesson
+kindly. He found that she disliked his presence, and shrunk from his
+smooth, lean face with unutterable dislike. From that moment he was
+always in her way, overwhelming her with oily politeness, rushing across
+the room to pick up anything she had dropped, or to open the door, till
+it required the greatest restraint to avoid breaking through all forms
+of politeness, and bidding him begone. But why should we go on detailing
+trifles like these, which in themselves are nothing, but accumulated are
+unbearable?
+
+So it went on, till one morning, about two years after the marriage,
+Mackworth appeared in Clifford's room, and, yawning, threw himself into
+a chair.
+
+"Benedicite," said Father Clifford, who never neglected religious
+etiquette on any occasion.
+
+Mackworth stretched out his legs and yawned, rather rudely, and then
+relapsed into silence. Father Clifford went on reading. At last
+Mackworth spoke.
+
+"I'll tell you what, my good friend, I am getting sick of this; I shall
+go back to Rome."
+
+"To Rome?"
+
+"Yes, back to Rome," repeated the other impertinently, for he always
+treated the good old priest with contemptuous insolence when they were
+alone. "What is the use of staying here, fighting that woman? There is
+no more chance of turning her than a rock, and there is going to be no
+family."
+
+"You think so?" said Clifford.
+
+"Good heavens, does it look like it? Two years, and not a sign; besides,
+should I talk of going, if I thought so? Then there would be a career
+worthy of me; then I should have a chance of deserving well of the
+Church, by keeping a wavering family in her bosom. And I could do it,
+too: every child would be a fresh weapon in my hands against that woman.
+Clifford, do you think that Ravenshoe is safe?"
+
+He said this so abruptly that Clifford coloured and started. Mackworth
+at the same time turned suddenly upon him, and scrutinised his face
+keenly.
+
+"Safe!" said the old man; "what makes you fear otherwise?"
+
+"Nothing special," said Mackworth; "only I have never been easy since
+you told me of that London escapade years ago."
+
+"He has been very devout ever since," said Clifford. "I fear nothing."
+
+"Humph! Well, I am glad to hear it," said Mackworth. "I shall go to
+Rome. I'd sooner be gossiping with Alphonse and Pierre in the cloisters
+than vegetating here. My talents are thrown away."
+
+He departed down the winding steps of the priest's turret, which led to
+the flower garden. The day was fine, and a pleasant seat a short
+distance off invited him to sit. He could get a book he knew from the
+drawing-room, and sit there. So, with habitually noiseless tread, he
+passed along the dark corridor, and opened the drawing-room door.
+
+Nobody was there. The book he wanted was in the little drawing-room
+beyond, separated from the room he was in by a partly-drawn curtain. The
+priest advanced silently over the deep piled carpet and looked in.
+
+The summer sunlight, struggling through a waving bower of climbing
+plants and the small panes of a deeply mullioned window, fell upon two
+persons, at the sight of whom he paused, and, holding his breath, stood,
+like a black statue in the gloomy room, wrapped in astonishment.
+
+He had never in his life heard these twain use any words beyond those of
+common courtesy towards one another; he had thought them the most
+indifferent, the coldest pair, he had ever seen. But now! now, the
+haughty beauty was bending from her chair over her husband, who sat on a
+stool at her feet; her arm was round his neck, and her hand was in his;
+and, as he looked, she parted the clustering black curls from his
+forehead and kissed him.
+
+He bent forward and listened more eagerly. He could hear the surf on the
+shore, the sea-birds on the cliffs, the nightingale in the wood; they
+fell upon his ear, but he could not distinguish them; he waited only for
+one of the two figures before him to speak.
+
+At last Mrs. Ravenshoe broke silence, but in so low a voice that even
+he, whose attention was strained to the uttermost, could barely catch
+what she said.
+
+"I yield, my love," said she; "I give you this one, but mind, the rest
+are mine. I have your solemn promise for that?"
+
+"My solemn promise," said Densil, and kissed her again.
+
+"My dear," she resumed, "I wish you could get rid of that priest, that
+Mackworth. He is irksome to me."
+
+"He was recommended to my especial care by my mother," was Densil's
+reply. "If you could let him stay I should much rather."
+
+"Oh, let him stay!" said she; "he is too contemptible for me to annoy
+myself about. But I distrust him, Densil. He has a lowering look
+sometimes."
+
+"He is talented and agreeable," said Densil; "but I never liked him."
+
+The listener turned to go, having heard enough, but was arrested by her
+continuing--
+
+"By the by, my love, do you know that that impudent girl Norah has been
+secretly married this three months?"
+
+The priest listened more intently than ever.
+
+"Who to?" asked Densil.
+
+"To James, your keeper."
+
+"I am glad of that. That lad James stuck to me in prison, Susan, when
+they all left me. She is a fine, faithful creature, too. Mind you give
+her a good scolding."
+
+Mackworth had heard enough apparently, for he stole gently away through
+the gloomy room, and walked musingly upstairs to Father Clifford.
+
+That excellent old man took up the conversation just where it had left
+off.
+
+"And when," said he, "my brother, do you propose returning to Rome?"
+
+"I shall not go to Rome at all," was the satisfactory reply, followed by
+a deep silence.
+
+In a few months, much to Father Clifford's joy and surprise, Mrs.
+Ravenshoe bore a noble boy, which was named Cuthbert. Cuthbert was
+brought up in the Romish faith, and at five years old had just begun to
+learn his prayers of Father Clifford, when an event occurred equally
+unexpected by all parties. Mrs. Ravenshoe was again found to be in a
+condition to make an addition to her family.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+IN WHICH OUR HERO'S TROUBLES BEGIN.
+
+
+If you were a lazy yachtsman, sliding on a summer's day, before a gentle
+easterly breeze, over the long swell from the Atlantic, past the
+south-westerly shores of the Bristol Channel, you would find, after
+sailing all day beneath shoreless headlands of black slate, that the
+land suddenly fell away and sunk down, leaving, instead of beetling
+cliffs, a lovely amphitheatre of hanging wood and lawn, fronted by a
+beach of yellow sand--a pleasing contrast to the white surf and dark
+crag to which your eye had got accustomed.
+
+This beautiful semicircular basin is about two miles in diameter,
+surrounded by hills on all sides, save that which is open to the sea.
+East and west the headlands stretch out a mile or more, forming a fine
+bay open to the north; while behind, landward, the downs roll up above
+the woodlands, a bare expanse of grass and grey stone. Half way along
+the sandy beach, a trout-stream comes foaming out of a dark wood, and
+finds its way across the shore in fifty sparkling channels; and the eye,
+caught by the silver thread of water, is snatched away above and beyond
+it, along a wooded glen, the cradle of the stream, which pierces the
+country landward for a mile or two, till the misty vista is abruptly
+barred by a steep blue hill, which crosses the valley at right angles. A
+pretty little village stands at the mouth of the stream, and straggles
+with charming irregularity along the shore for a considerable distance
+westward; while behind, some little distance up the glen, a handsome
+church tower rises from among the trees. There are some fishing boats at
+anchor, there are some small boats on the beach, there is a coasting
+schooner beached and discharging coal, there are some fishermen
+lounging, there are some nets drying, there are some boys bathing, there
+are two grooms exercising four handsome horses; but it is not upon
+horses, men, boats, ship, village, church, or stream, that you will find
+your eye resting, but upon a noble, turreted, deep-porched, grey stone
+mansion, that stands on the opposite side of the stream, about a hundred
+feet above the village.
+
+On the east bank of the little river, just where it joins the sea,
+abrupt lawns of grass and fern, beautifully broken by groups of birch
+and oak, rise above the dark woodlands, at the culminating point of
+which, on a buttress which runs down from the higher hills behind,
+stands the house I speak of, the north front looking on the sea, and the
+west on the wooded glen before mentioned--the house on a ridge dividing
+the two. Immediately behind again the dark woodlands begin once more,
+and above them is the moor.
+
+The house itself is of grey stone, built in the time of Henry VIII. The
+façade is exceedingly noble, though irregular; the most striking feature
+in the north or sea front being a large dark porch, open on three sides,
+forming the basement of a high stone tower, which occupies the centre of
+the building. At the north-west corner (that towards the village) rises
+another tower of equal height; and behind, above the irregular groups of
+chimneys, the more modern cupola of the stables shows itself as the
+highest point of all, and gives, combined with the other towers, a
+charming air of irregularity to the whole. The windows are mostly long,
+low, and heavily mullioned, and the walls are battlemented.
+
+On approaching the house you find that it is built very much after the
+fashion of a college, with a quadrangle in the centre. Two sides of
+this, the north and west, are occupied by the house, the south by the
+stables, and the east by a long and somewhat handsome chapel, of greater
+antiquity than the rest of the house. The centre of this quad, in place
+of the trim grass-plat, is occupied by a tan lunging ring, in the middle
+of which stands a granite basin filled with crystal water from the
+hills. In front of the west wing, a terraced flower-garden goes step by
+step towards the stream, till the smooth-shaven lawns almost mingle with
+the wild ferny heather turf of the park, where the dappled deer browse,
+and the rabbit runs to and fro busily. On the north, towards the sea,
+there are no gardens; but a noble gravel terrace, divided from the park
+only by a deep rampart, runs along beneath the windows; and to the east
+the deer-park stretches away till lawn and glade are swallowed up in the
+encroaching woodland.
+
+Such is Ravenshoe Hall at the present day, and such it was on the 10th
+of June, 1831 (I like to be particular), as regards the still life of
+the place; but, if one had then regarded the living inhabitants, one
+would have seen signs of an unusual agitation. Round the kitchen door
+stood a group of female servants talking eagerly together; and, at the
+other side of the court, some half-dozen grooms and helpers were
+evidently busy on the same theme, till the appearance of the stud-groom
+entering the yard suddenly dispersed them right and left; to do nothing
+with superabundant energy.
+
+To them also entered a lean, quiet-looking man, aged at this time
+fifty-two. We have seen him before. He was our old friend Jim, who had
+attended Densil in the Fleet prison in old times. He had some time
+before this married a beautiful Irish Catholic waiting-maid of Lady
+Alicia's, by whom he had a daughter, now five years old, and a son aged
+one week. He walked across the yard to where the women were talking, and
+addressed them.
+
+"How is my lady to-night?" said he.
+
+"Holy Mother of God!" said a weeping Irish housemaid, "she's worse."
+
+"How's the young master?"
+
+"Hearty, a darling; crying his little eyes out, he is, a-bless him."
+
+"He'll be bigger than Master Cuthbert, I'll warrant ye," said a portly
+cook.
+
+"When was he born?" asked James.
+
+"Nigh on two hours," said the other speaker.
+
+At this conjuncture a groom came running through the passage, putting a
+note in his hat as he went; he came to the stud-groom, and said
+hurriedly, "A note for Dr. Marcy at Lanceston, sir. What horse am I to
+take?"
+
+"Trumpeter. How is my lady?"
+
+"Going, as far as I can gather, sir."
+
+James waited until he heard him dash full speed out of the yard, and
+then till he saw him disappear like a speck along the mountain road far
+aloft; then he went into the house, and, getting as near to the sick
+room as he dared, waited quietly on the stairs.
+
+It was a house of woe, indeed! Two hours before, one feeble, wailing
+little creature had taken up his burthen, and begun his weary pilgrimage
+across the unknown desolate land that lay between him and the grave--for
+a part of which you and I are to accompany him; while his mother even
+now was preparing for her rest, yet striving for the child's sake to
+lengthen the last few weary steps of her journey, that they two might
+walk, were it never so short a distance, together.
+
+The room was very still. Faintly the pure scents and sounds stole into
+the chamber of death from the blessed summer air without; gently came
+the murmur of the surf upon the sands; fainter and still fainter came
+the breath of the dying mother. The babe lay beside her, and her arm was
+round its body. The old vicar knelt by the bed, and Densil stood with
+folded arms and bowed head, watching the face which had grown so dear to
+him, till the light should die out from it for ever. Only those four in
+the chamber of death!
+
+The sighing grew louder, and the eye grew once more animated. She
+reached out her hand, and, taking one of the vicar's, laid it upon the
+baby's head. Then she looked at Densil, who was now leaning over her,
+and with a great effort spoke.
+
+"Densil, dear, you will remember your promise?"
+
+"I will swear it, my love."
+
+A few more laboured sighs, and a greater effort: "Swear it to me, love."
+
+He swore that he would respect the promise he had made, so help him God!
+
+The eyes were fixed now, and all was still. Then there was a long sigh;
+then there was a long silence; then the vicar rose from his knees, and
+looked at Densil. There were but three in the chamber now.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Densil passed through the weeping women, and went straight to his own
+study. There he sat down, tearless, musing much about her who was gone.
+
+How he had grown to love that woman, he thought--her that he had married
+for her beauty and her pride, and had thought so cold and hard! He
+remembered how the love of her had grown stronger, year by year, since
+their first child was born. How he had respected her for her firmness
+and consistency; and how often, he thought, had he sheltered his
+weakness behind her strength! His right hand was gone, and he was left
+alone to do battle by himself!
+
+One thing was certain. Happen what would, his promise should be
+respected, and this last boy, just born, should be brought up a
+Protestant as his mother had wished. He knew the opposition he would
+have from Father Mackworth, and determined to brave it. And, as the name
+of that man came into his mind, some of his old fierce, savage nature
+broke out again, and he almost cursed him aloud.
+
+"I hate that fellow! I should like to defy him, and let him do his
+worst. I'd do it, now she's gone, if it wasn't for the boys. No, hang
+it, it wouldn't do. If I'd told him under seal of confession, instead of
+letting him grab it out, he couldn't have hung it over me like this. I
+wish he was--"
+
+If Father Mackworth had had the slightest inkling of the state of mind
+of his worthy patron towards him, it is very certain that he would not
+have chosen that very moment to rap at the door. The most acute of us
+make a mistake sometimes; and he, haunted with vague suspicions since
+the conversation he had overheard in the drawing-room before the birth
+of Cuthbert, grew impatient, and determined to solve his doubts at once,
+and, as we have seen, selected the singularly happy moment when poor
+passionate Densil was cursing him to his heart's content.
+
+"Brother, I am come to comfort you," he said, opening the door before
+Densil had time, either to finish the sentence written above, or to say
+"Come in." "This is a heavy affliction, and the heavier because--"
+
+"Go away," said Densil, pointing to the door.
+
+"Nay, nay," said the priest, "hear me--"
+
+"Go away," said Densil, in a louder tone. "Do you hear me? I want to be
+alone, and I mean to be. Go!"
+
+How recklessly defiant weak men get when they are once fairly in a rage?
+Densil, who was in general civilly afraid of this man, would have defied
+fifty such as he now.
+
+"There is one thing, Mr. Ravenshoe," said the priest, in a very
+different tone, "about which I feel it my duty to speak to you, in spite
+of the somewhat unreasonable form your grief has assumed. I wish to know
+what you mean to call your son."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because he is ailing, and I wish to baptise him."
+
+"You will do nothing of the kind, sir," said Densil, as red as a
+turkey-cock. "He will be baptised in proper time in the parish church.
+He is to be brought up a Protestant."
+
+The priest looked steadily at Densil, who, now brought fairly to bay,
+was bent on behaving like a valiant man, and said slowly--
+
+"So my suspicions are confirmed, then, and you have determined to hand
+over your son to eternal perdition" (he didn't say perdition, he used a
+stronger word, which we will dispense with, if you have no objection).
+
+"Perdition, sir!" bawled Densil; "how dare you talk of a son of mine in
+that free-and-easy sort of way? Why, what my family has done for the
+Church ought to keep a dozen generations of Ravenshoes from a
+possibility of perdition, sir. Don't tell me."
+
+This new and astounding theory of justification by works, which poor
+Densil had broached in his wrath, was overheard by a round-faced,
+bright-eyed, curly-headed man about fifty, who entered the room
+suddenly, followed by James. For one instant you might have seen a smile
+of intense amusement pass over his merry face; but in an instant it was
+gone again, and he gravely addressed Densil.
+
+"My dear Mr. Ravenshoe, I must use my authority as doctor, to request
+that your son's spiritual welfare should for the present yield to his
+temporal necessities. You must have a wet-nurse, my good sir."
+
+Densil's brow had grown placid in a moment beneath the doctor's kindly
+glance. "God bless me," he said, "I never thought of it. Poor little
+lad! poor little lad!"
+
+"I hope, sir," said James, "that you will let Norah have the young
+master. She has set her heart upon it."
+
+"I have seen Mrs. Horton," said the doctor, "and I quite approve of the
+proposal. I think it, indeed, a most special providence that she should
+be able to undertake it. Had it been otherwise, we might have been
+undone."
+
+"Let us go at once," said the impetuous Densil. "Where is the nurse?
+where is the boy?" And, so saying, he hurried out of the room, followed
+by the doctor and James.
+
+Mackworth stood alone, looking out of the window, silent. He stood so
+long that one who watched him peered from his hiding-place more than
+once to see if he were gone. At length he raised his arm and struck his
+clenched hand against the rough granite window-sill so hard that he
+brought blood. Then he moodily left the room.
+
+As soon as the room was quiet, a child about five years old crept
+stealthily from a dark corner where he had lain hidden, and with a look
+of mingled shyness and curiosity on his face, departed quietly by
+another door.
+
+Meanwhile, Densil, James, and the doctor, accompanied by the nurse and
+baby, were holding their way across the court-yard towards a cottage
+which lay in the wood beyond the stables. James opened the door, and
+they passed into the inner room.
+
+A beautiful woman was sitting propped up by pillows, nursing a week-old
+child. The sunlight, admitted by a half-open shutter, fell upon her,
+lighting up her delicate features, her pale pure complexion, and
+bringing a strange sheen on her long loose black hair. Her face was bent
+down, gazing on the child which lay on her breast; and at the entrance
+of the party she looked up, and displayed a large lustrous dark blue
+eye, which lighted up with infinite tenderness, as Densil, taking the
+wailing boy from the nurse, placed it on her arm beside the other.
+
+"Take care of that for me, Norah," said Densil. "It has no mother but
+you, now."
+
+"Acushla ma chree," she answered; "bless my little bird. Come to your
+nest, alanna, come to your pretty brother, my darlin'."
+
+The child's wailing was stilled now, and the doctor remarked, and
+remembered long afterwards, that the little waxen fingers, clutching
+uneasily about, came in contact with the little hand of the other child,
+and paused there. At this moment, a beautiful little girl, about five
+years old, got on the bed, and nestled her peachy cheek against her
+mother's. As they went out, he turned and looked at the beautiful group
+once more, and then he followed Densil back to the house of mourning.
+
+Reader, before we have done with those three innocent little faces, we
+shall see them distorted and changed by many passions, and shall meet
+them in many strange places. Come, take my hand, and we will follow them
+on to the end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+FATHER MACKWORTH.
+
+
+I have noticed that the sayings and doings of young gentlemen before
+they come to the age of, say seven or eight, are hardly interesting to
+any but their immediate relations and friends. I have my eye, at this
+moment, on a young gentleman of the mature age of two, the instances of
+whose sagacity and eloquence are of greater importance, and certainly
+more pleasant, to me, than the projects of Napoleon, or the orations of
+Bright. And yet I fear that even his most brilliant joke, if committed
+to paper, would fall dead upon the public ear; and so, for the present,
+I shall leave Charles Ravenshoe to the care of Norah, and pass on to
+some others who demand our attention more.
+
+The first thing which John Mackworth remembered was his being left in
+the _loge_ of a French school at Rouen by an English footman. Trying to
+push back his memory further, he always failed to conjure up any
+previous recollection to that. He had certainly a very indistinct one of
+having been happier, and having lived quietly in pleasant country places
+with a kind woman who talked English; but his first decided impression
+always remained the same--that of being, at six years old, left
+friendless, alone, among twenty or thirty French boys older than
+himself.
+
+His was a cruel fate. He would have been happier apprenticed to a
+collier. If the man who sent him there had wished to inflict the
+heaviest conceivable punishment on the poor unconscious little innocent,
+he could have done no more than simply left him at that school. We shall
+see how he found out at last who his benefactor was.
+
+English boys are sometimes brutal to one another (though not so often as
+some wish to make out), and are always rough. Yet I must say, as far as
+my personal experience goes, the French boy is entirely master in the
+art of tormenting. He never strikes; he does not know how to clench his
+fist. He is an arrant coward, according to an English schoolboy's
+definition of the word: but at pinching, pulling hair, ear pulling, and
+that class of annoyance, all the natural ingenuity of his nation comes
+out, and he is superb; add to this a combined insolent studied sarcasm,
+and you have an idea of what a disagreeable French schoolboy can be.
+
+To say that the boys at poor John Mackworth's school put all these
+methods of torture in force against him, and ten times more, is to give
+one but a faint idea of his sufferings. The English at that time were
+hated with a hatred which we in these sober times have but little idea
+of; and, with the cannon of Trafalgar ringing as it were in their ears,
+these young French gentlemen seized on Mackworth as a lawful prize
+providentially delivered into their hands. We do not know what he may
+have been under happier auspices, or what he may be yet with a more
+favourable start in another life; we have only to do with what he was.
+Six years of friendless persecution, of life ungraced and uncheered by
+domestic love, of such bitter misery as childhood alone is capable of
+feeling or enduring, transformed him from a child into a heartless,
+vindictive man.
+
+And then, the French schoolmaster having roughly finished the piece of
+goods, it was sent to Rome to be polished and turned out ready for the
+market. Here I must leave him; I don't know the process. I have seen the
+article when finished, and am familiar with it. I know the trade mark on
+it as well as I know the Tower mark on my rifle. I may predicate of a
+glass that it is Bohemian ruby, and yet not know how they gave it the
+colour. I must leave descriptions of that system to Mr. Steinmetz, and
+men who have been behind the scenes.
+
+The red-hot ultramontane thorough-going Catholicism of that pretty
+pervert, Lady Alicia, was but ill satisfied with the sensible, old
+English, cut and dried notions of the good Father Clifford. A comparison
+of notes with two or three other great ladies, brought about a
+consultation, and a letter to Rome, the result of which was that a young
+Englishman of presentable exterior, polite manners, talking English with
+a slight foreign accent, made his appearance at Ravenshoe, and was
+installed as her ladyship's confessor, about eighteen months before her
+death.
+
+His talents were by no means ordinary. In very few days he had gauged
+every intellect in the house, and found that he was by far the superior
+of all in wit and education; and he determined that as long as he stayed
+in the house he would be master there.
+
+Densil's jealous temper sadly interfered with this excellent resolution;
+he was immensely angry and rebellious at the slightest apparent
+infringement of his prerogative, and after his parents' death treated
+Mackworth in such an exceedingly cavalier manner, that the latter feared
+he should have to move, till chance threw into his hand a whip wherewith
+he might drive Densil where he would. He discovered a scandalous liaison
+of poor Densil's, and in an indirect manner let him know that he knew
+all about it. This served to cement his influence until the appearance
+of Mrs. Ravenshoe the second, who, as we have seen, treated him with
+such ill-disguised contempt, that he was anything but comfortable, and
+was even meditating a retreat to Rome, when the conversation he
+overheard in the drawing-room made him pause, and the birth of the boy
+Cuthbert confirmed his resolution to stay.
+
+For now, indeed, there was a prospect open to him. Here was this child
+delivered over to him like clay to a potter, that he might form it as he
+would. It should go hard but that the revenues and county influence of
+the Ravenshoes should tend to the glory of the Church as heretofore.
+Only one person was in his way, and that was Mrs. Ravenshoe; after her
+death he was master of the situation with regard to the eldest of the
+boys. He had partly guessed, ever since he overheard the conversation
+of Densil and his wife, that some sort of bargain existed between them
+about the second child; but he paid little heed to it. It was,
+therefore, with the bitterest anger that he saw his fears confirmed, and
+Densil angrily obstinate on the matter; for supposing Cuthbert were to
+die, all his trouble and anxiety would avail nothing, and the old house
+and lands would fall to a Protestant heir, the first time in the history
+of the island. Father Clifford consoled him.
+
+Meanwhile, his behaviour towards Densil was gradually and insensibly
+altered. He became the free and easy man of the world, the amusing
+companion, the wise counsellor. He saw that Densil was of a nature to
+lean on some one, and he was determined it should be on him; so he made
+himself necessary. But he did more than this; he determined he would be
+beloved as well as respected, and with a happy audacity he set to work
+to win that poor wild foolish heart to himself, using such arts of
+pleasing as must have been furnished by his own mother wit, and could
+never have been learned in a hundred years from a Jesuit college. The
+poor heart was not a hard one to win; and, the day they buried poor
+Father Clifford in the mausoleum, it was with a mixture of pride at his
+own talents, and contemptuous pity for his dupe, that Mackworth listened
+to Densil as he told him that he was now his only friend, and besought
+him not to leave him--which thing Mackworth promised, with the deepest
+sincerity, he would not do.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+RANFORD.
+
+
+Master Charles, blessed with a placid temper and a splendid appetite,
+throve amazingly. Before you knew where you were, he was in tops and
+bottoms; before you had thoroughly realized that, he was learning his
+letters; then there was hardly time to turn round, before he was a
+rosy-cheeked boy of ten.
+
+From the very first gleam of reason, he had been put solely and entirely
+under the care of Mr. Snell, the old vicar, who had been with his mother
+when she died, and a Protestant nurse, Mrs. Varley. Faithfully had these
+two discharged their sacred trust; and, if love can repay such services,
+right well were they repaid.
+
+A pleasant task they had, though, for a more lovable little lad than
+Charles there never was. His little heart seemed to have an infinite
+capacity of affection for all who approached him. Everything animate
+came before him in the light of a friend, to whom he wished to make
+himself agreeable, from his old kind tutor and nurse down to his pony
+and terrier. Charles had not arrived at the time of life when it was
+possible for him to quarrel about women; and so he actually had no
+enemies as yet, but was welcomed by pleasant and kind faces wherever he
+went. At one time he would be at his father's knee, while the
+good-natured Densil made him up some fishing tackle; next you would find
+him in the kennel with the whipper-in, feeding the hounds,
+half-smothered by their boisterous welcome; then the stables would own
+him for a time, while the lads were cleaning up and feeding; then came a
+sudden flitting to one of the keeper's lodges; and anon he would be down
+on the sands wading with half a dozen fisher-boys as happy as
+himself--but welcome and beloved everywhere.
+
+Sunday was a right pleasant day for him. After seeing his father shave,
+and examining his gold-topped dressing-case from top to
+bottom--amusements which were not participated in by Cuthbert, who had
+grown too manly--he would haste through his breakfast, and with his
+clean clothes hurry down the village towards the vicarage, which stood
+across the stream near the church. Not to go in yet, you will observe,
+because the sermon, he well knew, was getting its finishing touches, and
+the vicar must not be disturbed. No, the old stone bridge would bring
+him up; and there he would stay looking at the brown crystal-clear water
+rushing and seething among the rocks, lying dark under the oak-roots,
+and flashing merrily over the weir, just above the bridge; till "flick!"
+a silver bar would shoot quivering into the air, and a salmon would
+light on the top of the fall, just where the water broke, and would
+struggle on into the still pool above, or be beaten back by the force,
+to resume his attempt when he had gained breath. The trout, too, under
+the bridge, bless the rogues, they knew it was Sunday well enough--how
+they would lie up there in the swiftest places, where glancing liquid
+glorified the poor pebbles below into living amber, and would hardly
+trouble themselves to snap at the great fat, silly stoneflies that came
+floating down. Oh! it was a terrible place for dawdling was that stone
+bridge, on a summer sabbath morn.
+
+But now would the country folks come trooping in from far and near, for
+Ravenshoe was the only church for miles, and however many of them there
+were, every one had a good hearty West-country greeting for him. And,
+as the crowd increased near the church door, there was so much to say
+and hear, that I am afraid the prayers suffered a little sometimes.
+
+The villagers were pleased enough to see the lad in the old carved
+horsebox (not to be irreverent) of a pew, beneath the screen in the
+chancel, with the light from the old rose window shining on his curly
+brown hair. The older ones would think of the haughty beautiful lady who
+sat there so few years ago, and oftentimes one of the more sagacious
+would shake his head and mutter to himself, "Ah! if _he_ were heir."
+
+Any boy who reads this story, and I hope many will read it, is hereby
+advertised that it is exceedingly wrong to be inattentive in church in
+sermon time. It is very naughty to look up through the windows at the
+white clouds flying across the blue sky, and think how merrily the
+shadows are sweeping over the upland lawn, where the pewits' nests are,
+and the blackcock is crowing on the grey stones among the heather. No
+boy has any right to notice another boy's absence, and spend sermon-time
+in wondering whether he is catching crabs among the green and crimson
+seaweed on the rocks, or bathing in the still pool under the cliff. A
+boy had better not go to church at all if he spends his time in thinking
+about the big trout that lies up in one of the pools of the woodland
+stream, and whether he will be able to catch a sight of him again by
+creeping gently through the hazel and king fern. Birds' nests, too, even
+though it be the ringousel's, who is to lay her last egg this blessed
+day, and is marked for spoliation to-morrow, should be banished from a
+boy's mind entirely during church time. Now, I am sorry to say, that
+Charley was very much given to wander in church, and, when asked about
+the sermon by the vicar next day, would look rather foolish. Let us hope
+that he will be a warning to all sinners in this respect.
+
+Then, after church, there would be dinner, at his father's lunch time,
+in the dark old hall, and there would be more to tell his father and
+brother than could be conveniently got through at that meal; then there
+was church again, and a long stroll in the golden sunshine along the
+shore. Ah, happy summer sabbaths!
+
+The only two people who were ever cold to Charley, were his brother and
+Mackworth. Not that they were openly unkind, but there was between both
+of them and himself an indefinable gulf, an entire want of sympathy,
+which grieved him sometimes, though he was as yet too young to be much
+troubled by it. He only exhausted all his little arts of pleasing
+towards them to try and win them; he was indefatigable in running
+messages for Cuthbert and the chaplain; and once, when kind grandaunt
+Ascot (she was a Miss Headstall, daughter of Sir Cingle Headstall, and
+married Lord George Ascot, brother of Lady Alicia, Densil's mother) sent
+him a pineapple in a box, he took it to the priest and would have had
+him take it. Mackworth refused it, but looked on him not unkindly for a
+few minutes, and then turned away with a sigh. Perhaps he was trying to
+recall the time so long, long ago, when his own face was as open and as
+innocent as that. God knows! Charles cried a little, because the priest
+wouldn't take it, and, having given his brother the best slice, ate the
+rest in the stable, with the assistance of his foster brother and two of
+the pad grooms. Thereby proving himself to be a lad of low and
+dissipated habits.
+
+Cuthbert was at this time a somewhat good-looking young fellow of
+sixteen. Neither of the brothers was what would be called handsome,
+though, if Charley's face was the most pleasing, Cuthbert certainly had
+the most regular features. His forehead was lofty, although narrow, and
+flat at the sides; his cheek bones were high, and his nose was aquiline,
+not ill-formed, though prominent, starting rather suddenly out below his
+eyes; the lips were thin, the mouth small and firmly closed, and the
+chin short and prominent. The _tout ensemble_ was hardly pleasing even
+at this youthful period; the face was too much formed and decided for so
+young a man.
+
+Cuthbert was a reserved methodical lad, with whom no one could find
+fault, and yet whom few liked. He was studious and devout to an extent
+rare in one so young; and, although a capital horseman and a good shot,
+he but seldom indulged in those amusements, preferring rather a walk
+with the steward, and soon returning to the dark old library to his
+books and Father Mackworth. There they two would sit, like two owls,
+hour after hour, appearing only at meals, and talking French to one
+another, noticing Charley but little; who, however, was always full of
+news, and would tell it, too, in spite of the inattention of the strange
+couple. Densil began to respect and be slightly afraid of his eldest
+son, as his superior in learning and in natural abilities; but I think
+Charles had the biggest share in his heart.
+
+Aunt Ascot had a year before sent to Cuthbert to pay her a visit at
+Ranford, her son's, Lord Ascot's place, where she lived with him, he
+being a widower, and kept house for him. Ranford, we all know, or ought
+to know, contains the largest private racing stud in England, and the
+Ascot family for many generations had given themselves up entirely to
+sporting--so much so, that their marriages with other houses have been
+to a certain extent influenced by it; and so poor Cuthbert, as we may
+suppose, was quite like a fish out of water. He detested and despised
+the men he met there, and they, on their parts, such of them as chose to
+notice him, thought him a surly young bookworm; and, as for his
+grandaunt, he hated the very sound of that excellent lady's voice. Her
+abruptness, her homoeopathic medicines, her Protestantism (which she
+was always airing), and her stable-talk, nearly drove him mad; while
+she, on the other hand, thought him one of the most disagreeable boys
+she had ever met with in her life. So the visit was rather a failure
+than otherwise, and not very likely to be repeated. Nevertheless, her
+ladyship was very fond of young faces, and so in a twelvemonth, she
+wrote to Densil as follows:--
+
+"I am one mass of lumbago all round the small of my back, and I find
+nothing like opodeldoc after all. The pain is very severe, but I suppose
+you would comfort me, as a heretic, by saying it is nothing to what I
+shall endure in a few years' time. Bah! I have no patience with you
+Papists, packing better people than yourselves off somewhere in that
+free-and-easy way. By-the-bye, how is that father confessor of yours,
+Markworth, or some such name--mind me, Ravenshoe, that fellow is a
+rogue, and you being, like all Ravenshoes, a fool, there is a pair of
+you. Why, if one of Ascot's grooms was to smile as that man does, or to
+whine in his speech as that man does, when he is talking to a woman of
+rank, I'd have him discharged on the spot, without warning, for
+dishonesty.
+
+"Don't put a penny on Ascot's horse at Chester; he will never stay over
+the Cup course. Curfew, in my opinion, looks by no means badly for the
+Derby; he is scratched for the Two Thousand--which was necessary, though
+I am sorry for it, &c., &c., &c.
+
+"I wish you would send me your boy, will you? Not the eldest: the
+Protestant one. Perhaps he mayn't be such an insufferable coxcomb as his
+brother."
+
+At which letter Densil shook his honest sides with uproarious laughter.
+"Cuthbert, my boy," he said, "you have won your dear aunt's heart
+entirely; though she, being determined to mortify the flesh with its
+affection, does not propose seeing you again, but asks for Charley. The
+candour of that dear old lady increases with her age. You seem to have
+been making your court, too, father; she speaks of your smile in the
+most unqualified terms."
+
+"Her ladyship must do me the honour to quiz me," said Mackworth. "If it
+is possible to judge by her eye, she must like me about as well as a mad
+dog."
+
+"For my part, father," said Cuthbert, curling up the corners of his
+thin lips sardonically, "I shall be highly content to leave my dear aunt
+in the peaceable enjoyment of her favourite society of grooms,
+horse-jockeys, blacklegs, dissenting ministers, and such-like. A month
+in that house, my dear Charley, will qualify you for a billiard-marker;
+and, after a course of six weeks, you will be fit to take the situation
+of croupier in a low hell on a race-course. How you will enjoy yourself,
+my dear!"
+
+"Steady, Cuthbert steady," said his father; "I can't allow you to talk
+like that about your cousin's house. It is a great house for field
+sports, but there is not a better conducted house in the kingdom."
+
+Cuthbert lay over the sofa to fondle a cat, and then continued speaking
+very deliberately, in a slightly louder voice,--
+
+"I will allow my aunt to be the most polite, intellectual,
+delicate-minded old lady in creation, my dearest father, if you wish it;
+only, not having been born (I beg her pardon, dropped) in a racing
+stable, as she was herself, I can hardly appreciate her conversation
+always. As for my cousin, I consider him a splendid sample of an
+hereditary legislator. Charley, dear, you won't go to church on Sunday
+afternoon at Ranford; you will go into the croft with your cousin Ascot
+to see the chickens fed. Ascot is very curious in his poultry,
+particularly on Sunday afternoon. Father, why does he cut all the cocks'
+tails square?"
+
+"Pooh, pooh," said Densil, "what matter? many do it, besides him. Don't
+you be squeamish, Cuthbert--though, mind you, I don't defend
+cock-fighting on Sunday."
+
+Cuthbert laughed and departed, taking his cat with him.
+
+Charles had a long coach journey of one day, and then an awful and
+wonderful journey on the Great Western Railway as far as
+Twyford--alighting at which place, he was accosted by a
+pleasant-looking, fresh-coloured boy, dressed in close-fitting cord
+trousers, a blue handkerchief, spotted with white, and a Scotch cap; who
+said--
+
+"Oh! I'm your cousin Welter. I'm the same age as you, and I'm going to
+Eton next half. I've brought you over Tiger, because Punch is lame, and
+the station-master will look after your things; so we can come at once."
+
+The boys were friends in two minutes; and, going out, there was a groom
+holding two ponies--on the prettiest of which Charley soon found himself
+seated, and jogging on with his companion towards Henley.
+
+I like to see two honest lads, just introduced, opening their hearts to
+one another, and I know nothing more pleasant than to see how they
+rejoice as each similarity of taste comes out. By the time these two
+had got to Henley Bridge, Lord Welter had heard the name of every horse
+in the Ravenshoe stables, and Charley was rapidly getting learned in
+Lord Ascot's racing stud. The river at Henley distracted his attention
+for a time, as the biggest he had seen, and he asked his cousin, "Did he
+think the Mississippi was much bigger than that now?" and Lord Welter
+supposed, "Oh dear yes, a great deal bigger," he should say. Then there
+was more conversation about dogs and guns, and pleasant country places
+to ride through; then a canter over a lofty breezy down, and then the
+river again, far below, and at their feet the chimneys of Ranford.
+
+The house was very full; and, as the boys came up there was a crowd of
+phaetons, dog-carts, and saddle-horses, for the people were just
+arriving home for dinner after the afternoon drive; and, as they had all
+been to the same object of attraction that afternoon, they had all come
+in together and were loitering about talking, some not yet dismounted,
+and some on the steps. Welter was at home at once, and had a word with
+every one; but Charles was left alone, sitting on his pony, feeling very
+shy; till, at last, a great brown man with a great brown moustache, and
+a gruff voice, came up to him and lifted him off the horse, holding him
+out at arm's length for inspection.
+
+"So you are Curly Ravenshoe's boy, hey?" said he.
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Ha!" said the stranger, putting him down, and leading him towards the
+door; "just tell your father you saw General Mainwaring, will you? and
+that he wanted to know how his old friend was."
+
+Charles looked at the great brown hand which was in his own, and thought
+of the Affghan war, and of all the deeds of renown that that hand had
+done, and was raising his eyes to the general's face, when they were
+arrested half-way by another face, not the general's.
+
+It was that of a handsome, grey-headed man, who might have been sixty,
+he was so well _conservé_, but who was actually far more. He wore his
+own white hair, which contrasted strongly with a pair of delicate thin
+black eyebrows. His complexion was florid, with scarcely a wrinkle, his
+features were fine and regular, and a pair of sparkling dark grey eyes
+gave a pleasant light to his face. His dress was wondrously neat, and
+Charles, looking on him, guessed, with a boy's tact, that he was a man
+of mark.
+
+"Whose son did you say he was, general?" said the stranger.
+
+"Curly's!" said Mainwaring, stopping and smiling.
+
+"No, really!" said the other; and then he looked fixedly at Charles,
+and began to laugh, and Charley, seeing nothing better to do, looked up
+at the grey eyes and laughed too, and this made the stranger worse; and
+then, to crown the joke, the general began to laugh too, though none of
+them had said a syllable more than what I have written down; and at last
+the ridiculous exhibition finished up by the old gentleman taking a
+great pinch of snuff from a gold box, and turning away.
+
+Charles was much puzzled, and was still more so when, in an hour's time,
+having dressed himself, and being on his way downstairs to his aunt's
+room, who had just come in, he was stopped on a landing by this same old
+gentleman, beautifully dressed for dinner, who looked on him as before.
+
+He didn't laugh this time, but he did worse. He utterly "dumbfoundered"
+Charley, by asking abruptly--
+
+"How's Jim?"
+
+"He is very well, thank you, sir. His wife Norah nursed me when mamma
+died."
+
+"Oh, indeed," said the other; "so he hasn't cut your father's throat
+yet, or anything of that sort?"
+
+"Oh dear no," said Charles, horrified; "bless you, what can make you
+think of such things? Why, he is the kindest man in the world."
+
+"I don't know," said the old gentleman, thoughtfully; "that excessively
+faithful kind of creature is very apt to do that sort of thing. I should
+discharge any servant of mine who exhibited the slightest symptoms of
+affection as a dangerous lunatic;" with which villainous sentiment he
+departed.
+
+Charles thought what a strange old gentleman he was for a short time,
+and then slid down the banisters. They were better banisters than those
+at Ravenshoe, being not so steep, and longer: so he went up, and slid
+down again;[1] after which he knocked at his aunt's door.
+
+It was with a beating heart that he waited for an answer. Cuthbert had
+described Lady Ascot as such a horrid old ogress, that he was not
+without surprise when a cheery voice said, "Come in;" and entering a
+handsome room, he found himself in presence of a noble-looking old lady,
+with grey hair, who was netting in an upright, old-fashioned chair.
+
+"So you are Charles Ravenshoe, eh?" she began. "Why, my dear, you must
+be perished with cold and hunger. I should have come in before, but I
+didn't expect you so soon. Tea will be here directly. You ain't a
+beauty, my dear, but I think I shall like you. There never was but one
+really handsome Ravenshoe, and that was poor Petre, your grandfather.
+Poor Alicia made a great fool of herself, but she was very happy with
+him. Welter, you naughty boy, be still."
+
+The Right Honourable Viscount Welter wanted his tea, and was
+consequently troublesome and fractious. He had picked a quarrel with his
+grandmother's terrier, which he averred had bitten him in the leg, and
+he was now heating the poker, in order, he informed the lady, to burn
+the place out, and prevent hydrophobia. Whether he would have done so or
+not, we shall never know now, for, tea coming in at that moment, he
+instantly sat down at table, and called to Charles to do likewise.
+
+"Call Miss Adelaide, will you, Sims?" said Lady Ascot; and presently
+there came tripping into the room the loveliest little blonde fairy,
+about ten years old, that ever you saw. She fixed her large blue eyes on
+Charley, and then came up and gave him a kiss, which he, the rogue,
+returned with interest, and then, taking her seat at the table, she
+turned to Welter, and hoped he was going to be good.
+
+Such, however, it soon appeared, was not his lordship's intention. He
+had a guest at table, and he was bound in honour to show off before him,
+besides having to attend to his ordinary duty of frightening his
+grandmother as nearly into fits as was safe. Accordingly, he began the
+repast by cramming buns into his mouth, using the handle of his knife as
+a rammer, until the salvation of his life appeared an impossibility, at
+which point he rose and left the room with a rapid, uneven step. On his
+re-appearance he began drinking, but, having caught his grandmother's
+eye over his teacup, he winked at her, and then held his breath till he
+was purple, and she begun to wring her hands in despair. All this time
+he was stimulated by Charles's laughter and Adelaide's crying out,
+continually, "Oh, isn't he a naughty boy, Lady Ascot? oh, do tell him
+not to do it." But the crowning performance of this promising young
+gentleman--the feat which threw everything else into the shade, and
+which confirmed Charley in his admiration of his profound talents--was
+this. Just as a tall, grave, and handsome footman was pouring water into
+the teapot, and while her ladyship was inspecting the operation with all
+the interest of an old tea-maker, at that moment did Lord Welter
+contrive to inflict on the unfortunate man a pinch on the leg, of such a
+shrewdly agonising nature as caused him to gnash his teeth in Lady
+Ascot's face, to cry aloud, "Oh, Lord!" to whirl the kettle within an
+inch of her venerable nose, and finally, to gyrate across the room on
+one leg, and stand looking like the king of fools.
+
+Lady Ascot, who had merely seen the effect, and not the cause, ordered
+him promptly to leave the room, whereupon Welter explained, and
+afterwards continued to Charles, with an off-hand candour quite his own,
+as if no such person as his grandmother was within a hundred miles--
+
+"You know, Charley, I shouldn't dare to behave like this if my tutor was
+at home; she'd make nothing of telling him, now. She's in a terrible
+wax, but she'll be all right by the time he comes back from his
+holidays; won't you, grandma?"
+
+"You wicked boy," she replied, "I hope Hawtrey will cure you; Keate
+would have, I know."
+
+The boys slid on the banisters; then they went to dessert. Then they
+went upstairs, and looked over Welter's cricket apparatus, fishing
+tackle, and so on; and then they went into the billiard-room, which was
+now lighted up and full of guests.
+
+There were two tables in the room, at one of which a pool was getting
+up, while the other was empty. Welter was going to play pool, and
+Charles would have liked to do so too, being a very tolerable player;
+only he had promised his old tutor not to play for money till he was
+eighteen, and so he sat in the corner by the empty table, under the
+marking-board, with one leg gathered under him, and instantly found
+himself thinking about the little girl he had seen upstairs.
+
+Once or twice he was surprised to find himself thinking so much about
+her, but he found it a pleasant subject, too, for he had sat in his
+corner more than half an hour without changing it, when he became aware
+that two men were taking down cues from the rack, and were going to play
+at his table.
+
+They were his two friends of the afternoon, General Mainwaring and the
+grey-headed man who laughed. When they saw him they seemed glad, and the
+old gentleman asked him why he wasn't playing.
+
+"I musn't play pool," he answered. "I should like to mark for you."
+
+"Well said, my hero," said the general: "and so Jim's an honest man, is
+he?"
+
+Charles saw that the old gentleman had told the general what had passed
+on the stairs, and wondered why he should take such an interest in him;
+but he soon fell to thinking about little Adelaide again, and marking
+mechanically though correctly.
+
+He was aroused by the general's voice--"Who did you mark that last miss
+to, my little man?" he said.
+
+"To the old gentleman," said Charles, and then blushed at the
+consciousness of having said a rude thing.
+
+"That is one for you, Methuselah," said the general.
+
+"Never mind," said the old gentleman, "I have one great source of pride,
+which no one can rob me of; I am twelve years older than I look."
+
+They went on playing. "By-the-bye," said the general, "who is that
+exceedingly pretty child that the old lady has got with her?"
+
+"A child she has adopted," said the old gentleman. "A grand-daughter of
+an old friend who died in poverty. She is a noble-hearted old soul, the
+jockey, with all her absurdities."
+
+"Who was she?" said the general. "(That was rather a fluke, was it
+not?)"
+
+"She? Why, a daughter of old Cingle Headstall's, the mad old Cheshire
+baronet--you don't remember him, of course, but your father knew him.
+Drove his tandem round and round Berkeley square for four hours on a
+foggy night, under the impression he was going home to Hounslow, and
+then fired at the watchman who tried to put him right, taking him for a
+highwayman. The son went to France, and was lost sight of in the
+revolution; so the girl came in for what money there was: not very much,
+I take it. This poor thing, who was pretty and clever enough, but
+without education, having been literally brought up in a stable,
+captivated the sagacious Ascot, and made him a capital wife."
+
+"I suppose she'll portion this girl, then; you say she had money?"
+
+"H'm," said the old gentleman, "there's a story about the aforesaid
+money, which is told in different ways, but which amounts to this, that
+the money is no more. Hallo, our marker is getting sleepy."
+
+"Not at all, sir," said Charles. "If you will excuse me a moment, I will
+come back."
+
+He ran across to Lord Welter, who was leaning on his cue. "Can you tell
+me," said he, "who is that old gentleman?"
+
+"Which old gentleman?"
+
+"That one, with the black eyebrows, playing with General Mainwaring.
+There, he is taking snuff."
+
+"Oh _him_?" said Welter; "that is Lord Saltire."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE "WARREN HASTINGS."
+
+
+Time, the inexorable, kept mowing away at poor Charles's flowers until
+the disagreeable old creature had cut them all down but two or three,
+and mowed right into the morning when it was necessary that he should go
+home; and then Charles, looking forward through his tears, could see
+nothing at first but the very commonest grass. For was he not going to
+leave Adelaide, probably never to see her again? In short, Charles was
+in love, and going to separate from the object of his affections for the
+first time; at which I request you not to laugh, but just reflect how
+old you were yourself when you first fell in love.
+
+The little flirt, she must have waited till she heard him coming out of
+his room, and then have pretended to be coming upstairs all in a hurry.
+He got a kiss or a dozen, though, and a lock of hair, I believe; but he
+hadn't much time to think about it, for Lord Ascot was calling out for
+him, and when he got into the hall, there was all the household to see
+him off. Everybody had a kind word for him; the old lady cried; Lord
+Saltire and the general shook hands; Lord Welter said it was a beastly
+sell; and Lord Ascot hummed and hawed, and told him to tell his father
+he had been a good boy. They were all sorry he was going, and he felt as
+though he was leaving old friends; but the carriage was there, and the
+rain was pouring down; and, with one last look at the group of faces, he
+was in the carriage and away.
+
+It was a terrible day, though he did not notice it at first. He was
+thinking how pleasant it was that the people were all so kind to him,
+just as kind as they were at home. He thought of Adelaide, and wondered
+whether she would ever think of him. He was rather glad that Welter was
+a naughty boy (not really naughty, you know), because she would be less
+likely to like him. And then he thought how glad the people at home
+would be to see him; and then he looked out of the window. He had left
+Lord Ascot's carriage and got into the train some time before this. Now
+he saw that the train was going very slowly, and nothing was visible
+through the driving rain. Then he tried to remember whether he had heard
+his father speak of Lord Saltire, and what he had heard about him; and
+thinking about this, the train stopped.--Swindon.
+
+He got out to go to the refreshment room, and began wondering what the
+noise was which prevented him from hearing any one when they spoke, and
+why the people looked scared, and talked in knots. Then he found that it
+was the wind in the roof; and some one told him that a chimney had been
+blown across the line, and they must wait till it was removed.
+
+All the day the brave engine fought westward against the wind, and two
+hours after time Charles found himself in the coach which would take him
+to Stonnington. The night crept on, and the coach crawled on its way
+through the terrible night, and Charles slept. In the cold pitiless
+morning, as they were going over a loftily exposed moor, the coach,
+though only going foot's pace, stood for a moment on two wheels, and
+then fell crashing over on to a heap of road-side stones, awaking
+Charles, who, being unhurt, lay still for a minute or so, with a faint
+impression of having been shaken in his sleep, and, after due
+reflection, made the brilliant discovery that the coach was upset.
+
+He opened the door over his head and jumped out. For an instant he was
+blinded by the stinging rain, but turned his back to it; and then, for
+the first time, he became aware that this was the most terrible gale of
+wind he had ever seen in his lifetime.
+
+He assisted the coachman and guard, and the solitary outside passenger,
+to lead the poor horses along the road. They fought on for about two
+hundred yards, and came to an alehouse, on the sight of which Charles
+knew that they were two stages short of where he thought they had been,
+for this was the Watershed Inn, and the rain from its roof ran partly
+into the Bristol Channel and partly into the British.
+
+After an hour's rest here Charles was summoned to join the coach in the
+valley below, and they crawled on again. It was a weary day over some
+very bleak country. They saw in one place a cottage unroofed on a moor,
+and the terrified family crouched down beneath the tottering walls. In
+the valleys great trees were down across the road, which were cross-cut
+and moved by country men, who told of oaks of three hundred years fallen
+in the night, and of corn stacks hurried before the blast like the
+leaves of autumn. Still, as each obstacle was removed, there was the
+guard up blowing his horn cheerily, and Charles was inside with a jump,
+and on they went.
+
+At last, at three o'clock, the coach drove under the gate of the
+"Chichester Arms," at Stonnington, and Charles, jumping out, was
+received by the establishment with the air of people who had done a
+clever thing, and were ready to take their meed of praise with humility.
+The handsome landlady took great credit to herself for Charles's
+arrival--so much so, that one would have thought she herself had
+singlehanded dragged the coach from Exeter. "_She_ had been sure all
+along that Mr. Charles would come"--a speech which, with the cutting
+glance that accompanied it, goaded the landlord to retort in a voice
+wheezy with good living, and to remind her that she had said, not ten
+minutes before, that she was quite sure he wouldn't; whereupon the
+landlady loftily begged him not to expose himself before the servants.
+At which the landlord laughed, and choked himself; at which the landlady
+slapped him on the back, and laughed too; after which they went in.
+
+His father, the landlord told him, had sent his pony over, as he was
+afraid of a carriage on the moor to-day, and that, if he felt at all
+afraid to come on, he was to sleep where he was. Charles looked at the
+comfortable parlour and hesitated; but, happening to close his eyes an
+instant, he saw as plain as possible the library at home, and the
+flickering fire-light falling on the crimson and oak furniture, and his
+father listening for him through the roaring wind; and so he hesitated
+no longer, but said he would push on, and that he would wish to see his
+servant while he took dinner.
+
+The landlord eyed him admiringly with his head on one side, and
+proceeded to remark that corn was down another shilling; that Squire
+West had sold his chesnut mare for one hundred and twenty pounds; and
+that if he kept well under the walls going home he would be out of the
+wind; that his missis was took poorly in the night with spasms, and had
+been cured by two wine-glasses of peppermint; that a many chimney-pots
+was blown down, and that old Jim Baker had heard tell as a pig was
+blowed through a church window. After which he poked the fire and
+retired.
+
+Charles was hard at his dinner when his man came in. It was the oldest
+of the pad grooms--a man with grizzled hair, looking like a white
+terrier; and he stood before him smoothing his face with his hand.
+
+"Hallo, Michael," said Charley, "how came you to come?"
+
+"Master wouldn't send no other, sir. It's a awful day down there;
+there's above a hundred trees down along the road."
+
+"Shall we be able to get there?"
+
+"As much as we shall, sir."
+
+"Let us try. Terrible sea, I suppose?"
+
+"Awful to look at, sir. Mr. Mackworth and Mr. Cuthbert are down to look
+at it."
+
+"No craft ashore?"
+
+"None as yet. None of our boats is out. Yesterday morning a Pill boat,
+52, stood in to see where she was, and beat out again, but that was
+before it came on so bad."
+
+So they started. They pushed rapidly out of the town, and up a narrow
+wooded valley which led to the moor which lay between them and
+Ravenshoe. For some time they were well enough sheltered, and made
+capital way, till the wood began to grow sparer, and the road to rise
+abruptly. Here the blast began to be more sensibly felt, and in a
+quarter of mile they had to leap three uprooted trees; before them they
+heard a rushing noise like the sea. It was the wind upon the moor.
+
+Creeping along under the high stone walls, and bending down, they pushed
+on still, until, coming to the open moor, and receiving for the first
+time the terrible tornado full in their faces, the horses reared up and
+refused to proceed; but, being got side by side, and their heads being
+homeward, they managed to get on, though the rain upon their faces was
+agonising.
+
+As they were proceeding thus, with Michael on the windward side, Charles
+looked up, and there was another horseman beside him. He knew him
+directly; it was Lloyd's agent.
+
+"Anything wrong, Mr. Lewis? Any ship ashore?" he shouted.
+
+"Not yet, sir," said the agent. "But there'll be many a good sailor gone
+to the bottom before to-morrow morning, I am thinking. This is the
+heaviest gale for forty years."
+
+By degrees they descended to more sheltered valleys, and after a time
+found themselves in the court-yard of the hall. Charles was caught up by
+his father; Lloyd's agent was sent to the housekeeper's room; and very
+soon Charles had forgotten all about wind and weather, and was pouring
+into his father's ear all his impressions of Ranford.
+
+"I am glad you liked it," said Densil, "and I'll be bound they liked
+you. You ought to have gone first, Cuthbert don't suit them."
+
+"Oh, Cuthbert's too clever for them," said Charles; "they are not at all
+clever people, bless you!" And only just in time too, for Cuthbert
+walked into the room.
+
+"Well, Charley," he said, coolly, "so you're come back. Well, and what
+did you think of Welter, eh? I suppose he suited you?"
+
+"I thought him very funny, Cuthbert," said Charles, timidly.
+
+"I thought him an abominable young nuisance," said Cuthbert. "I hope he
+hasn't taught you any of his fool's tricks."
+
+Charles wasn't to be put off like this; so he went and kissed his
+brother, and then came back to his father. There was a long dull
+evening, and when they went to complines, he went to bed. Up in his
+room he could hear that the wind was worse than ever, not rushing up in
+great gusts and sinking again, as in ordinary gales, but keeping up one
+continued unvarying scream against the house, which was terrible to
+hear.
+
+He got frightened at being alone; afraid of finding some ghostly thing
+at his elbow, which had approached him unheard through the noise. He
+began, indeed, to meditate upon going down stairs, when Cuthbert, coming
+into the next room, reassured him, and he got into bed.
+
+This wasn't much better, though, for there was a thing in a black hood
+came and stood at the head of his bed; and, though he could not see it,
+he could feel the wind of its heavy draperies as it moved. Moreover, a
+thing like a caterpillar, with a cat's head, about two feet long, came
+creep--creeping up the counterpane, which he valiantly smote, and found
+it to be his handkerchief; and still the unvarying roar went on till it
+was unendurable.
+
+He got up and went to his brother's room, and was cheered to find a
+light burning; he came softly in and called "Cuthbert."
+
+"Who is there?" asked he, with a sudden start.
+
+"It's I," said Charles; "can you sleep?"
+
+"Not I," saith Cuthbert, sitting up. "I can hear people talking in the
+wind. Come into bed; I'm so glad you're come."
+
+Charles lay down by his brother, and they talked about ghosts for a long
+time. Once their father came in with a light from his bedroom next door,
+and sat on the bed talking, as if he, too, was glad of company, and
+after that they dozed off and slept.
+
+It was in the grey light of morning that they awoke together and started
+up. The wind was as bad as ever, but the whole house was still, and they
+stared terrified at one another.
+
+"What was it?" whispered Charles.
+
+Cuthbert shook his head, and listened again. As he was opening his mouth
+to speak it came again, and they knew it was that which woke them. A
+sound like a single footstep on the floor above, light enough, but which
+shook the room. Cuthbert was out of bed in an instant, tearing on his
+clothes. Charles jumped out too, and asked him, "What is it?"
+
+"A gun!"
+
+Charles well knew what awful disaster was implied in those words. The
+wind was N.W., setting into the bay. The ship that fired that gun was
+doomed.
+
+He heard his father leap out of bed, and ring furiously at his bell.
+Then doors began to open and shut, and voices and rapid footsteps were
+heard in the passage. In ten minutes the whole terrified household were
+running hither and thither, about they hardly knew what. The men were
+pale, and some of the women were beginning to whimper and wring their
+hands; when Densil, Lewis the agent, and Mackworth came rapidly down the
+staircase and passed out. Mackworth came back, and told the women to put
+on hot water and heat blankets. Then Cuthbert joined him, and they went
+together; and directly after Charles found himself between two
+men-servants, being dragged rapidly along towards the low headland which
+bounded the bay on the east.
+
+When they came to the beach, they found the whole village pushing on in
+a long straggling line the same way as themselves. The men were walking
+singly, either running or going very fast; and the women were in knots
+of twos and threes, straggling along and talking excitedly, with much
+gesticulation.
+
+"There's some of the elect on board, I'll be bound," Charles heard one
+woman say, "as will be supping in glory this blessed night."
+
+"Ay, ay," said an old woman. "I'd sooner be taken to rest sudden, like
+they're going to be, than drag on till all the faces you know are gone
+before."
+
+"My boy," said another, "was lost in a typhoon in the China sea. Darn
+they lousy typhoons! I wonder if he thought of his mother afore he went
+down."
+
+Among such conversation as this, with the terrible, ceaseless thunder of
+the surf upon the left, Charles, clinging tight to his two guardians,
+made the best weather of it he could, until they found themselves on the
+short turf of the promontory, with their faces seaward, and the water
+right and left of them. The cape ran out about a third of a mile, rather
+low, and then abruptly ended in a cone of slate, beyond which, about two
+hundred yards at sea, was that terrible sunken rock, "the Wolf," on to
+which, as sure as death, the flowing tide carried every stick which was
+embayed. The tide was making; a ship was known to be somewhere in the
+bay; it was blowing a hurricane; and what would you more?
+
+They hurried along as well as they could among the sharp slates which
+rose through the turf, until they came to where the people had halted.
+Charles saw his father, the agent, Mackworth, and Cuthbert together,
+under a rock; the villagers were standing around, and the crowd was
+thickening every moment. Every one had his hand over his eyes, and was
+peering due to windward, through the driving scud.
+
+They had stopped at the foot of the cone, which was between them and the
+sea, and some more adventurous had climbed partly up it, if, perhaps,
+they might see further than their fellows; but in vain: they all saw and
+heard the same--a blinding white cauldron of wind-driven spray below,
+and all around, filling every cranny, the howling storm.
+
+A quarter of an hour since she fired last, and no signs of her yet. She
+must be carrying canvas and struggling for life, ignorant of the
+four-knot stream. Some one says she may have gone down--hush! who spoke?
+
+Old Sam Evans had spoken. He had laid his hand on the squire's shoulder,
+and said, "There she is." And then arose a hubbub of talking from the
+men, and every one crowded on his neighbour and tried to get nearer. And
+the women moved hurriedly about, some moaning to themselves, and some
+saying, "Ah, poor dear!" "Ah, dear Lord! there she is, sure enough."
+
+She hove in sight so rapidly that, almost as soon as they could be sure
+of a dark object, they saw that it was a ship--a great ship about 900
+tons; that she was dismasted, and that her decks were crowded. They
+could see that she was unmanageable, turning her head hither and thither
+as the sea struck her, and that her people had seen the cliff at the
+same moment, for they were hurrying aft, and crowding on to the
+bulwarks.
+
+Charles and his guardians crept up to his father's party. Densil was
+standing silent, looking on the lamentable sight; and, as Charles looked
+at him, he saw a tear run down his cheek, and heard him say, "Poor
+fellows!" Cuthbert stood staring intently at the ship, with his lips
+slightly parted. Mackworth, like one who studies a picture, held his
+elbow in one hand, and kept the other over his mouth; and the agent
+cried out, "A troop-ship, by gad. Dear! dear!"
+
+It is a sad sight to see a fine ship beyond control. It is like seeing
+one one loves gone mad. Sad under any circumstances; how terrible it is
+when she is bearing on with her, in her mad Bacchante's dance, a freight
+of living human creatures to untimely destruction!
+
+As each terrible feature and circumstance of the catastrophe became
+apparent to the lookers-on, the excitement became more intense. Forward,
+and in the waist, there was a considerable body of seamen clustered
+about under the bulwarks--some half-stripped. In front of the cuddy
+door, between the poop and the mainmast, about forty soldiers were drawn
+up, with whom were three officers, to be distinguished by their blue
+coats and swords. On the quarter-deck were seven or eight women, two
+apparently ladies, one of whom carried a baby. A well-dressed man,
+evidently the captain, was with them; but the cynosure of all eyes was
+a tall man in white trousers, at once and correctly judged to be the
+mate, who carried in his arms a little girl.
+
+The ship was going straight upon the rock, now only marked as a whiter
+spot upon the whitened sea, and she was fearfully near it, rolling and
+pitching, turning her head hither and thither, fighting for her life.
+She had taken comparatively little water on board as yet; but now a
+great sea struck her forward, and she swung with her bow towards the
+rock, from which she was distant not a hundred yards. The end was
+coming. Charles saw the mate slip off his coat and shirt, and take the
+little girl again. He saw the lady with the baby rise very quietly and
+look forward; he saw the sailors climbing on the bulwarks; he saw the
+soldiers standing steady in two scarlet lines across the deck; he saw
+the officers wave their hands to one another; and then he hid his face
+in his hands, and sobbed as if his heart would break.
+
+They told him after how the end had come: she had lifted up her bows
+defiantly, and brought them crashing down upon the pitiless rock as
+though in despair. Then her stem had swung round, and a merciful sea
+broke over her, and hid her from their view, though above the storm they
+plainly heard her brave old timbers crack; then she floated off, with
+bulwarks gone, sinking, and drifted out of sight round the headland,
+and, though they raced across the headland, and waited a few breathless
+minutes for her to float round into sight again, they never saw her any
+more. The _Warren Hastings_ had gone down in fifteen fathoms. And now
+there was a new passion introduced into the tragedy to which it had
+hitherto been a stranger--Hope. The wreck of part of the mainmast and
+half the main-topmast, which they had seen, before she struck, lumbering
+the deck, had floated off, and there were three, four, five men clinging
+to the futtock shrouds; and then they saw the mate with the child hoist
+himself on to the spar, and part his dripping hair from his eyes.
+
+The spar had floated into the bay, into which they were looking, into
+much calmer water; but, directly too leeward, the swell was tearing at
+the black slate rocks, and in ten minutes it would be on them. Every man
+saw the danger, and Densil, running down to the water's edge, cried--
+
+"Fifty pounds to any one who will take 'em a rope! Fifty gold sovereigns
+down to-night! Who's going?"
+
+Jim Matthews was going, and had been going before he heard of the fifty
+pounds--that was evident; for he was stripped, and out on the rocks,
+with the rope round his waist. He stepped from the bank of slippery
+seaweed into the heaving water, and then his magnificent limbs were in
+full battle with the tide. A roar announced his success. As he was seen
+clambering on to the spar, a stouter rope was paid out; and very soon it
+and its burden were high and dry upon the little half-moon of land which
+ended the bay.
+
+Five sailors, the first mate, and a bright-eyed little girl, were their
+precious prize. The sailors lay about upon the sand, and the mate,
+untying the shawl that bound her to him, put the silent and frightened
+child into the hands of a woman that stood close by.
+
+The poor little thing was trembling in every limb. "If you please," she
+said to the woman, "I should like to go to mamma. She is standing with
+baby on the quarter-deck. Mr. Archer, will you take me back to mamma,
+please? She will be frightened if we stay away."
+
+"Well, a-deary me," said the honest woman, "she'll break my heart, a
+darling; mamma's in heaven, my tender, and baby too."
+
+"No, indeed," said the child eagerly; "she's on the quarter-deck. Mr.
+Archer, Mr. Archer!"
+
+The mate, a tall, brawny, whiskerless, hard-faced man, about
+six-and-twenty, who had been thrust into a pea-coat, now approached.
+
+"Where's mamma, Mr. Archer?" said the child.
+
+"Where's mamma, my lady-bird? Oh, dear! oh, dear!"
+
+"And where's the ship, and Captain Dixon, and the soldiers?"
+
+"The ship, my pretty love?" said the mate, putting his rough hand on the
+child's wet hair; "why the good ship, _Warren Hastings_, Dixon master,
+is a-sunk beneath the briny waves, my darling; and all on board of her,
+being good sailors and brave soldiers, is doubtless at this moment in
+glory."
+
+The poor little thing set up a low wailing cry, which went to the hearts
+of all present; then the women carried her away, and the mate, walking
+between Mackworth and Densil, headed the procession homeward to the
+hall.
+
+"She was the _Warren Hastings_, of 900 tons," he said, "from Calcutta,
+with a detachment of the 120th on board. The old story--dismasted, both
+anchors down, cables parted, and so on. And now I expect you know as
+much as I do. This little girl is daughter to Captain Corby, in command
+of the troops. She was always a favourite of mine, and I determined to
+get her through. How steady those sojers stood, by jingo, as though they
+were on parade! Well, I always thought something was going to happen,
+for we had never a quarrel the whole voyage, and that's curious with
+troops. Capital crew, too. Ah, well, they are comfortable enough now,
+eh, Sir?"
+
+That night the mate arose from his bed like a giant refreshed with wine,
+and posted off to Bristol to "her owners," followed by a letter from
+Densil, and another from Lloyd's agent of such a nature that he found
+himself in command of a ship in less than a month. Periodically, unto
+this day, there arrive at Ravenshoe, bows and arrows (supposed to be
+poisoned), paddles, punkahs, rice-paper screens; a malignant kind of
+pickle, which causeth the bowels of him that eateth of it to burn;
+wicked-looking old gods of wood and stone; models of Juggernaut's car;
+brown earthenware moonshees, translating glazed porcelain Bibles; and
+many other Indian curiosities, all of which are imported and presented
+by the kind-hearted Archer.
+
+In a fortnight the sailors were gone, and, save a dozen or so of new
+graves in the churchyard, nothing remained to tell of the _Warren
+Hastings_ but the little girl saved so miraculously--little Mary Corby.
+
+She had been handed over at once to the care of the kind-hearted Norah,
+Charles's nurse, who instantaneously loved her with all her great warm
+heart, and about three weeks after the wreck gave Charles these
+particulars about her, when he went to pay her a visit in the cottage
+behind the kennels.
+
+After having hugged him violently, and kissed him till he laughingly
+refused to let her do it again till she had told him the news, she
+began--"The beauty-boy, he gets handsomer every day" (this might be
+true, but there was great room for improvement yet), "and comes and sees
+his old nurse, and who loves him so well, alanna? It's little I can tell
+ye about the little girl, me darlin'. She's nine years old, and a
+heretic, like yer own darlin' self, and who's to gainsay ye from it?
+She's book-learned enough, and play she says she can, and I axed her
+would she like to live in the great house, and she said no. She liked
+me, and wanted to stay with me. She cries about her mother, a dear, but
+not so much as she did, and she's now inside and asleep. Come here,
+avick."
+
+She bent down her handsome face to Charles's ear and whispered, "If my
+boy was looking out for a little wee fairy wife, eh?"
+
+Charles shook his hair, and laughed, and there and then told Norah all
+about Adelaide, which attachment Norah highly approved of, and remarked
+that he'd be old enough to be married before he knew where he was.
+
+In spite of Densil's letters and inquiries, no friends came forward to
+claim little Mary. Uncle Corby, when in possession of facts, was far too
+much a man of business to do anything of the kind. In a very short time
+Densil gave up inquiring, and then he began dreading lest she should be
+taken from him, for he had got wonderfully fond of the quiet, pale,
+bright-eyed little creature. In three months she was considered as a
+permanent member of the household, and the night before Charles went to
+school he told her of his grand passion. His lordship considered this
+step showed deep knowledge of the world, as it would have the effect of
+crushing in the bud any rash hopes which Mary might have conceived; and,
+having made this provision for her peace of mind, he straightway
+departed to Shrewsbury school.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+IN WHICH CHARLES AND LORD WELTER DISTINGUISH THEMSELVES AT THE
+UNIVERSITY.
+
+
+It is a curious sensation, that of meeting, as a young man of two or
+three-and-twenty, a man one has last seen as a little lad of ten, or
+thereabouts. One is almost in a way disappointed. You may be asked out
+to dinner to meet a man called, say, Jones (or, if you like the name
+better, Delamere D'Eresby), whom you believe to be your old friend
+Jones, and whom you have not seen for a month or so; and on getting to
+the house find it is not your Jones at all, but another Jones whom you
+don't know. He may be cleverer, handsomer, more agreeable than your old
+friend--a man whom you are glad to know; and yet you are disappointed.
+You don't meet the man you expected, and you are rather disposed to be
+prejudiced against his representative.
+
+So it is when you meet a friend in manhood whom you have not seen since
+you were at school. You have been picturing to yourself the sort of man
+your friend must have developed into, and you find him different from
+what you thought. So, instead of foregathering with an old friend, you
+discover that you have to make a new acquaintance.
+
+You will now have to resume the acquaintance of Charles Ravenshoe at two
+and twenty. I hope you will not be much disappointed in him. He was a
+very nice boy, if you remember, and you will see immediately that he has
+developed into a very nice young man indeed. It is possible that I may
+not be about to introduce him to you under the most favourable
+circumstances; but he created those circumstances for himself, and must
+abide by them. As it is not my intention to follow him through any part
+of his University life, but only to resume his history when he quits it,
+so it becomes imperatively necessary for me to state, without any sort
+of disguise, the reason why he did leave it. And, as two or three other
+important characters in the story had something to do with it, I shall
+do so more at length than would at first seem necessary.
+
+It was nine o'clock on the 6th of November. The sun, which had been
+doing duty for her Majesty all night at Calcutta, Sydney, &c., had by
+this time reached Oxford, and was shining aslant into two pretty little
+Gothic windows in the inner or library quadrangle of St. Paul's College,
+and illuminating the features of a young man who was standing in the
+middle of the room, and scratching his head.
+
+He was a stout-built fellow, not particularly handsome, but with a very
+pleasing face. His hair was very dark brown, short, and curling; his
+forehead was broad and open, and below it were two uncommonly
+pleasant-looking dark grey eyes. His face was rather marked, his nose
+very slightly aquiline, and plenty of it, his mouth large and
+good-humoured, which, when opened to laugh, as it very frequently was,
+showed a splendid set of white teeth, which were well contrasted with a
+fine healthy brown and red complexion. Altogether a very pleasant young
+fellow to look on, and looking none the worse just now for an expression
+of droll perplexity, not unmixed with a certain amount of terror, which
+he had on his face.
+
+It was Charles Ravenshoe.
+
+He stood in his shirt and trousers only, in the midst of a scene of
+desolation so awful, that I, who have had to describe some of the most
+terrible scenes and circumstances conceivable, pause before attempting
+to give any idea of it in black and white. Every moveable article in the
+room--furniture, crockery, fender, fire-irons--lay in one vast heap of
+broken confusion in the corner of the room. Not a pane of glass remained
+in the windows; the bedroom-door was broken down; and the door which
+opened into the corridor was minus the two upper panels. Well might
+Charles Ravenshoe stand there and scratch his head!
+
+"By George," he said at last, soliloquising, "how deuced lucky it is
+that I never get drunk! If I had been screwed last night, those fellows
+would have burnt the college down. What a devil that Welter is when he
+gets drink into him! and Marlowe is not much better. The fellows were
+mad with fighting, too. I wish they hadn't come here and made hay
+afterwards. There'll be an awful row about this. It's all up, I am
+afraid. It's impossible to say though."
+
+At this moment, a man appeared in the passage, and, looking in through
+the broken door, as if from a witness-box, announced, "The dean wishes
+to see you at once, sir." And exit.
+
+Charles replied by using an expression then just coming into use among
+our youth, "All serene!" dressed himself by putting on a pilot coat, a
+pair of boots, and a cap and gown, and with a sigh descended into the
+quadrangle.
+
+There were a good many men about, gathered in groups. The same subject
+was in everybody's mouth. There had been, the night before, without
+warning or apparent cause, the most frightful disturbance which, in the
+opinion of the porter, had graced the college for fifty years. It had
+begun suddenly at half-past twelve, and had been continued till three.
+The dons had been afraid to come and interfere, the noise was so
+terrible. Five out-college men had knocked out at a quarter to three,
+refusing to give any name but the dean's. A rocket had been let up, and
+a five-barrel revolver had been let off, and--Charles Ravenshoe had been
+sent for.
+
+A party of young gentlemen, who looked very seedy and guilty, stood in
+his way, and as he came up shook their heads sorrowfully; one, a tall
+one, with large whiskers, sat down in the gravel walk, and made as
+though he would have cast dust upon his head.
+
+"This is a bad job, Charley," said one of them.
+
+"Some heads must fall," said Charles; "I hope mine is not among the
+number. Rather a shame if it is, eh?"
+
+The man with the big whiskers shook his head. "The state of your room,"
+he said.
+
+"Who has seen it?" eagerly asked Charles.
+
+"Sleeping innocent!" replied the other, "the porter was up there by
+eight o'clock, and at half-past the dean himself was gazing on your
+unconscious face as you lay peacefully sleeping in the arms of
+desolation."
+
+Charles whistled long and loud, and proceeded with a sinking heart
+towards the dean's rooms.
+
+A tall, pale man, with a hard, marked countenance, was sitting at his
+breakfast, who, as soon as he saw his visitor, regarded him with the
+greatest interest, and buttered a piece of toast.
+
+"_Well_, Mr. Ravenshoe," was his remark.
+
+"I believe you sent for me, sir," said Charles, adding to himself,
+"Confound you, you cruel old brute, you are amusing yourself with my
+tortures."
+
+"This is a pretty business," said the dean.
+
+Charles would be glad to know to what he alluded.
+
+"Well," said the dean, laughing, "I don't exactly know where to begin.
+However, I am not sure it much matters. You will be wanted in the common
+room at two. The proctor has sent for your character also. Altogether, I
+congratulate you. Your career at the University has been brilliant; but,
+your orbit being highly elliptical, it is to be feared that you will
+remain but a short time above the horizon. Good morning."
+
+Charles rejoined the eager knot of friends outside; and, when he spoke
+the awful word, "common room," every countenance wore a look of dismay.
+Five more, it appeared, were sent for, and three were wanted by the
+proctor at eleven. It was a disastrous morning.
+
+There was a large breakfast in the rooms of the man with the whiskers,
+to which all the unfortunates were of course going. One or two were in a
+state of badly-concealed terror, and fidgeted and were peevish, until
+they got slightly tipsy. Others laughed a good deal, rather nervously,
+and took the thing pluckily--the terror was there, but they fought
+against it; but the behaviour of Charles extorted applause from
+everybody. He was as cool and as merry as if he was just going down for
+the long vacation; he gave the most comical account of the whole
+proceedings last night from beginning to end, as he was well competent
+to do, being the only sober man who had witnessed them; he ate heartily,
+and laughed naturally, to the admiration of every one.
+
+One of the poor fellows who had shown greatest signs of terror, and who
+was as near crying as he could possibly be without actually doing so,
+looked up and complimented him on his courage, with an oath.
+
+"In me, my dear Dick," said Charles, good-naturedly, "you see the
+courage of despair. Had I half your chances, I should be as bad as you.
+I know there are but a few more ceremonies to be gone through, and
+then--"
+
+The other rose and left the room. "Well," said he, as he went, with a
+choking voice, "I expect my old governor will cut his throat, or
+something; I'm fifteen hundred in debt." And so the door closed on the
+poor lad, and the party was silent.
+
+There came in now a young man, to whom I wish especially to call your
+attention. He was an ordinary young man enough, in the morning livery of
+a groom. He was a moderately well-looking fellow, and there seems at
+first nothing in any way remarkable about him. But look at him again,
+and you are struck with a resemblance to some one you know, and yet at
+first you hardly know to whom. It is not decidedly, either, in any one
+feature, and you are puzzled for a time, till you come to the conclusion
+that everyone else does. That man is a handsome likeness of Charles
+Ravenshoe.
+
+This is Charles's foster-brother William, whom we saw on a former
+occasion taking refreshment with that young gentleman, and who had for
+some time been elevated to the rank of Mr. Charles's "lad." He had come
+for orders.
+
+There were no orders but to exercise the horses, Charles believed; he
+would tell him in the afternoon if there were, he added sorrowfully.
+
+"I saw Lord Welter coming away from the proctor's, sir," said William.
+"He told me to ask what train you were going down by. His lordship told
+me to say, sir, that Lord Welter of Christchurch would leave the
+University at twelve to-morrow, and would not come into residence again
+till next Michaelmas term."
+
+"By Jove," said Charles, "he has got a dose! I didn't think they'd have
+given him a year. Well, here goes."
+
+Charles went to the proctor's, but his troubles there were not so severe
+as he had expected. He had been seen fighting several times during the
+evening, but half the University had been doing the same. He had been
+sent home three times, and had reappeared; that was nothing so very bad.
+On his word of honour he had not tripped up the marshal; Brown himself
+thought he must have slipped on a piece of orange-peel. Altogether it
+came to this; that Ravenshoe of Paul's had better be in by nine for the
+rest of term, and mind what he was about for the future.
+
+But the common room at two was the thing by which poor Charles was to
+stand or fall. There were terrible odds against him--the master and six
+tutors. It was no use, he said, snivelling, or funking the thing; so he
+went into battle valiantly.
+
+THE MASTER opened the ball, in a voice suggestive of mild remonstrance.
+In all his experience in college life, extending over a period of
+forty-five years, he had never even heard of proceedings so
+insubordinate, so unparalleled, so--so--monstrous, as had taken place
+the night before, in a college only a twelvemonth ago considered to be
+the quietest in the University. A work of fiction of a low and vicious
+tendency, professing to describe scenes of headlong riot and debauchery
+at the sister University, called, he believed, "Peter Priggins," had
+been written, and was, he understood, greatly read by the youth of both
+seats of learning; but he was given to understand that the worst
+described in that book sank into nothing, actually dwindled into
+insignificance, before last night's proceedings. It appeared, he
+continued (referring to a paper through his gold eye-glasses), that at
+half-past twelve a band of intoxicated and frantic young men had rushed
+howling into the college, refusing to give their names to the porter
+(among whom was recognised Mr. Ravenshoe); that from that moment a scene
+of brutal riot had commenced in the usually peaceful quadrangle, and had
+continued till half-past three; loaded weapons had been resorted to, and
+fireworks had been exhibited; and, finally, that five members of another
+college had knocked out at half-past three, stating to the porter
+(without the slightest foundation) that they had been having tea with
+the dean. Now you know, really and truly, it simply resolved itself into
+this. Were they going to keep St. Paul's College open, or were they not?
+If the institution which had flourished now for above five hundred years
+was to continue to receive undergraduates, the disturbers of last night
+must be sternly eliminated. In the last case of this kind, where a man
+was only convicted of--eh, Mr. Dean?--pump handle--thank you--was only
+convicted of playfully secreting the handle of the college pump,
+rustication had been inflicted. In this case the college would do its
+duty, however painful.
+
+Charles was understood to say that he was quite sober, and had tried to
+keep the fellows out of mischief.
+
+THE MASTER believed Mr. Ravenshoe would hardly deny having let off a
+rocket on the grass-plat.
+
+Charles was ill-advised enough to say that he did it to keep the fellows
+quiet; but the excuse fell dead, and there was a slight pause. After
+which,
+
+THE DEAN rose, with his hands in his pockets, and remarked that this
+sort of thing was all mighty fine, you know; but they weren't going to
+stand it, and the sooner this was understood the better. He, for one, as
+long as he remained dean of that college, was not going to have a parcel
+of drunken young idiots making a row under his windows at all hours in
+the morning. He should have come out himself last night, but that he was
+afraid, positively afraid, of personal violence; and the odds were too
+heavy against him. He, for one, did not want any more words about it. He
+allowed the fact of Mr. Ravenshoe being perfectly sober, though whether
+that could be pleaded in extenuation was very doubtful. (Did you speak,
+Mr. Bursar? No. I beg pardon, I thought you did.) He proposed that Mr.
+Ravenshoe should be rusticated for a year, and that the Dean of
+Christchurch should be informed that Lord Welter was one of the most
+active of the rioters. That promising young nobleman had done them the
+honour to create a disturbance in the college on a previous occasion,
+when he was, as last night, the guest of Mr. Ravenshoe.
+
+Charles said that Lord Welter had been rusticated for a year.
+
+THE DEAN was excessively glad to hear it, and hoped that he would stay
+at home and give his family the benefit of his high spirits. As there
+were five other gentlemen to come before them, he would suggest that
+they should come to a determination.
+
+THE BURSAR thought that Mr. Ravenshoe's plea of sobriety should be taken
+in extenuation. Mr. Ravenshoe had never been previously accused of
+having resorted to stimulants. He thought it should be taken in
+extenuation.
+
+THE DEAN was sorry to be of a diametrically opposite opinion.
+
+No one else taking up the cudgels for poor Charles, the Master said he
+was afraid he must rusticate him.
+
+Charles said he hoped they wouldn't.
+
+THE DEAN gave a short laugh, and said that, if that was all he had to
+say, he might as well have held his tongue. And then the Master
+pronounced sentence of rustication for a year, and Charles, having
+bowed, withdrew.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+JOHN MARSTON.
+
+Charles returned to his room, a little easier in his mind than when he
+left it. There still remained one dreadful business to get over--the
+worst of all; that of letting his father know. Non-University men sneer
+at rustication; they can't see any particular punishment in having to
+absent yourself from your studies for a term or two. But do they think
+that the Dons don't know what they are about? Why, nine spirited young
+fellows out of ten would snap their fingers at rustication, if it wasn't
+for the _home_ business. It is breaking the matter to the father, his
+just anger, and his mother's still more bitter reproaches. It must all
+come out, the why and the wherefore, without concealment or palliation.
+The college write a letter to justify themselves, and then a mine of
+deceit is sprung under the parents' feet, and their eyes are opened to
+things they little dreamt of. This, it appears, is not the first
+offence. The college has been long-suffering, and has pardoned when it
+should have punished repeatedly. The lad who was thought to be doing so
+well has been leading a dissipated, riotous life, and deceiving them
+all. This is the bitterest blow they have ever had. How can they trust
+him again?--And so the wound takes long to heal, and sometimes is never
+healed at all. That is the meaning of rustication.
+
+A majority of young fellows at the University deceive their parents,
+especially if they come of serious houses. It is almost forced upon them
+sometimes, and in all cases the temptation is strong. It is very unwise
+to ask too many questions. Home questions are, in some cases,
+unpardonable. A son can't tell a father, as one man can tell another, to
+mind his own business. No. The father asks the question suddenly, and
+the son lies, perhaps, for the first time in his life. If he told the
+truth, his father would knock him down.
+
+Now Charles was a little better off than most young fellows in this
+respect. He knew his father would scold about the rustication, and still
+more at his being in debt. He wasn't much afraid of his father's anger.
+They two had always been too familiar to be much afraid of one another.
+He was much more afraid of the sarcasms of Mackworth, and he not a
+little dreaded his brother; but with regard to his father he felt but
+slight uneasiness.
+
+He found his scout and his servant William trying to get the room into
+some order, but it was hopeless. William looked up with a blank face as
+he came in, and said--
+
+"We can't do no good, sir; I'd better go for Herbert's man, I suppose?"
+
+"You may go, William," said Charles, "to the stables, and prepare my
+horses for a journey. Ward, you may pack up my things, as I go down
+to-morrow. I am rusticated."
+
+They both looked very blank, especially William, who, after a long
+pause, said--
+
+"I was afraid of something happening yesterday after Hall, when I see my
+lord----" here William paused abruptly, and, looking up, touched his
+head to some one who stood in the doorway.
+
+It was a well-dressed, well-looking young man of about Charles's age,
+with a handsome, hairless, florid face, and short light hair. Handsome
+though his face was, it was hardly pleasing in consequence of a certain
+lowering of the eyebrows which he indulged in every moment--as often,
+indeed, as he looked at any one--and also of a slight cynical curl at
+the corners of the mouth. There was nothing else noticeable about Lord
+Welter except his appearance of great personal strength, for which he
+was somewhat famous.
+
+"Hallo, Welter!" shouted Charles, "yesterday was an era in the annals of
+intoxication. Nobody ever was so drunk as you. I did all I could for
+you, more fool I, for things couldn't be worse than they are, and might
+be better. If I had gone to bed instead of looking after you, I
+shouldn't have been rusticated."
+
+"I'm deuced sorry, Charley, I am, 'pon my soul. It is all my confounded
+folly, and I shall write to your father and say so. You are coming home
+with me, of course?"
+
+"By Jove, I never thought of it. That wouldn't be a bad plan, eh? I
+might write from Ranford, you know. Yes, I think I'll say yes. William,
+you can take the horses over to-morrow. That is a splendid idea of
+yours. I was thinking of going to London."
+
+"Hang London in the hunting season," said Lord Welter. "By George, how
+the governor will blow up. I wonder what my grandmother will say.
+Somebody has told her the world is coming to an end next year. I hope
+there'll be another Derby. She has cut homoeopathy and taken to
+vegetable practice. She has deuced near slaughtered her maid with an
+overdose of Linum Catharticum, as she calls it. She goes digging about
+in waste places like a witch, with a big footman to carry the spade. She
+is a good old body, though; hanged if she ain't."
+
+"What does Adelaide think of the change in Lady Ascot's opinions,
+medical and religious?"
+
+"She don't care, bless you. She laughs about the world coming to an end,
+and as for the physic, she won't stand that. She has pretty much her own
+way with the old lady, I can tell you, and with every one else, as far
+as that goes. She is an imperious little body; I'm afraid of her.--How
+do, Marston?"
+
+This was said to a small, neatly-dressed, quiet-looking man, with a
+shrewd, pleasant face, who appeared at this moment, looking very grave.
+He returned Welter's salutation, and that gentleman sauntered out of the
+room, after having engaged Charles to dinner at the Cross at six. The
+new comer then sat down by Charles, and looked sorrowfully in his face.
+
+"So it has come to this, my poor boy," said he, "and only two days after
+our good resolutions. Charley, do you know what Issachar was like?"
+
+"No."
+
+"He was like a strong ass stooping between two burdens," replied the
+other, laughing. "I know somebody who is, oh, so very like him. I know
+a fellow who could do capitally in the schools and in the world, who is
+now always either lolling about reading novels, or else flying off in
+the opposite extreme, and running, or riding, or rowing like a madman.
+Those are his two burdens, and he is a dear old ass also, whom it is
+very hard to scold, even when one is furiously angry with him."
+
+"It's all true, Marston; it's all true as Gospel," said Charles.
+
+"Look how well you did at Shrewsbury," continued Marston, "when you were
+forced to work. And now, you haven't opened a book for a year. Why don't
+you have some object in life, old fellow? Try to be captain of the
+University Eight or the Eleven; get a good degree; anything. Think of
+last Easter vacation, Charley. Well, then, I won't----Be sure that
+pot-house work won't do. What earthly pleasure can there be in herding
+with men of that class, your inferiors in everything except strength?
+and you can talk quite well enough for any society?"
+
+"It ain't my fault," broke in Charles, piteously. "It's a good deal more
+the fault of the men I'm with. That Easter vacation business was planned
+by Welter. He wore a velveteen shooting-coat and knee-breeches, and
+called himself----"
+
+"That will do, Charley; I don't want to hear any of that gentleman's
+performances. I entertain the strongest personal dislike for him. He
+leads you into all your mischief. You often quarrel; why don't you break
+with him?"
+
+"I can't."
+
+"Because he is a distant relation? Nonsense. Your brother never speaks
+to him."
+
+"It isn't that."
+
+"Do you owe him money?"
+
+"No, it's the other way, by Jove! I can't break with that man. I can't
+lose the run of Ranford. I must go there. There's a girl there I care
+about more than all the world beside; if I don't see her I shall go
+mad."
+
+Marston looked very thoughtful. "You never told me of this," he said;
+"and she has--she has refused you, I suppose?"
+
+"Ay! how did you guess that?"
+
+"By my mother wit. I didn't suppose that Charles Ravenshoe would have
+gone on as he has under other circumstances."
+
+"I fell in love with her," said Charley, rocking himself to and fro,
+"when she was a child. I have never had another love but her; and the
+last time I left Ranford I asked her--you know--and she laughed in my
+face, and said we were getting too old for that sort of nonsense. And
+when I swore I was in earnest, she only laughed the more. And I'm a
+desperate beggar, by Jove, and I'll go and enlist, by Jove."
+
+"What a brilliant idea!" said Marston. "Don't be a fool, Charley. Is
+this girl a great lady?"
+
+"Great lady! Lord bless you, no; she's a dependant without a sixpence."
+
+"Begin all over again with her. Let her alone a little. Perhaps you took
+too much for granted, and offended her. Very likely she has got tired of
+you. By your own confession, you have been making love to her for ten
+years; that must be a great bore for a girl, you know. I suppose you are
+thinking of going to Ranford now?"
+
+"Yes, I am going for a time."
+
+"The worst place you could go to; much better go home to your father.
+Yours is a quiet, staid, wholesome house; not such a bear-garden as the
+other place--but let us change the subject. I am sent after you."
+
+"By whom?"
+
+"Musgrave. The University Eight is going down, and he wants you to row
+four. The match with Cambridge is made up."
+
+"Oh, hang it!" said poor Charles; "I can't show after this business. Get
+a waterman; do, Marston. They will know all about it by this time."
+
+"Nay, I want you to come; do come, Charles. I want you to contrast these
+men with the fellows you were with last night, and to see what effect
+three such gentlemen and scholars as Dixon, Hunt, and Smith have in
+raising the tone of the men they are thrown among."
+
+On the barge Charles met the others of the Eight--quiet, staid,
+gentlemanly men, every one of whom knew what had happened, and was more
+than usually polite in consequence. Musgrave, the captain, received him
+with manly courtesy. He was sorry to hear Ravenshoe was going down--had
+hoped to have had him in the Eight at Easter; however, it couldn't be
+helped; hoped to get him at Henley; and so on. The others were very
+courteous too, and Charles soon began to find that he himself was
+talking in a different tone of voice, and using different language from
+that which he would have been using in his cousin's rooms; and he
+confessed this to Marston that night.
+
+Meanwhile the University Eight, with the little blue flag at her bows,
+went rushing down the river on her splendid course. Past heavy barges
+and fairy skiffs; past men in dingys, who ran high and dry on the bank
+to get out of the way; and groups of dandys, who ran with them for a
+time. And before any man was warm--Iffley. Then across the broad
+mill-pool and through the deep crooks, out into the broads, and past the
+withered beds of reeds which told of coming winter. Bridges, and a
+rushing lasher--Sandford. No rest here. Out of the dripping well-like
+lock. Get your oars out and away again, past the yellowing willows, past
+the long wild grey meadows, swept by the singing autumn wind. Through
+the swirling curves and eddies, onward under the westering sun towards
+the woods of Nuneham.
+
+It was so late when they got back, that those few who had waited for
+them--those faithful few who would wait till midnight to see the Eight
+come in--could not see them, but heard afar off the measured throb and
+rush of eight oars as one, as they came with rapid stroke up the
+darkening reach. Charles and Marston walked home together.
+
+"By George," said Charles, "I should like to do that and nothing else
+all my life. What a splendid stroke Musgrave gives you, so marked, and
+so long, and yet so lively. Oh, I should like to be forced to row every
+day like the watermen."
+
+"In six or seven years you would probably row as well as a waterman. At
+least, I mean, as well as some of the second-rate ones. I have set my
+brains to learn steering, being a small weak man; but I shall never
+steer as well as little Tims, who is ten years old. Don't mistake a
+means for an end--"
+
+Charles wouldn't always stand his friend's good advice, and he thought
+he had had too much of it to-day. So he broke out into sudden and
+furious rebellion, much to Marston's amusement, who treasured up every
+word he said in his anger, and used them afterwards with fearful effect
+against him.
+
+"I don't care for you," bawled Charles; "you're a greater fool than I
+am, and be hanged to you. You're going to spend the best years of your
+life, and ruin your health, to get a first. _A first! A first!_ Why that
+miserable little beast, Lock, got a first. A fellow who is, take him all
+in all, the most despicable little wretch I know! If you are very
+diligent you may raise yourself to _his_ level! And when you have got
+your precious first, you will find yourself utterly unfit for any trade
+or profession whatever (except the Church, which you don't mean to
+enter). What do you know about modern languages or modern history? If
+you go into the law, you have got to begin all over again. They won't
+take you in the army; they are not such _muffs_. And this is what you
+get for your fifteen hundred pounds!"
+
+Charles paused, and Marston clapped his hands and said, "hear, _hear_!"
+which made him more angry still.
+
+"I shouldn't care if I _was_ a waterman. I'm sick of all this
+pretension and humbug; I'd sooner be anything than what I am, with my
+debts, and my rustication, and keeping up appearances. I wish I was a
+billiard marker; I wish I was a jockey; I wish I was Alick Reed's
+Novice; I wish I was one of Barclay and Perkins's draymen. Hang it! I
+wish I was a cabman! Queen Elizabeth was a wise woman, and she was of my
+opinion."
+
+"Did Queen Elizabeth wish she was a cabman?" asked Marston, gravely.
+
+"No, she didn't," said Charles, very tartly. "She wished she was a
+milkmaid, and I think she was quite right. Now, then."
+
+"So you would like to be a milkmaid?" said the inexorable Marston. "You
+had better try another Easter vacation with Welter. Mrs. Sherrat will
+get you a suit of cast-off clothes from some of the lads. Here's the
+'Cross,' where you dine. Bye, bye!"
+
+John Marston knew, and knew well, nearly every one worth knowing in the
+University. He did not appear particularly rich; he was not handsome; he
+was not brilliant in conversation; he did not dress well, though he was
+always neat; he was not a cricketer, a rower, or a rider; he never spoke
+at the Union; he never gave large parties; no one knew anything about
+his family; he never betted; and yet he was in the best set in the
+University.
+
+There was, of course, some reason for this; in fact, there were three
+good and sufficient reasons, although above I may seem to have exhausted
+the means of approach to good University society. First, He had been to
+Eton as a town boy, and had been popular there. Second, He had got one
+of the great open scholarships. And third, His behaviour had always been
+most correct and gentlemanly.
+
+A year before this he had met Charles as a freshman in Lord Welter's
+rooms, and had conceived a great liking for him. Charles had just come
+up with a capital name from Shrewsbury, and Marston hoped that he would
+have done something; but no. Charles took up with riding, rowing,
+driving, &c., &c., not to mention the giving and receiving of parties,
+with all the zest of a young fellow with a noble constitution, enough
+money, agreeable manners, and the faculty of excelling to a certain
+extent in every sport he took in hand.
+
+He very soon got to like and respect Marston. He used to allow him to
+blow him up, and give him good advice when he wouldn't take it from any
+one else. The night before he went down Marston came to his rooms, and
+tried to persuade him to go home, and not to "the training stables," as
+he irreverently called Ranford; but Charles had laughed and laughed, and
+joked, and given indirect answers, and Marston saw that he was
+determined, and discontinued pressing him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+ADELAIDE.
+
+
+The next afternoon Lord Welter and Charles rode up to the door at
+Ranford. The servants looked surprised; they were not expected. His
+lordship was out shooting; her ladyship was in the poultry-yard; Mr.
+Pool was in the billiard-room with Lord Saltire.
+
+"The deuce!" said Lord Welter; "that's lucky, I'll get him to break it
+to the governor."
+
+The venerable nobleman was very much amused by the misfortunes of these
+ingenuous youths, and undertook the commission with great good nature.
+But, when he had heard the cause of the mishap, he altered his tone
+considerably, and took on himself to give the young men what was for him
+a severe lecture. He was sorry this had come out of a drunken riot; he
+wished it ... which, though bad enough, did not carry the disgrace with
+it that the other did. Let them take the advice of an old fellow who had
+lived in the world, ay, and moved with the world, for above eighty
+years, and take care not to be marked, even by their own set, as
+drinking men. In his day, he allowed, drinking was entirely _de
+rigueur_; and indeed nothing could be more proper and correct than the
+whole thing they had just described to him, if it had happened fifty
+years ago. But now a drunken row was an anachronism. Nobody drank now.
+He had made a point of watching the best young fellows, and none of them
+drank. He made a point of taking the time from the rising young fellows,
+as every one ought to, who wished to go with the world. In his day, for
+instance, it was the custom to talk with considerable freedom on sacred
+subjects, and he himself had been somewhat notorious for that sort of
+thing; but look at him now: he conformed with the times, and went to
+church. Every one went to church now. Let him call their attention to
+the fact that a great improvement had taken place in public morals of
+late years.
+
+So the good-natured old heathen gave them what, I daresay, he thought
+was the best of advice. He is gone now to see what his system of
+morality was worth. I am very shy of judging him, or the men of his
+time. It gives me great pain to hear the men of the revolutionary era
+spoken of flippantly. The time was so exceptional. The men at that time
+were a race of giants. One wonders how the world got through that time
+at all. Six hundred millions of treasure spent by Britain alone! How
+many millions of lives lost none may guess. What wonder if there were
+hell-fire clubs and all kinds of monstrosities. Would any of the present
+generation have attended the fête of the goddess of reason, if they had
+lived at that time, I wonder? Of course they wouldn't.
+
+Charles went alone to the poultry-yard; but no one was there except the
+head keeper, who was administering medicine to a cock, whose appearance
+was indictable--that is to say, if the laws against cock-fighting were
+enforced. Lady Ascot had gone in; so Charles went in too, and went
+upstairs to his aunt's room.
+
+One of the old lady's last fancies was sitting in the dark, or in a
+gloom so profound as to approach to darkness. So Charles, passing out of
+a light corridor, and shutting the door behind him, found himself unable
+to see his hand before him. Confident, however, of his knowledge of
+localities, he advanced with such success that he immediately fell
+crashing headlong over an ottoman; and in his descent, imagining that he
+was falling into a pit or gulf of unknown depth, uttered a wild cry of
+alarm. Whereupon the voice of Lady Ascot from close by answered, "Come
+in," as if she thought she heard somebody knock.
+
+"Come up, would be more appropriate, aunt," said Charles. "Why do you
+sit in the dark? I've killed myself, I believe."
+
+"Is that you, Charles?" said she. "What brings you over? My dear, I am
+delighted. Open a bit of the window, Charles, and let me see you."
+
+Charles did as he was desired; and, as the strong light from without
+fell upon him, the old lady gave a deep sigh.
+
+"Ah, dear, so like poor dear Petre about the eyes. There never was a
+handsome Ravenshoe since him, and there never will be another. You were
+quite tolerable as a boy, my dear; but you've got very coarse, very
+coarse and plain indeed. Poor Petre!"
+
+"You're more unlucky in the light than you were in the darkness,
+Charles," said a brisk, clear, well-modulated voice from behind the old
+lady. "Grandma seems in one of her knock-me-down moods to-day. She had
+just told me that I was an insignificant chit, when you made your
+graceful and noiseless entrance, and saved me anything further."
+
+If Adelaide had been looking at Charles when she spoke, instead of at
+her work, she would have seen the start which he gave when he heard her
+voice. As it was, she saw nothing of it; and Charles, instantly
+recovering himself, said in the most nonchalant voice possible:
+
+"Hallo, are you here? How do you contrive to work in the dark?"
+
+"It is not dark to any one with eyes," was the curt reply. "I can see to
+read."
+
+Here Lady Ascot said that, if she had called Adelaide a chit, it was
+because she had set up her opinion against that of such a man as Dr.
+Going; that Adelaide was a good and dutiful girl to her; that she was a
+very old woman, and perhaps shouldn't live to see the finish of next
+year; and that her opinion still was that Charles was very plain and
+coarse, and she was sorry she couldn't alter it.
+
+Adelaide came rapidly up and kissed her, and then went and stood in the
+light beside Charles.
+
+She had grown into a superb blonde beauty. From her rich brown crêpé
+hair to her exquisite little foot, she was a model of grace. The nose
+was delicately aquiline, and the mouth receded slightly, while the chin
+was as slightly prominent; the eyes were brilliant, and were
+concentrated on their object in a moment; and the eyebrows surmounted
+them in a delicately but distinctly marked curve. A beauty she was, such
+as one seldom sees; and Charles, looking on her, felt that he loved her
+more madly than ever, and that he would die sooner than let her know it.
+
+"Well, Charles," she said, "you don't seem overjoyed to see me."
+
+"A man can't look joyous with broken shins, my dear Adelaide. Aunt, I've
+got some bad news for you. I am in trouble."
+
+"Oh dear," said the old lady, "and what is the matter now? Something
+about a woman, I suppose. You Ravenshoes are always--"
+
+"No, no, aunt. Nothing of the kind. Adelaide, don't go, pray; you will
+lose such a capital laugh. I've got rusticated, Aunt."
+
+"That is very comical, I dare say," said Adelaide, in a low voice; "but
+I don't see the joke."
+
+"I thought you would have had a laugh at me, perhaps," said Charles; "it
+is rather a favourite amusement of yours."
+
+"What, in the name of goodness, makes you so disagreeable and cross
+to-day, Charles? You were never so before, when anything happened. I am
+sure I am very sorry for your misfortune, though I really don't know its
+extent. Is it a very serious thing?"
+
+"Serious, very. I don't much like going home. Welter is in the same
+scrape; who is to tell her?"
+
+"This is the way," said Adelaide; "I'll show you how to manage her."
+
+All this was carried on in a low tone, and very rapidly. The old lady
+had just begun in a loud, querulous, scolding voice to Charles, when
+Adelaide interrupted her with--
+
+"I say, grandma, Welter is rusticated too."
+
+Adelaide good-naturedly said this to lead the old lady's wrath from
+Charles, and throw it partly on to her grandson; but however good her
+intentions, the execution of them was unsuccessful. The old lady fell to
+scolding Charles; accusing him of being the cause of the whole mishap,
+of leading Welter into every mischief, and stating her opinion that he
+was an innocent and exemplary youth, with the fault only of being too
+easily led away. Charles escaped as soon as he could, and was followed
+by Adelaide.
+
+"This is not true, is it?" she said. "It is not your fault?"
+
+"My fault, partly, of course. But Welter would have been sent down
+before, if it hadn't been for me. He got me into a scrape this time. He
+mustn't go back there. You mustn't let him go back."
+
+"I let him go back, forsooth! What on earth can I have to do with his
+lordship's movements?" she said, bitterly, "Do you know who you are
+talking to?--a beggarly orphan."
+
+"Hush! don't talk like that, Adelaide. Your power in this house is very
+great. The power of the only sound head in the house. You could stop
+anything you like from happening."
+
+They had come together at a conservatory door; and she put her back
+against it, and held up her hand to bespeak his attention more
+particularly.
+
+"I wish it was true, Charles; but it isn't. No one has any power over
+Lord Ascot. Is Welter much in debt?"
+
+"I should say, a great deal," was Charles's reply. "I think I ought to
+tell you. You may help him to break it to them."
+
+"Ay, he always comes to me for that sort of thing. Always did from a
+child. I'll tell you what, Charles, there's trouble coming or come on
+this house. Lord Ascot came home from Chester looking like death; they
+say he lost fearfully both there and at Newmarket. He came home quite
+late, and went up to grandma; and there was a dreadful scene. She hasn't
+been herself since. Another blow like it will kill her. I suspect my
+lord's bare existence depends on this colt winning the Derby. Come and
+see it gallop," she added, suddenly throwing her flashing eyes upon his,
+and speaking with an animation and rapidity very different from the
+cold stern voice in which she had been telling the family troubles.
+"Come, and let us have some oxygen. I have not spoken to a man for a
+month. I have been leading a life like a nun's; no, worse than any
+nun's; for I have been bothered and humiliated by--ah! such wretched
+trivialities. Go and order horses. I will join you directly."
+
+So she dashed away and left him, and he hurried to the yard. Scarcely
+were the horses ready when she was back again, with the same stem, cold
+expression on her face, now more marked, perhaps, from the effect of the
+masculine habit she wore. She was a consummate horsewoman, and rode the
+furious black Irish mare, which was brought out for her, with ease and
+self-possession, seeming to enjoy the rearing and plunging of the
+sour-tempered brute far more than Charles, her companion, did, who would
+rather have seen her on a quieter horse.
+
+A sweeping gallop under the noble old trees, through a deep valley, and
+past a herd of deer, which scudded away through the thick-strewn leaves,
+brought them to the great stables, a large building at the edge of the
+park, close to the downs. Twenty or thirty long-legged, elegant,
+nonchalant-looking animals, covered to the tips of their ears with
+cloths, and ridden each by a queer-looking brown-faced lad, were in the
+act of returning from their afternoon exercise. These Adelaide's mare,
+"Molly Asthore," charged and dispersed like a flock of sheep; and then,
+Adelaide pointing with her whip to the downs, hurried past the stables
+towards a group they saw a little distance off.
+
+There were only four people--Lord Ascot, the stud-groom, and two lads.
+Adelaide was correctly informed; they were going to gallop the Voltigeur
+colt (since called Haphazard), and the cloths were now coming off him.
+Lord Ascot and the stud-groom mounted their horses, and joined our pair,
+who were riding slowly along the measured mile the way the horse was to
+come.
+
+Lord Ascot looked very pale and worn; he gave Charles a kindly greeting,
+and made a joke with Adelaide; but his hands fidgeted with his reins,
+and he kept turning back towards the horse they had left, wondering
+impatiently what was keeping the boy. At last they saw the beautiful
+beast shake his head, give two or three playful plunges, and then come
+striding rapidly towards them, over the short, springy turf.
+
+Then they turned, and rode full speed: soon they heard the mighty
+hollow-sounding hoofs behind, that came rapidly towards them, devouring
+space. Then the colt rushed by them in his pride, with his chin on his
+chest, hard held, and his hind feet coming forward under his girth every
+stride, and casting the turf behind him in showers. Then Adelaide's
+horse, after a few mad plunges, bolted, overtook the colt, and actually
+raced him for a few hundred yards; then the colt was pulled up on a
+breezy hill, and they all stood a little together talking and
+congratulating one another on the beauty of the horse.
+
+Charles and Adelaide rode away together over the downs, intending to
+make a little détour, and so lengthen their ride. They had had no chance
+of conversation since they parted at the conservatory door, and they
+took it up nearly where they had left it. Adelaide began, and, I may
+say, went on, too, as she had most of the talking.
+
+"I should like to be a duchess; then I should be mistress of the only
+thing I am afraid of."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Poverty," said she; "that is my only terror, and that is my inevitable
+fate."
+
+"I should have thought, Adelaide, that you were too high spirited to
+care for that, or anything."
+
+"Ah, you don't know; all my relations are poor. _I_ know what it is; _I_
+know what it would be for a beauty like me."
+
+"You will never be poor or friendless while Lady Ascot lives."
+
+"How long will that be? My home now depends very much on that horse; oh,
+if I were only a man, I should welcome poverty; it would force me to
+action."
+
+Charles blushed. Not many days before, Marston and he had had a battle
+royal, in which the former had said, that the only hope for Charles was
+that he should go two or three times without his dinner, and be made to
+earn it, and that as long as he had a "mag" to bless himself with, he
+would always be a lazy, useless humbug; and now here was a young lady
+uttering the same atrocious sentiments. He called attention to the
+prospect.
+
+Three hundred feet below them, Father Thames was winding along under the
+downs and yellow woodlands, past chalk quarry and grey farm-house,
+blood-red beneath the setting sun; a soft, rich, autumnal haze was over
+everything; the smoke from the distant village hung like a curtain of
+pearl across the valley; and the long, straight, dark wood that crowned
+the high grey wold, was bathed in a dim purple mist, on its darkest
+side; and to perfect the air of dreamy stillness, some distant bells
+sent their golden sound floating on the peaceful air. It was a quiet day
+in the old age of the year; and its peace seemed to make itself felt on
+these two wild young birds; for they were silent more than half the way
+home; and then Charles said, in a low voice--
+
+"Dear Adelaide, I hope you have chosen aright. The time will come when
+you will have to make a more important decision than any you have made
+yet. At one time in a man's or woman's life, they say, there is a choice
+between good and evil. In God's name think before you make it."
+
+"Charles," she said, in a low and disturbed voice, "if a conjurer were
+to offer to show you your face in a glass, as it would be ten years
+hence, should you have courage to look?"
+
+"I suppose so; would not you!"
+
+"Oh, no, no, no! How do you know what horrid thing would look at you,
+and scare you to death? Ten years hence; where shall we be then?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+LADY ASCOT'S LITTLE NAP.
+
+
+There was a very dull dinner at Ranford that day, Lord Ascot scarcely
+spoke a word; he was kind and polite--he always was that--but he was
+very different from his usual self. The party missed his jokes; which,
+though feeble and sometimes possibly "rather close to the wind," served
+their purpose, served to show that the maker of them was desirous to
+make himself agreeable to the best of his ability. He never once laughed
+during dinner, which was very unusual. It was evident that Lord Saltire
+had performed his commission, and Charles was afraid that he was
+furiously angry with Welter; but, on one occasion, when the latter
+looked up suddenly and asked him some question, his father answered him
+kindly in his usual tone of voice, and spoke to him so for some time.
+
+Lady Ascot was a host in herself. With a noble self-sacrifice, she, at
+the risk of being laughed at, resolved to attract attention by airing
+some of her most remarkable opinions. She accordingly attacked Lord
+Saltire on the subject of the end of the world, putting its total
+destruction by fire at about nine months from that time. Lord Saltire
+had no opinion to offer on the probability of Dr. Going's theory, but
+sincerely hoped that it might last his time, and that he might be
+allowed to get out of the way in the ordinary manner. He did not for a
+moment doubt the correctness of her calculations; but he put it to her
+as a woman of the world, whether or no such an occurrence as she
+described would not be in the last degree awkward and disconcerting?
+
+Adelaide said she didn't believe a word of it, and nothing should induce
+her to do so until it took place. This brought the old lady's wrath down
+upon her and helped the flagging conversation on a little. But, after
+dinner, it got so dull in spite of every one's efforts, that Lord
+Saltire confided to his young friend, as they went upstairs, that he had
+an idea that something was wrong; but at all events, that the house was
+getting so insufferably dull that he must rat, pardieu, for he couldn't
+stand it. He should rat into Devon to his friend Lord Segur.
+
+Welter took occasion to tell Charles that Lord Ascot had sent for him,
+and told him that he knew all about what had happened, and his debts.
+That he did not wish the subject mentioned (as if I were likely to talk
+about it!); that his debts should, if possible, be paid. That he had
+then gone on to say, that he did not wish to say anything harsh to
+Welter on the subject--that he doubted whether he retained the right of
+reproving his son. That they both needed forgiveness one from the other,
+and that he hoped in what was to follow they would display that courtesy
+and mutual forbearance to one another which gentlemen should. "And what
+the deuce does he mean, eh? He never spoke like this before. Is he going
+to marry again? Ay, that's what it is, depend upon it," said this
+penetrating young gentleman; "that will be rather a shame of him, you
+know, particularly if he has two or three cubs to cut into my fortune;"
+and so from that time Lord Welter began to treat his father with a
+slight coolness, and an air of injured innocence most amusing, though
+painful, to Charles and Adelaide, who knew the truth.
+
+As for Adelaide, she seemed to treat Charles like a brother once more.
+She kept no secret from him; she walked with him, rode with him, just as
+of old. She did not seem to like Lord Welter's society, though she was
+very kind to him; and he seemed too much taken up with his dogs and
+horses to care much for her. So Charles and she were thrown together,
+and Charles's love for her grew stronger day by day, until that studied
+indifferent air which he had assumed on his arrival became almost
+impossible to sustain. He sustained it, nevertheless, treating Adelaide
+almost with rudeness, and flinging about his words so carelessly, that
+sometimes she would look suddenly up indignant, and make some passionate
+reply, and sometimes she would rise and leave the room--for aught I
+know, in tears.
+
+It was a sad house to stay in; and his heart began to yearn for his
+western home in spite of Adelaide. After a short time came a long letter
+from his father, a scolding loving letter, in which Densil showed
+plainly that he was trying to be angry, and could not, for joy at
+having his son home with him--and concluded by saying that he should
+never allude to the circumstance again, and by praying him to come back
+at once from that wicked, cock-fighting, horse-racing, Ranford. There
+was an inclosure for Lord Saltire, the reading of which caused his
+lordship to take a great deal of snuff, in which he begged him, for old
+friendship's sake, to send his boy home to him, as he had once sent him
+home to his father. And so Lord Saltire appeared in Charles's
+dressing-room before dinner one day, and, sitting down, said that he was
+come to take a great liberty, and, in fact, was rather presuming on his
+being an old man, but he hoped that his young friend would not take it
+amiss from a man old enough to be his grandfather, if he recommended him
+to leave that house, and go home to his father's. Ranford was a most
+desirable house in every way, but, at the same time, it was what he
+believed the young men of the day called a fast house; and he would not
+conceal from his young friend that his father had requested him to use
+his influence to make him return home; and he did beg his old friend's
+son to believe that he was actuated by the best of motives.
+
+"Dear Lord Saltire," said Charles, taking the old man's hand; "I am
+going home to-morrow; and you don't know how heartily I thank you for
+the interest you always take in me."
+
+"I know nothing," said Lord Saltire, "more pleasing to a battered old
+fellow like myself than to contemplate the ingenuousness of youth, and
+you must allow me to say that your ingenuousness sits uncommonly well
+upon you--in fact, is very becoming. I conceived a considerable interest
+in you the first time I saw you, on that very account. I should like to
+have had a son like you, but it was not to be. I had a son, who was all
+that could be desired by the most fastidious person, brought up in a far
+better school than mine; but he got shot in his first duel, at
+one-and-twenty. I remember to have been considerably annoyed at the
+time," continued the old gentleman, taking a pinch of snuff, and looking
+steadily at Charles without moving a muscle, "but I dare say it was all
+for the best; he might have run in debt, or married a woman with red
+hair, or fifty things. Well, I wish you good day, and beg your
+forgiveness once more for the liberty I have taken."
+
+Charles slipped away from the dinner-table early that evening, and,
+while Lady Ascot was having her after-dinner nap, had a long
+conversation with Adelaide in the dark, which was very pleasant to one
+of the parties concerned, at any rate.
+
+"Adelaide, I am going home to-morrow."
+
+"Are you really? Are you going so suddenly?"
+
+"I am, positively. I got a letter from home to-day. Are you very sorry
+or very glad?"
+
+"I am very sorry, Charles. You are the only friend I have in the world
+to whom I can speak as I like. Make me a promise."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"This is the last night we shall be together. Promise that you won't be
+rude and sarcastic as you are sometimes--almost always, now, to poor
+me--but talk kindly, as we used to do."
+
+"Very well," said Charles. "And you promise you won't be taking such a
+black view of the state of affairs as you do in general. Do you remember
+the conversation we had the day the colt was tried?"
+
+"I remember."
+
+"Well, don't talk like that, you know."
+
+"I won't promise that. The time will come very soon when we shall have
+no more pleasant talks together."
+
+"When will that be?"
+
+"When I am gone out for a governess."
+
+"What wages will you get? You will not get so much as some girls,
+because you are so pretty and so wilful, and you will lead them such a
+deuce of a life."
+
+"Charles, you said you wouldn't be rude."
+
+"I choose to be rude. I have been drinking wine, and we are in the dark,
+and aunt is asleep and snoring, and I shall say just what I like."
+
+"I'll wake her."
+
+"I should like to see you. What shall we talk about? What an old Roman
+Lord Saltire is. He talked about his son who was killed, to me to-day,
+just as I should talk about a pointer dog."
+
+"Then he thought he had been showing some signs of weakness. He always
+speaks of his son like that when he thinks he has been betraying some
+feeling."
+
+"I admire him for it," said Charles.--"So you are going to be a
+governess, eh?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"Why don't you try being barmaid at a public-house? Welter would get you
+a place directly; he has great influence in the licensed victualling
+way. You might come to marry a commercial traveller, for anything you
+know."
+
+"I would not have believed this," she said, in a fierce, low voice. "You
+have turned against me and insult me, because----Unkind, unjust,
+ungentlemanlike."
+
+He heard her passionately sobbing in the dark, and the next moment he
+had her in his arms, and was covering her face with kisses.
+
+"Lie there, my love," he said; "that is your place. All the world can't
+harm or insult my Adelaide while she is there. Why did you fly from me
+and repulse me, my darling, when I told you I was your own true love?"
+
+"Oh, let me go, Charles," she said, trying, ever so feebly, to repulse
+him. "Dear Charles, pray do; I am frightened."
+
+"Not till you tell me you love me, false one."
+
+"I love you more than all the world."
+
+"Traitress! And why did you repulse me and laugh at me?"
+
+"I did not think you were in earnest."
+
+"Another kiss for that wicked, wicked falsehood. Do you know that this
+rustication business has all come from the despair consequent on your
+wicked behaviour the other day?"
+
+"You said Welter caused it, Charles. But oh, please let me go."
+
+"Will you go as a governess now?"
+
+"I will do nothing but what you tell me."
+
+"Then give me one, your own, own self, and I will let you go."
+
+Have the reader's feelings of horror, indignation, astonishment,
+outraged modesty, or ridicule, given him time to remember that all this
+went on in the dark, within six feet of an unconscious old lady? Such,
+however, was the case. And scarcely had Adelaide determined that it was
+time to wake her, and barely had she bent over her for that purpose,
+when the door was thrown open, and--enter attendants with lights. Now,
+if the reader will reflect a moment, he will see what an awful escape
+they had; for the chances were about a thousand to one in favour of two
+things having happened: 1st, the groom of the chambers might have come
+into the room half a minute sooner; and 2nd, they might have sat as they
+were half a minute longer; in either of which cases, Charles would have
+been discovered with his arm round Adelaide's waist, and a fearful
+scandal would have been the consequence. And I mention this as a caution
+to young persons in general, and to remind them that, if they happen to
+be sitting hand in hand, it is no use to jump apart and look very red
+just as the door opens, because the incomer can see what they have been
+about as plain as if he had been there. On this occasion, also, Charles
+and Adelaide set down as usual to their own sagacity what was the result
+of pure accident.
+
+Adelaide was very glad to get away after tea, for she felt rather guilty
+and confused. On Charles's offering to go, however, Lady Ascot, who had
+been very silent and glum all tea-time, requested him to stay, as she
+had something serious to say to him. Which set the young gentleman
+speculating whether she could possibly have been awake before the
+advent of candles, and caused him to await her pleasure with no small
+amount of trepidation.
+
+Her ladyship began by remarking that digitalis was invaluable for
+palpitation, and that she had also found camomile, combined with gentle
+purgatives, efficient for the same thing, when suspected to proceed from
+the stomach. She opined that, if this weather continued, there would be
+heavy running for the Cambridgeshire, and Commissioner would probably
+stand as well as any horse. And then, having, like a pigeon, taken a few
+airy circles through stable-management, theology, and agriculture, she
+descended on her subject, and frightened Charles out of his five wits by
+asking him if he didn't think Adelaide a very nice girl.
+
+Charles decidedly thought she was a very nice girl; but he rather
+hesitated, and said--"Yes, that she was charming."
+
+"Now, tell me, my dear," said Lady Ascot, manoeuvring a great old fan,
+"for young eyes are quicker than old ones. Did you ever remark anything
+between her and Welter?"
+
+Charles caught up one of his legs, and exclaimed, "The devil!"
+
+"What a shocking expression, my dear! Well, I agree with you. I fancy I
+have noticed that they have entertained a decided preference for one
+another. Of course, Welter will be throwing himself away, and all that
+sort of thing, but he is pretty sure to do that. I expect, every time he
+comes home, that he will bring a wife from behind the bar of a
+public-house. Now, Adelaide--"
+
+"Aunt! Lady Ascot! Surely you are under a mistake. I never saw anything
+between them."
+
+"H'm."
+
+"I assure you I never did. I never heard Welter speak of her in that
+sort of way, and I don't think she cares for him."
+
+"What reason have you for thinking _that_?"
+
+"Well--why, you know it's hard to say. The fact is, I have rather a
+partiality for Adelaide myself, and I have watched her in the presence
+of other men."
+
+"Oho! Do you think she cares for you? Do you know she won't have a
+sixpence?"
+
+"We shall have enough to last till next year, aunt; and then the world
+is to come to an end, you know, and we shan't want anything."
+
+"Never you mind about the world, sir. Don't you be flippant and
+impertinent, sir. Don't evade my question, sir. Do you think Adelaide
+cares for you, sir?"
+
+"Charles looked steadily and defiantly at his aunt, and asked her
+whether she didn't think it was very difficult to find out what a
+girl's mind really was--whereby we may conclude that he was profiting by
+Lord Saltire's lesson on the command of feature."
+
+"This is too bad, Charles," broke out Lady Ascot, "to put me off like
+this, after your infamous and audacious conduct of this evening--after
+kissing and hugging that girl under my very nose--"
+
+"I thought it!" said Charles, with a shout of laughter. "I thought it,
+you were awake all the time!"
+
+"I was not awake all the time, sir--"
+
+"You were awake quite long enough, it appears, aunty. Now, what do you
+think of it?"
+
+At first Lady Ascot would think nothing of it, but that the iniquity of
+Charles's conduct was only to be equalled by the baseness and
+ingratitude of Adelaide's; but by degrees she was brought to think that
+it was possible that some good might come of an engagement; and, at
+length, becoming garrulous on this point, it leaked out by degrees, that
+she had set her heart on it for years, that she had noticed for some
+time Charles's partiality for her with the greatest pleasure, and
+recently had feared that something had disturbed it. In short, that it
+was her pet scheme, and that she had been coming to an explanation that
+very night, but had been anticipated.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+GIVES US AN INSIGHT INTO CHARLES'S DOMESTIC RELATIONS, AND SHOWS HOW THE
+GREAT CONSPIRATOR SOLILOQUISED TO THE GRAND CHANDELIER.
+
+
+It may be readily conceived that a considerable amount of familiarity
+existed between Charles and his servant and foster-brother William. But,
+to the honour of both of them be it said, there was more than this--a
+most sincere and hearty affection; a feeling for one another which, we
+shall see, lasted through everything. Till Charles went to Shrewsbury,
+he had never had another playfellow. He and William had been allowed to
+paddle about on the sand, or ride together on the moor, as they would,
+till a boy's friendship had arisen, sufficiently strong to obliterate
+all considerations of rank between them. This had grown with age, till
+William had become his confidential agent at home, during his absence,
+and Charles had come to depend very much on his account of the state of
+things at head-quarters. He had also another confidential agent, to whom
+we shall be immediately introduced. She, however, was of another sex and
+rank.
+
+William's office was barely a pleasant one. His affection for his master
+led him most faithfully to attend to his interests; and, as a Catholic,
+he was often brought into collision with Father Mackworth, who took a
+laudable interest in Charles's affairs, and considered himself injured
+on two or three occasions by the dogged refusal of William to
+communicate the substance and result of a message forwarded through
+William, from Shrewsbury, to Densil, which seemed to cause the old
+gentleman some thought and anxiety. William's religious opinions,
+however, had got to be somewhat loose, and to sit somewhat easily upon
+him, more particularly since his sojourn to Oxford. He had not very long
+ago confided to Charles, in a private sitting, that the conviction which
+was strong on his mind was, that Father Mackworth was not to be trusted.
+God forgive him for saying so; and, on being pressed by Charles to state
+why, he point-blank refused to give any reason whatever, but repeated
+his opinion with redoubled emphasis. Charles had a great confidence in
+William's shrewdness, and forbore to press him, but saw that something
+had occurred which had impressed the above conviction on William's mind
+most strongly.
+
+He had been sent from Oxford to see how the land lay at home, and had
+met Charles at the Rose and Crown, at Stonnington, with saddle horses.
+No sooner were they clear of the town than William, without waiting for
+Charles's leave, put spurs to his horse and rode up alongside of him.
+
+"What is your news, William?"
+
+"Nothing very great. Master looks bothered and worn."
+
+"About this business of mine."
+
+"The priest goes on talking about it, and plaguing him with it, when he
+wants to forget it."
+
+"The deuce take him! He talks about me a good deal."
+
+"Yes; he has begun about you again. Master wouldn't stand it the other
+day, and told him to hold his tongue, just like his own self. Tom heard
+him. They made it up afterwards, though."
+
+"What did Cuthbert say?"
+
+"Master Cuthbert spoke up for you, and said he hoped there wasn't going
+to be a scene, and that you weren't coming to live in disgrace, for that
+would be punishing every one in the house for you."
+
+"How's Mary?"
+
+"She's well. Master don't trust her out of his sight much. They will
+never set him against you while she is there. I wish you would marry
+her, Master Charles, if you can give up the other one."
+
+Charles laughed and told him he wasn't going to do anything of the sort.
+Then he asked, "Any visitors?"
+
+"Ay; one. Father Tiernay, a stranger."
+
+"What sort of man?"
+
+"A real good one. I don't think our man likes him, though."
+
+They had now come to the moor's edge, and were looking down on the
+amphitheatre which formed the domain of Ravenshoe. Far and wide the
+tranquil sea, vast, dim, and grey, flooded bay and headland, cave and
+islet. Beneath their feet slept the winter woodlands; from whose brown
+bosom rose the old house, many-gabled, throwing aloft from its chimneys
+hospitable columns of smoke, which hung in the still autumn air, and
+made a hazy cloud on the hill-side. Everything was so quiet that they
+could hear the gentle whisper of the ground-swell, and the voices of the
+children at play upon the beach, and the dogs barking in the kennels.
+
+"How calm and quiet old home looks, William," said Charles; "I like to
+get back here after Oxford."
+
+"No wine parties here. No steeplechases. No bloomer balls," said
+William.
+
+"No! and no chapels and lectures, and being sent for by the Dean," said
+Charles.
+
+"And none of they dratted bones, neither," said William, with emphasis.
+
+"Ahem! why no! Suppose we ride on."
+
+So they rode down the road through the woodland to the lodge, and so
+through the park--sloping steeply up on their left, with many a clump of
+oak and holly, and many a broad patch of crimson fern. The deer stood
+about in graceful groups, while the bucks belled and rattled noisily,
+making the thorn-thickets echo with the clatter of their horns. The
+rabbits scudded rapidly across the road, and the blackbird fled
+screaming from the mountain-ash tree, now all a-fire with golden fruit.
+So they passed on until a sudden sweep brought them upon the terrace
+between the old grey house and the murmuring sea.
+
+Charles jumped off, and William led the horses round to the stable. A
+young lady in a straw hat and brown gloves, with a pair of scissors and
+a basket, standing half-way up the steps, came down to meet him,
+dropping the basket, and holding out the brown gloves before her. This
+young lady he took in his arms, and kissed; and she, so far from
+resenting the liberty, after she was set on her feet again, held him by
+both hands, and put a sweet dark face towards his, as if she wouldn't
+care if he kissed her again. Which he immediately did.
+
+It was not a very pretty face, but oh! such a calm, quiet, pleasant one.
+There was scarcely a good feature in it, and yet the whole was so gentle
+and pleasing, and withal so shrewd and _espiègle_, that to look at it
+once was to think about it till you looked again; and to look again was
+to look as often as you had a chance, and to like the face the more each
+time you looked. I said there was not a good feature in the face. Well,
+I misled you; there was a pair of calm, honest, black eyes--a very good
+feature indeed, and which, once seen, you were not likely to forget.
+And, also, when I tell you that this face and eyes belonged to the
+neatest, trimmest little figure imaginable, I hope I have done my work
+sufficiently well to make you envy that lucky rogue Charles, who, as we
+know, cares for no woman in the world but Adelaide, and who, between you
+and me, seems to be much too partial to this sort of thing.
+
+"A thousand welcomes home, Charley," said the pleasant little voice
+which belonged to this pleasant little personage. "Oh! I am so glad
+you're come."
+
+"You'll soon wish me away again. I'll plague you."
+
+"I like to be plagued by you, Charley. How is Adelaide?"
+
+"Adelaide is all that the fondest lover could desire" (for they had no
+secrets, these two), "and either sent her love or meant to do so."
+
+"Charles, dearest," she said, eagerly, "come and see him now! come and
+see him with me!"
+
+"Where is he?"
+
+"In the shrubbery, with Flying Childers."
+
+"Is he alone?"
+
+"All alone, except the dog."
+
+"Where are _they_?"
+
+"They are gone out coursing. Come on; they will be back in an hour, and
+the Rook never leaves him. Come, come."
+
+It will be seen that these young folks had a tolerably good
+understanding with one another, and could carry on a conversation about
+"third parties" without even mentioning their names. We shall see how
+this came about presently; but, for the present, let us follow these
+wicked conspirators, and see in what deep plot they are engaged.
+
+They passed rapidly along the terrace, and turned the corner of the
+house to the left, where the west front overhung the river glen, and the
+broad terraced garden went down step by step towards the brawling
+stream. This they passed, and opening an iron gate, came suddenly into a
+gloomy maze of shrubbery that stretched its long vistas up the valley.
+
+Down one dark alley after another they hurried. The yellow leaves
+rustled beneath their feet, and all nature was pervaded with the smell
+of decay. It was hard to believe that these bare damp woods were the
+same as those they had passed through but four months ago, decked out
+with their summer bravery--an orchestra to a myriad birds. Here and
+there a bright berry shone out among the dull-coloured twigs, and a
+solitary robin quavered his soft melancholy song alone. The flowers were
+dead, the birds were flown or mute, and brave, green leaves were stamped
+under foot; everywhere decay, decay.
+
+In the dampest, darkest walk of them all, in a far-off path, hedged with
+holly and yew, they found a bent and grey old man walking with a
+toothless, grey old hound for his silent companion. And, as Charles
+moved forward with rapid elastic step, the old man looked up, and
+tottered to meet him, showing as he did so the face of Densil Ravenshoe.
+
+"Now the Virgin be praised," he said, "for putting it in your head to
+come so quick, my darling. Whenever you go away now, I am in terror lest
+I should die and never see you again. I might be struck with paralysis,
+and not know you, my boy. Don't go away from me again."
+
+"I should like never to leave you any more, father dear. See how well
+you get on with my arm. Let us come out into the sun; why do you walk in
+this dismal wood?
+
+"Why?" said the old man, with sudden animation, his grey eye kindling as
+he stopped. "Why? I come here because I can catch sight of a woodcock,
+lad! I sprang one by that holly just before you came up. Flip flap, and
+away through the hollies like a ghost! Cuthbert and the priest are away
+coursing. Now you are come, surely I can get on the grey pony, and go up
+to see a hare killed. You will lead him for me, won't you? I don't like
+to trouble _them_."
+
+"We can go to-morrow, dad, after lunch, you and I, and William. We'll
+have Leopard and Blue-ruin--by George, it will be like old times again."
+
+"And we'll take our little quiet bird on _her_ pony, won't we?" said
+Densil, turning to Mary. "She's such a good little bird, Charley. We sit
+and talk of you many an hour. Charley, can't you get me down on the
+shore, and let me sit there? I got Cuthbert to take me down once; but
+Father Mackworth came and talked about the Immaculate Conception through
+his nose all the time. I didn't want to hear him talk; I wanted to hear
+the surf on the shore. Good man! he thought he interested me, I dare
+say."
+
+"I hope he is very kind to you, father?"
+
+"Kind! I assure you, my dear boy, he is the kindest creature; he never
+lets me out of his sight; and so attentive!"
+
+"He'll have to be a little less attentive in future, confound him!"
+muttered Charles. "There he is. Talk of the devil! Mary, my dear," he
+added aloud, "go and amuse the Rooks for a little, and let us have
+Cuthbert to ourselves."
+
+The old man looked curious at the idea of Mary talking to the rooks; but
+his mind was drawn off by Charles having led him into a warm, southern
+corner, and set him down in the sun.
+
+Mary did her errand well, for in a few moments Cuthbert advanced rapidly
+towards them. Coming up, he took Charles's hand, and shook it with a
+faint, kindly smile.
+
+He had grown to be a tall and somewhat handsome young man--certainly
+handsomer than Charles. His face, even now he was warmed by exercise,
+was very pale, though the complexion was clear and healthy. His hair was
+slightly gone from his forehead, and he looked much older than he really
+was. The moment that the smile was gone his face resumed the expression
+of passionless calm that it had borne before; and sitting down by his
+brother, he asked him how he did.
+
+"I am as well, Cuthbert," said Charles, "as youth, health, a conscience
+of brass, and a whole world full of friends can make me. _I'm_ all
+right, bless you. But you look very peaking and pale. Do you take
+exercise enough?"
+
+"I? Oh, dear, yes. But I am very glad to see you, Charles. Our father
+misses you. Don't you, father?"
+
+"Very much, Cuthbert."
+
+"Yes. I bore him. I do, indeed. I don't take interest in the things he
+does. I can't; it's not my nature. You and he will be as happy as kings
+talking about salmon, and puppies, and colts."
+
+"I know, Cuthbert; I know. You never cared about those things as we do."
+
+"No, never, brother; and now less than ever. I hope you will stay with
+me--with us. You are my own brother. I will have you stay here," he
+continued in a slightly raised voice; "and I desire that any opposition
+or impertinence you may meet with may be immediately reported to me."
+
+"It will be immediately reported to those who use it, and in a way they
+won't like, Cuthbert. Don't you be afraid; I shan't quarrel. Tell me
+something about yourself, old boy."
+
+"I can tell you but little to interest you, Charles. You are of this
+world, and rejoice in being so. I, day by day, wean myself more and more
+from it, knowing its worthlessness. Leave me to my books and my
+religious exercises, and go on your way. The time will come when your
+pursuits and pleasures will turn to bitter dust in your mouth, as mine
+never can. When the world is like a howling wilderness to you, as it
+will be soon, then come to me, and I will show you where to find
+happiness. At present you will not listen to me."
+
+"Not I," said Charles. "Youth, health, talent, like yours--are these
+gifts to despise?"
+
+"They are clogs to keep me from higher things. Study, meditation, life
+in the past with those good men who have walked the glorious road before
+us--in these consist happiness. Ambition! I have one earthly
+ambition--to purge myself from earthly affections, so that, when I hear
+the cloister-gate close behind me for ever, my heart may leap with joy,
+and I may feel that I am in the antechamber of heaven."
+
+Charles was deeply affected, and bent down his head. "Youth, love,
+friends, joy in this beautiful world--all to be buried between four dull
+white walls, my brother!"
+
+"This beautiful earth, which is beautiful indeed--alas! how I love it
+still! shall become a burden to us in a few years. Love! the greater the
+love, the greater the bitterness. Charles, remember _that_, one day,
+will you, when your heart is torn to shreds? I shall have ceased to love
+you then more than any other fellow-creature; but remember my words. You
+are leading a life which can only end in misery, as even the teachers of
+the false and corrupt religion which you profess would tell you. If you
+were systematically to lead the life you do now, it were better almost
+that there were no future. You are not angry, Charles?"
+
+There was such a spice of truth in what Cuthbert said that it would have
+made nine men in ten angry. I am pleased to record of my favourite
+Charles that he was not; he kept his head bent down, and groaned.
+
+"Don't be hard on our boy, Cuthbert," said Densil; "he is a good boy,
+though he is not like you. It has always been so in our family--one a
+devotee and the other a sportsman. Let us go in, boys; it gets chill."
+
+Charles rose up, and, throwing his arms round his brother's neck,
+boisterously gave him a kiss on the cheek; then he began laughing and
+talking at the top of his voice, making the nooks and angles in the grey
+old façade echo with his jubilant voice.
+
+Under the dark porch they found a group of three--Mackworth; a
+jolly-looking, round-faced, Irish priest, by name Tiernay; and Mary.
+Mackworth received Charles with a pleasant smile, and they joined in
+conversation together heartily. Few men could be more agreeable than
+Mackworth, and he chose to be agreeable now. Charles was insensibly
+carried away by the charm of his frank, hearty manner, and for a time
+forgot who was talking to him.
+
+Mackworth and Charles were enemies. If we reflect a moment, we shall see
+that it could hardly be otherwise.
+
+Charles's existence, holding as he did the obnoxious religion, was an
+offence to him. He had been prejudiced against him from the first; and,
+children not being very slow to find out who are well disposed towards
+them, or the contrary, Charles had early begun to regard the priest with
+distrust and dislike. So a distant, sarcastic line of treatment, on the
+one hand, and childish insolence and defiance, on the other, had grown
+at last into something very like hatred on both sides. Every soul in the
+house adored Charles but the priest; and, on the other hand, the
+priest's authority and dignity were questioned by none but Charles. And,
+all these small matters being taken into consideration, it is not
+wonderful, I say, that Charles and the priest were not good friends even
+before anything had occurred to bring about any open rupture.
+
+Charles and Mackworth seldom met of late years without a "sparring
+match." On this day, however--partly owing, perhaps, to the presence of
+a jolly good-humoured Irish priest--they got through dinner pretty well.
+Charles was as brave as a lion, and, though by far the priest's inferior
+in scientific "sparring," had a rough, strong, effective method of
+fighting, which was by no means to be despised. His great strength lay
+in his being always ready for battle. As he used to tell his crony
+William, he would as soon fight as not; and often, when rebuked by
+Cuthbert for what he called insolence to the priest, he would exclaim,
+"I don't care; what did he begin at me for? If he lets me alone, I'll
+let him alone." And, seeing that he had been at continual war with the
+reverend gentleman for sixteen years or more, I think it speaks highly
+for the courage of both parties that neither had hitherto yielded. When
+Charles afterwards came to know what a terrible card the man had held in
+his hand, he was struck with amazement at his self-possession in not
+playing it, despite his interest.
+
+Mackworth was hardly so civil after dinner as he was before; but
+Cuthbert was hoping that Charles and he would get on without a
+battle-royal, when a slight accident brought on a general engagement,
+and threw all his hopes to the ground. Densil and Mary had gone up to
+the drawing-room, and Charles, having taken as much wine as he cared
+for, rose from the table, and sauntered towards the door, when Cuthbert
+quite innocently asked him where he was going.
+
+Charles said also in perfect good faith that he was going to smoke a
+cigar, and talk to William.
+
+Cuthbert asked him, Would he get William or one of them to give the grey
+colt a warm mash with some nitre in it; and Charles said he'd see it
+done for him himself; when, without warning or apparent cause, Father
+Mackworth said to Father Tiernay,
+
+"This William is one of the grooms. A renegade, I fancy! I believe the
+fellow is a Protestant at heart. He and Mr. Charles Ravenshoe are very
+intimate; they keep up a constant correspondence when apart, I assure
+you."
+
+Charles faced round instantly, and confronted his enemy with a smile on
+his lips; but he said not a word, trying to force Mackworth to continue.
+
+"Why don't you leave him alone?" said Cuthbert.
+
+"My dear Cuthbert," said Charles, "pray don't humiliate me by
+interceding; I assure you I am greatly amused. You see he doesn't speak
+to me; he addressed himself to Mr. Tiernay."
+
+"I wished," said Mackworth, "to call Father Tiernay's attention, as a
+stranger to this part of the world, to the fact of a young gentleman's
+corresponding with an illiterate groom in preference to any member of
+his family."
+
+"The reason I do it," said Charles, speaking to Tiernay, but steadily
+watching Mackworth to see if any of his shafts hit, "is to gain
+information. I like to know what goes on in my absence. Cuthbert here is
+buried in his books, and does not know everything."
+
+No signs of flinching there. Mackworth sat with a scornful smile on his
+pale face, without moving a muscle.
+
+"He likes to get information," said Mackworth, "about his village
+amours, I suppose. But, dear me, he can't know anything that the whole
+parish don't know. I could have told him that that poor deluded fool of
+an underkeeper was going to marry Mary Lee, after all that had happened.
+He will be dowering a wife for his precious favourite some day."
+
+"My precious favourite, Father Tiernay," said Charles, still closely
+watching Mackworth, "is my foster-brother. He used to be a great
+favourite with our reverend friend; his pretty sister Ellen is so still,
+I believe."
+
+This was as random an arrow as ever was shot, and yet it went home to
+the feather. Charles saw Mackworth give a start and bite his lip, and
+knew that he had smote him deep; he burst out laughing.
+
+"With regard to the rest, Father Tiernay, any man who says that there
+was anything wrong between me and Mary Lee tells, saving your presence,
+a lie. It's infernally hard if a man mayn't play at love-making with the
+whole village for a confidant, and the whole matter a merry joke, but
+one must be accused of all sorts of villainy. Isn't ours a pleasant
+household, Mr. Tiernay?"
+
+Father Tiernay shook his honest sides with a wondering laugh, and said,
+"Faix it is. But I hope ye'll allow me to put matters right betune you
+two. Father Mackworth begun on the young man; he was going out to his
+dudeen as peaceful as an honest young gentleman should. And some of the
+best quality are accustomed to converse their grooms in the evening over
+their cigar. I myself can instance Lord Mountdown, whose hospitality I
+have partook frequent. And I'm hardly aware of any act of parliament,
+brother, whereby a young man shouldn't kiss a pretty girl in the way of
+fun, as I've done myself, sure. Whist now, both on ye! I'll come with
+ye, ye heretic, and smoke a cigar meeself."
+
+"I call you to witness that he insulted me," said Mackworth, turning
+round from the window.
+
+"I wish you had let him alone, Father," said Cuthbert, peevishly; "we
+were getting on very happily till you began. Do go, Charles, and smoke
+your cigar with Father Tiernay."
+
+"I am waiting to see if he wants any more," said Charles, with a laugh.
+"Come on, Father Tiernay, and I'll show you the miscreant, and his
+pretty sister, too, if you like."
+
+"I wish he hadn't come home," said Cuthbert, as soon as he and Mackworth
+were alone together. "Why do you and he fight like cat and dog? You make
+me perfectly miserable. I know he is going to the devil, in a worldly
+point of view, and that his portion will be hell necessarily as a
+heretic; but I don't see why you should worry him to death, and make the
+house miserable to him."
+
+"It is for his good."
+
+"Nonsense," rejoined Cuthbert. "You make him hate you; and I don't think
+you ought to treat a son of this house in the way you treat him, You are
+under obligations to this house. Yes, you are. I won't be contradicted
+now. I will have my say when I am in this temper, and you know it. The
+devil is not dead yet by a long way, you see. Why do you rouse him?"
+
+"Go on, go on."
+
+"Yes, I will go on. I'm in my own house, I believe. By the eleven
+thousand virgins, more or less, of the holy St. Ursula, virgin and
+martyr, that brother of mine is a brave fellow. Why, he cares as much
+for you as for a little dog barking at him. And you're a noble enemy for
+any man. You'd better let him alone, I think; you won't get much out of
+him. Adieu."
+
+"What queer wild blood there is in these Ravenshoes," said Mackworth to
+himself, when he was alone. "A younger hand than myself would have been
+surprised at Cuthbert's kicking after so much schooling. Not I. I shall
+never quite tame him, though he is broken in enough for all practical
+purposes. He will be on his knees to-morrow for this. I like to make him
+kick; I shall do it sometimes for amusement; he is so much easier
+managed after one of these tantrums. By Jove! I love the man better
+every day; he is one after my own heart. As for Charles, I hate him, and
+yet I like him after a sort. I like to break a pointless lance with that
+boy, and let him fancy he is my equal. It amuses me.
+
+"I almost fancy that I could have fallen in love with that girl Ellen. I
+was uncommon near it. I must be very careful. What a wild hawk she is!
+What a magnificent move that was of hers, risking a prosecution for
+felony on one single throw, and winning. How could she have guessed that
+there was anything there? She couldn't have guessed it. It was an effort
+of genius. It was a splendid move.
+
+"How nearly that pigheaded fool of a young nobleman has gone to upset my
+calculations! His namesake the chessplayer could not have done more
+mischief by his talents than his friend had by stupidity. I wish Lord
+Ascot would get ruined as quickly as possible, and then my friend would
+be safe out of the way. But he won't."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+CONTAINING A SONG BY CHARLES RAVENSHOE, AND ALSO FATHER TIERNAY'S
+OPINION ABOUT THE FAMILY.
+
+
+Charles and the good-natured Father Tiernay wandered out across the old
+court-yard, towards the stables--a pile of buildings in the same style
+as the house, which lay back towards the hill. The moon was full,
+although obscured by clouds, and the whole court-yard was bathed in a
+soft mellow light. They both paused for a moment to look at the fine old
+building, standing silent for a time; and then Charles startled the
+contemplative priest by breaking into a harsh scornful laugh, as unlike
+his own cheery Ha! Ha! as it was possible to be.
+
+"What are you disturbing a gentleman's meditations in that way for?"
+said the Father. "Is them your Oxford manners? Give me ye'r cigar-case,
+ye haythen, if ye can't appreciate the beauties of nature and art
+combined--laughing like that at the cradle of your ancestors too."
+
+Charles gave him the cigar-case, and trolled out in a rich bass voice--
+
+            "The old falcon's nest
+            Was built up on the crest
+      Of the cliff that hangs over the sea;
+            And the jackdaws and crows,
+            As every one knows,
+      Were confounded respectful to he, to he--e--e."
+
+"Howld yer impudence, ye young heretic doggrel-writer; can't I see what
+ye are driving at?"
+
+            "But the falcon grew old,
+            And the nest it grew cold,
+      And the carrion birds they grew bolder;
+            So the jackdaws and crows,
+            Underneath his own nose,
+      Gave both the young falcons cold shoulder."
+
+"Bedad," said the good-natured Irishman, "some one got hot shoulder
+to-day. Aren't ye ashamed of yourself, singing such ribaldry, and all
+the servants hearing ye?"
+
+"Capital song, Father; only one verse more.
+
+            "The elder was quelled,
+            But the younger rebelled;
+      So he spread his white wings and fled over the sea.
+            Said the jackdaws and crows,
+            'He'll be hanged I suppose,
+      But what in the deuce does that matter to we?'"
+
+There was something in the wild, bitter tone in which he sang the last
+verse that made Father Tiernay smoke his cigar in silence as they
+sauntered across the yard, till Charles began again.
+
+"Not a word of applause for my poor impromptu song? Hang it, I'd have
+applauded anything you sang."
+
+"Don't be so reckless and bitter, Mr. Ravenshoe," said Tiernay, laying
+his hand on his shoulder. "I can feel for you, though there is so little
+in common between us. You might lead a happy peaceful life if you were
+to come over to us; which you will do, if I know anything of my trade,
+in the same day that the sun turns pea-green. _Allons_, as we used to
+say over the water; let us continue our travels."
+
+"Reckless! I am not reckless. The jolly old world is very wide, and I am
+young and strong. There will be a wrench when the tooth comes out; but
+it will soon be over, and the toothache will be cured."
+
+Tiernay remained silent a moment, and then in an absent manner sang this
+line, in a sweet low voice--
+
+      "For the girl of my heart that I'll never see more."
+
+"She must cast in her lot with me," said Charles. "Ay, and she will do
+it, too. She will follow me to the world's end, sir. Are you a judge of
+horses? What a question to ask of an Irishman! Here are the stables."
+
+The lads were bedding down, and all the great building was alive with
+the clattering of busy feet and the neighing of horses. The great
+Ravenshoe Stud was being tucked up for the night; and over that two
+thousand pounds' worth of horse-flesh at least six thousand pounds'
+worth of fuss was being made, under the superintendence of the stud
+groom, Mr. Dickson.
+
+The physical appearance of Mr. Dickson was as though you had taken an
+aged Newmarket jockey, and put a barrel of oysters, barrel and all,
+inside his waistcoat. His face was thin; his thighs were hollow; calves
+to his legs he had none. He was all stomach. Many years had elapsed
+since he had been brought to the verge of dissolution by severe
+training; and since then all that he had eaten, or drunk, or done, had
+flown to his stomach, producing a tympanitic action in that organ,
+astounding to behold. In speech he was, towards his superiors, courteous
+and polite; towards his equals, dictatorial; towards his subordinates,
+abusive, not to say blasphemous. To this gentleman Charles addressed
+himself, inquiring if he had seen William: and he, with a lofty, though
+courteous, sense of injury, inquired, in a loud tone of voice, of the
+stablemen generally, if any one had seen Mr. Charles's pad-groom.
+
+In a dead silence which ensued, one of the lads was ill-advised enough
+to say that he didn't exactly know where he was; which caused Mr.
+Dickson to remark that, if that was all he had to say, he had better go
+on with his work, and not make a fool of himself--which the man did,
+growling out something about always putting his foot in it.
+
+"Your groom comes and goes pretty much as he likes, sir," said Mr.
+Dickson. "I don't consider him as under my orders. Had he been so, I
+should have felt it my duty to make complaint on more than one occasion;
+he is a little too much of the gentleman for _my_ stable, sir."
+
+"Of course, my good Dickson," interrupted Charles, "the fact of his
+being my favourite makes you madly jealous of him; that is not the
+question now. If you don't know where he is, be so good as to hold your
+tongue."
+
+Charles was only now and then insolent and abrupt with servants, and
+they liked him the better for it. It was one of Cuthbert's rules to be
+coldly, evenly polite, and, as he thought, considerate to the whole
+household; and yet they did not like him half so well as Charles, who
+would sometimes, when anything went wrong, "kick up," what an
+intelligent young Irish footman used to call "the divvle's own shindy."
+Cuthbert, they knew, had no sympathy for them, but treated them, as he
+treated himself, as mere machines; while Charles had that infinite
+capacity of goodwill which none are more quick to recognise than
+servants and labouring people. And on this occasion, though Mr. Dickson
+might have sworn a little more than usual after Charles's departure, yet
+his feeling, on the whole, was that he was sorry for having vexed the
+young gentleman by sneering at his favourite.
+
+But Charles, having rescued the enraptured Father Tiernay from the
+stable, and having listened somewhat inattentively to a long description
+of the Curragh of Kildare, led the worthy priest round the back of the
+stables, up a short path through the wood, and knocked at the door of a
+long, low keeper's lodge, which stood within a stone's throw of the
+other buildings, in an open, grassy glade, through which flowed a
+musical, slender stream of water. In one instant, night was hideous with
+rattling chains and barking dogs, who made as though they would tear the
+intruders to pieces; all except one foolish pointer pup, who was loose,
+and who, instead of doing his duty by barking, came feebly up, and cast
+himself on his back at their feet, as though they were the car of
+Juggernaut, and he was a candidate for paradise. Finding that he was not
+destroyed, he made a humiliating feint of being glad to see them, and
+nearly overthrew the priest by getting between his legs. But Charles,
+finding that his second summons was unanswered, lifted the latch, and
+went into the house.
+
+The room they entered was dark, or nearly so, and at the first moment
+appeared empty; but, at the second glance, they made out that a figure
+was kneeling before the dying embers of the fire, and trying to kindle a
+match by blowing on the coals.
+
+"Hullo!" said Charles.
+
+"William, my boy," said a voice which made the priest start, "where have
+you been, lad?"
+
+At the same moment a match was lit, and then a candle; as the light
+blazed up, it fell on the features of a grey-headed old man, who was
+peering through the darkness at them, and the priest cried, "Good God!
+Mr. Ravenshoe!"
+
+The likeness for one moment was very extraordinary; but, as the eye grew
+accustomed to the light, one saw that the face was the face of a taller
+man than Densil, and one, too, who wore the dress of a gamekeeper.
+Charles laughed at the priest, and said--
+
+"You were struck, as many have been, by the likeness. He has been so
+long with my father that he has the very trick of his voice, and the
+look of the eye. Where have you been to-night, James?" he added,
+affectionately. "Why do you go out so late alone? If any of those mining
+rascals were to be round poaching, you might be killed."
+
+"I can take care of myself yet, Master Charles," said the old man,
+laughing; and, to do him justice, he certainly looked as if he could.
+
+"Where is Norah?"
+
+"Gone down to young James Holby's wife; she is lying-in."
+
+"Pretty early, too. Where's Ellen?"
+
+"Gone up to the house."
+
+"See, Father, I shall be disappointed in showing you the belle of
+Ravenshoe; and now you will go back to Ireland, fancying you can compete
+with us."
+
+Father Tiernay was beginning a story about five Miss Moriartys, who were
+supposed to rival in charms and accomplishments any five young ladies in
+the world, when his eye was attracted by a stuffed hare in a glass case,
+of unusual size and very dark colour.
+
+"That, sir," said James, the keeper, in a bland, polite, explanatory
+tone of voice, coming and leaning over him, "is old Mrs. Jewel, that
+lived in the last cottage on the right-hand side, under the cliff. I
+always thought that it had been Mrs. Simpson, but it was not. I shot
+this hare on the Monday, not three hundred yards from Mrs. Jewel's
+house; and on the Wednesday the neighbours noticed the shutters hadn't
+been down for two days, and broke the door open; and there she was, sure
+enough, dead in her bed. I had shot her as she was coming home from some
+of her devilries. A quiet old soul she was, though. No, I never thought
+it had been she."
+
+It would be totally impossible to describe the changes through which the
+broad, sunny face of Father Tiernay went during the above astounding
+narration; horror, astonishment, inquiry, and humour were so strangely
+blended. He looked in the face of the old gamekeeper, and met the
+expression of a man who had mentioned an interesting fact, and had
+contributed to the scientific experience of the listener. He looked at
+Charles, and met no expression whatever; but the latter said--
+
+"Our witches in these parts, Father, take the form of some inferior
+animal when attending their Sabbath or general meetings, which I believe
+are presided over by an undoubted gentleman, who is not generally named
+in polite society. In this case, the old woman was caught sneaking home
+under the form of a hare, and promptly rolled over by James; and here
+she is."
+
+Father Tiernay said, "Oh, indeed!" but looked as if he thought the more.
+
+"And there's another of them out now, sir," said the keeper; "and,
+Master Charles, dear, if you're going to take the greyhounds out
+to-morrow, do have a turn at that big black hare under Birch Tor----"
+
+"A black hare!" said Father Tiernay, aghast.
+
+"Nearly coal-black, your reverence," said James. "She's a witch, your
+reverence, and who she is the blessed saints only know. I have seen her
+three or four times. If the master was on terms with Squire Humby to
+Hele, we might have the harriers over and run her down. But that can't
+be, in course. If you take Blue-ruin and Lightning out to-morrow, Master
+Charles, and turn her out of the brambles under the rocks, and leave the
+Master and Miss Mary against the corner of the stone wall to turn her
+down the gully, you must have her."
+
+The look of astonishment had gradually faded from Father Tiernay's face.
+It is said that one of the great elements of power in the Roman Catholic
+priesthood is that they can lend themselves to any little bit of--well,
+of mild deception--which happens to be going. Father Tiernay was up to
+the situation. He looked from the keeper to Charles with a bland and
+stolid expression of face, and said--
+
+"If she is a witch, mark my words, the dogs will never touch her. The
+way would be to bite up a crooked sixpence and fire at her with that. I
+shall be there to see the sport. I never hunted a witch yet."
+
+"Has your reverence ever seen a white polecat?" said the keeper.
+
+"No, never," said the priest; "I have heard of them though. My friend,
+Mr. Moriarty, of Castledown (not Mountdown Castle, ye understand; that
+is the sate of my Lord Mountdown, whose blessed mother was a Moriarty,
+the heavens be her bed), claimed to have seen one; but, bedad, no one
+else ever saw it, and he said it turned brown again as the season came
+round. May the--may the saints have my sowl if I believe a word of it."
+
+"_I_ have one, your reverence; and it is a rarity, I allow. Stoats turn
+white often in hard winters, but polecats rarely. If your reverence and
+your honour will excuse me a moment, I will fetch it. It was shot by my
+Lord Welter when he was staying here last winter. A fine shot is my
+lord, your reverence, for so young a man."
+
+He left the room, and the priest and Charles were left alone together.
+
+"Does he believe all this rubbish about witches?" said Father Tiernay.
+
+"As firmly as you do the liquefaction of the blood of----"
+
+"There, there; we don't want all that. Do you believe in it?"
+
+"Of course I don't," said Charles; "but why should I tell him so?"
+
+"Why do you lend yourself to such humbug?"
+
+"Why do you?"
+
+"Begorra, I don't know. I am always lending. I lent a low-browed,
+hang-jawed spalpeen of a Belgian priest two pound the other day, and
+sorra a halfpenny of it will me mother's son ever see again. Hark!"
+
+There were voices approaching the lodge--the voices of two uneducated
+persons quarrelling; one that of a man, and the other of a woman. They
+both made so much out in a moment. Charles recognised the voices, and
+would have distracted the priest's attention, and given those without
+warning that there were strangers within; but, in his anxiety to catch
+what was said, he was not ready enough, and they both heard this.
+
+The man's voice said fiercely, "You did."
+
+The woman's voice said, after a wild sob, "I did not."
+
+"You did. I saw you. You are a liar as well as----"
+
+"I swear I didn't. Strike me dead, Bill, if there's been anything
+wrong."
+
+"No. If I thought there had, I'd cut his throat first and yours after."
+
+"If it had been _him_, Bill, you wouldn't have used me like this."
+
+"Never you mind that."
+
+"You want to drive me mad. You do. You hate me. Master Charles hates me.
+Oh, I wish I was mad."
+
+"I'd sooner see you chained by the waist in the straw than see what I
+saw to-night." Then followed an oath.
+
+The door was rudely opened, and there entered first of all our old
+friend, Charles's groom, William, who seemed beside himself with
+passion, and after him a figure which struck the good Irishman dumb with
+amazement and admiration--a girl as beautiful as the summer morning,
+with her bright brown hair tangled over her forehead, and an expression
+of wild terror and wrath on her face, such as one may conceive the old
+sculptor wished to express when he tried, and failed, to carve the face
+of the Gorgon.
+
+She glared on them both in her magnificent beauty only one moment. Yet
+that look, as of a lost soul of another world, mad, hopeless, defiant,
+has never past from the memory of either of them.
+
+She was gone in an instant into an inner room, and William was standing
+looking savagely at the priest. In another moment his eyes had wandered
+to Charles, and then his face grew smooth and quiet, and he said--
+
+"We've been quarrelling, sir; don't you and this good gentleman say
+anything about it. Master Charles, dear, she drives me mad sometimes.
+Things are not going right with her."
+
+Charles and the priest walked thoughtfully home together.
+
+"Allow me to say, Ravenshoe," said the priest, "that, as an Irishman, I
+consider myself a judge of remarkable establishments. I must say
+honestly that I have seldom or never met with a great house with so many
+queer elements about it as yours. You are all remarkable people. And, on
+my honour, I think that our friend Mackworth is the most remarkable man
+of the lot."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE BLACK HARE.
+
+
+It was a glorious breezy November morning; the sturdy oaks alone held on
+to the last brown remnants of their summer finery; all the rest of the
+trees in the vast sheets of wood which clothed the lower parts of the
+downs overhanging Ravenshoe had changed the bright colours of autumn for
+the duller, but not less beautiful, browns and purples of winter. Below,
+in the park, the deer were feeding among the yellow fern brakes, and the
+rabbits were basking and hopping in the narrow patches of slanting
+sunlight, which streamed through the leafless trees. Aloft, on the hill,
+the valiant blackcock led out his wives and family from the
+whortle-grown rocks, to flaunt his plumage in the warmest corner beneath
+the Tor.
+
+And the Tors, too, how they hung aloft above the brown heather, which
+was relieved here and there by patches of dead, brown, king-fern; hung
+aloft like brilliant, clearly-defined crystals, with such mighty
+breadths of light and shadow as Sir Charles Barry never could
+accomplish, though he had Westminster Abbey to look at every day.
+
+Up past a narrow sheep-path, where the short grass faded on the one side
+into feathery broom, and on the other into brown heather and grey stone,
+under the shadow of the Tor which lay nearest to Ravenshoe, and overhung
+those dark woods in which we saw Densil just now walking with his old
+hound; there was grouped, on the morning after the day of Charles's
+arrival, a happy party, every one of whom is already known to the
+reader. Of which circumstance I, the writer, am most especially glad.
+For I am already as tired of introducing new people to you as my lord
+chamberlain must be of presenting strangers to her Majesty at a levée.
+
+Densil first, on a grey cob, looking very old and feeble, straining his
+eyes up the glen whither Charles, and James, the old keeper, had gone
+with the greyhounds. At his rein stood William, whom we knew at Oxford.
+Beside the old man sat Mary on her pony, looking so radiant and happy,
+that, even if there had been no glorious autumn sun overhead, one glance
+at her face would have made the dullest landscape in Lancashire look
+bright. Last, not least, the good Father Tiernay, who sat on his horse,
+hatless, radiant, scratching his tonsure.
+
+"And so you're determined to back the blue dog, Miss Mary," said he.
+
+"I have already betted a pair of gloves with Charles, Mr. Tiernay," said
+Mary, "and I will be rash enough to do so with you. Ruin is the quickest
+striker we have ever bred."
+
+"I know it; they all say so," said the priest; "but come, I must have a
+bet on the course. I will back Lightning."
+
+"Lightning is the quicker dog," said Densil; "but Ruin! you will see him
+lie behind the other dog all the run, and strike the hare at last.
+Father Mackworth, a good judge of a dog, always backs him against the
+kennel."
+
+"Where is Father Mackworth?"
+
+"I don't know," said Densil. "I am surprised he is not with us; he is
+very fond of coursing."
+
+"His reverence, sir," said William, "started up the moor about an hour
+ago. I saw him going."
+
+"Where was he going to?"
+
+"I can't say, sir. He took just over past the rocks on the opposite side
+of the bottom from Mr. Charles."
+
+"I wonder," said Father Tiernay, "whether James will find his friend,
+the witch, this morning."
+
+"Ah," said Densil, "he was telling me about that. I am sure I hope not."
+
+Father Tiernay was going to laugh, but didn't.
+
+"Do you believe in witches, then, Mr. Ravenshoe?"
+
+"Why, no," said Densil, stroking his chin thoughtfully, "I suppose not.
+It don't seem to me now, as an old man, a more absurd belief than this
+new electro-biology and table-turning. Charles tells me that they use
+magic crystals at Oxford, and even claim to have raised the devil
+himself at Merton; which, at this time of day, seems rather like
+reverting to first principles. But I am not sure I believe in any of it.
+I only know that, if any poor old woman has sold herself to Satan, and
+taken it into her head to transform herself into a black hare, my
+greyhounds won't light upon her. She must have made such a deuced hard
+bargain that I shouldn't like to cheat her out of any of the small space
+left her between this and, and--thingamy."
+
+William, as a privileged servant, took the liberty of remarking that old
+Mrs. Jewel didn't seem to have been anything like a match for Satan in
+the way of a bargain, for she had had hard times of it seven years
+before she died. From which--
+
+Father Tiernay deduced the moral lesson, that that sort of thing didn't
+pay; and--
+
+Mary said she didn't believe a word of such rubbish, for old Mrs. Jewel
+was as nice an old body as ever was seen, and had worked hard for her
+living, until her strength failed, and her son went down in one of the
+herring-boats.
+
+Densil said that his little bird was too positive. There was the witch
+of Endor, for instance--
+
+Father Tiernay, who had been straining his eyes and attention at the
+movements of Charles and the greyhounds, and had only caught the last
+word, said with remarkable emphasis and distinctness--
+
+      "A broomstick of the Witch of Endor,
+      Well shod wi' brass,"
+
+and then looked at Densil as though he had helped him out of a
+difficulty, and wanted to be thanked. Densil continued without noticing
+him--
+
+"There was the witch of Endor. And 'thou shalt not suffer a witch to
+live.' If there weren't such things as witches, you know, St. Paul
+wouldn't have said that."
+
+"I don't think it was St. Paul, papa, was it?" said Mary.
+
+"It was one of them, my love; and, for that matter, I consider St. Peter
+quite as good as St. Paul, if not better. St. Peter was always in
+trouble, I know; but he was the only one who struck a blow for the good
+cause, all honour to him. Let me see, he married St. Veronica, didn't
+he?"
+
+"Marry St. Veronica, virgin and martyr?" said the priest, aghast. "My
+good sir, you are really talking at random."
+
+"Ah, well, I may be wrong; she was virgin, but she was no martyr."
+
+"St. Veronica," said Father Tiernay, dogmatically, and somewhat sulkily,
+"was martyred under Tiberius; no less than that."
+
+"I bet you what you like of it," cried Densil, "she died----"
+
+But what was Densil's opinion about the last days of St. Veronica will
+for ever remain a mystery; for at this moment there came a "See, HO!"
+from Charles; in the next a noble hare had burst from a tangled mass of
+brambles at his feet; in another the two dogs were on her haunches, and
+Charles, carrying two little flags furled in his hand, had dashed at the
+rough rocks on the bottom of the valley, had brought his horse on his
+nose, recovered him, and was half way up the hill after the flying
+greyhounds.
+
+It was but a short course. Puss raced for some broken ground under the
+hill, opposite to where our party stood. She was too close pressed, and
+doubled back for the open, but, meeting James, turned as a last
+desperate chance back to her first point. Too late; the dogs were upon
+her. There was a short scuffle, and then Charles, rising in his saddle,
+unfurled his blue flag, and waved it.
+
+"Hurrah!" cried Mary, clapping her hands, "two pairs of gloves this
+morning; where will he try now, I wonder? Here comes James; let us ask
+him."
+
+James approached them with the dead hare, and Densil asked where he was
+going to try. He said, just where they were.
+
+Densil asked, had he seen Father Mackworth? and he was in the act of
+saying that he was gone over the down, when a shout from Charles, and a
+still louder one from James, made them all start. A large _black hare_
+had burst from the thorns at Charles's feet, and was bowling down the
+glen straight toward them, with the dogs close behind her.
+
+"The witch," shouted James, "the witch! we shall know who she is now."
+
+It seemed very likely indeed. Densil broke away from William, and,
+spurring his pony down the sheep-path at the risk of his neck, made for
+the entrance of the wood. The hare, one of such dark colour that she
+looked almost black, scudded along in a parallel direction, and dashed
+into the grass ride just in front of Densil; they saw her flying down
+it, just under the dog's noses, and then they saw her dash into a cross
+ride, one of the dogs making a strike at her as she did so; then hare
+and greyhounds disappeared round the corner.
+
+"She's dead, sir, confound her; we shall have her now, the witch!"
+
+They all came round the corner pell-mell. Here stood the dogs, panting
+and looking foolishly about them, while in front of them, a few yards
+distant, stood Father Mackworth, looking disturbed and flushed, as
+though he had been running.
+
+Old James stared aghast; William gave a long whistle; Mary, for a
+moment, was actually terrified. Densil looked puzzled, Charles amused;
+while Father Tiernay made the forest ring with peal after peal of
+uproarious laughter.
+
+"I am afraid I have spoilt sport, Mr. Ravenshoe," said Mackworth, coming
+forward; "the hare ran almost against my legs, and doubled into the
+copse, puzzling the dogs. They seemed almost inclined to revenge
+themselves on me for a moment."
+
+"Ha, ha!" cried the jolly priest, not noticing, as Charles did, how
+confused the priest was. "So we've caught you sneaking home from your
+appointment with your dear friend."
+
+"What do you mean, sir, by appointment? You are over-stepping the bounds
+of decorum, sir. Mr. Ravenshoe, I beg you to forgive me for
+inadvertently spoiling your sport."
+
+"Not at all, my dear Father," said Densil, thinking it best, from the
+scared look of old James, to enter into no further explanations; "we
+have killed one hare, and now I think it is time to come home to lunch."
+
+"Don't eat it all before I come; I must run up to the Tor; I have
+dropped my whip there," said Charles. "James, ride my horse home; you
+look tired. I shall be there on foot in half the time."
+
+He had cast the reins to James, and was gone, and they all turned
+homewards together.
+
+Charles, fleet of foot, was up on the Tor in a few minutes, and had
+picked up his missing property; then he sat him down on a stone,
+thinking.
+
+"There is something confoundedly wrong somewhere, and I should like to
+find out what it is. What had that Jack priest been up to, that made him
+look so queer? And also, what was the matter between Ellen and William
+last night? Whom has she been going on with? I will go down. I wish I
+could find some trace of him. One thing I know, and one thing only, that
+he hates me worse than poison; and that his is not likely to be a
+passive hatred."
+
+The wood into which Charles descended was of very large extent, and
+composed of the densest copse, intersected by long straight grass rides.
+The day had turned dark and chilly; and a low moaning wind began to
+sweep through the bare boughs, rendering still more dismal the prospect
+of the long-drawn vistas of damp grass and rotting leaves.
+
+He passed musing on from one ride to another, and in one of them came in
+sight of a low, white building, partly ruinous, which had been built in
+the deepest recesses of the wood for a summer-house. Years ago Cuthbert
+and Charles used to come and play there on happy summer holidays--play
+at being Robinson Crusoe and what not; but there had been a fight with
+the poachers there, and one of their young men had been kicked in the
+head by one of the gang, and rendered idiotic; and Charles had seen the
+blood on the grass next morning; and so they voted it a dismal place,
+and never went near it again. Since then it had been taken possession of
+by the pheasants to dust themselves in. Altogether it was a solitary,
+ghostly sort of place; and, therefore, Charles was considerable
+startled, on looking in at the low door, to see a female figure, sitting
+unmoveable in the darkest corner.
+
+It was not a ghost, for it spoke. It said, "Are you come back to upbraid
+me again? I know my power, and you shall never have it." And Charles
+said, "Ellen!"
+
+She looked up, and began to cry. At first a low, moaning cry, and
+afterwards a wild passionate burst of grief.
+
+He drew her towards him, and tried to quiet her, but she drew away. "Not
+to-day," she cried, "not to-day."
+
+"What is the matter, pretty one? What is the matter, sister?" said
+Charles.
+
+"Call me sister again," she said, looking up. "I like that name. Kiss
+me, and call me sister, just for once."
+
+"Sister dear," said Charles kindly, kissing her on the forehead, "What
+is the matter?"
+
+"I have had a disagreement with Father Mackworth, and he has called me
+names. He found me here walking with Master Cuthbert."
+
+"With Cuthbert?"
+
+"Ay, why not? I might walk with you or him any time, and no harm. I must
+go."
+
+Before Charles had time to say one word of kindness, or consolation, or
+wonder, she had drawn him towards her, given him a kiss, and was gone
+down the ride towards the house. He saw her dress flutter round the last
+corner, and she disappeared.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+LORD SALTIRE'S VISIT, AND SOME OF HIS OPINIONS.
+
+
+There followed on the events above narrated two or three quiet months--a
+time well remembered by Charles, as one of the quietest and most
+peaceful in his life, in all the times which followed. Every fine day
+there was a ramble with his father through the kennels and stables, and
+down through the wood, or over the farm. Charles, who at Oxford thought
+no day complete, after riding with the drag, or Drakes, or rowing to
+Sandford; without banquier, vingt-et-un, or loo, till three oclock in
+the morning, now found, greatly to his astonishment, that he got more
+pleasure by leaning over a gate with his father, and looking at fat
+beasts and pigs, chewing a straw the while. A noisy wine-party, where he
+met the same men he had met the night before, who sang the same songs,
+and told the same silly stories, was well enough; but he began to find
+that supper in the oak dining-room, sitting between Mary and his father,
+and talking of the merest trifles, was a great deal pleasanter. Another
+noticeable fact was that Father Mackworth's sarcasms were turned off
+with a good-natured laugh, and that battle was on all occasions refused
+to the worthy priest. In short, Charles, away from company and
+dissipation, was himself. The good, worthy fellow, whom I learnt to like
+years ago. The man whose history I am proud to write.
+
+Lord Saltire had arrived meanwhile; he had written to Densil, to say
+that he was horribly bored; that he wished, as an ethical study, to
+settle, once for all, the amount of boredom a man could stand without
+dying under it; that, having looked carefully about him, to select a
+spot and a society where that object could be obtained, he had selected
+Ravenshoe, as being the most eligible; that he should wish his room to
+have a south aspect; and that his man would arrive with his things three
+days after date. To this Densil had written an appropriate reply,
+begging his kind old friend to come and make his house his home; and
+Lord Saltire had arrived one evening, when every one was out of the way
+but Mary, who received him in the hall.
+
+She was in some little trepidation. She had read and heard enough of
+"the wild prince and Poyns," and of Lord Saltire's powers of sarcasm, to
+be thoroughly frightened at her awful position. She had pictured to
+herself a terrible old man, with overhanging eyebrows, and cruel
+gleaming eyes beneath them. Therefore she was astonished to see a
+gentleman, old it is true, but upright as a young oak, of such
+remarkable personal beauty, and such a pleasant expression of
+countenance, as she had never seen before.
+
+She was astonished, I said; but, mind you, Mary was too much of a lady
+to show too much of it. She sailed towards him through the gloom of the
+old hall with a frank smile, and just that amount of admiration in her
+sweet eyes which paid Lord Saltire the truest compliment he had had for
+many a day.
+
+"Mr. Ravenshoe will be sorry to have missed receiving you, my lord," she
+said.
+
+"If Mr. Ravenshoe is sorry," he said, "I certainly am not. Mr. Ravenshoe
+has done me the honour to show me the most beautiful thing in his house
+first. I rather think that is a pretty compliment, Miss Corby, unless I
+am getting out of practice."
+
+"That is a very pretty compliment, indeed," she answered, laughing. "I
+most heartily thank you for it. I know nothing in life so pleasant as
+being flattered. May I introduce Father Mackworth?"
+
+Lord Saltire would be delighted. Father Mackworth came forward, and Mary
+saw them look at one another. She saw at a glance that either they had
+met before, or there was some secret which both of them knew. She never
+forgot Mackworth's defiant look, or Lord Saltire's calm considerate
+glance, which said as plain as words, "This fellow knows it."
+
+This fellow knew it--had known it for years. The footman who had left
+Mackworth at the lodge of the French Lycée, the nameless domestic, who
+formed the last link with his former life--this man had worn Lord
+Saltire's livery, and he remembered it.
+
+"I see," said Lord Saltire, "that Miss Corby is prepared for walking. I
+guess that she is going to meet Mr. Ravenshoe, and, if my surmise is
+correct, I beg to be allowed to accompany her."
+
+"You are wonderfully correct, my lord. Cuthbert and Charles are shooting
+pheasants in the wood, and Mr. Ravenshoe is with them on his pony. If
+you will walk with me, we shall meet them."
+
+So the grand old eagle and the pretty sweet-voiced robin passed out on
+to the terrace, and stood looking together, under the dull December sky,
+at the whispering surges. Right and left the misty headlands seemed to
+float on the quiet grey sea, which broke in sighs at their feet, as the
+long majestic ground-swell rolled in from the ocean; and these two stood
+there for a minute or more without speaking.
+
+"The new school of men," said Lord Saltire at last, looking out to sea,
+"have perhaps done wisely, in thinking more of scenery and the mere
+externals of nature than we did. We lived the life of clubs and crowds,
+and we are going to our places one after another. There are but few left
+now. These Stephensons and Paxtons are fine men enough. _They_ are
+fighting inert matter, but _we_ fought the armies of the Philistine. We
+had no time for botany and that sort of thing; which was unfortunate.
+You young folks shouldn't laugh at us though."
+
+"I laugh at you!" she said, suddenly and rapidly; "laugh at the giants
+who warred with the gods. My lord, the men of our time has not shown
+themselves equal to their fathers."
+
+Lord Saltire laughed.
+
+"No, not yet," she continued; "when the time comes they will. The time
+has not come yet."
+
+"Not yet, Miss Corby. It will come,--mind the words of a very old man;
+an old fellow who has seen a confounded deal of the world."
+
+"Are we to have any more wars, Lord Saltire?"
+
+"Wars such as we never dreamt of, young lady."
+
+"Is all this new inauguration of peace to go for nothing?"
+
+"Only as the inauguration of a new series of wars, more terrible than
+those which have gone before."
+
+"France and England combined can give the law to Europe."
+
+Lord Saltire turned upon her and laughed. "And so you actually believe
+that France and England can really combine for anything more important
+than a raid against Russia. Not that they will ever fight Russia, you
+know. There will be no fight. If they threaten loud enough, Russia will
+yield. Nicholas knows his weakness, and will give way. If he is fool
+enough to fight the Western powers, it will end in another _duel à
+l'outrance_ between France and England. They will never work together
+for long. If they do, Europe is enslaved, and England lost."
+
+"But why, Lord Saltire?"
+
+"Well, well; I think so. Allow me to say that I was not prepared to find
+a deep-thinking, though misguided politician in such an innocent-looking
+young lady. God defend the dear old land, for every fresh acre I see of
+it confirms my belief that it is the first country in the world."
+
+They were crossing the old terraced garden towards the wood, when they
+heard the guns going rapidly, and both were silent for a minute or so.
+The leafless wood was before them, and the village at their feet. The
+church spire rose aloft among the trees. Some fisherman patriarch had
+gone to his well-earned rest that day, and the bell was tolling for him.
+Mary looked at the quiet village, at the calm winter sea, and then up at
+the calm stern face of the man who walked beside her, and said--
+
+"Tell me one thing, Lord Saltire; you have travelled in many countries.
+Is there any land, east or west, that can give us what this dear old
+England does--settled order, in which each man knows his place and his
+duties? It is so easy to be good in England."
+
+"Well, no. It is the first country in the world. A few bad harvests
+would make a hell of it, though. Has Ravenshoe got many pheasants down
+here?"
+
+And, so talking, this strange pair wandered on towards the wood, side by
+side.
+
+Charles was not without news in his retirement, for a few friends kept
+him pretty well _au fait_ with what was going on in the world. First,
+there was news from Oxford; one sort of which was communicated by
+Charles Marston, and another sort by one Marker of Brazenose, otherwise
+known as "Bodger," though why, I know not, nor ever could get any one to
+tell me. He was purveyor of fashionable intelligence, while Charles
+Marston dealt more in example and advice. About this time the latter
+wrote as follows:--
+
+"How goes Issachar? Is the ass stronger or weaker than formerly? Has my
+dearly-beloved ass profited, or otherwise, by his stay at Ranford? How
+is the other ass, my Lord Welter? He is undoubtedly a fool, but I think
+an honest one, so long as you keep temptation out of his way. He is
+shamefully in debt; but I suppose, if their horse wins the Derby, he
+will pay; otherwise I would sooner be my lord than his tradesmen. How
+goes the 'grand passion,'--has Chloe relented? She is a great fool if
+she does. Why, if she refuses you, she may marry Lord Welter, and he may
+settle his debts on her. A word in your ear. I have an invitation to
+Ranford. I must go, I suppose. The dear old woman, whose absurdities
+your honour is pleased to laugh at, has been always kind to me and mine;
+and I shall go. I shall pay my just tribute of flattery to the noble
+honest old soul, who is struggling to save a falling house. Don't you
+laugh at Lady Ascot, you impudent young rascal. I have no doubt that
+she offers some prominent points for the exercise of your excellency's
+wit, but she is unmeasurably superior to you, you young scapegrace.
+
+"Bless your dear old face; how I long to see it again! I am coming to
+see it. I shall come to you at the beginning of the Christmas vacation.
+I shall come to you a beaten man, Charley. I shall only get a second.
+Never mind; I would sooner come to you and yours and hide my shame, than
+to any one else.
+
+"Charles, old friend, if I get a third, I shall break my heart. Don't
+show this letter to any one. I have lost the trick of Greek prose. Oh,
+old Charley! believe this, that the day once lost can never, never come
+back any more! They preach a future hell; but what hell could be worse
+than the eternal contemplation of opportunities thrown away--of
+turning-points in the affairs of a man's life, when, instead of rising,
+he has fallen--not by a bold stroke, like Satan, but by laziness and
+neglect?"
+
+Charles was very sorry, very grieved and vexed, to find his shrewd old
+friend brought to this pass by over-reading, and over-anxiety about a
+subject which, to a non-university man, does not seem of such vital
+importance. He carried the letter to his father, in spite of the
+prohibition contained in it, and he found his father alone with the
+good, honest Father Tiernay; to whom, not thinking that thereby he was
+serving his friend ill, he read it aloud.
+
+"Charley dear," said his father, half rising from his chair, "he must
+come to us, my boy; he must come here to us, and stay with us till he
+forgets his disappointment. He is a noble lad. He has been a good friend
+to my boy; and, by George, the house is his own."
+
+"I don't think, dad," said Charles, looking from Densil to Father
+Tiernay, "that he is at all justified in the dark view he is taking of
+matters. The clever fellows used to say that he was safe of his first.
+You know he is going in for mathematics as well."
+
+"He is a good young man, any way," said Father Tiernay; "his sentiments
+do honour to him; and none the worst of them is his admiration for my
+heretic young friend here, which does him most honour of all. Mr.
+Ravenshoe, I'll take three to one against his double first; pity he
+ain't a Catholic. What the divvle do ye Prothestants mean by absorbing
+(to use no worse language) the rints and revenues left by Catholic
+testators for the good of the hooly Church, for the edication of
+heretics? Tell me that, now."
+
+The other letter from Oxford was of a very different tenor. Mr. Marker,
+of Brazenose, began by remarking that--
+
+"He didn't know what was come over the place; it was getting
+confoundedly slow, somehow. They had had another Bloomer ball at
+Abingdon, but the thing was a dead failure, sir. Jemmy Dane, of
+University, had driven two of them home in a cart, by way of Nuneham. He
+had passed the Pro's at Magdalen turnpike, and they never thought of
+stopping him, by George. Their weak intellects were not capable of
+conceiving such glorious audacity. Both the Proctors were down at
+Coldharbour turnpike, stopping every man who came from Abingdon way.
+Toreker, of Exeter, was coming home on George Simmond's Darius, and,
+seeing the Proctors in the light of the turnpike-gate, had put his horse
+at the fence (Charles would remember it, a stubbed hedge and a ditch),
+and got over the back water by the White House, and so home by the
+Castle. Above forty men had been rusticated over this business, and some
+good fellows too." (Here followed a list of names, which I could
+produce, if necessary; but seeing that some names on the list are now
+rising at the bar, or in the Church, think it better not.) "Pembroke had
+won the fours, very much in consequence of Exeter having gone round the
+flag, and, on being made to row again, of fouling them in the gut. The
+water was out heavily, and had spoilt the boating. The Christchurch
+grind had been slow, but the best that year. L--n was going down, and
+they said was going to take the Pychley. C--n was pretty safe of his
+first--so reading men said. Martin, of Trinity, had got his testamur, at
+which event astonishment, not unmixed with awe, had fallen on the
+University generally. That he himself was in for his _vivâ voce_ two
+days after date, and he wished himself out of the hands of his enemies."
+
+There was a postscript, which interested Charles as much as all the rest
+of the letter put together. It ran thus:--
+
+"By the by, Welter has muckered; you know that by this time. But, worse
+than that, they say that Charles Marston's classical first is fishy. The
+old cock has overworked himself, they say."
+
+Lord Saltire never went to bed without having Charles up into his
+dressing-room for a chat. "Not having," as his lordship most truly said,
+"any wig to take off, or any false teeth to come out, I cannot see why I
+should deny myself the pleasure of my young friend's company at night.
+Every evening, young gentleman, we are one day older, and one day wiser.
+I myself have got so confoundedly wise with my many years, that I have
+nothing left to learn. But it amuses me to hear your exceedingly
+_naïve_ remarks on things in general, and it also flatters and soothes
+me to contrast my own consummate wisdom with your folly. Therefore, I
+will trouble you to come up to my dressing-room every night, and give me
+your crude reflections on the events of the day."
+
+So Charles came up one night with Mr. Marker's letter, which he read to
+Lord Saltire, while his valet was brushing his hair; and then Charles,
+by way of an easily-answered question, asked Lord Saltire, What did he
+think of his friend's chances?
+
+"I must really remark," said Lord Saltire, "even if I use
+unparliamentary language, which I should be very sorry to do, that that
+is one of the silliest questions I ever had put to me. When I held
+certain seals, I used to have some very foolish questions put to me
+(which, by the way, I never answered), but I don't know that I ever had
+such a foolish question put to me as that. Why, how on earth can I have
+any idea of what your friend's chances are? Do be reasonable."
+
+"Dear Lord Saltire, don't be angry with me. Tell me, as far as your
+experience can, how far a man who knows his work, by George, as well as
+a man can know it, is likely to fail through nervousness. You have seen
+the same thing in Parliament. You know how much mischief nervousness may
+do. Now, do give me your opinion."
+
+"Well, you are putting your question in a slightly more reasonable form;
+but it is a very silly one yet. I have seen a long sort of man, with
+black hair, and a hook nose, like long Montague, for instance, who has
+been devilishly nervous till he got on his legs, and then has astonished
+every one, and no one more than myself, not so much by his power of
+declamation as by the extraordinary logical tenacity with which he clung
+to his subject. Yes, I don't know but what I have heard more telling and
+logical speeches from unprepared men than I ever have from one of the
+law lords. But I am a bad man to ask. I never was in the Lower House.
+About your friend's chance;--well, I would not give twopence for it; in
+after-life he may succeed. But from what you have told me, I should
+prepare myself for a disappointment."
+
+Very shortly after this, good Lord Saltire had to retire for a time into
+the upper chambers; he had a severe attack of gout.
+
+There had been no more quarrelling between Father Mackworth and Charles;
+peace was proclaimed--an armed truce; and Charles was watching, watching
+in silence. Never since he met her in the wood had he had an opportunity
+of speaking to Ellen. She always avoided him. William, being asked
+confidentially by Charles what he thought was the matter, said that
+Ellen had been "carrin on" with some one, and he had been blowing her
+up; which was all the explanation he offered. In the meantime, Charles
+lived under the comforting assurance that there was mischief brewing,
+and that Mackworth was at the bottom of it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+CHARLES'S "LIDDELL AND SCOTT."
+
+
+A growing anxiety began to take possession of Charles shortly before
+Christmas, arising from the state of his father's health. Densil was
+failing. His memory was getting defective, and his sense dulled. His eye
+always was searching for Charles, and he was uneasy at his absence. So
+it was with a vague sense of impending misfortune that he got a letter
+from the Dean of his college, summoning him back after the Christmas
+vacation.
+
+Mr. Dean said, "That Mr. Ravenshoe's case had been reconsidered, and
+that at the warm, and, he thought, misguided, intercession of the
+Bursar, a determination had been come to, to allow Mr. Ravenshoe to come
+into residence again for the Lent term. He trusted that this would be a
+warning, and that, while there was time, he would arrest himself in that
+miserable career of vice and folly which could only have one
+termination--utter ruin in this world and in the next."
+
+A college "Don," by long practice, acquires a power of hurting a young
+man's feelings, utterly beyond competition, save by a police magistrate.
+Charles winced under this letter; but the same day Mary, coming singing
+downstairs as was her wont, was alarmed by the descent of a large opaque
+body of considerable weight down the well of the staircase, which lodged
+in the wood basket at the bottom, and which, on examination, she found
+to be a Liddell and Scott's Lexicon. At which she rejoiced; for she
+concluded that Charles had taken to reading again, though why he should
+begin by throwing his books downstairs she could not well understand,
+until he joined her, and explained that he had been dusting it on the
+landing, and that it had slipped out of his hand.
+
+"What a crack it came down," added he; "I wish Father Mackworth's head
+had been underneath it."
+
+"I have no doubt of it, young gentleman," said the priest quietly from
+behind; and there he was with his hand on the library door, and in he
+went and shut it behind him.
+
+Mary and Charles were both awfully disconcerted. Mary felt horribly
+guilty; in fact, if the priest had remained quiet one moment more, he
+would undoubtedly have heard one or two candid and far from
+complimentary remarks about himself from that young lady, which would
+have made his ears tingle.
+
+"Confound him," said Charles; "how he glides about! He learned that
+trick, and a few others, at that precious Jesuit College of his. They
+teach them that sort of thing as the old Jews teach the young
+pickpockets. The old father inquisitor puts the door ajar with a bell
+against it, and they all have to come in one after another. The one who
+rings it gets dropped on to like blazes."
+
+Mary was going to ask what exact amount of personal suffering being
+dropped on to like blazes involved; but Charles stopped her, and took
+her hand.
+
+"Mary dear," he said, "do you ever think of the future?"
+
+"Night and day, Charles,--night and day."
+
+"If he dies, Mary? When he dies?"
+
+"Night and day, brother," she answered, taking one of his great brown
+hands between her two white little palms. "I dream in my sleep of the
+new regime which is to come, and I see only trouble, and again trouble."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"There is a God in heaven, Charles."
+
+"Ay, but Mary, what will you do?"
+
+"I?" and she laughed the merriest little laugh ever you heard. "Little
+me? Why, go for a governess, to be sure. Charles, they shall love me so
+that this life shall be a paradise. I will go into a family where there
+are two beautiful girls; and, when I am old and withered, there shall be
+two nurseries in which I shall be often welcome, where the children
+shall come babbling to my knee, the darlings, and they shall tell me how
+they love me, almost as well as their mother. There is my future. Would
+you change it?"
+
+Charles was leaning against the oak banister; and, when he saw her there
+before him, when he saw that valiant, true-hearted face, in the light
+which streamed from the old window above, he was rebuked, and bent down
+his head on the rail. The Dean's letter of that morning had done
+something; but the sight of that brave little woman, so fearless with
+all the world before her, did more. She weak, friendless, moneyless, and
+so courageous! He with the strong arm, so cowardly! It taught him a
+lesson indeed, a lesson he never forgot. But oh! for that terrible
+word--too late!
+
+Ah! too late! What word is so terrible as that? You will see what I mean
+soon. That is the cry which one writer puts in the mouths of the lost
+spirits in hell. God's mercy is infinite, and it is yet a question
+whether it were better for Charles to have fallen into the groove of
+ordinary life, or to have gone through those humiliating scenes through
+which we must follow him.
+
+"Charley dear," said Mary, laying her hand on his shoulder, "it is not
+about myself I am thinking; it is about you. What are you going to do
+when he has gone? are you going into the Church?"
+
+"Oh, no!" said Charles, "I couldn't bear the idea of that."
+
+"Then why are you at Oxford?"
+
+"To get an education, I suppose."
+
+"But what use will a university education be to you, Charles! Have you
+no plans?"
+
+"I give you my word, my dear Mary, that I am as much in the dark about
+the future as a five days old puppy."
+
+"Has he made any provision for you?"
+
+"Oh, yes! I am to have six thousand."
+
+"Do you know that the estate is involved, Charles?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I believe it is. There has been a great deal of state kept up here, and
+I believe it is the case."
+
+"Cuthbert would soon bring that round."
+
+"I tremble to think of the future, Charles. Are your debts at Oxford
+heavy?"
+
+"Pretty well. Five hundred would clear me."
+
+"Don't get any more in debt, that's a dear."
+
+"No, Mary dear, I won't. I don't care for the future. I shall have £180
+a year. That will be enough for William and me. Then I shall go to the
+bar, and make a deuce of a lot of money, and marry Adelaide. Then you
+will come to live with us, and we shall have such jolly times of
+it.--Take that, you villain!"
+
+This last elegant apostrophe was addressed to William (who at that
+moment had come in by the side door), and was accompanied by the
+dexterous delivery of the Liddell and Scott, in the manner of a cricket
+ball. Our friend William stood to catch it in a style worthy of Box,
+with his knees a yard apart, and one palm over the other; but as luck
+would have it, he missed it, and it alighted full on the shins of Father
+Mackworth, who had selected that time for coming out of the library; and
+so it lay sillily open at [Greek: lam, gem.] at his feet.
+
+Mackworth really thought that it was intentional, and was furious. He
+went back into the library; and Charles, seeing what must come, followed
+him, while Mary fled upstairs. There was no one in the room but Cuthbert
+and Father Tiernay.
+
+"I will be protected from insult in this house," began Mackworth; "twice
+to-day I have been insulted by Mr. Charles Ravenshoe, and I demand
+protection."
+
+"What have you been doing, Charley?" said Cuthbert. "I thought you two
+had given up quarrelling. You will wear my life out. Sometimes, what
+with one thing and another, I wish I were dead. Oh! if the great problem
+were solved! Surely my brother may avoid brawling with a priest, a man
+sacred by his office, though of another faith. Surely my brother has
+taste enough to see the propriety of that."
+
+"Your brother has no taste or sense, sir," said Father Mackworth. "He
+has no decency. He has no gentlemanly feeling. Within ten minutes he has
+dropped a book downstairs, and lamented, to my face, that it hadn't
+fallen on my head; and just now he has thrown the same book at me, and
+hit me with it."
+
+"I thank God, Charles," said poor weary Cuthbert, "that our father is
+spared this. It would kill him. Brother, brother, why do you vex me like
+this? I have always stood on your side, Charley. Don't let me be killed
+with these ceaseless brawls."
+
+"They will soon cease, sir," said Father Mackworth; "I leave this house
+to-morrow."
+
+"Cuthbert, hear me now. I never intended to insult him."
+
+"Why did you throw your book at him, Charley? It is not decorous. You
+must know when you wound him you wound me. And I have fought such
+battles for you, Charley."
+
+"Cuthbert! brother! do hear me. And let him hear me. And let Father
+Tiernay hear me. Cuthbert, you know I love you. Father Tiernay, you are
+a good and honest man; hear what I have to say. You, Mackworth, you are
+a scoundrel. You are a double-dyed villain. What were you doing with
+that girl in the wood, the day you hunted the black hare a month ago?
+Cuthbert, tell me, like an honest gentleman, did you ever walk in the
+wood with Ellen?"
+
+"I?" said Cuthbert, scared; "I never walked with Ellen there. I have
+walked with Mary there, brother. Why should I not?"
+
+"There, look at the lie that this man has put into her mouth. She told
+me that he had found you and her walking together there."
+
+"I am not answerable for any young woman's lies," said Father
+Mackworth. "I decline to continue this discussion. It is humiliating. As
+for you, you poor little moth," he said, turning to Charles, "when the
+time comes, I will crush you with my thumb against the wall. My liking
+for your father prevents my doing my duty as yet. In that I err. Wait."
+
+Charles had been in a passion before this; but, seeing danger, and real
+danger, abroad, he got cool, and said--
+
+"Wait."
+
+And they both waited, and we shall see who waited the longest.
+
+"I have done it now, Mary dear," said Charles, returning upstairs with
+the unlucky lexicon. "It is all over now."
+
+"Has there been a scene?"
+
+"A terrible scene. I swore at him, and called him a villain."
+
+"Why did you do that, Charles? Why are you so violent? You are not
+yourself, Charles, when you give way to your temper like that."
+
+"Well, I'll tell you, my robin. He is a villain."
+
+"I don't think so, Charles. I believe he is a high-minded man."
+
+"I know he is not, birdie. At least, I believe he is not."
+
+"I believe him to be so, Charles."
+
+"I know him to be otherwise; at least, I think so."
+
+"Are you doing him justice, Charley dear? Are you sure you are doing him
+justice?"
+
+"I think so."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I cannot tell you, Mary. When the end of all things comes, and you and
+I are thrown abroad like two corks on the great sea, you will know. But
+I cannot tell you."
+
+"I believe, dear, that you are so honest that you would not do injustice
+even to him. But, oh! be sure that you are right. Hush! Change the
+subject. What were you going to read when that unlucky book fell
+downstairs?"
+
+"Demosthenes."
+
+"Let me come in and sit with you, Charley dear, and look out the words;
+you don't know how clever I am. Is it the 'De Coronâ'?"
+
+Charles took her hand and kissed it; and so they two poor fools went on
+with their Demosthenes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+MARSTON'S ARRIVAL.
+
+
+The night after the terrible lexicon quarrel, which, you will observe,
+arose entirely from Charles's good resolution to set to work
+reading--whereby we should take warning not to be too sanguine of good
+resolutions, taken late, bringing forth good fruit--the very evening, I
+say, after this fracas, Charles, his father, and Mary, were sitting in
+the library together. Of course Densil had heard nothing of the
+disturbance, and was, good old gentleman, as happy as you please; all
+his elements of pleasure were there. Father Mackworth was absent. Father
+Tiernay was throwing his whole hearty soul into a splendid copy of
+Bewick's birds, date 1799. Cuthbert was before the upper fireplace,
+beyond the pillar, poring over goodness only knows what monkish lore;
+while close to him was bird Mary sewing, and Charles reading aloud a
+book, very often quoted in everyday life unconsciously.
+
+Charles read how Mr. Quilp begged Mr. Brass would take particular care
+of himself, or he would never forgive him; how there was a dog in the
+lane who had killed a boy on Tuesday, and bitten a man on Friday; how
+the dog lived on the right-hand side, but generally lurked on the left,
+ready for a spring; and they were laughing over Mr. Brass's horror, when
+there came a noise of wheels on the gravel.
+
+"That is Marston, father, for a thousand pounds," said Charles.
+
+He hurried into the hall, as the men were undoing the door; Mary,
+dropping her work, went after him; and Densil taking his stick, came
+too. Cuthbert looked up from the further end of the room, and then bent
+his head over his book again. Father Tiernay looked up, inquisitive and
+interested, but sat still. They who followed into the hall saw this.
+
+Charles stood in front of the hall door, and out of the winter's
+darkness came a man, with whom, as Mary once playfully said, she had
+fallen in love at once. It was Marston.
+
+Charles went up to him quickly with both hands out, and said--
+
+"We are so glad."
+
+"It is very kind of you. God bless you; how did you know it?"
+
+"We know nothing, my dear Marston, except that you are welcome. Now put
+me out of my pain."
+
+"Why, well," said the other, "I don't know how it has happened: but I
+have got my double first."
+
+Charles gave a wild cheer, and the others were all on him
+directly--Densil, Tiernay, Cuthbert, and all. Never was such a welcome;
+not one of them, save Charles, had ever seen him before, yet they
+welcomed him as an old friend.
+
+"You have not been to Ranford, then?" said Charles.
+
+"Why, no. I did not feel inclined for it after so much work. I must take
+it on my way back."
+
+Lord Saltire's gout was better to-night, and he was downstairs. He
+proceeded to remark that, having been in----; well, he wouldn't shock
+Miss Corby by saying where--for a day or so, he had suddenly, through no
+merit of his own, got promoted back into purgatory. That, having fought
+against the blue devils, and come downstairs, for the sole purpose of
+making himself disagreeable, he had been rewarded, for that display of
+personal energy and self-sacrifice, by most unexpectedly meeting a son
+of his old friend, Jackdaw Marston. He begged to welcome his old
+friend's son, and to say that, by Jove, he was proud of him. His young
+friend's father had not been a brilliant scholar, as his young friend
+was; but had been one of the first whist-players in England. His young
+friend had turned his attention to scholastic honours, in preference to
+whist, which might or might not be a mistake: though he believed he was
+committing no breach of trust in saying that the position had been
+thrust on his young friend from pecuniary motives. Property had an
+infernal trick of deteriorating. His own property had not happened to
+deteriorate (none knew why, for he had given it every chance); but the
+property of his young friend's father having deteriorated in a
+confounded rapid sort of way, he must say that it was exceedingly
+creditable in his young friend to have made such a decided step towards
+bringing matters right again as he had.
+
+"My father's son, my lord, thanks you for your kind remembrance of his
+father. I have always desired to see and meet my father's old friends,
+of whom you, Mr. Ravenshoe, were among the kindest. We have given up the
+greater vices lately, my lord, but we do our best among the smaller
+ones."
+
+There was a quiet supper, at which Lord Saltire consented to stay,
+provided no one used the expression "cheese"; in which case he said he
+should have to retire. There wasn't cheese on the table, but there was
+more than cheese; there was scolloped cockles, and Lord Saltire ate
+some. He said at the time that they would have the same effect on him as
+swallowing the fire-shovel. But, to relieve your mind at once, I may
+tell you that they didn't do him any harm at all, and he was as well as
+ever next morning.
+
+Father Tiernay said grace; and, when the meal was half over, in came
+Father Mackworth. Densil said, "Father Mackworth, Mr. Marston;" and
+Marston said, after a moment's glance at him, "How do you do, sir?"
+
+Possibly a more courteous form of speaking to a new acquaintance might
+have been used. But Marston had his opinions about Father Mackworth, and
+had no objection that the holy father should know them.
+
+"We got, Mary," said Cuthbert, suddenly, "more cocks than pheasants
+to-day. Charles killed five couple, and I four. I was very vexed at
+being beaten by Charles, because I am so much the better shot."
+
+Charles looked up and met his eyes--a look he never forgot. Accompanying
+the apparent petulance of the remark was a look of love and pity and
+sorrow. It pleased him, above everything, during the events which were
+to come, to-recall that look, and say, "Well, he liked me once."
+
+That evening Charles and Marston retired to Charles's study (a deal of
+study had been carried on there, you may depend), and had a long talk
+over future prospects. Charles began by telling him all about Madam
+Adelaide, and Marston said, "Oh, indeed! what are you going to do,
+Charley, boy, to keep her? She comes out of an extravagant house, you
+know."
+
+"I must get called to the bar."
+
+"Hard work for nothing, for many years, you know."
+
+"I know. But I won't go into the Church; and what else is there?"
+
+"Nothing I know of, except billiard marking and steeplechase riding."
+
+"Then, you approve of it?"
+
+"I do, most heartily. The work will be good for you. You have worked
+before, and can do it again. Remember how well you got on at
+Shrewsbury."
+
+Then Charles told him about the relations between himself and Father
+Mackworth, and what had happened that day.
+
+"You and he have had disgraceful scenes like this before, haven't you?"
+
+"Yes, but never so bad as this."
+
+"He is a very passionate man, isn't he? You took utterly wrong grounds
+for what you did to-day. Don't you see that you have no earthly grounds
+for what you said, except your own suspicions? The girl's own account of
+the matter seems natural enough. That she was walking with your most
+saint-like brother, and the priest found them, and sent them to the
+right-about with fleas in their ears."
+
+"I believe that man to be a great villain," said Charles.
+
+"So may I," said the other, "but I shan't tell him so till I can prove
+it. As for that quarrel between William and his sister the night you
+came home, that proves nothing, except that she has been going too far
+with some one. But who? What have you been doing that empowers him to
+say that he will crush you like a moth?"
+
+"Oh, bravado, I take it! You should have seen how mad he looked when he
+said it."
+
+"I am glad I did not. Let us talk no more about him; Is that sweet
+little bird Mary Corby?"
+
+"You know it is."
+
+"Well, so I do know, but I wanted an excuse for saying the name over
+again. Charles, you are a fool."
+
+"That is such a very novel discovery of yours," said Charles, laughing.
+"What have I been a-doing on now?"
+
+"Why didn't you fall in love with Mary Corby instead of Madam Adelaide?"
+
+"I am sure I don't know. Why, I never thought of such a thing as that."
+
+"Then you ought to have done so. Now go to bed."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+IN WHICH THERE IS ANOTHER SHIPWRECK.
+
+
+Time jogged on very pleasantly to the party assembled at Ravenshoe that
+Christmas. There were woodcocks and pheasants in the woods; there were
+hares, snipes, and rabbits on the moor. In the sea there were fish; and
+many a long excursion they had in the herring-boats--sometimes standing
+boldly out to sea towards the distant blue island in the main, sometimes
+crawling lazily along under the lofty shoreless cliffs which towered
+above their heads from 200 to 1,100 feet high.
+
+It was three days before Christmas-day, and they were returning from
+fishing along the coast, and were about ten miles or so from home. I say
+returning, though in fact there was not a breath of wind, and the boat
+was drifting idly along on the tide. Two handsome simple-looking young
+men were lolling by the useless tiller; an old man, hale and strong as a
+lion, with a courteous high-bred look about him, was splicing a rope;
+and a tall, pale, black-haired man was looking steadily seaward, with
+his hands in his pockets, while Charles and Marston were standing in the
+bows smoking.
+
+"What a curious, dreamy, dosy, delicious kind of winter you have down
+here," said Marston.
+
+"I am very fond of it," said Charles; "it keeps you in continual hope
+for the spring that is coming. In the middle of frost and snow and ice
+one is apt to lose one's faith in waving boughs and shady pools."
+
+"I have had such a quiet time with you down here, Charley. I am so
+pleased with the way in which you are going on. You are quite an altered
+man. I think we shall both look back to the last few quiet weeks as a
+happy time."
+
+Here the tall dark man, who was looking out to sea, suddenly said--
+
+"Rain and hail, snow and tempest, stormy wind fulfilling His word."
+
+"Ay, ay," said the old man; "going to blow to-night, I expect."
+
+"We shall go home pretty fast, may be."
+
+"Not us, Master Charles, dear," said the tall man. "We are going to have
+it from south and by west, and so through west round to north. Before
+which time there'll be souls in glory, praise be to God."
+
+The old man took off his hat reverently.
+
+"There won't be amuch surf on when we beaches she," said one of the
+young men. "It won't get up afore the wind be full round west for an
+hour."
+
+"You're a spaking like a printed buke, Jan," said the old man.
+
+"I'm a thinking differently, Master Evans," said the dark man. "It will
+chop round very sudden, and be west before we know where we are. I speak
+with humility to a man who has seen the Lord's wonders in the deep so
+many years longer nor me. But I think, under God, I am right."
+
+"You most in general be right. They as converses with the Lord night and
+day, day and night, like as you do, knows likely more of His works nor
+we, as ain't your gifts."
+
+"The Lord has vouchsafed me nothing in the way of a vision, about this
+afternoon, Master Evans."
+
+"Didn't 'ee dream never at all last night?" said one of the young men:
+"Think 'ee now."
+
+"Nought to bear on wind or weather, Jan. I judges from the glass. It's a
+dropping fast."
+
+Jan would have had more faith in one of Matthew's dreams, and didn't
+seem to think much of the barometer. Meanwhile Marston had whispered
+Charles--
+
+"Who is Matthews? What sect is he?"
+
+"Oh, he's a Brianite."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"A sort of Ranter, I believe."
+
+Marston looked up, and saw the two great black eyes under the lofty
+forehead fixed full upon him. With the instinct of a gentleman, he said
+at once--
+
+"I was asking Mr. Charles what sect you were of; that was all. He tells
+me you are a Brianite, and I had never heard of that sect before. I hope
+you will let me talk to you about your matters of belief some day."
+
+Matthews took off his hat, and said--That with the Lord's will he would
+speak to his honour. "Will your honour bear with a poor fisherman,
+ignorant of the world's learning, but who has had matters revealed to
+him by the Lord in dreams and visions of the night? Peter was only a
+fisherman, your honour, and, oh, if we could only hear him speak now!"
+
+He paused, and looked again to seaward. Charles had gone again into the
+bow, and Marston was standing among the men right aft. Suddenly Matthews
+turned again upon him and said--
+
+"In the beaching of this here boat to-night, your honour, there may be
+danger. In such case my place will be alongside of him," pointing to
+Charles. "There'd be a many kind hearts aching, if aught happened to
+him. You stick close to these young men. They'll see after you, sir."
+
+"You keep close alongside of we, sir. You hold on of we, sir. We'll see
+you all right, sir," said the two young men.
+
+"But, my dear good souls, I am as good a swimmer as any in England, and
+as active as a cat. Pray, don't mind me."
+
+"You keep hold of we and run, sir," said one of the young men, "that's
+all you're a'got to do, sir."
+
+"I shall most certainly run," said Marston, laughing, "but I decline
+drowning any one but myself--"
+
+Charles said at this moment, "Do come here and look at this."
+
+It was worth looking at, indeed. They were about a mile from shore,
+floating about anyhow on an oily smooth sea; for the tide had changed,
+and they were making no headway. Before them one of the noblest
+headlands on the coast, an abrupt cone of slate, nigh a thousand feet
+high, covered almost entirely with grass, sloped suddenly into the
+water; and in advance of it, but slightly on one side, a rugged mound of
+black rock, nearly six hundred feet, stood out into the sea, and
+contrasted its horrid jagged lines with the smooth green of the peak
+behind. Round its base, dividing it from the glossy sea, ran a delicate
+line of silver--the surf caused by the ground-swell; and in front the
+whole promontory was dimly mirrored in the quietly heaving ocean.
+
+"What a noble headland," said Marston; "is that grass on the further
+peak too steep to walk upon?"
+
+"There's some one a'walking on it now," said old Evans. "There's a woman
+a'walking on it."
+
+None could see it but he, except Matthews, who said he couldn't tell if
+it was a sheep or no.
+
+Charles got out his glass, and the old man was right. A woman was
+walking rapidly along the peak, about the third of the way down.
+
+"What a curious place for a woman to be in!" he remarked. "It is almost
+terrible to look at."
+
+"I never saw any one there before, save the shepherd," said the old man.
+
+"It's a sheep-path," said one of the young ones. "I have been along
+there myself. It is the short way round to Coombe."
+
+Charles would have thought more of the solitary female figure on that
+awful precipice, but that their attention was diverted by something
+else. From the south-westward black flaws of wind began to creep towards
+them, alternated with long irregular bands of oily calm. Soon the calm
+bands disappeared, and the wind reached them. Then they had steerage,
+and in a very short time were roaring out to sea close hauled, with a
+brisk and ever-increasing breeze.
+
+They saw that they would have to fetch a very long leg, and make a great
+offing, in order to reach Ravenshoe at all. The wind was freshening
+every moment, changing to the west, and the sea was getting up. It took
+them three hours to open Ravenshoe Bay; and, being about five miles from
+the shore, they could see that already there was an ugly side-surf
+sweeping in, and that the people were busy on the beach hauling up their
+boats out of harm's way.
+
+"How beautifully these craft sail," said Marston, as they were all
+hanging on by her weather gunwale, and the green sea was rushing past to
+leeward, almost under their feet, in sheets of angry foam.
+
+"It is amazing what speed is got out of them on a wind," said Charles,
+"but they are dangerous craft."
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"These lug-sails are so awkward in tacking, you will see."
+
+They ran considerably past Ravenshoe and about six miles to sea, when
+the word was given to go about. In an instant the half deck was lumbered
+with the heavy red sails; and, after five minutes of unutterable
+confusion, she got about. Marston was expecting her to broach to every
+moment during this long five minutes, but fortune favoured them. They
+went freer on this tack, for the wind was now north of west, and the
+brave little craft went nearly before it at her finest pace. The men
+kept on her as much sail as she could stand, but that was very little;
+fast as they went, the great seas went faster, as though determined to
+be at the dreadful rendezvous before the boat. Still the waves rose
+higher and the wind howled louder. They were nearing the shore rapidly.
+
+Now they began to see, through the mist, the people gathered in a crowd
+on the shore, densest at one point, but with a few restless stragglers
+right and left of that point, who kept coming and going. This spot was
+where they expected to come ashore. They were apparently the last boat
+out, and all the village was watching them with the deepest anxiety.
+
+They began to hear a sound other than the howling of the wind in the
+rigging, and the rush of waters around them--a continuous thunder,
+growing louder each moment as the boat swept onward. The thunder of the
+surf upon the sand. And, looking forward, they could see just the top of
+it as it leapt madly up.
+
+It was a nervous moment. They stood ready in their shirts and trousers,
+for a rush, should it be necessary. And the old man was at the helm.
+They saw the seas begin to curl. Then they were in the middle of them.
+Then the water left them on the sand, and three brave fellows from the
+shore dashed to hook on the tackles; but they were too late. Back with a
+roar like a hungry lion came the sea; the poor boat broached to, and
+took the whole force of the deluge on her broadside. In a moment more,
+blinded and stunned, they were all in the water, trying to stand against
+the backward rush which took them near midthigh. Old Master Evans was
+nearest to Marston; he was tottering to fall when Marston got hold of
+him, and saved him. The two young men got hold of both of them. Then
+three men from the shore dashed in and got hold of Charles; and then, as
+the water went down and they dared move their feet, they all ran for
+their lives. Marston and his party got on to dry land on their feet,
+but Charles and his assistants were tumbled over and over, and washed up
+ignominiously covered with sand. Charles, however, soon recovered
+himself, and, looking round to thank those who had done him this
+service, found that one of them was William, who, when the gale had come
+on, had, with that bland indifference to the stud-groom's personal
+feelings which we have seen him exhibit before, left his work, and
+dressed in a Jersey and blue trousers, and come down to lend a hand. He
+had come in time to help his foster-brother out of the surf.
+
+"I am so very thankful to you," said Charles to the two others. "I will
+never forget you. I should have been drowned but for you. William, when
+I am in trouble I am sure to find you at my elbow."
+
+"You won't find me far off, Master Charles," said William. They didn't
+say any more to one another those two. There was no need.
+
+The tall man, Matthews, had been cast up with a broken head, and, on the
+whole, seemed rather disappointed at not finding himself in paradise. He
+had stumbled in leaping out of the boat, and hurt his foot, and had had
+a hard time of it, poor fellow.
+
+As Charles and William stood watching the poor boat breaking up, and the
+men venturing their lives to get the nets out of her, a hand was laid on
+Charles's shoulder, and, turning round, he faced Cuthbert.
+
+"Oh, Charles, Charles, I thought I had lost you! Come home and let us
+dry you, and take care of you. William, you have risked your life for
+one who is very dear to us. God reward you for it! Brother, you are
+shivering with cold, and you have nothing but your trousers and Jersey
+on, and your head and feet are bare, and your poor hair is wet and full
+of sand; let me carry you up, Charles, the stones will cut your feet.
+Let me carry you, Charles. I used to do it when you were little."
+
+There was water in Charles's eyes (the salt water out of his hair, you
+understand), as he answered:--
+
+"I think I can walk, Cuthbert; my feet are as hard as iron."
+
+"No, but I must carry you," said Cuthbert. "Get up, brother."
+
+Charles prepared to comply, and Cuthbert suddenly pulled off his shoes
+and stockings, and made ready.
+
+"Oh, Cuthbert, don't do that," said Charles, "you break my heart."
+
+"Do let me, dear Charles. I seldom ask you a favour. If I didn't know
+that it was acceptable to God, do you think I would do it?"
+
+Charles hesitated one moment; but he caught William's eye, and William's
+eye and William's face said so plainly "do it," that Charles hesitated
+no longer, but got on his brother's back. Cuthbert ordered William, who
+was barefoot, to put on his discarded shoes and stockings, which William
+did; and then Cuthbert went toiling up the stony path towards the hall,
+with his brother on his back--glorying in his penance.
+
+Is this ridiculous? I cannot say I can see it in this light. I may laugh
+to scorn the religion that teaches men that, by artificially producing
+misery and nervous terror, and in that state flying to religion as a
+comfort and refuge, we in any way glorify God, or benefit ourselves. I
+can laugh, I say, at a form of religion like this; but I cannot laugh at
+the men who believe in it, and act up to it. No. I may smoke my pipe,
+and say that the fool Cuthbert Ravenshoe took off his shoes, and gave
+them to the groom, and carried a twelve-stone brother for a quarter of a
+mile barefoot, and what a fool he must be, and so forth. But the sneer
+is a failure, and the laugh dies away; and I say, "Well, Cuthbert, if
+you are a fool, you are a consistent and manly one at all events."
+
+Let us leave these three toiling up the steep rocky path, and take a
+glance elsewhere. When the gale had come on, little Mary had left
+Densil, and putting on her bonnet, gone down to the beach. She had asked
+the elder fishermen whether there would be any danger in beaching the
+boat, and they had said in chorus, "Oh, bless her sweet ladyship's
+heart, no. The young men would have the tackles on her and have her up,
+oh, ever so quick;" and so she had been reassured, and walked up and
+down. But, as the wind came stronger and stronger, and she had seen the
+last boat taken in half full of water--and as the women kept walking up
+and down uneasily, with their hands under their aprons--and as she saw
+many an old eagle eye, shaded by a horny hand, gazing anxiously seaward
+at the two brown sails plunging about in the offing--she had lost heart
+again, and had sat her down on a windlass apart, with a pale face, and a
+sick heart.
+
+A tall gaunt brown woman came up to her and said,
+
+"My lady musn't fret. My lady would never do for a fisherman's wife.
+Why, my dear tender flesh, there's a hundred strong arms on the beach
+now, as would fetch a Ravenshoe out of anywhere a'most. 'Tis a cross
+surf, Miss Mary; but, Lord love ye, they'll have the tackles on her
+afore she's in it. Don't ye fret, dear, don't ye fret."
+
+But she had sat apart and fretted nevertheless; and, when she saw the
+brown bows rushing madly through the yellow surf, she had shut her eyes
+and prayed, and had opened them to see the boat on her beam ends, and a
+dozen struggling figures in the pitiless water.
+
+Then she had stood up and wrung her hands.
+
+They were safe. She heard that, and she buried her face in her hands,
+and murmured a prayer of thanksgiving.
+
+Some one stood beside her. It was Marston, bareheaded and barefooted.
+
+"Oh, thank God!" she said.
+
+"We have given you a sad fright."
+
+"I have been terribly frightened. But you must not stand dripping there.
+Please come up, and let me attend you."
+
+So she got him a pair of shoes, and they went up together. The penance
+procession had passed on before; and a curious circumstance is this,
+that although on ordinary occasions Marston was as lively a talker as
+need be, on this occasion he was an uncommonly stupid one, as he never
+said one word all the way up to the hall, and then separated from her
+with a formal little salutation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+MARSTON'S DISAPPOINTMENT.
+
+
+Mary did not wonder at Marston's silence. She imagined that perhaps he
+had been sobered by being cast on the shore so unceremoniously, and
+thought but little more of it. Then she dressed for dinner, and went and
+stood in one of the deep windows of the hall, looking out.
+
+The great fire which leapt and blazed in the hall chimney was fast
+superseding the waning daylight outside. It was very pleasant to look at
+the fire, and the fire-light on wall and ceiling, on antler and armour,
+and then to get behind the curtain, and look out into the howling
+winter's evening, over the darkening, raging sea, and the tossing trees,
+and think how all the boats were safe in, and the men sitting round the
+pleasant fires with their wives and children, and that the dogs were
+warm in the kennels, and the horses in the stable; and to pity the poor
+birds, and hope they had good warm nooks and corners to get to; and
+then to think of the ships coming up the channel, and hope they might
+keep a good offing.
+
+This brought her to thinking, for the first time, of her own little
+self--how, so many years ago, she had been cast up like a little piece
+of seaweed out of that awful ocean. She thought of the _Warren
+Hastings_, and how she and Charles, on summer days, when out gathering
+shells on the rocks, used to look over to where the ship lay beneath the
+sea, and wonder whereabout it was. Then she had a kindly smile on her
+face as she thought of Mr. Archer, the brave and good (now I am happy to
+say Captain Archer), and looked over the hall to a hideous and
+diabolical graven image, which he had sent the year before, among some
+very valuable presents, and had begged her to be particularly careful
+of, as he had risked his life in getting it; and which she and Charles
+had triumphantly placed in the hall, and maintained there, too, in spite
+of the sarcasms of Father Mackworth, and the pious horror of the
+servants and villagers. And so she went on thinking--thinking of her
+dead parents, of the silence maintained by her relations, of old
+Densil's protection, and then of the future. That protection must cease
+soon, and then--
+
+A governess! There were many stories about governesses not being well
+treated. Perhaps it was their own fault, or they were exceptional cases.
+She would like the nursery best, and to keep away from the drawing-room
+altogether. "Yes," she said, "I will _make_ them love me; I will be so
+gentle, patient, and obliging. I am not afraid of the children--I know I
+can win _them_--or of my mistress much; I believe I can win _her_. I am
+most afraid of the superior servants; but, surely, kindness and
+submission will win them in time.
+
+"My sheet-anchor is old Lady Ascot. She got very fond of me during that
+six months I stayed with her; and she is very kind. Surely she will get
+me a place where I shall be well treated! and, if not, why then--I shall
+only be in the position of thousands of other girls. I must fight
+through it. There is another life after this.
+
+"It will be terribly hard parting from all the old friends though! After
+that, I think I shall have no heart left to suffer with. Yes; I suppose
+the last details of the break-up will be harder to bear than anything
+which will follow. That will tear one's heart terribly. That over, I
+suppose my salary will keep me in drawing materials, and give me the
+power, at every moment of leisure, of taking myself into fairy land.
+
+"I suppose actual destitution is impossible. I should think so. Yes,
+yes; Lady Ascot would take care of that. If that were to come though?
+They say a girl can always make four-pence a day by her needle. How I
+would fight, and strive, and toil! And then how sweet death would be!"
+
+She paused, and looked out on the darkened ocean. "And yet," she thought
+again, "I would follow--follow him to the world's end:--
+
+      "'Across the hills, and far away,
+          Beyond their utmost purple rim;
+        Beyond the night, across the day,
+          The happy princess followed him.'"
+
+A door opened into the hall, and a man's step was on the stone-floor;
+she raised the curtain to see who it was. It was Marston; and he came
+straight towards her, and stood beside her, looking out over the wild
+stormy landscape.
+
+"Miss Corby," he said, "I was coming to try and find you."
+
+"You are very lucky in your search," she said, smiling on him. "I was
+alone here with the storm; and, if I had not raised the curtain, you
+would never have seen me. How it blows! I am glad you are not out in
+this. This is one of your lucky days."
+
+"I should be glad to think so. Will you listen to me for a very few
+minutes, while I tell you something?"
+
+"Surely," she said. "Who is there that I would sooner listen to?"
+
+"I fear I shall tire your patience now, though. I am a comparatively
+poor man."
+
+"And what of that, my dear Mr. Marston? You are rich in honour, in
+future prospects. You have a noble future before you."
+
+"Will you share it, Mary?"
+
+"Oh! what do you mean?"
+
+"Will you be my wife? I love you beyond all the riches and honours of
+the world--I love you as you will never be loved again. It is due to you
+and to myself to say that, although I call myself poor, I have enough to
+keep you like a lady, and all my future prospects beside. Don't give me
+a hasty answer, but tell me, is it possible you can become my wife?"
+
+"Oh, I am so sorry for this!" said poor Mary. "I never dreamt of this.
+Oh, no! it is utterly and entirely impossible, Mr. Marston--utterly and
+hopelessly impossible! You must forgive me, if you can; but you must
+never, never think about me more."
+
+"Is there no hope?" said Marston.
+
+"No hope, no hope!" said Mary. "Please never think about me any more,
+till you have forgiven me; and then, with your children on your knee,
+think of me as a friend who loves you dearly."
+
+"I shall think of you till I die. I was afraid of this: it is just as I
+thought."
+
+"What did you think?"
+
+"Nothing--nothing! Will you let me kiss your hand?"
+
+"Surely; and God bless you!"
+
+"Are we to say good-bye for ever, then?" said poor Marston.
+
+"I hope not. I should be sorry to think that," said poor Mary, crying.
+"But you must never speak to me like this again, dear Mr. Marston. God
+bless you, once more!"
+
+Charles was dressing while this scene was going on, and was thinking,
+while brushing his hair, what there was for dinner, and whether there
+would be a turbot or not, and whether the cook would send in the breast
+of the venison. The doe, Charles sagely reflected, had been killed five
+days before, and the weather had been warm: surely That Woman would let
+them have the breast. He was a fool not to have told her of it in the
+morning before he went out; but she was such an obstinate old catamaran
+that she very likely wouldn't have done it. "There was no greater
+mistake," this young Heliogabalus proceeded to remark, "than hanging
+your breasts too long. Now your haunch, on the other hand----" but we
+cannot follow him into such a vast and important field of speculation.
+"There would be a couple of cocks, though--pretty high, near about the
+mark----"
+
+The door opened, and in walked Father Mackworth.
+
+"Hallo, Father!" said Charles. "How are you? Did you hear of our spill
+to-day? We were deuced near done for, I assure you."
+
+"Charles," said the priest, "your nature is frank and noble. I was in
+terror to-day lest you should go to your account bearing me malice."
+
+"A Ravenshoe never bears malice, Father," said Charles.
+
+"A Ravenshoe never does, I am aware," said Father Mackworth, with such a
+dead equality of emphasis, that Charles could not have sworn that he
+laid any on the word "Ravenshoe."
+
+"But I have got an apology to make to you, Father," said Charles: "I
+have to apologise to you for losing my temper with you the other day,
+and breaking out into I can't say what tirade of unjust anger. I pray
+you to forgive me. We don't love one another, you know. How can we? But
+I behaved like a blackguard, as I always do when I am in a passion.
+Will you forgive me?"
+
+"I had forgotten the circumstance." ("Good heaven!" said Charles to
+himself, "can't this man help lying!") "But, if I have anything to
+forgive, I freely do so. I have come to ask for a peace. As long as your
+father lives, let there be outward peace between us, if no more."
+
+"I swear there shall," said Charles. "I like you to-night, sir, better
+than ever I did before, for the kindness and consideration you show to
+my father. When he is gone there will be peace between us, for I shall
+leave this house, and trouble you no more."
+
+"I suppose you will," said Father Mackworth, with the same deadness of
+emphasis remarked before. And so he departed.
+
+"That is a manly young fellow, and a gentleman," thought Father
+Mackworth. "Obstinate and headstrong, without much brains; but with more
+brains than the other, and more education. The other will be very
+troublesome and headstrong; but I suppose I shall be able to manage
+him."
+
+What person do you think Father Mackworth meant by the "other"? He
+didn't mean Cuthbert.
+
+At dinner Densil was garrulous, and eager to hear of their shipwreck. He
+had made a great rally the last fortnight, and was his old self again.
+Lord Saltire, whose gout had fled before careful living and moderate
+exercise, informed them, after the soup, that he intended to leave them
+after four days' time, as he had business in another part of the
+country. They were rather surprised at his abrupt departure, and he said
+that he was very sorry to leave such pleasant society, in which he had
+been happier than he had been for many years.
+
+"There is a pleasant, innocent, domestic sort of atmosphere which
+radiates from you, my old friend," he said, "such as I seldom or never
+get away from you or Mainwaring, grim warrior though he be (you remember
+him at Ranford, Charles?). But the law of the Medes and Persians is not
+amenable to change, and I go on Thursday."
+
+The post arrived during dinner, and there was a letter for Charles. It
+was from Ranford. "Welter comes on Thursday, father--the very day Lord
+Saltire goes. How annoying!"
+
+"I must try to bear up under the affliction!" said that nobleman, taking
+snuff, and speaking very drily.
+
+"Where is he to go, I wonder?" mused Mary, aloud. "He must go into the
+west wing, for he always smokes in his bedroom."
+
+Charles expected that Cuthbert would have had a sneer at Welter, whom he
+cordially disliked; but Cuthbert had given up sneering lately. "Not much
+more reading for you, Charles!" he said.
+
+"I am afraid not," said Charles. "I almost wish he wasn't coming; we
+were very happy before."
+
+Charles was surprised to see Marston so silent at dinner. He feared he
+might have offended him, but couldn't tell how. Then he wondered to see
+Mary so silent, too, for she generally chirruped away like a lark; but
+he didn't refer the two similar phenomena to a common cause, and so he
+arrived at no conclusion.
+
+When Lord Saltire went to bed that night, he dismissed Charles from
+attendance, and took Marston's arm; and, when they were alone together,
+he thus began:--
+
+"Does your shrewdness connect my abrupt departure with the arrival of
+Lord Welter?"
+
+"I was inclined to, my lord; but I do not see how you were to have known
+it."
+
+"I heard yesterday from Lady Ascot."
+
+"I am sorry he is coming," said Marston.
+
+"So am I. I can't stay in the house with him. The contrast of his loud,
+coarse voice and stable slang to the sort of quiet conversation we have
+had lately would be intolerable; besides, he is an atrocious young
+ruffian, and will ruin our boy if he can."
+
+"Charles won't let him now, Lord Saltire."
+
+"Charles is young and foolish. I am glad, however, that Welter does not
+go back to Oxford with him. But there will be Welter's set in their
+glory, I suppose, unless some of them have got hung. I would sooner see
+him at home. He is naturally quiet and domestic. I suppose he was in a
+sad set up there."
+
+"He was in a very good set, and a very bad one. He was a favourite
+everywhere."
+
+"He had made some acquaintances he ought to be proud of, at least," said
+Lord Saltire, in a way which made honest Marston blush. "I wish he
+wasn't going to Ranford."
+
+"Report says," said Marston, "that affairs are getting somewhat shaky
+there: Welter's tradesmen can't get any money."
+
+Lord Saltire shook his head significantly, and then said, "Now I want to
+speak to you about yourself. Did not you have a disappointment to-day?"
+
+"Yes, my lord."
+
+"Ha!"
+
+They both sat silent for a moment.
+
+"How did you guess that, Lord Saltire?"
+
+"I saw what was going on; and, by your manner and hers to-day, I guessed
+something had taken place. Is there no hope for you?"
+
+"None."
+
+"I feared not: but what right had I to tell you so?"
+
+"Perhaps, my lord, I should not have believed you if you had," said
+Marston, smiling.
+
+"What man would have? You are not angry?"
+
+"How could I be? The world is out of joint, that is all."
+
+"You are a true gentleman. I swear to you," said the old man, eagerly,
+"that there is no one in fault. She has given her honest little heart
+away--and what wonder!--but believe me that you are behaving as a man
+should behave, in not resenting it. If you were a heathen and a
+Frenchman (synonymous terms, my dear boy), you might find it your duty
+to cut somebody's throat; but, being a Christian and a gentleman, you
+will remain a true friend to somebody who loves you dearly, and is worth
+loving in return. This sort of thing cuts a man up confoundedly. It
+happened to me once; but, believe me, you will get over it."
+
+"I mean to do so. How kind and generous you are to me! How shall I ever
+repay you?"
+
+"By kindness to those I love," said the old man. "I take this
+opportunity of telling you that your fortunes are my particular care. I
+cannot get you the wife you love, but I am rich and powerful, and can do
+much. Not another word. Go to bed, sir--to bed."
+
+Marston, sitting on his bedside that night, said aloud to himself, "And
+so that is that dicing old _roué_, Saltire, is it? Well, well; it is a
+funny world. What a noble fellow he would have been if he had had a
+better chance. Nay, what a noble fellow he is. I am ten years older
+since this morning" (he wasn't, but he thought it). And so he said his
+prayers like an honest man, and prayed for the kind old heathen who had
+such a warm heart; and then, being nowise ashamed to do so, he prayed
+that he might sleep well; and, for a time, he forgot all about his
+disappointment, and slept like a child.
+
+Lord Saltire's valet was a staid and sober-minded gentleman of
+sixty-four. Generally, when he was putting his lordship to bed, he used
+to give him the news of the day; but to-night Lord Saltire said, "Never
+mind the news, Simpson, if you please; I am thinking of something." My
+lord used to wear a sort of muffler, like a footless stocking, to keep
+his old knees warm in bed. He remained silent till he got one on, and
+then, without taking the other from the expectant Simpson, he addressed
+the fire-irons aloud:
+
+"This is a pretty clumsy contrivance to call a world!" he said, with
+profound scorn. "Look here (to the poker), here's as fine a lad as ever
+you saw, goes and falls in love with a charming girl, who cares no more
+for him than the deuce. He proposes to her, and is refused. Why? because
+she has given her heart away to another fine young fellow, who don't
+care twopence for her, and has given _his_ heart away to the most
+ambitious young Jezebel in the three kingdoms, who I don't believe cares
+so very much for him. I am utterly disgusted with the whole system of
+mundane affairs! Simpson, give me that muffler, if you please; and pray
+don't wake me before nine. I must try to sleep off the recollection of
+some of this folly."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+ELLEN'S FLIGHT.
+
+
+After all the fatigues and adventures of the day before, Charles slept
+well--long pleasant dreams of roaming in sunny places on summer days
+fell to his happy lot--and so he was not pleased when he found himself
+shaken by the shoulder.
+
+It was William come to wake him. Charles was at once alarmed to see him
+there, and started up, saying--
+
+"Is anything the matter, Will? Is my father ill?"
+
+"The Master's well, I trust, Master Charles. I want to tell you
+something that I want others to find out for themselves."
+
+"What is it?" said Charles, seriously alarmed, for he had had his
+suspicions lately, though he had dreaded to give them a name.
+
+"Ellen is gone!"
+
+"My dear lad," said Charles, hurriedly, "what makes you think so? Since
+when have you missed her?"
+
+"Since yesterday afternoon."
+
+"Have you been in her room?"
+
+"Yes. She has not been to bed, and the window is open just as it was
+yesterday morning at bed-making time."
+
+"Hush--wait! There may be time yet. Go down and saddle two horses at
+once. I will tell you what I know as we ride, but there is not time now.
+Tell me only one thing, Is there any one she would be likely to go to at
+Coombe?"
+
+"No one that I know of."
+
+William departed to get the horses. Charles had suddenly thought of the
+solitary female figure he had seen passing along the dizzy sheep-path
+the day before, and he determined to follow that till he lost sight of
+it.
+
+"For the poor dear girl's sake--for the honour of this old house--I
+wonder who is at the bottom of all this? I must tell Marston," he said,
+when he was out on the landing. "George, tell them to get me some coffee
+instantly. I am going out hunting."
+
+Marston thought as Charles did. The right thing to do would be to follow
+her, see that she wanted for nothing, and leave her brother with her for
+a time. "He won't quarrel with her now, you'll see. He is a good fellow,
+mind you, Charles, though he did lose his temper with her that night."
+
+So they rode forth side by side into the wild winter's morning. The rain
+had ceased for a time, but the low dark clouds were hurrying swiftly
+before the blast, and eddying among the loftier tors and summits. The
+wind was behind them, and their way was east, across the lofty downs.
+
+"William," said Charles, at last, "who is at the bottom of this?"
+
+"I don't know, Master Charles. If I did there would be mischief, unless
+it was one of two."
+
+"Ay, Will, but it ain't. You don't think it is Cuthbert?"
+
+"No, no! He, forsooth! Father Mackworth knows, I believe, more than we
+do."
+
+"You do not suspect him?"
+
+"Certainly not. I did, but I don't now. I suspect he knows, as I said,
+more than we do. He has been speaking harshly to her about it."
+
+They had arrived at the hill round which Charles suspected he had seen
+her pass the day before. It was impossible to pass round the promontory
+on horseback in the best of weathers; now doubly so. They would have to
+pass inland of it. They both pulled up their horses and looked. The
+steep slope of turf, the top of which, close over head, was hid by
+flying mists, trended suddenly downwards, and disappeared. Eight hundred
+feet below was the raging sea.
+
+As they stood there, the same thought came across both of them. It was a
+dreadful place. They neither spoke at all, but spurred on faster, till
+the little grey village of Coombe, down at their feet, sheltered from
+the storm by the lofty hills around, opened to their view; and they
+pushed on down the steep rocky path.
+
+No. No one had seen her yesterday at such a time. The streets would have
+been full of the miners coming from work; or, if she had come earlier,
+there would have been plenty of people to see her. It was a small place,
+and no stranger, they said, could ever pass through it unnoticed.
+
+And, though they scoured the country far and wide, and though for months
+after the fishermen fished among the quiet bays beneath the cliffs in
+fear, lest they should find there something which should be carried in
+silent awe up the village, and laid quietly in the old churchyard,
+beneath the elm; yet Ellen was gone--gone from their ken like a summer
+cloud. They thought it a pious fraud to tell Densil that she was
+gone--with some excuse, I forget what, but which satisfied him. In a
+conclave held over the matter, Cuthbert seemed only surprised and
+shocked, but evidently knew nothing of the matter. Father Mackworth said
+that he expected something of the kind for some little time, and William
+held his peace. The gossips in the village laid their heads together,
+and shook them. There was but one opinion there.
+
+      "Never again shall she put garland on;
+      Instead of it she'll wear sad cypress now,
+      And bitter elder broken from the bough."
+
+Nora--poor old Nora--took to her bed. Father Mackworth was with her
+continually, but she sank and sank. Father Mackworth was called away
+across the moors, one afternoon, to an outlying Catholic tenant's
+family; and, during his absence, William was sent to Charles to pray him
+to come, in God's name, to his mother. Charles ran across at once, but
+Nora was speechless. She had something to say to Charles; but the great
+Sower, which shall sow us all in the ground, and tread us down, had His
+hand heavy on her, and she could not speak. In the morning, when the
+gale had broken, and the white sea-birds were soaring and skimming
+between the blue sky and the noble green, rolling sea, and the ships
+were running up channel, and the fishing-boats were putting out gaily
+from the pier, and all nature was brilliant and beautiful, old Nora lay
+dead, and her secret with her.
+
+"Master Charles," said William, as they stood on the shore together,
+"she knew something, and Ellen knows it too, I very much suspect. The
+time will come, Master Charles, when we shall have to hunt her through
+the world, and get the secret from her."
+
+"William, I would go many weary journeys to bring poor Ellen back into
+the ways of peace. The fact of her being your sister would be enough to
+make me do that."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+RANFORD AGAIN.
+
+
+Charles, though no genius, had a certain amount of common sense, and,
+indeed, more of that commodity than most people gave him credit for.
+Therefore he did not pursue the subject with William. Firstly, because
+he did not think he could get any more out of him (for William had a
+certain amount of sturdy obstinacy in his composition); and secondly,
+because he knew William was, in the main, a sensible fellow, and loved
+the ground he stood on. Charles would never believe that William would
+serve him falsely; and he was right.
+
+He told Marston of the curious words which William had used, and Marston
+had said--
+
+"I don't understand it. The devil is abroad. Are you coming into any
+money at your father's death?"
+
+"I am to have £180 a year."
+
+"I wouldn't give £50 a year for your chance of it. What is this property
+worth?"
+
+"£9,000 a year. The governor has lived very extravagantly. The stable
+establishment is fit for a duke now; and, then, look at the servants!"
+
+"He is not living up to ten thousand a year now, I should say."
+
+"No; but it is only the other day he gave up the hounds. They cost him
+two thousand a year; and, while he had them, the house was carried on
+very extravagantly. The governor has a wonderful talent for muddling
+away money; and, what is more, I believe he was bit with the railways.
+You know, I believe, the estate is involved."
+
+"Bathershin. But still, Cuthbert won't marry, and his life is a bad one,
+and you are a heretic, my poor little innocent."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Heaven only knows what then. I am sure I don't. At what time does the
+worthy and intellectual Welter arrive?"
+
+"He will be here about six."
+
+"Two hours more rational existence for one, then. After that a smell as
+of ten thousand stables and fifty stale copies of _Bell's Life_ in one's
+nose, till his lordship takes his departure. I don't like your cousin,
+Charles."
+
+"What an astounding piece of news! He says you are a conceited prig, and
+give yourself airs."
+
+"He never said a wiser or truer thing in his life. I am exactly that;
+and he is a fifth-class steeple chaserider, with a title."
+
+"How you and he will fight!"
+
+"So I expect. That is, if he has the courage for battle, which I rather
+doubt. He is terribly afraid of me."
+
+"I think you are hard on poor Welter," said Charles; "I do, indeed. He
+is a generous, good-hearted fellow."
+
+"Oh! we are all generous, good-hearted fellows," said Marston, "as long
+as we have plenty of money and good digestions. You are right, though,
+Charley. He is what you say, as far as I know; but the reason I hate him
+is this:--You are the dearest friend I have, and I am jealous of him. He
+is in eternal antagonism to me. I am always trying to lead you right,
+and he is equally diligent in leading you into wrong."
+
+"Well, he sha'n't lead me into any more, I promise you now. Do be civil
+to him."
+
+"Of course I will, you gaby. Did you think I was going to show fight in
+your house?"
+
+When Marston came down to dinner, there was Lord Welter, sitting beside
+old Densil, and kindly amusing him with all sorts of gossip--stable and
+other.
+
+"How do, Marston?" said he, rising and coming forward.
+
+"How d'ye do, Lord Welter?" said Marston.
+
+"I am very glad to meet you here," said Lord Welter, with a
+good-humoured smile, "although I am ashamed to look you in the face.
+Marston, my dear Mr. Ravenshoe, is Charles's good genius, and I am his
+evil one; I am always getting Charles into mischief, and he is always
+trying to keep him out of it. Hitherto, however, I have been completely
+successful, and he has made a dead failure."
+
+Old Densil laughed. "You are doing yourself injustice, Welter," he said.
+"Is he not doing himself an injustice, Mr. Marston?"
+
+"Not in the least, sir," said Marston. And the two young men shook hands
+more cordially than they had ever done before.
+
+That evening Lord Welter fulfilled Mary's prophecy, that he would smoke
+in his bedroom, and not only smoked there himself, but induced Charles
+to come and do so also. Marston was not in the humour for the style of
+conversation he knew he should have there, and so he retired to bed, and
+left the other two to themselves.
+
+"Well, Charles," said Welter. "Oh, by the by, I have got a letter for
+you from that mysterious madcap, Adelaide. She couldn't send it by post;
+that would not have been mysterious and underhand enough for her. Catch
+hold."
+
+Charles caught hold, and read his letter. Welter watched him curiously
+from under the heavy eyebrows, and when he had finished, said--
+
+"Come, put that away, and talk. That sort of thing is pretty much the
+same in all cases, I take it. As far as my own experience goes, it is
+always the same. Scold and whine and whimper; whimper, whine, and scold.
+How's that old keeper of yours?"
+
+"He has lost his wife."
+
+"Poor fellow! I remember his wife--a handsome Irish woman."
+
+"My nurse?"
+
+"Ay, ay. And the pretty girl, Ellen; how is she?"
+
+"Poor Ellen! She has run away, Welter; gone on the bad, I fear."
+
+Lord Welter sat in just the same position, gazing on the fire. He then
+said, in a very deliberate voice:--
+
+"The deuce she is! I am very sorry to hear that. I was in hopes of
+renewing our acquaintance."
+
+The days flew by, and, as you know, there came no news from Ellen. The
+household had been much saddened by her disappearance and by Norah's
+death, though not one of the number ever guessed what had passed between
+Mary and Marston. They were not a very cheerful household; scarce one of
+them but had some secret trouble. Father Tiernay came back after a week
+or so; and, if good-natured, kindly chatter could have cheered them at
+all, he would have done it. But there was a settled gloom on the party,
+which nothing could overcome. Even Lord Welter, boisterous as his
+spirits usually were, seemed often anxious and distraught; and, as for
+poor Cuthbert, he would, at any time, within the knowledge of man, have
+acted as a "damper" on the liveliest party. His affection for Charles
+seemed, for some reason, to increase day by day, but it was sometimes
+very hard to keep the peace between Welter and him. If there was one man
+beyond another that Cuthbert hated, it was Lord Welter; and sometimes,
+after dinner, such a scene as this would take place.
+
+You will, perhaps, have remarked that I have never yet represented
+Cuthbert as speaking to Mary. The real fact is, that he never did speak
+to her, or to any woman, anything beyond the merest commonplaces--a
+circumstance which made Charles very much doubt the truth of Ellen's
+statement--that the priest had caught them talking together in the wood.
+However, Cuthbert was, in this way, fond enough of the bonny little soul
+(I swear I am in love with her myself, over head and ears); and so, one
+day, when she came crying in, and told him--as being the first person
+she met--that her little bantam-cock had been killed by the Dorking,
+Cuthbert comforted her, bottled up his wrath, till his father had gone
+into the drawing-room with her after dinner, and the others were sitting
+at their wine. Then he said, suddenly--
+
+"Welter, did you have any cock-fighting to-day?"
+
+"Oh, yes, by the by, a splendid turn-up. There was a noble little bantam
+in an inclosed yard challenging a great Dorking, and they both seemed so
+very anxious for sport that I thought it would be a pity to baulk them;
+so I just let the bantam out. I give you my word, it is my belief that
+the bantam would have been the best man, but that he was too old. His
+attack was splendid; but he met the fate of the brave."
+
+"You should not have done that, Welter," said Charles; "that was Mary's
+favourite bantam."
+
+"I don't allow any cock-fighting at Ravenshoe, Welter," said Cuthbert.
+
+"You don't allow it!" said Lord Welter, scornfully.
+
+"No, by heaven," said Cuthbert, "I don't allow it!"
+
+"Don't you?" said Welter; "you are not master here, nor ever will be. No
+Ravenshoe was ever master of his own house yet."
+
+"I am absolute master here," said Cuthbert, with a rising colour. "There
+is no appeal against me here."
+
+"Only to the priest," said Welter. (I must do him justice to say that
+neither Mackworth nor Tiernay was in the room, or he would not have said
+it.)
+
+"You are insolent, Welter, and brutal. It is your nature to be so," said
+Cuthbert, fiercely.
+
+Marston, who had been watching Welter all this time, saw a flash come
+from his eyes, and, for one moment, a terrible savage setting of the
+teeth. "Ha, ha! my friend," thought he, "I thought that stupid face was
+capable of some such expression as that. I am obliged to you, my friend,
+for giving me one little glimpse of the devil inside."
+
+"By gad, Cuthbert," said Lord Welter, "if you hadn't been at your own
+table, you shouldn't have said that, cousin or no cousin, twice."
+
+"Stop, now," said Charles, "don't turn the place into a bear-pit.
+Cuthbert, do be moderate. Welter, you shouldn't have set the cocks
+fighting. Now don't begin quarrelling again, you two, for heaven's
+sake!"
+
+And so the peace was made: but Charles was very glad when the time came
+for the party to break up; and he went away to Ranford with Welter,
+preparatory to his going back to Oxford.
+
+His father was quite his own old self again, and seemed to have rallied
+amazingly; so Charles left him without much anxiety; and there were
+reasons we know of why his heart should bound when he heard the word
+Ranford mentioned, and why the raging speed of the Great Western Railway
+express seemed all too slow for him. Lord Ascot's horses were fast, the
+mail-phaeton was a good one, and Lord Welter's worst enemies could not
+accuse him of driving slow; yet the way from Didcot to Ranford seemed so
+interminably long that he said:--
+
+"By Jove, I wish we had come by a slower train, and gone on to Twyford!"
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"I don't know. I think it is pleasanter driving through Wargrave and
+Henley."
+
+Lord Welter laughed, and Charles wondered why. There were no visitors at
+Ranford; and, when they arrived, Welter of course adjourned to the
+stables, while Charles ran upstairs and knocked at Lady Ascot's door.
+
+He was bidden to come in by the old lady's voice. Her black-and-tan
+terrier, who was now so old that his teeth and voice were alike gone,
+rose from the hearth, and went through the motion and outward semblance
+of barking furiously at Charles, though without producing any audible
+sound. Lady Ascot rose up and welcomed him kindly.
+
+"I am so glad to see your honest face, my dear boy. I have been sitting
+here all alone so long. Ascot is very kind, and comes and sits with me,
+and I give him some advice about his horses, which he never takes. But I
+am very lonely."
+
+"But where is Adelaide, aunt, dear?"
+
+"She's gone."
+
+"Gone! My dear aunt, where to?"
+
+"Gone to stay ten days with Lady Hainault."
+
+Here was a blow.
+
+"I know you are very disappointed, my poor boy, and I told Welter so
+expressly to tell you in my last letter. He is so shockingly careless
+and forgetful!"
+
+"So Welter knew of it," said Charles to himself. "And that is what made
+him laugh at my hurry. It is very ungentlemanly behaviour."
+
+But Charles's anger was like a summer cloud. "I think, aunt," he said,
+"that Welter was having a joke with me; that was all. When will she be
+back?"
+
+"The end of next week."
+
+"And I shall be gone to Oxford. I shall ride over to Casterton and see
+her."
+
+"You knew Hainault at Shrewsbury? Yes. Well, you had better do so,
+child. Yes, certainly."
+
+"What made her go, aunt, I wonder?"
+
+"Lady Hainault was ill, and would have her, and I was forced to let her
+go."
+
+Oh, Lady Ascot, Lady Ascot, you wicked old fibster! Didn't you hesitate,
+stammer, and blush, when you said that? I am very much afraid you
+didn't. Hadn't you had, three days before, a furious _fracas_ with
+Adelaide about something, and hadn't it ended by her declaring that she
+would claim the protection of Lady Hainault? Hadn't she ordered out the
+pony-carriage and driven off with a solitary bandbox, and what I choose
+to call a crinoline-chest? And hadn't you and Lady Hainault had a
+brilliant passage of arms over her ladyship's receiving and abetting the
+recalcitrant Adelaide?
+
+Lady Ascot was perfectly certain of one thing--that Charles would never
+hear about this from Adelaide; and so she lied boldly and with
+confidence. Otherwise, she must have made a dead failure, for few people
+had practised that great and difficult art so little as her ladyship.
+
+That there had been a furious quarrel between Lady Ascot and Adelaide
+about this time, I well know from the best authority. It had taken place
+just as I have described it above. I do not know for certain the cause
+of it, but can guess; and, as I am honestly going to tell you all I
+know, you will be able to make as good a guess as I hereafter.
+
+Lady Ascot said, furthermore, that she was very uneasy in her mind about
+Ascot's colt, which she felt certain would not stay over the Derby
+course. The horse was not so well ribbed up as he should be, and had
+hardly quarter enough to suit her. Talking of that, her lumbago had set
+in worse than ever since the frost had come on, and her doctor had had
+the impudence to tell her that her liver was deranged, whereas, she knew
+it proceeded from cold in the small of her back. Talking of the frost,
+she was told that there had been a very good sheet of ice on the
+carp-pond, where Charles might have skated, though she did hope he would
+never go on the ice till it was quite safe--as, if he were to get
+drowned, it would only add to her vexation, and surely she had had
+enough of that, with that audacious chit of a girl, Adelaide, who was
+enough to turn one's hair grey; though for that matter it had been grey
+many years, as all the world might see.
+
+"Has Adelaide been vexing you, aunt, dear?" interrupted Charles.
+
+"No, my dear boy, no," replied the old woman. "She is a little tiresome
+sometimes, but I dare say it is more my fault than hers."
+
+"You will not be angry with her, aunt, dear? You will be long-suffering
+with her, for my sake?"
+
+"Dear Charles," said the good old woman, weeping, "I will forgive her
+till seventy times seven. Sometimes, dear, she is high-spirited, and
+tries my temper. And I am very old, dear, and very cross and cruel to
+her. It is all my fault, Charles, all my fault."
+
+Afterwards, when Charles knew the truth, he used to bless the memory of
+this good old woman, recalling this conversation, and knowing on which
+side the fault lay. At this time, blindly in love as he was with
+Adelaide, he had sense enough left to do justice.
+
+"Aunt, dear," he said, "you are old, but you are neither cross nor
+cruel. You are the kindest and most generous of women. You are the only
+mother I ever had, aunt. I dare say Adelaide is tiresome sometimes; bear
+with her for my sake. Tell me some more about the horses. God help us,
+they are an important subject enough in this house now!"
+
+Lady Ascot said, having dried her eyes and kissed Charles, that she had
+seen this a very long time: that she had warned Ascot solemnly, as it
+was a mother's duty to do, to be careful of Ramoneur blood, and that
+Ascot would never listen to her; that no horse of that breed had ever
+been a staying horse; that she believed, if the truth could be got at,
+that the Pope of Rome had been, indirectly, perhaps, but certainly, the
+inventor of produce stakes, which had done more to ruin the breed of
+horses, and consequently the country, than fifty reform bills. Then her
+ladyship wished to know if Charles had read Lord Mount E----'s book on
+the Battle of Armageddon, and on receiving a negative answer, gave a
+slight abstract of that most prophetical production, till the gong
+sounded, and Charles went up to dress for dinner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+CLOTHO, LACHESIS, AND ATROPOS.
+
+
+The road from Ranford to Casterton, which is the name of Lord Hainault's
+place, runs through about three miles of the most beautiful scenery.
+Although it may barely come up to Cookham or Cliefden, yet it surpasses
+the piece from Wargrave to Henley, and beats Pangbourne hollow. Leaving
+Ranford Park, the road passes through the pretty village of Ranford. And
+in the street of Ranford, which is a regular street, the principal inn
+is the White Hart, kept by Mrs. Foley.
+
+Here, in summer, all through the long glorious days, which seem so hard
+to believe in in winter time, come anglers, and live. Here they order
+their meals at impossible hours, and drive the landlady mad by not
+coming home to them. Here, too, they plan mad expeditions with the
+fishermen, who are now in all their glory, wearing bright-patterned
+shirts, scornful of half-crowns, and in a general state of obfuscation,
+in consequence of being plied with strange liquors by their patrons, out
+of flasks, when they are out fishing. Here, too, come artists, with
+beards as long as your arm, and pass the day under white umbrellas, in
+pleasant places by the waterside, painting.
+
+The dark old porch of the inn stands out in the street, but the back of
+the house goes down to the river. At this porch there is generally a
+group of idlers, or an old man sunning himself, or a man on horseback
+drinking. On this present occasion there were all three of these things,
+and also Lord Ascot's head-keeper, with a brace of setters.
+
+As Charles rode very slowly towards the group, the keeper and the groom
+on horseback left off talking. Charles fancied they had been talking
+about him, and I, who know everything, also know that they had. When
+Charles was nearly opposite him, the keeper came forward and said--
+
+"I should like to show you the first trout of the season, sir. Jim, show
+Mr. Ravenshoe that trout."
+
+A beautiful ten-pounder was immediately laid on the stones.
+
+"He would have looked handsomer in another month, Jackson," said
+Charles.
+
+"Perhaps he would, sir. My lady generally likes to get one as soon as
+she can."
+
+At this stage the groom, who had been standing apart, came up, and,
+touching his hat, put into Charles's hand a note.
+
+It was in Adelaide's handwriting. The groom knew it, the keeper knew it,
+they all knew it, and Charles knew they knew it; but what cared he?--all
+the world might know it. But they knew and had been talking of something
+else before he came up, which Charles did not know. If anything is going
+wrong, all the country side know it before the person principally
+concerned. And all the country side knew that there had been a great and
+scandalous quarrel between Adelaide and Lady Ascot--all, except Charles.
+
+He put the note in his pocket without opening it; he gave the groom
+half-a-crown; he bade good-bye to the keeper; he touched his hat to the
+loiterers; and then he rode on his way towards Casterton, down the
+village street. He passed the church among the leafless walnut trees,
+beneath the towering elms, now noisy with building rooks; and then, in
+the broad road under the lofty chalk downs, with the elms on his left,
+and glimpses of the flashing river between their stems, there he pulled
+up his horse, and read his love-letter.
+
+      "DEAR CHARLES,--Ain't you very cross at my having been away
+      when you came? I don't believe you are, for you are never
+      cross. I couldn't help it, Charles, dear. Aunt wanted me to
+      go.
+
+      "Aunt is very cross and tiresome. She don't like me as well
+      as she used. You mustn't believe all she says, you know. It
+      ain't one word of it true. It is only her fancy.
+
+      "Do come over and see me. Lord Hainault" (this I must tell
+      you, reader, is the son, not the husband, of Lady Ascot's
+      most cherished old enemy,) "is going to be married, and
+      there will be a great wedding. She is that long Burton
+      girl, whom you may remember. I have always had a great
+      dislike for her; but she has asked me to be bridesmaid, and
+      of course one can't refuse. Lady Emily Montfort is 'with
+      me,' as the lawyers say, and of course she will have her
+      mother's pearls in her ugly red hair."--
+
+      Charles couldn't agree as to Lady Emily's hair being red.
+      He had thought it the most beautiful hair he had ever seen
+      in his life.--
+
+      "_Pour moi_, I shall wear a camelia, if the gardener will
+      give me one. How I wish I had jewels to beat hers! She
+      can't wear the Cleveland diamonds as a bridesmaid; that is
+      a comfort. Come over and see me. I am in agony about what
+      aunt may have said to you.
+
+                                  "ADELAIDE."
+
+The reader may see more in this letter than Charles did. The reader may
+see a certain amount of selfishness and vanity in it: Charles did not.
+He took up his reins and rode on; and, as he rode, said, "By Jove,
+Cuthbert shall lend me the emeralds!"
+
+He hardly liked asking for them; but he could not bear the idea of Lady
+Emily shining superior to Adelaide in consequence of her pearls. Had he
+been a wise man (which I suppose you have, by this time, found out that
+he is decidedly not. Allow me to recommend this last sentence in a
+grammatical point of view), he would have seen that, with two such
+glorious creatures as Adelaide and Lady Emily, no one would have seen
+whether they were clothed in purple and fine linen, or in sackcloth and
+ashes. But Charles was a fool. He was in love, and he was riding out to
+see his love.
+
+The Scotchman tells us about Spey leaping out a glorious giant from
+among the everlasting hills; the Irishman tells you of Shannon rambling
+on past castle and mountain, gathering new beauty as he goes; the
+Canadian tells you of the great river which streams over the cliff
+between Erie and Ontario; and the Australian tells you of Snowy pouring
+eternally from his great curtain of dolomite, seen forty miles away by
+the lonely traveller on the dull grey plains; but the Englishman tells
+you of the Thames, whose valley is the cradle of Freedom, and the
+possessors of which are the arbiters of the world.
+
+And along the Thames valley rode Charles. At first the road ran along
+beneath some pleasant sunny heights; but, as it gradually rose, the
+ground grew more abrupt, and, on the right, a considerable down, with
+patches of gorse and juniper, hung over the road; while, on the left,
+the broad valley stretched away to where a distant cloud of grey smoke
+showed where lay the good old town of Casterton. Now the road entered a
+dark beech wood beneath lofty banks, where the squirrels, merry fellows,
+ran across the road and rattled up the trees, and the air was faint with
+the scent of last year's leaves. Then came a break in the wood to the
+right, and a vista up a long-drawn valley, which ended in a chalk cliff.
+Then a break in the wood to the left, and a glance at the flat meadows,
+the gleaming river, and the dim grey distance. Then the wood again,
+denser and darker than ever. Then a sound, at first faint and
+indistinct, but growing gradually upon the ear until it could be plainly
+heard above the horse's footfall. Then suddenly the end of the wood, and
+broad open sunlight. Below, the weirs of Casterton, spouting by a
+hundred channels, through the bucks and under the mills. Hard by,
+Casterton town, lying, a tumbled mass of red brick and grey flint,
+beneath a faint soft haze of smoke, against the vast roll in the land
+called Marldown. On the right, Casterton Park, a great wooded
+promontory, so steep that one can barely walk along it, clothed with
+beech and oak from base to summit, save in one place, where a bold lawn
+of short grass, five hundred feet high, stoops suddenly down towards the
+meadows, fringed at the edges with broom and fern, and topped with three
+tall pines--the landmark for ten miles along the river.
+
+A lodge, the white gate of which is swung open by a pretty maiden; a
+dark oak wood again, with a long vista, ended by the noble precipitous
+hill on which the house stands; a more open park, with groups of deer
+lying about and feeding; another dark wood, the road now rising rapidly;
+rabbits, and a pot-valiant cock-pheasant standing in the middle of the
+way, and "carrucking," under the impression that Charles is in
+possession of all his domestic arrangements, and has come to disturb
+them; then the smooth gravel road, getting steeper and steeper; then the
+summit; one glimpse of a glorious panorama; then the front door and
+footmen.
+
+Charles sent his card in, and would be glad to know if Lady Hainault
+could see him. While he waited for an answer, his horse rubbed its nose
+against its knee, and yawned, while the footmen on the steps looked at
+the rooks. They knew all about it too. (The footmen, I mean, not the
+rooks; though I wouldn't swear against a rook's knowing anything, mind
+you.)
+
+Lady Hainault would see Mr. Ravenshoe--which was lucky, because, if she
+wouldn't have done so, Charles would have been obliged to ask for
+Adelaide. So Charles's horse was led to the stable, and Charles was led
+by the butler through the hall, and shown into a cool and empty library,
+to purge himself of earthly passions, before he was admitted to The
+Presence.
+
+Charles sat himself down in the easiest chair he could find, and got
+hold of "Ruskin's Modern Painters." That is a very nice book: it is
+printed on thick paper, with large print; the reading is very good, full
+of the most beautiful sentiments ever you heard; and there are also
+capital plates in it. Charles looked through the pictures: he didn't
+look at the letterpress, I know--for, if he had, he would have been so
+deeply enchained with it that he wouldn't have done what he did--get up,
+and look out of the window. The window looked into the flower-garden.
+There he saw a young Scotch gardener, looking after his rose-trees. His
+child, a toddling bit of a thing, four years old (it must have been his
+first, for he was a very young man), was holding the slips of matting
+for him; and glancing up between whiles at the great façade of the
+house, as though wondering what great people were inside, and whether
+they were looking at him. This was a pretty sight to a good
+whole-hearted fellow like Charles; but he got tired of looking at that
+even, after a time; for he was anxious and not well at ease. And so,
+after his watch had told him that he had waited half an hour he rang the
+bell.
+
+The butler came almost directly.
+
+"Did you tell Lady Hainault that I was here?" said Charles.
+
+"My lady was told, sir."
+
+"Tell her again, will you?" said Charles, and yawned.
+
+Charles had time for another look at Ruskin, and another look at the
+gardener and his boy, before the butler came back and said, "My lady is
+disengaged, sir."
+
+Charles was dying to see Adelaide, and was getting very impatient; but
+he was, as you have seen, a very contented sort of fellow: and, as he
+had fully made up his mind not to leave the house without a good
+half-hour with her, he could afford to wait. He crossed the hall behind
+the butler, and then went up the great staircase, and through the
+picture-gallery. Here he was struck by seeing the original of one of the
+prints he had seen downstairs, in the book, hanging on the wall among
+others. He stopped the butler, and asked, "What picture is that?"
+
+"That, sir," said the butler, hesitatingly, "that, sir--that is the
+great Turner, sir. Yes, sir," he repeated, after a glance at a Francia
+on the one side, and a Rembrandt on the other, "yes, sir, that _is_ the
+great Turner, sir."
+
+Charles was shown into a boudoir on the south side of the house, where
+sat Lady Hainault, an old and not singularly agreeable looking woman,
+who was doing crotchet-work, and her companion, a strong-minded and
+vixenish-looking old maid, who was also doing crotchet-work. They looked
+so very like two of the Fates, weaving woe, that Charles looked round
+for the third sister, and found her not.
+
+"How d'ye do, Mr. Ravenshoe?" said Lady Hainault. "I hope you haven't
+been kept waiting?"
+
+"Not at all," said Charles; and if that was not a deliberate lie, I want
+to know what is.
+
+If there was any one person in the world for whom Charles bore a
+cherished feeling of dislike, it was this virtuous old lady. Charles
+loved Lady Ascot dearly, and Lady Hainault was her bitterest enemy. That
+would have been enough; but she had a horrid trick of sharpening her wit
+upon young men, and saying things to them in public which gave them a
+justifiable desire to knock her down and jump on her, as the Irish
+reapers do to their wives; and she had exercised this talent on Charles
+once at Ranford, and he hated her as much as he could hate any one, and
+that was not much. Lord Saltire used to say that he must give her the
+credit of being the most infernally disagreeable woman in Europe.
+Charles thought, by the twitching of her long fingers over her work,
+that she was going to be disagreeable now, and he was prepared. But, to
+Charles's great astonishment, the old lady was singularly gracious.
+
+"And how," she said, "is dear Lady Ascot? I have been coming, and
+coming, for a long time, but I never have gone so far this winter."
+
+"Lucky for aunt!" thought Charles. Then there was a pause, and a very
+awkward one.
+
+Charles said, very quietly, "Lady Hainault, may I see Miss Summers?"
+
+"Surely! I wonder where she is. Miss Hicks, ring the bell."
+
+Charles stepped forward and rang; and Miss Hicks, as Clotho, who had
+half-risen, sat down again, and wove her web grimly.
+
+Atropos appeared, after an interval, looking as beautiful as the dawn.
+So Charles was looking too intently at her to notice the quick, eager
+glances that the old woman threw at her as she came into the room. His
+heart leapt up as he went forward to meet her; and he took her hand and
+pressed it, and would have done so if all the furies in Pandemonium were
+there to prevent him.
+
+It did not please her ladyship to see this; and so Charles did it once
+more, and then they sat down together in a window.
+
+"And how am I looking?" said Adelaide, gazing at him full in the face.
+"Not a single pretty compliment for me after so long? I require
+compliments; I am used to them. Lady Hainault paid me some this
+morning."
+
+Lady Hainault, as Lachesis, laughed and woved. Charles thought, "I
+suppose she and Adelaide have been having a shindy. She and aunt fall
+out sometimes."
+
+Adelaide and Charles had a good deal of quiet conversation in the
+window; but what two lovers could talk with Clotho and Lachesis looking
+on, weaving? I, of course, know perfectly well what they talked of, but
+it is hardly worth setting down here. I find that lovers' conversations
+are not always interesting to the general public. After a decent time,
+Charles rose to go, and Adelaide went out by a side door.
+
+Charles made his adieux to Clotho and Lachesis, and departed at the
+other end of the room. The door had barely closed on him, when Lady
+Hainault, eagerly thrusting her face towards Miss Hicks, hissed out--
+
+"Did I give her time enough? Were her eyes red? Does he suspect
+anything?"
+
+"You gave her time enough, I should say," said Miss Hicks, deliberately.
+"I didn't see that her eyes were red. But he must certainly suspect that
+you and she are not on the best of terms, from what she said."
+
+"Do you think he knows that Hainault is at home? Did he ask for
+Hainault?"
+
+"I don't know," said Miss Hicks.
+
+"She shall not stop in the house. She shall go back to Lady Ascot. I
+won't have her in the house," said the old lady, furiously.
+
+"Why did you have her here, Lady Hainault?"
+
+"You know perfectly well, Hicks. You know I only had her to spite old
+Ascot. But she shall stay here no longer."
+
+"She must stay for the wedding now," said Miss Hicks.
+
+"I suppose she must," said Lady Hainault; "but, after that, she shall
+pack. If the Burton people only knew what was going on, the match would
+be broken off."
+
+"I don't believe anything is going on," said Miss Hicks; "at least, not
+on his side. You are putting yourself in a passion for nothing, and you
+will be ill after it."
+
+"I am not putting myself in a passion, and I won't be ill, Hicks! And
+you are impudent to me, as you always are. I tell you that she must be
+got rid of, and she must marry that young booby, or we are all undone. I
+say that Hainault is smitten with her."
+
+"I say he is not, Lady Hainault. I say that what there is is all on her
+side."
+
+"She shall go back to Ranford after the wedding. I was a fool to have
+such a beautiful vixen in the house at all."
+
+We shall not see much more of Lady Hainault. Her son is about to marry
+the beautiful Miss Burton, and make her Lady Hainault. We shall see
+something of her by and by.
+
+The wedding came off the next week. A few days previously Charles rode
+over to Casterton and saw Adelaide. He had with him a note and
+jewel-case. The note was from Cuthbert, in which he spoke of her as his
+future sister, and begged her to accept the loan of "these few poor
+jewels." She was graciously pleased to do so; and Charles took his leave
+very soon, for the house was turned out of the windows, and the next day
+but one "the long Burton girl" became Lady Hainault, and Lady Ascot's
+friend became Dowager. Lady Emily did not wear pearls at the wedding.
+She wore her own splendid golden hair, which hung round her lovely face
+like a glory. None who saw the two could say which was the most
+beautiful of these two celebrated blondes--Adelaide, the imperial, or
+Lady Emily, the gentle and the winning.
+
+But, when Lady Ascot heard that Adelaide had appeared at the wedding
+with the emeralds, she was furious. "She has gone," said that deeply
+injured lady--"she, a penniless girl, has actually gone, and, without my
+consent or knowledge, borrowed the Ravenshoe emeralds, and flaunted in
+them at a wedding. That girl would dance over my grave, Brooks."
+
+"Miss Adelaide," said Brooks, "must have looked very well in them, my
+lady!" for Brooks was good-natured, and wished to turn away her
+ladyship's wrath.
+
+Lady Ascot turned upon her and withered her. She only said, "Emeralds
+upon pink! Heugh!" But Brooks was withered nevertheless.
+
+I cannot give you any idea as to how Lady Ascot said "Heugh!" as I have
+written it above. We don't know how the Greeks pronounced the amazing
+interjections in the Greek plays. We can only write them down.
+
+"Perhaps the jewels were not remarked, my lady," said the maid, making a
+second and worse shot.
+
+"Not remarked, you foolish woman!" said the angry old lady. "Not remark
+a thousand pounds' worth of emeralds upon a girl who is very well known
+to be a pensioner of mine. And I daren't speak to her, or we shall have
+a scene with Charles. I am glad of one thing, though; it shows that
+Charles is thoroughly in earnest. Now let me get to bed, that's a good
+soul; and don't be angry with me if I am short tempered, for heaven
+knows I have enough to try me! Send one of the footmen across to the
+stable to know if Mahratta has had her nitre. Say that I insist on a
+categorical answer. Has Lord Ascot come home?"
+
+"Yes, my lady."
+
+"He might have come and given me some news about the horse. But there,
+poor boy, I can forgive him."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE LAST GLIMPSE OF OXFORD.
+
+
+Oxford. The front of Magdalen Hall, about which the least said the
+soonest mended. On the left, further on, All Souls, which seems to have
+been built by the same happy hand which built the new courts of St.
+John's, Cambridge (for they are about equally bad). On the right, the
+Clarendon and the Schools, blocking out the western sky. Still more to
+the right, a bit of Exeter, and all Brazenose. In front, the Radcliff,
+the third dome in England, and, beyond, the straight façade of St.
+Mary's, gathering its lines upward ever, till tired of window and
+buttress, of crocket, finial, gargoyle, and all the rest of it, it leaps
+up aloft in one glorious crystal, and carries up one's heart with it
+into the heaven above.
+
+Charles Ravenshoe and Marston. They stood side by side on the pavement,
+and their eyes roamed together over the noble mass of architecture,
+passing from the straight lines, and abrupt corner of the Radcliffe, on
+to the steeple of St. Mary's. They stood silent for a moment, and then
+Marston said--
+
+"Serve him right."
+
+"Why?" said Charles.
+
+"Because he had no business to be driving tandem at all. He can't afford
+it. And, besides, if he could, why should he defy the authorities by
+driving tandem? Nobody would drive tandem if it wasn't forbidden."
+
+"Well, he is sent down, and therefore your virtue may spare him."
+
+"Sent down!" said Marston, testily, "he never ought to have come up. He
+was only sent here to be pitchforked through the Schools, and get a
+family living."
+
+"Well, well," said Charles; "I was very fond of him."
+
+"Pish!" said Marston. Whereat Charles laughed uproariously, and stood in
+the gutter. His mirth was stopped by his being attacked by a toothless
+black-and-tan terrier, who was so old that he could only bark in a
+whisper, but whose privilege it was to follow about one of the first
+divinity scholars of the day, round the sunniest spots in the town. The
+dog having been appeased, Charles and Marston stood aside, and got a
+kindly smile from the good old man, in recognition of their having
+touched their caps to him.
+
+"Charley," said Marston, "I am so glad to hear of your going on so
+well. Mind you, if you had stuck to your work sooner, you would have had
+more than a second in Moderations. You must, and you shall, get a first,
+you know. I will have it."
+
+"Never, my boy, never;" said Charles: "I haven't head for it."
+
+"Nonsense. You are a great fool; but you may get your first."
+
+Thereupon Charles laughed again, louder than before, and wanted to know
+what his friend had been eating to upset his liver. To which Marston
+answered "Bosh!" and then they went down Oriel Lane, "And so by Merton,"
+as the fox-hunters say, to Christ Church Meadow.
+
+"I am glad you are in the University eight," said Marston; "it will do
+you a vast deal of good. You used to over-value that sort of thing, but
+I don't think that you do so now. You can't row or ride yourself into a
+place in the world, but that is no reason why you should not row or
+ride. I wish I was heavy enough to row. Who steers to-day?"
+
+"The great Panjandrum."
+
+"I don't like the great Panjandrum. I think him slangy. And I don't
+pardon slang in any one beyond a very young bachelor."
+
+"I am very fond of him," said Charles, "and you are bilious, and out of
+humour with every one in heaven and earth, except apparently me. But,
+seriously speaking, old man, I think you have had something to vex you,
+since you came up yesterday. I haven't seen you since you were at
+Ravenshoe, and you are deucedly altered, do you know?"
+
+"I am sure you are wrong, Charles. I have had nothing--Well, I never
+lie. I have been disappointed in something, but I have fought against it
+so, that I am sure you must be wrong. I cannot be altered."
+
+"Tell me what has gone wrong, Marston. Is it in money matters? If it is,
+I know I can help you there."
+
+"Money. Oh! dear no;" said Marston. "Charley, you are a good fellow. You
+are the best fellow I ever met, do you know? But I can't tell you what
+is the matter now."
+
+"Have I been doing anything?" said Charles, eagerly.
+
+"You have been doing a great deal to make me like and respect you,
+Charles; but nothing to make me unhappy. Now answer me some questions,
+and let us change the subject. How is your father?"
+
+"Dear old dad is very well. I got a letter from him to-day."
+
+"And how is your brother?"
+
+"Well in health, but weak in mind, I fear. I am very much afraid that I
+shall be heir of Ravenshoe."
+
+"Why? is he going mad?"
+
+"Not a bit of it, poor lad. He is going into a religious house, I am
+afraid. At least he mentioned that sort of thing the last time he wrote
+to me, as if he were trying to bring me face to face with the idea; and
+be sure my dearly beloved Father Mackworth will never let the idea
+rest."
+
+"Poor fellow! And how is Adelaide the beautiful?"
+
+"_She's_ all right," said Charles. "She and aunt are the best friends in
+the world."
+
+"They always were, weren't they?"
+
+"Why, you see," said Charles, "sometimes aunt was cross, and Adelaide is
+very high-spirited, you know. Exceedingly high-spirited."
+
+"Indeed?"
+
+"Oh, yes, very much so; she didn't take much nonsense from Lady
+Hainault, I can tell you."
+
+"Well," said Marston, "to continue my catechising, how is William?"
+
+"He is very well. Is there no one else you were going to ask after?"
+
+"Oh, yes. Miss Corby?"
+
+"She is pretty well, I believe, in health, but she does not seem quite
+so happy as she was," said Charles, looking at Marston, suddenly.
+
+He might as well have looked at the Taylor building, if he expected any
+change to take place in Marston's face. He regarded him with a stony
+stare, and said--
+
+"Indeed. I am sorry to hear that."
+
+"Marston," said Charles, "I once thought that there was something
+between you and her."
+
+"That is a remarkable instance of what silly notions get into vacant
+minds," said Marston, steadily. Whereat Charles laughed again.
+
+At this point, being opposite the University barge, Charles was hailed
+by a West-countryman of Exeter, whom we shall call Lee, who never met
+with Charles without having a turn at talking Devonshire with him. He
+now began at the top of his voice, to the great astonishment of the
+surrounding dandies.
+
+"Where be gwine? Charles Ravenshoe, where be gwine?"
+
+"We'm gwine for a ride on the watter, Jan Lee."
+
+"Be gwine in the 'Varsity eight, Charles Ravenshoe?"
+
+"Iss, sure."
+
+"How do'e feel? Dont'e feel afeard?"
+
+"Ma dear soul, I've got such a wambling in my innards, and--"
+
+"We are waiting for you, Ravenshoe," said the Captain; and, a few
+minutes after, the University eight rushed forth on her glorious career,
+clearing her way through the crowd of boats, and their admiring rowers,
+towards Iffley.
+
+And Marston sat on the top of the University barge, and watched her
+sweeping on towards the distance, and then he said to himself--
+
+"Ah! there goes the man I like best in the world, who don't care for the
+woman I love best in the world, who is in love with the man before
+mentioned, who is in love with a woman who don't care a hang for him.
+There is a certain left-handedness in human affairs."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.[2]
+
+THE LAST GLIMPSE OF THE OLD WORLD.
+
+
+Putney Bridge at half an hour before high tide; thirteen or fourteen
+steamers; five or six thousand boats, and fifteen or twenty thousand
+spectators. This is the morning of the great University race, about
+which every member of the two great Universities, and a very large
+section of the general public, have been fidgeting and talking for a
+month or so.
+
+The bridge is black, the lawns are black, every balcony and window in
+the town is black; the steamers are black with a swarming, eager
+multitude, come to see the picked youths of the upper class try their
+strength against one another. There are two friends of ours nearly
+concerned in the great event of the day. Charles is rowing three in the
+Oxford boat, and Marston is steering. This is a memorable day for both
+of them, and more especially for poor Charles.
+
+Now the crowd surges to and fro, and there is a cheer. The men are
+getting into their boats. The police-boats are busy clearing the
+course. Now there is a cheer of admiration. Cambridge dashes out, swings
+round, and takes her place at the bridge.
+
+Another shout. Oxford sweeps majestically out and takes her place by
+Cambridge. Away go the police-galleys, away go all the London
+club-boats, at ten miles an hour down the course. Now the course is
+clear, and there is almost a silence.
+
+Then a wild hubbub; and people begin to squeeze and crush against one
+another. The boats are off; the fight has begun! then the thirteen
+steamers come roaring on after them, and their wake is alive once more
+with boats.
+
+Everywhere a roar and a rushing to and fro. Frantic crowds upon the
+towing-path, mad crowds on the steamers, which make them sway and rock
+fearfully. Ahead Hammersmith Bridge, hanging like a black bar, covered
+with people as with a swarm of bees. As an eye-piece to the picture, two
+solitary flying boats, and the flashing oars, working with the rapidity
+and regularity of a steam-engine.
+
+"Who's in front?" is asked by a thousand mouths; but who can tell? We
+shall see soon. Hammersmith Bridge is stretching across the water not a
+hundred yards in front of the boats. For one half-second a light shadow
+crosses the Oxford boat, and then it is out into the sunlight beyond. In
+another second the same shadow crosses the Cambridge boat. Oxford is
+ahead.
+
+The men with light-blue neckties say that, "By George, Oxford can't keep
+that terrible quick stroke going much longer;" and the men with
+dark-blue ties say, "Can't she, by Jove?" Well, we shall know all about
+it soon, for here is Barnes Bridge. Again the shadow goes over the
+Oxford boat, and then one, two, three, four seconds before the Cambridge
+men pass beneath it. Oxford is winning! There is a shout from the people
+at Barnes, though the [Greek: polloi] don't know why. Cambridge has made
+a furious rush, and drawn nearly up to Oxford; but it is useless. Oxford
+leaves rowing, and Cambridge rows ten strokes before they are level.
+Oxford has won!
+
+Five minutes after, Charles was on the wharf in front of the Ship Inn at
+Mortlake, as happy as a king. He had got separated from his friends in
+the crowd, and the people round him were cheering him, and passing
+flattering remarks on his personal appearance, which caused Charles to
+laugh, and blush, and bow, as he tried to push through his good-natured
+persecutors, when he suddenly, in the midst of a burst of laughter
+caused by a remark made by a drunken bargeman, felt somebody clasp his
+arm, and, turning round, saw William.
+
+He felt such a shock that he was giddy and faint. "Will," he said, "what
+is the matter?"
+
+"Come here, and I'll tell you."
+
+He forced his way to a quieter place, and then turned round to his
+companion,--"Make it short, Will; that's a dear fellow. I can stand the
+worst."
+
+"Master was took very bad two days ago, Master Charles; and Master
+Cuthbert sent me off for you at once. He told me directly I got to
+Paddington to ask for a telegraph message, so that you might hear the
+last accounts; and here it is."
+
+He put what we now call a "telegram" into Charles's hand, and the burden
+of it was mourning and woe. Densil Ravenshoe was sinking fast, and all
+that steam and horse-flesh could do would be needed, if Charles would
+see him alive.
+
+"Will, go and find Mr. Marston for me, and I will wait here for you. How
+are we to get back to Putney?"
+
+"I have got a cab waiting."
+
+William dashed into the inn, and Charles waited. He turned and looked at
+the river.
+
+There it was winding away past villa and park, bearing a thousand boats
+upon its bosom. He looked once again upon the crowded steamers and the
+busy multitude, and even in his grief felt a rush of honest pride as he
+thought that he was one of the heroes of the day. And then he turned,
+for William was beside him again. Marston was not to be found.
+
+"I should like to have seen him again," he said; "but we must fly, Will,
+we must fly!"
+
+Had he known under what circumstances he was next to see a great
+concourse of people, and under what circumstances he was next to meet
+Marston, who knows but that in his ignorance and short-sightedness he
+would have chosen to die where he stood in such a moment of triumph and
+honour?
+
+In the hurry of departure he had no time to ask questions. Only when he
+found himself in the express train, having chosen to go second-class
+with his servant, and not be alone, did he find time to ask how it had
+come about.
+
+There was but little to be told. Densil had been seized after breakfast,
+and at first so slightly that they were not much alarmed. He had been
+put to bed, and the symptoms had grown worse. Then William had been
+despatched for Charles, leaving Cuthbert, Mary, and Father Mackworth at
+his bedside. All had been done that could be done. He seemed to be in no
+pain, and quite contented. That was all. The telegraph told the rest.
+Cuthbert had promised to send horses to Crediton, and a relay forty
+miles nearer home.
+
+The terrible excitement of the day, and the fact that he had eaten
+nothing since breakfast, made Charles less able to bear up against the
+news than he would otherwise have been. Strange thoughts and fears began
+to shape themselves in his head, and to find voices in the monotonous
+jolting of the carriage.
+
+Not so much the fear of his father's death. That he did not fear,
+because he knew it would come; and, as to that, the bitterness of death
+was past, bitter, deeply bitter, as it was; but a terror lest his father
+should die without speaking to him--that he should never see those dear
+lips wreathe into a smile for him any more.
+
+Yesterday he had been thinking of this very journey--of how, if they won
+the race, he would fly down on the wings of the wind to tell them, and
+how the old man would brighten up with joy at the news. Yesterday he was
+a strong, brave man; and now what deadly terror was this at his heart?
+
+"William, what frightens me like this?"
+
+"The news I brought you, and the excitement of the race. And you have
+been training hard for a long time, and that don't mend a man's nerves;
+and you are hungry."
+
+"Not I."
+
+"What a noble race it was! I saw you above a mile off. I could tell the
+shape of you that distance, and see how you was pulling your oar
+through. I knew that my boy was going to be in the winning boat, Lord
+bless you! before the race was rowed. And when I saw Mr. C---- come in
+with that tearing, licking quick stroke of his, I sung out for old
+Oxford, and pretty nearly forgot the photograph for a bit."
+
+"Photograph, Will? what photograph?"
+
+"Telegraph, I mean, It's all the same."
+
+Charles couldn't talk, though he tried. He felt an anxiety he had never
+felt before. It was so ill-defined that he could not trace it to its
+source. He had a right to feel grief, and deep anxiety to see his father
+alive; but this was sheer terror, and at what?
+
+At Swindon, William got out and returned laden with this and with that,
+and forced Charles to eat and drink. He had not tasted wine for a long
+time; so he had to be careful with it; but it seemed to do him no good.
+But, at last, tired nature did something for him, and he fell asleep.
+
+When he awoke it was night, and at first he did not remember where he
+was. But rapidly his grief came upon him; and up, as it were out of a
+dark gulf, came the other nameless terror and took possession of his
+heart.
+
+There was a change at Exeter; then at Crediton they met with their first
+relay of horses, and, at ten o'clock at night, after a hasty supper,
+started on their midnight ride. The terror was gone the moment Charles
+was on horseback.
+
+The road was muddy and dark, often with steep banks on each side; but a
+delicious April moon was overhead, and they got on bravely. At Bow there
+was a glimpse of Dartmoor towering black, and a fresh puff of westerly
+wind, laden with scents of spring. At Hatherleigh, there were fresh
+horses, and one of the Ravenshoe grooms waiting for them. The man had
+heard nothing since yesterday; so at one o'clock they started on again.
+After this, there were none but cross-country roads, and dangerous steep
+lanes; so they got on slowly. Then came the morning with voice of ten
+thousand birds, and all the rich perfume of awaking nature. And then
+came the woods of home, and they stood on the terrace, between the old
+house and the sea.
+
+The white surf was playing and leaping around the quiet headlands; the
+sea-birds were floating merrily in the sunshine; the April clouds were
+racing their purple shadows across the jubilant blue sea; but the old
+house stood blank and dull. Every window was closed, and not a sound was
+heard.
+
+For Charles had come too late. Densil Ravenshoe was dead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+THE FIRST GLIMPSE OF THE NEW WORLD.
+
+
+In the long dark old room with the mullioned windows looking out on the
+ocean, in the room that had been Charles's bedroom, study, and
+play-room, since he was a boy, there sat Charles Ravenshoe, musing,
+stricken down with grief, and forlorn.
+
+There were the fishing-rods and the guns, there were the books and the
+homely pictures in which his soul had delighted. There was "The
+Sanctuary and the Challenge," and Bob Coombes in his outrigger. All were
+there. But Charles Ravenshoe was not there. There was another man in his
+place, bearing his likeness, who sat and brooded with his head on his
+hands.
+
+Where was the soul which was gone? Was he an infant in a new cycle of
+existence? or was he still connected with the scenes and people he had
+known and loved so long? Was he present? Could he tell at last the deep
+love that one poor foolish heart had borne for him? Could he know now
+the deep, deep grief that tore that poor silly heart, because its owner
+had not been by to see the last faint smile of intelligence flutter over
+features that he was to see no more?
+
+"Father! Father! Where are you? Don't leave me all alone, father." No
+answer! only the ceaseless beating of the surf upon the shore.
+
+He opened the window, and looked out. The terrace, the woods, the
+village, and beyond, the great unmeasurable ocean! What beyond that?
+
+What was this death, which suddenly made that which we loved so well, so
+worthless? Could they none of them tell us? One there was who triumphed
+over death and the grave, and was caught up in His earthly body. Who is
+this Death that he should triumph over us? Alas, poor Charles! There are
+evils worse than death. There are times when death seems to a man like
+going to bed. Wait!
+
+There was a picture of Mary's, of which he bethought himself. One we all
+know. Of a soul being carried away by angels to heaven. They call it St.
+Catherine, though it had nothing particular to do with St. Catherine,
+that I know of; and he thought he would go see it. But, as he turned,
+there stood Mary herself before him.
+
+He held out his hands towards her, and she came and sat beside him, and
+put her arm round his neck. He kissed her! Why not? They were as brother
+and sister.
+
+He asked her why she had come.
+
+"I knew you wanted me," she said.
+
+Then she, still with her arm round his neck, talked to him about what
+had just happened. "He asked for you soon after he was taken on the
+first day, and told Father Mackworth to send off for you. Cuthbert had
+sent two hours before, and he said he was glad, and hoped that Oxford
+would win the race----"
+
+"Charles," said Mary again, "do you know that old James has had a fit,
+and is not expected to live?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes, as soon as he heard of our dear one's death he was taken. It has
+killed him."
+
+"Poor old James!"
+
+They sat there some time, hand in hand, in sorrowful communion, and then
+Charles said suddenly--
+
+"The future, Mary! The future, my love?"
+
+"We discussed that before, Charles, dear. There is only one line of life
+open to me."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"I shall write to Lady Ascot to-morrow. I heard from Adelaide the other
+day, and she tells me that young Lady Hainault is going to take charge
+of poor Lord Charles's children in a short time; and she will want a
+nursery governess; and I will go."
+
+"I would sooner you were there than here, Mary. I am very glad of this.
+She is a very good woman. I will go and see you there very often."
+
+"Are you going back to Oxford, Charles?"
+
+"I think not."
+
+"Do you owe much money there?"
+
+"Very little, now. He paid it almost all for me."
+
+"What shall you do?"
+
+"I have not the remotest idea. I cannot possibly conceive. I must
+consult Marston."
+
+There passed a weary week--a week of long brooding days and sleepless
+nights, while outside the darkened house the bright spring sun flooded
+all earth with light and life, and the full spring wind sang pleasantly
+through the musical woods, and swept away inland over heather and crag.
+
+Strange sounds began to reach Charles in his solitary chamber; sounds
+which at first made him fancy he was dreaming, they were so mysterious
+and inexplicable. The first day they assumed the forms of solitary notes
+of music, some almost harsh, and some exquisitely soft and melodious. As
+the day went on they began to arrange themselves into chords, and sound
+slightly louder, though still a long way off. At last, near midnight,
+they seemed to take form, and flow off into a wild, mournful piece of
+music, the like of which Charles had never heard before; and then all
+was still.
+
+Charles went to bed, believing either that the sounds were supernatural
+or that they arose from noises in his head. He came to the latter
+conclusion, and thought sleep would put an end to them; but, next
+morning, when he had half opened the shutters, and let in the blessed
+sunlight, there came the sound again--a wild, rich, triumphant melody,
+played by some hand, whether earthly or unearthly, that knew its work
+well.
+
+"What is that, William?"
+
+"Music."
+
+"Where does it come from?"
+
+"Out of the air. The pixies make such music at times. Maybe it's the
+saints in glory with their golden harps, welcoming Master and Father."
+
+"Father!"
+
+"He died this morning at daybreak; not long after his old master, eh? He
+was very faithful to him. He was in prison with him once, I've heard
+tell. I'll be as faithful to you, Charles, when the time comes."
+
+And another day wore on in the darkened house, and still the angelic
+music rose and fell at intervals, and moved the hearts of those that
+heard it strangely.
+
+"Surely," said Charles to himself, "that music must sound louder in one
+place than another." And then he felt himself smiling at the idea that
+he half believed it to be supernatural.
+
+He rose and passed on through corridor and gallery, still listening as
+he went. The music had ceased, and all was still.
+
+He went on through parts of the house he had not been in since a boy.
+This part of the house was very much deserted; some of the rooms he
+looked into were occupied as inferior servants' bedrooms; some were
+empty, and all were dark. Here was where he, Cuthbert, and William would
+play hide-and-seek on wet days; and well he remembered each nook and
+lair. A window was open in one empty room, and it looked into the
+court-yard. They were carrying things into the chapel, and he walked
+that way.
+
+In the dark entrance to the dim chapel a black figure stood aside to let
+him pass; he bowed, and did so, but was barely in the building when a
+voice he knew said, "It is Charles," and the next moment he was clasped
+by both hands, and the kind face of Father Tiernay was beaming before
+him.
+
+"I am so glad to see you, Father Tiernay. It is so kind of you to come."
+
+"You look pale and worn," said the good man; "you have been fretting. I
+won't have that, now that I am come. I will have you out in the air and
+sunshine, my boy, along the shore----"
+
+The music again! Not faint and distant as heretofore, but close
+overhead, crashing out into a mighty jubilate, which broke itself
+against rafter and window in a thousand sweet echoes. Then, as the noble
+echoes began to sink, there arose a soft flute-like note, which grew
+more intense until the air was filled with passionate sound; and it
+trilled and ran, and paused, and ran on, and died you knew not where.
+
+"I can't stand much of that, Father Tiernay," said Charles. "They have
+been mending the organ, I see. That accounts for the music I have heard.
+I suppose there will be music at the funeral, then."
+
+"My brother Murtagh," said Father Tiernay, "came over yesterday morning
+from Lord Segur's. He is organist there, and he mended it. Bedad he is
+a sweet musician. Hear what Sir Henry Bishop says of him."
+
+There came towards them, from the organ-loft, a young man, wearing a
+long black coat and black bands with white edges, and having of his own
+one of the sweetest, kindliest faces eye ever rested on. Father Tiernay
+looked on him with pride and affection, and said--
+
+"Murty, my dear brother, this is Mr. Charles Ravenshoe, me very good
+friend, I hope you'll become acquaintances, for the reason that two good
+fellows should know one another."
+
+"I am almost afraid," said the young man, with a frank smile, "that
+Charles Ravenshoe has already a prejudice against me for the
+disagreeable sounds I was making all day yesterday in bringing the old
+organ into work again."
+
+"Nay, I was only wondering where such noble bursts of melody came from,"
+said Charles. "If you had made all the evil noises in Pandemonium, they
+would have been forgiven for that last piece of music. Do you know that
+I had no idea the old organ could be played on. Years ago, when we were
+boys, Cuthbert and I tried to play on it; I blew for him, and he sounded
+two or three notes, but it frightened us, and we ran away, and never
+went near it again."
+
+"It is a beautiful old instrument," said young Tiernay; "will you stand
+just here, and listen to it?"
+
+Charles stood in one of the windows, and Father Tiernay beside him. He
+leant his head on his arm, and looked forth eastward and northward, over
+the rolling woods, the cliffs, and the bright blue sea.
+
+The music began with a movement soft, low, melodious, beyond expression,
+and yet strong, firm, and regular as of a thousand armed men marching to
+victory. It grew into volume and power till it was irresistible, yet
+still harmonious and perfect. Charles understood it. It was the life of
+a just man growing towards perfection and honour.
+
+It wavered and fluttered, and threw itself into sparkling sprays and
+eddies. It leapt and laughed with joy unutterable, yet still through all
+the solemn measure went on. Love had come to gladden the perfect life,
+and had adorned without disturbing it.
+
+Then began discords and wild sweeping storms of sound, harsh always, but
+never unmelodious: fainter and fainter grew the melody, till it was
+almost lost. Misfortunes had come upon the just man, and he was bending
+under them.
+
+No. More majestic, more grand, more solemn than ever the melody
+re-asserted itself: and again, as though purified by a furnace, marched
+solemnly on with a clearness and sweetness greater than at first. The
+just man had emerged from his sea of troubles ennobled. Charles felt a
+hand on his shoulder. He thought it had been Father Tiernay. Father
+Tiernay was gone. It was Cuthbert.
+
+"Cuthbert! I am so glad you have come to see me. I was not surprised
+because you would not see me before. You didn't think I was offended,
+brother, did you? I know you. I know you!"
+
+Charles smoothed his hair and smiled pleasantly upon him. Cuthbert stood
+quite still and said nothing.
+
+"Cuthbert," said Charles, "you are in pain. In bodily pain I mean."
+
+"I am. I spent last night on these stones praying, and the cold has got
+into my very bones."
+
+"You pray for the dead, I know," said Charles. "But why destroy the
+health God has given you because a good man has gone to sleep?"
+
+"I was not praying for him so much as for you."
+
+"God knows I want it, dear Cuthbert. But can you benefit me by killing
+yourself?"
+
+"Who knows? I may try. How long is it since we were boys together,
+Charles?"
+
+"How long? Let me see. Why, it is nineteen years at least since I can
+first remember you."
+
+"I have been sarcastic and distant with you sometimes, Charles, but I
+have never been unkind."
+
+"Cuthbert! I never had an unkind word or action from you. Why do you say
+this?"
+
+"Because----Charles, do you remember the night the _Warren Hastings_
+came ashore?"
+
+"Ay," said Charles, wonderingly.
+
+"In future, when you call me to mind, will you try to think of me as I
+was then, not as I have been lately? We slept together, you remember,
+through the storm, and he sat on the bed. God has tried me very hard.
+Let us hope that heaven will be worth the winning. After this you will
+see me no more in private. Good-bye!"
+
+Charles thought he knew what he meant, and had expected it. He would not
+let him go for a time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+FATHER MACKWORTH BRINGS LORD SALTIRE TO BAY, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.
+
+
+Old James was to be buried side by side with his old master in the vault
+under the altar. The funeral was to be on the grandest scale, and all
+the Catholic gentry of the neighbourhood, and most of the Protestant
+were coming. Father Mackworth, it may be conceived, was very busy, and
+seldom alone. All day he and the two Tiernays were arranging and
+ordering. When thoroughly tired out, late at night, he would retire to
+his room and take a frugal supper (Mackworth was no glutton), and sit
+before the fire musing.
+
+One night, towards the middle of the week, he was sitting thus before
+the fire, when the door opened, and some one came in; thinking it was
+the servant, he did not look round; but, when the supposed servant came
+up to the fireplace and stood still, he cast his eyes suddenly up, and
+they fell upon the cadaverous face of Cuthbert.
+
+He looked deadly pale and wan as he stood with his face turned to the
+flickering fire, and Mackworth felt deep pity for him. He held an open
+letter towards Mackworth, and said--
+
+"This is from Lord Saltire. He proposes to come here the night before
+the funeral and go away in Lord Segur's carriage with him after it is
+over. Will you kindly see after his rooms, and so on? Here is the
+letter."
+
+"I will," said Mackworth. "My dear boy, you look deadly ill."
+
+"I wish I were dead."
+
+"So do all who hope for heaven," said Mackworth.
+
+"Who would not look worn and ill with such a scene hanging over their
+heads?"
+
+"Go away and avoid it."
+
+"Not I. A Ravenshoe is not a coward. Besides, I want to see him again.
+How cruel you have been! Why did you let him gain my heart? I have
+little enough to love."
+
+There was a long pause--so long that a bright-eyed little mouse ran out
+from the wainscot and watched. Both their eyes were bent on the fire,
+and Father Mackworth listened with painful intentness for what was to
+come.
+
+"He shall speak first," he thought. "How I wonder----"
+
+At last Cuthbert spoke slowly, without raising his eyes--
+
+"Will nothing induce you to forego your purpose?"
+
+"How can I forego it, Cuthbert, with common honesty? I have foregone it
+long enough."
+
+"Listen now," said Cuthbert, unheedingly: "I have been reckoning up what
+I can afford, and I find that I can give you five thousand pounds down
+for that paper, and five thousand more in bills of six, eight, and
+twelve months. Will that content you?"
+
+Father Mackworth would have given a finger to have answered promptly
+"No," but he could not. The offer was so astounding, so unexpected, that
+he hesitated long enough to make Cuthbert look round, and say--
+
+"Ten thousand pounds is a large sum of money, Father."
+
+It was, indeed; and Lord Saltire coming next week! Let us do the man
+justice; he acted with a certain amount of honour. When you have read
+this book to the end you will see that ten thousand pounds was only part
+of what was offered to him. He gave it all up because he would not lower
+himself in the eyes of Cuthbert, who had believed in him so long.
+
+"I paused," said he, "from astonishment, that a gentleman could have
+insulted me by such a proposition."
+
+"Your pause," said Cuthbert, "arose from hesitation, not from
+astonishment. I saw your eyes blaze when I made you the offer. Think of
+ten thousand pounds. You might appear in the world as an English Roman
+Catholic of fortune. Good heavens! with your talent you might aspire to
+the cardinal's chair!"
+
+"No, no, no!" said Mackworth, fiercely. "I did hesitate, and I have lied
+to you; but I hesitate no longer. I won't have the subject mentioned to
+me again, sir. What sort of a gentleman are you to come to men's rooms
+in the dead of night, with your father lying dead in the house, and
+tempt men to felony? I will not."
+
+"God knows," said Cuthbert, as he passed out, "whether I have lost
+heaven in trying to save him."
+
+Mackworth heard the door close behind him, and then looked eagerly
+towards it. He heard Cuthbert's footsteps die along the corridor, and
+then, rising up, he opened it and looked out. The corridor was empty. He
+walked hurriedly back to the fireplace.
+
+"Shall I call him back?" he said. "It is not too late. Ten thousand
+pounds! A greater stake than I played for; and now, when it is at my
+feet, I am throwing it away. And for what? For honour, after I have
+acted the----" (he could not say the word). "After I have gone so far. I
+must be a gentleman. A common rogue would have jumped at the offer. By
+heaven! there are some things better than money. If I were to take his
+offer he would know me for a rogue. And I love the lad. No, no! let the
+fool go to his prayers. I will keep the respect of one man at least.
+
+"What a curious jumble and puzzle it all is, to be sure. Am I any worse
+than my neighbours? I have made a desperate attempt at power, for a
+name, and an ambition; and then, because the ball comes suddenly at my
+feet, from a quarter I did not expect, I dare not strike it because I
+fear the contempt of one single pair of eyes from which I have been used
+to receive nothing but love and reverence.
+
+"Yet he cannot trust me, as I thought he did, or he would not have made
+the offer to me. And then he made it in such a confident way that he
+must have thought I was going to accept it. That is strange. He has
+never rebelled lately. Am I throwing away substance for shadow? I have
+been bound to the Church body and soul from my boyhood, and I must go
+on. I have refused a cardinal's chair this night, but who will ever know
+it?
+
+"I must go about with my Lord Saltire. I could go at him with more
+confidence if I had ten thousand pounds in the bank though, in case of
+failure. I am less afraid of that terrible old heretic than I am of
+those great eyes of Cuthbert's turned on me in scorn. I have lived so
+long among gentlemen that I believe myself to be one. He knows, and he
+shall tell.
+
+"And, if all fails, I have served the Church, and the Church shall serve
+me. What fools the best of us are! Why did I ever allow that
+straightforward idiot Tiernay into the house? He hates me, I know. I
+rather like the fool. He will take the younger one's part on Monday; but
+I don't think my gentleman will dare to say too much."
+
+After this soliloquy, the key to which will appear very shortly, Father
+Mackworth took off his clothes and got into bed.
+
+The day before the funeral, Cuthbert sent a message to Charles, to beg
+that he would be kind enough to receive Lord Saltire; and, as the old
+man was expected at a certain hour, Charles, about ten minutes before
+the time, went down to the bottom of the hall-steps on to the terrace,
+to be ready for him when he came.
+
+Oh, the glorious wild freshness of the sea and sky after the darkened
+house! The two old capes right and left; the mile-long stretch of sand
+between them; and the short crisp waves rolling in before the westerly
+wind of spring! Life and useful action in the rolling water; budding
+promise in the darkening woods; young love in every bird's note!
+
+William stood beside him before he had observed him. Charles turned to
+him, and took his arm in his.
+
+"Look at this," he said.
+
+"I am looking at it."
+
+"Does it make you glad and wild?" said Charles. "Does it make the last
+week in the dark house look like twenty years? Are the two good souls
+which are gone looking at it now, and rejoicing that earth should still
+have some pleasure left for us?"
+
+"I hope not," said William, turning to Charles.
+
+"And why?" said Charles, and wondering rather what William would say.
+
+"I wouldn't," said William, "have neither of their hearts broke with
+seeing what is to come."
+
+"Their hearts broke!" said Charles, turning full round on his
+foster-brother. "Let them see how we behave under it, William. That will
+never break their hearts, my boy."
+
+"Charles," said William, earnestly, "do you know what is coming?"
+
+"No; nor care."
+
+"It is something terrible for you, I fear," said William.
+
+"Have you any idea what it is?" said Charles.
+
+"Not the least. But look here. Last night, near twelve, I went down to
+the chapel, thinking to say an ave before the coffin, and there lay
+Master Cuthbert on the stones. So I kept quiet and said my prayer. And
+of a sudden he burst out and said, 'I have risked my soul and my fortune
+to save him: Lord, remember it!'"
+
+"Did he say that, William?"
+
+"The very words."
+
+"Then he could not have been speaking of me," said Charles. "It is
+possible that by some means I may not come into the property I have been
+led to expect; but that could not have referred to me. Suppose I was to
+leave the house, penniless, to-morrow morning, William, should I go
+alone? I am very strong, and very patient, and soon learn anything.
+Cuthbert would take care of me. Would you come with me, or let me go
+alone?"
+
+"You know. Why should I answer?"
+
+"We might go to Canada and settle. And then Adelaide would come over
+when the house was ready; and you would marry the girl of your choice;
+and our boys would grow up to be such friends as you and I are. And then
+my boy should marry your girl, and----"
+
+Poor dreaming Charles, all unprepared for what was to come!
+
+A carriage drove on to the terrace at this moment, with Lord Saltire's
+solemn servant on the box.
+
+Charles and William assisted Lord Saltire to alight. His lordship said
+that he was getting devilish stiff and old, and had been confoundedly
+cut up by his old friend's death, and had felt bound to come down to
+show his respect to the memory of one of the best and honestest men it
+had ever been his lot to meet in a tolerably large experience. And then,
+standing on the steps, went on--
+
+"It is very pleasant to me to be greeted by a face I like as yours,
+Charles. I was gratified at seeing your name in the _Times_ as being one
+of the winners of the great boat-race the other day. My man pointed it
+out to me. That sort of thing is very honourable to a young fellow, if
+it does not lead to a neglect of other duties, in which case it becomes
+very mischievous; in yours it has not. That young man is, I believe,
+your foster-brother. Will he be good enough to go and find Miss Corby,
+and tell her that Lord Saltire wants her to come and walk with him on
+the terrace? Give me your shoulder." William ran right willingly on his
+errand.
+
+"Your position here, Charles," continued Lord Saltire, "will be a
+difficult one."
+
+"It will, indeed, my lord."
+
+"I intend you to spend most of your time with me in future. I want some
+one to take care of me. In return for boring you all day, I shall get
+you the run of all the best houses, and make a man of you. Hush! not a
+word now! Here comes our Robin Redbreast. I am glad I have tempted her
+out into the air and the sunshine. How peaked you look, my dear! How are
+you?"
+
+Poor Mary looked pale and wan, indeed, but brightened up at the sight of
+her old friend. They three walked and talked in the fresh spring morning
+an hour or more.
+
+That afternoon came a servant to Lord Saltire with a note from Father
+Mackworth, requesting the honour of ten minutes' conversation with Lord
+Saltire in private.
+
+"I suppose I must see the fellow," said the old man to himself.
+
+"My compliments to Mr. Mackworth, and I am alone in the library. The
+fool," continued he, when the man had left the room, "why doesn't he let
+well alone? I hate the fellow. I believe he is as treacherous as his
+mother. If he broaches the subject, he shall have the whole truth."
+
+Meanwhile, Father Mackworth was advancing towards him through the dark
+corridors, and walking slower, and yet more slow, as he neared the room
+where sat the grim old man. He knew that there would be a fencing match;
+and of all the men in broad England he feared his lordship most. His
+determination held, however; though, up to the very last, he had almost
+determined to speak only about comparatively indifferent subjects, and
+not about that nearest to his heart.
+
+"How do you do, my good sir," said Lord Saltire, as he came in; "I have
+to condole with you on the loss of our dear old friend. We shall neither
+of us ever have a better one, sir."
+
+Mackworth uttered some commonplaces; to which Lord Saltire bowed,
+without speaking, and then sat with his elbows on the arms of his chair,
+making a triangle of his two fore-fingers and thumbs, staring at Father
+Mackworth.
+
+"I am going, Lord Saltire, to trouble you with some of my early
+reminiscences as a boy."
+
+Lord Saltire bowed, and settled himself easily in his chair, as one does
+who expects a good story. Mackworth went on--
+
+"One of my earliest recollections, my lord, is of being at a French
+lycée."
+
+"The fault of those establishments," said Lord Saltire, pensively, "is
+the great range of subjects which are superficially taught. I ask pardon
+for interrupting you. Do you take snuff?"
+
+Mackworth declined, with great politeness, and continued--
+
+"I was taken to that school by a footman in livery."
+
+"Upon my honour, then, I owe you an apology. I thought, of course, that
+the butler had gone with you. But, in a large house, one never really
+knows what one's people are about."
+
+Father Mackworth did not exactly like this. It was perfectly evident to
+him, not only that Lord Saltire knew all about his birth and parentage,
+but also was willing to tell.
+
+"Lord Saltire," he said, "I have never had a parent's care, or any name
+but one I believe to be fictitious. You can give me a name--give me,
+perhaps, a parent--possibly, a brother. Will you do this for me?"
+
+"I can do neither the one thing nor the other, my good sir. I entreat
+you, for your own sake, to inquire no further."
+
+There was a troubled expression in the old man's face as he answered.
+Mackworth thought he was gaining his point, and pressed on.
+
+"Lord Saltire, as you are a gentleman, tell me who my parents were;"
+and, as he said this, he rose up and stood before him, folding his arms.
+
+"Confound the impudent, theatrical jackanapes!" thought Lord Saltire.
+"His mother all over. I will gratify your curiosity sir," he said aloud,
+angrily. "You are the illegitimate son of a French ballet-dancer!"
+
+"But who was my father, my lord? Answer me that, on your honour."
+
+"Who was your father? _Pardieu_, that is more than I can tell. If any
+one ever knew, it must have been your mother. You are assuming a tone
+with me, sir, which I don't intend to put up with. I wished to spare you
+a certain amount of humiliation. I shall not trouble myself to do so
+now, for many reasons. Now listen to me, sir--to the man who saved you
+from the kennel, sir--and drop that theatrical attitude. Your mother was
+my brother's mistress, and a clever woman in her way; and meeting her
+here and there, in the green-room and where not, and going sometimes to
+her house with my brother, I had a sort of acquaintance with her, and
+liked her as one likes a clever, brilliant woman of that sort. My
+brother died. Some time after your mother fell into poverty and disgrace
+under circumstances into which I should advise you not to inquire, and
+on her death-bed recommended you to my care as an old acquaintance,
+praying that you might be brought up in her own religion. The request
+was, under the circumstances, almost impudent; but remembering that I
+had once liked the woman, and calling to mind the relation she had held
+to poor dear John, I complied, and did for you what I have done. You
+were a little over a twelvemonth old at the time of your mother's death,
+and my brother had been dead nearly or quite five years. Your mother had
+changed her protector thrice during that time. Now, sir!"
+
+Mackworth stood before Lord Saltire all this time as firm as a rock. He
+had seen from the old man's eye that every word was terribly true, but
+he had never flinched--never a nerve in his face had quivered; but he
+had grown deadly pale. When Lord Saltire had finished he tried to speak,
+but found his mouth as dry as dust. He smiled, and, with a bow, reaching
+past Lord Saltire, took up a glass of lemonade which stood at his elbow
+and drank it. Then he spoke clearly and well.
+
+"You see how you have upset me, my lord. In seeking this interview, I
+had some hopes of having forced a confession from your lordship of my
+relationship with you, and thereby serving my personal ambition. I have
+failed. It now remains to me to thank you heartily and frankly for the
+benefits I have received from you, and to beg you to forgive my
+indiscretion."
+
+"You are a brave man, sir," said Lord Saltire. "I don't think you are an
+honest one. But I can respect manliness."
+
+"You have a great affection for Charles Ravenshoe, my lord?"
+
+"Yes," said Lord Saltire; "I love Charles Ravenshoe more than any other
+human being."
+
+"Perhaps the time may come, my lord, when he will need all your love and
+protection."
+
+"Highly possible. I am in possession of the tenor of his father's will;
+and those who try to set that will aside, unless they have a very strong
+case, had better consider that Charles is backed up by an amount of
+ready money sufficient to ruin the Ravenshoe estate in law."
+
+"No attempt of the kind will be made, my lord. But I very much doubt
+whether your lordship will continue your protection to that young man. I
+wish you good afternoon."
+
+"That fellow," said Lord Saltire, "has got a card to play which I don't
+know of. What matter? I can adopt Charles, and he may defy them. I wish
+I could give him my title; but that will be extinct. I am glad little
+Mary is going to Lady Hainault. It will be the best place for her till
+she marries. I wish that fool of a boy had fallen in love with her. But
+he wouldn't."
+
+Mackworth hurried away to his room; and, as he went, he said, "I have
+been a fool--a fool. I should have taken Cuthbert's offer. None but a
+fool would have done otherwise. A cardinal's chair thrown to the dogs!
+
+"I could not do it this morning; but I can do it now. The son of a
+figurante, and without a father! Perhaps he will offer it again.
+
+"If he does not, there is one thing certain. That young ruffian Charles
+is ruined. Ah, ah! my Lord Saltire, I have you there! I should like to
+see that old man's face when I play my last card. It will be a finer
+sight than Charles's. You'll make him your heir, will you, my lord? Will
+you make him your groom?"
+
+He went to his desk, took out an envelope, and looked at it. He looked
+at it long, and then put it back. "It will never do to tempt him with
+it. If he were to refuse his offer of this morning, I should be ruined.
+Much better to wait and play out the ace boldly. I can keep my hold over
+_him_: and William is mine, body and soul, if he dies."
+
+With which reflections, the good Father dressed for dinner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE GRAND CRASH.
+
+
+The funeral was over. Charles had waited with poor weeping Mary to see
+the coffin carried away under the dark grim archway of the vault, and
+had tried to comfort her who would not be comforted. And, when the last
+wild wail of the organ had died away, and all the dark figures but they
+two had withdrawn from the chapel, there stood those two poor orphans
+alone together.
+
+It was all over, and they began for the first time to realise it; they
+began to feel what they lost. King Densil was dead, and King Cuthbert
+reigned. When a prime minister dies, the world is shaken; when a county
+member dies, the county is agitated, and the opposition electors, till
+lately insignificant, rise suddenly into importance, and the possible
+new members are suddenly great men. So, when a mere country gentleman
+dies, the head of a great family dies, relations are changed entirely
+between some score or two of persons. The dog of to-day is not the dog
+of yesterday. Servants are agitated, and remember themselves of old
+impertinences, and tremble. Farmers wonder what the new Squire's first
+move will be. Perhaps even the old hound wonders whether he is to keep
+his old place by the fire or no; and younger brothers bite their nails,
+and wonder, too, about many things.
+
+Charles wondered profoundly in his own room that afternoon, whither he
+had retired after having dismissed Mary at her door with a kiss. In
+spite of his grief, he wondered what was coming, and tried to persuade
+himself that he didn't care. From this state of mind he was aroused by
+William, who told him that Lord Segur was going, and Lord Saltire with
+him, and that the latter wanted to speak to him.
+
+Lord Saltire had his foot on the step of the carriage. "Charles, my dear
+boy," he said, "the moment things are settled come to me at Segur
+Castle. Lord Segur wants you to come and stay there while I am there."
+
+Lord Segur, from the carriage, hoped Charles would come and see them at
+once.
+
+"And mind, you know," said Lord Saltire, "that you don't do anything
+without consulting me. Let the little bird pack off to Lady Ascot's, and
+help to blow up the grooms. Don't let her stay moping here. Now,
+good-bye, my dear boy. I shall see you in a day or so."
+
+And so the old man was gone. And, as Charles watched the carriage, he
+saw the sleek grey head thrust from the window, and the great white hand
+waved to him. He never forgot that glimpse of the grey head and the
+white hand, and he never will.
+
+A servant came up to him, and asked him, Would he see Mr. Ravenshoe in
+the library? Charles answered Yes, but was in no hurry to go. So he
+stood a little longer on the terrace, watching the bright sea, and the
+gulls, and the distant island. Then he turned into the darkened house
+again, and walked slowly towards the library door.
+
+Some one else stood in the passage--it was William, with his hand on the
+handle of the door.
+
+"I waited for you, Master Charles," he said; "they have sent for me too.
+Now you will hear something to your advantage."
+
+"I care not," said Charles, and they went in.
+
+Once, in lands far away, there was a sailor lad, a good-humoured,
+good-looking, thoughtless fellow, who lived alongside of me, and with
+whom I was always joking. We had a great liking for one another. I left
+him at the shaft's mouth at two o'clock one summer's day, roaring with
+laughter at a story I had told him; and at half-past five I was helping
+to wind up the shattered corpse, which when alive had borne his name. A
+flake of gravel had come down from the roof of the drive and killed him,
+and his laughing and story-telling were over for ever. How terrible
+these true stories are! Why do I tell this one? Because, whenever I
+think of this poor lad's death, I find myself not thinking of the
+ghastly thing that came swinging up out of the darkness into the summer
+air, but of the poor fellow as he was the morning before. I try to think
+how he looked, as leaning against the windlass with the forest behind
+and the mountains beyond, and if, in word or look, he gave any sign of
+his coming fate before he went gaily down into his tomb.
+
+So it was with Charles Ravenshoe. He remembers part of the scene that
+followed perfectly well; but he tries more than all to recall how
+Cuthbert looked, and how Mackworth looked before the terrible words were
+spoken. After it was all over he remembers, he tells me, every trifling
+incident well. But his memory is a little gone about the first few
+minutes which elapsed after he and William came into the room. He says
+that Cuthbert was sitting at the table very pale, with his hands clasped
+on the table before him, looking steadily at him without expression on
+his face; and that Mackworth leant against the chimney-piece, and looked
+keenly and curiously at him.
+
+Charles went up silently and kissed his brother on the forehead.
+Cuthbert neither moved nor spoke. Charles greeted Mackworth civilly, and
+then leant against the chimney-piece by the side of him, and said what a
+glorious day it was. William stood at a little distance, looking
+uneasily from one to another.
+
+Cuthbert broke silence. "I sent for you," he said.
+
+"I am glad to come to you, Cuthbert, though I think you sent for me on
+business, which I am not very well up to to-day."
+
+"On business," said Cuthbert: "business which must be gone through with
+to-day, though I expect it will kill me."
+
+Charles, by some instinct (who knows what? it was nothing reasonable, he
+says) moved rapidly towards William, and laid his hand on his shoulder.
+I take it, that it arose from that curious gregarious feeling that men
+have in times of terror. He could not have done better than to move
+towards his truest friend, whatever it was.
+
+"I should like to prepare you for what is to come," continued Cuthbert,
+speaking calmly, with the most curious distinctness; "but that would be
+useless. The blow would be equally severe whether you expect it or not.
+You two who stand there were nursed at the same breast. That groom, on
+whose shoulder you have your hand now, is my real brother. You are no
+relation to me; you are the son of the faithful old servant whom we
+buried to-day with my father."
+
+Charles said, Ho! like a great sigh. William put his arm round him, and,
+raising his finger, and looking into his face with his calm, honest
+eyes, said with a smile--
+
+"This was it then. We know it all now."
+
+Charles burst out into a wild laugh, and said, "Father Mackworth's ace
+of trumps! He has inherited a talent for melodrama from his blessed
+mother. Stop. I beg your pardon, sir, for saying that; I said it in a
+hurry. It was blackguardly. Let's have the proofs of this, and all that
+sort of thing, and witnesses too, if you please. Father Mackworth, there
+have been such things as prosecutions for conspiracy. I have Lord
+Saltire and Lord Ascot at my back. You have made a desperate cast, sir.
+My astonishment is that you have allowed your hatred for me to outrun
+your discretion so far. This matter will cost some money before it is
+settled."
+
+Father Mackworth smiled, and Charles passed him, and rang the bell. Then
+he went back to William and took his arm.
+
+"Fetch the Fathers Tiernay here immediately," said Charles to the
+servant who answered the bell.
+
+In a few minutes the worthy priests were in the room. The group was not
+altered. Father Mackworth still leant against the mantel-piece, Charles
+and William stood together, and Cuthbert sat pale and calm with his
+hands clasped together.
+
+Father Tiernay looked at the disturbed group and became uneasy. "Would
+it not be better to defer the settlement of any family disagreements to
+another day? On such a solemn occasion----"
+
+"The ice is broken, Father Tiernay," said Charles. "Cuthbert, tell him
+what you have told me."
+
+Cuthbert, clasping his hands together, did so, in a low, quiet voice.
+
+"There," said Charles, turning to Father Tiernay, "what do you think of
+that?"
+
+"I am so astounded and shocked, that I don't know what to say," said
+Father Tiernay; "your mind must be abused, my dear sir. The likeness
+between yourself and Mr. Charles is so great that I cannot believe it.
+Mackworth, what have you to say to this?"
+
+"Look at William, who is standing beside Charles," said the priest,
+quietly, "and tell me which of those two is most like Cuthbert."
+
+"Charles and William are very much alike, certainly," said Tiernay;
+"but----"
+
+"Do you remember James Horton, Tiernay?" said Mackworth.
+
+"Surely."
+
+"Did you ever notice the likeness between him and Densil Ravenshoe?"
+
+"I have noticed it, certainly; especially one night. One night I went to
+his cottage last autumn. Yes--well?"
+
+"James Horton was Densil Ravenshoe's half-brother. He was the
+illegitimate son of Petre."
+
+"Good God."
+
+"And the man whom you call Charles Ravenshoe, whom I call Charles
+Horton, is his son."
+
+Charles was looking eagerly from one to the other, bewildered.
+
+"Ask him, Father Tiernay," he said, "what proofs he has. Perhaps he will
+tell us."
+
+"You hear what Mr. Charles says, Mackworth. I address you because you
+have spoken last. You must surely have strong proofs for such an
+astounding statement."
+
+"I have his mother's handwriting," said Father Mackworth.
+
+"My mother's, sir," said Charles, flushing up, and advancing a pace
+towards him.
+
+"You forget who your mother was," said Mackworth. "Your mother was
+Norah, James Horton's wife. She confessed to me the wicked fraud she
+practised, and has committed that confession to paper. I hold it. You
+have not a point of ground to stand on. Fifty Lord Saltires could not
+help you one jot. You must submit. You have been living in luxury and
+receiving an expensive education when you should have been cleaning out
+the stable. So far from being overwhelmed at this, you should consider
+how terribly the balance is against you."
+
+He spoke with such awful convincing calmness that Charles's heart died
+away within him. He knew the man.
+
+"Cuthbert," he said, "you are a gentleman. Is this true?"
+
+"God knows how terribly true it is," said Cuthbert, quietly. Then there
+was a silence, broken by Charles in a strange thick voice, the like of
+which none there had heard before.
+
+"I want to sit down somewhere. I want some drink. Will, my own boy, take
+this d----d thing from round my neck? I can't see; where is there a
+chair? Oh, God!"
+
+He fell heavily against William, looking deadly white, without sense or
+power. And Cuthbert looked up at the priest, and said, in a low voice--
+
+"You have killed him."
+
+Little by little he came round again, and rose on his feet, looking
+round him as a buck or stag looks when run to soil, and is watching to
+see which dog will come, with a piteous wild look, despairing and yet
+defiant. There was a dead silence.
+
+"Are we to be allowed to see this paper?" said Charles, at length.
+
+Father Mackworth immediately handed it to him, and he read it. It was
+completely conclusive. He saw that there was not a loophole to creep out
+of. The two Tiernays read it, and shook their heads. William read it and
+turned pale. And then they all stood staring blankly at one another.
+
+"You see, sir," said Father Mackworth, "that there are two courses open
+to you. Either, on the one hand, to acquiesce in the truth of this
+paper; or, on the other, to accuse me in a court of justice of
+conspiracy and fraud. If you were to be successful in the latter course,
+I should be transported out of your way, and the matter would end so.
+But any practical man would tell you, and you would see in your calmer
+moments, that no lawyer would undertake your case. What say you, Father
+Tiernay?"
+
+"I cannot see what case he has, poor dear," said Father Tiernay.
+"Mackworth," he added, suddenly.
+
+Father Mackworth met his eye with a steady stare, and Tiernay saw there
+was no hope of explanation there.
+
+"On the other hand," continued Father Mackworth, "if this new state of
+things is quietly submitted to (as it must be ultimately, whether
+quietly or otherwise you yourself will decide), I am authorised to say
+that the very handsomest provision will be made for you, and that, to
+all intents and purposes, your prospects in the world will not suffer in
+the least degree. I am right in saying so, I believe, Mr. Ravenshoe?"
+
+"You are perfectly right, sir," said Cuthbert in a quiet, passionless
+voice. "My intention is to make a provision of three hundred a year for
+this gentleman, whom, till the last few days, I believed to be my
+brother. Less than twenty-four hours ago, Charles, I offered Father
+Mackworth ten thousand pounds for this paper, with a view to destroy it.
+I would, for your sake, Charles, have committed an act of villainy which
+would have entailed a life's remorse, and have robbed William, my own
+brother, of his succession. You see what a poor weak rogue I am, and
+what a criminal I might become with a little temptation. Father
+Mackworth did his duty and refused me. I tell you this to show you that
+he is, at all events, sincere enough in his conviction of the truth of
+this."
+
+"You acted like yourself, Cuthbert. Like one who would risk body and
+soul for one you loved."
+
+He paused; but they waited for him to speak again. And very calmly, in a
+very low voice, he continued--
+
+"It is time that this scene should end. No one's interest will be served
+by continuing it. I want to say a very few words, and I want them to be
+considered as the words, as it were, of a dying man; for no one here
+present will see me again till the day when I come back to claim a right
+to the name I have been bearing so long--and that day will be never."
+
+Another pause. He moistened his lips, which were dry and cracked, and
+then went on--
+
+"Here is the paper, Father Mackworth; and may the Lord of Heaven be
+judge between us if that paper be not true!"
+
+Father Mackworth took it, and, looking him steadily in the face,
+repeated his words, and Charles's heart sank lower yet as he watched
+him, and felt that hope was dead.
+
+"May the Lord of Heaven be judge between us two, Charles, if that paper
+be not true! Amen."
+
+"I utterly refuse," Charles continued, "the assistance which Mr.
+Ravenshoe has so nobly offered. I go forth alone into the world to make
+my own way, or to be forgotten. Cuthbert and William, you will be sorry
+for a time, but not for long. You will think of me sometimes of dark
+winter nights when the wind blows, won't you? I shall never write to
+you, and shall never return here any more. Worse things than this have
+happened to men, and they have not died."
+
+All this was said with perfect self-possession, and without a failure in
+the voice. It was magnificent despair. Father Tiernay, looking at
+William's face, saw there a sort of sarcastic smile, which puzzled him
+amazingly.
+
+"I had better," said Charles, "make my will. I should like William to
+ride my horse Monté. He has thrown a curb, sir, as you know" he said,
+turning to William; "but he will serve you well, and I know you will be
+gentle with him."
+
+William gave a short, dry laugh.
+
+"I should have liked to take my terrier away with me, but I think I had
+better not. I want to have nothing with me to remind me of this place.
+My greyhound and the pointers I know you will take care of. It would
+please me to think that William had moved into my room, and had taken
+possession of all my guns, and fishing-rods, and so on. There is a
+double-barrelled gun left at Venables', in St. Aldate's, at Oxford, for
+repairs. It ought to be fetched away.
+
+"Now, sir," he said, turning to Cuthbert, "I should like to say a few
+words about money matters. I owe about £150 at Oxford. It was a great
+deal more at one time, but I have been more careful lately. I have the
+bills upstairs. If that could be paid----"
+
+"To the utmost farthing, my dear Charles," said Cuthbert; "but----"
+
+"Hush!" said Charles, "I have five-and-twenty pounds by me. May I keep
+that?"
+
+"I will write you a check for five hundred. I shall move your
+resolution, Charles," said Cuthbert.
+
+"Never, so help me God!" said Charles; "it only remains to say good-bye.
+I leave this room without a hard thought towards any one in it. I am at
+peace with all the world. Father Mackworth, I beg your forgiveness. I
+have been often rude and brutal to you. I suppose that you always meant
+kindly to me. Good-bye."
+
+He shook hands with Mackworth, then with the Tiernays; then he offered
+his hand to William, who took it smiling; and, lastly, he went up to
+Cuthbert, and kissed him on the cheek, and then walked out of the door
+into the hall.
+
+William, as he was going, turned as though to speak to Cuthbert, but
+Cuthbert had risen, and he paused a moment.
+
+Cuthbert had risen, and stood looking wildly about him; then he said,
+"Oh, my God, he is gone!" And then he broke through them, and ran out
+into the hall, crying, "Charles, Charles, come back. Only one more word,
+Charles." And then they saw Charles pause, and Cuthbert kneel down
+before him, calling him his own dear brother, and saying he would die
+for him. And then Father Tiernay hastily shut the library door, and left
+those two wild hearts out in the old hall together alone.
+
+Father Tiernay came back to William, and took both his hands. "What are
+you going to do?" he said.
+
+"I am going to follow him wherever he goes," said William. "I am never
+going to leave him again. If he goes to the world's end, I will be with
+him."
+
+"Brave fellow!" said Tiernay. "If he goes from here, and is lost sight
+of, we may never see him again. If you go with him, you may change his
+resolution."
+
+"That I shall never do," said William; "I know him too well. But I'll
+save him from what I am frightened to think of. I will go to him now. I
+shall see you again directly; but I must go to him."
+
+He passed out into the hall. Cuthbert was standing alone, and Charles
+was gone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+THE COUP DE GRACE.
+
+
+In the long watches of the winter night, when one has awoke from some
+evil dream, and lies sleepless and terrified with the solemn pall of
+darkness around one--on one of those deadly, still dark nights, when the
+window only shows a murky patch of positive gloom in contrast with the
+nothingness of the walls, when the howling of a tempest round chimney
+and roof would be welcomed as a boisterous companion--in such still dead
+times only, lying as in the silence of the tomb, one realises that some
+day we shall lie in that bed and not think at all: that the time will
+come soon when we must die.
+
+Our preachers remind us of this often enough, but we cannot realise it
+in a pew in broad daylight. You must wake in the middle of the night to
+do that, and face the thought like a man, that it will come, and come to
+ninety-nine in a hundred of us, not in a maddening clatter of musquetry
+as the day is won; or in carrying a line to a stranded ship, or in such
+like glorious times, when the soul is in mastery over the body, but in
+bed, by slow degrees. It is in darkness and silence only that we realise
+this; and then let us hope that we humbly remember that death has been
+conquered for us, and that in spite of our unworthiness we may defy him.
+And after that sometimes will come the thought, "Are there no evils
+worse even than death?"
+
+I have made these few remarks (I have made very few in this story, for I
+want to suggest thought, not to supply it ready-made) because Charles
+Ravenshoe has said to me in his wild way, that he did not fear death,
+for he had died once already.
+
+I did not say anything, but waited for him to go on.
+
+"For what," he continued, "do you make out death even at the worst? A
+terror, then a pang, more or less severe; then a total severance of all
+ties on earth, an entire and permanent loss of everything one has loved.
+After that, remorse, and useless regret, and the horrible torture of
+missed opportunities without number thrust continually before one. The
+monotonous song of the fiends, 'Too late! too late!' I have suffered all
+these things! I have known what very few men have known, and
+lived--despair; but perhaps the most terrible agony for a time was the
+feeling of _loss of identity_--that I was not myself; that my whole
+existence from babyhood had been a lie. This at times, at times only,
+mind you, washed away from me the only spar to which I could cling--the
+feeling that I was a gentleman. When the deluge came, that was the only
+creed I had, and I was left alone as it were on the midnight ocean, out
+of sight of land, swimming with failing strength."
+
+I have made Charles speak for himself. In this I know that I am right.
+Now we must go on with him through the gathering darkness without
+flinching; in terror, perhaps, but not in despair as yet.
+
+It never for one moment entered into his head to doubt the truth of what
+Father Mackworth had set up. If he had had doubts even to the last, he
+had none after Mackworth had looked him compassionately in the face, and
+said, "God judge between us if this paper be not true!" Though he
+distrusted Mackworth, he felt that no man, be he never so profound an
+actor, could have looked so and spoken so if he were not telling what he
+believed to be the truth. And that he and Norah were mistaken he justly
+felt to be an impossibility. No. He was the child of Petre Ravenshoe's
+bastard son by an Irish peasant girl. He who but half an hour before had
+been heir to the proud old name, to the noble old house, the pride of
+the west country, to hundreds of acres of rolling woodland, to mile
+beyond mile of sweeping moorland, to twenty thriving farms, deep in
+happy valleys, or perched high up on the side of lofty downs, was now
+just this--a peasant, an impostor.
+
+The tenantry, the fishermen, the servants, they would come to know all
+this. Had he died (ah! how much better than this), they would have
+mourned for him, but what would they say or think now? That he, the
+patron, the intercessor, the condescending young prince, should be the
+child of a waiting-woman and a gamekeeper. Ah! mother, mother, God
+forgive you!
+
+Adelaide: what would she think of this? He determined that he must go
+and see her, and tell her the whole miserable story. She was ambitious,
+but she loved him. Oh yes, she loved him. She could wait. There were
+lands beyond the sea, where a man could win a fortune in a few years,
+perhaps in one. There were Canada, and Australia, and India, where a man
+needed nothing but energy. He never would take one farthing from the
+Ravenshoes, save the twenty pounds he had. That was a determination
+nothing could alter. But why need he? There was gold to be won, and
+forest to be cleared, in happier lands.
+
+Alas, poor Charles! He has never yet set foot out of England, and
+perhaps never will. He never thought seriously about it but this once.
+He never had it put before him strongly by any one. Men only emigrate
+from idleness, restlessness, or necessity; with the two first of these
+he was not troubled, and the last had not come yet. It would, perhaps,
+have been better for him to have gone to the backwoods or the diggings;
+but, as he says, the reason why he didn't was that he didn't. But at
+this sad crisis of his life it gave him comfort for a little to think
+about; only for a little, then thought and terror came sweeping back
+again.
+
+Lord Saltire? He would be told of this by others. It would be Charles's
+duty not to see Lord Saltire again. With his present position in
+society, as a servant's son, there was nothing to prevent his asking
+Lord Saltire to provide for him, except--what was it? Pride? Well,
+hardly pride. He was humble enough, God knows; but he felt as if he had
+gained his goodwill, as it were, by false pretences, and that duty would
+forbid his presuming on that goodwill any longer. And would Lord Saltire
+be the same to a lady's-maid's son, as he would to the heir presumptive
+of Ravenshoe? No; there must be no humiliation before those stern grey
+eyes. Now he began to see that he loved the owner of those eyes more
+deeply than he had thought; and there was a gleam of pleasure in
+thinking that, when Lord Saltire heard of his fighting bravely
+unassisted with the world, he would say, "That lad was a brave fellow; a
+gentleman after all."
+
+Marston? Would this terrible business, which was so new and terrible as
+to be as yet only half appreciated--would it make any difference to him?
+Perhaps it might. But, whether or no he would humble himself there, and
+take from him just reproaches for idleness and missed opportunities,
+however bitter they might be.
+
+And Mary? Poor little Mary! Ah! she would be safe with that good Lady
+Hainault. That was all. Ah, Charles! what pale little sprite was that
+outside your door now, listening, dry-eyed, terrified, till you should
+move? Who saw you come up with your hands clutched in your hair, like a
+madman, an hour ago, and heard you throw yourself upon the floor, and
+has waited patiently ever since to see if she could comfort you, were it
+never so little? Ah, Charles! Foolish fellow!
+
+Thinking, thinking--now with anger, now with tears, and now with
+terror--till his head was hot and his hands dry, his thoughts began to
+run into one channel. He saw that action was necessary, and he came to a
+great and noble resolution, worthy of himself. All the world was on one
+side, and he alone on the other. He would meet the world humbly and
+bravely, and conquer it. He would begin at the beginning, and find his
+own value in the world, and then, if he found himself worthy, would
+claim once more the love and respect of those who had been his friends
+hitherto.
+
+How he would begin he knew not, nor cared, but it must be from the
+beginning. And, when he had come to this resolution, he rose up and
+faced the light of day once more.
+
+There was a still figure sitting in his chair, watching him. It was
+William.
+
+"William! How long have you been here?"
+
+"Nigh on an hour. I came in just after you, and you have been lying on
+the hearthrug ever since, moaning."
+
+"An hour? Is it only an hour?"
+
+"A short hour."
+
+"It seemed like a year. Why, it is not dark yet. The sun still shines,
+does it?"
+
+He went to the window and looked out. "Spring," he said, "early spring.
+Fifty more of them between me and rest most likely. Do I look older,
+William?"
+
+"You look pale and wild, but not older. I am mazed and stunned. I want
+you to look like yourself and help me, Charles. We must get away
+together out of this house."
+
+"You must stay here, William; you are heir to the name and the house.
+You must stay here and learn your duty; I must go forth and dree my
+weary weird alone."
+
+"You must go forth, I know; but I must go with you."
+
+"William, that is impossible."
+
+"To the world's end, Charles; I swear it by the holy Mother of God."
+
+"Hush! You don't know what you are saying. Think of your duties."
+
+"I know my duty. My duty is with you."
+
+"William, look at the matter in another point of view. Will Cuthbert let
+you come with me?"
+
+"I don't care. I am coming."
+
+William was sitting where he had been in Charles's chair, and Charles
+was standing beside him. If William had been looking at Charles, he
+would have seen a troubled thoughtful expression on his face for one
+moment, followed by a sudden look of determination. He laid his hand on
+William's shoulder, and said--
+
+"We must talk this over again. I _must_ go to Ranford and see Adelaide
+at once, before this news gets there from other mouths. Will you meet me
+at the old hotel in Covent Garden, four days from this time?"
+
+"Why there?" said William. "Why not at Henley?"
+
+"Why not at London, rather?" replied Charles. "I must go to London. I
+mean to go to London. I don't want to delay about Ranford. No; say
+London."
+
+William looked in his face for a moment, and then said,--
+
+"I'd rather travel with you. You can leave me at Wargrave, which is only
+just over the water from Ranford, or at Didcot, while you go on to
+Ranford. You must let me do that, Charles."
+
+"We will do that, William, if you like."
+
+"Yes, yes!" said William. "It must be so. Now you must come downstairs."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"To eat. Dinner is ready. I am going to tea in the servant's hall."
+
+"Will Mary be at dinner, William?"
+
+"Of course she will."
+
+"Will you let me go for the last time? I should like to see the dear
+little face again. Only this once."
+
+"Charles! Don't talk like that. All that this house contains is yours,
+and will be as long as Cuthbert and I are here. Of course you must go.
+This must not get out for a long while yet--we must keep up
+appearances."
+
+So Charles went down into the drawing-room. It was nearly dark; and at
+first he thought there was no one there, but, as he advanced towards the
+fireplace, he made out a tall, dark figure, and saw that it was
+Mackworth.
+
+"I am come, sir," he said, "to dinner in the old room for the last time
+for ever."
+
+"God forbid!" said Mackworth. "Sir, you have behaved like a brave man
+to-day, and I earnestly hope that, as long as I stay in this house, you
+will be its honoured guest. It would be simply nonsensical to make any
+excuses to you for the part I have taken. Even if you had not
+systematically opposed your interest to mine in this house, I had no
+other course open. You must see that."
+
+"I believe I owe you my thanks for your forbearance so long," said
+Charles; "though that was for the sake of my father more than myself.
+Will you tell me, sir, now we are alone, how long have you known this?"
+
+"Nearly eighteen months," said Father Mackworth, promptly.
+
+Mackworth was not an ill-natured man when he was not opposed, and, being
+a brave man himself, could well appreciate bravery in others. He had
+knowledge enough of men to know that the revelation of to-day had been
+as bitter a blow to a passionate, sensitive man like Charles, as he
+could well endure and live. And he knew that Charles distrusted him, and
+that all out-of-the-way expressions of condolence would be thrown away;
+and so, departing from his usual rule of conduct, he spoke for once in a
+way naturally and sincerely, and said: "I am very, very sorry. I would
+have done much to avoid this."
+
+Then Mary came in and the Tiernays. Cuthbert did not come down. There
+was a long, dull dinner, at which Charles forced himself to eat, having
+a resolution before him. Mary sat scared at the head of the table, and
+scarcely spoke a word, and, when she rose to go into the drawing-room
+again, Charles followed her.
+
+She saw that he was coming, and waited for him in the hall. When he shut
+the dining-room door after him she ran back, and putting her two hands
+on his shoulders, said--
+
+"Charles! Charles! what is the matter?"
+
+"Nothing, dear; only I have lost my fortune; I am penniless."
+
+"Is it all gone, Charles?"
+
+"All. You will hear how, soon. I just come out to wish my bird good-bye.
+I am going to London to-morrow."
+
+"Can't you come and talk to me, Charles, a little?"
+
+"No; not to-night. Not to-night."
+
+"You will come to see me at Lady Hainault's in town, Charles?"
+
+"Yes, my love; yes."
+
+"Won't you tell me any more, Charles?"
+
+"No more, my robin. It is good-bye. You will hear all about it soon
+enough."
+
+"Good-bye."
+
+A kiss, and he was gone up the old staircase towards his own room. When
+he gained the first landing he turned and looked at her once more,
+standing alone in the centre of the old hall in the light of a solitary
+lamp. A lonely, beautiful little figure, with her arms drooping at her
+sides, and the quiet, dark eyes turned towards him, so lovingly! And
+there, in his ruin and desolation, he began to see, for the first time,
+what others, keener-eyed, had seen long ago. Something that might have
+been, but could not be now! And so, saying, "I must not see her again,"
+he went up to his own room, and shut the door on his misery.
+
+Once again he was seen that night. William invaded the still-room, and
+got some coffee, which he carried up to him. He found him packing his
+portmanteau, and he asked William to see to this and to that for him, if
+he should sleep too long. William made him sit down and take coffee and
+smoke a cigar, and sat on the footstool at his feet, before the fire,
+complaining of cold. They sat an hour or two, smoking, talking of old
+times, of horses and dogs, and birds and trout, as lads do, till Charles
+said he would go to bed, and William left him.
+
+He had hardly got to the end of the passage, when Charles called him
+back, and he came.
+
+"I want to look at you again," said Charles; and he put his two hands on
+William's shoulders, and looked at him again. Then he said, "Good
+night," and went in.
+
+William went slowly away, and, passing to a lower storey, came to the
+door of a room immediately over the main entrance, above the hall. This
+room was in the turret above the porch. It was Cuthbert's room.
+
+He knocked softly, and there was no answer; again, and louder. A voice
+cried querulously, "Come in," and he opened the door.
+
+Cuthbert was sitting before the fire with a lamp beside him and a book
+on his knee. He looked up and saw a groom before him, and said,
+angrily--
+
+"I can give no orders to-night. I will not be disturbed to-night."
+
+"It is me, sir," said William.
+
+Cuthbert rose at once. "Come here, brother," he said, "and let me look
+at you. They told me just now that you were with our brother Charles."
+
+"I stayed with him till he went to bed, and then I came to you."
+
+"How is he?"
+
+"Very quiet--too quiet."
+
+"Is he going away?"
+
+"He is going in the morning."
+
+"You must go with him, William," said Cuthbert, eagerly.
+
+"I came to tell you that I must go with him, and to ask you for some
+money."
+
+"God bless you. Don't leave him. Write to me every day. Watch and see
+what he is inclined to settle to, and then let me know. You must get
+some education too. You will get it with him as well as anywhere. He
+must be our first care."
+
+William said yes. He must be their first care. He had suffered a
+terrible wrong.
+
+"We must get to be as brothers to one another, William," said Cuthbert.
+"That will come in time. We have one great object in common--Charles;
+and that will bring us together. The time was, when I was a fool, that I
+thought of being a saint, without human affections. I am wiser now.
+People near death see many things which are hidden in health and youth."
+
+"Near death, Cuthbert!" said William, calling him so for the first time.
+"I shall live, please God, to take your children on my knee."
+
+"It is right that you should know, brother, that in a few short years
+you will be master of Ravenshoe. My heart is gone. I have had an attack
+to-night."
+
+"But people who are ill don't always die," said William. "Holy Virgin!
+you must not go and leave me all abroad in the world like a lost sheep."
+
+"I like to hear you speak like that, William. Two days ago, I was moving
+heaven and earth to rob you of your just inheritance."
+
+"I like you the better for that. Never think of that again. Does
+Mackworth know of your illness?"
+
+"He knows everything."
+
+"If Charles had been a Catholic, would he have concealed this?"
+
+"No; I think not. I offered him ten thousand pounds to hush it up."
+
+"I wish he had taken it. I don't want to be a great man. I should have
+been far happier as it was. I was half a gentleman, and had everything I
+wanted. Shall you oppose my marrying when Charles is settled?"
+
+"You must marry, brother. I can never marry, and would not if I could.
+You must marry, certainly. The estate is a little involved; but we can
+soon bring it right. Till you marry, you must be contented with four
+hundred a year."
+
+William laughed. "I will be content and obedient enough, I warrant you.
+But, when I speak of marrying, I mean marrying my present sweetheart."
+
+Cuthbert looked up suddenly. "I did not think of that. Who is she?"
+
+"Master Evans's daughter, Jane."
+
+"A fisherman's daughter," said Cuthbert. "William, the mistress of
+Ravenshoe ought to be a lady."
+
+"The master of Ravenshoe ought to be a gentleman," was William's reply.
+"And, after your death (which I don't believe in, mind you), he won't
+be. The master of Ravenshoe then will be only a groom; and what sort of
+a fine lady would he buy with his money, think you? A woman who would
+despise him and be ashamed of him. No, by St. George and the dragon, I
+will marry my old sweetheart or be single!"
+
+"Perhaps you are right, William," said Cuthbert; "and, if you are not, I
+am not one who has a right to speak about it. Let us in future be honest
+and straightforward, and have no more miserable _esclandres_, in God's
+name. What sort of a girl is she?"
+
+"She is handsome enough for a duchess, and she is very quiet and shy."
+
+"All the better. I shall offer not the slightest opposition. She had
+better know what is in store for her."
+
+"She shall; and the blessing of all the holy saints be on you! I must go
+now. I must be up at dawn."
+
+"Don't go yet, William. Think of the long night that is before me. Sit
+with me, and let me get used to your voice. Tell me about the horses, or
+anything--only don't leave me alone yet."
+
+William sat down with him. They sat long and late. When at last William
+rose to go, Cuthbert said--
+
+"You will make a good landlord, William. You have been always a patient,
+faithful servant, and you will make a good master. Our people will get
+to love you better than ever they would have loved me. Cling to the old
+faith. It has served us well so many hundred years. It seems as if God
+willed that Ravenshoe should not pass from the hands of the faithful.
+And now, one thing more; I must see Charles before he goes. When you go
+to wake him in the morning, call me, and I will go with you. Good
+night!"
+
+In the morning they went up together to wake him. His window was open,
+and the fresh spring air was blowing in. His books, his clothes, his
+guns and rods, were piled about in their usual confusion. His dog was
+lying on the hearthrug, and stretched himself as he came to greet them.
+The dog had a glove at his feet, and they wondered at it. The curtains
+of his bed were drawn close. Cuthbert went softly to them and drew them
+aside. He was not there. The bed was smooth.
+
+"Gone! gone!" cried Cuthbert. "I half feared it. Fly, William, for God's
+sake, to Lord Ascot's, to Ranford; catch him there, and never leave him
+again. Come, and get some money, and begone. You may be in time. If we
+should lose him after all--after all!"
+
+William needed no second bidding. In an hour he was at Stonnington. Mr.
+Charles Ravenshoe had arrived there at daybreak, and had gone on in the
+coach which started at eight. William posted to Exeter, and at eleven
+o'clock in the evening saw Lady Ascot at Ranford. Charles Ravenshoe had
+been there that afternoon, but was gone. And then Lady Ascot, weeping
+wildly, told him such news as made him break from the room with an oath,
+and dash through the scared servants in the hall and out into the
+darkness, to try to overtake the carriage he had discharged, and reach
+London.
+
+The morning before, Adelaide had eloped with Lord Welter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+FLIGHT.
+
+
+When William left Charles in his room at Ravenshoe, the latter sat down
+in his chair and began thinking.
+
+The smart of the blow, which had fallen so heavily at first, had become
+less painful. He knew by intuition that it would be worse on the morrow,
+and on many morrows; but at present it was alleviated. He began to dread
+sleeping, for fear of the waking.
+
+He dreaded the night and dreams; and, more than all, the morrow and the
+departure. He felt that he ought to see Cuthbert again, and he dreaded
+that. He dreaded the servants seeing him go. He had a horror of parting
+from all he had known so long, formally. It was natural. It would be so
+much pain to all concerned; were it not better avoided? He thought of
+all these things, and tried to persuade himself that these were the
+reasons which made him do what he had as good as determined to do an
+hour or two before, what he had in his mind when he called William back
+in the corridor--to go away alone, and hide and mope like a wounded stag
+for a little time.
+
+It was his instinct to do so. Perhaps it would have been the best thing
+for him. At all events, he determined on it, and packed up a portmanteau
+and carpet-bag, and then sat down again, waiting.
+
+"Yes," he said to himself, "it will be better to do this. I must get
+away from William, poor lad. He must not follow my fortunes, for many
+reasons."
+
+His dog had been watching him, looking, with his bright loving eyes,
+first at him and then at his baggage, wondering what journey they were
+going on now. When Charles had done packing, and had sat down again in
+his chair, before the fire, the dog leapt up in his lap unbidden, and
+laid his head upon his breast.
+
+"Grip, Grip!" said Charles, "I am going away to leave you for ever,
+Grip. Dogs don't live so long as men, my boy; you will be quietly under
+the turf and at rest, when I shall have forty long years more to go
+through with."
+
+The dog wagged his tail, and pawed his waistcoat. He wanted some
+biscuit. Charles got him some, and then went on talking.
+
+"I am going to London, old dog. I am going to see what the world is
+like. I sha'n't come back before you are dead, Grip, I expect. I have
+got to win money and a name for the sake of one who is worth winning it
+for. Very likely I shall go abroad, to the land where the stuff comes
+from they make sovereigns of, and try my luck at getting some of the
+yellow rubbish. And she will wait in the old house at Ranford."
+
+He paused here. The thought came upon him, "Would it not be more
+honourable to absolve Adelaide from her engagement? Was he acting
+generously in demanding of her to waste the best part of her life in
+waiting till a ruined man had won fortune and means?"
+
+The answer came. "She loves me. If I can wait, why not she?"
+
+"I have wronged her by such a thought, Grip. Haven't I, my boy?"--and
+so on. I needn't continue telling you the nonsense Charles talked to his
+dog. Men will talk nonsense to their dogs and friends when they are in
+love; and such nonsense is but poor reading at any time. To us who know
+what had happened, and how worthless and false Adelaide was, it would be
+merely painful and humiliating to hear any more of it. I only gave you
+so much to show you how completely Charles was in the dark, poor fool,
+with regard to Adelaide's character, and to render less surprising the
+folly of his behaviour after he heard the news at Ranford.
+
+Charles judged every one by his own standard. She had told him that she
+loved him; and perhaps she did, for a time. He believed her. As for
+vanity, selfishness, fickleness, calculation, coming in and conquering
+love, he knew it was impossible in his own case, and so he conceived it
+impossible in hers. I think I have been very careful to impress on you
+that Charles was not wise. At all events, if I have softened matters so
+far hitherto as to leave you in doubt, his actions, which we shall have
+to chronicle immediately, will leave not the slightest doubt of it. I
+love the man. I love his very faults in a way. He is a reality to me,
+though I may not have the art to make him so to you. His mad, impulsive
+way of forming a resolution, and his honourable obstinacy in sticking to
+that resolution afterwards, even to the death, are very great faults;
+but they are, more or less, the faults of men who have made a very great
+figure in the world, or I have read history wrong. Men with Charles
+Ravenshoe's character, and power of patience and application superadded,
+turn out very brilliant characters for the most part. Charles had not
+been drilled into habits of application early enough. Densil's
+unthinking indulgence had done him much harm, and he was just the sort
+of boy to be spoilt at school--a favourite among the masters and the
+boys; always just up to his work and no more. It is possible that Eton
+in one way, or Rugby in another, might have done for him what Shrewsbury
+certainly did not. At Eton, thrown at once into a great, free republic,
+he might have been forced to fight his way up to his proper place,
+which, I believe, would not have been a low one. At Rugby he would have
+had his place to win all the same; but to help him he would have had all
+the traditionary school policy which a great man has left behind him as
+an immortal legacy. It was not to be. He was sent to a good and manly
+school enough, but one where there was for him too little of
+competition. Shrewsbury is, in most respects, the third of the _old_
+schools in England; but it was, unluckily, not the school for him. He
+was too great a man there.
+
+At Oxford, too, he hardly had a fair chance. Lord Welter was there
+before him, and had got just such a set about him as one would expect
+from that young gentleman's character and bringing up. These men were
+Charles's first and only acquaintances at the University. What chance
+was there among them for correcting and disciplining himself? None. The
+wonder was, that he came out from among them without being greatly
+deteriorated. The only friend Charles ever had who could guide him on
+the way to being a man was John Marston. But John Marston, to say the
+truth, was sometimes too hard and didactic, and very often roused
+Charles's obstinacy through want of tact. Marston loved Charles, and
+thought him better than the ninety and nine who need no repentance; but
+it did not fall to Marston's lot to make a man of Charles. Some one took
+that in hand who never fails.
+
+This is the place for my poor apology for Charles's folly. If I had
+inserted it before, you would not have attended to it, or would have
+forgotten it. If I have done my work right, it is merely a statement of
+the very conclusion you must have come to. In the humiliating scenes
+which are to follow, I only beg you to remember that Charles Horton was
+Charles Ravenshoe once; and that, while he was a gentleman, the people
+loved him well.
+
+Once, about twelve o'clock, he left his room, and passed through the
+house to see if all was quiet. He heard the grooms and footmen talking
+in the servants' hall. He stole back again to his room, and sat before
+the fire.
+
+In half an hour he rose again, and put his portmanteau and carpet-bag
+outside his room door. Then he took his hat, and rose to go.
+
+One more look round the old room! The last for ever! The present
+overmastered the past, and he looked round almost without recognition. I
+doubt whether at great crises men have much time for recollecting old
+associations. I looked once into a room, which had been my home, ever
+since I was six years old, for five-and-twenty years, knowing I should
+never see it again. But it was to see that I had left nothing behind me.
+The coach was at the door, and they were calling for me. Now I could
+draw you a correct map of all the blotches and cracks in the ceiling, as
+I used to see them when I lay in bed of a morning. But then, I only shut
+the door and ran down the passage, without even saying "good-bye, old
+bedroom." Charles Ravenshoe looked round the room thoughtlessly, and
+then blew out the candle, went out, and shut the door.
+
+The dog whined and scratched to come after him; so he went back again.
+The old room bathed in a flood of moonlight, and, seen through the open
+window, the busy chafing sea, calling to him to hasten.
+
+He took a glove from the table, and, laying it on the hearthrug, told
+the dog to mind it. The dog looked wistfully at him, and lay down. The
+next moment he was outside the door again.
+
+Through long moonlit corridors, down the moonlit hall, through dark
+passages, which led among the sleeping household, to the door in the
+priest's tower. The household slept, old men and young men, maids and
+matrons, quietly, and dreamt of this and of that. And he, who was
+yesterday nigh master of all, passed out from among them, and stood
+alone in the world, outside the dark old house, which he had called his
+home.
+
+Then he felt the deed was done. Was it only the night-wind from the
+north that laid such a chill hand on his heart? Busy waves upon the
+shore talking eternally--"We have come in from the Atlantic, bearing
+messages; we have come over foundered ships and the bones of drowned
+sailors, and we tell our messages and die upon the shore."
+
+Shadows that came sweeping from the sea, over lawn and flower-bed, and
+wrapped the old mansion like a pall for one moment, and then left it
+shining again in the moonlight, clear, pitiless. Within, warm rooms,
+warm beds, and the bated breath of sleepers, lying secure in the lap of
+wealth and order. Without, hard, cold stone. The great world around
+awaiting to devour one more atom. The bright unsympathising stars, and
+the sea, babbling of the men it had rolled over, whose names should
+never be known.
+
+Now the park, with herds of ghostly startled deer, and the sweet scent
+of growing fern; then the rush of the brook, the bridge, and the vista
+of woodland above; and then the sleeping village.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+CHARLES'S RETREAT UPON LONDON.
+
+
+Passing out of the park, Charles set down his burden at the door of a
+small farm-house at the further end of the village, and knocked. For
+some time he stood waiting for an answer, and heard no sound save the
+cows and horses moving about in the warm straw-yard. The beasts were in
+their home. No terrible new morrow for them. He was without in the
+street; his home irrevocable miles behind him; still not a thought of
+flinching or turning back. He knocked again.
+
+The door was unbarred. An old man looked out, and recognised him with
+wild astonishment.
+
+"Mr. Charles! Good lord-a-mercy! My dear tender heart, what be doing out
+at this time a-night? With his portmantle, too, and his carpet-bag! Come
+in, my dear soul, come in. An' so pale and wild! Why, you'm overlooked,
+Master Charles."
+
+"No, Master Lee, I ain't overlooked. At least not that I know of----"
+
+The old man shook his head, and reserved his opinion.
+
+"----But I want your gig to go to Stonnington."
+
+"To-night?"
+
+"Ay, to-night. The coach goes at eight in the morning; I want to be
+there before that."
+
+"Why do'ee start so soon? They'll be all abed in the Chichester Arms."
+
+"I know. I shall get into the stable. I don't know where I shall get. I
+must go. There is trouble at the Hall."
+
+"Ay! ay! I thought as much, and you'm going away into the world?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The old man said, "Ay! ay!" again, and turned to go upstairs. Then he
+held his candle over his head, and looked at Charles; and then went
+upstairs muttering to himself.
+
+Presently was aroused from sleep a young Devonshire giant, half
+Hercules, half Antinoüs, who lumbered down the stairs, and into the
+room, and made his obeisance to Charles with an air of wonder in his
+great sleepy black eyes, and departed to get the gig.
+
+Of course his first point was Ranford. He got there in the afternoon. He
+had in his mind at this time, he thinks (for he does not remember it all
+very distinctly), the idea of going to Australia. He had an idea, too,
+of being eminently practical and business-like; and so he did a thing
+which may appear to be trifling, but which was important--one cannot say
+how much so. He asked for Lord Ascot instead of Lady Ascot.
+
+Lord Ascot was in the library. Charles was shown in to him. He was
+sitting before the fire, reading a novel. He looked very worn and
+anxious, and jumped up nervously when Charles was announced. He dropped
+his book on the floor, and came forward to him, holding out his right
+hand.
+
+"Charles," he said, "you will forgive me any participation in this. I
+swear to you----"
+
+Charles thought that by some means the news of what had happened at
+Ravenshoe had come before him, and that Lord Ascot knew all about Father
+Mackworth's discovery. Lord Ascot was thinking about Adelaide's flight;
+so they were at cross purposes.
+
+"Dear Lord Ascot," said Charles, "how could I think of blaming you, my
+kind old friend?"
+
+"It is devilish gentlemanly of you to speak so, Charles," said Lord
+Ascot. "I am worn to death about that horse, Haphazard, and other
+things; and this has finished me. I have been reading a novel to
+distract my mind. I must win the Derby, you know; by Gad, I must."
+
+"Whom have you got, Lord Ascot?"
+
+"Wells."
+
+"You couldn't do better, I suppose?"
+
+"I suppose not. You don't know--I'd rather not talk any more about it,
+Charles."
+
+"Lord Ascot, this is, as you may well guess, the last time I shall ever
+see you. I want you to do me a favour."
+
+"I will do it, my dear Charles, with the greatest pleasure. Any
+reparation----"
+
+"Hush, my lord! I only want a certificate. Will you read this which I
+have written in pencil, and, if you conscientiously can, copy in your
+own hand, and sign it. Also, if I send to you a reference, will you
+confirm it?"
+
+Lord Ascot read what Charles had written, and said--
+
+"Yes, certainly. You are going to change your name then?"
+
+"I must bear that name, now; I am going abroad."
+
+Lord Ascot wrote--
+
+      "The undermentioned Charles Horton I have known ever since
+      he was a boy. His character is beyond praise in every way.
+      He is a singularly bold and dexterous rider, and is
+      thoroughly up to the management of horses.
+
+"ASCOT."
+
+"You have improved upon my text, Lord Ascot," said Charles. "It is like
+your kindheartedness. The mouse may offer to help the lion, my lord;
+and, although the lion may know how little likely it is that he should
+require help, yet he may take it as a sign of goodwill on the part of
+the poor mouse. Now good-bye, my lord; I must see Lady Ascot, and then
+be off."
+
+Lord Ascot wished him kindly good-bye, and took up his novel again.
+Charles went alone up to Lady Ascot's room.
+
+He knocked at the door, and received no answer; so he went in. Lady
+Ascot was there, although she had not answered him. She was sitting
+upright by the fire, staring at the door, with her hands folded on her
+lap. A fine brave-looking old lady at all times, but just now, Charles
+thought, with that sweet look of pity showing itself principally about
+the corners of the gentle old mouth, more noble-looking than ever!
+
+"May I come in, Lady Ascot?" said Charles.
+
+"My dearest own boy! You must come in and sit down. You must be very
+quiet over it. Try not to make a scene, my dear. I am not strong enough.
+It has shaken me so terribly. I heard you had come, and were with Ascot.
+And I have been trembling in every limb. Not from terror so much of you
+in your anger, as because my conscience is not clear. I may have hidden
+things from you, Charles, which you ought to have known." And Lady Ascot
+began crying silently.
+
+Charles felt the blood going from his cheeks to his heart. His interview
+with Lord Ascot had made him suspect something further was wrong than
+what he knew of, and his suspicions were getting stronger every moment.
+He sat down quite quietly, looking at Lady Ascot, and spoke not one
+word. Lady Ascot, wiping her eyes, went on; and Charles's heart began to
+beat with a dull heavy pulsation, like the feet of those who carry a
+coffin.
+
+"I ought to have told you what was going on between them before she went
+to old Lady Hainault. I ought to have told you of what went on before
+Lord Hainault was married. I can never forgive myself, Charles. You may
+upbraid me, and I will sit here and make not one excuse. But I must say
+that I never for one moment thought that she was anything more than
+light-headed. I,--oh Lord! I never dreamt it would have come to this."
+
+"Are you speaking of Adelaide, Lady Ascot?" said Charles.
+
+"Of course I am," she said, almost peevishly. "If I had ever----"
+
+"Lady Ascot," said Charles, quietly, "you are evidently speaking of
+something of which I have not heard. What has Adelaide done?"
+
+The old lady clasped her hands above her head. "Oh, weary, weary day!
+And I thought that he had heard it all, and that the blow was broken.
+The cowards! they have left it to a poor old woman to tell him at last."
+
+"Dear Lady Ascot, you evidently have not heard of what a terrible fate
+has befallen me. I am a ruined man, and I am very patient. I had one
+hope left in the world, and I fear that you are going to cut it away
+from me. I am very quiet, and will make no scene; only tell me what has
+happened."
+
+"Adelaide!--be proud, Charles, be angry, furious--you Ravenshoes
+can!--be a man, but don't look like that. Adelaide, dead to honour and
+good fame, has gone off with Welter!"
+
+Charles walked towards the door.
+
+"That is enough. Please let me go. I can't stand any more at present.
+You have been very kind to me and to her, and I thank you and bless you
+for it. The son of a bastard blesses you for it. Let me go--let me go!"
+
+Lady Ascot had stepped actively to the door, and had laid one hand on
+the door, and one on his breast. "You shall not go," she said, "till you
+have told me what you mean!"
+
+"How? I cannot stand any more at present."
+
+"What do you mean by being the son of a bastard?"
+
+"I am the son of James, Mr. Ravenshoe's keeper. He was the illegitimate
+son of Mr. Petre Ravenshoe."
+
+"Who told you this?" said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Cuthbert."
+
+"How did he know it!"
+
+Charles told her all.
+
+"So the priest has found that out, eh?" said Lady Ascot. "It seems
+true;" and, as she said so, she moved back from the door. "Go to your
+old bedroom, Charles. It will always be ready for you while this house
+is a house. And come down to me presently. Where is Lord Saltire?"
+
+"At Lord Segur's."
+
+Charles went out of the room, and out of the house, and was seen no
+more. Lady Ascot sat down by the fire again.
+
+"The one blow has softened the other," she said. "I will never keep
+another secret after this. It was for Alicia's sake and for Petre's that
+I did it, and now see what has become of it. I shall send for Lord
+Saltire. The boy must have his rights, and shall, too."
+
+So the brave old woman sat down and wrote to Lord Saltire. We shall see
+what she wrote to him in the proper place--not now. She sat calmly and
+methodically writing, with her kind old face wreathing into a smile as
+she went on. And Charles, the madman, left the house, and posted off to
+London, only intent on seeking to lose himself among the sordid crowd,
+so that no man he had ever called a friend should set eyes on him
+again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+MR. SLOANE.
+
+
+Charles Ravenshoe had committed suicide--committed suicide as
+deliberately as any maddened wretch had done that day in all the wide
+miserable world. He knew it very well, and was determined to go on with
+it. He had not hung himself, or drowned himself, but he had committed
+deliberate suicide, and he knew--knew well--that his obstinacy would
+carry him through to the end.
+
+What is suicide, nine cases out of ten? Any one can tell you. It is the
+act of a mad, proud coward, who flies, by his own deed, not from
+humiliation or disgrace, but, as he fancies, from feeling the
+consequences of them--who flies to unknown, doubtful evils, sooner than
+bear positive, present, undoubted ones. All this had Charles done,
+buoying him up with this excuse and that excuse, and fancying that he
+was behaving, the cur, like Bayard, or Lieutenant Willoughby--a greater
+than Bayard--all the time.
+
+The above is Charles's idea of the matter himself, put in the third
+person for form's sake. I don't agree with all he says about himself. I
+don't deny that he did a very foolish thing, but I incline to believe
+that there was something noble and self-reliant in his doing it. Think a
+moment. He had only two courses open to him--the one (I put it coarsely)
+to eat humble-pie, to go back to Cuthbert and Mackworth, and accept
+their offers; the other to do as he had done--to go alone into the
+world, and stand by himself. He did the latter, as we shall see. He
+could not face Ravenshoe, or any connected with it, again. It had been
+proved that he was an unwilling impostor, of base, low blood; and his
+sister--ah! one more pang, poor heart!--his sister Ellen, what was she?
+
+Little doubt--little doubt! Better for both of them if they had never
+been born! He was going to London, and, perhaps, might meet her there!
+All the vice and misery of the country got thrown into that cesspool.
+When anything had got too foul for the pure country air, men said, Away
+with it; throw it into the great dunghill, and let it rot there. Was he
+not going there himself? It was fit she should be there before him! They
+would meet for certain!
+
+How would they meet? Would she be in silks and satins, or in rags?
+flaunting in her carriage, or shivering in an archway? What matter? was
+not shame the heritage of the "lower orders"? The pleasures of the rich
+must be ministered to by the "lower orders," or what was the use of
+money or rank? He was one of the lower orders now. He must learn his
+lesson; learn to cringe and whine like the rest of them. It would be
+hard, but it must be learnt. The dogs rose against it sometimes, but it
+never paid.
+
+The devil was pretty busy with poor Charles in his despair, you see.
+This was all he had left after three and twenty years of careless
+idleness and luxury. His creed had been, "I am a Ravenshoe," and lo! one
+morning, he was a Ravenshoe no longer. A poor crow, that had been
+fancying himself an eagle. A crow! "by heavens," he thought, "he was not
+even that." A nonentity, turned into the world to find his own value!
+What were honour, honesty, virtue to him? Why, nothing--words! He must
+truckle and pander for his living. Why not go back and truckle to Father
+Mackworth? There was time yet.
+
+No!
+
+Why not? Was it pride only? We have no right to say what it was. If it
+was only pride, it was better than nothing. Better to have that straw
+only to cling to, than to be all alone in the great sea with nothing. We
+have seen that he has done nothing good, with circumstances all in his
+favour; let us see if he can in any way hold his own, with circumstances
+all against him.
+
+"America?" he thought once. "They are all gentlemen there. If I could
+only find her, and tear her jewels off, we would go there together. But
+she must be found--she must be found. I will never leave England till
+she goes with me. We shall be brought together. We shall see one
+another. I love her as I never loved her before. What a sweet, gentle
+little love she was! My darling! And, when I have kissed her, I never
+dreamed she was my sister. My pretty love! Ellen, Ellen, I am coming to
+you. Where are you, my love?"
+
+He was alone, in a railway carriage, leaning out to catch the fresh
+wind, as he said this. He said it once again, this time aloud. "Where
+are you, my sister?"
+
+Where was she? Could he have only seen! We may be allowed to see, though
+_he_ could not. Come forward into the great Babylon with me, while he is
+speeding on towards it; we will rejoin him in an instant.
+
+In a small luxuriously furnished hall, there stands a beautiful woman,
+dressed modestly in the garb of a servant. She is standing with her arms
+folded, and a cold, stern, curious look on her face. She is looking
+towards the hall-door, which is held open by a footman. She is waiting
+for some one who is coming in; and two travellers enter, a man and a
+woman. She goes up to the woman, and says, quietly, "I bid you welcome,
+madam." Who are these people? Is that waiting-woman Ellen? and these
+travellers, are they Lord Welter and Adelaide? Let us get back to poor
+Charles; better be with him than here!
+
+We must follow him closely. We must see why, in his despair, he took the
+extraordinary resolution that he did. Not that I shall take any
+particular pains to follow the exact process of his mind in arriving at
+his determination. If the story has hitherto been told well it will
+appear nothing extraordinary, and, if otherwise, an intelligent reader
+would very soon detect any attempt at bolstering up ill-told facts by
+elaborate, soul-analysing theories.
+
+He could have wished the train would have run on for ever; but he was
+aroused by the lights growing thicker and more brilliant, and he felt
+that they were nearing London, and that the time for action was come.
+
+The great plunge was taken, and he was alone in the cold street--alone,
+save for the man who carried his baggage. He stood for a moment or so,
+confused with the rush of carriages of all sorts which were taking the
+people from the train, till he was aroused by the man asking him where
+he was to go to.
+
+Charles said, without thinking, "The Warwick Hotel," and thither they
+went. For a moment he regretted that he had said so, but the next moment
+he said aloud, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die!"
+
+The man turned round and begged his pardon. Charles did not answer him;
+and the man went on, wondering what sort of a young gentleman he had got
+hold of.
+
+The good landlord was glad to see him. Would he have dinner?--a bit of
+fish and a lamb chop, for instance? Then it suddenly struck Charles that
+he was hungry--ravenous. He laughed aloud at the idea; and the landlord
+laughed too, and rubbed his hands. Should it be whiting or smelts now?
+he asked.
+
+"Anything," said Charles, "so long as you feed me quick. And give me
+wine, will you, of some sort; I want to drink. Give me sherry, will you?
+And I say, let me taste some now, and then I can see if I like it. I am
+very particular about my wine, you must know."
+
+In a few minutes a waiter brought in a glass of wine, and waited to know
+how Charles liked it. He told the man he could go, and he would tell
+him at dinner-time. When the man was gone, he looked at the wine with a
+smile. Then he took it up, and poured it into the coal-scuttle.
+
+"Not yet," he said, "not yet! I'll try something else before I try to
+drink my troubles away." And then he plunged into the _Times_.
+
+He had no sooner convinced himself that Lord Aberdeen was tampering with
+the honour of the country by not declaring war, than he found himself
+profoundly considering what had caused that great statesman to elope
+with Adelaide, and whether, in case of a Russian war, Lady Ascot would
+possibly convict Father Mackworth of having caused it. Then Lady Ascot
+came into the room with a large bottle of medicine and a testament,
+announcing that she was going to attend a sick gun-boat. And then, just
+as he began to see that he was getting sleepy, to sleep he went, fast as
+a top.
+
+Half an hour's sleep restored him, and dinner made things look
+different. "After all," he said, as he sipped his wine, "here is only
+the world on the one side and I on the other. I am utterly reckless, and
+can sink no further. I will get all the pleasure out of life that I can,
+honestly; for I am an honest man still, and mean to be. I love you
+Madame Adelaide, and you have used me worse than a hound, and made me
+desperate. If he marries you, I will come forward some day, and disgrace
+you. If you had only waited till you knew everything, I could have
+forgiven you. I'll get a place as a footman, and talk about you in the
+servant's hall. All London shall know you were engaged to me."
+
+"Poor dear, pretty Adelaide: as if I would ever hurt a hair of your
+head, my sweet love! Silly----"
+
+The landlord came in. There was most excellent company in the
+smoking-room. Would he condescend to join them?
+
+Company and tobacco! Charles would certainly join them; so he had his
+wine carried in.
+
+There was a fat gentleman, with a snub nose, who was a Conservative.
+There was a tall gentleman, with a long nose, who was Liberal. There was
+a short gentleman, with no particular kind of nose, who was Radical.
+There was a handsome gentleman, with big whiskers, who was commercial;
+and there was a gentleman with bandy legs, who was horsy.
+
+I strongly object to using a slang adjective, if any other can be got to
+supply its place; but by doing so sometimes one avoids a periphrasis,
+and does not spoil one's period. Thus, I know of no predicate for a
+gentleman with a particular sort of hair, complexion, dress, whiskers,
+and legs, except the one I have used above, and so it must stand.
+
+As Providence would have it, Charles sat down between the landlord and
+the horsy man, away from the others. He smoked his cigar, and listened
+to the conversation.
+
+The Conservative gentleman coalesced with the Liberal gentleman on the
+subject of Lord Aberdeen's having sold the country to the Russians; the
+Radical gentleman also come over to them on that subject; and for a time
+the Opposition seemed to hold an overwhelming majority, and to be merely
+allowing Aberdeen's Government to hold place longer, that they might
+commit themselves deeper. In fact, things seemed to be going all one
+way, as is often the case in coalition ministries just before a grand
+crash, when the Radical gentleman caused a violent split in the cabinet,
+by saying that the whole complication had been brought about by the
+machinations of the aristocracy--which assertion caused the Conservative
+gentleman to retort in unmeasured language; and then the Liberal
+gentleman, trying to trim, found himself distrusted and despised by both
+parties. Charles listened to them, amused for the time to hear them
+quoting, quite unconsciously, whole sentences out of their respective
+leading papers, and then was distracted by the horsy man saying to him--
+
+"Darn politics. What horse will win the Derby, sir?"
+
+"Haphazard," said Charles, promptly. This, please to remember, was Lord
+Ascot's horse, which we have seen before.
+
+The landlord immediately drew closer up.
+
+The horsy man looked at Charles, and said, "H'm; and what has made my
+lord scratch him for the Two Thousand, sir?"
+
+And so on. We have something to do with Haphazard's winning the Derby,
+as we shall see; and we have still more to do with the result of
+Charles's conversation with the "horsy man." But we have certainly
+nothing to do with a wordy discussion about the various horses which
+stood well for the great race (wicked, lovely darlings, how many souls
+of heroes have they sent to Hades!), and so we will spare the reader.
+The conclusion of their conversation was the only important part of it.
+
+Charles said to the horsy man on the stairs, "Now you know everything. I
+am penniless, friendless, and nameless. Can you put me in the way of
+earning my living honestly?"
+
+And he said, "I can, and I will. This gentleman is a fast man, but he is
+rich. You'll have your own way. Maybe, you'll see some queer things, but
+what odds?"
+
+"None to me," said Charles; "I can always leave him."
+
+"And go back to your friends, like a wise young gentleman, eh?" said the
+other, kindly.
+
+"I am not a gentleman," said Charles. "I told you so before. I am a
+gamekeeper's son; I swear to you I am. I have been petted and pampered
+till I look like one, but I am not."
+
+"You are a deuced good imitation," said the other. "Good night; come to
+me at nine, mind."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At this time, Lady Ascot had despatched her letter to Lord Saltire, and
+had asked for Charles. The groom of the chambers said that Mr. Ravenshoe
+had left the house immediately after his interview with her ladyship,
+three hours before.
+
+She started up--"Gone!--Whither?"
+
+"To Twyford, my lady."
+
+"Send after him, you idiot! Send the grooms after him on all my lord's
+horses. Send a lad on Haphazard, and let him race the train to London.
+Send the police! He has stolen my purse, with ten thousand gold guineas
+in it!--I swear he has. Have him bound hand and foot, and bring him
+back, on your life. If you stay there I will kill you!"
+
+The violent old animal nature, dammed up so long by creeds and formulas,
+had broken out at last. The decorous Lady Ascot was transformed in one
+instant into a terrible, grey-headed, magnificent old Alecto, hurling
+her awful words abroad in a sharp, snarling voice, that made the hair of
+him that heard it to creep upon his head. The man fled, and shut Lady
+Ascot in alone.
+
+She walked across the room, and beat her withered old hands against the
+wall. "Oh, miserable, wicked old woman!" she cried aloud. "How surely
+have your sins found you out! After concealing a crime for so many
+years, to find the judgment fall on such an innocent and beloved head!
+Alicia, Alicia, I did this for your sake. Charles, Charles, come back to
+the old woman before she dies, and tell her you forgive her."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+LIEUTENANT HORNBY.
+
+
+Charles had always been passionately fond of horses and of riding. He
+was a consummate horseman, and was so perfectly accomplished in
+everything relating to horses, that I really believe that in time he
+might actually have risen to the dizzy height of being stud-groom to a
+great gentleman or nobleman. He had been brought up in a great
+horse-riding house, and had actually gained so much experience, and had
+so much to say on matters of this kind, that once, at Oxford, a
+promising young nobleman cast, so to speak, an adverse opinion of
+Charles's into George Simmond's own face. Mr. Simmonds looked round on
+the offender mildly and compassionately, and said, "If any undergraduate
+_could_ know, my lord, that undergraduate's name would be Ravenshoe of
+Paul's. But he is young, my lord; and, in consequence, ignorant." His
+lordship didn't say anything after that.
+
+I have kept this fact in the background rather, hitherto, because it has
+not been of any very great consequence. It becomes of some consequence
+now, for the first time. I enlarged a little on Charles being a rowing
+man, because rowing and training had, for good or for evil, a certain
+effect on his character. (Whether for good or for evil, you must
+determine for yourselves.) And I now mention the fact of his being a
+consummate horseman, because a considerable part of the incidents which
+follow arise from the fact.
+
+Don't think for one moment that you are going to be bored by
+stable-talk. You will have simply none of it. It only amounts to
+this--that Charles, being fond of horses, took up with a certain line of
+life, and in that line of life met with certain adventures which have
+made his history worth relating.
+
+When he met the "horsy" man next morning, he was not dressed like a
+gentleman. In his store he had some old clothes, which he used to wear
+at Ravenshoe, in the merry old days when he would be up with daylight to
+exercise the horses on the moor--cord trousers, and so on--which, being
+now old and worn, made him look uncommonly like a groom out of place.
+And what contributed to the delusion was, that for the first time in his
+life he wore no shirt collar, but allowed his blue-spotted neckcloth to
+border on his honest red face, without one single quarter of an inch of
+linen. And, if it ever pleases your lordship's noble excellence to look
+like a blackguard for any reason, allow me to recommend you to wear a
+dark necktie and no collar. Your success will be beyond your utmost
+hopes.
+
+Charles met his new friend in the bar, and touched his hat to him. His
+friend laughed, and said, that would do, but asked how long he thought
+he could keep that sort of thing going. Charles said, as long as was
+necessary; and they went out together.
+
+They walked as far as a street leading out of one of the largest and
+best squares (I mean B--lg--e Sq--e, but I don't like to write it at
+full length), and stopped at the door of a handsome shop. Charles knew
+enough of London to surmise that the first floor was let to a man of
+some wealth; and he was right.
+
+The door was opened, and his friend was shown up stairs, while he was
+told to wait in the hall. Now Charles began to perceive, with
+considerable amusement, that he was acting a part--that he was playing,
+so to speak, at being something other than what he really was, and that
+he was, perhaps, overdoing it. In this house, which yesterday he would
+have entered as an equal, he was now playing at being a servant. It was
+immensely amusing. He wiped his shoes very clean, and sat down on a
+bench in the hall, with his hat between his knees, as he had seen grooms
+do. It is no use wondering; one never finds out anything by that. But I
+do wonder, nevertheless, whether Charles, had he only known in what
+relation the master of that house stood to himself, would or would not
+have set the house on fire, or cut its owner's throat. When he did find
+out, he did neither the one thing nor the other; but he had been a good
+deal tamed by that time.
+
+Presently a servant came down, and, eyeing Charles curiously as a
+prospective fellow-servant, told him civilly to walk up stairs. He went
+up. The room was one of a handsome suite, and overlooked the street.
+Charles saw at a glance that it was the room of a great dandy. A dandy,
+if not of the first water, most assuredly high up in the second. Two
+things only jurred on his eye in his hurried glance round the room.
+There was too much bric-a-brac, and too many flowers. "I wonder if he is
+a gentleman," thought Charles. His friend of the night before was
+standing in a respectful attitude, leaning on the back of a chair, and
+Charles looked round for the master of the house, eagerly. He had to
+cast his eyes downward to see him, for he was lying back on an easy
+chair, half hidden by the breakfast table.
+
+There he was--Charles's master: the man who was going to buy him.
+Charles cast one intensely eager glance at him, and was satisfied. "He
+will do at a pinch," said he to himself.
+
+There were a great many handsome and splendid things in that room, but
+the owner of them was by far the handsomest and most splendid thing
+there.
+
+He was a young man, with very pale and delicate features, and a
+singularly amiable cast of face, who wore a moustache, with the long
+whiskers which were just then coming into fashion; and he was dressed
+in a splendid uniform of blue, gold, and scarlet, for he had been on
+duty that morning, and had just come in. His sabre was cast upon the
+floor before him, and his shako was on the table. As Charles looked at
+him, he passed his hand over his hair. There was one ring on it, but
+_such_ a ring! "That's a high-bred hand enough," said Charles to
+himself. "And he hasn't got too much jewellery on him. I wonder who the
+deuce he is?"
+
+"This is the young man, sir," said Charles's new friend.
+
+Lieutenant Hornby was looking at Charles, and after a pause, said--
+
+"I take him on your recommendation, Sloane. I have no doubt he will do.
+He seems a good fellow. You are a good fellow, ain't you?" he continued,
+addressing Charles personally, with that happy graceful insolence which
+is the peculiar property of prosperous and entirely amiable young men,
+and which charms one in spite of oneself.
+
+Charles replied, "I am quarrelsome sometimes among my equals, but I am
+always good-tempered among horses."
+
+"That will do very well. You may punch the other two lads' heads as much
+as you like. They don't mind me; perhaps they may you. You will be over
+them. You will have the management of everything. You will have
+unlimited opportunities of robbing and plundering me, with an entire
+absence of all chance of detection. But you won't do it. It isn't your
+line, I saw at once. Let me look at your hand."
+
+Charles gave him the great ribbed paw which served him in that capacity.
+And Hornby said--
+
+"Ha! Gentleman's hand. No business of mine. Don't wear that ring, will
+you? A groom mustn't wear such rings as that. Any character?"
+
+Charles showed him the letter Lord Ascot had written.
+
+"Lord Ascot, eh? I know Lord Welter, slightly."
+
+"The deuce you do," thought Charles.
+
+"Were you in Lord Ascot's stables?"
+
+"No, sir. I am the son of Squire Ravenshoe's gamekeeper. The Ravenshoes
+and my Lord Ascot's family are connected by marriage. Ravenshoe is in
+the west country, sir. Lord Ascot knows me by repute, sir, and has a
+good opinion of me."
+
+"It is perfectly satisfactory. Sloane, will you put him in the way of
+his duties? Make the other lads understand that he is master, will you?
+You may go."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+
+SOME OF THE HUMOURS OF A LONDON MEWS.
+
+
+So pursuing the course of our story, we have brought ourselves to the
+present extraordinary position. That Charles Ravenshoe, of Ravenshoe, in
+the county Devonshire, Esquire, and some time of St. Paul's College,
+Oxford, has hired himself out as groom to Lieutenant Hornby, of the
+140th Hussars, and that also the above-named Charles Ravenshoe was not,
+and never had been Charles Ravenshoe at all, but somebody else all the
+time, to wit, Charles Horton, a gamekeeper's son, if indeed he was even
+this, having been christened under a false name.
+
+The situation is so extraordinary and so sad, that having taken the
+tragical view of it in the previous chapter, we must of necessity begin
+to look on the brighter side of it now. And this is the better art,
+because it is exactly what Charles began to do himself. One blow
+succeeded the other so rapidly, the utter bouleversement of all that he
+cared about in the world. Father, friends, position, mistress, all lost
+in one day, had brought on a kind of light-hearted desperation, which
+had the effect of making him seek company, and talk boisterously and
+loud all day. It was not unnatural in so young and vigorous a man. But
+if he woke in the night, there was the cold claw grasping his heart.
+Well, I said we would have none of this at present, and we won't.
+
+Patient old earth, intent only on doing her duty in her set courses, and
+unmindful of the mites which had been set to make love or war on her
+bosom, and the least of whom was worth her whole well-organised mass,
+had rolled on, and on, until by bringing that portion of her which
+contains the island of Britain, gradually in greater proximity to the
+sun, she had produced that state of things on that particular part of
+her which is known among mortals as spring. Now, I am very anxious to
+please all parties. Some people like a little circumlocution, and for
+them the above paragraph was written; others do not, and for them, I
+state that it was the latter end of May, and beg them not to read the
+above flight of fancy, but to consider it as never having been written.
+
+It was spring. On the sea-coast, the watchers at the lighthouses and the
+preventive stations began to walk about in their shirt-sleeves, and trim
+up their patches of spray-beaten garden, hedged with tree-mallow and
+tamarisk, and to thank God that the long howling winter nights were
+past for a time. The fishermen shouted merrily one to another as they
+put off from the shore, no longer dreading a twelve hours' purgatory of
+sleet and freezing mist and snow; saying to one another how green the
+land looked, and how pleasant mackerel time was after all. Their wives,
+light-hearted at the thought that the wild winter was past, and that
+they were not widows, brought their work out to the doors, and gossiped
+pleasantly in the sun, while some of the bolder boys began to paddle
+about in the surf, and try to believe that the Gulf Stream had come in,
+and that it was summer again, and not only spring.
+
+In inland country places the barley was all in and springing, the
+meadows were all bush-harrowed, rolled, and laid up for hay; nay, in
+early places, brimful of grass, spangled with purple orchises, and in
+moist rich places golden with marsh marigold, over which the south-west
+wind passed pleasantly, bringing a sweet perfume of growing vegetation,
+which gave those who smelt it a tendency to lean against gates, and
+stiles, and such places, and think what a delicious season it was, and
+wish it were to last for ever. The young men began to slip away from
+work somewhat early of an evening, not (as now) to the parade ground, or
+the butts, but to take their turn at the wicket on the green, where Sir
+John (our young landlord) was to be found in a scarlet flannel shirt,
+bowling away like a catapult, at all comers, till the second bell began
+to ring, and he had to dash off and dress. Now lovers walking by
+moonlight in deep banked lanes began to notice how dark and broad the
+shadows grew, and to wait at the lane's end by the river, to listen to
+the nightingale, with his breast against the thorn, ranging on from
+height to height of melodious passion, petulant at his want of art, till
+he broke into one wild jubilant burst, and ceased, leaving night silent,
+save for the whispering of new-born insects, and the creeping sound of
+reviving vegetation.
+
+Spring. The great renewal of the lease. The time when nature-worshippers
+made good resolutions, to be very often broken before the leaves fall.
+The time the country becomes once more habitable and agreeable. Does it
+make any difference in the hundred miles of brick and mortar called
+London, save, in so far as it makes every reasonable Christian pack up
+his portmanteau and fly to the green fields, and lover's lanes
+before-mentioned (though it takes two people for the latter sort of
+business)? Why, yes; it makes a difference to London certainly, by
+bringing somewhere about 10,000 people, who have got sick of shooting
+and hunting through the winter months, swarming into the west end of
+it, and making it what is called full.
+
+I don't know that they are wrong after all, for London is a mighty
+pleasant place in the season (we don't call it spring on the
+paving-stones). At this time the windows of the great houses in the
+squares begin to be brilliant with flowers; and, under the awnings of
+the balconies, one sees women moving about in the shadow. Now, all
+through the short night, one hears the ceaseless low rolling thunder of
+beautiful carriages, and in the daytime also the noise ceases not. All
+through the west end of the town there is a smell of flowers, of
+fresh-watered roads, and Macassar oil; while at Covent Garden, the scent
+of the peaches and pine-apples begins to prevail over that of rotten
+cabbage-stalks. The fiddlers are all fiddling away at concert pitch for
+their lives, the actors are all acting their very hardest, and the men
+who look after the horses have never a minute to call their own, day or
+night.
+
+It is neither to dukes nor duchesses, to actors nor fiddlers, that we
+must turn our attention just now, but to a man who was sitting in a
+wheelbarrow, watching a tame jackdaw.
+
+The place was a London mews, behind one of the great squares--the time
+was afternoon. The weather was warm and sunny. All the proprietors of
+the horses were out riding or driving, and so the stables were empty,
+and the mews were quiet.
+
+This was about a week after Charles's degradation, almost the first hour
+he had to himself in the daytime, and so he sat pondering on his unhappy
+lot.
+
+Lord Ballyroundtower's coachman's wife was hanging out the clothes. She
+was an Irishwoman off the estate (his lordship's Irish residences, I
+see, on referring to the peerage, are, "The Grove," Blarney, and
+"Swatewathers," near Avoca). When I say that she was hanging out the
+clothes, I am hardly correct, for she was only fixing the lines up to do
+so, and being of short stature, and having to reach was naturally
+showing her heels, and the jackdaw, perceiving this, began to hop
+stealthily across the yard. Charles saw what was coming, and became
+deeply interested. He would not have spoken for his life. The jackdaw
+sidled up to her, and began digging into her tendon Achilles with his
+hard bill with a force and rapidity which showed that he was fully aware
+of the fact, that the amusement, like most pleasant things, could not
+last long, and must therefore be made the most of. Some women would have
+screamed and faced round at the first assault. Not so our Irish friend.
+She endured the anguish until she had succeeded in fastening the
+clothes-line round the post, and then she turned round on the jackdaw,
+who had fluttered away to a safe distance, and denounced him.
+
+"Bad cess to ye, ye impident divvle, sure it's Sathan's own sister's
+son, ye are, ye dirty prothestant, pecking at the hales of an honest
+woman, daughter of my lord's own man, Corny O'Brine, as was a dale
+bether nor them as sits on whalebarrows, and sets ye on too't--" (this
+was levelled at Charles, so he politely took off his cap, and bowed).
+
+"Though, God forgive me, there's some sitting on whalebarrows as should
+be sitting in drawing-rooms, may be (here the jackdaw raised one foot,
+and said 'Jark'). Get out, ye baste; don't ye hear me blessed lady's own
+bird swearing at ye, like a gentleman's bird as he is. A pretty dear."
+
+This was strictly true. Lord Ballyroundtower's brother, the Honourable
+Frederick Mulligan, was a lieutenant in the navy. A short time before
+this, being on the Australian station, and wishing to make his
+sister-in-law a handsome present, he had commissioned a Sydney Jew
+bird-dealer to get him a sulphur-crested cockatoo, price no object, but
+the best talker in the colony. The Jew faithfully performed his behest;
+he got him the best talking cockatoo in the colony, and the Hon. Fred
+brought it home in triumph to his sister-in-law's drawing-room in
+Belgrave Square.
+
+The bird was a beautiful talker. There was no doubt about that. It had
+such an amazingly distinct enunciation. But then the bird was not always
+discreet. Nay, to go further, the bird never _was_ discreet. He had been
+educated by a convict bullock-driver, and finished off by the sailors on
+board H.M.S. _Actæon_; and really, you know, sometimes he did say things
+he ought not to have said. It was all very well pretending that you
+couldn't hear him, but it rendered conversation impossible. You were
+always in agony at what was to come next. One afternoon, a great many
+people were there, calling. Old Lady Hainault was there. The bird was
+worse than ever. Everybody tried to avoid a silence, but it came
+inexorably. That awful old woman, Lady Hainault, broke it by saying that
+she thought Fred Mulligan must have been giving the bird private lessons
+himself. After that, you know, it wouldn't do. Fred might be angry, but
+the bird must go to the mews.
+
+So there the bird was, swearing dreadfully at the jackdaw. At last, her
+ladyship's pug-dog, who was staying with the coachman for medical
+treatment, got excited, bundled out of the house, and attacked the
+jackdaw. The jackdaw formed square to resist cavalry, and sent the dog
+howling into the house again quicker than he came out. After which the
+bird barked, and came and sat on the dunghill by Charles.
+
+The mews itself, as I said, was very quiet, with a smell of stable,
+subdued by a fresh scent of sprinkled water; but at the upper end it
+joined a street leading from Belgrave Square towards the Park, which was
+by no means quiet, and which smelt of geraniums and heliotropes.
+Carriage after carriage went blazing past the end of the mews, along
+this street, like figures across the disk of a magic lanthorn. Some had
+scarlet breeches, and some blue; and there were pink bonnets, and yellow
+bonnets, and Magenta bonnets; and Charles sat on the wheelbarrow by the
+dunghill, and looked at it all, perfectly contented.
+
+A stray dog lounged in out of the street. It was a cur dog--that any one
+might see. It was a dog which had bit its rope and run away, for the
+rope was round its neck now; and it was a thirsty dog, for it went up to
+the pump and licked the stones. Charles went and pumped for it, and it
+drank. Then, evidently considering that Charles, by his act of good
+nature, had acquired authority over its person, and having tried to do
+without a master already, and having found it wouldn't do, it sat down
+beside Charles, and declined to proceed any further.
+
+There was a public-house at the corner of the mews, where it joined the
+street; and on the other side of the street you could see one house, No.
+16. The footman of No. 16 was in the area, looking through the railings.
+A thirsty man came to the public-house on horseback, and drank a pot of
+beer at a draught, turning the pot upside down. It was too much for the
+footman, who disappeared.
+
+Next came a butcher with a tray of meat, who turned into the area of No.
+16, and left the gate open. After him came a blind man, led by a dog.
+The dog, instead of going straight on, turned down the area steps after
+the butcher. The blind man thought he was going round the corner.
+Charles saw what would happen; but, before he had time to cry out, the
+blind man had plunged headlong down the area steps and disappeared,
+while from the bottom, as from the pit, arose the curses of the butcher.
+
+Charles and others assisted the blind man up, gave him some beer, and
+sent him on his way. Charles watched him. After he had gone a little
+way, he began striking spitefully at where he thought his dog was, with
+his stick. The dog was evidently used to this amusement, and dexterously
+avoided the blows. Finding vertical blows of no avail, the blind man
+tried horizontal ones, and caught an old gentleman across the shins,
+making him drop his umbrella and catch up his leg. The blind man
+promptly asked an alms from him, and, not getting one, turned the
+corner; and Charles saw him no more.
+
+The hot street and, beyond, the square, the dusty lilacs and laburnums,
+and the crimson hawthorns. What a day for a bathe! outside the gentle
+surf, with the sunny headlands right and left, and the moor sleeping
+quietly in the afternoon sunlight, and Lundy, like a faint blue cloud on
+the Atlantic horizon, and the old house----He was away at Ravenshoe on a
+May afternoon.
+
+They say poets are never sane; but are they ever mad? Never. Even old
+Cowper saved himself from actual madness by using his imagination.
+Charles was no poet; but he was a good day-dreamer, and so now, instead
+of maddening himself in his squalid brick prison, he was away in the old
+bay, bathing and fishing, and wandering up the old stream, breast high
+among king-fern under the shadowy oaks.
+
+Bricks and mortar, carriages and footmen, wheelbarrows and dunghills,
+all came back in one moment, and settled on his outward senses with a
+jar. For there was a rattle of horse's feet on the stones, and the clank
+of a sabre, and Lieutenant Hornby, of the 140th Hussars (Prince Arthur's
+Own), came branking into the yard, with two hundred pounds' worth of
+trappings on him, looking out for his servant. He was certainly a
+splendid fellow, and Charles looked at him with a certain kind of pride,
+as on something that he had a share in.
+
+"Come round to the front door, Horton, and take my horse up to the
+barracks" (the Queen had been to the station that morning, and his guard
+was over).
+
+Charles walked beside him round into Grosvenor Place. He could not avoid
+stealing a glance up at the magnificent apparition beside him; and, as
+he did so, he met a pair of kind grey eyes looking down on him.
+
+"You mustn't sit and mope there, Horton," said the lieutenant; "it never
+does to mope. I know it is infernally hard to help it, and of course you
+can't associate with servants, and that sort of thing, at first; but you
+will get used to it. If you think I don't know you are a gentleman, you
+are mistaken. I don't know who you are, and shall not try to find out.
+I'll lend you books or anything of that sort; but you mustn't brood over
+it. I can't stand seeing my fellows wretched, more especially a fellow
+like you."
+
+If it had been to save his life, Charles couldn't say a word. He looked
+up at the lieutenant and nodded his head. The lieutenant understood him
+well enough, and said to himself--
+
+"Poor fellow!"
+
+So there arose between these two a feeling which lightened Charles's
+servitude, and which, before the end came, had grown into a liking.
+Charles's vengeance was not for Hornby, for the injury did not come from
+him. His vengeance was reserved for another, and we shall see how he
+took it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+A GLIMPSE OF SOME OLD FRIENDS.
+
+
+Hitherto I have been able to follow Charles right on without leaving him
+for one instant: now, however, that he is reduced to sitting on a
+wheelbarrow in a stable-yard, we must see a little less of him. He is,
+of course, our principal object; but he has removed himself from the
+immediate sphere of all our other acquaintances, and so we must look up
+some of them, and see how far they, though absent, are acting on his
+destiny--nay, we must look up every one of them sooner or later, for
+there is not one who is not in some way concerned in his adventures past
+and future.
+
+By reason of her age, her sex, and her rank, my Lady Ascot claims our
+attention first. We left the dear old woman in a terrible taking on
+finding that Charles had suddenly left the house and disappeared. Her
+wrath gave way to tears, and her tears to memory. Bitterly she blamed
+herself now for what seemed, years ago, such a harmless deceit. It was
+not too late. Charles might be found; would come back, surely--would
+come back to his poor old aunt! He would never--hush! it won't do to
+think of that!
+
+Lady Ascot thought of a brilliant plan, and put it into immediate
+execution. She communicated with Mr. Scotland Yard, the eminent
+ex-detective officer, forwarding a close description of Charles, and a
+request that he might be found, alive or dead, immediately. Her efforts
+were crowned with immediate and unlooked-for success. In a week's time
+the detective had discovered, not one Charles Ravenshoe, but three, from
+which her ladyship might take her choice. But the worst of it was that
+neither of the three was Charles Ravenshoe. There was a remarkable point
+of similarity between Charles and them, certainly; and that point was
+that they were all three young gentlemen under a cloud, and had all
+three dark hair and prominent features. Here the similarity ended.
+
+The first of the cases placed so promptly before her ladyship by
+Inspector Yard presented some startling features of similarity with that
+of Charles. The young gentleman was from the West of England, had been
+at college somewhere, had been extravagant ("God bless him, poor dear!
+when lived a Ravenshoe that wasn't?" thought Lady Ascot), had been
+crossed in love, the inspector believed (Lady Ascot thought she had got
+her fish), and was now in the Coldbath Fields Prison, doing two years'
+hard labour for swindling, of which two months were yet to run. The
+inspector would let her ladyship know the day of his release.
+
+This could not be Charles: and the next young gentleman offered to her
+notice was a worse shot than the other. He also was dark-haired; but
+here at once all resemblance ceased. This one had started in life with
+an ensigncy in the line. He had embezzled the mess funds, had been to
+California, had enlisted, deserted, and sold his kit, been a
+billiard-marker, had come into some property, had spent it, had enlisted
+again, had been imprisoned for a year and discharged--here Lady Ascot
+would read no more, but laid down the letter, saying, "Pish!"
+
+But the inspector's cup was not yet full. The unhappy man was acting
+from uncertain information, he says. He affirmed, throughout all the
+long and acrimonious discussion which followed, that his only
+instructions were to find a young gentleman with dark hair and a hook
+nose. If this be the case, he may possibly be excused for catching a
+curly-headed little Jew of sixteen, who was drinking himself to death in
+a public-house off Regent Street, and producing him as Charles
+Ravenshoe. His name was Cohen, and he had stolen some money from his
+father and gone to the races. This was so utterly the wrong article,
+that Lady Ascot wrote a violent letter to the ex-inspector, of such an
+extreme character, that he replied by informing her ladyship that he had
+sent her letter to his lawyer. A very pretty quarrel followed, which I
+have not time to describe.
+
+No tidings of Charles. He had hidden himself too effectually. So the old
+woman wept and watched--watched for her darling who came not, and for
+the ruin that she saw settling down upon her house like a dark cloud,
+that grew evermore darker.
+
+And little Mary had packed up her boxes and passed out of the old house,
+with the hard, bitter world before her. Father Mackworth had met her in
+the hall, and had shaken hands with her in silence. He loved her, in
+his way, so much, that he cared not to say anything. Cuthbert was
+outside, waiting to hand her to her carriage. When she was seated he
+said, "I shall write to you, Mary, for I can't say all I would." And
+then he opened the door and kissed her affectionately; then the carriage
+went on, and before it entered the wood she had a glimpse of the grey
+old house, and Cuthbert on the steps before the porch, bareheaded,
+waving his hand; then it was among the trees, and she had seen the last
+of him for ever; then she buried her face in her hands, and knew, for
+the first time, perhaps, how well she had loved him.
+
+She was going, as we know, to be nursery-governess to the orphan
+children of Lord Hainault's brother. She went straight to London to
+assume her charge. It was very late when she got to Paddington. One of
+Lord Hainault's carriages was waiting for her, and she was whirled
+through "the season" to Grosvenor Square. Then she had to walk alone
+into the great lighted hall, with the servants standing right and left,
+and looking at nothing, as well-bred servants are bound to do. She
+wished for a moment that the poor little governess had been allowed to
+come in a cab.
+
+The groom of the chambers informed her that her ladyship had gone out,
+and would not be home till late; that his lordship was dressing; and
+that dinner was ready in Miss Corby's room whenever she pleased.
+
+So she went up. She did not eat much dinner; the steward's-room boy in
+attendance had his foolish heart moved to pity by seeing how poor an
+appetite she had, when he thought what he could have done in that line
+too.
+
+Presently she asked the lad where was the nursery. The second door to
+the right. When all was quiet, she opened her door, and thought she
+would go and see the children asleep. At that moment the nursery-door
+opened, and a tall, handsome, quiet-looking man came out. It was Lord
+Hainault; she had seen him before.
+
+"I like this," said she, as she drew back. "It was kind of him to go and
+see his brother's children before he went out;" and so she went into the
+nursery.
+
+An old nurse was sitting by the fire sewing. The two elder children were
+asleep; but the youngest, an audacious young sinner of three, had
+refused to do anything of the kind until the cat came to bed with him.
+The nursery cat being at that time out a-walking on the leads, the
+nurserymaid had been despatched to borrow one from the kitchen. At this
+state of affairs Mary entered. The nurse rose and curtsied, and the
+rebel clambered on her knee, and took her into his confidence. He told
+her that that day, while walking in the square, he had seen a
+chimney-sweep; that he had called to Gus and Flora to come and look;
+that Gus had been in time and seen him go round the corner, but that
+Flora had come too late, and cried, and so Gus had lent her his hoop,
+and she had left off, &c., &c. After a time he requested to be allowed
+to say his prayers to her: to which the nurse objected on the
+theological ground that he had said them twice already that evening,
+which was once more than was usually allowed. Soon after this the little
+head lay heavy on Mary's arm, and the little hand loosed its hold on
+hers, and the child was asleep.
+
+She left the nursery with a lightened heart; but, nevertheless, she
+cried herself to sleep. "I wonder, shall I like Lady Hainault; Charles
+used to. But she is very proud, I believe. I cannot remember much of
+her.--How those carriages growl and roll, almost like the sea at dear
+old Ravenshoe." Then, after a time, she slept.
+
+There was a light in her eyes, not of dawn, which woke her. A tall,
+handsome woman, in silk and jewels, came and knelt beside her and kissed
+her; and said that, now her old home was broken up, she must make one
+there, and be a sister to her, and many other kind words of the same
+sort. It was Lady Hainault (the long Burton girl, as Madam Adelaide
+called her) come home from her last party; and in such kind keeping I
+think we may leave little Mary for the present.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+IN WHICH FRESH MISCHIEF IS BREWED.
+
+
+Charles's duties were light enough; he often wished they had been
+heavier. There were such long idle periods left for thinking and
+brooding. He rather wondered at first why he was not more employed. He
+never was in attendance on the lieutenant, save in the daytime. One of
+the young men under him drove the brougham, and was out all night and in
+bed all day; and the other was a mere stable-lad from the country.
+Charles's duty consisted almost entirely in dressing himself about two
+o'clock, and loitering about town after his master; and, after he had
+been at this work about a fortnight, it seemed to him as if he had been
+at it a year or more.
+
+Charles soon found out all he cared to know about the lieutenant. He was
+the only son and heir of an eminent solicitor, lately deceased, who had
+put him into the splendid regiment to which he belonged in order to get
+him into good society. The young fellow had done well enough in that
+way. He was amazingly rich, amazingly handsome, and passionately fond of
+his profession, at which he really worked hard; but he was terribly
+fast. Charles soon found that out; and the first object which he placed
+before himself, when he began to awaken from the first dead torpor which
+came on him after his fall, was to gain influence with him and save him
+from ruin.
+
+"He is burning the candle at both ends," said Charles. "He is too good
+to go to the deuce. In time, if I am careful, he may listen to me."
+
+And, indeed, it seemed probable. From the very first, Hornby had treated
+Charles with great respect and consideration. Hornby knew he was a
+gentleman. One morning, before Charles had been many days with him, the
+brougham had not come into the mews till seven o'clock; and Charles,
+going to his lodgings at eight, had found him in uniform, bolting a cup
+of coffee before going on duty. There was a great pile of money,
+sovereigns and notes, on the dressing-table, and he caught Charles
+looking at it.
+
+Hornby laughed. "What are you looking at with that solemn face of
+yours?" said he.
+
+"Nothing, sir," said Charles.
+
+"You are looking at that money," said Hornby; "and you are thinking that
+it would be as well if I didn't stay out all night playing--eh?"
+
+"I might have thought so, sir," said Charles. "I did think so."
+
+"Quite right, too. Some day I will leave off, perhaps."
+
+And then he rattled out of the room, and Charles watched him riding down
+the street, all blue, and scarlet, and gold, a brave figure, with the
+world at his feet.
+
+"There is time yet," said Charles.
+
+The first time Charles made his appearance in livery in the street he
+felt horribly guilty. He was in continual terror lest he should meet
+some one he knew; but, after a time, when he found that day after day he
+could walk about and see never a familiar face, he grew bolder. He
+wished sometimes he could see some one he knew from a distance, so as
+not to be recognised--it was so terrible lonely.
+
+Day after day he saw the crowds pass him in the street, and recognised
+no one. In old times, when he used to come to London on a raid from
+Oxford, he fancied he used to recognise an acquaintance at every step;
+but now, day after day went on, and he saw no one he knew. The world had
+become to him like a long uneasy dream of strange faces.
+
+After a very few days of his new life, there began to grow on him a
+desire to hear of those he had left so abruptly; a desire which was at
+first mere curiosity, but which soon developed into a yearning regret.
+At first, after a week or so, he began idly wondering where they all
+were, and what they thought of his disappearance; and at this time,
+perhaps, he may have felt a little conceited in thinking how he occupied
+their thoughts, and of what importance he had made himself by his sudden
+disappearance. But his curiosity and vanity soon wore away, and were
+succeeded by a deep gnawing desire to hear something of them all--to
+catch hold of some little thread, however thin, which should connect him
+with his past life, and with those he had loved so well. He would have
+died in his obstinacy sooner than move one inch towards his object; but
+every day, as he rode about the town, dressed in the livery of
+servitude, which he tried to think was his heritage, and yet of which he
+was ashamed, he stared hither and thither at the passing faces, trying
+to find one, were it only that of the meanest servant, which should
+connect him with the past.
+
+At last, and before long, he saw some one.
+
+One afternoon he was under orders to attend his master on horseback, as
+usual. After lunch, Hornby came out, beautifully dressed, handsome and
+happy, and rode up Grosvenor Place into the park. At the entrance to
+Rotten Row he joined an old gentleman and his two daughters, and they
+rode together, chatting pleasantly. Charles rode behind with the other
+groom, who talked to him about the coming Derby, and would have betted
+against Haphazard at the current odds. They rode up and down the Row
+twice, and then Hornby, calling Charles, gave him his horse and walked
+about by the Serpentine, talking to every one, and getting a kindly
+welcome from great and small, for the son of a great attorney, with
+wealth, manners, and person, may get into very good society, if he is
+worth it; or, quite possibly, if he isn't.
+
+Then Hornby and Charles left the park, and, coming down Grosvenor Place,
+passed into Pall Mall. Here Hornby went into a club, and left Charles
+waiting in the street with his horse half an hour or more.
+
+Then he mounted again, and rode up St. James's Street, into Piccadilly.
+He turned to the left; and, at the bottom of the hill, not far from
+Half-moon Street, he went into a private house, and, giving Charles his
+reins, told him to wait for him; and so Charles waited there, in the
+afternoon sun, watching what went by.
+
+It was a sleepy afternoon, and the horses stood quiet, and Charles was a
+contented fellow, and he rather liked dozing there and watching the
+world go by. There is plenty to see in Piccadilly on an afternoon in the
+season, even for a passer-by; but, sitting on a quiet horse, with
+nothing to do or think about, one can see it all better. And Charles had
+some humour in him, and so he was amused at what he saw, and would have
+sat there an hour or more without impatience.
+
+Opposite to him was a great bonnet-shop, and in front of it was an
+orange-woman. A grand carriage dashed up to the bonnet-shop, so that he
+had to move his horses, and the orange-woman had to get out of the way.
+Two young ladies got out of the carriage, went in, and (as he believes)
+bought bonnets, leaving a third, and older one, sitting in a back seat,
+who nursed a pug dog, with a blue riband. Neither the coachman nor
+footman belonging to the carriage seemed to mind this lady. The footman
+thought he would like some oranges; so he went to the orange-woman. The
+orange-woman was Irish, for her speech bewrayed her, and the footman was
+from the county Clare; so those two instantly began comparing notes
+about those delectable regions, to such purpose, that the two ladies,
+having, let us hope, suited themselves in the bonnet way, had to open
+their own carriage-door and get in, before the footman was recalled to a
+sense of his duties--after which he shut the door, and they drove away.
+
+Then there came by a blind man. It was not the same blind man that
+Charles saw fall down the area, because that blind man's dog was a brown
+one, with a curly tail, and this one's dog was black with no tail at
+all. Moreover, the present dog carried a basket, which the other one did
+not. Otherwise they were so much alike (all blind men are), that Charles
+might have mistaken one for the other. This blind man met with no such
+serious accident as the other, either. Only, turning into the
+public-house at the corner, opposite Mr. Hope's, the dog lagged behind,
+and, the swing-doors closing between him and his master, Charles saw him
+pulled through by his chain, and nearly throttled.
+
+Next there came by Lord Palmerston, with his umbrella on his shoulder,
+walking airily arm-in-arm with Lord John Russell. They were talking
+together; and, as they passed, Charles heard Lord Palmerston say that it
+was much warmer on this side of the street than on the other. With
+which proposition Lord John Russell appeared to agree; and so they
+passed on westward.
+
+After this there came by three prize fighters, arm-in-arm; each of them
+had a white hat and a cigar; two had white bull-dogs, and one a
+black-and-tan terrier. They made a left wheel, and looked at Charles and
+his horses, and then they made a right wheel, and looked into the
+bonnet-shop; after which they went into the public-house into which the
+blind man had gone before; and, from the noise which immediately arose
+from inside, Charles came to the conclusion that the two white bull-dogs
+and the black-and-tan terrier had set upon the blind man's dog, and
+touzled him.
+
+After the prize-fighters came Mr. Gladstone, walking very fast. A large
+Newfoundland dog with a walking-stick in his mouth blundered up against
+him, and nearly threw him down. Before he got under way again, the Irish
+orange-woman bore down on him, and faced him with three oranges in each
+hand, offering them for sale. Did she know, with the sagacity of her
+nation, that he was then on his way to the house, to make a Great
+Statement, and that he would want oranges? I cannot say. He probably got
+his oranges at Bellamy's for he bought none of her. After him came a
+quantity of indifferent people; and then Charles's heart beat high--for
+here was some one coming whom he knew with a vengeance.
+
+Lord Welter, walking calmly down the street, with his big chest thrown
+out, and his broad, stupid face in moody repose. He was thinking. He
+came so close to Charles that, stepping aside to avoid a passer-by, he
+whitened the shoulder of his coat against the pipe-clay on Charles's
+knee; then he stood stock still within six inches of him, but looking
+the other way towards the houses.
+
+He pulled off one of his gloves and bit his nails. Though his back was
+towards Charles, still Charles knew well what expression was on his face
+as he did that. The old cruel lowering of the eyebrows, and pinching in
+of the lips was there, he knew. The same expression as that which
+Marston remarked the time he quarrelled with Cuthbert once at
+Ravenshoe--mischief!
+
+He went into the house where Charles's master, Hornby, was; and Charles
+sat and wondered.
+
+Presently there came out on to the balcony above, six or seven
+well-dressed young men, who lounged with their elbows on the red
+cushions which were fixed to the railing, and talked, looking at the
+people in the street.
+
+Lord Welter and Lieutenant Hornby were together at the end. There was no
+scowl on Welter's face now; he was making himself agreeable. Charles
+watched him and Hornby; the conversation between them got eager, and
+they seemed to make an appointment. After that they parted, and Hornby
+came down stairs and got on his horse.
+
+They rode very slowly home. Hornby bowed right and left to the people he
+knew but seemed absent. When Charles took his horse at the door, he said
+suddenly to Charles--
+
+"I have been talking to a man who knows something of you, I
+believe--Lord Welter."
+
+"Did you mention me to him, sir?"
+
+"No; I didn't think of it."
+
+"You would do me a great kindness if you would not do so, sir."
+
+"Why," said Hornby, looking suddenly up.
+
+"I am sorry I cannot enter into particulars, sir; but, if I thought he
+would know where I was, I should at once quit your service and try to
+lose myself once more."
+
+"Lose yourself?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"H'm!" said Hornby, thoughtfully. "Well, I know there is something about
+you which I don't understand. I ain't sure it is any business of mine
+though. I will say nothing. You are not a man to chatter about anything
+you see. Mind you don't. You see how I trust you." And so he went in,
+and Charles went round to the stable.
+
+"Is the brougham going out to night?" he asked of his fellow-servant.
+
+"Ordered at ten," said the man. "Night-work again, I expect, I wanted to
+get out too. Consume the darned card-playing. Was you going anywhere
+to-night?"
+
+"Nowhere," said Charles.
+
+"It's a beautiful evening," said the man. "If you should by chance
+saunter up towards Grosvenor Square, and could leave a note for me, I
+should thank you very much; upon my soul I should."
+
+I don't think Charles ever hesitated at doing a good-natured action in
+his life. A request to him was like a command. It came as natural to him
+now to take a dirty, scrawled love-letter from a groom to a
+scullery-maid as in old times it did to lend a man fifty pounds. He said
+at once he would go with great pleasure.
+
+The man (a surly fellow enough at ordinary times) thanked him heartily;
+and, when Charles had got the letter, he sauntered away in that
+direction slowly, thinking of many things.
+
+"By Jove," he said to himself, "my scheme of hiding does not seem to be
+very successful. Little more than a fortnight gone, and I am thrown
+against Welter. What a strange thing!"
+
+It was still early in the afternoon--seven o'clock, or thereabouts--and
+he was opposite Tattersall's. A mail phaeton, with a pair of splendid
+horses, attracted his attention and diverted his thoughts. He turned
+down. Two eminent men on the turf walked past him up the nearly empty
+yard, and he heard one say to the other--
+
+"Ascot will run to win; that I know. He _must_. If Haphazard can stay,
+he is safe."
+
+To which the other said, "Pish!" and they passed on.
+
+"There they are again," said Charles, as he turned back. "The very birds
+of the air are talking about them. It gets interesting, though--if
+anything could ever be interesting again."
+
+St. George's Hospital. At the door was a gaudily-dressed, handsome young
+woman, who was asking the porter could she see some one inside. No. The
+visiting hours were over. She stood for a few minutes on the steps,
+impatiently biting her nails, and then fluttered down the street.
+
+What made him think of his sister Ellen? She must be found. That was the
+only object in the world, so to speak. There was nothing to be done,
+only to wait and watch.
+
+"I shall find her some day, in God's good time."
+
+The world had just found out that it was hungry, and was beginning to
+tear about in wheeled vehicles to its neighbours' houses to dinner. As
+the carriages passed Charles, he could catch glimpses of handsome girls,
+all a mass of white muslin, swan's-down fans, and fal-lals, going to
+begin their night's work; of stiff dandies, in white ties, yawning
+already; of old ladies in jewels, and old gentlemen buttoned up across
+the chest, going, as one might say, to see fair play among the young
+people. And then our philosophical Charles pleased himself by picturing
+how, in two months more, the old gentlemen would be among their turnips,
+the old ladies among their flowers and poor folks, the dandies creeping,
+creeping, weary hours through the heather, till the last maddening
+moment when the big stag was full in view, sixty yards off; and
+(prettiest thought of all), how the girls, with their thick shoes on,
+would be gossiping with old Goody Blake and Harry Gill, or romping with
+the village school-children on the lawn. Right, old Charles, with all
+but the dandies! For now the apotheosis of dandies was approaching. The
+time was coming when so many of them should disappear into that black
+thunder-cloud to the south, and be seen no more in park or club, in
+heather or stubble.
+
+But, in that same year, the London season went on much as usual; only
+folks talked of war, and the French were more popular than they are now.
+And through the din and hubbub poor Charles passed on like a lost sheep,
+and left his fellow-servant's note at an area in Grosvenor Square.
+
+"And which," said he to the man who took it, with promises of instant
+delivery, "is my Lord Hainault's house, now, for instance?"
+
+Lord Hainault's house was the other side of the square; number
+something. Charles thanked the man, and went across. When he had made it
+out he leant his back against the railings of the square, and watched
+it.
+
+The carriage was at the door. The coachman, seeing a handsomely-dressed
+groom leaning against the rails, called to him to come over and alter
+some strap or another. Charles ran over and helped him. Charles supposed
+her ladyship was going out to dinner. Yes, her ladyship was now coming
+out. And, almost before Charles had time to move out of the way, out she
+came, with her head in the air, more beautiful than ever, and drove
+away.
+
+He went back to his post from mere idleness. He wondered whether Mary
+had come there yet or not. He had half a mind to inquire, but was afraid
+of being seen. He still leant against the railings of the gate, as I
+said, in mere idleness, when he heard the sound of children's voices in
+the square behind.
+
+"That woman," said a child's voice, "was a gipsy-woman. I looked through
+the rails, and I said, 'Hallo, ma'am, what are you doing there?' And she
+asked me for a penny. And I said I couldn't give her anything, for I had
+given three halfpence to the Punch and Judy, and I shouldn't have any
+more money till next Saturday, which was quite true, Flora, as you
+know."
+
+"But, Gus," said another child's voice, "if she had been a gipsy-woman
+she would have tried to steal you, and make you beg in the streets; or
+else she would have told your fortune in coffee-grounds. I don't think
+she was a real gipsy."
+
+"I should like to have my fortune told in the coffee-grounds," said Gus;
+"but, if she had tried to steal me, I should have kicked her in the
+stomach. There is a groom outside there; let us ask him. Grooms go to
+the races, and see heaps of gipsies! I say, sir."
+
+Charles turned. A child's voice was always music to him. He had such a
+look on his face as he turned to them, that the children had his
+confidence in an instant. The gipsy question was laid before him
+instantly, by both Gus and Flora, with immense volubility, and he was
+just going to give an oracular opinion through the railings, when a
+voice--a low, gentle voice, which made him start--came from close by.
+
+"Gus and Flora, my dears, the dew is falling. Let us go in."
+
+"There is Miss Corby," said Gus. "Let us run to her."
+
+They raced to Mary. Soon after the three came to the gate, laughing, and
+passed close to him. The children were clinging to her skirt and talking
+merrily. They formed a pretty little group as they went across the
+street, and Mary's merry little laugh comforted him. "She is happy
+there," he said; "best as it is!"
+
+Once, when half-way across the street, she turned and looked towards
+him, before he had time to turn away. He saw that she did not dream of
+his being there, and went on. And so Charles sauntered home through the
+pleasant summer evening, saying to himself, "I think she is happy; I am
+glad she laughed."
+
+"Three meetings in one day! I shall be found out, if I don't mind. I
+must be very careful."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+IN WHICH AN ENTIRELY NEW, AND, AS WILL BE SEEN HEREAFTER, A MOST
+IMPORTANT CHARACTER IS INTRODUCED.
+
+
+The servants, I mean the stable servants, who lived in the mews where
+Charles did, had a club; and, a night or two after he had seen Mary in
+the square, he was elected a member of it. The duke's coachman, a wiry,
+grey, stern-looking, elderly man, waited upon him and informed him of
+the fact. He said that such a course was very unusual--in fact, without
+precedent. Men, he said, were seldom elected to the club until they were
+known to have been in good service for some years; but he (coachman) had
+the ear of the club pretty much, and had brought him in triumphant. He
+added that he could see through a brick wall as well as most men, and
+that when he see a _gentleman_ dressed in a livery, moping and brooding
+about the mews, he had said to himself that he wanted a little company,
+such as it was, to cheer him up, and so he had requested the club, &c.;
+and the club had done as he told them.
+
+"Now this is confoundedly kind of you," said Charles; "but I am not a
+gentleman; I am a gamekeeper's son."
+
+"I suppose you can read Greek, now, can't you?" said the coachman.
+
+Charles was obliged to confess he could.
+
+"Of course," said the coachman; "all gamekeepers' sons is forced to
+learn Greek, in order as they may slang the poachers in an unknown
+tongue. Fiddle-dedee! I know all about it; least-wise, guess. Come along
+with me; why, I've got sons as old as you. Come along."
+
+"Are they in service?" said Charles, by way of something to say.
+
+"Two of 'em are, but one's in the army."
+
+"Indeed!" said Charles, with more interest.
+
+"Ay; he is in your governor's regiment."
+
+"Does he like it?" said Charles. "I should like to know him."
+
+"Like it?--don't he?" said the coachman. "See what society he gets into.
+I suppose there ain't no gentlemen's sons troopers in that regiment, eh?
+Oh dear no. Don't for a moment suppose it, young man. Not at all."
+
+Charles was very much interested by this news. He made up his mind there
+and then that he would enlist immediately. But he didn't; he only
+thought about it.
+
+Charles found that the club was composed of about a dozen coachmen and
+superior pad-grooms. They were very civil to him, and to one another.
+There was nothing to laugh at. There was nothing that could be tortured
+into ridicule. They talked about their horses and their business quite
+naturally. There was an air of kindly fellowship, and a desire for
+mutual assistance among them, which, at times, Charles had not noticed
+at the university. One man sang a song, and sang it very prettily, too,
+about stag-hunting. He had got as far as--
+
+      "As every breath with sobs he drew,
+      The labouring buck strained full in view,"
+
+when the door opened, and an oldish groom came in.
+
+The song was not much attended to now. When the singer had finished, the
+others applauded him, but impatiently; and then there was a general
+exclamation of "Well?"
+
+"I've just come down from the Corner. There has been a regular run
+against Haphazard, and no one knows why. Something wrong with the horse,
+I suppose, because there's been no run on any other in particular, only
+against him."
+
+"Was Lord Ascot there?" said some one.
+
+"Ah, that he was. Wouldn't bet though, even at the long odds. Said he'd
+got every sixpence he was worth on the horse, and would stand where he
+was; and that's true, they say. And master says, likewise, that Lord
+Welter would have taken 'em, but that his father stopped him."
+
+"That looks queerish," said some one else.
+
+"Ay, and wasn't there a jolly row, too?"
+
+"Who with?" asked several.
+
+"Lord Welter and Lord Hainault. It happened outside, close to me. Lord
+Hainault was walking across the yard, and Lord Welter came up to him and
+said, 'How d'ye do, Hainault?' and Lord Hainault turned round and said,
+quite quiet, 'Welter, you are a scoundrel!' And Lord Welter said,
+'Hainault, you are out of your senses;' but he turned pale, too, and he
+looked--Lord! I shouldn't like to have been before him--and Lord
+Hainault says, 'You know what I mean;' and Lord Welter says, 'No, I
+don't; but, by Gad, you shall tell me;' and then the other says, as
+steady as a rock, 'I'll tell you. You are a man that one daren't leave a
+woman alone with. Where's that Casterton girl? Where's Adelaide Summers?
+Neither a friend's house, nor your own father's house, is any protection
+for a woman against you.' 'Gad,' says Lord Welter, 'you were pretty
+sweet on the last-named yourself, once on a time.'"
+
+"Well!" said some one, "and what did Lord Hainault say?"
+
+"He said, 'you are a liar and a scoundrel, Welter.' And then Lord Welter
+came at him; but Lord Ascot came between them, shaking like anything,
+and says he, 'Hainault, go away, for God's sake; you don't know what you
+are saying.--Welter, be silent.' But they made no more of he than----"
+(here our friend was at a loss for a simile).
+
+"But how did it end?" asked Charles.
+
+"Well," said the speaker, "General Mainwaring came up, and laid his hand
+on Lord Welter's shoulder, and took him off pretty quiet. And that's all
+I know about it."
+
+It was clearly all. Charles rose to go, and walked by himself from
+street to street, thinking.
+
+Suppose he _was_ to be thrown against Lord Welter, how should he act?
+what should he say? Truly it was a puzzling question. The anomaly of his
+position was never put before him more strikingly than now. What could
+he say? what could he do?
+
+After the first shock, the thought of Adelaide's unfaithfulness was not
+so terrible as on the first day or two; many little unamiable traits of
+character, vanity, selfishness, and so on, unnoticed before, began to
+come forth in somewhat startling relief. Anger, indignation, and love,
+all three jumbled up together, each one by turns in the ascendant, were
+the frames of mind in which Charles found himself when he began thinking
+about her. One moment he was saying to himself, "How beautiful she was!"
+and the next, "She was as treacherous as a tiger; she never could have
+cared for me." But, when he came to think of Welter, his anger
+overmastered everything, and he would clench his teeth as he walked
+along, and for a few moments feel the blood rushing to his head and
+singing in his ears. Let us hope that Lord Welter will not come across
+him while he is in that mood, or there will be mischief.
+
+But his anger was soon over. He had just had one of these fits of anger
+as he walked along; and he was, like a good fellow, trying to conquer
+it, by thinking of Lord Welter as he was as a boy, and before he was a
+villain, when he came before St. Peter's Church, in Eaton Square, and
+stopped to look at some fine horses which were coming out of Salter's.
+
+At the east end of St. Peter's Church there is a piece of bare white
+wall in a corner, and in front of the wall was a little shoeblack.
+
+He was not one of the regular brigade, with a red shirt, but an "Arab"
+of the first water. He might have been seven or eight years old, but was
+small. His whole dress consisted of two garments; a ragged shirt, with
+no buttons, and half of one sleeve gone, and a ragged pair of trousers,
+which, small as he was, were too small for him, and barely reached below
+his knees. His feet and head were bare; and under a wild, tangled shock
+of hair looked a pretty, dirty, roguish face, with a pair of grey,
+twinkling eyes, which was amazingly comical. Charles stopped, watching
+him, and, as he did so, felt what we have most of us felt, I dare
+say--that, at certain times of vexation and anger, the company and
+conversation of children is the best thing for us.
+
+The little man was playing at fives against the bare wall, with such
+tremendous energy, that he did not notice that Charles had stopped, and
+was looking at him. Every nerve in his wiry, lean little body was braced
+up to the game; his heart and soul were as deeply enlisted in it, as
+though he were captain of the eleven, or stroke of the eight.
+
+He had no ball to play with, but he played with a brass button. The
+button flew hither and thither, being so irregular in shape, and the boy
+dashed after it like lightning. At last, after he had kept up
+five-and-twenty or so, the button flew over his head, and lighted at
+Charles's feet.
+
+As the boy turned to get it, his eyes met Charles's, and he stopped,
+parting the long hair from his forehead, and gazing on him, till the
+beautiful little face--beautiful through dirt and ignorance and
+neglect--lit up with a smile, as Charles looked at him, with the kind,
+honest old expression. And so began their acquaintance, almost comically
+at first.
+
+Charles don't care to talk much about that boy now. If he ever does, it
+is to recall his comical, humorous sayings and doings in the first part
+of their strange friendship. He never speaks of the end, even to me.
+
+The boy stood smiling at him, as I said, holding his long hair out of
+his eyes; and Charles looked on him and laughed, and forgot all about
+Welter and the rest of them at once.
+
+"I want my boots cleaned," he said.
+
+The boy said, "I can't clean they dratted top-boots. I cleaned a groom's
+boots a Toosday, and he punched my block because I blacked the tops.
+Where did that button go?"
+
+And Charles said, "You can clean the lower part of my boots, and do no
+harm. Your button is here against the lamp-post."
+
+The boy picked it up, and got his apparatus ready. But, before he began,
+he looked up in Charles's face, as if he was going to speak; then he
+began vigorously, but in half a minute looked up again, and stopped.
+
+Charles saw that the boy liked him, and wanted to talk to him; so he
+began, severely--
+
+"How came you to be playing fives with a brass button, eh?"
+
+The boy struck work at once, and answered, "I ain't got no ball."
+
+"If you begin knocking stamped pieces of metal about in the street,"
+continued Charles, "you will come to chuck-farthing, and from
+chuck-farthing to the gallows is a very short step indeed, I can assure
+you."
+
+The boy did not seem to know whether Charles was joking or not. He cast
+a quick glance up at his face; but, seeing no sign of a smile there, he
+spat on one of his brushes, and said--
+
+"Not if you don't cheat, it aint."
+
+Charles suffered the penalty, which usually follows on talking nonsense,
+of finding himself in a dilemma; so he said imperiously--
+
+"I shall buy you a ball to-morrow; I am not going to have you knocking
+buttons about against people's walls in broad daylight, like that."
+
+It was the first time that the boy had ever heard nonsense talked in his
+life. It was a new sensation. He gave a sharp look up into Charles's
+face again, and then went on with his work.
+
+"Where do you live, my little manikin?" said Charles directly, in that
+quiet pleasant voice I know so well.
+
+The boy did not look up this time. It was not very often, possibly, that
+he got spoken to so kindly by his patrons; he worked away, and answered
+that he lived in Marquis Court, in Southwark.
+
+"Why do you come so far, then?" asked Charles.
+
+The boy told him why he plodded so wearily, day after day, over here in
+the West-end. It was for family reasons, into which I must not go too
+closely. Somebody, it appeared, still came home, now and then, just once
+in a way, to see her mother, and to visit the den where she was bred;
+and there was still left one who would wait for her, week after
+week--still one pair of childish feet, bare and dirty, that would patter
+back beside her--still one childish voice that would prattle with her,
+on her way to her hideous home, and call her sister.
+
+"Have you any brothers?"
+
+Five altogether. Jim was gone for a sojer, it appeared, and Nipper was
+sent over the water. Harry was on the cross--
+
+"On the cross?" said Charles.
+
+"Ah!" the boy said, "he goes out cly-faking, and such. He's a prig, and
+a smart one, too. He's fly, is Harry."
+
+"But what is cly-faking?" said Charles.
+
+"Why a-prigging of wipes, and sneeze-boxes, and ridicules, and such."
+
+Charles was not so ignorant of slang as not to understand what his
+little friend meant now. He said--
+
+"But _you_ are not a thief, are you?"
+
+The boy looked up at him frankly and honestly, and said--
+
+"Lord bless you, no! I shouldn't make no hand of that. I ain't brave
+enough for that!"
+
+He gave the boy twopence, and gave orders that one penny was to be spent
+in a ball. And then he sauntered listlessly away--every day more
+listless, and not three weeks gone yet.
+
+His mind returned to this child very often. He found himself thinking
+more about the little rogue than he could explain. The strange babble of
+the child, prattling so innocently, and, as he thought, so prettily,
+about vice, and crime, and misery; about one brother transported, one a
+thief--and you see he could love his sister even to the very end of it
+all. Strange babble indeed from a child's lips.
+
+He thought of it again and again, and then, dressing himself plainly,
+he went up to Grosvenor Square, where Mary would be walking with Lord
+Charles Herries's children. He wanted to hear _them_ talk.
+
+He was right in his calculations; the children were there. All three of
+them this time; and Mary was there too. They were close to the rails,
+and he leant his back on them, and heard every word.
+
+"Miss Corby," said Gus, "if Lady Ascot is such a good woman, she will go
+to heaven when she dies?"
+
+"Yes, indeed, my dear," said Mary.
+
+"And, when grandma dies, will she go to heaven, too?" said the artful
+Gus, knowing as well as possible that old Lady Hainault and Lady Ascot
+were deadly enemies.
+
+"I hope so, my dear," said Mary.
+
+"But does Lady Ascot hope so? Do you think grandma would be happy
+if----"
+
+It became high time to stop master Gus, who was getting on too fast.
+Mary having bowled him out, Miss Flora had an innings.
+
+"When I grow up," said Flora, "I shall wear knee-breeches and top-boots,
+and a white bull-dog, and a long clay pipe, and I shall drive into
+Henley on a market-day and put up at the Catherine Wheel."
+
+Mary had breath enough left to ask why.
+
+"Because Farmer Thompson at Casterton dresses like that, and he is such
+a dear old darling. He gives us strawberries and cream; and in his
+garden are gooseberries and peacocks; and the peacock's wives don't
+spread out their tails like their husbands do--the foolish things. Now,
+when I am married----"
+
+Gus was rude enough to interrupt her here. He remarked--
+
+"When Archy goes to heaven, he'll want the cat to come to bed with him;
+and, if he can't get her, there'll be a pretty noise."
+
+"My dears," said Mary, "you must not talk anymore nonsense; I can't
+permit it."
+
+"But, my dear Miss Corby," said Flora, "we haven't been talking
+nonsense, have we? I told you the truth about Farmer Thompson."
+
+"I know what she means," said Gus; "we have been saying what came into
+our heads, and it vexes her. It is all nonsense, you know, about your
+wearing breeches and spreading out your tail like a peacock; we mustn't
+vex her."
+
+Flora didn't answer Gus, but answered Mary by climbing on her knee and
+kissing her. "Tell us a story, dear," said Gus.
+
+"What shall I tell?" said Mary.
+
+"Tell us about Ravenshoe," said Flora; "tell us about the fishermen, and
+the priest that walked about like a ghost in the dark passages; and
+about Cuthbert Ravenshoe, who was always saying his prayers; and about
+the other one who won the boat race."
+
+"Which one?" said silly Mary.
+
+"Why, the other; the one you like best. What was his name?"
+
+"Charles!"
+
+How quietly and softly she said it! The word left her lips like a deep
+sigh. One who heard it was a gentleman still. He had heard enough,
+perhaps too much, and walked away towards the stable and the
+public-house, leaving her in the gathering gloom of the summer's evening
+under the red hawthorns, and laburnums, among the children. And, as he
+walked away, he thought of the night he left Ravenshoe, when the little
+figure was standing in the hall all alone. "She might have loved me, and
+I her," he said, "if the world were not out of joint; God grant it may
+not be so!" And although he said, "God grant that she may not," he
+really wished it had been so; and from this very time Mary began to take
+Adelaide's place in his heart.
+
+Not that he was capable of falling in love with any woman at this time.
+He says he was crazy, and I believe him to a certain extent. It was a
+remarkably lucky thing for him that he had so diligently neglected his
+education. If he had not, and had found himself in his present position,
+with three or four times more of intellectual cravings to be satisfied,
+he would have gone mad, or taken to drinking. I, who write, have seen
+the thing happen.
+
+But, before the crash came, I have seen Charles patiently spending the
+morning cutting gun-wads from an old hat, in preference to going to his
+books. It was this interest in trifles which saved him just now. He
+could think at times, and had had education enough to think logically;
+but his brain was not so active but that he could cut gun-wads for an
+hour or so; though his friend William could cut one-third more gun-wads
+out of an old hat than he.
+
+He was thinking now, in his way, about these children--about Gus and
+Flora on the one hand, and the little shoeblack on the other. Both so
+innocent and pretty, and yet so different. He had taken himself from the
+one world and thrown himself into the other. There were two worlds and
+two standards--gentlemen and non-gentlemen. The "lower orders" did not
+seem to be so particular about the character of their immediate
+relations as the upper. That was well, for he belonged to the former
+now, and had a sister. If one of Lord Charles Herries's children had
+gone wrong, Gus and Flora would never have talked of him or her to a
+stranger. He must learn the secret of this armour which made the poor so
+invulnerable. He must go and talk to the little shoeblack.
+
+He thought that was the reason why he went to look after the little
+rogue next day; but that was not the real reason. The reason was, that
+he had found a friend in a lower grade than himself, who would admire
+him and look up to him. The first friend of that sort he had made since
+his fall. What that friend accidentally saved him from, we shall see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+THE DERBY.
+
+
+Hornby was lying on his back on the sofa in the window and looking out.
+He had sent for Charles, and Charles was standing beside him; but he had
+not noticed him yet. In a minute Charles said, "You sent for me, sir."
+
+Hornby turned sharply round. "By Jove, yes," he said, looking straight
+at him; "Lord Welter is married."
+
+Charles did not move a muscle, and Hornby looked disappointed. Charles
+only said--
+
+"May I ask who she is, sir?"
+
+"She is a Miss Summers. Do you know anything of her?"
+
+Charles knew Miss Summers quite well by sight--had attended her while
+riding, in fact. A statement which, though strictly true, misled Hornby
+more than fifty lies.
+
+"Handsome?"
+
+"Remarkably so. Probably the handsomest (he was going to say 'girl,' but
+said 'lady') I ever saw in my life."
+
+"H'm!" and he sat silent a moment, and gave Charles time to think. "I am
+glad he has married her, and before to-morrow, too."
+
+"Well," said Hornby again, "we shall go down in the drag to-morrow.
+Ferrers will drive, he says. I suppose he had better; he drives better
+than I. Make the other two lads come in livery, but come in black
+trousers yourself. Wear your red waistcoat; you can button your coat
+over it, if it is necessary."
+
+"Shall I wear my cockade, sir?"
+
+"Yes; that won't matter. Can you fight?"
+
+Charles said to himself, "I suppose we shall be in Queer Street
+to-morrow, then;" but he rather liked the idea. "I used to like it,"
+said he aloud. "I don't think I care about it now. Last year, at Oxford,
+I and three other University men, three Pauls and a Brazenose, had a
+noble stramash on Folly-bridge. That is the last fighting I have seen."
+
+"What College were you at?" said Hornby, looking out at the window;
+"Brazenose?"
+
+"Paul's," said Charles without thinking.
+
+"Then you are the man Welter was telling me about--Charles Ravenshoe."
+
+Charles saw it was no good to fence, and said, "Yes."
+
+"By Jove," said Hornby, "yours is a sad story. You must have ridden out
+with Lady Welter more than once, I take it."
+
+"Are you going to say anything to Lord Welter, sir?"
+
+"Not I. I like you too well to lose you. You will stick by me, won't
+you?"
+
+"I will," said Charles, "to the death. But oh, Hornby, for any sake mind
+those d----d bones!"
+
+"I will. But don't be an ass: I don't play half as much as you think."
+
+"You are playing with Welter now, sir; are you not?"
+
+"You are a pretty dutiful sort of a groom, I don't think," said Hornby,
+looking round and laughing good-naturedly. "What the dickens do you mean
+by cross-questioning me like that? Yes, I am. There--and for a noble
+purpose too."
+
+Charles said no more, but was well pleased enough. If Hornby had only
+given him a little more of his confidence!
+
+"I suppose," said Hornby, "if Haphazard don't win to-morrow, Lord Ascot
+will be a beggar."
+
+"They say," said Charles, "that he has backed his own horse through
+thick and thin, sir. It is inconceivable folly; but things could not be
+worse at Ranford, and he stands to win some sum on the horse, as they
+say, which would put everything right; and the horse is a favourite."
+
+"Favourites never win," said Hornby; "and I don't think that Lord Ascot
+has so much on him as they say."
+
+So the next day they went to the Derby. Sir Robert Ferrer, of the Guards
+drove (this is Inkerman Bob, and he has got a patent cork leg now, and
+a Victoria Cross, and goes a-shooting on a grey cob); and there was Red
+Maclean, on furlough from India; and there was Lord Swansea, youngest of
+existing Guardsmen, who blew a horn, and didn't blow it at all well; and
+there were two of Lieutenant Hornby's brother-officers, besides the
+Lieutenant: and behind, with Hornby's two grooms and our own Charles,
+dressed in sober black, was little Dick Ferrers, of the Home Office, who
+carried a peashooter, and pea-shot the noses of the leading horses of a
+dragful of Plungers, which followed them--which thing, had he been in
+the army, he wouldn't have dared to do. And the Plungers swore, and the
+dust flew, and the wind blew, and Sir Robert drove, and Charles laughed,
+and Lord Swansea gave them a little music, and away they went to the
+Derby.
+
+When they came on the course, Charles and his fellow-servants had enough
+to do to get the horses out and see after them. After nearly an hour's
+absence he got back to the drag, and began to look about him.
+
+The Plungers had drawn up behind them, and were lolling about. Before
+them was a family party--a fine elderly gentleman, a noble elderly lady,
+and two uncommonly pretty girls; and they were enjoying themselves. They
+were too well bred to make a noise; but there was a subdued babbling
+sound of laughter in that carriage, which was better music than that of
+a little impish German who, catching Charles's eye, played the accordion
+and waltzed before him, as did Salome before Herod, but with a different
+effect.
+
+The carriage beyond that was a very handsome one, and in it sat a lady
+most beautifully dressed, alone. By the step of the carriage were a
+crowd of men--Hornby, Hornby's brother-officers, Sir Robert Ferrers, and
+even little Dick Ferrers. Nay, there was a Plunger there; and they were
+all talking and laughing at the top of their voices.
+
+Charles, goose as he was, used to be very fond of Dickens's novels. He
+used to say that almost everywhere in those novels you came across a
+sketch, may be unconnected with the story, as bold and true and
+beautiful as those chalk sketches of Raphael in the Taylor--scratches
+which, when once seen, you could never forget any more. And, as he
+looked at that lady in the carriage, he was reminded of one of Dickens's
+master-pieces in that way, out of the "Old Curiosity Shop"--of a lady
+sitting in a carriage all alone at the races, who bought Nell's poor
+flowers, and bade her go home and stay there, for God's sake.
+
+Her back was towards him, of course; yet he guessed she was beautiful.
+"She is a fast woman, God help her!" said he; and he determined to go
+and look at her.
+
+He sauntered past the carriage, and turned to look at her. It was
+Adelaide.
+
+As faultlessly beautiful as ever, but ah--how changed! The winning
+petulance, so charming in other days, was gone from that face for ever.
+Hard, stern, proud, defiant, she sat there upright, alone. Fallen from
+the society of all women of her own rank, she knew--who better?--that
+not one of those men chattering around her would have borne to see her
+in the company of his sister, viscountess though she were, countess and
+mother of earls as she would be. They laughed, and lounged, and joked
+before her; and she tolerated them, and cast her gibes hither and
+thither among them, bitterly and contemptuously. It was her first
+appearance in the world. She had been married three days.
+
+Not a woman would speak to her: Lord Welter had coarsely told her so
+that morning; and bitterness and hatred were in her heart. It was for
+this she had bartered honour and good fame. She had got her title, flung
+to her as a bone to a dog by Welter; but her social power, for which she
+had sold herself, was lower, far lower, than when she was poor Adelaide
+Summers.
+
+It is right that it should be so, as a rule; in her case it was doubly
+right.
+
+Charles knew all this well enough. And at the first glance at her face
+he knew that "the iron had entered into her soul" (I know no better
+expression), and he was revenged. He had ceased to love her, but revenge
+is sweet--to some.
+
+Not to him. When he looked at her, he would have given his life that she
+might smile again, though she was no more to him what she had been. He
+turned, for fear of being seen, saying to himself,--
+
+"Poor girl! Poor dear Adelaide! She must lie on the bed she has made.
+God help her!"
+
+Haphazard was the first favourite--_facile princeps_. He was at two and
+a half to one. Bill Sykes, at three and a half, was a very dangerous
+horse. Then came Carnarvon, Lablache, Lick-pitcher, Ivanhoe, Ben Caunt,
+Bath-bun, Hamlet, Allfours, and Colonel Sibthorp. The last of these was
+at twenty to one. Ben Caunt was to make the running for Haphazard, so
+they said; and Colonel Sibthorp for Bill Sykes.
+
+So he heard the men talking round Lady Welter's carriage. Hornby's voice
+was as loud as any one's, and a pleasant voice it was; but they none of
+them talked very low. Charles could hear every word.
+
+"I am afraid Lady Welter will never forgive me," said Hornby, "but I
+have bet against the favourite."
+
+"I beg your pardon," said Adelaide.
+
+"I have bet against your horse, Lady Welter."
+
+"My horse?" said Adelaide, coolly and scornfully. "My horses are all
+post-horses, hired for the day to bring me here. I hope none of them are
+engaged in the races, as I shall have to go home with a pair only, and
+then I shall be disgraced for ever."
+
+"I mean Haphazard."
+
+"Oh, that horse?" said Adelaide; "that is Lord Ascot's horse, not mine.
+I hope you may win. You ought to win something, oughtn't you? Welter has
+won a great deal from you, I believe."
+
+The facts were the other way. But Hornby said no more to her. She was
+glad of this, though she liked him well enough, for she hoped that she
+had offended him by her insolent manner. But they were at
+cross-purposes.
+
+Presently Lord Welter came swinging in among them; he looked terribly
+savage and wild, and Charles thought he had been drinking. Knowing what
+he was in this mood, and knowing also the mood Adelaide was in, he
+dreaded some scene. "But they cannot quarrel so soon," he thought.
+
+"How d'ye do?" said Lord Welter to the knot of men round his wife's
+carriage. "Lady Welter, have your people got any champagne, or anything
+of that sort?"
+
+"I suppose so; you had better ask them."
+
+She had not forgotten what he had said to her that morning so brutally.
+She saw he was madly angry, and would have liked to make him commit
+himself before these men. She had fawned, and wheedled, and flattered
+for a month; but now she was Lady Welter, and he should feel it.
+
+Lord Welter looked still more savage, but said nothing. A man brought
+him some wine; and, as he gave it to him, Adelaide said, as quietly as
+though she were telling him that there was some dust on his coat--
+
+"You had better not take too much of it; you seem to have had enough
+already. Sir Robert Ferrers here is very taciturn in his cups, I am
+told; but you make such a terrible to-do when you are drunk."
+
+They should feel her tongue, these fellows! They might come and dangle
+about her carriage-door, and joke to one another, and look on her beauty
+as if she were a doll; but they should feel her tongue; Charles's heart
+sank within him as he heard her. Only a month gone, and she desperate.
+
+But of all the mischievous things done on that race-course that day--and
+they were many--the most mischievous and uncalled-for was Adelaide's
+attack upon Sir Robert Ferrers, who, though very young, was as sober,
+clever, and discreet a young man as any in the Guards, or in England.
+But Adelaide had heard a story about him. To wit, that, going to dinner
+at Greenwich with a number of friends, and having taken two glasses or
+so of wine at his dinner, he got it into his head that he was getting
+tipsy; and refused to speak another word all the evening for fear of
+committing himself.
+
+The other men laughed at Ferrers. And Lord Welter chose to laugh too; he
+was determined that his wife should not make a fool of him. But now
+every one began to draw off and take their places for the race. Little
+Dick Ferrers, whose whole life was one long effort of good nature,
+stayed by Lady Welter, though horribly afraid of her, because he did not
+like to see her left alone. Charles forced himself into a front position
+against the rails, with his friend Mr. Sloane, and held on thereby,
+intensely interested. He was passionately fond of horse-racing; and he
+forgot everything, even his poor, kind old friend Lord Ascot, in
+scrutinising every horse as it came by from the Warren, and guessing
+which was to win.
+
+Haphazard was the horse, there could be no doubt. A cheer ran all along
+the line, as he came walking majestically down, as though he knew he was
+the hero of the day. Bill Sykes and Carnarvon were as good as good could
+be; but Haphazard was better. Charles remembered Lady Ascot's tearful
+warning about his not being able to stay; but he laughed it to scorn.
+The horse had furnished so since then! Here he came, flying past them
+like a whirlwind, shaking the earth, and making men's ears tingle with
+the glorious music of his feet on the turf. Haphazard, ridden by Wells,
+must win! Hurrah for Wells!
+
+As the horse came slowly past again, he looked up to see the calm stern
+face; but it was not there. There were Lord Ascot's colours, dark blue
+and white sash; but where was Wells? The jockey was a smooth-faced young
+man, with very white teeth, who kept grinning and touching his cap at
+every other word Lord Ascot said to him. Charles hurriedly borrowed
+Sloane's card, and read,
+
+"Lord Ascot's Haphazard----J. Brooks."
+
+Who, in the name of confusion, was J. Brooks? All of a sudden he
+remembered. It was one of Lord Ascot's own lads. It was the very lad
+that rode Haphazard on the day that Adelaide and he rode out to the
+Downs, at Ranford, to see the horse gallop. Lord Ascot must be mad.
+
+"But Wells was to have ridden Haphazard, Mr. Sloane," said Charles.
+
+"He wouldn't," said Sloane, and laughed sardonically. But there was no
+time for Charles to ask why he laughed, for the horses were off.
+
+Those who saw the race were rather surprised that Ben Caunt had not
+showed more to the front at first to force the running; but there was
+not much time to think of such things. As they came round the corner,
+Haphazard, who was lying sixth, walked through his horses and laid
+himself alongside of Bill Sykes. A hundred yards from the post, Bill
+Sykes made a push, and drew a neck a-head; in a second or so more
+Haphazard had passed him, winning the Derby by a clear length; and poor
+Lord Ascot fell headlong down in a fit, like a dead man.
+
+Little Dicky Ferrers, in the excitement of the race, had climbed into
+the rumble of Adelaide's carriage, peashooter and all; and, having
+cheered rather noisily as the favourite came in winner, he was beginning
+to wonder whether he hadn't made a fool of himself, and what Lady Welter
+would say when she found where he had got to, when Lord Welter broke
+through the crowd, and came up to his wife, looking like death.
+
+"Get home, Adelaide! You see what has happened, and know what to do.
+Lady Welter, if I get hold of that boy Brooks, to-night, in a safe
+place, I'll murder him, by----!"
+
+"I believe you will, Welter. Keep away from him, unless you are a
+madman. If you anger the boy it will all come out. Where is Lord Ascot?"
+
+"Dead, they say, or dying. He is in a fit."
+
+"I ought to go to him, Welter, in common decency."
+
+"Go home, I tell you. Get the things you know of packed, and taken to
+one of the hotels at London Bridge. Any name will do. Be at home
+to-night, dressed, in a state of jubilation; and keep a couple of
+hundred pounds in the house. Here, you fellows! her ladyship's
+horses--look sharp!"
+
+Poor little Dicky Ferrers had heard more than he intended; but Lord
+Welter, in his madness, had not noticed him. He didn't use his
+peashooter going home, and spoke very little. There was a party of all
+of them in Hornby's rooms that night, and Dicky was so dull at first,
+that his brother made some excuse to get him by himself, and say a few
+eager, affectionate words to him.
+
+"Dick, my child, you have lost some money. How much? You shall have it
+to-morrow."
+
+"Not half a halfpenny, Bob; but I was with Lady Welter just after the
+race, and I heard more than I ought to have heard."
+
+"You couldn't help it, I hope."
+
+"I ought to have helped it; but it was so sudden, I couldn't help it.
+And now I can't ease my mind by telling anybody."
+
+"I suppose it was some rascality of Welter's," said Sir Robert,
+laughing. "It don't much matter; only don't tell any one, you know." And
+then they went in again, and Dicky never told any one till every one
+knew.
+
+For it came out soon that Lord Ascot had been madly betting, by
+commission, against his own horse, and that forty years' rents of his
+estates wouldn't set my lord on his legs again. With his usual
+irresolution, he had changed his policy--partly owing, I fear, to our
+dear old friend Lady Ascot's perpetual croaking about "Ramoneur blood,"
+and its staying qualities. So, after betting such a sum on his own horse
+as gave the betting world confidence, and excusing himself by pleading
+his well-known poverty from going further, he had hedged, by commission;
+and, could his horse have lost, he would have won enough to have set
+matters right at Ranford. He dared not ask a great jockey to ride for
+him under such circumstances, and so he puffed one of his own lads to
+the world, and broke with Wells. The lad had sold him like a sheep.
+Meanwhile, thinking himself a man of honour, poor fool, he had raised
+every farthing possible on his estate to meet his engagements on the
+turf in case of failure--in case of his horse winning by some mischance,
+if such a thing could be. And so it came about that the men of the turf
+were all honourably paid, and he and his tradesmen were ruined. The
+estates were entailed; but for thirty years Ranford must be in the hands
+of strangers. Lord Welter, too, had raised money, and lost fearfully by
+the same speculation.
+
+There are some men who are always in the right place when they are
+wanted--always ready to do good and kind actions--and who are generally
+found "to the fore" in times of trouble. Such a man was General
+Mainwaring. When Lord Ascot fell down in a fit, he was beside him, and,
+having seen him doing well, and having heard from him, as he recovered,
+the fearful extent of the disaster, he had posted across country to
+Ranford and told Lady Ascot.
+
+She took it very quietly.
+
+"Win or lose," she said, "it is all one to this unhappy house. Tell them
+to get out my horses, dear general, and let me go to my poor darling
+Ascot. You have heard nothing of Charles Ravenshoe, general?"
+
+"Nothing, my dear lady."
+
+Charles had brushed his sleeve in the crowd that day, and had longed to
+take the dear old brown hand in his again, but dared not. Poor Charles!
+If he had only done so!
+
+So the general and Lady Ascot went off together, and nursed Lord Ascot;
+and Adelaide, pale as death, but beautiful as ever, was driven home
+through the dust and turmoil, clenching her hands impatiently together
+at every stoppage on the road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+
+LORD WELTER'S MÉNAGE.
+
+
+There was a time, a time we have seen, when Lord Welter was a merry,
+humorous, thoughtless boy. A boy, one would have said, with as little
+real mischief in him as might be. He might have made a decent member of
+society, who knows? But to do him justice, he had had everything against
+him from his earliest childhood. He had never known what a mother was,
+or a sister. His earliest companions were grooms and gamekeepers; and
+his religious instruction was got mostly from his grandmother, whose
+old-fashioned Sunday-morning lectures and collect learnings, so rigidly
+pursued that he dreaded Sunday of all days in the week, were succeeded
+by cock-fighting in the Croft with his father in the afternoon, and
+lounging away the evening among the stable-boys. As Lord Saltire once
+said, in the former part of this story, "Ranford was what the young men
+of the day called an uncommon fast house."
+
+Fast enough, in truth. "All downhill and no drag on." Welter soon defied
+his grandmother. For his father he cared nothing. Lord Ascot was so
+foolishly fond of the boy that he never contradicted him in anything,
+and used even to laugh when he was impudent to his grandmother, whom, to
+do Lord Ascot justice, he respected more than any living woman. Tutors
+were tried, of whom Welter, by a happy combination of obstinacy and
+recklessness, managed to vanquish three, in as many months. It was
+hopeless. Lord Ascot would not hear of his going to school. He was his
+only boy, his darling. He could not part with him; and, when Lady Ascot
+pressed the matter, he grew obstinate, as he could at times, and said he
+would not. The boy would do well enough; he had been just like him at
+his age, and look at him now!
+
+Lord Ascot was mistaken. He had not been quite like Lord Welter at his
+age. He had been a very quiet sort of boy indeed. Lord Ascot was a great
+stickler for blood in horses, and understood such things. I wonder he
+could not have seen the difference between the sweet, loving face of his
+mother, capable of violent, furious passion though it was, and that of
+his coarse, stupid, handsome, gipsy-looking wife, and judged
+accordingly. He had engrafted a new strain of blood on the old Staunton
+stock, and was to reap the consequences.
+
+What was to become of Lord Welter was a great problem, still unsolved;
+when, one night, shortly before Charles paid his first visit to Ranford,
+vice Cuthbert, disapproved of, Lord Ascot came up, as his custom was,
+into his mother's dressing-room, to have half-an-hour's chat with her
+before she went to bed.
+
+"I wonder, mother dear," he said, "whether I ought to ask old Saltire
+again, or not? He wouldn't come last time you know. If I thought he
+wouldn't come, I'd ask him."
+
+"You must ask him," said Lady Ascot, brushing her grey hair, "and he
+will come."
+
+"_Very_ well," said Lord Ascot. "It's a bore; but you must have some one
+to flirt with, I suppose."
+
+Lady Ascot laughed. In fact, she had written before, and told him that
+he _must_ come, for she wanted him; and come he did.
+
+"Now, Maria," said Lord Saltire, on the first night, as soon as he and
+Lady Ascot were seated together on a quiet sofa, "what is it? Why have
+you brought me down to meet this mob of jockeys and gamekeepers? A
+fortnight here, and not a soul to speak to, but Mainwaring and yourself.
+After I was here last time, dear old Lady Hainault croaked out in a
+large crowd that some one smelt of the stable."
+
+"Dear old soul," said Lady Ascot. "What a charming, delicate wit she
+has. You will have to come here again, though. Every year, mind."
+
+"Kismet," said Lord Saltire. "But what is the matter?"
+
+"What do you think of Ascot's boy?"
+
+"Oh, Lord!" said Lord Saltire. "So I have been brought all this way to
+be consulted about a schoolboy. Well, I think he looks an atrocious
+young cub, as like his dear mamma as he can be. I always used to expect
+that she would call me a pretty gentleman, and want to tell my fortune."
+
+Lady Ascot smiled: _she_ knew her man. She knew he would have died for
+her and hers.
+
+"He is getting very troublesome," said Lady Ascot. "What would you
+reco----"
+
+"Send him to Eton," said Lord Saltire.
+
+"But he is very high-spirited, James, and----"
+
+"_Send him to Eton._ Do you hear, Maria?"
+
+"But Ascot won't let him go," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Oh, he won't, won't he?" said Lord Saltire. "Now, let us hear no more
+of the cub, but have our picquet in peace."
+
+The next morning Lord Saltire had an interview with Lord Ascot, and two
+hours afterwards it was known that Lord Welter was to go to Eton at
+once.
+
+And so, when Lord Welter met Charles at Twyford, he told him of it.
+
+At Eton, he had rapidly found other boys brought up with the same tastes
+as himself, and with these he consorted. A rapid interchange of
+experiences went on among these young gentlemen; which ended in Lord
+Welter, at all events, being irreclaimably vicious.
+
+Lord Welter had fallen in love with Charles, as boys do, and their
+friendship had lasted on, waning as it went, till they permanently met
+again at Oxford. There, though their intimacy was as close as ever, the
+old love died out, for a time, amidst riot and debauchery. Charles had
+some sort of a creed about women; Lord Welter had none. Charles drew a
+line at a certain point, low down it might be, which he never passed;
+Welter set no bounds anywhere. What Lord Hainault said of him at
+Tattersall's was true. One day, when they had been arguing on this point
+rather sharply, Charles said--
+
+"If you mean what you say, you are not fit to come into a gentleman's
+house. But you don't mean it, old cock; so don't be an ass."
+
+He did mean it, and Charles was right. Alas! that ever he should have
+come to Ravenshoe!
+
+Lord Welter had lived so long in the house with Adelaide that he never
+thought of making love to her. They used to quarrel, like Benedict and
+Beatrice. What happened was her fault. She was worthless. Worthless. Let
+us have done with it. I can expand over Lord Saltire and Lady Ascot, and
+such good people, but I cannot over her, more than is necessary.
+
+Two things Lord Welter was very fond of--brawling and dicing. He was an
+arrant bully, very strong, and perfect in the use of his fists, and of
+such courage and tenacity that, having once began a brawl, no one had
+ever made him leave it, save as an unqualified victor. This was getting
+well known now. Since he had left Oxford and had been living in London,
+he had been engaged in two or three personal encounters in the terribly
+fast society to which he had betaken himself, and men were getting
+afraid of him. Another thing was, that, drink as he would, he never
+played the worse for it. He was a lucky player. Sometimes, after winning
+money of a man, he would ask him home to have his revenge. That man
+generally went again and again to Lord Welter's house, in St. John's
+Wood, and did not find himself any the richer. It was the most beautiful
+little gambling den in London, and it was presided over by one of the
+most beautiful, witty, fascinating women ever seen. A woman with whom
+all the men fell in love; so staid, so respectable, and charmingly
+behaved. Lord Welter always used to call her Lady Welter; so they all
+called her Lady Welter too, and treated her as though she were.
+
+But this Lady Welter was soon to be dethroned to make room for Adelaide.
+A day or two before they went off together, this poor woman got a note
+from Welter to tell her to prepare for a new mistress. It was no blow to
+her. He had prepared her for it for some time. There might have been
+tears, wild tears, in private; but what cared he for the tears of such
+an one? When Lord Welter and Adelaide came home, and Adelaide came with
+him into the hall, she advanced towards her, dressed as a waiting-woman,
+and said quietly,
+
+"You are welcome home, madam."
+
+It was Ellen, and Lord Welter was the delinquent, as you have guessed
+already. When she fled from Ravenshoe, she was flying from the anger of
+her supposed brother William; for he thought he knew all about it; and,
+when Charles Marston saw her passing round the cliff, she was making her
+weary way on foot towards Exeter to join him in London. After she was
+missed, William had written to Lord Welter, earnestly begging him to
+tell him if he had heard of her. And Welter had written back to him that
+he knew nothing, on his honour. Alas for Welter's honour, and William's
+folly in believing him!
+
+Poor Ellen! Lord Welter had thought that she would have left the house,
+and had good reason for thinking so. But, when he got home, there she
+was. All her finery cast away, dressed plainly and quietly. And there
+she stayed, waiting on Adelaide, demure and quiet as a waiting-woman
+should be. Adelaide had never been to Ravenshoe, and did not know her.
+Lord Welter had calculated on her going; but she stayed on. Why?
+
+You must bear with me, indeed you must, at such times as these. I touch
+as lightly as I can; but I have undertaken to tell a story, and I must
+tell it. These things are going on about us, and we try to ignore them,
+till they are thrust rudely upon us, as they are twenty times a year. No
+English story about young men could be complete without bringing in
+subjects which some may think best left alone. Let us comfort ourselves
+with one great, undeniable fact--the immense improvement in morals which
+has taken place in the last ten years. The very outcry which is now
+raised against such relations shows plainly one thing at least--that
+undeniable facts are being winked at no longer, and that some reform is
+coming. Every younger son who can command £200 a year ought to be
+allowed to marry in his own rank in life, whatever that may be. They
+will be uncomfortable, and have to save and push; and a very good thing
+for them. They won't lose caste. There are some things worse than mere
+discomfort. Let us look at bare facts, which no one dare deny. There is
+in the great world, and the upper middle-class world too, a crowd of
+cadets; younger sons, clerks, officers in the army, and so on;
+non-marrying men, as the slang goes, who are asked out to dine and dance
+with girls who are their equals in rank, and who have every opportunity
+of falling in love with them. And yet if one of this numerous crowd were
+to dare to fall in love with, and to propose to, one of these girls, he
+would be denied the house. It is the fathers and mothers who are to
+blame, to a great extent, for the very connexions they denounce so
+loudly. But yet the very outcry they are raising against these
+connexions is a hopeful sign.
+
+Lieutenant Hornby, walking up and down the earth to see what mischief he
+could get into, had done a smart stroke of business in that way, by
+making the acquaintance of Lord Welter at a gambling-house. Hornby was a
+very good fellow. He had two great pleasures in life. One, I am happy to
+say, was soldiering, at which he worked like a horse, and the other, I
+am very sorry to say, was gambling, at which he worked a great deal
+harder than he should. He was a marked man among professional players.
+Every one knew how awfully rich he was, and every one in succession had
+a "shy" at him. He was not at all particular. He would accept a battle
+with any one. Gaming men did all sorts of dirty things to get introduced
+to him, and play with him. The greater number of them had their wicked
+will; but the worst of it was that he always won. Sometimes, at a game
+of chance, he might lose enough to encourage his enemies to go on; but
+at games of skill no one could touch him. His billiard playing was
+simply masterly. And Dick Ferrers will tell you, that he and Hornby,
+being once, I am very sorry to say, together at G--n--ch F--r, were
+accosted in the park by a skittle-sharper, and that Hornby (who would,
+like Faust, have played chess with Old Gooseberry) allowed himself to be
+taken into a skittle-ground, from which he came out in half an hour
+victorious over the skittle-sharper, beating him easily.
+
+In the heyday of his fame, Lord Welter was told of him, and saying,
+"Give me the daggers," got introduced to him. They had a tournament at
+_écarté_, or billiards, or something or another of that sort, it don't
+matter; and Lord Welter asked him up to St. John's Wood, where he saw
+Ellen.
+
+He lost that night liberally, as he could afford to; and, with very
+little persuasion, was induced to come there the next. He lost liberally
+again. He had fallen in love with Ellen.
+
+Lord Welter saw it, and made use of it as a bait to draw on Hornby to
+play. Ellen's presence was, of course, a great attraction to him, and he
+came and played; but unluckily for Lord Welter, after a few nights his
+luck changed, or he took more care, and he began to win again; so much
+so that, about the time when Adelaide came home, my Lord Welter had had
+nearly enough of Lieutenant Hornby, and was in hopes that he should have
+got rid of Ellen and him together; for his lordship was no fool about
+some things, and saw plainly this--that Hornby was passionately fond of
+Ellen, and, moreover, that poor Ellen had fallen deeply in love with
+Hornby.
+
+So, when he came home, he was surprised and angry to find her there. She
+would not go. She would stay and wait on Adelaide. She had been asked to
+go; but had refused sharply the man she loved. Poor girl, she had her
+reasons; and we shall see what they were. Now you know what I meant when
+I wondered whether or no Charles would have burnt Hornby's house down if
+he had known all. But you will be rather inclined to forgive Hornby
+presently, as Charles did when he came to know everything.
+
+But the consequence of Ellen's staying on as servant to Adelaide brought
+this with it, that Hornby determined that he would have the _entrée_ of
+the house at St. John's Wood, at any price. Lord Welter guessed this,
+and guessed that Hornby would be inclined to lose a little money in
+order to gain it. When he brushed Charles's knee in Piccadilly he was
+deliberating whether or no he should ask him back there again. As he
+stood unconsciously, almost touching Charles, he came to the
+determination that he would try what bargain he could make with the
+honour of Charles's sister, whom he had so shamefully injured already.
+And Charles saw them make the appointment together in the balcony. How
+little he guessed for what!
+
+Lord Hainault was right. Welter was a scoundrel. But Hornby was not, as
+we shall see.
+
+Hornby loved play for play's sake. And, extravagant dandy though he was,
+the attorney blood of his father came out sometimes so strong in him
+that, although he would have paid any price to be near, and speak to
+Ellen, yet he could not help winning, to Lord Welter's great disgust,
+and his own great amusement. Their game, I believe, was generally
+_picquet_ or _écarté_, and at both these he was Lord Welter's master.
+What with his luck and his superior play, it was very hard to lose
+decently sometimes; and sometimes, as I said, he would cast his plans to
+the winds and win terribly. But he always repented when he saw Lord
+Welter get savage, and lost dutifully, though at times he could barely
+keep his countenance. Nevertheless the balance he allowed to Lord Welter
+made a very important item in that gentleman's somewhat precarious
+income.
+
+But, in spite of all his sacrifices, he but rarely got even a glimpse of
+Ellen. And, to complicate matters, Adelaide, who sat by and watched the
+play, and saw Hornby purposely losing at times, got it into her silly
+head that he was in love with her. She liked the man--who did not? But
+she had honour enough left to be rude to him. Hornby saw all this, and
+was amused. I often think that it must have been a fine spectacle, to
+see the honourable man playing with the scoundrel, and give him just as
+much line as he chose. And, when I call Hornby an honourable man, I mean
+what I say, as you will see.
+
+This was the state of things when the Derby crash came. At half-past
+five on that day, the Viscountess Welter dashed up to her elegant
+residence in St. John's Wood, in a splendid barouche, drawn by four
+horses, and, when "her people" came and opened the door and let down the
+steps, lazily descended, and followed by her footman bearing her
+fal-lals, lounged up the steps as if life were really too _ennuyant_ to
+be borne any longer. Three hours afterwards, a fierce, eager woman,
+plainly dressed, with a dark veil, was taking apartments in the Bridge
+Hotel, London Bridge, for Mr. and Mrs. Staunton, who were going abroad
+in a few days; and was overseeing, with her confidential servant, a
+staid man in black, the safe stowage of numerous hasped oak boxes, the
+most remarkable thing about which was their great weight. The lady was
+Lady Welter, and the man was Lord Welter's confidential scoundrel. The
+landlord thought they had robbed Hunt and Roskell's, and were off with
+the plunder, till he overheard the man say, "I think that is all, my
+lady;" after which he was quite satisfied. The fact was, that all the
+Ascot race plate, gold salvers and épergnes, silver cups rough with
+designs of the chase, and possibly also some of the Ascot family jewels,
+were so disgusted with the state of things in England, that they were
+thinking of going for a little trip on the Continent. What should a
+dutiful wife do but see to their safe stowage? If any enterprising
+burglar had taken it into his head to "crack" that particular "crib"
+known as the Bridge Hotel, and got clear off with the "swag," he might
+have retired on the hard-earned fruits of a well-spent life into happier
+lands--might have been "run" for M.L.C., or possibly for Congress in a
+year or two. Who can tell?
+
+And, also, if Lord Welter's confidential scoundrel had taken it into his
+head to waylay and rob his lordship's noble consort on her way
+home--which he was quite capable of doing--and if he also had got clear
+off, he would have found himself a better man by seven hundred and
+ninety-four pounds, three half-crowns, and a threepenny-piece; that is,
+if he had done it before her ladyship had paid the cabman. But both the
+burglars and the valet missed the tide, and the latter regrets it to
+this day.
+
+At eleven o'clock that night, Lady Welter was lolling leisurely on her
+drawing-room sofa, quite bored to death. When Lord Welter, and Hornby,
+and Sir Robert Ferrers, and some Dragoons came in, she was yawning, as
+if life was really too much of a plague to be endured. Would she play
+loo? Oh, yes; anything after such a wretched, lonely evening. That was
+the game where you had three cards, wasn't it, and you needn't go on
+unless you liked. Would Welter or some one lend her some money. She had
+got a threepenny-piece and a shilling somewhere or another, but that
+would not be enough, she supposed. Where was Sir Robert's little
+brother! Gone to bed? How tiresome; she had fallen in love with him, and
+had set her heart on seeing him to-night. And so on.
+
+Lord Welter gave her a key, and told her there was some money in his
+dressing-case. As she left the room, Hornby, who was watching them, saw
+a quick look of intelligence pass between them, and laughed in his
+sleeve.
+
+I have been given to understand that guinea unlimited loo is a charming
+pursuit, soothing to the feelings, and highly improving to the moral
+tone. I speak from hearsay, as circumstances over which I have no
+control have prevented my ever trying it. But this I know--that, if Lord
+Welter's valet had robbed his master and mistress, when they went to bed
+that night, instead of netting seven hundred and ninety-four, seven,
+nine, he would have netted eleven hundred and forty-six, eight, six;
+leaving out the threepenny-piece. But he didn't do it; and Lord and Lady
+Welter slept that sleep which is the peculiar reward of a quiet
+conscience undisturbed.
+
+But, next morning, when Charles waited on Hornby, in his dressing-room,
+the latter said--
+
+"I shall want you to-night, lad. I thought I might have last night; but,
+seeing the other fellows went, I left you at home. Be ready at half-past
+six. I lost a hundred and twenty pounds last night. I don't mean to
+afford it any longer. I shall stop it."
+
+"Where are we to go to, sir?"
+
+"To St. John's Wood. We shall be up late. Leave the servant's hall, and
+come up and lie in the hall, as if you were asleep. Don't let yourself
+be seen. No one will notice you."
+
+Charles little thought where he was going.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+THE HOUSE FULL OF GHOSTS.
+
+
+Charles had really no idea where he was going. Although he knew that
+Hornby had been playing with Lord Welter, yet he thought, from what
+Hornby had said, that he would not bring him into collision with him;
+and indeed he did not--only taking Charles with him as a reserve in case
+of accidents, for he thoroughly distrusted his lordship.
+
+At half-past six in the evening Hornby rode slowly away, followed by
+Charles. He had told Charles that he should dine in St. John's Wood at
+seven, and should ride there, and Charles was to wait with the horses.
+But it was nearly seven, and yet Hornby loitered, and seemed
+undetermined. It was a wild, gusty evening, threatening rain. There were
+very few people abroad, and those who were rode or walked rapidly. And
+yet Hornby dawdled irresolutely, as though his determination were hardly
+strong enough yet.
+
+At first he rode quite away from his destination, but by degrees his
+horse's head got changed into the right direction; then he made another
+détour, but a shorter one; at last he put spurs to his horse, and rode
+resolutely up the short carriage-drive before the door, and giving the
+reins to Charles, walked firmly in.
+
+Charles put up the horses and went into the servants' hall, or the room
+which answered that end in the rather small house of Lord Welter. No
+one was there. All the servants were busy with the dinner and Charles
+was left unnoticed.
+
+By-and-by a page, noticing a strange servant in passing the door,
+brought him some beer, and a volume of the Newgate Calendar. This young
+gentleman called his attention to the print of a lady cutting up the
+body of her husband with a chopper, assisted by a young Jew, who was
+depicted "walking off with a leg," like one of the Fans (the use of
+which seems to be, to cool the warm imagination of other travellers into
+proper limits), while the woman was preparing for another effort. After
+having recommended Charles to read the letterpress thereof, as he would
+find it tolerably spicy, he departed, and left him alone.
+
+The dinner was got over in time; and after a time there was silence in
+the house--a silence so great that Charles rose and left the room. He
+soon found his way to another; but all was dark and silent, though it
+was not more than half-past nine.
+
+He stood in the dark passage, wondering where to go, and determined to
+turn back to the room from which he had come. There was a light there,
+at all events.
+
+There was a light, and the Newgate Calendar. The wild wind, that had
+eddied and whirled the dust at the street corners, and swept across the
+park all day, had gone down, and the rain had come on. He could hear it
+drip, drip, outside; it was very melancholy. Confound the Newgate
+Calendar!
+
+He was in a very queer house, he knew. What did Hornby mean by asking
+him the night before whether or no he could fight, and whether he would
+stick to him? Drip, drip; otherwise a dead silence. Charles's heart
+began to beat a little faster.
+
+Where were all the servants? He had heard plenty of them half an hour
+ago. He had heard a French cook swearing at English kitchen-girls, and
+had heard plenty of other voices; and now--the silence of the grave. Or
+of Christie and Manson's on Saturday evening; or of the Southern Indian
+Ocean in a calm at midnight; or of anything else you like; similes are
+cheap.
+
+He remembered now that Hornby had said, "Come and lie in the hall as if
+asleep; no one will notice you." He determined to do so. But where was
+it? His candle was flickering in its socket, and as he tried to move it,
+it went out.
+
+He could scarcely keep from muttering on oath, but he did. His situation
+was very uncomfortable. He did not know in what house he was--only that
+he was in a quarter of the town in which there were not a few uncommonly
+queer houses. He determined to grope his way to the light.
+
+He felt his way out of the room and along a passage. The darkness was
+intense, and the silence perfect. Suddenly a dull red light gleamed in
+his eyes, and made him start. It was the light of the kitchen fire. A
+cricket would have been company, but there was none.
+
+He continued to advance cautiously. Soon a ghostly square of very dim
+grey light on his left showed him where was a long narrow window. It was
+barred with iron bars. He was just thinking of this, and how very queer
+it was, when he uttered a loud oath, and came crashing down. He had
+fallen upstairs.
+
+He had made noise enough to waken the seven sleepers; but those
+gentlemen did not seem to be in the neighbourhood, or, at all events, if
+awakened gave no sign of it. Dead silence. He sat on the bottom stair
+and rubbed his shins, and in spite of a strong suspicion that he had got
+into a scrape, laughed to himself at the absurdity of his position.
+
+"Would it be worth while, I wonder," he said to himself, "to go back to
+the kitchen and get the poker? I'd better not, I suppose. It would be so
+deuced awkward to be caught in the dark with a poker in your hand. Being
+on the premises for the purpose of committing a felony--that is what
+they would say; and then they would be sure to say that you were the
+companion of thieves, and had been convicted before. No. Under this
+staircase, in the nature of things, is the housemaid's cupboard. What
+should I find there as a weapon of defence? A dust-pan. A great deal
+might be done with a dust-pan, mind you, at close quarters. How would it
+do to arrange all her paraphernalia on the stairs, and cry fire, so that
+mine enemies, rushing forth, might stumble and fall, and be taken
+unawares? But that would be acting on the offensive, and I have no safe
+grounds for pitching into any one yet."
+
+Though Charles tried to comfort himself by talking nonsense, he was very
+uncomfortable. Staying where he was, was intolerable; and he hardly
+dared to ascend into the upper regions unbidden. Besides, he had fully
+persuaded himself that a disturbance was imminent, and, though a brave
+man, did not like to precipitate it. He had mistaken the character of
+the house he was in. At last, taking heart, he turned and felt his way
+upstairs. He came before a door through the keyhole of which the light
+streamed strongly; he was deliberating whether to open it or not, when a
+shadow crossed it, though he heard no noise, but a minute after the
+distant sound of a closing door. He could stand it no longer. He opened
+the door, and advanced into a blaze of light.
+
+He entered a beautiful flagged hall, frescoed and gilded. There were
+vases of flowers round the walls, and strips of Indian matting on the
+pavement. It was lit by a single chandelier, which was reflected in four
+great pier-glasses reaching to the ground, in which Charles's top-boots
+and brown face were re-duplicated most startlingly. The _tout ensemble_
+was very beautiful; but what struck Charles was the bad taste of having
+an entrance-hall decorated like a drawing-room. "That is just the sort
+of thing they do in these places," he thought.
+
+There were only two hats on the entrance table; one of which he was
+rejoiced to recognise as that of his most respected master. "May the
+deuce take his silly noddle for bringing me to such a place!" thought
+Charles.
+
+This was evidently the front hall spoken of by Hornby; and he remembered
+his advice to pretend to go to sleep. So he lay down on three
+hall-chairs, and put his hat over his eyes.
+
+Hall-chairs are hard; and, although Charles had just been laughing at
+the proprietor of the house for being so lavish in his decorations, he
+now wished that he had carried out his system a little further, and had
+cushions to his chairs. But no; the chairs were _de rigueur_, with
+crests on the back of them. Charles did not notice whose.
+
+If a man pretends to go to sleep, and, like the Marchioness with her
+orange-peel and water, "makes believe very much," he may sometimes
+succeed in going to sleep in good earnest. Charles imitated the thing so
+well, that in five minutes he was as fast off as a top.
+
+Till a night or two before this, Charles had never dreamt of Ravenshoe
+since he had left it. When the first sharp sting of his trouble was in
+his soul, his mind had refused to go back further than to the events of
+a day or so before. He had dreamt long silly dreams of his master, or
+his fellow-servants, or his horses, but always, all through the night,
+with a dread on him of waking in the dark. But, as his mind began to
+settle and his pain got dulled, he began to dream about Ravenshoe, and
+Oxford, and Shrewsbury again; and he no longer dreaded the waking as he
+did, for the reality of his life was no longer hideous to him. With the
+fatal "plasticity" of his nature, he had lowered himself, body and soul,
+to the level of it.
+
+But to-night, as he slept on these chairs, he dreamt of Ravenshoe, and
+of Cuthbert, and of Ellen. And he woke, and she was standing within ten
+feet of him, under the chandelier.
+
+He was awake in an instant, but he lay as still as a mouse, staring at
+her. She had not noticed him, but was standing in profound thought.
+Found, and so soon! His sister! How lovely she was, standing, dressed in
+light pearl grey, like some beautiful ghost, with her speaking eyes
+fixed on nothing. She moved now, but so lightly that her footfall was
+barely heard upon the matting. Then she turned and noticed him. She did
+not seem surprised at seeing a groom stretched out asleep on the
+chairs--she was used to that sort of thing, probably--but she turned
+away, gliding through a door at the further end of the hall, and was
+gone.
+
+Charles's heart was leaping and beating madly, but he heard another door
+open, and lay still.
+
+Adelaide came out of a door opposite to the one into which Ellen had
+passed. Charles was not surprised. He was beyond surprise. But, when he
+saw her and Ellen in the same house, in one instant, with the quickness
+of lightning, he understood it all. It was Welter had tempted Ellen from
+Ravenshoe! Fool! fool! he might have prevented it once if he had only
+guessed.
+
+If he had any doubt as to where he was now, it was soon dispelled. Lord
+Welter came rapidly out of the door after Adelaide, and called her in a
+whisper, "Adelaide."
+
+"Well," she said, turning round sharply.
+
+"Come back, do you hear?" said Lord Welter. "Where the deuce are you
+going?"
+
+"To my own room."
+
+"Come back, I tell you," said Lord Welter, savagely, in a low voice.
+"You are going to spoil everything with your confounded airs."
+
+"I shall not come back. I am not going to act as a decoy-duck to that
+man, or any other man. Let me go, Welter."
+
+Lord Welter was very near having to let her go with a vengeance. Charles
+was ready for a spring, but watched, and waited his time. Lord Welter
+had only caught her firmly by the wrist to detain her. He was not
+hurting her.
+
+"Look you here, my Lady Welter," he said slowly and distinctly. "Listen
+to what I've got to say, and don't try the shadow of a tantrum with me,
+for I won't have it for one moment. I don't mind your chaff and nonsense
+in public; it blinds people, it is racy and attracts people; but in
+private I am master, do you hear? Master. You know you are afraid of me,
+and have good cause to be, by Jove. You are shaking now. Go back to that
+room."
+
+"I won't, I won't, I won't. Not without you, Welter. How can you use me
+so cruelly, Welter? Oh, Welter, how can you be such a villain?"
+
+"You conceited fool," said Lord Welter, contemptuously. "Do you think he
+wants to make love to you?"
+
+"You know he does, Welter; you know it," said Adelaide, passionately.
+
+Lord Welter laughed good-naturedly. (He could be good-natured.) He drew
+her towards him and kissed her. "My poor little girl," he said, "if I
+thought that, I would break his neck. But it is utterly wide of the
+truth. Look here, Adelaide; you are as safe from insult as my wife as
+you were at Ranford. What you are not safe from is my own temper. Let us
+be friends in private and not squabble so much, eh? You are a good,
+shrewd, clever wife to me. Do keep your tongue quiet. Come in and mark
+what follows."
+
+They had not noticed Charles, though he had been so sure that they
+would, that he had got his face down on the chair, covered with his
+arms, feigning sleep. When they went into the room again, Charles caught
+hold of a coat which was on the back of a chair, and, curling himself
+up, put it over him. He would listen, listen, listen for every word. He
+had a right to listen now.
+
+In a minute a bell rang twice. Almost at the same moment some one came
+out of the door through which Lord Welter had passed, and stood silent.
+In about two minutes another door opened, and some one else came into
+the hall.
+
+A woman's voice--Ellen's--said, "Oh, are you come again?"
+
+A man's voice--Lieutenant Hornby's--said in answer, "You see I am. I got
+Lady Welter to ring her bell twice for you, and then to stay in that
+room, so that I might have an interview with you."
+
+"I am obliged to her ladyship. She must have been surprised that I was
+the object of attraction. She fancied herself so."
+
+"She was surprised. And she was more so, when I told her what my real
+object was."
+
+"Indeed," said Ellen, bitterly. "But her ladyship's surprise does not
+appear to have prevented her from assisting you."
+
+"On the contrary," said Hornby, "she wished me God speed--her own
+words."
+
+"Sir, you are a gentleman. Don't disgrace yourself and me--if I can be
+disgraced--by quoting that woman's blasphemy before me. Sir, you have
+had your answer. I shall go."
+
+"Ellen, you must stay. I have got this interview with you to-night, to
+ask you to be my wife. I love you as I believe woman was never loved
+before, and I ask you to be my wife."
+
+"You madman! you madman!"
+
+"I am no madman. I was a madman when I spoke to you before; I pray your
+forgiveness for that. You must forget that. I say that I love you as a
+woman was never loved before. Shall I say something more, Ellen?"
+
+"Say on."
+
+"You love me."
+
+"I love you as man was never loved before; and I swear to you that I
+hope I may lie stiff and cold in my unhonoured coffin, before I'll ruin
+the man I love by tying him to such a wretch as myself."
+
+"Ellen, Ellen, don't say that. Don't take such vows, which you will not
+dare to break afterwards. Think, you may regain all that you have lost,
+and marry a man who loves you--ah, so dearly!--and whom you love too."
+
+"Ay; there's the rub. If I did not love you, I would marry you
+to-morrow. Regain all I have lost, say you? Bring my mother to life
+again, for instance, or walk among other women again as an honest one?
+You talk nonsense, Mr. Hornby--nonsense. I am going."
+
+"Ellen! Ellen! Why do you stay in this house? Think once again."
+
+"I shall never leave thinking; but my determination is the same. I tell
+you, as a desperate woman like me dare tell you, that I love you far too
+well to ruin your prospects, and I love my own soul too well ever to
+make another false step. I stayed in this house because I loved to see
+you now and then, and hear your voice; but now I shall leave it."
+
+"See me once more, Ellen--only once more!"
+
+"I will see you once more. I will tear my heart once more, if you wish
+it. You have deserved all I can do for you, God knows. Come here the day
+after to-morrow; but come without hope, mind. A woman who has been
+through what I have can trust herself. Do you know that I am a
+Catholic?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I am. Would you turn Catholic if I were to marry you?"
+
+God forgive poor Hornby! He said, "Yes." What will not men say at such
+times?
+
+"Did I not say you were a madman? Do you think I would ruin you in the
+next world, as well as in this? Go away, sir; and, when your children
+are round you, humbly bless God's mercy for saving you, body and soul,
+this night."
+
+"I shall see you again?"
+
+"Come here the day after to-morrow; but come without hope."
+
+She passed through the door, and left him standing alone. Charles rose
+from his lair, and, coming up to him, laid his hand on his shoulder.
+
+"You have heard all this," said poor Hornby.
+
+"Every word," said Charles. "I had a right to listen, you know. She is
+my sister."
+
+"Your sister?"
+
+Then Charles told him all. Hornby had heard enough from Lord Welter to
+understand it.
+
+"Your sister! Can you help me, Horton? Surely she will hear reason from
+you. Will you persuade her to listen to me?"
+
+"No," said Charles. "She was right. You are mad. I will not help you do
+an act which you would bitterly repent all your life. You must forget
+her. She and I are disgraced, and must get away somewhere, and hide our
+shame together."
+
+What Hornby would have answered, no man can tell; for at this moment
+Adelaide came out of the room, and passed quickly across the hall,
+saying good night to him as she passed. She did not recognise Charles,
+or seem surprised at seeing Hornby talking to his groom. Nobody who had
+lived in Lord Welter's house a day or two was surprised at anything.
+
+But Charles, speaking to Hornby more as if he were master than servant,
+said, "Wait here;" and, stepping quickly from him, went into the room
+where Lord Welter sat alone, and shut the door. Hornby heard it locked
+behind him, and waited in the hall, listening intensely, for what was to
+follow.
+
+"There'll be a row directly," said Hornby to himself; "and that
+chivalrous fool, Charles, has locked himself in. I wish Welter did not
+send all his servants out of the house at night. There'll be murder done
+here some day."
+
+He listened and heard voices, low as yet--so low that he could hear the
+dripping of the rain outside. Drip--drip! The suspense was intolerable.
+When would they be at one another's throats?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+
+CHARLES'S EXPLANATION WITH LORD WELTER.
+
+
+There is a particular kind of Ghost, or Devil, which is represented by
+an isosceles triangle (more or less correctly drawn) for the body;
+straight lines turned up at the ends for legs; straight lines divided
+into five at the ends for arms; a round O, with arbitrary dots for the
+features, for a head; with a hat, an umbrella, and a pipe. Drawn like
+this, it is a sufficiently terrible object. But, if you take an ace of
+clubs, make the club represent the head, add horns, and fill in the body
+and limbs as above, in deep black, with the feather end of the pen, it
+becomes simply appalling, and will strike terror into the stoutest
+heart.
+
+Is this the place, say you, for talking such nonsense as this; If you
+must give us balderdash of this sort, could not you do so in a chapter
+with a less terrible heading than this one has? And I answer, Why not
+let me tell my story my own way? Something depends even on this nonsense
+of making devils out of the ace of clubs.
+
+It was rather a favourite amusement of Charles's and Lord Welter's, in
+old times at Ranford. They used, on rainy afternoon's, to collect all
+the old aces of clubs (and there were always plenty of them to be had in
+that house, God help it), and make devils out of them, each one worse
+than the first. And now, when Charles had locked the door, and advanced
+softly up to Welter, he saw, over his shoulder, that he had got an ace
+of clubs, and the pen and ink, and was making a devil.
+
+It was a trifling circumstance enough, perhaps; but there was enough of
+old times in it to alter the tone in which Charles said, "Welter," as he
+laid his hand on his shoulder.
+
+Lord Welter was a bully; but he was as brave as a lion, with nerves of
+steel. He neither left off his drawing, nor looked up; he only
+said--"Charley, boy, come and sit down till I have finished this fellow.
+Get an ace of clubs and try your own hand. I am out of practice."
+
+Perhaps even Lord Welter might have started when he heard Charles's
+voice, and felt his hand on his shoulder; but he had had one
+instant--only one instant--of preparation. When he heard the key turn in
+the door, he had looked in a pier-glass opposite to him, and seen who
+and what was coming, and then gone on with his employment. Even allowing
+for this moment's preparation, we must give him credit for the nerve of
+one man in ten thousand; for the apparition of Charles Ravenshoe was as
+unlooked-for as that of any one of Charles Ravenshoe's remote ancestors.
+
+You see, I call him Charles Ravenshoe still. It is a trick. You must
+excuse it.
+
+Charles did not sit down and draw devils; he said, in a quiet, mournful
+tone,
+
+"Welter, Welter, why have you been such a villain?"
+
+Lord Welter found that a difficult question to answer. He let it alone,
+and said nothing.
+
+"I say nothing about Adelaide. You did not use me well there; for, when
+you persuaded her to go off with you, you had not heard of my ruin."
+
+"On my soul, Charles, there was not much persuasion wanted there."
+
+"Very likely. I do not want to speak about that, but about Ellen, my
+sister. Was anything ever done more shamefully than that?"
+
+Charles expected some furious outbreak when he said that. None came.
+What was good in Lord Welter came to the surface, when he saw his old
+friend and playmate there before him, sunk so far below him in all that
+this world considers worth having, but rising so far above him in his
+fearless honour and manliness. He was humbled, sorry, and ashamed.
+Bitter as Charles's words were, he felt they were true, and had manhood
+enough left not to resent them. To the sensation of fear, as I have said
+before, Lord Welter was a total stranger, or he might have been nervous
+at being locked up in a room alone, with a desperate man, physically his
+equal, whom he had so shamefully wronged. He rose and leant against the
+chimney-piece, looking at Charles.
+
+"I did not know she was your sister, Charles. You must do me that
+justice."
+
+"Of course you did not. If----"
+
+"I know what you are going to say--that I should not have dared. On my
+soul, Charles, I don't know; I believe I dare do anything. But I tell
+you one thing--of all the men who walk this earth, you are the last I
+would willingly wrong. When I went off with Adelaide, I knew she did not
+care sixpence for you. I knew she would have made you wretched. I knew
+better than you, because I never was in love with her, and you were,
+what a heartless ambitious jade it was! She sold herself to me for the
+title I gave her, as she had tried to sell herself to that solemn prig
+Hainault, before. And I bought her, because a handsome, witty, clever
+wife is a valuable chattel to a man like me, who has to live by his
+wits."
+
+"Ellen was as handsome and as clever as she. Why did not you marry her?"
+said Charles, bitterly.
+
+"If you will have the real truth, Ellen would have been Lady Welter now,
+but----"
+
+Lord Welter hesitated. He was a great rascal, and he had a brazen front,
+but he found a difficulty in going on. It must be, I should fancy, very
+hard work to tell all the little ins and outs of a piece of villainy one
+has been engaged in, and to tell, as Lord Welter did on this occasion,
+the exact truth.
+
+"I am waiting," said Charles, "to hear you tell me why she was not made
+Lady Welter."
+
+"What, you will have it, then? Well, she was too scrupulous. She was too
+honourable a woman for this line of business. She wouldn't play, or
+learn to play--d--n it, sir, you have got the whole truth now, if that
+will content you."
+
+"I believe what you say, my lord. Do you know that Lieutenant Hornby
+made her an offer of marriage to-night?"
+
+"I supposed he would," said Lord Welter.
+
+"And that she has refused him?"
+
+"I guessed that she would. She is your own sister. Shall you try to
+persuade her?"
+
+"I would see her in her coffin first."
+
+"So I suppose."
+
+"She must come away from here, Lord Welter. I must keep her and do what
+I can for her. We must pull through it together, somehow."
+
+"She had better go from here. She is too good for this hole. I must make
+provision for her to live with you."
+
+"Not one halfpenny, my lord. She has lived too long in dependence and
+disgrace already. We will pull through together alone."
+
+Lord Welter said nothing, but he determined that Charles should not have
+his way in this respect.
+
+Charles continued, "When I came into this room to-night I came to
+quarrel with you. You have not allowed me to do so, and I thank you for
+it." Here he paused, and then went on in a lower voice, "I think you are
+sorry, Welter; are you not? I am sure you are sorry. I am sure you
+wouldn't have done it if you had foreseen the consequences, eh?"
+
+Lord Welter's coarse under-lip shook for half a second, and his big
+chest heaved once; but he said nothing.
+
+"Only think another time; that is all. Now do me a favour; make me a
+promise."
+
+"I have made it."
+
+"Don't tell any human soul you have seen me. If you do, you will only
+entail a new disguise and a new hiding on me. You have promised."
+
+"On my honour."
+
+"If you keep your promise I can stay where I am. How is--Lady Ascot?"
+
+"Well. Nursing my father."
+
+"Is he ill?"
+
+"Had a fit the day before yesterday. I heard this morning from them. He
+is much better, and will get over it."
+
+"Have you heard anything from Ravenshoe?"
+
+"Not a word. Lord Saltire and General Mainwaring are both with my
+father, in London. Grandma won't see either me or Adelaide. Do you know
+that she has been moving heaven and earth to find you?"
+
+"Good soul! I won't be found, though. Now, good-night!"
+
+And he went. If any one had told him three months before that he would
+have been locked in the same room with a man who had done him such
+irreparable injury, and have left it at the end of half an hour with a
+quiet "good-night," he would most likely have beaten that man there and
+then. But he was getting tamed very fast. Ay, he was already getting
+more than tamed; he was in a fair way to get broken-hearted.
+
+"I will not see her to-night, sir," he said to Hornby, whom he found
+with his head resting on the table; "I will come to-morrow, and prepare
+her for leaving this house. You are to see her the day after to-morrow;
+but without hope, remember."
+
+He roused a groom from above the stable to help him to saddle the
+horses. "Will it soon be morning?" he asked.
+
+"Morning," said the lad; "it's not twelve o'clock yet. It's a dark
+night, mate, and no moon. But the nights are short now. The dawn will be
+on us before we have time to turn in our beds."
+
+He rode slowly home after Hornby. "The night is dark, but the dawn will
+be upon us before we can turn in our beds!" Only the idle words of a
+sleepy groom, yet they echoed in his ears all the way home. The night is
+dark indeed; but it will be darker yet before the dawn, Charles
+Ravenshoe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL.
+
+A DINNER PARTY AMONG SOME OLD FRIENDS.
+
+
+Lady Hainault (_née_ Burton, not the Dowager) had asked some one to
+dinner, and the question had been whom to ask to meet him. Mary had been
+called into consultation, as she generally was on most occasions, and
+she and Lady Hainault had made up a list together. Every one had
+accepted, and was coming; and here were Mary and Lady Hainault dressed
+for dinner, alone in the drawing-room with the children.
+
+"We could not have done better for him, Mary, I think. You must go in to
+dinner with him."
+
+"Is Mary going to stop down to dinner?" said the youngest boy; "what a
+shame! I sha'n't say my prayers to-night if she don't come up."
+
+The straightforward Gus let his brother know what would be the
+consequences of such neglect hereafter, in a plain-spoken way peculiarly
+his own.
+
+"Gus! Gus! don't say such things," said Lady Hainault.
+
+"The hymn-book says so, aunt," said Gus, triumphantly; and he quoted a
+charming little verse of Dr. Watts's, beginning, "There is a dreadful
+Hell."
+
+Lady Hainault might have been puzzled what to say, and Mary would not
+have helped her, for they had had an argument about that same hymn-book
+(Mary contending that one or two of the hymns were as well left alone at
+first), when Flora struck in and saved her aunt, by remarking.
+
+"I shall save up my money and buy some jewels for Mary like aunt's, so
+that when she stays down to dinner some of the men may fall in love with
+her, and marry her."
+
+"Pooh! you silly goose," said Gus, "those jewels cost sixty million
+thousand pounds a-piece. I don't want her to be married till I grow up,
+and then I shall marry her myself. Till then, I shall buy her a yellow
+wig, like grandma Hainault's, and then nobody will want to marry her."
+
+"Be quiet, Gus," said Lady Hainault.
+
+It was one thing to say "be quiet Gus," and it was another thing to make
+him hold his tongue. But, to do Gus justice, he was a good fellow, and
+never acted "_enfant terrible_" but to the most select and private
+audience. Now he had begun: "I wish some one would marry grandma," when
+the door was thrown open, the first guest was announced, and Gus was
+dumb.
+
+"General Mainwaring." The general sat down between Lady Hainault and
+Mary, and, while talking to them, reached out his broad brown hand and
+lifted the youngest boy on his knee, who played with his ribands, and
+cried out that he would have the orange and blue one, if he pleased;
+while Gus and Flora came and stood at his knee.
+
+He talked to them both sadly in a low voice about the ruin which had
+come on Lord Ascot. There was worse than mere ruin, he feared. He feared
+there was disgrace. He had been with him that morning. He was a wreck.
+One side of his face was sadly pulled down, and he stammered in his
+speech. He would get over it. He was only three-and-forty. But he would
+not show again in society, he feared. Here was somebody else; they would
+change the subject.
+
+Lord Saltire. They were so glad to see him. Every one's face had a kind
+smile on it as the old man came and sat down among them. His own smile
+was not the least pleasant of the lot, I warrant you.
+
+"So you are talking about poor Ascot, eh?" he said. "I don't know
+whether you were or not; but, if you were, let us talk about something
+else. You see, my dear Miss Corby, that my prophecy to you on the
+terrace at Ravenshoe is falsified. I said they would not fight, and lo,
+they are as good as at it."
+
+They talked about the coming war, and Lord Hainault came in and joined
+them. Soon after, another guest was announced.
+
+Lady Ascot. She was dressed in dark grey silk, with her white hair
+simply parted under a plain lace cap. She looked so calm, so brave, so
+kind, so beautiful, as she came with firm strong step in at the door,
+that they one and all rose and came towards her. She had always been
+loved by them all; how much more deeply was she loved now, when her
+bitter troubles had made her doubly sacred!
+
+Lord Saltire gave her his arm, and she came and sat down among them with
+her hands calmly folded before her. "I was determined to come and see
+you to-night, my dear," she said. "I should break down if I couldn't see
+some that I loved. And to-night, in particular" (she looked earnestly at
+Lord Saltire). "Is he come yet?"
+
+"Not yet, dear grandma," said Mary.
+
+"No one is coming besides, I suppose?" asked Lady Ascot.
+
+"No one; we are waiting for him."
+
+The door was opened once more, and they all looked curiously round. This
+time the servant announced, perhaps in a somewhat louder tone than
+usual, as if he were aware that they were more interested,
+
+"Mr. Ravenshoe."
+
+A well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man came into the room, bearing such
+a wonderful likeness to Charles Ravenshoe, that Lady Hainault and
+General Mainwaring, the only two who had never seen him before, started,
+and thought they saw Charles himself. It was not Charles, though; it was
+our old friend whilom pad-groom to Charles Ravenshoe, Esquire, now
+himself William Ravenshoe, Esquire, of Ravenshoe.
+
+He was the guest of the evening. He would be heir to Ravenshoe himself
+some day; for they had made up their minds that Cuthbert would never
+marry. Ravenshoe, as Cuthbert was managing it now, would be worth ten or
+twelve thousand a year, and, if these new tin lodes came to anything,
+perhaps twenty. He had been a stable-helper, said old Lady
+Hainault--the companion of the drunken riots of his foster-brother
+impostor, and that quiet gentlemanly creature Welter. If he entered the
+house, she left it. To which young Lady Hainault had replied that some
+one must ask him to dinner in common decency, if it was only for the
+sake of that dear Charles, who had been loved by every one who knew him.
+That she intended to ask him to dinner, and that, if her dear
+mother-in-law objected to meet him, why the remedy lay with herself.
+Somebody must introduce him to some sort of society; and Lord Hainault
+and herself had made up their minds to do it, so that further argument
+on the subject would be wasted breath. To which the Dowager replied that
+she really wished, after all, that Hainault had married that pretty chit
+of a thing, Adelaide Summers, as he was thinking of doing; as she, the
+Dowager, could not have been treated with greater insolence even by her,
+bold as she was. With which Parthian piece of spite she had departed to
+Casterton with Miss Hicks, and had so goaded and snapped at that
+unfortunate reduced gentlewoman by the way, that at last Hicks, as her
+wont was, had turned upon her and given her as good as she brought. If
+the Dowager could have heard Lady Hainault telling her lord the whole
+business that night, and joking with him about his alleged _penchant_
+for Adelaide, and heard the jolly laugh that those two good souls had
+about it, her ladyship would have been more spiteful still.
+
+But, nevertheless, Lady Hainault was very nervous about William. When
+Mary was consulted, she promptly went bail for his good behaviour, and
+pled his case so warmly, that the tears stood in her eyes. Her old
+friend William! What innocent plots she and he had hatched together
+against the priest in the old times. What a bond there was between them
+in their mutual love for him who was lost to them.
+
+But Lady Hainault would be on the safe side; and so only the party named
+above were asked. All old friends of the family.
+
+Before dinner was announced, they were all at their ease about him. He
+was shy, certainly, but not awkward. He evidently knew that he was asked
+there on trial, and he accepted his position. But he was so handsome
+(handsomer than poor Charles), he was so gentle and modest,
+and--perhaps, too, not least--had such a well-modulated voice, that,
+before the evening was over, he had won every one in the room. If he
+knew anything of a subject, he helped the conversation quietly, as well
+as he could; if he had to confess ignorance (which was seldom, for he
+was among well-bred people), he did so frankly, but unobtrusively. He
+was a great success.
+
+One thing puzzled him, and pleased him. He knew that he was a person of
+importance, and that he was the guest of the evening. But he soon found
+that there was another cause for his being interesting to them all, more
+powerful than his curious position, or his prospective wealth; and that
+was his connection with Charles Ravenshoe, now Horton. _He_ was the hero
+of the evening. Half William's light was borrowed from him. He quickly
+became aware of it, and it made him happy.
+
+How strange it is that some men have the power of winning such love from
+all they meet. I knew one, gone from us now by a glorious death, who had
+that faculty. Only a few knew his great worth and goodness; and yet, as
+his biographer most truly says, those who once saw his face never forgot
+it. Charles Ravenshoe had that faculty also, though, alas! his value,
+both in worth and utility, was far inferior to that of the man to whom I
+have alluded above.[3] But he had the same infinite kindness towards
+everything created; which is part of the secret.
+
+The first hint that William had, as to how deeply important a person
+Charles was among the present company, was given him at dinner. Various
+subjects had been talked of indifferently, and William had listened,
+till Lord Hainault said to William--
+
+"What a strange price people are giving for cobs! I saw one sold to-day
+at Tattersall's for ninety guineas."
+
+William answered, "Good cobs are very hard to get, Lord Hainault. I
+could get you ten good horses, over fifteen, for one good cob."
+
+Lord Saltire said, "My cob is the best I ever had; and a sweet-tempered
+creature. Our dear boy broke it for me at Ravenshoe."
+
+"Dear Charles," said Lady Ascot. "What a splendid rider he was! Dear
+boy! He got Ascot to write him a certificate about that sort of thing,
+before he went away. Ah, dear!"
+
+"I never thought," said Lord Saltire, quietly, "that I ever should have
+cared half as much for anybody as I do for that lad. Do you remember,
+Mainwaring," he continued, speaking still lower, while they all sat
+hushed, "the first night I ever saw him, when he marked for you and me
+at billiards, at Ranford? I don't know why, but I loved the boy from the
+first moment I saw him. Both there and ever afterwards, he reminded me
+so strongly of Barkham. He had just the same gentle, winning way with
+him that Barkham had. Barkham was a little taller, though, I fancy," he
+went on, looking straight at Lady Ascot, and taking snuff. "Don't you
+think so, Maria?"
+
+No one spoke for a moment.
+
+Lord Barkham had been Lord Saltire's only son. He had been killed in a
+duel at nineteen, as I have mentioned before. Lord Saltire very rarely
+spoke of him, and, when he did, generally in a cynical manner. But
+General Mainwaring and Lady Ascot knew that the memory of that poor boy
+was as fresh in the true old heart, after forty years, as it was on the
+morning when he came out from his dressing-room, and met them carrying
+his corpse upstairs.
+
+"He was a good fellow," said Lord Hainault, alluding to Charles. "He was
+a very good fellow."
+
+"This great disappointment which I have had about him," said Lord
+Saltire, in his own dry tone, "is a just judgment on me for doing a
+good-natured and virtuous action many years ago. When his poor father
+Densil was in prison, I went to see him, and reconciled him with his
+family. Poor Densil was so grateful for this act of folly on my part,
+that I grew personally attached to him; and hence all this misery.
+Disinterested actions are great mistakes, Maria, depend upon it."
+
+When the ladies were gone upstairs, William found Lord Saltire beside
+him. He talked to him a little time, and then finished by saying--
+
+"You are modest and gentlemanly, and the love you bear for your
+foster-brother is very pleasing to me indeed. I am going to put it to
+the test. You must come and see me to-morrow morning. I have a great
+deal to say to you."
+
+"About him, my lord? Have you heard of him?"
+
+"Not a word. I fear he has gone to America or Australia. He told Lord
+Ascot he should do so."
+
+"I'll hunt him to the world's end, my lord," said true William. "And
+Cuthbert shall pray for me the while. I fear you are right. But we shall
+find him soon."
+
+When they went up into the drawing-room, Mary was sitting on a sofa by
+herself. She looked up to William, and he went and sat down by her. They
+were quite away from the rest, together.
+
+"Dear William," said Mary, looking frankly at him, and laying her hand
+on his.
+
+"I am so glad," said William, "to see your sweet face again. I was down
+at Ravenshoe last week. How they love you there! An idea prevails among
+old and young that dear Cuthbert is to die, and that I am to marry you,
+and that we are to rule Ravenshoe triumphantly. It was useless to
+represent to them that Cuthbert would not die, and that you and I most
+certainly never would marry one another. My dearest Jane Evans was
+treated as a thing of nought. You were elected mistress of Ravenshoe
+unanimously."
+
+"How is Jane?"
+
+"Pining, poor dear, at her school. She don't like it."
+
+"I should think not," said Mary. "Give my dear love to her. She will
+make you a good wife. How is Cuthbert?"
+
+"Very well in health. No more signs of his heart complaint, which never
+existed. But he is peaking at getting no tidings from Charles. Ah, how
+he loved him! May I call you 'Mary'?"
+
+"You must not dare to call me anything else. No tidings of him yet?"
+
+"None. I feel sure he is gone to America. We will get him back, Mary.
+Never fear."
+
+They talked till she was cheerful, and at last she said--
+
+"William, you were always so well-mannered; but how--how--have you got
+to be so gentlemanly in so short a time?"
+
+"By playing at it," said William, laughing. "The stud-groom at Ravenshoe
+used always to say I was too much of a gentleman for him. In twenty
+years' time I shall pass muster in a crowd. Good-night."
+
+And Charles was playing at being something other than a gentleman all
+the time. We shall see who did best in the end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI.
+
+CHARLES'S SECOND EXPEDITION TO ST. JOHN'S WOOD.
+
+
+What a happy place a man's bed is--probably the best place in which he
+ever finds himself. Very few people will like to deny that, I think;
+that is to say, as a general rule. After a long day's shooting in cold
+weather, for instance; or half a night on deck among the ice, when the
+fog has lifted, and the ghastly cold walls are safe in sight; or after a
+fifty mile ride in the bush, under a pouring rain; or after a pleasant
+ball, when you have to pull down the blind, that the impudent sun may
+not roast you awake in two hours; for in all these cases, and a hundred
+more, bed is very pleasant; but you know as well as I do, that there
+are times when you would sooner be on a frozen deck, or in the wildest
+bush in the worst weather, or waltzing in the hall of Eblis with
+Vathek's mama, or almost in your very grave, than in bed and awake.
+
+Oh, the weary watches! when the soul, which in sleep would leave the
+tortured body to rest and ramble off in dreams, holds on by a mere
+thread, yet a thread strong enough to keep every nerve in tense agony.
+When one's waking dreams of the past are as vivid as those of sleep, and
+there is always present, through all, the dreadful lurking thought that
+one is awake, and that it is all real. When, looking back, every kindly
+impulsive action, every heartily spoken word, makes you fancy that you
+have only earned contempt where you merit kindness. When the past looks
+like a hell of missed opportunities, and the future like another black
+hopeless hell of uncertainty and imminent misfortune of all kinds! Oh,
+weary watches! Let us be at such times on the bleakest hill-side, in the
+coldest night that ever blew, rather than in the warmest bed that money
+will buy.
+
+When you are going to have a night of this kind, you seldom know it
+beforehand, for certain. Sometimes, if you have had much experience in
+the sort of thing--if you have lost money, or gone in debt, or if your
+sweetheart has cut you very often--you may at least guess, before you
+get your boots off, that you are going to have a night of it; in which
+case, read yourself to sleep _in bed_. Never mind burning the house down
+(that would be rather desirable as a distraction from thought); but
+don't read till you are sleepy with your clothes on, and then undress,
+because, if you do, you will find, by the time you have undressed
+yourself, that you are terribly wide awake, and, when the candle is
+blown out, you will be all ready for a regular Walpurgis night.
+
+Charles, poor lad, had not as yet had much experience of Walpurgis
+nights. Before his catastrophe he had never had one. He had been used to
+tumble tired into his bed, and sleep a heavy dreamless sleep till an
+hour before waking. Then, indeed, he might begin to dream of his horses,
+and his dogs, and so on, and then gradually wake into a state more sweet
+than the sweetest dream--that state in which sense is awake to all
+outward objects, but in which the soul is taking its few last airy
+flutters round its home, before coming to rest for the day. But, even
+since then, he had not had experience enough to make him dread the
+night. The night he came home from St. John's Wood, he thought he would
+go to bed and sleep it off. Poor fellow!
+
+A fellow-servant slept in the same room with him--the younger and better
+tempered of the two (though Charles had no complaint against either of
+them). The lad was asleep; and, before Charles put out the light, he
+looked at him. His cheek was laid on his arm, and he seemed so calm and
+happy that Charles knew that he was not there, but far away. He was
+right. As he looked the lad smiled, and babbled out something in his
+dream. Strange! the soul had still sufficient connection with the body
+to make it smile.
+
+"I wonder if Miss Martineau or Mr. Atkinson ever watched the face of one
+who slept and dreamt," said Charles, rambling on as soon as he had got
+into bed. "Pish! why that fellow's body is the mere tool of his soul.
+His soul is out a-walking, and his body is only a log. Hey, that won't
+do; that's as bad as Miss Martineau. I should have said that his body is
+only a fine piece of clockwork. But clockwork don't smile of itself. My
+dear Madam, and Mr. Atkinson, I am going to leave my body behind, and be
+off to Ravenshoe in five minutes. That is to say, I am going to sleep."
+
+He was, was he? Why no, not just at present. If he had meant to do so,
+he had, perhaps, better not have bothered himself about "Letters on the
+laws of man's nature"; for, when he had done his profound cogitations
+about them, as above, he thought he had got a----well, say a pulex in
+his bed. There was no more a pulex than there was a scorpion; but he had
+an exciting chase after an imaginary one, like our old friend Mr. Sponge
+after an imaginary fox at Laverick Wells. After this, he had an
+irritation where he couldn't reach, that is to say, in the middle of his
+back: then he had the same complaint where he could reach, and used a
+certain remedy (which is a pretty way of saying that he scratched
+himself); then he had the cramp in his right leg; then he had the cramp
+in his left leg; then he grew hot all over, and threw the clothes off;
+then he grew cold all over, and pulled them on again; then he had the
+cramp in his left leg again; then he had another flea hunt, cramp,
+irritation in back, heat, cold, and so on, all over; and then, after
+half an hour, finding himself in a state of feverish despondency, he
+fell into a cheerful train of thought, and was quite inclined to look at
+his already pleasant prospects from a hopeful point of view.
+
+Poor dear fellow! You may say that it is heartless to make fun of him
+just now, when everything is going so terribly wrong. But really my
+story is so very sad, that we must try to make a little feeble fun where
+we can, or it would be unreadable.
+
+He tried to face the future, manfully. But lo! there was no future to
+face--it was all such a dead, hopeless blank. Ellen must come away from
+that house, and he must support her; but how? It would be dishonourable
+for him to come upon the Ravenshoes for a farthing; and it would be
+dishonourable for her to marry that foolish Hornby. And these two
+courses, being dishonourable, were impossible. And there he was brought
+up short.
+
+But would either course be dishonourable? Yes, yes, was the answer each
+weary time he put the question to himself; and there the matter ended.
+Was there one soul in the wide world he could consult? Not one. All
+alone in the weary world, he and she. Not one friend for either of them.
+They had made their beds, and must lie on them. When would the end of it
+all come? What would the end be?
+
+There was a noise in the street. A noise of a woman scolding, whose
+voice got louder and louder, till it rose into a scream. A noise of a
+man cursing and abusing her; then a louder scream, and a sound of blows.
+One, two, then a heavy fall, and silence. A drunken, homeless couple had
+fallen out in the street, and the man had knocked the woman down. That
+was all. It was very common. Probably the woman was not much hurt. That
+sort of woman got used to it. The police would come and take them to the
+station. There they were. The man and woman were being taken off by two
+constables, scolding and swearing. Well, well!
+
+Was it to come to that? There were bridges in London, and under them
+runs the river. Charles had come over one once, after midnight. He
+wished he had never seen the cursed place. He remembered a fluttering
+figure which had come and begged a halfpenny of him to pay the toll and
+get home. He had given her money, and then, by a sudden impulse,
+followed her till she was safe off the bridge. Ugly thoughts, Charles!
+ugly thoughts! Will the dawn never come? Why, the night is not half over
+yet.
+
+God in His mercy sets a limit to human misery in many ways. I do not
+believe that the condemned man, waiting through the weary night for the
+gallows, thinks all night through of his fate. We read generally in
+those accounts of the terrible last night (which are so rightly
+published in the newspapers--they are the most terrifying part of the
+punishment), that they conversed cheerfully, or slept, or did something,
+showing that they half forgot for a time what was coming. And so, before
+the little window grew to a lighter grey, poor Charles had found some
+relief from his misery. He was between sleep and waking, and he had
+fulfilled his challenge to Miss Martineau, though later than he
+intended. He had gone to Ravenshoe.
+
+There it was, all before him. The dawn behind the eastern headland had
+flooded the amphitheatre of hills, till the crags behind the house had
+turned from grey to gold, and the vane upon the priest's tower shone
+like a star. The sea had changed from black to purple, and the
+fishing-boats were stealing lazily homewards, over the gentle rolling
+ground-swell. The surf was whispering to the sand of their coming. As
+window after window blazed out before the sun, and as woodland and
+hill-side, stream and park, village and lonely farm in the distant
+valley, waked before the coming day, Charles watched, in his mind's eye,
+the dark old porch, till there came out a figure in black, and stood
+solitary in the terrace gazing seawards. And as he said, "Cuthbert," he
+fell into a dreamless, happy sleep.
+
+He determined that he would not go to see Ellen till the afternoon.
+Hornby was on duty in the morning, and never saw Charles all day; he
+avoided him as though on purpose. Charles, on his part, did not want to
+meet him till he had made some definite arrangement, and so was glad of
+it. But, towards two o'clock, it came across his mind that he would
+saunter round to St. Peter's Church, and see the comical little imp of a
+boy who was generally to be found there, and beguile a quarter of an
+hour by listening to his prattle.
+
+He had given up reading. He had hardly opened a book since his
+misfortune. This may seem an odd thing to have to record about a
+gentleman, and to a certain extent a scholar; but so it was. He wanted
+to lower himself, and he was beginning to succeed. There was an
+essential honesty in him, which made him hate to appear what he was not;
+and this feeling, carried to an absurd extent, prevented his taking
+refuge in the most obvious remedy for all troubles except hunger--books.
+He did not know, as I do, that determined reading--reading of anything,
+even the advertisements in a newspaper--will stop all cravings except
+those of the stomach, and will even soften them; but he guessed it,
+nevertheless. "Why should I read?" said he. "I must learn to do as the
+rest of them." And so he did as the rest of them, and "rather loafed
+away his time than otherwise."
+
+And he was more inclined to "loaf" than usual this day, because he very
+much dreaded what was to come. And so he dawdled round to St. Peter's
+Church, and came upon his young friend, playing at fives with the ball
+he had given him, as energetically as he had before played with the
+brass button. Shoeblacks are compelled to a great deal of unavoidable
+"loafing;" but certainly this one loafed rather energetically, for he
+was hot and frantic in his play.
+
+He was very glad to see Charles. He parted his matted hair from his
+face, and looked at him admiringly with a pleasant smile; then he
+suddenly said--
+
+"You was drunk last night, worn't you?"
+
+Charles said, No--that he never got drunk.
+
+"Worn't you really, though?" said the boy; "you look as tho' you had a
+been. You looks wild about the eyes;" and then he hazarded another
+theory to account for Charles's appearance, which Charles also negatived
+emphatically.
+
+"I gave a halpenny for this one," said the boy, showing him the ball,
+"and I spent the other halpenny." Here he paused, expecting a rebuke,
+apparently; but Charles nodded kindly at him, and he was encouraged to
+go on, and to communicate a piece of intelligence with the air of one
+who assumes that his hearer is _au fait_ with all the movements of the
+great world, and will be interested.
+
+"Old Biddy Flanigan's dead."
+
+"No! is she?" said Charles, who, of course, had not the wildest idea who
+she was, but guessed her to be an aged, and probably a dissipated
+Irishwoman.
+
+"Ah! I believe you," said the boy. "And they was a-waking on her last
+night, down in our court (he said, "daone in aour cawt").
+They waked me sharp enough; but, as for she! she's fast."
+
+"What did she die of?" asked Charles.
+
+"Well, she died mostly along of Mr. Malone's bumble foot, I fancy. Him
+and old Biddy was both drunk a-fighting on the stairs, and she was a
+step below he; and he being drunk, and bumble-footed too, lost his
+balance, and down they come together, and the back of her head come
+against the door scraper, and there she was. Wake she!" he added with
+scorn, "not if all the Irish and Rooshans in France was to put stones in
+their stockings, and howl a week on end, they wouldn't wake her."
+
+"Did they put stones in their stockings?" asked Charles, thinking that
+it was some papist form of penance.
+
+"Miss Ophelia Flanigan, she put half a brick in her stocking end, so she
+did, and come at Mr. Malone for to break his head with it, and there
+were a hole in the stocking, and the brick flew out, and hit old Denny
+Moriarty in the jaw, and broke it. And he worn't a doing nothink, he
+worn't; but was sitting in a corner decent and quiet, blind drunk, a
+singing to his self; and they took he to Guy's orspital. And the pleece
+come in, and got gallus well kicked about the head, and then they took
+they to Guy's orspital; and then Miss Flanigan fell out of winder into
+the airy, and then they took she to Guy's orspital; and there they is,
+the whole bilin of 'em in bed together, with their heads broke, a-eating
+of jelly and a-drinking of sherry wind; and then in comes a mob from
+Rosemary Lane, and then they all begins to get a bit noisy and want to
+fight, and so I hooked it."
+
+"Then there are a good many Irish in your court?" said Charles.
+
+"Irish! ah! I believe you. They're all Irish there except we and Billy
+Jones's lot. The Emperor of Rooshar is a nigger; but his lot is mostly
+Irish, but another bilin of Irish from Mr. Malone's lot. And one on 'em
+plays the bagpipes, with a bellus, against the water-butt of a Sunday
+evening, when they're off the lay. And Mr. Malone's lot heaves crockery
+and broken vegetables at him out of winder, by reason of their being
+costermongers, and having such things handy; so there's mostly a shine
+of a Sunday evening."
+
+"But who are Mr. Malone, and Billy Jones, and the Emperor of Russia?"
+
+"They keeps lodging houses," said the boy. "Miss Ophelia Flanigan is
+married on Mr. Malone, but she keeps her own name, because her family's
+a better one nor his'n, and she's ashamed of him. They gets on very well
+when they're sober, but since they've been a making money they mostly
+gets drunk in bed of a morning, so they ain't so happy together as they
+was."
+
+"Does she often attack him with a brick in the foot of a stocking?"
+asked Charles.
+
+"No," said the boy, "she said her papa had taught her that little game.
+She used to fist hold of the poker, but he got up to that, and spouted
+it. So now they pokes the fire with a mop-stick, which ain't so handy to
+hit with, and softer."
+
+Charles walked away northward, and thought what a charming sort of
+person Miss Ophelia Flanigan must be, and how he would rather like to
+know her for curiosity's sake. The picture he drew of her in his mind
+was not exactly like the original, as we shall see.
+
+It was very pleasant summer weather--weather in which an idle man would
+be inclined to dawdle, under any circumstances; and Charles was the more
+inclined to dawdle, because he very much disliked the errand on which he
+went. He could loiter at street corners now with the best of them, and
+talk to any one who happened to be loitering there too. He was getting
+on.
+
+So he loitered at street corners and talked. And he found out something
+to-day for the first time. He had been so absorbed in his own troubles
+that all rumours had been to him like the buzzing of bees; but to-day he
+began to appreciate that this rumour of war was no longer a mere rumour,
+but likely to grow into an awful reality.
+
+If he were only free, he said to himself. If he could only provide for
+poor Ellen. "Gad, if they could get up a regiment of fellows in the same
+state of mind as I am!"
+
+He went into a public-house, and drank a glass of ale. They were talking
+of it there. "Sir Charles Napier is to have the fleet," said one man,
+"and if he don't bring Cronstadt about their ears in two hours, I am a
+Dutchman. As for Odessa----"
+
+A man in seedy black, who (let us hope) had seen better days, suggested
+Sebastopol.
+
+The first man had not heard of Sebastopol. It could not be a place of
+much importance, or he must have heard of it. Talk to him about
+Petersburg and Moscow, and he would listen to you.
+
+This sort of talk, heard everywhere on his slow walk, excited Charles;
+and thinking over it, he came to the door of Lord Welter's house, and
+rang.
+
+The door was barely opened, when he saw Lord Welter himself in the hall,
+who called to him by his Christian name, and bade him come in. Charles
+followed Lord Welter into a room, and, when the latter turned round,
+Charles saw that he was disturbed and anxious.
+
+"Charles," he said, "Ellen is gone!"
+
+Charles said "Where?" for he hardly understood him.
+
+"Where? God knows! She must have left the house soon after you saw her
+last night. She left this note for me. Take it and read it. You see I am
+free from blame in this matter."
+
+Charles took it and read it.
+
+      "MY LORD,
+
+      "I should have consented to accept the shelter of your roof
+      for a longer period, were it not that, by doing so, I
+      should be continually tempted to the commission of a
+      dishonourable action--an action which would bring speedy
+      punishment on myself, by ruining too surely the man whom,
+      of all others in the world, I love and respect.
+
+      "Lieutenant Hornby has proposed marriage to me. Your
+      lordship's fine sense of honour will show you at once how
+      impossible it is for me to consent to ruin his prospects by
+      a union with such a one as myself. Distrusting my own
+      resolution, I have fled, and henceforth I am dead to him
+      and to you.
+
+      "Ah! Welter, Welter! you yourself might have been loved as
+      he is, once; but that time is gone by for ever. I should
+      have made you a better wife than Adelaide. I might have
+      loved you myself once, but I fell more through anger and
+      vanity than through love.
+
+      "My brother, he whom we call Charles Ravenshoe, is in this
+      weary world somewhere. I have an idea that you will meet
+      him. You used to love one another. Don't let him quarrel
+      with you for such a worthless straw as I am. Tell him I
+      always loved him as a brother. It is better that we should
+      not meet yet. Tell him that he must make his own place in
+      the world before we meet, and then I have something to say
+      to him.
+
+      "Mary, the Mother of God, and the blessed saints before the
+      throne, bless you and him, here and hereafter!"
+
+Charles had nothing to say to Lord Welter, not one word. He saw that the
+letter was genuine. He understood that Welter had had no time to tell
+her of his coming, and that she was gone; neither Welter nor he knew
+where, or were likely to know; that was all. He only bid him good-bye,
+and walked home again.
+
+When you know the whole story, you will think that Charles's run of ill
+luck at this time is almost incredible; but I shall call you to witness
+that it is not so. This was the first stroke of real ill luck that he
+had had. All his other misfortunes came from his mad determination of
+alienating himself from all his friends. If he had even left Lord Welter
+free to have mentioned that he had been seen, all might have gone well,
+but he made him promise secrecy; and now, after having, so to speak,
+made ill luck for himself, and lamented over it, here was a real stroke
+of it with a vengeance, and he did not know it. He was not anxious about
+Ellen's future; he felt sure at once that she was going into some Roman
+Catholic refuge, where she would be quiet and happy. In fact, with a new
+fancy he had in his head, he was almost content to have missed her. And
+Ellen, meanwhile, never dreamt either of his position or state of mind,
+or she would have searched him out at the end of the world. She thought
+he was just as he always had been, or, perhaps, turning his attention to
+some useful career with Cuthbert's assistance; and she thought she would
+wait, and wait she did; and they went apart, not to meet till the valley
+of the shadow of death had been passed, and life was not so well worth
+having as it had been.
+
+But as for our old friend Father Mackworth. As I said once before, "It's
+no use wondering, but I do wonder," whether Father Mackworth, had he
+known how near Ellen and Charles had been to meeting the night before,
+would not have whistled "Lillibulero," as Uncle Toby did in times of
+dismay; that is, if he had known the tune.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII.
+
+RAVENSHOE HALL, DURING ALL THIS.
+
+
+The villagers at Ravenshoe, who loved Charles, were very much puzzled
+and put out by his sudden disappearance. Although they had little or no
+idea of the real cause of his absence, yet it was understood to be a
+truth, not to be gainsayed, that it was permanent. And as it was a
+heavily-felt misfortune to them, and as they really had no idea why he
+was gone, or where he was gone to, it became necessary that they should
+comfort themselves by a formula. At which time Master Lee up to Slarrow,
+erected the theory, that Master Charles was gone to the Indies--which
+was found to be a doctrine so comfortable to the souls of those that
+adopted it, as being hazy and vague, and as leaving his return an open
+question, that it was unanimously adopted; and those who ventured to
+doubt it, were treated as heretics and heathens.
+
+It was an additional puzzle to them to find that William had turned out
+to be a gentleman, and a Ravenshoe, a fact which could not, of course,
+be concealed from them, though the other facts of the case were
+carefully hushed up--not a very difficult matter in a simple feudal
+village, like Ravenshoe. But, when William appeared, after a short
+absence, he suffered greatly in popularity, from the belief that he had
+allowed Charles to go to the Indies by himself. Old Master James Lee of
+Tor Head, old Master James Lee of Withycombe Barton, and old Master
+James Lee up to Slarrow, the three great quidnuncs of the village, were
+sunning themselves one day under the wall which divides part of the
+village from the shore, when by there came, talking earnestly together,
+William and John Marston.
+
+The three old men raised their hats, courteously. They were in no
+distinguishable relation to one another, but, from similarity of name
+and age, always hunted in a leash. (Sporting men will notice a confusion
+here about the word "leash," but let it pass.) When no one was by, I
+have heard them fall out and squabble together about dates, or such
+like; but, when others were present, they would, so to speak, trump one
+another's tricks to any amount. And if, on these occasions, any one of
+the three took up an untenable position, the other two would lie him out
+of it like Jesuits, and only fall foul of him when they were alone
+together--which, to say the least of it, was neighbourly and decent.
+
+"God save you, gentlemen," said old Master Lee up to Slarrow, who was
+allowed to commit himself by the other two, who were waiting to be "down
+on him" in private. "Any news from the Indies lately?"
+
+William and Marston stopped, and William said--
+
+"No, Master Lee, we have not heard from Captain Archer for seven months,
+or more."
+
+"I ask your pardon," said Lee up to Slarrow; "I warn't a speaking of he.
+I was speaking of our own darling boy, Master Charles. When be he
+a-coming back to see we?"
+
+"When, indeed!" said William. "I wish I knew, Master Lee."
+
+"They Indies," said the old man, "is well enough; but what's he there no
+more than any other gentleman? Why don't he come home to his own. Who's
+a-keeping on him away?"
+
+William and John Marston walked on without answering. And then the two
+other Master Lees fell on to Master Lee up to Slarrow, and verbally
+ill-treated him--partly because he had got no information out of
+William, and partly because, having both sat quiet and given him plenty
+of rope, he had not hanged himself. Master Lee up to Slarrow had evil
+times of it that blessed spring afternoon, and ended by "dratting" both
+his companions, for a couple of old fools. After which, they adjourned
+to the public-house and hard cider, sent them to drink for their sins.
+
+"They'll never make a scholar of me, Marston," said William; "I will go
+on at it for a year, but no more, I shall away soon to hunt up Charles.
+Is there any police in America?"
+
+Marston answered absently, "Yes; he believed so;" but was evidently
+thinking of something else.
+
+They had gone sauntering out for a walk together. Marston had come down
+from Oxford the day before (after an examination for an Exeter
+fellowship, I believe) for change of air; and he thought he would like
+to walk with William up to the top of the lofty promontory, which
+bounded Ravenshoe Bay on the west, and catch the pleasant summer breeze
+coming in from the Atlantic.
+
+On the loftiest point of all, with the whispering blue sea on three
+sides of them, four hundred feet below, there they sat down on the short
+sheep-eaten turf, and looked westward.
+
+Cape after cape stretched away under the afternoon sun, till the last
+seemed only a dark cloud floating on the sea. Beyond that cape there was
+nothing but water for three thousand weary miles. The scene was
+beautiful enough, but very melancholy; a long coastline trending away
+into dim distance, on a quiet sunny afternoon, is very melancholy.
+Indeed, far more melancholy than the same place in a howling gale: when
+the nearest promontory only is dimly visible, a black wall, echoing the
+thunder of bursting waves, and when sea, air, and sky, like the three
+furies, are rushing on with mad, destructive unanimity.
+
+They lay, these two, on the short turf, looking westward; and, after a
+time, John Marston broke silence. He spoke very low and quietly, and
+without looking at William.
+
+"I have something very heavy on my mind, William. I am not a fool, with
+a morbid conscience, but I have been very wrong. I have done what I
+never can undo. I loved that fellow, William!"
+
+William said "Ay."
+
+"I know what you would say. You would say, that every one who ever knew
+Charles loved him; and you are right. He was so utterly unselfish, so
+entirely given up to trying to win others, that every one loved him, and
+could not help it. The cleverest man in England, with all his
+cleverness, could not gain so many friends as Charles."
+
+William seemed to think this such a self-evident proposition, that he
+did not think it worth while to say anything.
+
+"And Charles was not clever. And what makes me mad with myself is this.
+I had influence over him, and I abused it. I was not gentle enough with
+him. I used to make fun of him, and be flippant, and priggish, and
+dictatorial, with him. God help me! And now he has taken some desperate
+step, and, in fear of my ridicule, has not told me of it. I felt sure he
+would come to me, but I have lost hope now. May God forgive me--God
+forgive me!"
+
+In a few moments, William said, "If you pause to think, Marston, you
+will see how unjust you are to yourself. He could not be afraid of me,
+and yet he has never come near me."
+
+"Of course not," said Marston. "You seem hardly to know him so well as
+I. He fears that you would make him take money, and that he would be a
+burthen on you. I never expected that he would come back to you. He
+knows that you would never leave him. He knows, as well as you know
+yourself, that you would sacrifice all your time and your opportunities
+of education to him. And, by being dependent on you, he would be
+dependent on Father Mackworth--the only man in the world he dislikes and
+distrusts."
+
+William uttered a form of speech concerning the good father, which is
+considered by foreigners to be merely a harmless national _façon de
+parler_--sometimes, perhaps, intensive, when the participle is used, but
+in general no more than expletive. In this case, the speaker was, I
+fear, in earnest, and meant what he said most heartily.
+
+Marston never swore, but he certainly did not correct William for
+swearing, in this case, as he should have done. There was a silence for
+a time. After a little, William laid his hand on Marston's shoulder, and
+said--
+
+"He never had a truer friend than you. Don't you blame yourself?"
+
+"I do; and shall, until I find him."
+
+"Marston," said William, "what _has_ he done with himself? Where the
+deuce is he gone?"
+
+"Lord Saltire and I were over the same problem for two hours the other
+night, and we could make nothing of it, but that he was gone to America
+or Australia. He hardly took money enough with him to keep him till now.
+I can make nothing of it. Do _you_ think he would be likely to seek out
+Welter?"
+
+"If he were going to do so, he would have done so by now, and we must
+have heard of it. No," said William.
+
+"He was capable of doing very odd things," said Marston. "Do you
+remember that Easter vacation, when he and Lord Welter and Mowbray went
+away together?"
+
+"Remember!" said William. "Why I was with them; and glorious fun it was.
+Rather fast fun though--too fast by half. We went up and lived on the
+Severn and Avon Canal, among the bargeman, dressing accordingly. Charles
+had nothing to do with that folly, beyond joining in it, and spending
+the day in laughing. That was Lord Welter's doing. The bargees nicknamed
+Lord Welter 'the sweep,' and said he was a good fellow, but a terrible
+blackguard. And so he was--for that time, at all events."
+
+Marston laughed, and, after a time, said, "Did he ever seem to care
+about soldiering? Do you think he was likely to enlist?"
+
+"It is possible," said William; "it is quite possible. Yes, he has often
+talked to me about soldiering. I mind--I remember, I should say--that he
+once was hot about going into the army, but he gave it up because it
+would have taken him away from Mr. Ravenshoe too much."
+
+They turned and walked homewards, without speaking a word all the way.
+On the bridge they paused and leant upon the coping, looking into the
+stream. All of a sudden, William laid his hand on Marston's arm, and
+looking in his face, said--
+
+"Every day we lose, I feel he is getting farther from us. I don't know
+what may happen. I shall go and seek him. I will get educated at my
+leisure. Only think of what may be happening now! I was a fool to have
+given it up so soon, and to have tried waiting till he came to us. He
+will never come. I must go and fetch him. Here is Cuthbert, too, good
+fellow, fretting himself to death about it. Let us go and talk to him."
+
+And John Marston said, "Right, true heart; let us go."
+
+Of all their acquaintances, there was only one who could have given them
+any information--Lord Welter; and he, of all others, was the very last
+they dreamt of going to. You begin to see, I dare say, that, when
+Charles is found, my story will nearly be at an end. But my story is not
+near finished yet, I assure you.
+
+Standing where they were on the bridge, they could look along the
+village street. It was as neat a street as one ever sees in a fishing
+village; that is to say, rather an untidy one, for of all human
+employments, fishing involves more lumber and mess than any other.
+Everything past use was "hit," as they say in Berkshire, out into the
+street; and of the inorganic part of this refuse, that is to say, tiles,
+bricks, potsherds, and so on, the children built themselves shops and
+bazaars, and sold one another the organic orts, that is to say,
+cabbage-stalks, fish-bones, and orange-peel, which were paid for in
+mussel-shells. And, as Marston and William looked along this street, as
+one may say, at high market time, they saw Cuthbert come slowly riding
+along among the children, and the dogs, and the pigs, and the
+herring-bones, and brickbats.
+
+He was riding a noble horse, and was dressed with his usual faultless
+neatness and good taste, as clean as a new pin from top to toe. As he
+came along, picking his way gently among the children, the fishermen and
+their wives came out right and left from their doors, and greeted him
+kindly. In olden times they would not have done this, but it had got
+about that he was pining for the loss of his brother, and their hearts
+had warmed to him. It did not take much to make their hearts warm to a
+Ravenshoe; though they were sturdy, independent rogues enough at times.
+I am a very great admirer of the old feudal feeling, when it is not
+abused by either party. In parts of Australia, where it, or something
+near akin to it, is very strong indeed, I have seen it act on high and
+low most beneficially; giving to the one side a sense of responsibility,
+and to the other a feeling of trust and reliance. "Here's 'Captain
+Dash,' or 'Colonel Blank,' or 'Mr. So-and-So,' and he won't see me
+wronged, I know. I have served him and his father for forty year, and
+he's a _gentleman_, and so were his father before him." That is a sort
+of thing you will hear often enough in Australia. And even on the
+diggings, with all the leaven of Americanism and European Radicalism one
+finds there, it is much easier for a warden to get on with the diggers
+if he comes of a known colonial family, than if he is an unknown man.
+The old colonial diggers, the people of the greatest real weight, talk
+of them, and the others listen and mark. All people, prate as they may,
+like a guarantee for respectability. In the colonies, such a guarantee
+is given by a man's being tolerably well off, and "come of decent
+people." In England, it is given, in cases, by a man and a man's
+forefathers having been good landlords and honest men. Such a guarantee
+is given by such people as the Ravenshoes, but that is not the whole
+secret of _their_ influence. That comes more from association--a feeling
+strong enough, as one sees, to make educated and clever men use their
+talents and eloquence towards keeping a school in a crowded unhealthy
+neighbourhood, instead of moving it into the country; merely because, as
+far as one can gather from their speeches, they were educated at it
+themselves, twenty years ago. Hereby visiting the sins of the fathers on
+the children with a vengeance!
+
+"Somewhat too much of this." It would be stretching a point to say that
+Cuthbert was a handsome man, though he was very near being so, indeed.
+He was tall, but not too slender, for he had developed in chest somewhat
+since we first knew him. His face was rather pale, but his complexion
+perfectly clear; save that he had a black mark round his eyes. His
+features were decidedly marked, but not so strongly as Charles's; and
+there was an air of stately repose about him, showing itself in his way
+of carrying his head perfectly upright, and the firm, but not harsh,
+settling of his mouth, with the lower lip slightly pouting, which was
+very attractive. He was a consummate horseman, too, and, as I said,
+perfectly dressed; and, as he came towards them, looking apparently at
+nothing, both William and Marston thought they had never seen a finer
+specimen of a gentleman.
+
+He had strangely altered in two months. As great a change had come over
+him as comes over a rustic when the drill-sergeant gets him and makes a
+soldier of him. There is the same body, the same features, the same hair
+and eyes. Bill Jones is Bill Jones, if you are to believe his mother.
+But Bill Jones the soldier is not Bill Jones the ploughboy. He is quite
+a different person. So, since the night when Charles departed, Cuthbert
+had not been the Cuthbert of former times. He was no longer wayward and
+irritable; he was as silent as ever, but he had grown so staid, so
+studiously courteous to every one, so exceedingly humble-minded and
+patient with every one, that all save one or two wondered at the change
+in him.
+
+He had been passionately fond of Charles, though he had seldom shown it,
+and was terribly cut up at his loss. He had greatly humiliated himself
+to himself by what was certainly his felonious offer to Father
+Mackworth; and he had found the estate somewhat involved, and had
+determined to set to work and bring it to rights. These three causes had
+made Cuthbert Ravenshoe a humbler and better man than he had ever been
+before.
+
+"William," he said, smiling kindly on him, "I have been seeing after
+your estate for you. It does me good to have some one to work for. You
+will die a rich man."
+
+William said nothing. One of Cuthbert's fixed notions was, that he would
+die young and childless. He claimed to have a heart-complaint, though it
+really appeared without any foundation. It was a fancy which William had
+combated at first, but now acquiesced in, because he found it useless to
+do otherwise.
+
+He dismounted and walked with him. "Cuthbert," said William, "we have
+been thinking about Charles."
+
+"I am always thinking about him," said Cuthbert; "is there no way of
+finding him?"
+
+"I am going. I want you to give me some money and let me go."
+
+"You had better go at once, William. You had better try if the police
+can help you. We are pretty sure that he has gone to America, unless he
+has enlisted. In either case, it is very possible we may find him. Aunt
+Ascot would have succeeded, if she had not lost her temper. Don't you
+think I am right, my dear Marston?"
+
+"I do, indeed, Ravenshoe," said Marston. "Don't you think now, Mr.
+Mackworth, that, if a real push is made, and with judgment, we may find
+Charles again?"
+
+They had reached the terrace, and Father Mackworth was standing in front
+of the porch. He said he believed it was perfectly possible. "Nay," he
+said, "possible! I am as sure of seeing Charles Horton back here again
+as I am that I shall eat my dinner to-day."
+
+"And I," said Cuthbert, "am equally sure that we shall see poor Ellen
+back some day. Poor girl! she shall have a warm welcome."
+
+Father Mackworth said he hoped it might be so. And the lie did not choke
+him.
+
+"We are going to send William away again to look after him, Father,"
+said Cuthbert.
+
+"He had much better stay at home and mind his education," said
+Mackworth.
+
+William had his back towards them, and was looking out to sea,
+whistling. When the priest spoke he turned round sharply, and said--
+
+"Hey? what's that?"
+
+The priest repeated it.
+
+"I suppose," said William, "that that is more my business than yours, is
+it not? I don't intend to go to school again, certainly not to you."
+
+Cuthbert looked from one to the other of them, and said nothing. A few
+days before this William and the priest had fallen out; and Mackworth,
+appealing, had been told with the greatest kindness and politeness by
+Cuthbert that he could not interfere. That William was heir to
+Ravenshoe, and that he really had no power over him whatever. Mackworth
+had said nothing then, but now he had followed Cuthbert into the
+library, and, when they were alone, said--
+
+"Cuthbert, I did not expect this from you. You have let him insult me
+twice, and have not corrected him."
+
+Cuthbert put his back against the door, and said--
+
+"Now you don't leave this room till you apologise for these wicked
+words. My dear old fellow, what a goose you are! Have not you and he
+always squabbled? Do fight it out with him, and don't try and force me
+to take a side. I ain't going to do it, you know, and so I tell you
+plainly. Give it to him. Who can do it so well as you? Remember what an
+altered position he is in. How can you expect me to take your part
+against him?"
+
+Father Mackworth cleared his brow, and said, laughing, "You are right,
+Cuthbert. I'll go about with the rogue. He is inclined to kick over the
+traces, but I'll whip him in a little. I have had the whip-hand of every
+Ravenshoe I have had to deal with yet, yourself included, and it's hard
+if I am to be beat by this new whipper-snapper."
+
+Cuthbert said affectionately to him, "I think you love me, Mackworth.
+Don't quarrel with him more than you can help. I know you love me." And
+so Cuthbert went to seek John Marston.
+
+Love him! Ay, that he did. John Mackworth could be cruel, hard, false,
+vindictive. He could cheat, and he could lie, if need were. He was
+heartless and ambitious. But he loved Cuthbert. It was a love which had
+taken a long time growing, but there it was, and he was half ashamed of
+it. Even to himself he would try to make out that it was mere
+selfishness and ambition--that he was gentle with Cuthbert, because he
+must keep his place at Ravenshoe. Even now he would try to persuade
+himself that such was the case--perhaps the more strongly because he
+began to see now that there was a soft spot in his heart, and that
+Cuthbert was master of it. Since the night when Cuthbert had offered him
+ten thousand pounds, and he had refused it, Cuthbert had never been the
+same to him. And Mackworth, expecting to find his influence increased,
+found to his astonishment that from that moment it was _gone_.
+Cuthbert's intensely sensitive and proud nature revolted from the
+domination of a man before whom he had so lowered himself; and firmly,
+though humbly now, for he was altered by seeing how nearly he had been a
+villain, he let him see that he would walk in future in his own
+strength. Father Mackworth saw soon that Ravenshoe was a comfortable
+home for him, but that his power was gone. Unless!
+
+And yet he knew he could exercise a power little dreamt of. It is in the
+power, possibly, of a condemned man to burn the prison down, and
+possibly his interest; but he has compunctions. Mackworth tried to
+persuade himself that the reason he did not use his power was that it
+would not be advisable. He was a cipher in the house, and knew by
+instinct that he would never be more. But in reality, I believe, he let
+his power sleep for Cuthbert's sake.
+
+"Who could have thought," he said, "that the very thing which clenched
+my power, as I thought, should have destroyed it? Are not those people
+fools who lay down rules for human action? Why, no. They are possibly
+right five times out of ten. But as for the other five! Bah!
+
+"No, I won't allow that. It was my own fault. I should have known his
+character better. But there, I could not have helped it, for he did it
+himself. I was passive."
+
+And Cuthbert followed Marston into the hall, and said, "You are not
+going away because William goes, Marston?"
+
+"Do you want me?" said Marston.
+
+"Yes," said Cuthbert. "You must stay with me. My time is short, and I
+must know as much of this world as I may. I have much to do; you must
+help me. I will be like a little child in your hands. I will die in the
+old faith; but I will learn something new."
+
+And so Marston stayed with him, and they two grew fast friends. Cuthbert
+had nothing to learn in this management of his estate; there he was
+Marston's master; but all that a shrewd young man of the world could
+teach a bookworm, so much Cuthbert got from Marston.
+
+Marston one day met the village doctor, the very man whom we saw at the
+beginning of the book, putting out William (whom we then supposed to be
+Charles) to nurse. Marston asked him, "Was there any reality in this
+heart-complaint of Cuthbert's?"
+
+"Not the very faintest shadow of a reality," said the doctor. "It is the
+most tiresome whimsy I ever knew. He has persuaded himself of it,
+though. He used to be very hypochondriac. He is as likely to live till
+eighty as you are."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII.
+
+THE MEETING.
+
+
+There was ruin in the Ascot family, we know. And Lord Ascot, crippled
+with paralysis at six-and-forty, was lying in South Audley Street,
+nursed by Lady Ascot. The boxes, which we saw packed ready for their
+foreign tour at the London Bridge Hotel, were still there--not gone
+abroad yet, for the simple reason that Herodias had won the Oaks, and
+that Lord Welter had won, some said seven, others said seventy thousand
+pounds. (He had really won nine). So the boxes might stay where they
+were a few days, and he might pursue his usual avocations in peace, all
+his debts of honour being satisfied.
+
+He had barely saved himself from being posted. Fortunately for him, he
+had, on the Derby, betted chiefly with a few friends, one of whom was
+Hornby; and they waited and said nothing till after the Oaks, when they
+were paid, and Welter could hold up his head again. He was indebted to
+the generosity of Hornby and Sir Charles Ferrars for his honour--the
+very men whom he would have swindled. But he laughed and ate his
+dinner, and said they were good fellows, and thought no more of it.
+
+The bailiffs were at Ranford. The servants were gone, and the horses
+were advertised at Tattersall's already. It was reported in the county
+that an aged Jew, being in possession, and prowling about the premises,
+had come into the poultry-yard, and had surreptitiously slain, cooked,
+and essayed to eat, the famous cock "Sampson," the champion bird of
+England, since his match with "Young Countryman." On being informed by
+the old keeper that my lord had refused sixty guineas for him a few
+weeks before, he had (so said the county) fled out of the house, tearing
+his hair, and knocked old Lady Hainault, who had also come prowling over
+in her pony-carriage, down the steps, flat on her back. Miss Hicks, who
+was behind with her shawls, had picked her up, they said, and "caught
+it."
+
+If Adelaide was beautiful everywhere, surely she was more beautiful on
+horseback than anywhere else, and no one knew it better than herself.
+She was one of the few who appeared in the park in a low-crowned hat--a
+"wide-awake." They are not _de rigueur_ even yet, I believe; but
+Adelaide was never very particular, so long as she could look well. She
+had found out how splendid her perfect mask looked under the careless,
+irregular curves of such a head-dress, and how bright her banded hair
+shone in contrast with a black ostrich feather which drooped on her
+shoulder. And so she had taken to wear one since she had been Lady
+Welter, and had appeared in the park in it twice.
+
+Lord Welter bethought himself once in these times--that is, just after
+the Oaks--that he would like to take his handsome wife out, and show her
+in the park. His Hornby speculation had turned out ill; in fact, Hornby
+had altogether made rather a handsome sum out of him, and he must look
+for some one else. The some one else, a young Austrian, Pscechenyi by
+name, a young fellow of wealth, had received his advances somewhat
+coldly, and it became necessary to hang out Adelaide as a lure.
+
+Lord Welter was aware that, if he had asked Adelaide to come and ride
+with him, on the ground of giving her an afternoon's amusement, and
+tried to persuade her to it by fair-spoken commonplaces, she would
+probably not have come; and so he did nothing of the kind. He and his
+wife thoroughly understood one another. There was perfect confidence
+between them in everything. Towards one another they were perfectly
+sincere; and this very sincerity begot a feeling of trust between them,
+which ultimately ripened into something better. They began life together
+without any professions of affection; but out of use, and a similarity
+of character, there grew a liking in the end. She knew everything about
+Lord Welter, save one thing, which she was to know immediately, and
+which was of no importance; and she was always ready to help him,
+provided, as she told him, "he didn't humbug," which his lordship, as we
+know, was not inclined to do, without her caution.
+
+Lord Welter went into her dressing-room, in the morning, and said--
+
+"Here's a note from Pscechenyi. He won't come to-night."
+
+"Indeed!" said Adelaide, brushing her hair. "I did not give him credit
+for so much sense. Really, you know, he can't be such a fool as he
+looks."
+
+"We must have him," said Lord Welter.
+
+"Of course we must," said Adelaide. "I really cannot allow such a fat
+goose to run about with a knife and fork in him any longer. Heigh ho!
+Let's see. He affects Lady Brittlejug, don't he? I am going to her party
+to-night, and I'll capture him for you, and bring him home to you from
+under her very nose. Now, do try and make a better hand of him than you
+did of Hornby, or we shall all be in the workhouse together."
+
+"I'll do my best," said Lord Welter, laughing. "But look here. I don't
+think you'll catch him so, you know. She looks as well as you by
+candlelight; but she can't ride a hang. Come out in the park this
+afternoon. He will be there."
+
+"Very well," said Adelaide; "I suppose you know best. I shall be glad of
+a ride. Half-past two, then."
+
+So, at the time appointed, these two innocent lambkins rode forth to
+take the air. Lord Welter, big, burly, red-faced, good-humoured,
+perfectly dressed, and sitting on his horse as few others could sit, the
+model of a frank English nobleman. Adelaide, beautiful and fragile
+beyond description, perfect in dress and carriage, riding trustingly and
+lovingly in the shadow of her lord, the happy, timid bride all over.
+They had no groom. What should a poor simple couple like them want with
+a groom? It was a beautiful sight, and many turned to look at them.
+
+But Lord Saltire, who was looking out of the drawing-room window of Lord
+Ascot's house in South Audley Street, as they passed, turned to Marston,
+and said very emphatically--
+
+"Now, I do really wonder what infernal mischief those two are after.
+There is an air of pastoral simplicity about their whole get-up, which
+forebodes some very great--very great"--here he paused, took snuff, and
+looked Marston straight in the face--"obliquity of moral purpose."
+
+Meanwhile the unconscious innocents sauntered on into the park, under
+the Marble Arch, and down towards Rotten Row. When they got into the
+Row, they had a canter. There was Pscechenyi riding with Hornby and Miss
+Buckjumper, but they gave them the "go by," and went sortly on towards
+Kensington Gate. "Who is the woman in the hat and feathers?" said
+everybody who didn't know. "Lady Welter" said everybody who did; and,
+whatever else they said of her, they all agreed that she was wonderfully
+beautiful, and rode divinely. When they came slowly back, they found
+Hornby and the Austrian were standing against the rail, talking to some
+ladies. They drew close up, and entered into conversation; and Adelaide
+found herself beside Miss Buckjumper, now Lady Handlycross.
+
+Adelaide was somewhat pleased to find herself at the side of this famous
+horsewoman and beauty. She was so sure that comparisons would be
+favourable to herself. And they were. If ever an exquisitely-formed nose
+was, so to speak put out of joint, that nose was in the middle of Miss
+Buckjumper's face that day. Nevertheless, she did not show anything. She
+had rather a respect for Adelaide, as being a successful woman. Was not
+she herself cantering for a coronet? There was very soon a group round
+them, and Lord Welter's hoarse, jolly laugh was heard continually.
+People, who were walking in the park to see the great people, paused
+outside the circle to look at her, and repassed again. Mr. Pelagius J.
+Bottom, of New York, whose father emigrated to Athens, and made a great
+fortune at the weaving business in the time of King Theseus, got on a
+bench, and looked at her through a double-barrelled opera-glass. There
+never was such a success. The Austrian thought no more of Hornby's
+cautions, thought no more of Miss Buckjumper or Lady Brittlejug. He was
+desperately in love, and was dying for some excuse to withdraw his
+refusal of this morning. Pelagius Jas. Bottom would have come, and
+mortgaged the paternal weaving business at the dice, but unfortunately
+his letters of introduction, being all addressed to respectable people,
+did not include one to Lord and Lady Welter. All the young fellows would
+have come and played all night, till church-time next morning, for her
+sake. As Lord Welter candidly told her that night, she was the best
+investment he had ever made.
+
+They did not want all the young fellows though. Too many cooks spoil the
+broth. They only wanted the young Austrian, and so Lord Welter said,
+after a time, "I was in hopes of seeing you at my house last night."
+That was quite enough. Fifty Hornbys would not have stopped him now.
+
+Still they stood there talking. Adelaide was almost happy. Which of
+these staid women had such power as she? There was a look of pride and
+admiration even on Lord Welter's stupid face. Yes, it was a great
+success. Suddenly all people began to look one way and come towards the
+rails, and a buzz arose, "The Queen--the Queen!"
+
+Adelaide turned just as the outriders were opposite to her. She saw the
+dark claret-coloured carriage, fifty yards off, and she knew that Lady
+Emily Montford, who had been her sister bridesmaid at Lady Hainault's
+wedding, was in waiting that day. Hornby declares the whole thing was
+done on purpose. Let us be more charitable, and suppose that her horse
+was startled at the scarlet coats of the outriders; however it was, the
+brute took fright, stood on its hind legs, and bolted straight towards
+the royal carriage. She reined it up within ten feet of the carriage
+step, plunging furiously. Raising her whip hand to push her hat more
+firmly on, she knocked it off, and sat there bareheaded, with one loop
+of her hair fallen down, a sight which no man who saw it ever forgot.
+She saw a look of amazed admiration in the Queen's face. She saw Lady
+Emily's look of gentle pity. She saw her Majesty lean forward, and ask
+who it was. She saw her name pass Lady Emily's lips, and then she saw
+the Queen turn with a frown, and look steadily the other way.
+
+Wrath and rage were in her heart, and showed themselves one instant in
+her face. A groom had run out and picked up her hat. She bent down to
+take it from him, and saw that it was Charles Ravenshoe.
+
+Her face grew soft again directly. Poor thing! she must have had a kind
+heart after all, crusted over as it was with vanity, pride, and
+selfishness. Now, in her anger and shame, she could have cried to see
+her old love so degraded. There was no time for crying, or for saying
+more than a few sharp words, for they were coming towards her.
+
+"What nonsense is this, Charles?" she said. "What is this masquerade?
+Are you come to double my shame? Go home and take that dress off and
+burn it. Is your pride dead, that you disgrace yourself like this in
+public? If you are desperate, as you seem, why are you not at the war?
+They want desperate men there. Oh! if I was a man!"
+
+They parted then! no one but Lord Welter and Hornby knew who Charles
+was. The former saw that Adelaide had recognised him, and, as they rode
+simply home together, said--
+
+"I knew poor Charles was a groom. He saw his sister the other night at
+our house. I didn't tell you; I hardly know why. I really believe, do
+you know, that the truth of the matter is, Adelaide, that I did not want
+to vex you. Now!"
+
+He looked at her as if he thought she would disbelieve him, but she
+said--
+
+"Nay, I do believe you, Welter. You are not an ill-natured man, but you
+are selfish and unprincipled. So am I, perhaps to a greater extent than
+you. At what time is that fool of a German coming?"
+
+"At half-past eleven."
+
+"I must go to that woman Brittlejug's party. I must show there, to keep
+friends with her. She has such a terrible tongue, I will be back by
+twelve or so."
+
+"I wish you could stay at home."
+
+"I really dare not, my dear Welter. I must go. I will be back in good
+time."
+
+"Of course you will please yourself about it," said Lord Welter, a
+thought sulkily. And, when he was by himself he said--
+
+"She is going to see Charles Ravenshoe. Well, perhaps she ought. She
+treated him d----d bad! And so did I."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV.
+
+ANOTHER MEETING.
+
+
+Lord Ascot had been moved into South Audley Street, his town house, and
+Lady Ascot was there nursing him. General Mainwaring was off for Varna.
+But Lord Saltire had been a constant visitor, bringing with him very
+often Marston, who was, you will remember, an old friend of Lady Ascot.
+
+It was not at all an unpleasant house to be in. Lord Ascot was
+crippled--he had been seized with paralysis at Epsom; and he was ruined.
+But every one knew the worst, and felt relieved by thinking that things
+could get no worse than worst, and so must get better.
+
+In fact, every one admitted to the family party about that time
+remembered it as a very happy and quiet time indeed. Lord Ascot was
+their first object, of course; and a more gentle and biddable invalid
+than the poor fellow made can hardly be conceived. He was passionately
+fond of reading novels (a most reprehensible practice), and so was
+easily amused. Lord Saltire and he would play picquet: and every evening
+there would be three hours of whist, until the doctor looked in the
+last thing, and Lord Ascot was helped to bed.
+
+Marston was always set to play with Lord Ascot, because Lord Saltire and
+Lady Ascot would not play against one another. Lord Saltire, was, of
+course, one of the best players in Europe; and I really believe that
+Lady Ascot was not the worst by any means. I can see the party now. I
+can see Lady Ascot laying down a card, and looking at the same time at
+her partner, to call his attention to her lead. And I can see Lord
+Saltire take out his snuff-box threat, as if he were puzzled, but not
+alarmed. William would come sometimes and sit quietly behind Marston, or
+Lord Saltire, watching the game. In short, they were a very quiet
+pleasant party indeed.
+
+One night--it was the very night on which Adelaide had lost her hat in
+the Park--there was no whist. Marston had gone down to Oxford suddenly,
+and William came in to tell them so. Lady Ascot was rather glad, she
+said, for she had a friend coming to tea, who did not play whist; so
+Lord Saltire and Lord Ascot sat down to picquet, and William talked to
+his aunt.
+
+"Who is your friend, Maria?" asked Lord Saltire.
+
+"A Mr. Bidder, a minister. He has written a book on the Revelations,
+which you really ought to read, James; it would suit you."
+
+They both laughed.
+
+"About the seven seals, hey?" said Lord Saltire; "'_septem phocæ_,' as I
+remember Machynleth translated it at Eton once. We called him 'Vitulina'
+ever after. The name stuck to him through life with some of us. A
+capital name for him, too! His fussy blundering in this war-business is
+just like his old headlong way of looking out words in his dictionary.
+He is an ass, Maria; and I will bet fifty pounds that your friend, the
+minister, is another."
+
+"How can you know? at all events, the man he brings with him is none."
+
+"Another minister?"
+
+"Yes, a Moravian missionary from Australia."
+
+"Then certainly another ass, or he would have gone as missionary to a
+less abominably detestable hole. They were all burnt into the sea there
+the other day. Immediately after which the river rose seventy feet, and
+drowned the rest of them."
+
+Soon after were announced Mr. Bidder and Mr. Smith. Mr. Bidder was an
+entirely unremarkable man; but Mr. Smith was one of the most remarkable
+men I have ever seen, or rather heard--for externally there was nothing
+remarkable about him, except a fine forehead, and a large expressive
+grey eye, which, when he spoke to you, seemed to come back from a long
+distance, and fix itself upon yours. In manners he was perfect. He was
+rather taciturn, though always delighted to communicate information
+about his travels, in a perfectly natural way. If one man wanted
+information on botany, or what not, he was there to give it. If another
+wanted to hear about missionary work, he was ready for him. He never
+spoke or acted untruthfully for one instant. He never acted the free and
+easy man of the world as some religious gentlemen of all sects feel it
+necessary to do sometimes, imitating the real thing as well as Paul
+Bedford would imitate Fanny Ellsler. What made him remarkable was his
+terrible earnestness, and the feeling you had, that his curious language
+was natural, and meant something; something very important indeed.
+
+He has something to do with the story. The straws in the gutter have to
+do with the history of a man like Charles, a man who leaves all things
+to chance. And this man Smith is very worthy of notice, and so I have
+said thus much about him, and am going to say more.
+
+Mr. Bidder was very strong on the Russian war, which he illustrated by
+the Revelations. He was a good fellow, and well-bred enough to see that
+his friend Smith was an object of greater interest to Lady Ascot than
+himself; so he "retired into" a book of prints, and left the field
+clear.
+
+Mr. Smith sat by Lady Ascot, and William drew close up. Lady Ascot began
+by a commonplace, of course.
+
+"You have suffered great hardships among those savages, Mr. Smith, have
+you not?"
+
+"Hardships! Oh, dear no, my dear lady. Our station was one of the
+pleasantest places in the whole earth I believe; and we had a peaceful
+time. When the old man is strong in me I wish I was back there."
+
+"You did not make much progress with them, I believe?"
+
+"None whatever. We found out after a year or two that it was hopeless to
+make them understand the existence of a God; and after that we stayed on
+to see if we could bring them to some knowledge of agriculture, and save
+them from their inevitable extermination, as the New Zealanders have
+been saved."
+
+"And to no purpose?"
+
+"None. For instance, we taught them to plant our potatoes for us. They
+did it beautifully, but in the night they dug them up and ate them. And
+in due season we waited that our potatoes should grow, and they grew
+not. Then they came to Brother Hillyar, my coadjutor, an old man, now
+ruling ten cities for his Master, and promised for rewards of flour to
+tell him why the potatoes did not grow. And he, loving them, gave them
+what they desired. And they told him that they dug them up while we
+slept. And for two days I went about my business, laughing in secret
+places, for which he tried to rebuke me, but could not, laughing
+himself. The Lord kept him waiting long, for he was seventy-four; but,
+doubtless, his reward is the greater."
+
+William said, "You brought home a collection of zoological specimens, I
+think. They are in the Museum."
+
+"Yes. But what I could not bring over were my live pets. I and my wife
+had a menagerie of our own--a great number of beasts----"
+
+Mr. Bidder looking up from his book, catching the last sentence only,
+said the number of the beast was 666; and, then turning round, held
+himself ready to strike into the conversation, thinking that the time
+was come when he should hide his light no longer.
+
+"The natives are very low savages, are they not, Mr. Smith?" said
+William. "I have heard that they cannot count above ten."
+
+"Not so far as that," said Mr. Smith. "The tribe we were most among used
+to express all large unknown quantities by 'eighty-four;'[4] it was as
+_x_ and _y_ to them. That seems curious at first, does it not?"
+
+William said it did seem curious, their choosing that particular number.
+But Mr. Bidder, dying to mount his hobby-horse, and not caring how, said
+it was not at all curious. If you multiplied the twelve tribes of Israel
+into the seven cities of refuge, there you were at once.
+
+Mr. Smith said he thought he had made a little mistake. The number, he
+fancied, was ninety-four.
+
+Lord Saltire, from the card-table, said that that made the matter
+clearer than before, For if you placed the Ten Commandments to the
+previous result you arrived at ninety-four, which was the number wanted.
+And his lordship, who had lost, and was consequently possibly cross,
+added that, if you divided the whole by the five foolish virgins, and
+pitched Tobit's dog, neck and heels into the result, you would find
+yourself much about where you started.
+
+Mr. Bidder, who, as I said, was a good fellow, laughed, and Mr. Smith
+resumed the conversation once more; Lord Saltire seemed interested in
+what he said, and did not interfere with him.
+
+"You buried poor Mrs. Smith out there," said Lady Ascot. "I remember her
+well. She was very beautiful as a girl."
+
+"Very beautiful," said the missionary. "Yes; she never lost her beauty,
+do you know. That climate is very deadly to those who go there with the
+seeds of consumption in them. She had done a hard day's work before she
+went to sleep, though she was young. Don't you think so, Lady Ascot?"
+
+"A hard day's work; a good day's work, indeed. Who knows better than I?"
+said Lady Ascot. "What an awakening it must be from such a sleep as
+hers!"
+
+"Beyond the power of human tongue to tell," said the missionary, looking
+dreamily as at something far away. "Show me the poet that can describe
+in his finest language the joy of one's soul when one wakes on a
+summer's morning. Who, then, can conceive or tell the unutterable
+happiness of the purified soul, waking face to face with the King of
+Glory?"
+
+Lord Saltire looked at him curiously, and said to himself, "This fellow
+is in earnest. I have seen this sort of thing before. But seldom! Yes,
+but seldom!"
+
+"I should not have alluded to my wife's death," continued the
+missionary, in a low voice, "but that her ladyship introduced the
+subject. And no one has a better right to hear of her than her kind old
+friend. She fell asleep on the Sabbath evening after prayers. We moved
+her bed into the verandah, Lady Ascot, that she might see the sunlight
+fade out on the tops of the highest trees--a sight she always loved. And
+from the verandah we could see through the tree stems Mount Joorma, laid
+out in endless folds of woodland, all purple and gold. And I thought she
+was looking at the mountain, but she was looking far beyond that, for
+she said, 'I shall have to wait thirty years for you, James, but I shall
+be very happy and very busy. The time will go quick enough for me, but
+it will be a slow, weary time for you, my darling. Go home from here, my
+love, into the great towns, and see what is to be done there.' And so
+she went to sleep.
+
+"I rebelled for three days. I went away into the bush, with Satan at my
+elbow all the time, through dry places, through the forest, down by
+lonely creeksides, up among bald volcanic downs, where there are slopes
+of slippery turf, leading down to treacherous precipices of slag; and
+then through the quartz ranges, and the reedy swamps, where the black
+swans float, and the spur-winged plover hovers and cackles; all about I
+went among the beasts and the birds. But on the third day the Lord
+wearied of me, and took me back, and I lay on His bosom again like a
+child. He will always take you home, my lord, if you come. After three
+days, after thrice twenty years, my lord. Time is nothing to Him."
+
+Lord Saltire was looking on him with kindly admiration.
+
+"There is something in it, my lord. Depend upon it that it is not all a
+dream. Would not you give all your amazing wealth, all your honours,
+everything, to change places with me?"
+
+"I certainly would," said Lord Saltire. "I have always been of opinion
+that there was something in it. I remember," he continued, turning to
+William, "expressing the same opinion to your father in the Fleet Prison
+once, when he had quarrelled with the priests for expressing some
+opinions which he had got from me. But you must take up with that sort
+of thing very early in life if you mean it to have any reality at all. I
+am too old now!"[5]
+
+Lord Saltire said this in a different tone from his usual one. In a tone
+that we have never heard him use before. There was something about the
+man Smith which, in spite of his quaint language, softened every one who
+heard him speak. Lady Ascot says it was the grace of God. I entirely
+agree with her ladyship.
+
+"I came home," concluded the missionary, "to try some city work. My
+wife's nephew, John Marston, whom I expected to see here to-night, is
+going to assist me in this work. There seems plenty to do. We are at
+work in Southwark, at present."
+
+Possibly it was well that the company, more particularly Lady Ascot,
+were in a softened and forgiving mood. For, before any one had resumed
+the conversation, Lord Ascot's valet stood in the door, and, looking at
+Lady Ascot with a face which said as plain as words, "It is a terrible
+business, my lady, but I am innocent," announced--
+
+"Lady Welter."
+
+Lord Saltire put his snuff-box into his right-hand trousers' pocket, and
+his pocket handkerchief into his left, and kept his hands there, leaning
+back in his chair, with his legs stretched out, and a smile of infinite
+wicked amusement on his face. Lord Ascot and William stared like a
+couple of gabies. Lady Ascot had no time to make the slightest change,
+either in feature or position, before Adelaide, dressed for the evening
+in a cloud of white and pink, with her bare arms loaded with bracelets,
+a swansdown fan hanging from her left wrist, sailed swiftly into the
+room, with outstretched hands, bore down on Lady Ascot, and began
+kissing her, as though the old lady were a fruit of some sort, and she
+were a dove pecking at it.
+
+"Dearest grandma!"--peck. "So glad to see you!"--peck. "Couldn't help
+calling in on you as I went to Lady Brittlejug's--and how well you are
+looking!"--peck, peck. "I can spare ten minutes--do tell me all the
+news, since I saw you. My dear Lord Ascot, I was so sorry to hear of
+your illness, but you look better than I expected. And how do _you_ do,
+my dear Lord Saltire?"
+
+Lord Saltire was pretty well, and was delighted to see Lady Welter
+apparently in the enjoyment of such health and spirits, and so on,
+aloud. But, secretly, Lord Saltire was wondering what on earth could
+have brought her here. Perhaps she only wanted to take Lady Ascot by
+surprise, and force her into a recognition of her as Lady Welter. No. My
+lord saw there was something more than that. She was restless and absent
+with Lady Ascot. Her eye kept wandering in the middle of all her
+rattling talk; but, wherever it wandered, it always came back to
+William, of whom she had hitherto taken no notice whatever.
+
+"She has come after him. For what?" thought my lord. "I wonder if the
+jade knows anything of Charles."
+
+Lady Ascot had steeled herself against this meeting. She had determined,
+firstly, that no mortal power should ever induce her to set eyes on
+Adelaide again; and, secondly, that she, Lady Ascot, would give her,
+Adelaide, a piece of her mind, which she should never forget to her
+dying day. The first of these rather contradictory determinations had
+been disposed of by Adelaide's audacity; and as for the second--why, the
+piece of Lady Ascot's mind which was to be given to Adelaide was somehow
+not ready; but, instead of it, only silent tears, and withered,
+trembling fingers, which wandered lovingly over the beautiful young
+hand, and made the gaudy bracelets on the wrist click one against the
+other.
+
+"What could I say, Brooks? what could I do?" said Lady Ascot to her maid
+that night, "when I saw her own self come back, with her own old way? I
+love the girl more than ever, Brooks, I believe. She beat me. She took
+me by surprise. I could not resist her. If she had proposed to put me in
+a wheelbarrow, and wheel me into the middle of that disgraceful, that
+detestable woman Brittlejug's drawing-room, there and then, I should
+have let her do it, I believe. I might have begged for time to put on my
+bonnet; but I should have gone."
+
+She sat there ten minutes or more, talking. Then she said that it was
+time to go, but that she should come and see Lady Ascot on the morrow.
+Then she turned to William, to whom she had not been introduced, and
+asked, would he see her to her carriage? Lord Saltire was next the bell,
+and looking her steadily in the face, raised his hand slowly to pull it.
+Adelaide begged him eagerly not to trouble himself; he, with a smile,
+promptly dropped his hand, and out she sailed on William's arm, Lord
+Saltire holding the door open, and shutting it after her, with somewhat
+singular rapidity.
+
+"I hope none of those fools of servants will come blundering upstairs
+before she has said her say," he remarked, aloud. "Give us some of your
+South African experiences, Mr. Smith. Did you ever see a woman beautiful
+enough to go clip a lion's claws singlehanded, eh?"
+
+William, convoying Adelaide downstairs, had got no farther than the
+first step, when he felt her hand drawn from his arm; he had got one
+foot on the step below, when he turned to see the cause of this.
+Adelaide was standing on the step above him, with her glorious face bent
+sternly, almost fiercely, down on his, and the hand from which the fan
+hung pointed towards him. It was as beautiful a sight as he had ever
+seen, and he calmly wondered what it meant. The perfect mouth was curved
+in scorn, and from it came sharp ringing words, decisive, hard, clear,
+like the sound of a hammer on an anvil.
+
+"Are you a party to this shameful business, sir? you, who have taken his
+name, and his place, and his prospects in society. You, who professed,
+as I hear, to love him like another life, dearer than your own. You, who
+lay on the same breast with him--tell me, in God's name, that you are
+sinning in ignorance."
+
+William, as I have remarked before, had a certain amount of shrewdness.
+He determined to let her go on. He only said, "You are speaking of
+Charles Ravenshoe."
+
+"Ay," she said, sharply; "of Charles Ravenshoe, sir--ex-stable-boy. I
+came here to-night to beard them all; to ask them did they know, and did
+they dare to suffer it. If they had not given me an answer, I would have
+said such things to them as would have made them stop their ears. Lord
+Saltire has a biting tongue, has he? Let him hear what mine is. But when
+I saw you among them, I determined to save a scene, and speak to you
+alone. Shameful----"
+
+William looked quietly at her. "Will your ladyship remark that I, that
+all of us, have been moving heaven and earth to find Charles Ravenshoe,
+and that we have been utterly unable to find him? If you have any
+information about him, would it not be as well to consider that the
+desperation caused by your treatment of him was the principal cause of
+his extraordinary resolution of hiding himself? And, instead of scolding
+me and others, who are doing all we can, to give us all the information
+in your power?"
+
+"Well, well," she said, "perhaps you are right. Consider me rebuked,
+will you have the goodness? I saw Charles Ravenshoe to-day."
+
+"To-day!"
+
+"Ay, and talked to him."
+
+"How did he look? was he pale? was he thin? Did he seem to want money?
+Did he ask after me? Did he send any message? Can you take me to where
+he is? Did he seem much broken down? Does he know we have been seeking
+him? Lady Welter, for God's sake, do something to repair the wrong you
+did him, and take me to where he is."
+
+"I don't know where he is, I tell you. I saw him for just one moment. He
+picked up my hat in the Park. He was dressed like a groom. He came from
+I know not where, like a ghost from the grave. He did not speak to me.
+He gave me my hat, and was gone. I do not know whose groom he is, but I
+think Welter knows. He will tell me to-night. I dared not ask him
+to-day, lest he should think I was going to see him. When I tell him
+where I have been, and describe what has passed here, he will tell me.
+Come to me to-morrow morning, and he shall tell you; that will be
+better. You have sense enough to see why."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Another thing. He has seen his sister Ellen. And yet another thing.
+When I ran away with Lord Welter, I had no idea of what had happened to
+him--of this miserable _esclandre_. But you must have known that before,
+if you were inclined to do me justice. Come to-morrow morning. I must go
+now."
+
+And so she went to her carriage by herself after all. And William stood
+still on the stairs, triumphant. Charles was as good as found.
+
+The two clergymen passed him on their way downstairs, and bade him
+good-night. Then he returned to the drawing-room, and said--
+
+"My lord, Lady Welter has seen Charles to-day, and spoken to him. With
+God's help, I will have him here with us to-morrow night."
+
+It was half-past eleven. What Charles, in his headlong folly and
+stupidity, had contrived to do before this time, must be told in
+another chapter--no, I have not patience to wait. My patience is
+exhausted. One act of folly following another so fast would exhaust the
+patience of Job. If one did not love him so well, one would not be so
+angry with him. I will tell it here and have done with it. When he had
+left Adelaide, he had gone home with Hornby. He had taken the horses to
+the stable; he had written a note to Hornby. Then he had packed up a
+bundle of clothes, and walked quietly off.
+
+Round by St. Peter's Church--he had no particular reason for going
+there, except, perhaps, that his poor foolish heart yearned that evening
+to see some one who cared for him, though it were only a shoeblack.
+There was still one pair of eyes which would throw a light for one
+instant into the thick darkness which was gathering fast around him.
+
+His little friend was there. Charles and he talked for a while, and at
+last he said--
+
+"You will not see me again. I am going to the war. I am going to Windsor
+to enlist in the Hussars, to-night."
+
+"They will kill you," said the boy.
+
+"Most likely," said Charles. "So we must say good-bye. Mind, now, you go
+to the school at night, and say that prayer I gave you on the paper. We
+must say good-bye. We had better be quick about it."
+
+The boy looked at him steadily. Then he began to draw his breath in long
+sighs--longer, longer yet, till his chest seemed bursting. Then out it
+all came in a furious hurricane of tears, and he leant his head against
+the wall, and beat the bricks with his clenched hand.
+
+"And I am never to see you no more! no more! no more!"
+
+"No more," said Charles. But he thought he might soften the poor boy's
+grief; and he did think, too, at the moment, that he would go and see
+the house where his kind old aunt lived, before he went away for ever;
+so he said--
+
+"I shall be in South Audley Street, 167, to-morrow at noon. Now, you
+must not cry, my dear. You must say good-bye."
+
+And so he left him, thinking to see him no more. Once more, Charles,
+only once more, and then God help you!
+
+He went off that night to Windsor, and enlisted in the 140th Hussars.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLV.
+
+HALF A MILLION.
+
+
+And so you see here we are all at sixes and sevens once more. Apparently
+as near the end of the story as when I wrote the adventures of Alured
+Ravenshoe at the Court of Henry the Eighth in the very first chapter. If
+Charles had had a little of that worthy's impudence, instead of being
+the shy, sensitive fellow he was, why, the story would have been over
+long ago. In point of fact, I don't know that it would ever have been
+written at all. So it is best as it is for all parties.
+
+Although Charles had enlisted in Hornby's own regiment he had craftily
+calculated that there was not the slightest chance of Hornby's finding
+it out for some time. Hornby's troop was at the Regent's Park. The
+head-quarters were at Windsor, and the only officer likely to recognise
+him was Hornby's captain. And so he went to work at his new duties with
+an easy mind, rather amused than otherwise, and wondering where and when
+it would all end.
+
+From sheer unadulterated ignorance, I cannot follow him during the first
+week or so of his career. I have a suspicion almost amounting to a
+certainty, that, if I could, I should not. I do not believe that the
+readers of Ravenshoe would care to hear about sword-exercise,
+riding-school, stable-guard, and so on. I can, however, tell you thus
+much, that Charles learnt his duties in a wonderfully short space of
+time, and was a great favourite with high and low.
+
+When William went to see Adelaide by appointment the morning after his
+interview with her, he had an interview with Lord Welter, who told him
+in answer to his inquiries, that Charles was groom to Lieutenant Hornby.
+
+"I promised that I would say nothing about it," he continued, "but I
+think I ought; and Lady Welter has been persuading me to do so, if any
+inquiries were made, only this morning. I am deuced glad, Ravenshoe,
+that none of you have forgotten him. It would be a great shame if you
+had. He is a good fellow, and has been infernally used by some of us--by
+me, for instance."
+
+William, in his gladness, said, "Never mind, my lord; let bygones be
+bygones. We shall all be to one another as we were before, please God. I
+have found Charles, at all events; so there is no gap in the old circle,
+except my father's. I had a message for Lady Welter."
+
+"She is not down; she is really not well this morning, or she could have
+seen you."
+
+"It is only this. Lady Ascot begs that she will come over to lunch. My
+aunt wished she would have stopped longer last night."
+
+"Your aunt?"
+
+"My aunt, Lady Ascot."
+
+"Ah! I beg pardon; I am not quite used to the new state of affairs. Was
+Lady Welter with Lady Ascot last night?"
+
+William was obliged to say yes, but felt as if he had committed an
+indiscretion by having said anything about it.
+
+"The deuce she was!" said Lord Welter. "I thought she was somewhere
+else. Tell my father that I will come and see him to-day, if he don't
+think it would be too much for him."
+
+"Ah, Lord Welter! you would have come before, if you had known----"
+
+"I know--I know. You must know that I had my reasons for not coming.
+Well, I hope that you and I will be better acquainted in our new
+positions; we were intimate enough in our old."
+
+When William was gone, Lord Welter went up to his wife's dressing-room
+and said--
+
+"Lady Welter, you are a jewel. If you go on like this, you will be
+recognised, and we shall die at Ranford--you and I--a rich and
+respectable couple. If 'ifs and ands were pots and pans,' Lady Welter,
+we should do surprisingly well. If, for instance, Lord Saltire could be
+got to like me something better than a mad dog, he would leave my father
+the whole of his landed estate, and cut Charles Horton, whilom
+Ravenshoe, off with the comparatively insignificant sum of eighty
+thousand pounds, the amount of his funded property. Eh! Lady Welter?"
+
+Adelaide actually bounded from her chair.
+
+"Are you drunk, Welter?" she said.
+
+"Seeing that it is but the third hour of the day, I am not, Lady Welter.
+Neither am I a fool. Lord Saltire would clear my father now, if he did
+not know that it would be more for my benefit than his. I believe he
+would sooner leave his money to a hospital than see me get one farthing
+of it."
+
+"Welter," said Adelaide, eagerly, "if Charles gets hold of Lord Saltire
+again, he will have the whole; the old man adores him. I know it; I see
+it all now; why did I never think of it before. He thinks he is like
+Lord Barkham, his son. There is time yet. If that man William Ravenshoe
+comes this morning, you must know nothing of Charles. Mind that.
+Nothing. They must not meet. He may forget him. Mind, Welter, no
+answer!"
+
+She was walking up and down the room rapidly now, and Lord Welter was
+looking at her with a satirical smile on his face.
+
+"Lady Welter," he said, "the man William Ravenshoe has been here and got
+his answer. By this time, Charles is receiving his lordship's blessing."
+
+"Fool!" was all that Adelaide could say.
+
+"Well, hardly that," said Lord Welter. "At least, _you_ should hardly
+call me so. I understood the position of affairs long before you. I was
+a reckless young cub not to have paid Lord Saltire more court in old
+times; but I never knew the state of our affairs till very shortly
+before the crash came, or I might have done so. In the present case, I
+have not been such a fool. Charles is restored to Lord Saltire through
+my instrumentality. A very good basis of operations, Lady Welter."
+
+"At the risk of about half a million of money," remarked Adelaide.
+
+"There was no risk in the other course, certainly," said Lord Welter,
+"for we should never have seen a farthing of it. And besides, Lady
+Welter----"
+
+"Well!"
+
+"I have your attention. Good. It may seem strange to you, who care about
+no one in heaven or earth, but I love this fellow, this Charles Horton.
+I always did. He is worth all the men I ever met put together. I am glad
+to have been able to give him a lift this morning. Even if I had not
+been helping myself, I should have done it all the same. That is
+comical, is it not? For Lord Saltire's landed property I shall fight.
+The campaign begins at lunch to-day, Lady Welter; so, if you will be so
+good as to put on your full war-paint and feathers, we will dig up the
+tomahawk, and be off on the war-trail in your ladyship's brougham.
+Good-bye for the present."
+
+Adelaide was beaten. She was getting afraid of her husband--afraid of
+his strong masculine cunning, of his reckless courage, and of the
+strange apparition of a great brutal _heart_ at the bottom of it all.
+What were all her fine-spun female cobwebs worth against such a huge,
+blundering, thieving hornet as he?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVI.
+
+TO LUNCH WITH LORD ASCOT.
+
+
+That same day, Lord Saltire and Lady Ascot were sitting in the
+drawing-room window, in South Audley Street, alone. He had come in, as
+his custom was, about eleven, and found her reading her great old Bible;
+he had taken up the paper and read away for a time, saying that he would
+not interrupt her; she, too, had seemed glad to avoid a _tête-à-tête_
+conversation, and had continued; but, after a few minutes, he had
+dropped the paper, and cried--
+
+"The deuce!"
+
+"My dear James," said she, "what is the matter?"
+
+"Matter! why, we have lost a war-steamer, almost without a shot fired.
+The Russians have got the _Tiger_, crew and all. It is unbearable,
+Maria; if they are going to blunder like this at the beginning, where
+will it end?"
+
+Lord Saltire was disgusted with the war from the very beginning, in
+consequence of the French alliance, and so the present accident was as
+fuel for his wrath. Lady Ascot, as loyal a soul as lived, was possibly
+rather glad that something had taken up Lord Saltire's attention just
+then, for she was rather afraid of him this morning. She knew his great
+dislike for Lord Welter, and expected to be scolded for her weakness
+with regard to Adelaide the night before. Moreover, she had the guilty
+consciousness that she had asked Adelaide to come to lunch that morning,
+of which he did not yet know. So she was rather glad to have a subject
+to talk of, not personal.
+
+"And when did it happen, my dear James?" she asked.
+
+"On the twelfth of last month, Lady Ascot. Come and sit here in the
+window, and give an account of yourself, will you have the goodness?"
+
+Now that she saw it must come, she was as cool and as careless as need
+be. He could not be hard on her. Charles was to come home to them that
+day. She drew her chair up, and laid her withered old hand on his, and
+the two grey heads were bent together. Grey heads but green hearts.
+
+"Look at old Daventry," said Lord Saltire, "on the other side of the
+way. Don't you see him, Maria, listening to that organ? He is two years
+older than I am. He looks younger."
+
+"I don't know that he does. He ought to look older. She led him a
+terrible life. Have you been to see him lately?"
+
+"What business is that of yours? So you are going to take Welter's wife
+back into your good graces, eh, my lady?"
+
+"Yes, James."
+
+"'Yes, James!' I have no patience with you. You are weaker than water.
+Well, well, we must forgive her, I suppose. She has behaved generous
+enough about Charles, has she not? I rather admire her scolding poor
+William Ravenshoe. I must renew our acquaintance."
+
+"She is coming to lunch to-day."
+
+"I thought you looked guilty. Is Welter coming?"
+
+Lady Ascot made no reply. Neither at that moment would Lord Saltire have
+heard her if she had. He was totally absorbed in the proceedings of his
+old friend Lord Daventry, before mentioned. That venerable dandy had
+listened to the organ until the man had played all his tunes twice
+through, when he had given him half-a-crown, and the man had departed.
+Immediately afterwards, a Punch and Judy had come, which Punch and Judy
+was evidently an acquaintance of his; for, on descrying him, it had
+hurried on with its attendant crowd, and breathlessly pitched itself in
+front of him, let down its green curtains, and plunged at once _in
+medias res_. The back of the show was towards Lord Saltire; but, just as
+he saw Punch look round the corner, to see which way the Devil was gone,
+he saw two pickpockets advance on Lord Daventry from different quarters,
+with fell intentions. They met at his tail-coat pocket, quarrelled, and
+fought. A policeman bore down on them; Lord Daventry was still
+unconscious, staring his eyes out of his head. The affair was becoming
+exciting, when Lord Saltire felt a warm tear drop on his hand.
+
+"James," said Lady Ascot, "don't be hard on Welter. I love Welter. There
+is good in him; there is, indeed. I know how shamefully he has behaved;
+but don't be hard on him, James."
+
+"My dearest Maria," said Lord Saltire, "I would not give you one
+moment's uneasiness for the world. I do not like Welter. I dislike him.
+But I will treat him for your sake and Ascot's as though I loved
+him--there. Now about Charles. He will be with us to-day, thank God.
+What the deuce are we to do?"
+
+"I cannot conceive," said Lady Ascot; "it is such a terrible puzzle. One
+does not like to move, and yet it seems such a sin to stand still."
+
+"No answer to your advertisement, of course?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"None whatever. It seems strange, too, with such a reward as we have
+offered; but it was worded so cautiously, you see."
+
+Lord Saltire laughed. "Cautiously, indeed. No one could possibly guess
+what it was about. It was a miracle of obscurity; but it won't do to go
+any further yet." After a pause, he said--"You are perfectly certain of
+your facts, Maria, for the fiftieth time."
+
+"Perfectly certain. I committed a great crime, James. I did it for
+Alicia's sake. Think what my bringing up had been, how young I was, and
+forgive me if you can; excuse me if you cannot."
+
+"Nonsense about a great crime, Maria. It was a great mistake, certainly.
+If you had only had the courage to have asked Petre one simple question!
+Alicia never guessed the fact, of course?"
+
+"Never."
+
+"Do you think, Maria, that by any wild possibility James or Nora knew?"
+
+"How could they possibly? What a foolish question."
+
+"I don't know. These Roman Catholics do strange things," said Lord
+Saltire, staring out of window at the crowd.
+
+"If she knew, why did she change the child?"
+
+"Eh?" said Lord Saltire, turning round.
+
+"You have not been attending," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"No, I have not," said Lord Saltire; "I was looking at Daventry."
+
+"Do you still," said Lord Saltire, "since all our researches and
+failures, stick to the belief that the place was in Hampshire?"
+
+"I do indeed, and in the north of Hampshire too."
+
+"I wonder," said Lord Saltire, turning round suddenly, "whether
+Mackworth knows?"
+
+"Of course he does," said Lady Ascot, quietly.
+
+"Hum," said Lord Saltire, "I had a hold over that man once; but I threw
+it away as being worthless. I wish I had made a bargain for my
+information. But what nonsense; how can he know?"
+
+"Know?" said Lady Ascot, scornfully; "what is there a confessor don't
+know? Don't tell me that all Mackworth's power came from finding out
+poor Densil's _faux pas_. The man had a sense of power other than that."
+
+"Then he never used it," said Lord Saltire. "Densil, dear soul, never
+knew."
+
+"I said a _sense_ of power," said Lady Ascot, "which gave him his
+consummate impudence. Densil never dreamt of it."
+
+At this point the policeman had succeeded in capturing the two
+pickpockets, and was charging them before Lord Daventry. Lord Daventry
+audibly offered them ten shillings a-piece to say nothing about it; at
+which the crowd cheered.
+
+"Would it be any use to offer money to the priest--say ten thousand
+pounds or so?" said Lord Saltire. "You are a religious woman, Maria, and
+as such are a better judge of a priest's conscience than I. What do you
+think?"
+
+"I don't know," said Lady Ascot. "I don't know but what the man is
+high-minded, in his heathenish way. You know Cuthbert's story of his
+having refused ten thousand pounds to hush up the matter about Charles.
+His information would be a blow to the Popish Church in the West. He
+would lose position by accepting your offer. I don't know what his
+position may be worth. You can try him, if all else fails; not
+otherwise, I should say. We must have a closer search."
+
+"When you come to think, Maria, he can't know. If Densil did not know,
+how could he?"
+
+"Old Clifford might have known, and told him."
+
+"If we are successful, and if Adelaide has no children--two improbable
+things--" said Lord Saltire, "why then----"
+
+"Why then----" said Lady Ascot. "But at the worst you are going to make
+Charles a rich man. Shall you tell William?"
+
+"Not yet. Cuthbert should never be told, I say; but that is Charles's
+business. I have prepared William."
+
+"Cuthbert will not live," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Not a chance of it, I believe. Marston says his heart-complaint does
+not exist, but I think differently."
+
+At this moment, Lord Daventry's offer of money having been refused, the
+whole crowd moved off in procession towards the police-station. First
+came three little girls with big bonnets and babies, who, trying to do
+two things at once--to wit, head the procession by superior speed,
+and at the same time look round at Lord Daventry and the
+pickpockets--succeeded in neither, but only brought the three babies'
+heads in violent collision every other step. Next came Lord Daventry,
+resigned. Next the policeman, with a pickpocket in each hand, who were
+giving explanations. Next the boys; after them, the Punch and Judy,
+which had unfortunately seen the attempt made, and must to the station
+as a witness, to the detriment of business. Bringing up the rear were
+the British public, who played practical jokes with one another. The
+dogs kept a parallel course in the gutter, and barked. In turning the
+first corner, the procession was cut into, and for a time thrown into
+confusion, by a light-hearted costermonger, who, returning from a
+successful market with an empty barrow, drove it in among them with
+considerable velocity. After which, they disappeared like the baseless
+fabric of a dream, only to be heard of again in the police reports.
+
+"Lord and Lady Welter."
+
+Lord Saltire had seen them drive up to the door; so he was quite
+prepared. He had been laughing intensely; but quite silently, at poor
+Lord Daventry's adventures, and so, when he turned round, he had a smile
+on his face. Adelaide had done kissing Lady Ascot, and was still holding
+both her hands with a look of intense mournful affection. Lord Saltire
+was so much amused by Adelaide's acting, and her simplicity in
+performing before himself, that, when he advanced to Lord Welter, he was
+perfectly radiant.
+
+"Well, my dear scapegrace, and how do _you_ do?" he said, giving his
+hand to Lord Welter; "a more ill-mannered fellow I never saw in my life.
+To go away and hide yourself with that lovely young wife of yours, and
+leave all us oldsters to bore one another to death. What the deuce do
+you mean by it, eh, sir?"
+
+Lord Welter did not reply in the same strain. He said--
+
+"It is very kind of you to receive me like this. I did not expect it.
+Allow me to tell you, that I think your manner towards me would not be
+quite so cordial if you knew everything; there is a great deal that you
+don't know, and which I don't mean to tell you."
+
+It is sometimes quite impossible, even for a writer of fiction, a man
+with _carte blanche_ in the way of invention, to give the cause, for a
+man's actions. I have thought and thought, and I cannot for the life of
+me tell you why Lord Welter answered Lord Saltire like that, whether it
+was from deep cunning or merely from recklessness. If it was cunning, it
+was cunning of a high order. It was genius. The mixture of respect and
+kindness towards the person, and of carelessness about his favour
+was--well--very creditable. Lord Saltire did not think he was acting,
+and his opinion is of some value, I believe. But then, we must remember
+that he was prepared to think the best of Lord Welter that day, and must
+make allowances. I am not prepared with an opinion; let every man form
+his own. I only know that Lord Saltire tapped his teeth with his
+snuff-box and remained silent. Lord Welter, whether consciously or no,
+was nearer the half of a million of money than he had ever been before.
+
+But Adelaide's finer sense was offended at her husband's method of
+proceeding. For one instant, when she heard him say what he did, she
+could have killed him. "Reckless, brutal, selfish," she said fiercely
+to herself, "throwing a duke's fortune to the winds by sheer obstinacy."
+(At this time she had picked up Lady Ascot's spectacles, and was
+playfully placing them on her venerable nose.) "I wish I had never seen
+him. He is maddening. If he only had some brains, where might not we
+be?" But the conversation of that morning came to her mind with a jar,
+and the suspicion with it, that he had more brains of a sort than she;
+that, though they were on a par in morality, there was a strength about
+him, against which her finesse was worthless. She knew she could never
+deceive Lord Saltire, and there was Lord Saltire tapping him on the knee
+with his snuff-box, and talking earnestly and confidentially to him. She
+was beginning to respect her husband. _He_ dared face that terrible old
+man with his hundreds of thousands; _she_ trembled in his presence.
+
+Let us leave her, fooling our dear old friend to the top of her bent,
+and hear what the men were saying.
+
+"I know you have been, as they say now, 'very fast,'" said Lord Saltire,
+drawing nearer to him. "I don't want to ask any questions which don't
+concern me. You have sense enough to know that it is worth your while to
+stand well with me. Will you answer me a few questions which do concern
+me?"
+
+"I can make no promises, Lord Saltire. Let me hear what they are, will
+you?"
+
+"Why," said Lord Saltire, "about Charles Ravenshoe."
+
+"About Charles!" said Lord Welter, looking up at Lord Saltire. "Oh, yes;
+any number. I have nothing to conceal there. Of course you will know
+everything. I had sooner you knew it from me than another."
+
+"I don't mean about Adelaide; let that go by. Perhaps I am glad that
+that is as it is. But have you known where Charles was lately? Your wife
+told William to come to her this morning; that is why I ask."
+
+"I have known a very short time. When William Ravenshoe came this
+morning, I gave him every information. Charles will be with you to-day."
+
+"I am satisfied."
+
+"I don't care to justify myself, but if it had not been for me you would
+never have seen him. And more. I am not the first man, Lord Saltire, who
+has done what I have done."
+
+"No, of course not," said Lord Saltire. "I can't fling the first stone
+at you; God forgive me."
+
+"But you must see, Lord Saltire, that I could not have guessed that
+Ellen was his sister."
+
+"Hey?" said Lord Saltire. "Say that again."
+
+"I say that, when I took Ellen Horton away from Ravenshoe, I did not
+know that she was Charles's sister."
+
+Lord Saltire fell back in his chair, and said--
+
+"Good God!"
+
+"It is very terrible, looked at one way, Lord Saltire. If you come to
+look at it another, it amounts to this, that she was only, as far as I
+knew, a gamekeeper's daughter. Do you remember what you said to Charles
+and me when we were rusticated?"
+
+"Yes. I said that one vice was considered more venial than another vice
+nowadays; and I say so still. I had sooner that you had died of delirium
+tremens in a ditch than done this."
+
+"So had not I, Lord Saltire. When I became involved with Adelaide, I
+thought Ellen was provided for; I, even then, had not heard this
+_esclandre_ about Charles. She refused a splendid offer of marriage
+before she left me."
+
+"We thought she was dead. Where is she gone?"
+
+"I have no idea. She refused everything. She stayed on as Adelaide's
+maid, and left us suddenly. We have lost all trace of her."
+
+"What a miserable, dreadful business!" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"Very so," said Lord Welter. "Hadn't we better change the subject, my
+lord?" he added, drily. "I am not at all sure that I shall submit to
+much more cross-questioning. You must not push me too far, or I shall
+get savage."
+
+"I won't," said Lord Saltire. "But, Welter, for God's sake, answer me
+two more questions. Not offensive ones, on my honour."
+
+"Fifty, if you will; only consider my rascally temper."
+
+"Yes, yes! When Ellen was with you, did she ever hint that she was in
+possession of any information about the Ravenshoes?"
+
+"Yes; or rather, when she went, she left a letter, and in it she said
+that she had something to tell Charles."
+
+"Good, good!" said Lord Saltire. "She may know. We must find her. Now,
+Charles is coming here to-day. Had you better meet him, Welter?"
+
+"We have met before. All that is past is forgiven between us."
+
+"Met!" said Lord Saltire, eagerly. "And what did he say to you? Was
+there a scene, Welter?"
+
+Lord Welter paused before he answered, and Lord Saltire, the wise,
+looked out of the window. Once Lord Welter seemed going to speak, but
+there was a catch in his breath. The second attempt was more fortunate.
+He said, in a low voice--
+
+"Why, I'll tell you, my lord. Charles Ravenshoe is broken-hearted."
+
+"Lord and Lady Hainault."
+
+And Miss Corby, and Gus, and Flora, and Archy, the footman might have
+added, but was probably afraid of spoiling his period.
+
+It was rather awkward. They were totally unexpected, and Lord Hainault
+and Lord Welter had not met since Lord Hainault had denounced Lord
+Welter at Tattersall's. It was so terribly awkward that Lord Saltire
+recovered his spirits, and looked at the two young men with a smile. The
+young men disappointed him, however, for Lord Hainault said, "How d'ye
+do, Welter?" and Lord Welter said, "How do, Hainault?" and the matter
+was settled, at all events for the present.
+
+When all salutations had been exchanged among the ladies, and Archy had
+hoisted himself up into Mary's lap, and Lady Hainault had imperially
+settled herself in a chair, with Flora at her knee, exactly opposite
+Adelaide, there was a silence for a moment, during which it became
+apparent that Gus had a question to ask of Lady Ascot. Mary trembled,
+but the others were not quite sorry to have the silence broken. Gus,
+having obtained leave of the house, wished to know whether or not Satan,
+should he repent of his sins, would have a chance of regaining his
+former position?
+
+"That silly Scotch nursemaid has been reading Burns's poems to him, I
+suppose," said Lady Hainault; "unless Mary herself has been doing so.
+Mary prefers anything to Watts's hymns, Lady Ascot."
+
+"You must not believe one word Lady Hainault says, Lady Ascot," said
+Mary. "She has been shamefully worsted in an argument, and she is
+resorting to all sorts of unfair means to turn the scales. I never read
+a word of Burns's poems in my life."
+
+"You will be pleased not to believe a single word Miss Corby says, Lady
+Ascot," said Lady Hainault. "She has convicted herself. She sings, 'The
+banks and braes of bonny Doon'--very badly, I will allow, but still she
+sings it."
+
+There was a laugh at this. Anything was better than the silence which
+had gone before. It became evident that Lady Hainault would not speak to
+Adelaide. It was very uncomfortable. Dear Mary would have got up another
+friendly passage of arms with Lady Hainault, but she was too nervous.
+She would have even drawn out Gus, but she saw that Gus, dear fellow,
+was not in a humour to be trusted that morning. He evidently was aware
+that the dogs of war were loose, and was champing the bit like a
+war-horse. Lady Ascot was as nervous as Mary, dying to say something,
+but unable. Lady Hainault was calmly inexorable, Adelaide sublimely
+indifferent. If you will also consider that Lady Ascot was awaiting news
+of Charles--nay, possibly Charles himself--and that, in asking Adelaide
+to lunch, she had overlooked the probability that William would bring
+him back with him--that Lord Welter had come without invitation, and
+that the Hainaults wore totally unexpected--you will think that the dear
+old lady was in about as uncomfortable a position as she could be, and
+that any event, even the house catching fire, must change matters for
+the better.
+
+Not at all. They say that, when things come to the worst, they must
+mend. That is undeniable. But when are they at the worst? Who can tell
+that? Lady Ascot thought they were at the worst now, and was taking
+comfort. And then the footman threw open the door, and announced--
+
+"Lady Hainault and Miss Hicks."
+
+At this point Lady Ascot lost her temper, and exclaimed aloud, "This is
+too much!" They thought old Lady Hainault did not hear her; but she did,
+and so did Hicks. They heard it fast enough, and remembered it too.
+
+In great social catastrophes, minor differences are forgotten. In the
+Indian mutiny, people spoke to one another, and made friends, who were
+at bitterest variance before. There are crises so terrible that people
+of all creeds and shades of political opinion must combine against a
+common enemy. This was one. When this dreadful old woman made her
+totally unexpected entrance, and when Lady Ascot showed herself so
+entirely without discretion as to exclaim aloud in the way she did,
+young Lady Hainault and Adelaide were so horrified, so suddenly
+quickened to a sense of impending danger, that they began talking loudly
+and somewhat affectionately to one another. And young Lady Hainault,
+whose self-possession was scattered to the four winds by this last
+misfortune, began asking Adelaide all about Lady Brittlejug's drum, in
+full hearing of her mamma-in-law, who treasured up every word she said.
+And, just as she became conscious of saying wildly that she was so sorry
+she could not have been there--as if Lady Brittlejug would ever have had
+the impudence to ask her--she saw Lord Saltire, across the room, looking
+quietly at her, with the expression on his face of one of the idols at
+Abou Simbel.
+
+Turn Lady Ascot once fairly to bay, you would (if you can forgive slang)
+get very little change out of her. She came of valiant blood. No
+Headstall was ever yet known to refuse his fence. Even her poor brother,
+showing as he did traces of worn-out blood (the men always go a
+generation or two before the women), had been a desperate rider,
+offered to kick Fouquier Tinville at his trial, and had kept Simon
+waiting on the guillotine while he pared his nails. Her ladyship rose
+and accepted battle; she advanced towards old Lady Hainault, and,
+leaning on her crutched stick, began--
+
+"And how do you do, my dear Lady Hainault?"
+
+She thought Lady Hainault would say something very disagreeable, as she
+usually did. She looked at her, and was surprised to see how altered she
+was. There was something about her looks that Lady Ascot did not like.
+
+"My dear Lady Ascot," said old Lady Hainault, "I thank you. I am a very
+old woman. I never forget my friends, I assure you. Hicks, is Lord
+Hainault here?--I am very blind, you will be glad to hear, Lady Ascot.
+Hicks, I want Lord Hainault, instantly. Fetch him to me, you stupid
+woman. Hainault! Hainault!"
+
+Our Lady Hainault rose suddenly, and put her arm round her waist.
+"Mamma," she said, "what do you want!"
+
+"I want Hainault, you foolish girl. Is that him? Hainault, I have made
+the will, my dear boy. The rogue came to me, and I told him that the
+will was made, and that Britten and Sloane had witnessed it. Did I do
+right or not, eh? Ha! ha! I followed you here to tell you. Don't let
+that woman Ascot insult me, Hainault. She has committed a felony, that
+woman. I'll have her prosecuted. And all to get that chit Alicia married
+to that pale-faced papist, Petre Ravenshoe. She thinks I didn't know it,
+does she? I knew she knew it well enough, and I knew it too, and I have
+committed a felony too, in holding my tongue, and we'll both go to
+Bridewell, and----"
+
+Lord Saltire here came up, and quietly offered her his arm. She took it
+and departed, muttering to herself.
+
+I must mention here, that the circumstance mentioned by old Lady
+Hainault, of having made a will, had nothing to do with the story. A
+will had existed to the detriment of Lady Hainault and Miss Hicks, and
+she had most honourably made another in their favour.
+
+Lady Ascot would have given worlds to unsay many things she had
+heretofore said to her. It was evident that poor old Lady Hainault's
+mind was failing. Lady Ascot would have prayed her forgiveness on her
+knees, but it was too late. Lady Hainault never appeared in public
+again. She died a short time after this, and, as I mentioned before,
+left poor Miss Hicks a rich woman. Very few people knew how much good
+there was in the poor old soul. Let the Casterton tenantry testify.
+
+On this occasion her appearance had, as we have seen, the effect of
+reconciling Lady Hainault and Adelaide. A very few minutes after her
+departure William entered the room, followed by Hornby, whom none of
+them had ever seen before.
+
+They saw from William's face that something fresh was the matter. He
+introduced Hornby, who seemed concerned, and then gave an open note to
+Lord Saltire. He read it over, and then said--
+
+"This unhappy boy has disappeared again. Apparently his interview with
+you determined him, my dear Lady Welter. Can you give us any clue? This
+is his letter:"
+
+      "DEAR LIEUTENANT,--I must say good-bye even to you, my last
+      friend. I was recognised in your service to-day by Lady
+      Welter, and it will not do for me to stay in it any longer.
+      It was a piece of madness ever taking to such a line of
+      life."
+
+      [Here there were three lines carefully erased. Lord Saltire
+      mentioned it, and Hornby quietly said, "I erased those
+      lines previous to showing the letter to any one; they
+      referred to exceedingly private matters." Lord Saltire
+      bowed and continued.] "A hundred thanks for your kindness;
+      you have been to me more like a brother than a master. We
+      shall meet again, when you little expect it. Pray don't
+      assist in any search after me; it will be quite useless.
+
+                             CHARLES HORTON."
+
+Adelaide came forward as pale as death. "I believe I am the cause of
+this. I did not dream it would have made him alter his resolution so
+suddenly. When I saw him yesterday he was in a groom's livery. I told
+him he was disgracing himself, and told him, if he was desperate, to go
+to the war."
+
+They looked at one another in silence.
+
+"Then," Lady Ascot said, "he has enlisted, I suppose. I wonder in what
+regiment?--could it be in yours, Mr. Hornby?"
+
+"The very last in which he would, I should say," said Hornby, "if he
+wants to conceal himself. He must know that I should find him at once."
+
+So Lady Ascot was greatly pooh-poohed by the other wiseacres, she being
+right all the time.
+
+"I think," said Lord Saltire to Lady Ascot, "that perhaps we had better
+take Mr. Hornby into our confidence." She agreed, and, after the
+Hainaults and Welters were gone, Hornby remained behind with them, and
+heard things which rather surprised him.
+
+"Inquiries at the depôts of various regiments would be as good a plan as
+any. Meanwhile I will give any assistance in my power. Pray, would it
+not be a good plan to advertise for him, and state all the circumstances
+of the case?"
+
+"Why, no," said Lord Saltire, "we do not wish to make known all the
+circumstances yet. Other interests have to be consulted, and our
+information is not yet complete. Complete! we have nothing to go on but
+mere surmise."
+
+"You will think me inquisitive," said Hornby. "But you little know what
+a right (I had almost said) I have to ask these questions. Does the
+present Mr. Ravenshoe know of all this?"
+
+"Not one word."
+
+And so Hornby departed with William, and said nothing at all about
+Ellen. As they left the door a little shoeblack looked inquisitively at
+them, and seemed as though he would speak. They did not notice the
+child. He could have told them what they wanted to know, but how were
+they to guess that?
+
+Impossible. Actually, according to the sagacious Welter, half a million
+pounds, and other things, going a-begging, and a dirty little shoeblack
+the only human being who knew where the heir was! A pig is an obstinate
+animal, likewise a sheep; but what pig or sheep was ever so provoking in
+its obstinacy as Charles in his good-natured, well-meaning, blundering
+stupidity? In a very short time you will read an advertisement put into
+_The Times_ by Lady Ascot's solicitor, which will show the reason for
+some of the great anxiety which she and others felt to have him on the
+spot. At first Lady Ascot and Lord Saltire lamented his absence, from
+the hearty goodwill they bore him; but, as time wore on, they began to
+get deeply solicitous for his return for other reasons. Lady Ascot's
+hands were tied. She was in a quandary, and, when the intelligence came
+of his having enlisted, and there seemed nearly a certainty of his being
+shipped off to foreign parts, and killed before she could get at him,
+she was in a still greater quandary. Suppose, before being killed, he
+was to marry some one? "Good heavens, my dear James, was ever an
+unfortunate wretch punished so before for keeping a secret?"
+
+"I should say not, Maria," said Lord Saltire, coolly. "I declare I love
+the lad the better the more trouble he gives one. There never was such a
+dear obstinate dog. Welter has been making his court, and has made it
+well--with an air of ruffian-like simplicity, which was charming,
+because novel. I, even I, can hardly tell whether it was real or not. He
+has ten times the brains of his shallow-pated little wife, whose
+manoeuvres, my dear Maria, I should have thought even you, not
+ordinarily a sagacious person, might have seen through."
+
+"I believe the girl loves me; and don't be rude, James."
+
+"I believe she don't care twopence for you; and I shall be as rude as I
+please, Maria."
+
+Poor Lord Ascot had a laugh at this little battle between his mother and
+her old friend. So Lord Saltire turned to him and said--
+
+"At half-past one to-morrow morning you will be awakened by three
+ruffians in crape masks, with pistols, who will take you out of bed with
+horrid threats, and walk you upstairs and down in your shirt, until you
+have placed all your money and valuables into their hands. They will
+effect an entrance by removing a pane of glass, and introducing a small
+boy, disguised as a shoeblack, who will give them admittance."
+
+"Good Gad!" said Lord Ascot, "what are you talking about?"
+
+"Don't you see that shoeblack over the way?" said Lord Saltire. "He has
+been watching the house for two hours; the burglars are going to put him
+in at the back-kitchen window. There comes Daventry back from the
+police-station. I bet you a sovereign he has his boots cleaned."
+
+Poor Lord Ascot jumped at the bet like an old war-horse. "I'd have given
+you three to one if you had waited."
+
+Lord Daventry had indeed re-appeared on the scene; his sole attendant
+was one of the little girls with a big bonnet and a baby, before
+mentioned, who had evidently followed him to the police-station, watched
+him in, and then accompanied him home, staring at him as at a man of
+dark experiences, a man not to be lost sight of on any account, lest
+some new and exciting thing should befall him meanwhile. This young
+lady, having absented herself some two hours on this errand, and having
+thereby deprived the baby of its natural nourishment, was now suddenly
+encountered by an angry mother, and, knowing what she had to expect, was
+forced to "dodge" her infuriated parent round and round Lord Daventry,
+in a way which made that venerable nobleman giddy, and caused him to
+stop, shut his eyes, and feebly offer them money not to do it any more.
+Ultimately the young lady was caught and cuffed, the baby was refreshed,
+and his lordship free.
+
+Lord Saltire won his pound, to his great delight. Such an event as a
+shoeblack in South Audley Street was not to be passed by. Lord Daventry
+entered into conversation with our little friend, asked him if he went
+to school? if he could say the Lord's Prayer? how much he made in the
+day? whether his parents were alive? and ultimately had his boots
+cleaned, and gave the boy half-a-crown. After which he disappeared from
+the scene, and, like many of our large staff of supernumeraries, from
+this history for evermore--he has served his turn with us. Let us
+dismiss the kind-hearted old dandy with our best wishes.
+
+Lord Saltire saw him give the boy the half-crown. He saw the boy pocket
+it as though it were a halfpenny: and afterwards continue to watch the
+house, as before. He was more sure than ever that the boy meant no good.
+If he had known that he was waiting for one chance of seeing Charles
+again, perhaps he would have given him half-a-crown himself. What a
+difference one word from that boy would have made in our story!
+
+When they came back from dinner, there was the boy still lying on the
+pavement, leaning against his box. The little girl who had had her ears
+boxed came and talked to him for a time, and went on. After a time she
+came back with a quartern loaf in her hand, the crumbs of which she
+picked as she went along, after the manner of children sent on an errand
+to the baker's. When she had gone by, he rose and leant against the
+railings, as though lingering, loth to go.
+
+Once more, later, Lord Saltire looked out, and the boy was still there.
+"I wonder what the poor little rogue wants?" said Lord Saltire; "I have
+half a mind to go and ask him." But he did not. It was not to be, my
+lord. You might have been with Charles the next morning at Windsor. You
+might have been in time if you had; you will have a different sort of
+meeting with him than that, if you meet him at all. Beyond the grave, my
+lord, that meeting must be. Possibly a happier one, who knows? who dare
+say?
+
+The summer night closed in, but the boy lingered yet, to see, if
+perchance he might, the only friend he ever had; to hear, if he might,
+the only voice which had ever spoken gently and kindly to him of higher
+things: the only voice which had told him that strange, wild tale,
+scarce believed as yet, of a glorious immortality.
+
+The streets began to get empty. The people passed him--
+
+                  "Ones and twos,
+      And groups; the latest said the night grew chill,
+      And hastened; but he loitered; whilst the dews
+      Fell fast, he loitered still."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVII.
+
+LADY HAINAULT'S BLOTTING-BOOK.
+
+
+In the natural course of events, I ought now to follow Charles in his
+military career, step by step. But the fact is that I know no more about
+the details of horse-soldiering than a marine, and therefore I cannot.
+It is within the bounds of possibility that the reader may congratulate
+himself on my ignorance, and it may also be possible that he has good
+reason for so doing.
+
+Within a fortnight after Hornby's introduction to Lord Saltire and Lady
+Ascot, he was off with the head-quarters of his regiment to Varna. The
+depôt was at Windsor, and there, unknown to Hornby, was Charles,
+drilling and drilling. Two more troops were to follow the head-quarters
+in a short time, and so well had Charles stuck to his duty that he was
+considered fit to take his place in one of them. Before his moustaches
+were properly grown, he found himself a soldier in good earnest.
+
+In all his troubles this was the happiest time he had, for he had got
+rid of the feeling that he was a disgraced man. If he must wear a
+livery, he would wear the Queen's; there was no disgrace in that. He was
+a soldier, and he would be a hero. Sometimes, perhaps, he thought for a
+moment that he, with his two thousand pounds' worth of education, might
+have been better employed than in littering a horse, and
+swash-bucklering about among the Windsor taverns; but he did not think
+long about it. If there were any disgrace in the matter, there was a
+time coming soon, by all accounts, when the disgrace would be wiped out
+in fire and blood. On Sunday, when he saw the Eton lads streaming up to
+the terrace, the old Shrewsbury days, and the past generally, used to
+come back to him rather unpleasantly; but the bugle put it all out of
+his head again in a moment. Were there not the three most famous armies
+in the world gathering, gathering, for a feast of ravens? Was not the
+world looking on in silence and awe, to see England, France, and Russia
+locked in a death-grip? Was not he to make one at the merry meeting? Who
+could think at such a time as this?
+
+The time was getting short now. In five days they were to start for
+Southampton, to follow the head-quarters to Constantinople, to Varna,
+and so into the dark thunder-cloud beyond. He felt as certain that he
+would never come back again, as that the sun would rise on the morrow.
+
+He made the last energetic effort that he made at all. It was like the
+last struggle of a drowning man. He says that the way it happened was
+this. And I believe him, for it was one of his own mad impulses, and,
+like all his other impulses, it came too late. They came branking into
+some pot-house, half a dozen of them, and talked aloud about this and
+that, and one young lad among them said, that "he would give a thousand
+pounds, if he had it, to see his sister before he went away, for fear
+she should think that he had gone off without thinking of her."
+
+Charles left them, and walked up the street. As he walked, his purpose
+grew. He went straight to the quarters of a certain cornet, son to the
+major of the regiment, and asked to speak to him.
+
+The cornet, a quiet, smooth-faced boy, listened patiently to what he had
+to say, but shook his head and told him he feared it was impossible.
+But, he said, after a pause, he would help him all he could. The next
+morning he took him to the major while he was alone at breakfast, and
+Charles laid his case before him so well, that the kind old man gave him
+leave to go to London at four o'clock, and come back by the last train
+that same evening.
+
+The Duchess of Cheshire's ball was the last and greatest which was given
+that season. It was, they say, in some sort like the Duchess of
+Richmond's ball before Waterloo. The story I have heard is, that Lord
+George Barty persuaded his mother to give it, because he was sure that
+it would be the last ball he should ever dance at. At all events it was
+given, and he was right; for he sailed in the same ship with Charles
+four days after, and was killed at Balaclava. However, we have nothing
+to do with that. All we have to do with is the fact, that it was a very
+great ball indeed, and that Lady Hainault was going to it.
+
+Some traditions and customs grow by degrees into laws, ay, and into laws
+less frequently broken than those made and provided by Parliament. Allow
+people to walk across the corner of one of your fields for twenty years,
+and there is a right of way, and they may walk across that field till
+the crack of doom. Allow a man to build a hut on your property, and live
+in it for twenty years, and you can't get rid of him. He gains a right
+there. (I never was annoyed in either of these ways myself, for reasons
+which I decline to mention; but it is the law, I believe.) There is no
+law to make the young men fire off guns at one's gate on the 6th of
+November, but they never miss doing it. (I found some of the men using
+their rifles for this purpose last year, and had to fulminate about
+it.) To follow out the argument, there was no rule in Lord Hainault's
+house that the children should always come in and see their aunt dress
+for a ball. But they always did; and Lady Hainault herself, though she
+could be perfectly determined, never dared to question their right.
+
+They behaved very well. Flora brought in a broken picture-broom, which,
+stuck into an old straw hat of Archy's, served her for feathers. She
+also made unto herself a newspaper fan. Gus had an old twelfth-cake
+ornament on his breast for a star, and a tape round his neck for a
+garter. In this guise they represented the Duke and Duchess of Cheshire,
+and received their company in a corner, as good as gold. As for Archy,
+he nursed his cat, sucked his thumb, and looked at his aunt.
+
+Mary was "by way of" helping Lady Hainault's maid, but she was very
+clumsy about it, and her hands shook a good deal. Lady Hainault, at last
+looking up, saw that she was deadly pale, and crying. So, instead of
+taking any notice, she dismissed the children as soon as she could, as a
+first step towards being left alone with Mary.
+
+Gus and Flora, finding that they must go, changed the game, and made
+believe that they were at court, and that their aunt was the Queen. So
+they dexterously backed to the door, and bowed themselves out. Archy was
+lord chamberlain, or gold stick, or what not, and had to follow them in
+the same way. He was less successful, for he had to walk backwards,
+sucking his thumb, and nursing his cat upside down (she was a patient
+cat, and was as much accustomed to be nursed that way as any other). He
+got on very well till he came to the door, when he fell on the back of
+his head, crushing his cat and biting his thumb to the bone. Gus and
+Flora picked him up, saying that lord chamberlains never cried when they
+fell on the backs of their heads. But Archy, poor dear, was obliged to
+cry a little, the more so as the dear cat had bolted upstairs, with her
+tail as big as a fox's, and Archy was afraid she was angry with him,
+which seemed quite possible. So Mary had to go out and take him to the
+nursery. He would stop his crying, he said, if she would tell him the
+story of Ivedy Avedy. So she told it him quite to the end, where the
+baffled old sorcerer, Gongolo, gets into the plate-warmer, with his
+three-farthings and the brass soup-ladle, shuts the door after him, and
+disappears for ever. After which she went down to Lady Hainault's room
+again.
+
+Lady Hainault was alone now. She was sitting before her dressing-table,
+with her hands folded, apparently looking at herself in the glass. She
+took no notice of what she had seen; though, now they were alone
+together, she determined that Mary should tell her what was the
+matter--for, in truth, she was very anxious to know. She never looked at
+Mary when she came in; she only said--
+
+"Mary, my love, how do I look?"
+
+"I never saw you look so beautiful before," said Mary.
+
+"I am glad of that. Hainault is so ridiculously proud of me, that I
+really delight in looking my best. Now, Mary, let me have the necklace;
+that is all, I believe, unless you would like me to put on a little
+rouge."
+
+Mary tried to laugh, but could not. Her hands were shaking so that the
+jewels were clicking together as she held them. Lady Hainault saw that
+she must help her to speak, but she had no occasion; the necklace helped
+her.
+
+It was a very singular necklace, a Hainault heirloom, which Lady
+Hainault always wore on grand occasions to please her husband. There was
+no other necklace like it anywhere, though some folks who did not own it
+said it was old-fashioned, and should be reset. It was a collar of nine
+points, the ends of brilliants, running upwards as the points broadened
+into larger rose diamonds. The eye, catching the end of the points, was
+dazzled with yellow light, which faded into red as the rays of the
+larger roses overpowered the brilliants; and at the upper rim the soft
+crimson haze of light melted, overpowered, into nine blazing great
+rubies. It seemed, however, a shame to hide such a beautiful neck by
+such a glorious bauble.
+
+Mary was trying to clasp it on, but her fingers failed, and down went
+the jewels clashing on the floor. The next moment she was down too, on
+her knees, clutching Lady Hainault's hand, and saying, or trying to say,
+in spite of a passionate burst of sobbing, "Lady Hainault, let me see
+him; let me see him, or I shall die."
+
+Lady Hainault turned suddenly upon her, and laid her disengaged hand
+upon her hair. "My little darling," she said, "my pretty little bird."
+
+"You must let me see him. You could not be so cruel. I always loved him,
+not like a sister, oh! not like a sister, woe to me. As you love Lord
+Hainault; I know it now."
+
+"My poor little Mary. I always thought something of this kind."
+
+"He is coming to-night. He sails to-morrow or next day, and I shall
+never see him again."
+
+"Sails! where for?"
+
+"I don't know; he does not say. But you must let me see him. He don't
+dream I care for him, Lady Hainault. But I must see him, or I shall
+die."
+
+"You shall see him; but who is it? Any one I know?"
+
+"Who is it? Who could it be but Charles Ravenshoe?"
+
+"Good God! Coming here to-night! Mary, ring the bell for Alwright. Send
+round to South Audley Street for Lord Saltire, or William Ravenshoe, or
+some of them. They are dying to catch him. There is something more in
+their eagerness than you or I know of. Send at once, Mary, or we shall
+be too late. When does he come? Get up, my dear. My poor little Mary. I
+am so sorry. Is he coming here? And how soon will he come, dear? Do be
+calm. Think what we may do for him. He should be here now. Stay, I will
+write a note--just one line. Where is my blotting-book? Alwright, get my
+blotting-book. And stay; say that, if any one calls for Miss Corby, he
+is to be shown into the drawing-room at once. Let us go there, Mary."
+
+Alwright had meanwhile, not having heard the last sentence, departed to
+the drawing-room, and possessed herself of Lady Hainault's portfolio,
+meaning to carry it up to the dressing-room; then she had remembered the
+message about any one calling being shown up to the drawing-room, and
+had gandered down to the hall to give it to the porter; after which she
+gandered upstairs to the dressing-room again, thinking that Lady
+Hainault was there, and missing both her and Mary from having gone
+downstairs. So, while she and Mary were looking for the blotting-book
+impatiently in the drawing-room, the door was opened, and the servant
+announced, "A gentleman to see Miss Corby."
+
+He had discreetly said a gentleman, for he did not like to say an
+Hussar. Mary turned round and saw a man all scarlet and gold before her,
+and was frightened, and did not know him. But when he said "Mary," in
+the old, old voice, there came such a rush of bygone times, bygone
+words, scenes, sounds, meetings and partings, sorrows and joys, into her
+wild, warm little heart, that, with a low, loving, tender cry she ran to
+him and hid her face on his bosom.[6]
+
+And Lady Hainault swept out of the room after that unlucky
+blotting-book. And I intend to go after her, out of mere politeness, to
+help her to find it. I will not submit to be lectured for making an
+aposiopesis. If any think they could do this business better than I, let
+them communicate with the publishers, and finish the story for
+themselves. I decline to go into that drawing-room at present. I shall
+wander upstairs into my lady's chamber, after that goosey-gander
+Alwright, and see what she has done with the blotting-book.
+
+Lady Hainault found the idiot of a woman in her dressing-room, looking
+at herself in the glass, with the blotting-book under her arm. The maid
+looked as foolish as people generally do who are caught looking at
+themselves in the glass. (How disconcerting it is to be found standing
+on a chair before the chimney-glass, just to have a look at your entire
+figure before going to a party!)[7] But Lady Hainault said nothing to
+her; but, taking the book from under her arm, she sat down and fiercely
+scrawled off a note to Lord Saltire, to be opened by any of them, to say
+that Charles Ravenshoe was then in her house, and to come in God's name.
+
+"I have caged their bird for them," she said out loud when she had just
+finished and was folding up the letter; "they will owe me a good turn
+for this."
+
+The maid, who had no notion anything was the matter, had been
+surreptitiously looking in the glass again, and wondering whether her
+nose was really so very red after all. When Lady Hainault spoke thus
+aloud to herself, she gave a guilty start, and said, "Immediately, my
+lady," which you will perceive was not exactly appropriate to the
+occasion.
+
+"Don't be a goose, my good old Alwright, and don't tread on my necklace,
+Alwright; it is close at your feet."
+
+So it was. Lying where Mary had dropped it. Alwright thought she must
+have knocked it off the dressing-table; but when Lady Hainault told her
+that Miss Corby had dropped it there, Alwright began to wonder why her
+Ladyship had not thought it worth while to pick it up again.
+
+"Put it on while I seal this letter will you? I cannot trust you,
+Alwright; I must go myself." She went out of the room and quickly down
+stairs to the hall. All this had taken but a few minutes; she had
+hurried as much as was possible, but the time seems longer to us,
+because, following my usual plan of playing the fool on important
+occasions, I have been telling you about the lady's-maid's nose. She
+went down quickly to the hall, and sent off one of the men to South
+Audley Street, with her note, giving him orders to run all the way, and
+personally to see Lady Ascot, or some one else of those named. After
+this she came upstairs again.
+
+When she came to the drawing-room door, Charles was standing at it.
+"Lady Hainault," he said, "would you come here, please? Poor Mary has
+fainted."
+
+"Poor thing," said Lady Hainault. "I will come to her. One word, Mr.
+Ravenshoe. Oh, do think one instant of this fatal, miserable resolution
+of yours. Think how fond we have all been of you. Think of the love that
+your cousin and Lady Ascot bear for you, and communicate with them. At
+all events, stay ten minutes more, and see one of them. I must go to
+poor Mary."
+
+"Dear Lady Hainault, you will not change my resolution to stand alone.
+There is a source of disgrace you probably know nothing of. Besides,
+nothing short of an Order in Council could stop me now. We sail for the
+East in twenty-four hours."
+
+They had just time for this, very hurriedly spoken, for poor little Mary
+had done what she never had done before in her life, fainted away. Lady
+Hainault and Charles went into the drawing-room.
+
+Just before this, Alwright, coming downstairs, had seen her most sacred
+mistress standing at the drawing-room door, talking familiarly and
+earnestly to a common soldier. Her ladyship had taken his hand in hers,
+and was laying her other hand upon his breast. Alwright sat down on the
+stairs.
+
+She was a poor feeble thing, and it was too much for her. She was
+Casterton-bred, and had a feeling for the honour of the family. Her
+first impulse was to run to Lord Hainault's dressing-room door and lock
+him in. Her next was to rock herself to and fro and moan. She followed
+the latter of these two impulses. Meanwhile, Lady Hainault had succeeded
+in bringing poor Mary to herself. Charles had seen her bending over the
+poor little lifeless body, and blessed her. Presently Lady Hainault
+said, "She is better now, Mr. Ravenshoe; will you come and speak to
+her?" There was no answer. Lady Hainault thought Charles was in the
+little drawing-room, and had not heard her. She went there. It was dimly
+lighted, but she saw in a moment that it was empty. She grew frightened,
+and hurriedly went out on to the stairs. There was no one there. She
+hurried down, and was met by the weeping Alwright.
+
+"He is safe out of the house, my lady," said that brilliant genius. "I
+saw him come out of the drawing-room, and I ran down and sent the hall
+porter on a message, and let him out myself. Oh, my lady! my lady!"
+
+Lady Hainault was a perfect-tempered woman, but she could not stand
+this. "Alwright," she said, "you are a perfect, hopeless, imbecile
+idiot. Go and tell his lordship to come to me instantly. Instantly! do
+you hear? I wouldn't," she continued to herself when Alwright was gone,
+"face Lord Saltire alone after this for a thousand pounds."
+
+What was the result of Charles's interview with Mary? Simply this. The
+poor little thing had innocently shown him, in a way he could not
+mistake, that she loved him with all her heart and soul. And, when he
+left that room, he had sworn an oath to himself that he would use all
+his ingenuity to prevent her ever setting eyes on him again. "I am low
+and degraded enough now," he said to himself; "but if I gave that poor
+innocent child the opportunity of nourishing her love for me, I should
+be too low to live."
+
+He did not contemplate the possibility, you see, of raising himself to
+her level. No. He was too much broken down for that. Hope was dead
+within him. He had always been a man of less than average strength of
+will; and two or three disasters--terrible disasters they were,
+remember--had made him such as we see him, a helpless, drifting log upon
+the sea of chance. What Lord Welter had said was terribly true, "Charles
+Ravenshoe is broken-hearted." But to the very last he was a just,
+honourable, true, kind-hearted man. A man in ten thousand. Call him
+fool, if you will. I cannot gainsay you there. But when you have said
+that you have finished.
+
+Did he love Mary? Yes, from this time forward, he loved her as she loved
+him; and, the darker the night grew, that star burned steadily and more
+steadily yet. Never brighter, perhaps, than when it gleamed on the
+turbid waters, which whelm the bodies of those to whose eyesight all
+stars have set for ever.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII.
+
+IN WHICH CUTHBERT BEGINS TO SEE THINGS IN A NEW LIGHT.
+
+
+The stream at Ravenshoe was as low as they had ever seen it, said the
+keeper's boys, who were allowed to take artists and strangers up to see
+the waterfall in the wood. The artists said that it was more beautiful
+than ever; for now, instead of roaring headlong over the rocks in one
+great sheet beneath the quivering oak leaves, it streamed and spouted
+over and among the black slabs of slate in a million interlacing jets.
+Yes, the artists were quite satisfied with the state of things; but the
+few happy souls who had dared to ask Cuthbert for a day or so of
+salmon-fishing were not so well satisfied by any means. While the
+artists were saying that this sort of thing, you know, was the sort of
+thing to show one how true it was that beauty, life, and art, were terms
+co-ordinate, synonymous, inseparable--that these made up the sum of
+existence--that the end of existence was love, and what was love but the
+worship of the beautiful (or something of this sort, for your artist is
+but a mortal man, like the rest of us, and is apt, if you give him
+plenty of tobacco on a hot day, to get uncommon hazy in his
+talk)--while, I say, the artists were working away like mad, and
+uttering the most beautiful sentiments in the world, the anglers were,
+as old Master Lee up to Slarrow would have said, "dratting" the scenery,
+the water, the weather, the beer, and existence generally, because it
+wouldn't rain. If it had rained, you see, the artists would have left
+talking about the beautiful, and begun "dratting" in turn; leaving the
+anglers to talk about the beautiful as best they might. Which fact gives
+rise to moral reflections of the profoundest sort. But every one, except
+the discontented anglers, would have said that it was heavenly summer
+weather. The hay was all got in without one drop of rain on it. And now,
+as one glorious, cloudless day succeeded another, all the land seemed
+silently swelling with the wealth of the harvest. Fed by gentle dews at
+night, warmed by the genial sun by day, the corn began to turn from grey
+to gold, and the distant valleys which spread away inland, folded in the
+mighty grey arms of the moor, shone out gallantly with acre beyond acre
+of yellow wheat and barley. A still, happy time.
+
+And the sea! Who shall tell the beauty of the restless Atlantic in such
+weather? For nearly three weeks there was a gentle wind, now here, now
+there, which just curled the water, and made a purple shadow for such
+light clouds as crept across the blue sky above. Night and morning the
+fishing-boats crept out and in. Never was such a fishing season. The
+mouth of the stream was crowded with salmon, waiting to get up the first
+fresh. You might see them as you sailed across the shallow sand-bank,
+the delta of the stream, which had never risen above the water for forty
+years, yet which now, so still had been the bay for three weeks, was
+within a foot of the surface at low tide.
+
+A quiet, happy time. The three old Master Lees lay all day on the sand,
+where the fishing-boats were drawn up, and had their meals brought to
+them by young male relatives, who immediately pulled off every rag of
+clothes they had, and went into the water for an hour or two. The
+minding of these 'ere clothes, and the looking out to sea, was quite
+enough employment for these three old cronies. They never fell out once
+for three weeks. They used to talk about the war, or the cholera, which
+was said to be here, or there, or coming, or gone. But they cared little
+about that. Ravenshoe was not a cholera place. It had never come there
+before, and they did not think that it was coming now. They were quite
+right; it never came. Cuthbert used his influence, and got the folks to
+move some cabbage stalks, and rotten fish, just to make sure, as he
+said. They would have done more for him than that just now; so it was
+soon accomplished. The juvenile population, which is the pretty way of
+saying the children, might have offered considerable opposition to
+certain articles of merchandise being removed without due leave obtained
+and given; but, when it was done, they were all in the water as naked as
+they were born. When it was over they had good sense enough to see that
+it could not be helped. These sweeping measures of reform, however, are
+apt to bear hard on particular cases. For instance, young James Lee,
+great-grandson of Master James Lee up to Slarrow, lost six dozen (some
+say nine, but that I don't believe) of oyster-shells, which he was
+storing up for a grotto. Cuthbert very properly refunded the price of
+them, which amounted to twopence.
+
+"Nonsense, again," you say. Why, no! What I have written above is not
+nonsense. The whims and oddities of a village; which one has seen with
+one's own eyes, and heard with one's own ears, are not nonsense. I knew,
+when I began, what I had to say in this chapter, and I have just
+followed on a train of images. And the more readily, because I know that
+what I have to say in this chapter must be said without effort to be
+said well.
+
+If I thought I was writing for a reader who was going to criticise
+closely my way of telling my story, I tell you the honest truth, I
+should tell my story very poorly indeed. Of course I must submit to the
+same criticism as my betters. But there are times when I feel that I
+must have my reader go hand in hand with me. To do so, he must follow
+the same train of ideas as I do. At such times I write as naturally as I
+can. I see that greater men than I have done the same. I see that
+Captain Marryat, for instance, at a particular part of his noblest
+novel, "The King's Own," has put in a chapter about his grandmother and
+the spring tides, which, for perfect English and rough humour, it is
+hard to match anywhere.
+
+I have not dared to play the fool, as he has, for two reasons. The
+first, that I could not play it so well, and the second, that I have no
+frightful tragedy to put before you, to counterbalance it, as he had.
+Well, it is time that this rambling came to an end. I hope that I have
+not rambled too far, and bored you. That would be very unfortunate just
+now.
+
+Ravenshoe Bay again, then--in the pleasant summer drought I have been
+speaking of before. Father Mackworth and the two Tiernays were lying on
+the sand, looking to the sea. Cuthbert had gone off to send away some
+boys who were bathing too near the mouth of the stream and hunting his
+precious salmon. The younger Tiernay had recently taken to collect
+"common objects of the shore"--a pleasant, healthy mania which prevailed
+about that time. He had been dabbling among the rocks at the western end
+of the bay, and had just joined his brother and Father Mackworth with a
+tin-box full of all sorts of creatures, and he turned them out on the
+sand and called their attention to them.
+
+"A very good morning's work, my brother," he said. "These anemones are
+all good and rare ones."
+
+"Bedad," said the jolly priest, "they'd need be of some value, for they
+ain't pretty to look at; what's this cockle now wid the long red spike
+coming out of him?"
+
+"Cardium tuberculatum."
+
+"See here, Mackworth," said Tiernay, rolling over toward him on the sand
+with the shell in his hand.
+
+"Here's the rid-nosed oysther of Carlingford. Ye remember the legend
+about it, surely?"
+
+"I don't, indeed," said Mackworth, angrily, pretty sure that Father
+Tiernay was going to talk nonsense, but not exactly knowing how to stop
+him.
+
+"Not know the legend!" said Father Tiernay. "Why, when Saint Bridget was
+hurrying across the sand, to attend St. Patrick in his last illness,
+poor dear, this divvle of a oysther was sunning himself on the shore,
+and, as she went by, he winked at her holiness with the wicked eye of
+'um, and he says, says he, 'Nate ankles enough, anyhow,' he says. 'Ye're
+drunk, ye spalpeen,' says St. Bridget, 'to talk like that to an honest
+gentlewoman.' 'Sorra a bit of me,' says the oysther. 'Ye're always
+drunk,' says St. Bridget. 'Drunk yourself,' says the oysther; 'I'm
+fastin from licker since the tide went down.' 'What makes your nose so
+red, ye scoundrel?' says St. Bridget: 'No ridder nor yer own,' says the
+oysther, getting angry. For the Saint was stricken in years, and
+red-nosed by rayson of being out in all weathers, seeing to this and to
+that. 'Yer nose is red through drink,' says she, 'and yer nose shall
+stay as rid as mine is now, till the day of judgment.' And that's the
+legend about St. Bridget and the Carlingford oysther, and ye ought to be
+ashamed that ye never heard it before."
+
+"I wish, sir," said Mackworth, "that you could possibly stop yourself
+from talking this preposterous, indecent nonsense. Surely the first and
+noblest of Irish Saints may claim exemption from your clumsy wit."
+
+"Begorra, I'm catching it, Mr. Ravenshoe," said Tiernay.
+
+"What for?" said Cuthbert, who had just come up.
+
+"Why, for telling a legend. Sure, I made it up on the spot. But it is
+none the worse for that; d'ye think so, now?"
+
+"Not much the better, I should think," said Cuthbert, laughing.
+
+"Allow me to say," said Mackworth, "that I never heard such shameless,
+blasphemous nonsense in my life."
+
+The younger Tiernay was frightened, and began gathering up his shells
+and weeds. His handsome weak face was turned towards the great, strong,
+coarse face of his brother, with a look of terror, and his fingers
+trembled as he put the sea-spoils into his box. Cuthbert, watching them
+both, guessed that sometimes Father Tiernay could show a violent,
+headlong temper, and that his brother had seen an outbreak of this kind
+and trembled for one now. It was only a guess, probably a good one; but
+there were no signs of such an outbreak now. Father Tiernay only lay
+back on the sand and laughed, without a cloud on his face.
+
+"Bedad," he said, "I've been lying on the sand, and the sun has got into
+my stomach and made me talk nonsense. When I was a gossoon, I used to
+sleep with the pig; and it was a poor, feeble-minded pig, as never got
+fat on petaty skins. If folly's catchin', I must have caught it from
+that pig. Did ye ever hear the legend of St. Laurence O'Toole's
+wooden-legged sow, Mackworth?"
+
+It was evident, after this, that the more Mackworth fulminated against
+good Father Tiernay's unutterable nonsense, the more he would talk; so
+he rose and moved sulkily away. Cuthbert asked him, laughing, what the
+story was.
+
+"Faix," said Tiernay, "I ain't sure, principally because I haven't had
+time to invent it; but we've got rid of Mackworth, and can now discourse
+reasonable."
+
+Cuthbert sent a boy up to the hall for some towels, and then lay down on
+the sand beside Tiernay. He was very fond of that man in spite of his
+reckless Irish habit of talking nonsense. He was not alone there. I
+think that every one who knew Tiernay liked him.
+
+They lay on the sand together those three; and, when Father Mackworth's
+anger had evaporated, he came back and lay beside him. Tiernay put his
+hand out to him, and Mackworth shook it, and they were reconciled. I
+believe Mackworth esteemed Tiernay, though they were so utterly unlike
+in character and feeling. I know that Tiernay had a certain admiration
+for Mackworth.
+
+"Do you think, now," said Tiernay, "that you Englishmen enjoy such a
+scene and such a time as this as much as we Irishmen do? I cannot tell.
+You talk better about it. You have a dozen poets to our one. Our best
+poet, I take it, is Tommy Moore. You class him as third-rate; but I
+doubt, mind you, whether you feel nature as acutely as we do."
+
+"I think we do," said Cuthbert, eagerly. "I cannot think that you can
+feel the beauty of the scene we are looking at more deeply than I do.
+You feel nature as in 'Silent O'Moyle'; we feel it as in Keats' 'St.
+Agnes' Eve!'"
+
+He was sitting up on the sand, with his elbows on his knees, and his
+face buried in his hands. None of them spoke for a time; and he, looking
+seaward, said idly, in a low voice--
+
+      "'St. Agnes' Eve. Ah! bitter chill it was.
+      The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold;
+      The hare limped, trembling, through the frozen grass;
+      And drowsy was the flock in woolly fold.'"
+
+What was the poor lad thinking of? God knows. There are times when one
+can't follow the train of a man's thoughts--only treasure up their
+spoken words as priceless relics.
+
+His beautiful face was turned towards the dying sun, and in that face
+there was a look of such kindly, quiet peace, that they who watched it
+were silent, and waited to hear what he would say.
+
+The western headland was black before the afternoon sun, and, far to
+sea, Lundy lay asleep in a golden haze. All before them the summer sea
+heaved between the capes, and along the sand, and broke in short crisp
+surf at their feet, gently moving the seaweed, the sand, and the shells.
+
+"'St. Agnes' Eve,'" he said again. "Ah, yes! that is one of the poems
+written by Protestants which help to make men Catholics. Nine-tenths of
+their highest religious imagery is taken from Catholicism. The English
+poets have nothing to supply the place of it. Milton felt it, and wrote
+about it; yes, after ranging through all heathendom for images he comes
+home, to us at last:--
+
+      "'Let my due feet never fail
+      To walk the studious cloisters pale,
+      And love the high embowed roof,
+      With antique pillars massy proof,
+      And storied windows, richly dight,
+      Casting a dim religious light.'"
+
+"Yes; he could feel for that cloister life. The highest form of human
+happiness! We have the poets with us, at all events. Why, what is the
+most perfect bijou of a poem in the English language? Tennyson's 'St.
+Agnes.' He had to come to us."
+
+The poor fellow looked across the sea, which was breaking in crisp
+ripples at his feet among the seaweed, the sand, and the shells; and as
+they listened, they heard him say, almost passionately--
+
+      "'Break up the heavens, oh, Lord! and far
+        Through all yon starlight keen
+      Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star
+        In raiment white and clean.'
+
+"They have taken our churches from us, and driven us into
+Birmingham-built chapels. They sneer at us, but they forget that we
+built their arches and stained their glass for them. Art has revenged
+herself on them for their sacrilege by quitting earth in disgust. They
+have robbed us of our churches and our revenues, and turned us out on
+the world. Ay, but we are revenged. They don't know the use of them now
+they have got them; and the only men who could teach them, the
+Tractarians, are abused and persecuted by them for their superior
+knowledge."
+
+So he rambled on, looking seaward; at his feet the surf playing with the
+sand, the seaweed, and the shells.
+
+He made a very long pause, and then, when they thought that he was
+thinking of something quite different, he suddenly said--
+
+"I don't believe it matters whether a man is buried in the chancel or
+out of it. But they are mad to discourage such a feeling as that, and
+not make use of it. Am I the worse man because I fancy that, when I lay
+there so quiet, I shall hear above my head the footfalls of those who go
+to kneel around the altar? What is it one of them says--
+
+      "'Or where the kneeling hamlet drains
+      The chalice of the grapes of God.'"
+
+He very seldom spoke so much as this. They were surprised to hear him
+ramble on so; but it was an afternoon in which it was natural to sit
+upon the shore and talk, saying straight on just what came uppermost--a
+quiet, pleasant afternoon; an afternoon to lie upon the sand and conjure
+up old memories.
+
+"I have been rambling, haven't I," he said presently. "Have I been
+talking aloud, or only thinking?"
+
+"You have been talking," said Tiernay, wondering at such a question.
+
+"Have I? I thought I had been only thinking. I will go and bathe, I
+think, and clear my head from dreams. I must have been quoting poetry,
+then," he added, smiling.
+
+"Ay, and quoting it well, too," said Tiernay.
+
+A young fisherman was waiting with a boat, and the lad had come with his
+towels. He stepped lazily across the sand to the boat, and they shoved
+off.
+
+Besides the murmur of the surf upon the sand, playing with the shells
+and seaweed; besides the shouting of the bathing boys; besides the
+voices of the home-returning fishermen, carried sharp and distinct along
+the water; besides the gentle chafing of the stream among the pebbles,
+was there no other sound upon the beach that afternoon? Yes, a sound
+different to all these. A loud-sounding alarm drum, beating more rapidly
+and furiously each moment, but only heard by one man, and not heeded by
+him.
+
+The tide drawing eastward, and a gentle wind following it, hardly enough
+to fill the sails of the lazy fishing-boats and keep them to their
+course. Here and there among the leeward part of the fleet, you might
+hear the sound of an oar working in the row-locks, sleepily coming over
+the sea and mingling harmoniously with the rest.
+
+The young man with Cuthbert rowed out a little distance, and then they
+saw Cuthbert standing in the prow undressing himself. The fishing-boats
+near him luffed and hurriedly put out oars, to keep away. The Squire was
+going to bathe, and no Ravenshoe man was ill-mannered enough to come
+near.
+
+Those on the shore saw him standing stripped for one moment--a tall
+majestic figure. Then they saw him plunge into the water and begin
+swimming.
+
+And then;--it is an easy task to tell it. They saw his head go under
+water, and, though they started on their feet and waited till seconds
+grew to minutes and hope was dead, it never rose again. Without one cry,
+without one struggle, without even one last farewell wave of the hand,
+as the familiar old landscape faded on his eyes for ever, poor Cuthbert
+went down; to be seen no more until the sea gave up its dead. The poor
+wild, passionate heart had fluttered itself to rest for ever.
+
+The surf still gently playing with the sand, the sea changing from
+purple to grey, and from grey to black, under the fading twilight. The
+tide sweeping westward towards the tall black headland, towards the
+slender-curved thread of the new moon, which grew more brilliant as the
+sun dipped to his rest in the red Atlantic.
+
+Groups of fishermen and sea boys and servants, that followed the ebbing
+tide as it went westward, peering into the crisping surf to see
+something they knew was there. One group that paused among the tumbled
+boulders on the edge of the retreating surges, under the dark
+promontory, and bent over something which lay at their feet.
+
+The naked corpse of a young man, calm and beautiful in death, lying
+quiet and still between two rocks, softly pillowed on a bed of green and
+purple seaweed. And a priest that stood upon the shore, and cried wildly
+to the four winds of heaven. "Oh, my God, I loved him! My God! my God! I
+loved him!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIX.
+
+THE SECOND COLUMN OF "THE TIMES" OF THIS DATE, WITH OTHER MATTERS.
+
+
+      "TOMATO. Slam the door!"
+
+      "EDWARD. Come at once; poor Maria is in sad distress.
+      Toodlekins stole!!!!"
+
+      "J. B. can return to his deeply afflicted family if he
+      likes, or remain away if he likes. The A F, one and all,
+      will view either course with supreme indifference. Should
+      he choose the former alternative, he is requested to be as
+      quick as possible. If the latter, to send the key of the
+      cellaret."
+
+      "LOST. A little black and tan lady's lap dog. Its real name
+      is Pussy, but it will answer to the name of Toodlekins
+      best. If any gentleman living near Kensal Green, or Kentish
+      Town, should happen, perfectly accidentally of course, to
+      have it in his possession, and would be so good as to bring
+      it to 997, Sloane Street, I would give him a sovereign and
+      welcome, and not a single question asked, upon my honour."
+
+It becomes evident to me that the dog Toodlekins mentioned in the second
+advertisement, is the same dog alluded to in the fourth; unless you
+resort to the theory that two dogs were stolen on the same day, and that
+both were called Toodlekins. And you are hardly prepared to do that, I
+fancy. Consequently, you arrive at this, that the "Maria" of the second
+advertisement is the "little black and tan lady" of the fourth. And
+that, in 1854, she lived at 997, Sloane Street. Who was she? Had she
+made a fortune by exhibiting herself in a caravan, like Mrs. Gamp's
+spotted negress, and taken a house in Sloane Street, for herself,
+Toodlekins, and the person who advertised for Edward to come and comfort
+her? Again, who was Edward? Was he her brother? Was he something nearer
+and dearer? Was he enamoured of her person or her property? I fear the
+latter. Who could truly love a little black and tan lady?
+
+Again. The wording of her advertisement gives rise to this train of
+thought. Two persons must always be concerned in stealing a dog--the
+person who steals the dog, and the person who has the dog stolen;
+because, if the dog did not belong to any one, it is evident that no one
+could steal it. To put it more scientifically, there must be an active
+and a passive agent. Now, I'll bet a dirty old dishcloth against the
+_New York Herald_, which is pretty even betting, that our little black
+and tan friend, Maria, had been passive agent in a dog-stealing case
+more than once before this, or why does she mention these two
+localities? But we must get on to the other advertisements.
+
+      "LOST. A large white bull-dog, very red about the eyes:
+      desperately savage. Answers to the name of 'Billy.' The
+      advertiser begs that any person finding him will be very
+      careful not to irritate him. The best way of securing him
+      is to make him pin another dog, and then tie his four legs
+      together and muzzle him. Any one bringing him to the Coach
+      and Horses, St. Martin's Lane, will be rewarded."
+
+He seems to have been found the same day, and by some one who was a bit
+of a wag; for the very next advertisement runs thus:
+
+      "FOUND. A large white bull-dog, very red about the eyes;
+      desperately savage. The owner can have him at once, by
+      applying to Queen's Mews, Belgrave Street, and paying the
+      price of the advertisement and the cost of a new pad groom,
+      aged 18, as the dog has bitten one so severely about the
+      knee that it is necessary to sell him at once to drive a
+      cab."
+
+      "LOST. Somewhere between Mile-end Road and Putney Bridge,
+      an old leathern purse, containing a counterfeit sixpence, a
+      lock of hair in a paper, and a twenty-pound note. Any one
+      bringing the note to 267, Tylney Street, Mayfair, may keep
+      the purse and the rest of its contents for their trouble."
+
+This was a very shabby advertisement. The next, though coming from an
+attorney's office, is much more munificent. It quite makes one's mouth
+water, and envy the lucky fellow who would answer it.
+
+      "ONE HUNDRED GUINEAS REWARD. Register wanted. To parish
+      clerks. Any person who can discover the register of
+      marriage between Petre Ravenshoe, Esq. of Ravenshoe, in the
+      county of Devon, and Maria Dawson, which is supposed to
+      have been solemnised in or about the year 1778, will
+      receive the above reward, on communicating with Messrs.
+      Compton and Brogden, Solicitors, 2004, Lincoln's Inn
+      Fields."
+
+Tomato slammed the door as he was told. Edward dashed up to 997, Sloane
+Street, in a hansom cab, just as the little black and tan lady paid one
+sovereign to a gentleman in a velveteen shooting-coat from Kentish Town,
+and hugged Toodlekins to her bosom. J. B. came home to his afflicted
+family with the key of the cellaret. The white bull-dog was restored to
+the prize-fighter, and the groom-lad received shin-plaster and was sent
+home tipsy. Nay, even an honest man, finding that the note was stopped,
+took it to Tylney Street, and got half-a-crown. But no one ever answered
+the advertisement of Lord Saltire's solicitor about the marriage
+register. The long summer dragged on. The square grew dry and dusty;
+business grew slack, and the clerks grew idle; but no one came. As they
+sat there drinking ginger-beer, and looking out at the parched lilacs
+and laburnums, talking about the theatres, and the war, and the cholera,
+it grew to be a joke with them. When any shabby man in black was seen
+coming across the square, they would say to one another, "Here comes the
+man to answer Lord Saltire's advertisement." Many men in black, shabby
+and smart, came across the square and into the office; but none had a
+word to say about the marriage of Petre Ravenshoe with Maria Dawson,
+which took place in the year 1778.
+
+Once, during that long sad summer, the little shoeblack thought he would
+saunter up to the house in South Audley Street, before which he had
+waited so long one night to meet Charles, who had never come. Not
+perhaps with any hope. Only that he would like to see the place which
+his friend had appointed. He might come back there some day; who could
+tell?
+
+Almost every house in South Audley Street had the shutters closed. When
+he came opposite Lord Ascot's house, he saw the shutters were closed
+there too. But more; at the second storey there was a great painted
+board hung edgeways, all scarlet and gold. There was some writing on it,
+too, on a scroll. He could spell a little now, thanks to the
+ragged-school, and he spelt out "Christus Salvator meus." What could
+that mean? he wondered.
+
+There was an old woman in the area, holding two of the rails in her
+hands, and resting her chin on the kerb-stone, looking along the hot
+desolate street. Our friend went over and spoke to her.
+
+"I say, missus," he said, "what's that thing up there?"
+
+"That's the scutching, my man," said she.
+
+"The scutching?"
+
+"Ah! my lord's dead. Died last Friday week, and they've took him down to
+the country house to bury him."
+
+"My lord?" said the boy; "was he the one as used to wear top-boots, and
+went for a soger?"
+
+The old woman had never seen my lord wear top-boots. Had hearn tell,
+though, as his father used to, and drive a coach and four in 'em. None
+of 'em hadn't gone for soldiers, neither.
+
+"But what's the scutching for?" asked the boy.
+
+They put it for a year, like for a monument, she said. She couldn't say
+what the writing on it meant. It was my lord's motter, that was all she
+knowd. And, being a tender-hearted old woman, and not having the fear of
+thieves before her eyes, she had taken him down into the kitchen and fed
+him. When he returned to the upper regions, he was "collared" by a
+policeman, on a charge of "area sneaking," but, after explanations, was
+let go, to paddle home, barefooted, to the cholera-stricken court where
+he lived, little dreaming, poor lad, what an important part he was
+accidentally to play in this history hereafter.
+
+They laid poor Lord Ascot to sleep in the chancel at Ranford, and Lady
+Ascot stood over the grave like a grey, old storm-beaten tower. "It is
+strange, James," she said to Lord Saltire that day, "you and I being
+left like this, with the young ones going down around us like grass.
+Surely our summons must come soon, James. It's weary, weary waiting."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER L.
+
+SHREDS AND PATCHES.
+
+
+Lord Welter was now Lord Ascot. I was thinking at one time that I would
+continue to call him by his old title, as being the one most familiar to
+you. But, on second thoughts, I prefer to call him by his real name, as
+I see plainly that to follow the other course would produce still worse
+confusion. I only ask that you will bear his change of title in mind.
+The new Lady Ascot I shall continue to call Adelaide, choosing rather to
+incur the charge of undue familiarity with people so far above me in
+social position, than to be answerable for the inevitable confusion
+which would be caused by my speaking, so often as I shall have to speak,
+of two Ladies Ascot, with such a vast difference between them of age and
+character.
+
+Colonel Whisker, a tenant of Lord Ascot's, had kindly placed his house
+at the disposal of his lordship for his father's funeral. Never was
+there a more opportune act of civility, for Ranford was dismantled; and
+the doors of Casterton were as firmly closed to Adelaide as the gates of
+the great mosque at Ispahan to a Christian.
+
+Two or three days after Lord Ascot's death, it was arranged that he
+should be buried at Ranford. That night the new Lord Ascot came to his
+wife's dressing-room, as usual, to plot and conspire.
+
+"Ascot," said she, "they are all asked to Casterton for the funeral. Do
+you think she will ask me?"
+
+"Oh dear no," said Lord Ascot.
+
+"Why not?" said Adelaide. "She ought to. She is civil enough to me."
+
+"I tell you I know she won't. He and I were speaking about it to-day."
+
+He was looking over her shoulder into the glass, and saw her bite her
+lip.
+
+"Ah," said she. "And what did he say?"
+
+"Oh, he came up in his infernal, cold, insolent way, and said that he
+should be delighted to see me at Casterton during the funeral, but Lady
+Hainault feared that she could hardly find rooms for Lady Ascot and her
+maid."
+
+"Did you knock him down? Did you kick him? Did you take him by the
+throat and knock his hateful head against the wall?" said Adelaide, as
+quietly as if she was saying "How d'ye do?"
+
+"No, my dear, I didn't," said Lord Ascot. "Partly, you see, because I
+did not know how Lord Saltire would take it. And remember, Adelaide, I
+always told you that it would take years, years, before people of that
+sort would receive you."
+
+"What did you say to him?"
+
+"Well, as much as you could expect me to say. I sneered as insolently,
+but much more coarsely, than he could possibly sneer; and I said that I
+declined staying at any house where my wife was not received. And so we
+bowed and parted."
+
+Adelaide turned round and said, "That was kind and manly of you, Welter.
+I thank you for that, Welter."
+
+And so they went down to Colonel Whisker's cottage for the funeral. The
+colonel probably knew quite how the land lay, for he was a man of the
+world, and so he had done a very good-natured action just at the right
+time. She and Lord Ascot lived for a fortnight there, in the most
+charming style; and Adelaide used to make him laugh, by describing what
+it was possible the other party were doing up at the solemn old
+Casterton. She used to put her nose in the air and imitate young Lady
+Hainault to perfection. At another time she would imitate old Lady
+Hainault and her disagreeable sayings equally well. She was very amusing
+that fortnight, though never affectionate. She knew that was useless;
+but she tried to keep Lord Ascot in good humour with her. She had a
+reason. She wanted to get his ear. She wanted him to confide entirely to
+her the exact state of affairs between Lord Saltire and himself. Here
+was Lord Ascot dead, Charles Ravenshoe probably at Alyden in the middle
+of the cholera, and Lord Saltire's vast fortune, so to speak, going
+a-begging. If he were to be clumsy now--now that the link formed by his
+father, Lord Ascot, between him and Lord Saltire was taken away--they
+were ruined indeed. And he was so terribly outspoken!
+
+And so she strained her wits, till her face grew sharp and thin, to keep
+him in good humour. She had a hard task at times; for there was
+something lying up in the deserted house at Ranford which made Lord
+Ascot gloomy and savage now and then, when he thought of it. I believe
+that the man, coarse and brutal as he was, loved his father, in his own
+way, very deeply.
+
+A night or so after the funeral, there was a dressing-room conference
+between the two; and, as the conversation which ensued was very
+important, I must transcribe it carefully.
+
+When he came up to her, she was sitting with her hands folded on her
+lap, looking so perfectly beautiful that Lord Ascot, astonished and
+anxious as he was at that moment, remarked it, and felt pleased at, and
+proud of, her beauty. A greater fool than she might probably have met
+him with a look of love. She did not. She only raised her great eyes to
+his, with a look of intelligent curiosity.
+
+He drew a chair up close to her, and said--
+
+"I am going to make your hair stand bolt up on end, Adelaide, in spite
+of your bandoline."
+
+"I don't think so," said she; but she looked startled, nevertheless.
+
+"I am. What do you think of this?"
+
+"This? I think that is the _Times_ newspaper. Is there anything in it?"
+
+"Read," said he, and pointed to the list of deaths. She read.
+
+"Drowned, while bathing in Ravenshoe Bay, Cuthbert Ravenshoe, Esq., of
+Ravenshoe Hall. In the faith that his forefathers bled and died
+for.--R.I.P."
+
+"Poor fellow!" she said, quietly. "So _he's_ gone, and brother William,
+the groom, reigns in his stead. That is a piece of nonsense of the
+priests about their dying for the faith. I never heard that any of them
+did that. Also, isn't there something wrong about the grammar?"
+
+"I can't say," said Lord Ascot. "I was at Eton, and hadn't the advantage
+that you had of learning English grammar. Did you ever play the game of
+trying to read the _Times_ right across, from one column to another, and
+see what funny nonsense it makes?"
+
+"No. I should think it was good fun."
+
+"Do it now."
+
+She did. Exactly opposite the announcement of Cuthbert's death was the
+advertisement we have seen before--Lord Saltire's advertisement for the
+missing register.
+
+She was attentive and eager enough now. After a time, she said, "Oho!"
+
+Lord Ascot said, "Hey! what do you think of that, Lady Ascot?"
+
+"I am all abroad."
+
+"I'll see if I can fetch you home again. Petre Ravenshoe, in 1778,
+married a milkmaid. She remembered the duties of her position so far as
+to conveniently die before any of the family knew what a fool he had
+made of himself; but so far forgot them as to give birth to a boy, who
+lived to be one of the best shots, and one of the jolliest old cocks I
+ever saw--Old James, the Ravenshoe keeper. Now, my dearly beloved
+grandmother Ascot is, at this present speaking, no less than eighty-six
+years old, and so, at the time of the occurrence, was a remarkably
+shrewd girl of ten. It appears that Petre Ravenshoe, sneaking away here
+and there with his pretty Protestant wife, out of the way of the
+priests, and finding life unendurable, not having had a single chance to
+confess his sins for two long years, came to the good-natured Sir Cingle
+Headstall, grandmamma's papa, and opened his griefs, trying to persuade
+him to break the matter to that fox-hunting old Turk of a father of his,
+Howard. Sir Cingle was too cowardly to face the old man for a time; and
+before the pair of them could summon courage to speak, the poor young
+thing died at Manger Hall, where they had been staying with the
+Headstalls some months. This solved the difficulty, and nothing was said
+about the matter. Petre went home. They had heard reports about his
+living with a woman and having had a baby born. They asked very few
+questions about the child or his mother, and of course it was all
+forgotten conveniently, long before his marriage with my grandaunt, Lady
+Alicia Staunton, came on the tapis, which took place in 1782, when
+grandma was fourteen years of age. Now grandma had, as a girl of ten,
+heard this marriage of Petre Ravenshoe with Maria Dawson discussed in
+her presence, from every point of view, by her father and Petre. Night
+and morning, at bed-time, at meal-times, sober, and very frequently
+drunk. She had heard every possible particular. When she heard of his
+second marriage (my mouth is as dry as dust with this talking; ring the
+bell, and send your maid down for some claret and water)--when she heard
+of his second marriage, she never dreamt of saying anything, of
+course--a chit of fourteen, with a great liability to having her ears
+boxed. So she held her tongue. When, afterwards, my grandfather made
+love to her, she held it the tighter, for my grandaunt's sake, of whom
+she was fond. Petre, after a time, had the boy James home to Ravenshoe,
+and kept him about his own person. He made him his gamekeeper, treated
+him with marked favour, and so on; but the whole thing was a sort of
+misprision of felony, and poor silly old grandma was a party to it."
+
+"You are telling this very well, Ascot," said Adelaide. "I will, as a
+reward, go so far out of my usual habits as to mix you some claret and
+water. I am not going to be tender, you know; but I'll do so much. Now
+that's a dear, good fellow; go on."
+
+"Now comes something unimportant, but inexplicable. Old Lady Hainault
+knew it, and held _her_ tongue. How or why is a mystery we cannot
+fathom, and don't want to. Grandma says that she would have married
+Petre herself, and that her hatred for grandma came from the belief that
+grandma could have stopped the marriage with my grandaunt by speaking.
+After it was over, she thinks that Lady Hainault had sufficient love
+left for Petre to hold her tongue. But this is nothing to the purpose.
+This James, the real heir of Ravenshoe, married an English girl, a
+daughter of a steward on one of our Irish estates, who had been born in
+Ireland, and was called Nora. She was, you see, Irish enough at heart;
+for she committed the bull of changing her own child, poor dear Charles,
+the real heir, for his youngest cousin, William, by way of bettering his
+position, and then confessed the whole matter to the priest. Now this
+new discovery would blow the honest priest's boat out of the water;
+but----"
+
+"Yes!"
+
+"Why, grandma can't, for the life of her, remember where they were
+married. She is certain that it was in the north of Hampshire, she says.
+Why or wherefore, she can't say. She says they resided the necessary
+time, and were married by license. She says she is sure of it, because
+she heard him, more than once, say to her father that he had been so
+careful of poor Maria's honour, that he sent her from Ravenshoe to the
+house of the clergyman who married them, who was a friend of his;
+farther than this she knows nothing."
+
+"Hence the advertisement, then. But why was it not inserted before?"
+
+"Why, it appears that, when the whole _esclandre_ took place, and when
+you, my Lady Ascot, jilted the poor fellow for a man who is not worth
+his little finger, she communicated with Lord Saltire at once, and the
+result was, that she began advertising in so mysterious a manner that
+the advertisement was wholly unintelligible. It appears that she and
+Lord Saltire agreed not to disturb Cuthbert till they were perfectly
+sure of everything. But, now he is dead, Lord Saltire has insisted on
+instantly advertising in a sensible way. So you see his advertisement
+appears actually in the same paper which contains Cuthbert's death, the
+news of which William got the night before last by telegraph."
+
+"William, eh? How does he like the cup being dashed from his lips like
+this?"
+
+Lord Ascot laughed. "That ex-groom is a born fool, Lady Ascot. He loves
+his foster-brother better than nine thousand a year, Lady Ascot. He is
+going to start to Varna, and hunt him through the army and bring him
+back."
+
+"It is incredible," said Adelaide.
+
+"I don't know. I might have been such a fool myself once, who knows?"
+
+"Who knows indeed," thought Adelaide, "who knows now?" "So," she said
+aloud, "Charles is heir of Ravenshoe after all."
+
+"Yes. You were foolish to jilt him."
+
+"I was. Is Alyden healthy?"
+
+"You know it is not. Our fellows are dying like dogs."
+
+"Do they know what regiment he is in?"
+
+"They think, from Lady Hainault's and Mary Corby's description, that it
+is the 140th."
+
+"Why did not William start on this expedition before?"
+
+"I don't know. A new impulse. They have written to all sorts of
+commanding officers, but he won't turn up till he chooses, if I know him
+right."
+
+"If William brings him back?"
+
+"Why, then he'll come into nine, or more probably twelve thousand a
+year. For those tin lodes have turned up trumps."
+
+"And the whole of Lord Saltire's property?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"And we remain beggars?"
+
+"I suppose so," said Lord Ascot. "It is time to go to bed, Lady Ascot."
+
+This is exactly the proper place to give the results of William's
+expedition to Varna. He arrived there just after the army had gone
+forward. Some men were left behind invalided, among whom were two or
+three of the 140th. One of these William selected as being a likely man
+from whom to make inquiries.
+
+He was a young man, and, likely enough, a kind-hearted one; but when he
+found himself inquired of by a handsome, well-dressed young gentleman,
+obviously in search of a missing relative, a lying spirit entered into
+him, and he lied horribly. It appeared that he had been the intimate and
+cherished comrade of Charles Horton (of whom he had never heard in his
+life). That they had ridden together, drunk together, and slept side by
+side. That he had nursed him through the cholera, and then (seeing no
+other way out of the maze of falsehood in which he had entangled
+himself), that he assisted to bury him with his own hands. Lastly, lying
+on through mere recklessness, into desperation, and so into a kind of
+sublimity, he led William out of the town, and pointed out to him
+Charles's untimely grave. When he saw William pick some dry grass from
+the grave, when he saw him down on his knees, with his cheek on the
+earth, then he was sorry for what he had done. And, when he was alone,
+and saw William's shadow pass across the blazing white wall, for one
+instant, before he went under the dark gateway of the town, then the
+chinking gold pieces fell from his hand on the burning sandy ground, and
+he felt that he would have given them, and ten times more, to have
+spoken the truth.
+
+So Charles was dead and buried, was he? Not quite yet, if you please.
+Who is this riding, one of a gallant train, along the shores of the bay
+of Eupatoria towards some dim blue mountains? Who is this that keeps
+looking each minute to the right, at the noble fleet which is keeping
+pace with the great scarlet and blue rainbow which men call the allied
+armies? At the great cloud of smoke floating angrily seaward, and the
+calm waters of the bay beaten into madness by three hundred throbbing
+propellers?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LI.
+
+IN WHICH CHARLES COMES TO LIFE AGAIN.
+
+
+Ha! This was a life again. Better this than dawdling about at the heels
+of a dandy, or sitting on a wheelbarrow in a mews! There is a scent here
+sweeter than that of the dunghill, or the dandy's essences--what is it?
+The smell of tar, and bilge water, and red herrings. There is a fresh
+whiff of air up this narrow street, which moves your hair, and makes
+your pulse quicken. It is the free wind of the sea. At the end of the
+street are ships, from which comes the clinking of cranes; pleasanter
+music sometimes than the song of nightingales.
+
+Down the narrow street towards the wharf come the hussars. Charles is
+among them. On the wharf, in the confusion, foremost, as far as he dare,
+to assist. He was known as the best horseman in the troop, and, as such,
+was put into dangerous places. He had attracted great attention among
+the officers by his fearlessness and dexterity. The captain had openly
+praised him; and, when the last horse had been slung in, and the last
+cheer given, and the great ship was away down the river, on her message
+of wrath, and woe, and glory, Charles was looking back at Southampton
+spires, a new man with a new career before him.
+
+The few months of degradation, of brooding misery, of listlessness and
+helplessness he had gone through, made this short episode in his life
+appear the most happy and most beautiful of all. The merest clod of a
+recruit in the regiment felt in some way ennobled and exalted: but as
+for Charles, with his intensely, sensitive, romantic nature, he was
+quite, as the French say, _tête montée_. The lowest menial drudgery was
+exalted and glorified. Groom his horse and help clean the deck? Why not?
+That horse must carry him in the day of the merry meeting of heroes.
+Hard living, hard work, bad weather, disease, death: what were they,
+with his youth, health, strength, and nerve? Not to be thought of save
+with a smile. Yes! this expedition of his to the Crimea was the noblest,
+and possibly the happiest in his life. To use a borrowed simile, it was
+like the mournful, beautiful autumn sunset, before the dark night closes
+in. He felt like a boy at midsummer, exploring some wood, or distant
+valley, watched from a distance long, and at last attained; or as one
+feels when, a stranger in a new land, one first rides forth alone into
+the forest on some distant expedition, and sees the new world, dreamt of
+and longed for all one's life, realised in all its beauty and wonder at
+last; and expanding leaf by leaf before one. In a romantic state of
+mind. I can express it no better.
+
+And really it is no wonder that a man, not sea-sick, should have been in
+a state of wonder, eager curiosity, kindliness, and, above all, high
+excitement--which four states of mind, I take it, make up together the
+state of mind called romantic, quixotic, or chivalrous; which is a very
+pleasant state of mind indeed. For curiosity, there was enough to make
+the dullest man curious. Where were they going? Where would the blow be
+struck? Where would the dogs of war first fix their teeth? Would it be a
+campaign in the field, or a siege, or what? For kindliness: were not his
+comrades a good set of brave, free-hearted lads, and was not he the
+favourite among them? As for wonder and excitement, there was plenty of
+that, and it promised to last. Why, the ship herself was a wonder. The
+biggest in the world, carrying 500 men and horses; and every man in the
+ship knew, before she had been five hours at sea, that that
+quiet-looking commander of hers was going to race her out under steam
+the whole way. Who could tire of wondering at the glimpse one got down
+the iron-railed well into the machinery, at the busy cranks and leaping
+pistons, or, when tired of that, at the strange dim vista of swinging
+horses between decks? Wonder and excitement enough here to keep twenty
+Don Quixotes going! Her very name too was romantic--HIMALAYA.
+
+A north-east wind and a mountain of rustling white canvas over head.
+Blue water that seethed and creamed, and roared past to leeward. A calm,
+and the Lizard to the north, a dim grey cape. A south-west wind, and
+above a mighty cobweb of sailless rigging. Top-gallant masts sent down
+and yards close hauled. Still, through it all, the busy clack and rattle
+of the untiring engine.
+
+A dim wild sunset, and scudding prophet clouds that hurried from the
+west across the crimson zenith, like witches towards a sabbath. A wind
+that rose and grew as the sun went down, and hummed loud in the rigging
+as the bows of the ship dipped into the trough of the waves, and failed
+almost into silence as she raised them. A night of storm and terror: in
+the morning, the tumbling broken seas of Biscay. A few fruit brigs
+scudding wildly here and there; and a cape on a new land. A high round
+down, showing a gleam of green among the flying mists.
+
+Sail set again before a northerly wind, and the ship rolling before it
+like a jolly drunkard. Then a dim cloud of smoke before them. Then the
+great steamer _Bussorah_, thundering forward against the wind, tearing
+furiously at the leaping seas with her iron teeth. A hurried glimpse of
+fluttering signals, and bare wet empty decks; and, before you had time
+to say what a noble ship she was, and what good weather she was making
+of it, only a cloud of smoke miles astern.
+
+Now, a dark line, too faint for landsmen's eyes, far ahead, which
+changed into a loom of land, which changed into a cloud, which changed
+into a dim peak towering above the sea mists, which changed into a tall
+crag, with a town, and endless tiers of white fortification--Gibraltar.
+
+Then a strong west wind for three days, carrying the ship flying before
+it with all plain sail set. And each day, at noon, a great excitement on
+the quarter-deck, among the officers. On the third day much cheering and
+laughter, and shaking of hands with the commander. Charles, catching an
+opportunity, took leave to ask his little friend the cornet, what it
+meant. The _Himalaya_ had run a thousand miles in sixty-three hours.[8]
+
+And now at sunrise an island is in sight, flat, bald, blazing yellow in
+the morning sun, with a solitary, flat-topped mass of buildings just in
+the centre, which the sailors say is Civita Vecchia; and, as they sweep
+round the southern point of it, a smooth bay opens, and there is a
+flat-roofed town rising in tiers from the green water--above heavier
+fortifications than those of Gibralter, Charles thinks, but wrongly.
+Right and left, two great forts, St. Elmo and St. Angelo, say the
+sailors; and that flight of stone steps, winding up into the town, is
+the Nix Mangare stairs. A flood of historical recollections comes over
+Charles, and he recognises the place as one long known and very dear to
+him. On those very stairs, Mr. Midshipman Easy stood and resolved that
+he would take a boat and sail to Gozo. What followed on his resolution
+is a matter of history. Other events have taken place at Malta, about
+which Charles was as well informed as the majority, but Charles did not
+think of them; not even of St. Paul and the viper, or the old windy
+dispute, in Greek Testament lecture, at Oxford, between this Melita and
+the other one off the coast of Illyricum. He thought of Midshipman Easy,
+and felt as if he had seen the place before.
+
+I suppose that, if I knew my business properly, I should at this point
+represent Charles as falling down the companion-ladder and spraining his
+ankle, or as having over-eaten himself, or something of that sort, and
+so pass over the rest of the voyage by saying that he was confined to
+his bunk, and saw no more of it. But I am going to do nothing of the
+sort, for two reasons. In the first place, because he did not do
+anything of the kind; and in the next, because he saw somebody at
+Constantinople, of whom I am sure you will be glad to hear again.
+
+Charles had seen Tenedos golden in the east, and Lemnos purple in the
+west, as the sun went down; then, after having steamed at half-speed
+through the Dardanelles, was looking the next evening at Constantinople,
+and at the sun going down behind the minarets, and at all that sort of
+thing, which is no doubt very beautiful, but of which one seems to have
+heard once or twice before. The ship was lying at anchor, with fires
+banked, and it was understood that they were waiting for a Queen's
+messenger.
+
+They could see their own boat, which they had sent to wait for him at
+Seraglio Point. One of the sailors had lent Charles a telescope--a
+regular old brute of a telescope, with a crack across the object-glass.
+Charles was looking at the boat with it, and suddenly said, "There he
+is."
+
+He saw a small grey-headed man, with moustaches, come quickly down and
+get into the boat, followed by some Turks with his luggage. This was
+Colonel Oldhoss, the Queen's messenger; but there was another man with
+him, whom Charles recognised at once. He handed the telescope to the man
+next him, and walked up and down the deck rapidly.
+
+"I _should_ like to speak to him," he thought, "if it were only one
+word. Dear old fellow. But then he will betray me, and they will begin
+persecuting me at home, dear souls. I suppose I had better not. No. If I
+am wounded and dying I will send for him. I will not speak to him now."
+
+The Queen's messenger and his companion came on board, and the ship got
+under way and steamed through the Bosphorus out into the wild seething
+waves of the "Fena Kara degniz," and Charles turned in without having
+come near either of them. But in the chill morning, when the ship's head
+was north-west, and the dawn was flushing up on the distant Thracian
+sierra, Charles was on deck, and, while pausing for an instant in his
+duties, to look westward, and try to remember what country and what
+mountains lay to the north-west of Constantinople, a voice behind him
+said quietly, "Go, find me Captain Croker, my man." He turned, and was
+face to face with General Mainwaring.
+
+It was only for an instant, but their eyes met; the general started, but
+he did not recognise him. Charles's moustache had altered him so much
+that it was no great wonder. He was afraid that the general would seek
+him out again, but he did not. These were busy times. They were at Varna
+that night.
+
+Men were looking sourly at one another. The French expedition had just
+come in from Kustendji in a lamentable state, and the army was rotting
+in its inactivity. You know all about that as well as I can tell you;
+what is of more importance to us is, that Lieutenant Hornby had been
+down with typhus, and was recovering very slowly, so that Charles's
+chances of meeting him were very small.
+
+What am I to do with this three weeks or more at Varna to which I have
+reduced Charles, you, and myself? Say as little about it as need be, I
+should say. Charles and his company were, of course, moved up at once to
+the cavalry camp at Devna, eighteen miles off, among the pleasant hills
+and woodlands. Once, his little friend, the young cornet, who had taken
+a fancy for him, made him come out shooting with him to carry his bag.
+And they scrambled and clambered, and they tore themselves with thorns,
+and they fell down steep places, and utterly forgot their social
+positions towards one another. And they tried to carry home every object
+which was new to them, including a live turtle and a basaltic column.
+And they saw a green lizard, who arched his tail and galloped away like
+a racehorse, and a grey lizard, who let down a bag under his chin and
+barked at them like a dog. And the cornet shot a quail, and a hare, and
+a long-tailed francolin, like a pheasant, and a wood-pigeon. And,
+lastly, they found out that, if you turned over the stones, there were
+scorpions under them, who tucked their claws under their armpits, as a
+man folds his arms, and sparred at them with their tails, drawing their
+sting in and out, as an experienced boxer moves his left hand when
+waiting for an attack. Altogether, they had a glorious day in a new
+country, and did not remember in what relation they were to one another
+till they topped the hill above Devna by moonlight, and saw the two long
+lakes, stretching towards the sea, broken here and there into silver
+ripples by the oars of the commissariat boats. A happy innocent
+schoolboy day--the sort of day which never comes if we prepare for it
+and anticipate it, but which comes without warning, and is never
+forgotten.
+
+Another day the cornet had business in Varna, and he managed that
+Charles should come with him as orderly; and with him, as another
+orderly, went the young lad who spoke about his sister in the pot-house
+of Windsor; for this lad was another favourite of the cornet's, being a
+quiet, gentlemanly lad, in fact a favourite with everybody. A very
+handsome lad, too. And the three went branking bravely down the
+hill-side, through the woodlands, over the streaming plain, into the
+white dirty town. And the cornet must stay and dine with the mess of the
+42nd, and so Charles and the other lad might go where they would. And
+they went and bathed, and then, when they had dressed, they stood
+together under the burning white wall, looking over the wicked Black
+Sea, smoking. And Charles told his comrade about Ravenshoe, about the
+deer, and the pheasants, and the blackcock, and about the big trout that
+lay nosing up into the swift places, in the cool clear water. And
+suddenly the lad turned on him, with his handsome face livid with agony
+and horror, and clutched him convulsively by both arms, and prayed him,
+for God Almighty's sake----
+
+There, that will do. We need not go on. The poor lad was dead in four
+hours. The cholera was very prevalent at Varna that month, and those who
+dawdled about in the hot sun, at the mouth of the filthy drains of that
+accursed hole, found it unto their cost. We were fighting, you see, to
+preserve the town to those worthless dirty Turks, against the valiant,
+noble, but, I fear, equally dirty Russians. The provoking part of the
+Russian war was, that all through we respected and liked our gallant
+enemies far more than we did the useless rogues for whom we were
+fighting. Moreover, our good friends the French seem to have been more
+struck by this absurdity than ourselves.
+
+I only mentioned this sad little incident to show that this Devna life
+among the pleasant woodlands was not all sunshine; that now and then
+Charles was reminded, by some tragedy like this, that vast masses of men
+were being removed from ordinary occupations and duties into an unusual
+and abnormal mode of life; and that Nature was revenging herself for the
+violation of her laws.
+
+You see that we have got through this three weeks more pleasantly than
+they did at Varna. Charles was sorry when the time came for breaking up
+the camp among the mountain woodlands. The more so, as it had got about
+among the men that they were only to take Sebastopol by a sudden attack
+in the rear, and spend the winter there. There would be no work for the
+cavalry, every one said.
+
+It is just worthy of notice how, when one once begins a vagabond life,
+one gets attached to a place where one may chance to rest even for a
+week. When one gets accustomed to a change of locality every day for a
+long while, a week's pause gives one more familiarity with a place than
+a month's residence in a strange house would give if one were habitually
+stationary. This remark is almost a platitude, but just worth writing
+down. Charles liked Devna, and had got used to it, and parted from it as
+he would from a home.
+
+This brings us up to the point where, after his death and burial, I have
+described him as riding along the shore of the Bay of Eupatoria,
+watching the fleet. The 140th had very little to do. They were on the
+extreme left; on the seventeenth they thought they were going to have
+some work, for they saw 150 of the lancers coming in, driving a lot of
+cattle before them, and about 1,000 Cossacks hanging on their rear. But,
+when some light dragoons rode leisurely out to support them, the
+Cossacks rode off, and the 140th were still condemned to inactivity.
+
+Hornby had recovered, and was with the regiment. He had not recognised
+Charles, of course. Even if he had come face to face with him, it was
+almost unlikely that he would have recognised him in his moustache. They
+were not to meet as yet.
+
+In the evening of the nineteenth there was a rumble of artillery over
+the hill in front of them, which died away in half an hour. Most of the
+rest of the cavalry were further to the front of the extreme left, and
+were "at it," so it was understood, with the Cossacks. But the 140th
+were still idle.
+
+On the morning of the twentieth, Charles and the rest of them, sitting
+in their saddles, heard the guns booming in front and on the right. It
+became understood among the men that the fleet was attacking some
+batteries. Also, it was whispered that the Russians were going to stand
+and fight. Charles was sixth man from the right of the rear rank of the
+third troop. He could see the tails of the horses immediately before
+him, and could remark that his front-rank man had a great patch of oil
+on the right shoulder of his uniform. He could also see Hornby in the
+troop before him.
+
+These guns went moaning on in the distance till half-past one; but still
+they sat there idle. About that time there was a new sound in the air,
+close on their right, which made them prick up their ears and look at
+one another. Even the head of the column could have seen nothing, for
+they were behind the hill. But all could hear, and guess. We all know
+that sound well enough now. You hear it now, thank God, on every village
+green in England when the cricket is over. Crack, crack! Crack, crack!
+The noise of advancing skirmishers.
+
+And so it grew from the right towards the front, towards the left, till
+the air was filled with the shrill treble of musketry. Then, as the
+French skirmished within reach of the artillery, the deep bass roared
+up, and the men, who dared not whisper before, could shout at one
+another without rebuke.
+
+Louder again, as our artillery came into range. All the air was tortured
+with concussion. Charles would have given ten years of his life to know
+what was going on on the other side of the hill. But no. There they sat,
+and he had to look at the back of the man before him; and at this time
+he came to the conclusion that the patch of grease on his right shoulder
+was of the same shape as the map of Sweden.
+
+A long weary two hours or more was spent like this. Charles, by looking
+forward and to the right, between the two right-hand men of the troop
+before him, could see the ridge of the hill, and see the smoke rising
+from beyond it, and drifting away to the left before the sea-breeze. He
+saw an aide-de-camp come over that ridge and dismount beside the captain
+of Hornby's troop, loosening his girths. They laughed together; then the
+captain shouted to Hornby, and he laughed and waved his sword over his
+head. After this, he was reduced to watching the back of the man before
+him, and studying the map of Sweden. It was becoming evident that the
+map of North America, if it existed, must be on his left shoulder, under
+his hussar jacket, and that the Pacific Islands must be round in front,
+about his left breast, when the word was given to go forward.
+
+They advanced to the top of the hill, and wheeled. Charles, for one
+instant, had a glimpse of the valley below, seething and roaring like a
+volcano. Everywhere bright flashes of flame, single, or running along in
+lines, or blazing out in volleys. The smoke, driven to the left by the
+wind, hung across the valley like a curtain. On the opposite hill a ring
+of smoke and fire, and in front of it a thin scarlet line disappearing.
+That was all. The next moment they wheeled to the right, and Charles saw
+only the back of the man before him, and the patch of grease on his
+shoulder.
+
+But that night was a night of spurs for them. Hard riding for them far
+into the night. The field of the Alma had been won, and they were
+ordered forward to harass the Cossacks, who were covering the rear of
+the Russian army. They never got near them. But ever after, when the
+battle of the Alma was mentioned before him, Charles at once used to
+begin thinking of the map of Sweden.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LII.
+
+WHAT LORD SALTIRE AND FATHER MACKWORTH SAID WHEN THEY LOOKED OUT OF THE
+WINDOW.
+
+
+"And how do you do, my dear sir?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"I enjoy the same perfect health as ever, I thank you, my lord," said
+Father Mackworth. "And allow me to say, that I am glad to see your
+lordship looking just the same as ever. You may have forgotten that you
+were the greatest benefactor that I ever had. I have not."
+
+"Nay, nay," said Lord Saltire. "Let bygones be bygones, my dear sir.
+By-the-bye, Mr. Mackworth--Lord Hainault."
+
+"I am delighted to see you at Casterton, Mr. Mackworth," said Lord
+Hainault. "We are such rabid Protestants here, that the mere presence of
+a Catholic ecclesiastic of any kind is a source of pleasurable
+excitement to us. When, however, we get among us a man like you--a man
+of whose talents we have heard so much, and a man personally endeared to
+us, through the love he bore to one of us who is dead, we give him a
+threefold welcome."
+
+Lord Saltire used, in his _tête-à-têtes_ with Lady Ascot, to wish to Gad
+that Hainault would cure himself of making speeches. He was one of the
+best fellows in the world, but he would always talk as if he was in the
+House of Lords. This was very true about Lord Hainault; but, although he
+might be a little stilted in his speech, he meant every word he said,
+and was an affectionate, good-hearted man, and withal, a clever one.
+
+Father Mackworth bowed, and was pleased with the compliment. His nerve
+was in perfect order, and he was glad to find that Lord Hainault was
+well inclined towards him, though just at this time the Most Noble the
+Marquis of Hainault was of less importance to him than one of the grooms
+in the stable. What he required of himself just now was to act and look
+in a particular way, and to do it naturally and without effort. His
+genius rose to the situation. He puzzled Lord Saltire.
+
+"This is a sad business," said Lord Saltire.
+
+"A bitter business," said Mackworth. "I loved that man, my lord."
+
+He looked suddenly up as he said it, and Lord Saltire saw that he was in
+earnest. He waited for him to go on, watching him intently with his
+eyelids half dropped over his grey eagle eyes.
+
+"That is not of much consequence, though," said Father Mackworth.
+"Speaking to a man of the world, what is more to the purpose is, to
+hear what is the reason of your lordship's having sought this interview.
+I am very anxious to know that, and so, if I appear rude, I must crave
+forgiveness."
+
+Lord Saltire looked at him minutely and steadily. How Mackworth looked
+was of more importance to Lord Saltire than what he said. On the other
+hand, Mackworth every now and then calmly and steadily raised his eyes
+to Lord Saltire's, and kept them fixed there while he spoke to him.
+
+"Not at all, my dear sir," said Lord Saltire. "If you will have business
+first, however, which is possibly the best plan, we will have it, and
+improve our acquaintance afterwards. I asked you to come to me to speak
+of family matters. You have seen our advertisement?"
+
+"I have, indeed," said Mackworth, looking up with a smile. "I was
+utterly taken by surprise. Do you think that you can be right about this
+marriage?"
+
+"Oh! I am sure of it," said Lord Saltire.
+
+"I cannot believe it," said Mackworth. "And I'll tell you why. If it
+ever took place I _must_ have heard of it. Father Clifford, my
+predecessor, was Petre Ravenshoe's confessor. I need not tell you that
+he must have been in possession of the fact. Your knowledge of the world
+will tell you how impossible it is that, in a house so utterly
+priest-ridden as the House of Ravenshoe, an affair of such moment could
+be kept from the knowledge of the father-confessor. Especially when the
+delinquent, if I may so express myself, was the most foolishly bigoted,
+and cowardly representative of that house which had appeared for many
+generations. I assure you, upon my honour, that Clifford _must_ have
+known it. And, if he had known of it, he must have communicated it to
+me. No priest could possibly have died without leaving such a secret to
+his successor; a secret which would make the owner of it--that is, the
+priest--so completely the master of Ravenshoe and all in it. I confessed
+that man on his death-bed, my lord," said Mackworth, looking quietly at
+Lord Saltire, with a smile, "and I can only tell you, if you can bring
+yourself to believe a priest, that there was not one word said about his
+marriage."
+
+"No?" said Lord Saltire, pensively looking out of the window. "And yet
+Lady Ascot seems so positive."
+
+"I sincerely hope," said Mackworth, "that she may be wrong. It would be
+a sad thing for me. I am comfortable and happy at Ravenshoe. Poor dear
+Cuthbert has secured my position there during my lifetime. The present
+Mr. Ravenshoe is not so tractable as his brother, but I can get on well
+enough with him. But in case of this story being true, and Mr. Charles
+Horton coming back, my position would be untenable, and Ravenshoe would
+be in Protestant hands for the first time in history. I should lose my
+home, and the Church would lose one of its best houses in the west. The
+best, in fact. I had sooner be at Ravenshoe than at Segur. I am very
+much pleased at your lordship's having sought this conference. It shows
+you have some trust in me, to consult me upon a matter in which my own
+interests are all on one side."
+
+Lord Saltire bowed. "There is another way to look at the matter, too, my
+dear sir. If we prove our case, which is possible, and in case of our
+poor dear Charles dying or getting killed, which is probable, why then
+William comes in for the estate again. Suppose, now, such a possibility
+as his dying without heirs; why, then, Miss Ravenshoe is the greatest
+heiress in the West of England. Have you any idea where Miss Ravenshoe
+is?"
+
+Both Lord Saltire and Lord Hainault turned on him as the former said
+this. For an instant Mackworth looked inquiringly from one to the other,
+with his lips slightly parted, and said, "Miss Ravenshoe?" Then he gave
+a half-smile of intelligence, and said, "Ah! yes; I was puzzled for a
+moment. Yes, in that case poor Ellen would be Miss Ravenshoe. Yes, and
+the estate would remain in Catholic hands. What a prospect for the
+Church! A penitent heiress! The management of £12,000 a year! Forgive my
+being carried away for a moment. You know I am an enthusiastic
+Churchman. I have been bound, body and soul, to the Church from a child,
+and such a prospect, even in such remote perspective, has dazzled me.
+But I am afraid I shall see rather a large family of Ravenshoes between
+me and such a consummation. William is going to marry."
+
+"Then you do not know where poor Ellen is?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"I do not," said Mackworth; "but I certainly shall try to discover, and
+most certainly I shall succeed. William might die on this very
+expedition. You might prove your case. If anything were to happen to
+William, I most certainly hope you may, and will give you every
+assistance. For half a loaf is better than no bread. And besides,
+Charles also might be killed, or die of cholera. As it is, I shall not
+move in the matter. I shall not help you to bring a Protestant to
+Ravenshoe. Now, don't think me a heartless man for talking like this; I
+am nothing of the kind. But I am talking to two very shrewd men of the
+world, and I talk as a man of the world; that is all."
+
+At this point Lord Hainault said, "What is that?" and left the room.
+Lord Saltire and Mackworth were alone together.
+
+"Now, my dear sir," said Lord Saltire, "I am glad you have spoken merely
+as a man of the world. It makes matters so much easier. You could help
+us if you would."
+
+Mackworth laughed. "Of course I could, my lord. I could bring the whole
+force of the Catholic Church, at my back, to give assistance. With our
+powers of organisation, we could discover all about the marriage in no
+time (if it ever took place, which I don't choose to believe just now).
+Why, it would pay us to search minutely every register in England, if it
+were to keep such a house in the hands of the Church. But the Catholic
+Church, in my poor person, politely declines to move all its vast
+machinery, to give away one of its best houses to a Protestant."
+
+"I never supposed that the dear old lady would do anything of the kind.
+But, as for Mr. Mackworth, will nothing induce _him_ to move _his_ vast
+machinery in our cause?"
+
+"I am all attention, my lord."
+
+"In case of our finding Charles, then?"
+
+"Yes," said Mackworth, calmly.
+
+"Twenty thousand?"
+
+"No," said Mackworth. "It wouldn't do. Twenty million wouldn't do. You
+see there is a difference between a soldier disguising himself, and
+going into the enemy's camp, to lie, and it may be, murder, to gain
+information for his own side, and the same soldier deserting to the
+enemy, and giving information. The one is a hero, and the other a rogue.
+I am a hero. You must forgive me for putting matters so coarsely, but
+you distrust me so entirely that I am forced to do so."
+
+"I do not think you have put it so coarsely," said Lord Saltire. "I have
+to ask your forgiveness for this offer of money, which you have so nobly
+refused. They say every man has his price. If this is the case, yours is
+a very high one, and you should be valued accordingly."
+
+"Now, my lord, before we conclude this interview, let me tell you two
+things, which may be of advantage to you. The first is, that you cannot
+buy a Jesuit."
+
+"A Jesuit!"
+
+"Ay. And the next thing is this. This marriage of Petre Ravenshoe is all
+a fiction of Lady Ascot's brain. I wish you good morning, my lord."
+
+There are two sides to every door. You grant that. A man cannot be in
+two places at once. You grant that, without the exception made by the
+Irish member. Very well then. I am going to describe what took place on
+both sides of the library door at the conclusion of this interview.
+Which side shall I describe first?
+
+That is entirely as I choose, and I choose to describe the outside
+first. The side where Father Mackworth was. This paragraph and the last
+are written in imitation of the Shandean-Southey-Doctorian style. The
+imitation is a bad one, I find, and approaches nearer to the lower style
+known among critics as Swivellerism; which consists in saying the first
+thing that comes into your head. Any style would be quite allowable,
+merely as a rest to one's aching brain, after the dreadfully keen
+encounter between Lord Saltire and Father Mackworth, recorded above.
+
+When Mackworth had closed the library door behind him, he looked at it
+for a moment, as if to see it was safe, and then his whole face
+underwent a change. It grew haggard and anxious, and, as he parted his
+lips to moisten them, the lower one trembled. His eyes seemed to grow
+more prominent, and a leaden ring began to settle round them; he paused
+in a window, and raised his hand towards his head. When he had raised it
+half way he looked at it; it was shaking violently.
+
+"I am not the man I was," he said. "These great field-days upset me. My
+nerve is going, God help me. It is lucky that I was really puzzled by
+his calling her Miss Ravenshoe. If I had not been all abroad, I could
+never have done so well. I must be very careful. My nerve ought not to
+go like this. I have lived a temperate life in every way. Possibly a
+little too temperate. I won't go through another interview of this kind
+without wine. It is not safe.
+
+"The chances are ten to one in favour of one never hearing of Charles
+again, Shot and steel and cholera. Then William only to think of. In
+that case I am afraid I should like to bring in the elder branch of the
+family, to that young gentleman's detriment. I wish my nerve was better;
+this irritability increases on me in spite of all my care. I wish I
+could stand wine.
+
+"Ravenshoe, with Ellen for its mistress, and Mackworth living there as
+her master! A penitential devotee, and a clever man for confessor! And
+twelve thousand a year! If we Jesuits were such villains as the
+Protestants try to make us out, Master William would be unwise to live
+in the house with me.
+
+"I wonder if Lord Saltire guesses that I hold the clue in my hand. I
+can't remember the interview, or what I said. My memory begins to go.
+They should put a younger man in such a place. But I would not yield to
+another man. No. The stakes are too high. I wish I could remember what I
+said.
+
+"Does William dream that, in case of Charles's death, he is standing
+between me and the light? At all events, Lord Saltire sees it. I wonder
+if I committed myself. I remember I was very honest and
+straightforward? What was it I said at last? I have an uneasy feeling
+about that, but I can't remember.
+
+"I hope that Butler will keep the girl well in hand. If I was to get
+ill, it would all rest with him. God! I hope I shall not get ill."
+
+Now we will go to the other side of the door. Lord Saltire sat quietly
+upright in his chair until the door was safely closed. Then he took a
+pinch of snuff. He did not speak aloud, but he looked cunningly at the
+door, and said to himself--
+
+"Odd!"
+
+Another pinch of snuff. Then he said aloud, "Uncommon curious, by Ged."
+
+"What is curious?" said Lord Hainault, who had come into the room.
+
+"Why, that fellow. He took me in to the last moment. I thought he was
+going to be simply honest; but he betrayed himself by over-eagerness at
+the end. His look of frank honesty was assumed; the real man came out in
+the last sentence. You should have seen how his face changed, when he
+turned sharply on me, after fancying he had lulled suspicion to sleep,
+and told me that the marriage was a fiction. He forgot his manners for
+the first time, and laid his hand upon my knee."
+
+Lord Hainault said, "Do you think that he knows about the marriage?"
+
+"I am sure he does. And he knows where Ellen is."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I am sure of it."
+
+"That is hardly a reason, my dear Lord Saltire. Don't you think, eh?"
+
+"Think what?"
+
+"Think that you are--well," said Lord Hainault, in a sort of
+desperation, "are not you, my dear lord, to put it very mildly,
+generalising from an insufficient number of facts? I speak with all
+humility before one of the shrewdest men in Europe; but don't you think
+so?"
+
+"No, I don't," said Lord Saltire.
+
+"I bow," said Lord Hainault. "The chances are ten to one that you are
+right, and I am wrong. Did you make the offer?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And did he accept it?"
+
+"Of course he didn't. I told you he wouldn't."
+
+"That is strange, is it not?"
+
+"No," said Lord Saltire.
+
+Lord Hainault laughed, and then Lord Saltire looked up and laughed too.
+"I like being rude to you, Hainault. You are so solemn."
+
+"Well," said Lord Hainault with another hearty laugh. "And what are we
+to do now?"
+
+"Why, wait till William comes back," said Lord Saltire. "We can do
+nothing till then, my dear boy. God bless you, Hainault. You are a good
+fellow."
+
+When the old man was left alone, he rose and looked out of the window.
+The bucks were feeding together close under the windows; and, farther
+off, under the shadow of the mighty cedars, the does and fawns were
+standing and lying about lazily, shaking their broad ears and stamping
+their feet. Out from the great rhododendron thickets, right and left of
+the house, the pheasants were coming to spend the pleasant evening-tide
+in running to and fro, and scratching at the ant-hills. The rabbits,
+too, were showing out among the grass, scuttling about busily. The
+peacock had lit down from the stable roof, and was elegantly picking his
+way and dragging his sweeping train among the pheasants and the rabbits;
+and on the topmost, copper-red, cedar-boughs, some guinea fowl were
+noisily preparing for roost. One hundred yards from the window the park
+seemed to end, for it dropped suddenly down in a precipitous, almost
+perpendicular slope of turf, three hundred and fifty feet high, towards
+the river, which you could see winding on for miles through the richly
+wooded valley; a broad riband of silver, far below. Beyond, wooded
+hills: on the left, endless folds of pearl-coloured downs; to the right,
+the town, a fantastic grey and red heap of buildings, lying along from
+the river, which brimmed full up to its wharves and lane ends; and, over
+it, a lazy cloud of smoke, from which came the gentle booming of
+golden-toned bells.
+
+Casterton is not a show place. Lord Hainault has a whim about it. But
+you may see just such a scene, with variations, of course, from
+Park-place, or Hedsor, or Chiefden, or fifty other houses on the king of
+rivers. I wonder when the tour of the Thames will become fashionable. I
+have never seen anything like it, in its way. And I have seen a great
+many things.
+
+Lord Saltire looked out on all this which I have roughly described (for
+a reason). And, as he looked, he spoke to himself, thus, or nearly so--
+
+"And so I am the last of them all; and alone. Hardly one of them left.
+Hardly one. And their sons are feeding their pheasants, and planting
+their shrubberies still, as we did. And the things that were terrible
+realities for us, are only printed words for them, which they try to
+realise, but cannot. The thirty mad long years, through which we stood
+with our backs to the wall, and ticketed as "the revolutionary wars,"
+and put in a pigeon-hole. I wish they would do us justice. We _were_
+right. Hainault's pheasants prove it. They must pay their twenty million
+a year, and thank us that they have got off so easy.
+
+"I wonder what _they_ would do, in such a pinch as we had. They seem to
+be as brave as ever; but I am afraid of their getting too much
+unbrutalised for another struggle like ours. I suppose I am wrong, for I
+am getting too old to appreciate new ideas, but I am afraid of our
+getting too soft. It is a bygone prejudice, I am afraid. One comfort is,
+that such a struggle can never come again. If it did, they might have
+the will to do all that we did, and more, but have they the power? This
+extension of the suffrage has played the devil, and now they want to
+extend it farther, the madmen! They'll end by having a House full of
+Whigs. And then--why, then, I suppose, there'll be nothing but Whigs in
+the House. That seems to me near about what will happen. Well! well! I
+was a Whig myself once on a time.
+
+"All gone. Every one of them. And I left on here, in perfect health and
+preservation, as much an object of wonder to the young ones as a dodo
+would be to a poultry-fancier. Before the effect of our deeds has been
+fully felt, our persons have become strange, and out of date. But yet I,
+strange to say, don't want to go yet. I want to see that Ravenshoe boy
+again. Gad! how I love that boy. He has just Barkham's sweet, gentle,
+foolish way with him. I determined to make him my heir from the first
+time I saw him at Ranford, if he turned out well. If I had announced it,
+everything would have gone right. What an endless series of unlucky
+accidents that poor boy has had.
+
+"Just like Barkham. The same idle, foolish, lovable creature, with anger
+for nothing; only furious, blind indignation for injustice and wrong. I
+wish he would come back. I am getting aweary of waiting.
+
+"I wonder if I shall see Barkham again, just to sit with my arm on his
+shoulder, as I used to on the terrace in old times. Only for one short
+half-hour----"
+
+I shall leave off here. I don't want to follow the kind old heathen
+through his vague speculations about a future state. You see how he had
+loved his son. You see why he loved Charles. That is all I wished to
+show you.
+
+"And if Charles don't come back? By Gad! I am very much afraid the
+chances are against it. Well, I suppose, if the poor lad dies, I must
+leave the money to Welter and his wife, if it is only for the sake of
+poor Ascot, who was a good fellow. I wonder if we shall ever get at the
+bottom of this matter about the marriage. I fancy not, unless Charles
+dies, in which case Ellen will be re-instated by the priest.
+
+"I hope William will make haste back with him. Old fellows like me are
+apt to go off in a minute. And if he dies and I have not time to make a
+will, the whole goes to the Crown, which will be a bore. I would sooner
+Welter had it than that."
+
+Lord Saltire stood looking out of the library window, until the river
+looked like a chain of crimson pools, stretching westward towards the
+sinking sun. The room behind him grew dark, and the marble pillars,
+which divided it in unequal portions, stood like ghosts in the gloom. He
+was hidden by the curtain, and presently he heard the door open, and a
+light footstep stealthily approaching over the Turkey carpet. There was
+a rustle of a woman's dress, and a moving of books on the centre table,
+by some hand which evidently feared detection. Lord Saltire stepped from
+behind his curtain, and confronted Mary Corby.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIII.
+
+CAPTAIN ARCHER TURNS UP.
+
+
+"Do not betray me, my lord," said Mary, from out of the gloom.
+
+"I will declare your malpractices to the four winds of heaven, Miss
+Corby, as soon as I know what they are. Why, why do you come rustling
+into the room, like a mouse in the dark? Tell me at once what this
+hole-and-corner work means."
+
+"I will not, unless you promise not to betray me, Lord Saltire."
+
+"Now just think how foolish you are. How can I possibly make myself
+particeps, of what is evidently a most dark and nefarious business,
+without knowing beforehand what benefit I am to receive? You offer me no
+share of booty; you offer me no advantage, direct or indirect, in
+exchange for my silence, except that of being put into possession of
+facts which it is probably dangerous to know anything about. How can you
+expect to buy me on such terms as these?"
+
+"Well, then, I will throw myself on your generosity. I want
+_Blackwood_. If I can find _Blackwood_ now, I shall get a full hour at
+it to myself while you are all at dinner. Do you know where it is?"
+
+"Yes," said Lord Saltire.
+
+"Do tell me, please. I do so want to finish a story in it. Please to
+tell me where it is."
+
+"I won't."
+
+"Why not? How very unkind. We have been friends eight months now, and
+you are just beginning to be cross to me. You see how familiarity breeds
+contempt; you used to be so polite."
+
+"I shan't tell you where _Blackwood_ is," said Lord Saltire, "because I
+don't choose. I don't want you to have it. I want you to sit here in the
+dark and talk to me, instead of reading it."
+
+"I will sit and talk to you in the dark; only you must not tell ghost
+stories."
+
+"I want you to sit in the dark," said Lord Saltire, "because I want to
+be '_vox et præterea nihil_.' You will see why, directly. My dear Mary
+Corby, I want to have some very serious talk with you. Let us joke no
+more."
+
+Mary settled herself at once into the arm-chair opposite Lord Saltire,
+and, resting her cheek on her hand, turned her face towards the empty
+fireplace. "Now, my dear Lord Saltire," she said, "go on. I think I can
+anticipate what you are going to say."
+
+"You mean about Charles."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Ah, that is only a part of what I have to say. I want to consult you
+there, certainly; but that is but a small part of the business."
+
+"Then I am curious."
+
+"Do you know, then, I am between eighty and ninety years old?"
+
+"I have heard so, my lord."
+
+"Well then, I think that the voice to which you are now listening will
+soon be silent for ever; and do not take offence; consider it as a dead
+man's voice, if you will."
+
+"I will listen to it as the voice of a kind living friend," said Mary.
+"A friend who has always treated me as a reasonable being and an equal."
+
+"That is true, Mary; you are so gentle and so clever, that is no wonder.
+See here, you have no private fortune."
+
+"I have my profession," said Mary, laughing.
+
+"Yes, but your profession is one in which it is difficult to rise,"
+said Lord Saltire, "and so I have thought it necessary to provide for
+you in my will. For I must make a new one."
+
+Poor Mary gave a start. The announcement was so utterly unexpected. She
+did not know what to say or what to think. She had had long night
+thoughts about poverty, old age, a life in a garret as a needlewoman,
+and so on; and had many a good cry over them, and had never found any
+remedy for them except saying her prayers, which she always found a
+perfect specific. And here, all of a sudden, was the question solved!
+She would have liked to thank Lord Saltire. She would have liked to kiss
+his hand; but words were rather deficient. She tried to keep her tears
+back, and she in a way succeeded; then in the honesty of her soul she
+spoke.
+
+"I will thank you more heartily, my lord, than if I went down on my
+knees and kissed your feet. All my present has been darkened by a great
+cloud of old age and poverty in the distance. You have swept that cloud
+away. Can I say more?"
+
+"On your life, not another word. I could have over-burdened you with
+wealth, but I have chosen not to do so. Twenty thousand pounds will
+enable you to live as you have been brought up. Believe an old man when
+he says that more would be a plague to you."
+
+"Twenty thousand pounds!"
+
+"Yes. That will bring you in, you will find, about six hundred a year.
+Take my word for it, it is quite enough. You will be able to keep your
+brougham, and all that sort of thing. Believe me, you would not be happy
+with more."
+
+"More!" said Mary, quietly. "My lord, look here, and see what you have
+done. When the children are going to sleep, I sit, and sew, and sing,
+and, when they are gone to sleep, I still sit, and sew, and think. Then
+I build my Spanish castles; but the highest tower of my castle has risen
+to this--that in my old age I should have ten shillings a week left me
+by some one, and be able to keep a canary bird, and have some old woman
+as pensioner. And now--now--now. Oh! I'll be quiet in a moment. Don't
+speak to me for a moment. God is very good."
+
+I hope Lord Saltire enjoyed his snuff. I think that, if he did not, he
+deserved to. After a pause Mary began again.
+
+"Have I left on you the impression that I am selfish? I am almost afraid
+I have. Is it not so? I have one favour to ask of you. Will you grant
+it?"
+
+"Certainly I will."
+
+"On your honour, my lord."
+
+"On my honour."
+
+"Reduce the sum you have mentioned to one-fourth. I have bound you by
+your honour. Oh, don't make me a great heiress; I am not fit for it."
+
+Lord Saltire said, "Pish! If you say another word I will leave you ten
+thousand more. To the deuce with my honour; don't talk nonsense."
+
+"You said you were going to be quiet in a moment," he resumed presently.
+"Are you quiet now?"
+
+"Yes, my lord, quiet and happy."
+
+"Are you glad I spoke to you in the dark?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You will be more glad that it was in the dark directly. Is Charles
+Ravenshoe quite the same to you as other men?"
+
+"No," said Mary; "that he most certainly is not. I could have answered
+that question _to you_ in the brightest daylight."
+
+"Humph!" said Lord Saltire. "I wish I could see him and you comfortably
+married, do you know? I hope I speak plain enough. If I don't, perhaps
+you will be so good as to mention it, and I'll try to speak a little
+plainer."
+
+"Nay; I quite understand you. I wonder if you will understand me, when I
+say that such a thing is utterly and totally out of the question."
+
+"I was afraid so. You are a pair of simpletons. My dear daughter (you
+must let me call you so), you must contemplate the contingency I have
+hinted at in the dark. I know that the best way to get a man rejected,
+is to recommend him; I therefore, only say, that John Marston loves you
+with his whole heart and soul, and that he is a _protégé_ of mine."
+
+"I am speaking to you as I would to my own father. John Marston asked me
+to be his wife last Christmas, and I refused him."
+
+"Oh, yes. I knew all about that the same evening. It was the evening
+after they were nearly drowned out fishing. Then there is no hope of a
+reconsideration there?"
+
+"Not the least," said Mary. "My lord, I will never marry."
+
+"I have not distressed you?"
+
+"Certainly not. You have a right to speak as you have. I am not a silly
+hysterical girl either, that I cannot talk on such subjects without
+affectation. But I will never marry; I will be an old maid. I will write
+novels, or something of that sort. I will not even marry Captain Archer,
+charm he never so wisely."
+
+"Captain Archer! Who on earth is Captain Archer?"
+
+"Don't you know Captain Archer, my lord?" replied Mary, laughing
+heartily, but ending her laugh with a short sob. "Avast heaving! Bear a
+hand, my hearties, and let us light this taper. I think you ought to
+read his letter. He is the man who swam with me out of the cruel sea,
+when the _Warren Hastings_ went down. That is who he is, Lord Saltire."
+And at this point, little Mary, thoroughly unhinged by this strange
+conversation, broke down, and began crying her eyes out, and putting a
+letter into his hand, rose to leave the room.
+
+He held the door open for her. "My dear Mary," he said, "if I have been
+coarse or rude, you must try to forgive me."
+
+"Your straightforward kindness," she said, "is less confusing than the
+most delicate finesse." And so she went.
+
+Captain Archer is one of the very best men I know. If you and I, reader,
+continue our acquaintance, you will soon know more of him than you have
+been able to gather from the pages of Ravenshoe. He was in person
+perhaps the grandest and handsomest fellow you ever saw. He was gentle,
+brave, and courteous. In short, the best example I have ever seen of the
+best class of sailor. By birth he was a gentleman, and he had carefully
+made himself a gentleman in manners. Neither from his dress, which was
+always scrupulously neat and in good taste, nor from his conversation,
+would you guess that he was a sailor, unless in a very select circle,
+where he would, if he thought it pleased or amused, talk salt water by
+the yard. The reason why he had written to Mary in the following style
+was, that he knew she loved it, and he wished to make her laugh. Lord
+Saltire set him down for a mad seaman, and nothing more. You will see
+that he had so thoroughly obscured what he meant to say, that he left
+Mary with the very natural impression that he was going to propose to
+her.
+
+He had done it, he said, from Port Philip Heads, in sixty-four days, at
+last, in consequence of one of his young gentlemen (merchant midshipmen)
+having stole a black cat in Flinder's-lane, and brought her aboard. He
+had caught the westerly wind off the Leuwin and carried it down to 62°,
+through the ice, and round the Horn, where he had met a cyclone, by
+special appointment, and carried the outside edge of it past the
+Auroras. That during this time it had blown so hard, that it was
+necessary for three midshipmen to be on deck with him night and day, to
+hold his hair on. That, getting too near the centre, he had found it
+necessary to lay her to, which he had successfully done, by tying one of
+his false collars in the fore weather-rigging. And so on. Giving an
+absurd account of his whole voyage, evidently with the intention of
+making her laugh.
+
+He concluded thus: "And now, my dear Mary, I am going to surprise you. I
+am getting rich, and I am thinking of getting married. Have you ever
+thought of such a thing? Your present dependence must be irksome. Begin
+to contemplate a change to a happier and freer mode of life. I will
+explain more fully when I come to you. I shall have much to tell you
+which will surprise you; but you know I love you, and only study your
+happiness. When the first pang of breaking off old associations is over,
+the new life, to such a quiet spirit as yours, becomes at first
+bearable, then happy. A past is soon created. Think of what I have said,
+before I come to you. Your future, my dear, is not a very bright one. It
+is a source of great anxiety to me, who love you so dearly--you little
+know how dearly."
+
+I appeal to any young lady to say whether or no dear Mary was to blame
+if she thought good, blundering Archer was going to propose to her. If
+they give it against her, and declare that there is nothing in the above
+letter leading to such a conclusion, I can only say that Lord Saltire
+went with her and with me, and regarded the letter as written
+preparatory to a proposal. Archer's dismay, when we afterwards let him
+know this, was delightful to behold. His wife was put in possession of
+the fact, by some one who shall be nameless, and I have heard that jolly
+soul use her information against him in the most telling manner on
+critical occasions.
+
+But, before Captain Archer came, there came a letter from William, from
+Varna, announcing Charles's death of cholera. There are melancholy
+scenes, more than enough, in this book, and alas! one more to come: so I
+may spare you the description of their woe at the intelligence, which we
+know to be false. The letter was closely followed by William himself,
+who showed them the grass from his grave. This helped to confirm their
+impression of its truth, however unreasonable. Lord Saltire had a
+correspondence with the Horse Guards, long and windy, which resulted,
+after months, in discovering that no man had enlisted in the 140th under
+the name of Horton. This proved nothing, for Charles might have enlisted
+under a false name, and yet might have been known by his real name to an
+intimate comrade.
+
+Lord Saltire wrote to General Mainwaring. But, by the time his letter
+reached him, that had happened which made it easy for a fool to count on
+his fingers the number of men left in the 140th. Among the dead or among
+the living, no signs of Charles Ravenshoe.
+
+General Mainwaring was, as we all know, wounded on Cathcart's Hill, and
+came home. The news which he brought about the doings of the 140th we
+shall have from first hand. But he gave them no hope about Charles.
+
+Lord Saltire and General Mainwaring had a long interview, and a long
+consultation. Lord Hainault and the General witnessed his will. There
+were some legacies to servants; twenty thousand pounds to Miss Corby;
+ten thousand to John Marston; fifty thousand pounds to Lady Ascot; and
+the rest, amounting in one way or another, to nearly five hundred
+thousand pounds, was left to Lord Ascot (our old acquaintance, Lord
+Welter) and his heirs for ever.
+
+There was another clause in the will, carefully worded--carefully
+guarded about by every legal fence which could be erected by law, and by
+money to buy that law--to the effect that, if Charles should reappear,
+he was to come into a fortune of eighty thousand pounds, funded
+property.
+
+Now please to mark this. Lord Ascot was informed by General Mainwaring
+that, the death of Charles Ravenshoe being determined on as being a
+fact, Lord Saltire had made his will in his (Lord Ascot's) favour. I
+pray you to remember this. Lord Ascot knew no particulars, only that the
+will was in his favour. If you do not keep this in mind, it would be
+just as well if there had been no Lord Welter at all in the story.
+
+Ravenshoe and its poor twelve thousand a year begin to sink into
+insignificance, you see. But still we must attend to it. How did
+Charles's death affect Mackworth? Rather favourably. The property could
+not come into the hands of a Protestant now. William was a staunch
+Catholic, though rebellious and disagreeable. If anything happened to
+him, why, then there was Ellen to be produced. Things might have been
+better, certainly, but they were certainly improved by that young cub's
+death, and by the cessation of all search for the marriage register. And
+so on. If you care to waste time on it, you may think it all through for
+yourselves, as did not Father Mackworth.
+
+And I'll tell you why. Father Mackworth had had a stroke of paralysis,
+as men will have, who lead, as he did, a life of worry and excitement,
+without taking proper nourishment; and he was lying, half idiotic, in
+the priest's tower at Ravenshoe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIV.
+
+CHARLES MEETS HORNBY AT LAST
+
+
+Oh for the whispering woodlands of Devna! Oh for the quiet summer
+evenings above the lakes, looking far away at the white-walled town on
+the distant shore! No more hare-shooting, no more turtle-catching, for
+you, my dear Charles. The allies had determined to take Sebastopol, and
+winter in the town. It was a very dull place, every one said; but there
+was a race-course, and there would be splendid boat-racing in the
+harbour. The country about the town was reported to be romantic, and
+there would be pleasant excursions in the winter to Simpheropol, a gayer
+town than Sebastopol, and where there was more society. They were not
+going to move till the spring, when they were to advance up the valley
+of the Dnieper to Moscow, while a flying column was to be sent to follow
+the course of the Don, cross to the Volga at Suratow, and so penetrate
+into the Ural Mountains and seize the gold mines, or do something of
+this sort; it was all laid out quite plain.
+
+Now, don't call this _ex post facto_ wisdom, but just try to remember
+what extravagant ideas every non-military man had that autumn about what
+our army would do. The ministers of the King of Lernè never laid down a
+more glorious campaign than we did. "I will," says poor Picrochole,
+"give him fair quarter, and spare his life--I will rebuild Solomon's
+Temple--I will give you Caramania, Syria, and all Palestine." "Ha!
+sire," said they, "it is out of your goodness. Grammercy, we thank you."
+We have had our little lesson about that kind of amusement. There has
+been none of it in this American business; but our good friends the
+other side of the Atlantic are worse than they were in the time of the
+Pogram defiance. Either they don't file their newspapers, or else they
+console themselves by saying that they could have done it all if they
+had liked.
+
+It now becomes my duty to use all the resources of my art to describe
+Charles's emotions at the first sight of Sebastopol. Such an opportunity
+for the display of beautiful language should not be let slip. I could do
+it capitally by buying a copy of Mr. Russell's "War," or even by using
+the correspondence I have on the table before me. But I think you will
+agree with me that it is better left alone. One hardly likes to come
+into the field in that line after Russell.
+
+Balaclava was not such a pleasant place as Devna. It was bare and rocky,
+and everything was in confusion, and the men were dying in heaps of
+cholera. The nights were beginning to grow chill, too, and Charles began
+to dream regularly that he was sleeping on the bare hill-side, in a
+sharp frost, and that he was agonisingly cold about the small of his
+back. And the most singular thing was, that he always woke and found his
+dream come true. At first he only used to dream this dream towards
+morning; but, as October began to creep on, he used to wake with it
+several times in the night, and at last hardly used to go to sleep at
+all for fear of dreaming it.
+
+Were there no other dreams? No. No dreams, but one ever-present reality.
+A dull aching regret for a past for ever gone. A heavy deadly grief,
+lost for a time among the woods of Devna, but come back to him now
+amidst the cold, and the squalor, and the sickness of Balaclava. A
+brooding over missed opportunities, and the things that might have been.
+Sometimes a tangled puzzled train of thought, as to how much of this
+ghastly misery was his own fault, and how much accident. And above all,
+a growing desire for death, unknown before.
+
+And all this time, behind the hill, the great guns--which had begun a
+fitful muttering when they first came there, often dying off into
+silence--now day by day, as trench after trench was opened, grew louder
+and more continuous, till hearing and thought were deadened, and the
+soul was sick of their never-ceasing melancholy thunder.
+
+And at six o'clock on the morning of the seventeenth, such an infernal
+din began as no man there had ever heard before, which grew louder and
+louder till nine, when it seemed impossible that the ear could bear the
+accumulation of sound; and then suddenly doubled, as the _Agamemnon_ and
+the _Montebello_, followed by the fleets, steamed in, and laid
+broadside-to under the forts. Four thousand pieces of the heaviest
+ordnance in the world were doing their work over that hill, and the
+140th stood dismounted and listened.
+
+At ten o'clock the earth shook, and a column of smoke towered up in the
+air above the hill, and as it began to hang motionless, the sound of it
+reached them. It was different from the noise of guns. It was something
+new and terrible. An angry hissing roar. An hour after they heard that
+twenty tons of powder were blown up in the French lines.
+
+Soon after this, though, there was work to be done, and plenty of it.
+The wounded were being carried to the rear. Some cavalry were
+dismounted, and told off for the work. Charles was one of them.
+
+The wind had not yet sprung up, and all that Charles saw for the moment
+was a valley full of smoke, and fire, and sound. He caught the glimpse
+of the spars and funnel of a great liner above the smoke to the left;
+but directly after they were under fire, and the sickening day's work
+began.
+
+Death and horror in every form, of course. The wounded lying about in
+heaps. Officers trying to compose their faces, and die like gentlemen.
+Old Indian soldiers dying grimly as they had lived; and lads, fresh from
+the plough last year, listed at the market-cross some unlucky Saturday,
+sitting up staring before them with a look of terror and wonder: sadder
+sight than either. But everywhere all the day, where the shot screamed
+loudest, where the shell fell thickest, with his shako gone, with his
+ambrosial curls tangled with blood, with his splendid gaudy fripperies
+soiled with dust and sweat, was Hornby, the dandy, the fop, the dicer;
+doing the work of ten, carrying out the wounded in his arms, encouraging
+the dying, cheering on the living.
+
+"I knew there was some stuff in him," said Charles, as he followed him
+into the Crown battery; just at that time the worst place of all, for
+the _The Twelve Apostles_ had begun dropping red-hot shot into it, and
+exploded some ammunition, and killed some men. And they had met a naval
+officer, known to Hornby, wounded, staggering to the rear, who said,
+"that his brother was knocked over, and that they wanted to make out he
+was dead, but he had only fainted." So they went back with him. The
+officer's brother was dead enough, poor fellow; but as Charles and
+Hornby bent suddenly over to look at him, their faces actually touched.
+
+Hornby did not recognise him. He was in a state of excitement, and was
+thinking of no one less than Charles, and Charles's moustaches had
+altered him, as I said before. If their eyes had met, I believe Hornby
+would have known him; but it was not to be till the 25th, and this was
+only the 17th. If Hornby could only have known him, if they could only
+have had ten minutes' talk together, Charles would have known all that
+we know about the previous marriage of his grandfather: and, if that
+conversation had taken place, he would have known more than any of them,
+for Hornby knew something which he thought of no importance, which was
+very important indeed. He knew where Ellen was.
+
+But Charles turned his face away, and the recognition did not take
+place. Poor Charles said afterwards that it was all a piece of
+luck--that "the stars in their courses fought against Sisera." It is not
+the case. He turned away his eyes, and avoided the recognition. What he
+meant is this:--
+
+As Hornby's face was touching his, and they were both bending over the
+dead man, whom they could hardly believe to be dead, the men behind them
+fired off the great Lancaster in the next one-gun battery. "Crack!" and
+they heard the shell go piff, piff, piff, piff, and strike something.
+And then one man close to them cried, "God Almighty!" and another cried,
+"Christ!" as sailors will at such awful times; and they both leapt to
+their feet. Above the smoke there hung, a hundred feet in the air, a
+something like a vast black pine-tree; and before they had time to
+realise what had happened, there was a horrible roar, and a concussion
+which made them stagger on their legs. A shell from the Lancaster had
+blown up the great redoubt in front of the Redan wall, and every Russian
+gun ceased firing. And above the sound of the Allied guns rose the
+cheering of our own men, sounding, amidst the awful bass, like the
+shrill treble of school-children at play.
+
+Charles said afterwards that this glorious accident prevented their
+recognition. It is not true. He prevented it himself, and took the
+consequences. But Hornby recognised him on the twenty-fifth in this
+wise:--
+
+The first thing in the morning, they saw, on the hills to the right,
+Russian skirmishers creeping about towards them, apparently without an
+object. They had breakfast, and took no notice of them till about eight
+o'clock, when a great body of cavalry came slowly, regiment by regiment,
+from behind a hill near the Turks. Then gleaming batteries of artillery;
+and lastly, an endless column of grey infantry, which began to wheel
+into line. And when Charles had seen some five or six grey batallions
+come swinging out, the word was given to mount, and he saw no more, but
+contemplated the tails of horses. And at the same moment the guns began
+an irregular fire on their right.
+
+Almost immediately the word was given to advance, which they did slowly.
+Charles could see Hornby just before him, in his old place, for they
+were in column. They crossed the plain, and went up the crest of the
+hill, halting on the high road. Here they sat for some time, and the
+more fortunate could see the battle raging below to the right. The
+English seemed getting rather the worst of it.
+
+They sat there about an hour and a half; and all in a moment, before any
+one seemed to expect it, some guns opened on them from the right; so
+close that it made their right ears tingle. A horse from the squadron in
+front of Charles bolted from the ranks, and nearly knocked down Hornby.
+The horse had need to bolt, for he carried a dead man, who in the last
+spasm had pulled him on his haunches, and struck his spurs deep into his
+sides.
+
+Charles began to guess that they were "in for it" at last. He had no
+idea, of course, whether it was a great battle or a little one; but he
+saw that the 140th had work before them. I, of course, have only to
+speak of what Charles saw with his own eyes, and what therefore bears
+upon the story I am telling you. That was the only man he saw killed at
+that time, though the whole brigade suffered rather heavily by the
+Russian cannonade at that spot.
+
+Very shortly after this they were told to form line. Of course, when
+this manoeuvre was accomplished, Charles had lost sight of Hornby. He
+was sorry for this. He would have liked to know where he was; to help
+him if possible, should anything happen to him; but there was not much
+time to think of it, for directly after they moved forward at a canter.
+In the front line were the 11th Hussars and the 13th Light Dragoons, and
+in the second where the 140th Hussars,[9] the 8th Hussars, and the 4th
+Dragoons. Charles could see thus much, now they were in line.
+
+They went down hill, straight towards the guns, and almost at once the
+shot from them began to tell. The men of the 11th and 13th began to fall
+terribly fast. The men in the second line, in which Charles was, were
+falling nearly as fast, but this he could not remark. He missed the man
+next him on the right, one of his favourite comrades, but it did not
+strike him that the poor fellow was cut in two by a shot. He kept on
+wishing that he could see Hornby. He judged that the affair was getting
+serious. He little knew what was to come.
+
+He had his wish of seeing Hornby, for they were riding up hill into a
+narrowing valley, and it was impossible to keep line. They formed into
+column again, though men and horses were rolling over and over at every
+stride, and there was Hornby before him, sailing along as gallant and
+gay as ever. A fine beacon to lead a man to a glorious death.
+
+And, almost the next moment, the batteries right and left opened on
+them. Those who were there engaged can give us very little idea of what
+followed in the next quarter of an hour. They were soon among guns--the
+very guns that had annoyed them from the first; and infantry beyond
+opened fire on them. There seems to have been a degree of confusion at
+this point. Charles, and two or three others known to him, were hunting
+some Russian artillerymen round their guns, for a minute or so. Hornby
+was among them. He saw also at this time his little friend the cornet,
+on foot, and rode to his assistance. He caught a riderless horse, and
+the cornet mounted. Then the word was given to get back again; I know
+not how; I have nothing to do with it. But, as they turned their faces
+to get out of this horrible hell, poor Charles gave a short, sharp
+scream, and bent down in his saddle over his horse's neck.
+
+It was nothing. It was only as if one were to have twenty teeth pulled
+out at once. The pain was over in an instant. What a fool he was to cry
+out! The pain was gone again, and they were still under fire, and Hornby
+was before him.
+
+How long? How many minutes, how many hours? His left arm was nearly
+dead, but he could hold his reins in a way, and rode hard after Hornby,
+from some wild instinct. The pain had stopped, but was coming on again
+as if ten thousand red-hot devils were pulling at his flesh, and twenty
+thousand were arriving each moment to help them.
+
+His own friends were beside him again, and there was a rally and a
+charge. At what? he thought for an instant. At guns? No. At men this
+time, Russian hussars--right valiant fellows, too. He saw Hornby in the
+thick of the _mêlée_, with his sword flickering about his head like
+lightning. He could do but little himself; he rode at a Russian and
+unhorsed him; he remembers seeing the man go down, though whether he
+struck at him, or whether he went down by the mere superior weight of
+his horse, he cannot say. This I can say, though, that, whatever he did,
+he did his duty as a valiant gentleman; I will go bail for that much.
+
+They beat them back, and then turned. Then they turned again and beat
+them back once more. And then they turned and rode. For it was time.
+Charles lost sight of Hornby till the last, when some one caught his
+rein and turned his horse, and then he saw that they were getting into
+order again, and that Hornby was before him, reeling in his saddle.
+
+As the noise of the battle grew fainter behind them, he looked round to
+see who was riding beside him, and holding him by the right arm. It was
+the little cornet. Charles wondered why he did so. "You're hard hit,
+Simpson," said the cornet. "Never mind. Keep your saddle a little
+longer. We shall be all right directly."
+
+His faculties were perfectly acute, and, having thanked the cornet he
+looked down and noticed that he was riding between him and a trooper,
+that his left arm was hanging numbed by his side, and that the trooper
+was guiding his horse. He saw that they had saved him, and even in his
+deadly agony he was so far his own old courteous self, that he turned
+right and left to them, and thanked them for what they had done for him.
+
+But he had kept his eyes fixed on Hornby, for he saw that he was
+desperately hit, and he wanted to say one or two words to him before
+either of them died. Soon they were among English faces, and English
+cheers rang out in welcome to their return, but it was nothing to him;
+he kept his eye, which was growing dim, on Hornby, and, when he saw him
+fall off his saddle into the arms of a trooper, he dismounted too and
+staggered towards him.
+
+The world seemed to go round and round, and he felt about him like a
+blind man. But he found Hornby somehow. A doctor, all scarlet and gold,
+was bending over him, and Charles knelt down on the other side, and
+looked into the dying man's face.
+
+"Do you know me, lieutenant?" he said, speaking thick like a drunken
+man, but determined to hold out. "You know your old servant, don't you?"
+
+Hornby smiled as he recognised him, and said, "Ravenshoe." But then his
+face grew anxious, and he said, "Why did you hide yourself from me? You
+have ruined everything."
+
+He could get no further for a minute, and then he said--
+
+"Take this from round my neck and carry it to her. Tell her that you saw
+me die, and that I was true to our compact. Tell her that my share of
+our purification was complete, for I followed duty to death, as I
+promised her. She has a long life of weary penance before her to fulfil
+our bargain. Say I should wish her to be happy, only that I know she
+cannot be. And also say that I see now, that there is something better
+and more desirable than what we call happiness. I don't know what it is,
+but I suspect it is what we call duty."
+
+Here the doctor said, "They are at it again, and I must go with them. I
+can do no good here for the poor dear fellow. Take what he tells you off
+his neck, in my presence, and let me go."
+
+The doctor did it himself. When the great heavy gold stock was
+unbuttoned, Hornby seemed to breathe more freely. The doctor found round
+his neck a gold chain, from which hung a photograph of Ellen, and a
+black cross. He gave them to Charles, and departed.
+
+Once more Charles spoke to Hornby. He said, "Where shall I find her?"
+
+Hornby said, "Why, at Hackney, to be sure; did you not know she was
+there?" And afterwards, at the very last, "Ravenshoe, I should have
+loved you; you are like her, my boy. Don't forget."
+
+But Charles never heard that. They found Hornby dead and cold, with his
+head on Charles's lap, and Charles looked so like him that they said,
+"This man is dead too; let us bury him." But a skilful doctor there
+present said, "This man is not dead, and will not die;" and he was
+right.
+
+Oh, but the sabres bit deep that autumn afternoon! There were women in
+Minsk, in Moglef, in Tchernigof, in Jitemir, in Polimva, whose husbands
+were Hussars--and women in Taganrog, in Tcherkask, in Sanepta, which
+lies under the pleasant slate mountains, whose husbands and sons were
+Cossacks--who were made widows that day. For that day's work there was
+weeping in reed-thatched hovels of the Don, and in the mud-built
+shanties of the Dnieper. For the 17th Lancers, the Scots Greys, the 1st
+Royals, and the 6th Enniskillens--"these terrible beef-fed islanders"
+(to use the words of the _Northern Bee_)--were upon them; and Volhynia
+and Hampshire, Renfrewshire and Grodno, Podolia and Fermanagh, were
+mixed together in one common ruin.
+
+Still, they say, the Princess Petrovitch, on certain days, leaves her
+carriage, and walks a mile through the snow barefoot, into Alexandroski,
+in memory of her light-haired handsome young son, whom Hornby slew at
+Balaclava. And I myself know the place where Lady Allerton makes her
+pilgrimage for those two merry boys of hers who lie out on the Crimean
+hill. Alas! not side by side. Up and down, in all weathers, along a
+certain gravel walk, where the chalk brook, having flooded the park with
+its dammed-up waters, comes foaming and spouting over a cascade, and
+hurries past between the smooth-mown lawns of the pleasance. In the very
+place where she stood when the second letter came. And there, they say,
+she will walk at times, until her beauty and her strength are gone, and
+her limbs refuse to carry her.
+
+Karlin Karlinoff was herding strange-looking goats on the Suratow
+hill-side, which looks towards the melancholy Volga on one side, and the
+reedy Ural on the other, when the Pulk came back, and her son was not
+with them. Eliza Jones had got on her husband's smock-frock, and was
+a-setting of beans, when the rector's wife came struggling over the
+heavy lands and water-furrows, and broke the news gently, and with many
+tears. Karlin Karlinoff drove her goats into the mud-walled yard that
+night, though the bittern in the melancholy fen may have been startled
+from his reeds by a cry more wild and doleful than his own; and Eliza
+Jones went on setting her beans, though they were watered with her
+tears.
+
+What a strange, wild business it was! The extreme east of Europe against
+the extreme west. Men without a word, an idea, a habit, or a hope in
+common, thrown suddenly together to fight and slay; and then to part,
+having learned to respect one another better, in one year of war, than
+ever they had in a hundred years of peace. Since that year we have
+understood Eylau and Borodino, which battles were a puzzle to some of us
+before that time. The French did better than we, which was provoking,
+because the curs began to bark--Spanish curs, for instance; American
+curs; the lower sort of French cur; and the Irish curs, who have the
+strange habit of barking the louder the more they are laughed at, and
+who, now, being represented by about two hundred men among six million,
+have rather a hard time of it. They barked louder, of course, at the
+Indian mutiny. But they have all got their tails between their legs now,
+and are likely to keep them there. We have had our lesson. We have
+learnt that what our fathers told us was true--that we are the most
+powerful nation on the face of the earth.
+
+This, you will see, bears all upon the story I am telling you. Well, in
+a sort of way. Though I do not exactly see how. I could find a reason,
+if you gave me time. If you gave me time, I could find a reason for
+anything. However, the result is this, that our poor Charles had been
+struck by a ball in the bone of his arm, and that the splinters were
+driven into the flesh, though the arm was not broken. It was a nasty
+business, said the doctors. All sorts of things might happen to him.
+Only one thing was certain, and that was that Charles Ravenshoe's career
+in the army was over for ever.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LV.
+
+ARCHER'S PROPOSAL.
+
+
+Six weeks had passed since the date of Captain Archer's letter before he
+presented himself in person at Casterton. They were weary weeks enough
+to Mary, Lord Saltire, and Lady Ascot. Lady Ascot was staying on at
+Casterton, as if permanently, at the earnest request of Lord and Lady
+Hainault; and she stayed on the more willingly that she and Mary might
+mingle their tears about Charles Ravenshoe, whom they were never to see
+again. The "previous marriage affair" had apparently fallen through
+utterly. All the advertisements, were they worded never so frantically,
+failed to raise to the surface the particular parish-clerk required; and
+Lady Ascot, after having propounded a grand scheme for personally
+inspecting every register in the United Kingdom, which was pooh-poohed
+by Lord Saltire, now gave up the matter as a bad job; and Lord Saltire
+himself began to be puzzled and uneasy, and once more to wonder whether
+or no Maria was not mistaken after all. Mackworth was still very ill,
+though slowly recovering. The younger Tiernay, who was nursing him,
+reported that his head seemed entirely gone, although he began to eat
+voraciously, and, if encouraged, would take exercise. He would now walk
+far and fast, in silence, with the kind priest toiling after him. But
+his wilful feet always led him to the same spot. Whether they rambled in
+the park, whether they climbed the granite tors of the moor, or whether
+they followed the stream up through the woods, they always ended their
+walk at the same place--at the pool among the tumbled boulders, under
+the dark western headland, where Cuthbert's body had been found. And
+here the priest would sit looking seaward, as if his life and his
+intellect had come to a full stop here, and he was waiting patiently
+till a gleam of light should come from beyond.
+
+William was at Ravenshoe, in full possession of the property. He had
+been born a gamekeeper's son, and brought up as a groom. He had now
+£10,000 a year; and was going to marry the fisherman's daughter, his own
+true love; as beautiful, as sweet-tempered a girl as any in the three
+kingdoms. It was one of the most extraordinary rises in life that had
+ever taken place. Youth, health, and wealth--they must produce
+happiness. Why no, not exactly in this case. He believed Charles was
+dead, and he knew, if that was the case, that the property was his; but
+he was not happy. He could not help thinking about Charles. He knew he
+was dead and buried, of course; but still he could not help wishing that
+he would come back, and that things might be again as they had been
+before. It is not very easy to analyse the processes of the mind of a
+man brought up as William was. Let us suppose that, having been taught
+to love and admire Charles above all earthly persons, his mind was not
+strong enough to disabuse himself of the illusion. I suppose that your
+African gets fond of his fetish. I take it that, if you stole his
+miserable old wooden idol in the night, though it might be badly carved,
+and split all up the back by the sun, and put in its place an Old
+Chelsea shepherdess, he would lament his graven image, and probably
+break the fifty guineas' worth of china with his club. I know this,
+however, that William would have given up his ten thousand a year, and
+have trusted to his brother's generosity, if he could have seen him back
+again. In barbarous, out-of-the-way places, like the west of Devonshire,
+the feudal feeling between foster-brothers is still absurdly strong. It
+is very ridiculous, of course. Nothing can be more ridiculous or
+unnecessary than the lightning coming down the dining-room chimney and
+sending the fire-irons flying about the cat's ears. But there it is, and
+you must make the best of it.
+
+We are now posted up well enough in the six weeks which preceded the
+arrival of the mysterious Archer. He deferred his arrival till his
+honeymoon was completed. His mysterious letter to Mary partly alluded to
+his approaching marriage with Jane Blockstrop--daughter of Lieutenant
+Blockstrop of the coast guard, and niece of Rear-Admiral Blockstrop,
+who, as Captain Blockstrop, had the _Tartar_ on the Australian
+station--and partly to something else. We shall see what directly. For,
+when Mary came down to see him in the drawing-room, there was with him,
+besides his wife, whom he introduced at once, a very tall and handsome
+young man, whom he presented to her as her cousin, George Corby.
+
+Did Charles turn in his pallet at Scutari? Did he turn over and stare at
+the man in the next bed, who lay so deadly still, and who was gone when
+he woke on the weary morrow?
+
+There was no mystery about George Corby's appearance. When Mary's
+father, Captain Corby, had gone to India, his younger brother, George's
+father, had gone to Australia. This younger brother was a somewhat
+peevish, selfish man, and was not on the best of terms with Captain
+Corby. He heard, of course, of the wreck of the _Warren Hastings_, and
+the loss of his brother. He also informed himself that his niece was
+saved, and was the protected favourite of the Ravenshoes. He had then
+said to himself, "I am needy. I have a rising family. She is better off
+than I can make her. Let her stay there." And so he let her stay there,
+keeping himself, however, to do him justice, pretty well informed of her
+position. He had made the acquaintance of Captain Archer, at Melbourne,
+on his first voyage to that port, in the end of 1852; laid the whole
+matter before him, and begged him not to break it to her at present.
+Captain Archer had readily promised to say nothing, for he saw Mary the
+lady of a great house, with every prospect, as he thought, of marrying
+the heir. But when he saw Mary, after the break-up, in Grosvenor Square,
+a nursery governess, he felt that he ought to speak, and set sail from
+the port of London with a full determination of giving a piece of his
+mind to her uncle, should he hesitate to acknowledge her. He had no need
+to say much. Mr. Corby, though a selfish, was not an unkind man, by any
+means. And, besides, he was now very wealthy, and perfectly able to
+provide for his niece. So, when Archer had finished his story, he
+merely said, "I suppose I had better send over George to see if he will
+fall in love with her. That will be the best thing, I take it. She must
+not be a governess to those swells. They might slight or insult her.
+Take George over for me, will you, my dear soul, and see how it is
+likely to go. At all events, bring her back to me. Possibly I may not
+have done my duty by her."
+
+George was called in from the rocking-chair in the verandah to receive
+instructions. He was, so his father told him, to go to Europe with
+Captain Archer, and, as Captain Archer was going to get married and miss
+a voyage, he might stay till he came back. First and foremost, he was to
+avail himself of his letters of introduction, and get into the good
+society that his father was able to command for him. Under this head of
+instruction he was to dance as much as possible, and to ride to the
+fox-hounds, taking care not to get too near to the hounds, or to rush at
+his fences like a madman, as all Australians did. Secondly, he was, if
+possible, to fall in love with his cousin Mary Corby, marry her, bring
+her back, and reside _pro tem._ at Toorallooralyballycoomefoozleah,
+which station should be swept and garnished for his reception, until the
+new house at the Juggerugahugjug crossing-place was finished. Thirdly,
+he might run across to the Saxony ram sales, and, if he saw anything
+reasonable, buy, but be careful of pink ears, for they wouldn't stand
+the Grampian frosts. Fourthly, he was not to smoke without changing his
+coat, or to eat the sugar when any one was looking. Fifthly, he was to
+look out for a stud horse, and might go as far as five hundred. Such a
+horse as Allow Me, Ask Mamma, or Pam's Mixture would do.[10] And so on,
+like the directions of the Aulic Council to the Archduke. He was not to
+go expressly to Durham; but, if he found himself in that part of the
+world, he might get a short-horned bull. He need not go to Scotland
+unless he liked; but, if he did, he might buy a couple of collies, &c.,
+&c.
+
+George attended the ram sales in Saxony, and just ran on to Vienna,
+thinking, with the philosophy of an Australian, that, if he _did_ fall
+in love with his cousin, he might not care to travel far from her, and
+that therefore she might "keep." However, he came at last, when Archer
+had finished his honeymoon; and there he was in the drawing-room at
+Casterton.
+
+Mary was not very much surprised when it was all put before her. She had
+said to Charles, in old times, "I know I have relations somewhere; when
+I am rich they will acknowledge me;" and, just for one instant, the
+suspicion crossed her mind that her relations might have heard of the
+fortune Lord Saltire had left her. It was unjust and impossible, and in
+an instant she felt it to be so. Possibly the consciousness of her
+injustice made her reception of her cousin somewhat warmer.
+
+He was certainly very handsome and very charming. He had been brought up
+by his father the most punctilious dandy in the southern hemisphere, and
+thrown from a boy among the best society in the colony; so he was quite
+able to make himself at home everywhere. If there was a fault in his
+manner, it was that there was just a shade too much lazy ease in the
+presence of ladies. One has seen that lately, however, in other young
+gentlemen, not educated in the bush, to a greater extent: so we must not
+be hard upon him. When Lady Hainault and Lady Ascot heard that a cousin
+of Mary's had just turned up from the wilds of Australia, they looked at
+one another in astonishment, and agreed that he must be a wild man. But,
+when they had gone down and sat on him, as a committee of two, for an
+hour, they both pronounced him charming. And so he was.
+
+Lord Hainault, on receiving this report, could do no less than ask him
+to stay a day or two. And so his luggage was sent for to Twyford, and
+the good Archer left, leaving him in possession.
+
+Lord Saltire had been travelling round to all his estates. He had taken
+it into his head, about a month before this, that it was time that he
+should get into one of his great houses, and die there. He told Lady
+Ascot so, and advised her to come with him; but she still held on by
+Lord Charles Herries' children, and Mary, and said she would wait. So he
+had gone away, with no one but his confidential servant. He had gone to
+Cottingdean first, which stands on the banks of the Wannet, at the foot
+of the North Hampshire mountains.
+
+Well, Cottingdean did seem at first sight a noble lair for an old lion
+to crawl away to, and die in. There was a great mile-long elm avenue,
+carried, utterly regardless of economy, over the flat valley, across the
+innumerable branches of the river; and at the last the trees ran up over
+the first great heave of the chalk hill: and above the topmost boughs of
+those which stood in the valley, above the highest spire of the tallest
+poplar in the water-meadow, the old grey house hung aloft, a long
+irregular façade of stone. Behind were dark woods, and above all a
+pearl-green line of down.
+
+But Cottingdean wouldn't do. His lordship's man Simpson knew it wouldn't
+do from the first. There were draughts in Cottingdean, and doors that
+slammed in the night, and the armour in the great gallery used suddenly
+to go "clank" at all hours, in a terrible way. And the lady ancestress
+of the seventeenth century, who carried her head in a plate before her,
+used to stump upstairs and downstairs, from twelve o'clock to one, when
+she was punctually relieved from duty by the wicked old ancestor of the
+sixteenth century, who opened the cellar door and came rattling his
+sword against the banisters up all the staircase till he got to the
+north-east tower, into which he went and slammed the door; and, when he
+had transacted his business, came clanking down again: when he in turn
+was relieved by an [Greek: oi polloi] of ghosts, who walked till
+cockcrow. Simpson couldn't stand it. No more could Lord Saltire, though
+possibly for different reasons than Simpson's.
+
+The first night at Cottingdean Lord Saltire had his writing-desk
+unpacked, and took therefrom a rusty key. He said to Simpson, "You know
+where I am going. If I am not back in half an hour, come after me."
+Simpson knew where he was going. Lord Barkham had been staying here at
+Cottingdean just before he went up to town, and was killed in that
+unhappy duel. The old servants remembered that, when Lord Barkham went
+away that morning, he had taken the key of his room with him, and had
+said, in his merry way, that no one was going in there till he came back
+the next week, for he had left all his love-letters about. Lord Saltire
+had got the key, and was going to open the room the first time for forty
+years.
+
+What did the poor old man find there? Probably nothing more than poor
+Barkham had said--some love-letters lying about. When the room was
+opened afterwards, by the new master of Cottingdean, we found only a
+boy's room, with fishing-rods and guns lying about. In one corner were a
+pair of muddy top-boots kicked off in a hurry, and an old groom
+remembered that Lord Barkham had been riding out the very morning he
+started for London. But, amidst the dust of forty years, we could
+plainly trace that some one had, comparatively recently, moved a chair
+up to the fireplace; and on the cold hearth there was a heap of the
+ashes of burnt paper.
+
+Lord Saltire came back to Simpson just as his half-hour was over, and
+told him in confidence that the room he had been in was devilish
+draughty, and that he had caught cold in his ear. Cottingdean would not
+do after this. They departed next morning. They must try Marksworth.
+
+Marksworth, Lord Saltire's north country place, is in Cumberland. If you
+are on top of the coach, going northward, between Hiltonsbridge and
+Copley Beck, you can see it all the way for three miles or more, over
+the stone walls. The mountains are on your left; to the right are
+endless unbroken level woodlands; and, rising out of them, two miles
+off, is a great mass of grey building, from the centre of which rises a
+square Norman keep, ninety feet high, a beacon for miles even in that
+mountainous country. The Hilton and Copley Beck join in the park, which
+is twelve miles in circumference, and nearly all thick woodland. Beyond
+the great tower, between it and the further mountains, you catch a gleam
+of water. This is Marksmere, in which there are charr.
+
+The draughts at Marksworth were colder and keener than the draughts at
+Cottingdean. Lord Saltire always hated the place: for the truth is this,
+that although Marksworth looked as if it had stood for eight hundred
+years, every stone in it had been set up by his father, when he, Lord
+Saltire, was quite a big boy. It was beautifully done; it was splendidly
+and solidly built--probably the best executed humbug in England; but it
+was not comfortable to live in. A nobleman of the nineteenth century,
+stricken in years, finds it difficult to accommodate himself in a house
+the windows of which are calculated to resist arrows. At the time of the
+Eglinton tournament, Lord Saltire challenged the whole Tory world in
+arms, to attack Marksworth in the ante-gunpowder style of warfare; his
+lordship to provide eatables and liquor to besiegers and besieged;
+probably hoping that he might get it burnt down over his head, and have
+a decent excuse for rebuilding it in a more sensible style. The
+challenge was not accepted. "The trouble," said certain Tory noblemen,
+"of getting up the old tactics correctly would be very great; and the
+expense of having the old engines of war constructed would be enormous.
+Besides, it might come on to rain again, and spoil the whole affair."
+
+Marksworth wouldn't do. And then Simpson suggested his lordship's town
+house in Curzon Street, and Lord Saltire said "Hey?" and Simpson
+repeated his suggestion, and Lord Saltire said "Hah!" As Charles's luck
+would have it, he liked the suggestion, and turned south, coming to
+Casterton on his way to London. He arrived at Casterton a few days after
+George Corby. When he alighted at the door, Lord Hainault ran down the
+steps to greet him, for this pair were very fond of one another. Lord
+Hainault, who was accused by some people of "priggishness," was
+certainly not priggish before Lord Saltire. He was genial and hearty.
+There was a slight crust on Lord Hainault. Because he had held his own
+among the clever commoners at the University, he fancied himself a
+little cleverer than he was. He in his heart thought more of his second,
+than Marston did of his double first, and possibly showed it among his
+equals. But before an acknowledged superior, like Lord Saltire, this
+never showed. When Lord Saltire talked wisely and shrewdly (and who
+could do so better than he?), he listened; when Lord Saltire was cross,
+he laughed. On this occasion Lord Saltire was cross. He never was cross
+to any one but Lady Ascot, Lord Hainault, and Marston. He knew they
+liked it.
+
+"Good Ged, Hainault," he began, "don't stand grinning there, and looking
+so abominably healthy and happy, or I will drive away again and go on to
+London. Nothing can be in worse taste than to look like that at a man
+whom you see is tired, and cold, and peevish. You have been out
+shooting, too. Don't deny it; you smell of gunpowder."
+
+"Did you _never_ shoot?" said Lord Hainault, laughing.
+
+"I shot as long as I could walk, and therefore I have a right to nourish
+envy and all uncharitableness against those who can still do so. I wish
+you would be cross, Hainault. It is wretched manners not to be cross
+when you see a man is trying to put you out of temper."
+
+"And how _are_ you, my dear lad?" continued Lord Saltire, when he had
+got hold of his arm. "How is Lady Ascot? and whom have you got here?"
+
+"We are all very well," said Lord Hainault; "and we have got nobody."
+
+"Well done," said Lord Saltire. "I thought I should have found the house
+smelling like a poulterer's shop on Guy Fawkes's day, in consequence of
+your having got together all the hawbucks in the country for pheasant
+shooting. I'll go upstairs, my dear boy, and change, and then come down
+to the library fire."
+
+And so he did. There was no one there, and he sank into a comfortable
+chair, with a contented "humph!" in front of the fire, beside a big
+round table. He had read the paper in the train; so he looked for a
+book. There was a book on the table beside him--Ruskin's "Modern
+Painters," which had pictures in it; so he took out his great gold
+glasses, and began turning it over.
+
+A man's card fell from it. He picked it up and read it. "Mr. Charles
+Ravenshoe." Poor Charles! That spring, you remember, he had come over to
+see Adelaide, and, while waiting to see old Lady Hainault, had held his
+card in his hand. It had got into the book. Lord Saltire put the book
+away, put up his glasses, and walked to the window.
+
+And Charles lay in his bed at Scutari, and watched the flies upon the
+wall.
+
+"I'll send up for little Mary," said Lord Saltire. "I want to see the
+little bird. Poor Charles!"
+
+He looked out over the landscape. It was dull and foggy. He wandered
+into the conservatory, and idly looked out of the glass door at the end.
+Then, as he looked, he said, suddenly, "Gadzooks!" and then, still more
+briskly, "The deuce!"
+
+There was a splendid show of chrysanthemums in the flower-garden, but
+they were not what his lordship exclaimed at. In the middle of the walk
+was Mary Corby, leaning on the arm of a very handsome young man. He was
+telling some very animated story, and she was looking up into his face
+with sparkling eyes.
+
+"Othello and Desdemona! Death and confusion!" said Lord Saltire. "Here's
+a pretty kettle of fish! Maria must be mad!"
+
+He went back into the library. Lord Hainault was there. "Hainault," said
+he, quietly, "who is that young gentleman, walking with Mary Corby in
+the garden?"
+
+"Oh! her cousin. I have not had time to tell you about it." Which he
+did.
+
+"And what sort of fellow is he?" said Lord Saltire. "A Yahoo, I
+suppose?"
+
+"Not at all. He is a capital fellow--a perfect gentleman. There will be
+a match, I believe, unless you put a stop to it. You know best. We will
+talk it over. It seems to me to offer a good many advantages. I think it
+will come off in time. It is best for the poor little thing to forget
+poor Ravenshoe, if she can."
+
+"Yes, it will be best for her to forget poor Ravenshoe, if she can,"
+repeated Lord Saltire. "I wish her to do so. I must make the young
+fellow's acquaintance. By-the-bye, what time does your post go out?"
+
+"At five."
+
+"Have you no morning post?"
+
+"Yes. We can send to Henley before nine."
+
+"Then I shall not plague myself with writing my letter now. I should
+like to see this young fellow, Hainault."
+
+George Corby was introduced. Lord Saltire seemed to take a great fancy
+to him. He kept near him all the evening, and listened with great
+pleasure to his Australian stories. George Corby was, of course, very
+much flattered by such attention from such a famous man. Possibly he
+might have preferred to be near Mary; but old men, he thought, are
+exacting, and it is the duty of gentlemen to bear with them. So he
+stayed by him with good grace. After a time, Lord Saltire seemed to see
+that he had an intelligent listener. And then the others were astonished
+to hear Lord Saltire do what he but seldom did for them--use his utmost
+powers of conversation; use an art almost forgotten, that of _talking_.
+To this young man, who was clever and well educated, and, like most
+"squatters," perhaps a _trifle_ fond of hearing of great people, Lord
+Saltire opened the storehouse of his memory, of a memory extending over
+seventy years; and in a clear, well modulated voice, gave him his
+recollection of his interviews with great people--conversations with
+Sièyes, Talleyrand, with Madame de Staël, with Robespierre, with
+Egalité, with Alexander, and a dozen others. George was intensely eager
+to hear about Marat. Lord Saltire and his snuff-box had not penetrated
+into the lair of that filthy wolf, but he had heard much of him from
+many friends, and told it well. When the ladies rose to go to bed,
+George Corby was astonished; he had forgotten Mary, had never been near
+her the whole evening, and he had made an engagement to drive Lord
+Saltire the next morning up to Wargrave in a pony-chaise, to look at
+Barrymore House, and the place where the theatre stood, and where the
+game of high jinks had been played so bravely fifty years before. And,
+moreover, he and Lord Saltire were, the day after, to make an excursion
+down the river and see Medmenham, where once Jack Wilkes and the devil
+had held court. Mary would not see much of him at this rate for a day or
+two.
+
+It was a great shame of this veteran to make such a fool of the innocent
+young bushman. There ought to be fair play in love or war. His
+acquaintance, Talleyrand, could not have been more crafty. I am so angry
+with him that I will give the letter he wrote that night _in extenso_,
+and show the world what a wicked old man he was. When he went to his
+room, he said to Simpson, "I have got to write a letter before I go to
+bed. I want it to go to the post at Henley before nine. I don't want it
+to lie in the letter-box in the hall. I don't want them to see the
+direction. What an appetite you would have for your breakfast, Simpson,
+if you were to walk to Henley." And Simpson said, "Very good, my lord."
+And Lord Saltire wrote as follows:--
+
+      "MY DEAR LAD,--I have been travelling to my places, looking
+      for a place to die in. They are all cold and draughty, and
+      won't do. I have come back to Casterton. I must stay here
+      at present on your account, and I am in mortal fear of
+      dying here. Nothing, remember, can be more unmannerly or
+      rude than falling ill, and dying, in another man's house. I
+      know that I should resent such a proceeding myself as a
+      deliberate affront, and I therefore would not do it for the
+      world.
+
+      "You must come here to me _instantly_; do you hear? I am
+      keeping the breach for you at all sacrifices. Until you
+      come, I am to be trundled about this foggy valley in pony
+      carriages through the day, and talk myself hoarse all the
+      evening, all for your sake. A cousin of Mary Corby's has
+      come from Australia. He is very handsome, clever, and
+      gentlemanly, and I am afraid she is getting very fond of
+      him.
+
+      "This must not be, my dear boy. Now our dear Charles is
+      gone, you must, if possible, marry her. It is insufferable
+      that we should have another disappointment from an
+      interloper. I don't blame you for not having come before.
+      You were quite right, but don't lose a moment now. Leave
+      those boys of yours. The dirty little rogues must get on
+      for a time without you. Don't think that I sneer at the
+      noble work that you and your uncle are doing; God Almighty
+      forbid; but you must leave it for a time, and come here.
+
+      "Don't argue or procrastinate, but come. I cannot go on
+      being driven all over the country in November to keep him
+      out of the way. Besides, if you don't come soon, I shall
+      have finished all my true stories, and have to do what I
+      have never done yet--to lie. So make haste, my dear boy.
+
+               "Yours affectionately,
+
+                     "SALTIRE."
+
+On the second day from this Lord Saltire was driven to Medmenham by
+George Corby, and prophesied to him about it. When they neared home,
+Lord Saltire grew distraught for the first time, and looked eagerly
+towards the terrace. As they drove up, John Marston ran down the steps
+to meet them. Lord Saltire said, "Thank God!" and walked up to the
+hall-door between the two young men.
+
+"Are you staying in London?" said George Corby.
+
+"Yes. I am living in London," said John Marston. "An uncle of mine, a
+Moravian Missionary from Australia, is working at a large ragged school
+in the Borough, and I am helping him."
+
+"You don't surely mean James Smith?" said Corby.
+
+"Indeed I do."
+
+"Your uncle? Well, that is very strange. I know him very well. My father
+fought his battle for him when he was at variance with the squatters
+about.... He is one of the best fellows in the world. I am delighted to
+make your acquaintance."
+
+Lord Saltire said to Lord Hainault, when they were alone together--"You
+see what a liberty I have taken, having my private secretary down in
+this unceremonious way. Do ask him to stay."
+
+"You know how welcome he is for his own sake. Do you think you are
+right?"
+
+"I think so."
+
+"I am afraid you are a little too late," said Lord Hainault.
+
+Alas! poor Charles.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVI.
+
+SCUTARI.
+
+
+Alas! poor Charles. While they were all dividing the spoil at home,
+thinking him dead, where was he?
+
+At Scutari. What happened to him before he got there, no one knows or
+ever will know. He does not remember, and there is no one else to tell.
+He was passed from hand to hand and put on board ship. Here fever set
+in, and he passed from a state of stupid agony into a state of delirium.
+He may have lain on the pier in the pouring rain, moistening his parched
+lips in the chilling shower; he may have been jolted from hospital to
+hospital, and laid in draughty passages, till a bed was found for him;
+as others were. But he happily knew nothing of it. Things were so bad
+with him now that it did not much matter how he was treated. Read Lord
+Sidney Osborne's "Scutari and its Hospitals," and see how he _might_
+have been, and probably was. It is no part of our duty to dig up and
+exhibit all that miserable mismanagement. I think we have learnt our
+lesson. I think I will go bail it don't happen again. Before Charles
+knew where he was, there was a great change for the better. The hospital
+nurses arrived early in November.
+
+He thinks that there were faint gleams of consciousness in his delirium.
+In the first, he says he was lying on his back, and above him were the
+masts and spars of a ship, and a sailor-boy was sitting out on a yard
+in the clear blue, mending a rope or doing something. It may have been a
+dream or not. Afterwards there were periods, distinctly remembered, when
+he seemed conscious--conscious of pain and space, and time--to a certain
+extent. At these times he began to understand, in a way, that he was
+dead, and in hell. The delirium was better than this at ordinary times,
+in spite of its headlong incongruities. It was not so unbearable, save
+at times, when there came the feeling, too horrible for human brain to
+bear, of being millions and millions of miles, or of centuries, away,
+with no road back; at such times there was nothing to be done but to
+leap out of bed, and cry aloud for help in God's name.
+
+Then there came a time when he began, at intervals, to see a great
+vaulted arch overhead, and to wonder whether or no it was the roof of
+the pit. He began, after studying the matter many times, to find that
+pain had ceased, and that the great vaulted arch was real. And he heard
+low voices once at this time--blessed voices of his fellow-men. He was
+content to wait.
+
+At last, his soul and consciousness seemed to return to him in a strange
+way. He seemed to pass out of some abnormal state into a natural one.
+For he became aware that he was alive; nay, more, that he was asleep,
+and dreaming a silly, pleasant dream, and that he could wake himself at
+any time. He awoke, expecting to awake in his old room at Ravenshoe. But
+he was not there, and looked round him in wonder.
+
+The arch he remembered was overhead. That was real enough. Three people
+were round his bed--a doctor in undress, a grey-haired gentleman who
+peered into his face, and a lady.
+
+"God bless me!" said the doctor. "We have fetched him through. Look at
+his eyes, just look at his eyes. As sane an eye as yours or mine, and
+the pulse as round as a button."
+
+"Do you know us, my man?" said the gentleman.
+
+It was possible enough that he did not, for he had never set eyes on him
+before. The gentleman meant only, "Are you sane enough to know your
+fellow-creatures when you see one?" Charles thought he must be some one
+he had met in society in old times and ought to recognise. He framed a
+polite reply, to the effect that he hoped he had been well since he met
+him last, and that, if he found himself in the west, he would not pass
+Ravenshoe without coming to see him.
+
+The doctor laughed. "A little abroad, still, I daresay; I have pulled
+you through. You have had a narrow escape."
+
+Charles was recovered enough to take his hand and thank him fervently,
+and whispered, "Would you tell me one thing, sir? How did Lady Hainault
+come here?"
+
+"Lady Hainault, my man?"
+
+"Yes; she was standing at the foot of the bed."
+
+"That is no Lady Hainault, my man; that is Miss Nightingale. Do you ever
+say your prayers?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Say them to-night before you go to sleep, and remember her name in
+them. Possibly they may get to heaven the quicker for it. Good-night."
+
+Prayers forgotten, eh! How much of all this misery lay in that, I
+wonder? How much of this dull, stupid, careless despair--earth a
+hopeless, sunless wilderness, and heaven not thought of? Read on.
+
+But, while you read, remember that poor Charles had had no domestic
+religious education whatever. The vicar had taught him his catechism and
+"his prayers." After that, Shrewsbury and Oxford. Read on, but don't
+condemn; at least not yet.
+
+That he thanked God with all the earnestness of his warm heart that
+night, and remembered that name the doctor told him, you may be sure.
+But, when the prayer was finished, he began to think whether or no it
+was sincere, whether it would not be better that he should die, and that
+it should be all over and done. His creed was, that, if he died in the
+faith of Christ, bearing no ill will to any one, having repented of his
+sins, it would not go ill with him. Would it not be better to die now
+that he could fulfil those conditions, and not tempt the horrible black
+future? Certainly.
+
+In time he left watching the great arch overhead, and the creeping
+shadows, and the patch of light on the wall, which shaped itself into a
+faint rhomboid at noon, and crept on till it defined itself into a
+perfect square at sundown, and then grew golden and died out. He began
+to notice other things. But till the last there was one effect of light
+and shadow which he always lay awake to see--a faint flickering on the
+walls and roof, which came slowly nearer, till a light was in his eyes.
+We all know what that was. It has been described twenty times. I can
+believe that story of the dying man kissing the shadow on the wall. When
+Miss Nightingale and her lamp are forgotten, it will be time to consider
+whether one would prefer to turn Turk or Mormon.
+
+He began to take notice that there were men in the beds beside him. One,
+as we know, had been carried out dead; but there was another in his
+place now. And one day there was a great event; when Charles woke, both
+of them were up, sitting at the side of their beds, ghastly shadows, and
+talking across him.
+
+The maddest musician never listened to the "vox humana" stop at Haarlem,
+with such delight as Charles did to these two voices. He lay for a time
+hearing them make acquaintance, and then he tried to sit up and join. He
+was on his left side, and tried to rise. His left arm would not support
+him, and he fell back, but they crept to him and set him up, and sat on
+his bed.
+
+"Right again, eh, comrade?" said one. "I thought you was gone, my lad.
+But I heard the doctor say you'd get through. You look bravely. Time was
+when you used to jump out of bed, and cry on God A'mighty. Many a time
+I've strove to help ye. The man in _his_ bed died while you was like
+that: a Fusilier Guards man. What regiment?"
+
+"I am of the 140th," said Charles. "We had a bit of a brush with the
+enemy on the twenty-fifth. I was wounded there. It was a pretty little
+rattle, I think, for a time, but not of very much importance, I fancy."
+
+The man who had first spoken laughed; the other man, a lad who had a
+round face once, perhaps, but which now was a pale death's head, with
+two great staring eyes, speaking with a voice which Charles knew at once
+to be a gentleman's, said, "Don't you know then that that charge of
+yours is the talk of Europe? That charge will never be forgotten while
+the world is round. Six hundred men against ten battalions. Good God!
+And you might have died there, and not known it."
+
+"Ah, is it so?" said Charles. "If some could only know it!"
+
+"That is the worst of it," said the young man. "I have enlisted under a
+false name, and will never go home any more. Never more. And she will
+never know that I did my duty."
+
+And after a time he got strong again in a way. A bullet, it appears, had
+struck the bone of his arm, and driven the splinters into the flesh.
+Fever had come on, and his splendid constitution, as yet untried, save
+by severe training, had pulled him through. But his left arm was
+useless. The doctor looked at it again and again, and shook his head.
+
+The two men who were in the beds on each side of him were moved before
+him. They were only there a fortnight after his coming to himself. The
+oldest of the two went first, and two or three days after the younger.
+
+The three made all sorts of plans for meeting in England. Alas, what
+chance is there for three soldiers to meet again, unless by accident?
+At home it would have taken three years to have made these three men
+such hearty friends as they had become in a fortnight. Friendships are
+made in the camp, in the bush, or on board ship, at a wonderful rate.
+And, moreover, they last for an indefinite time. For ever, I fancy: for
+these reasons. Time does not destroy friendship. Time has nothing
+whatever to do with it. I have heard an old man of seventy-eight talking
+of a man he had not seen for twelve years, and before that for
+twenty-five, as if they were young men together. Craving for his
+company, as if once more they were together on the deck of the
+white-sailed yacht, flying before the easterly wind between Hurstcastle
+and Sconce Point. Mere continual familiarity, again, does not hurt
+friendship, unless interests clash. Diversity of interests is the
+death-blow of friendship. One great sacrifice may be made--two, or even
+three; but after the first, two men are not to one another as they were
+before. Where men are thrown intimately together for a short time, and
+part have only seen the best side of one another, or where men see one
+another frequently, and have not very many causes of difference,
+friendship will flourish for ever. In the case of love it is very
+different, and for this obvious reason, which I will explain in a few
+pages if----
+
+I entered into my own recognisances, in an early chapter of this story,
+not to preach. I fear they are escheated after this short essay on
+friendship, coming, as it does, exactly in the wrong place. I must only
+throw myself on the court, and purge myself of my contempt by promising
+amendment.
+
+Poor Charles after a time was sent home to Fort Pitt. But that mighty
+left arm, which had done such noble work when it belonged to No. 3 in
+the Oxford University eight, was useless, and Charles Simpson, trooper
+in the 140th, was discharged from the army, and found himself on
+Christmas Eve in the street in front of the Waterloo Station, with
+eighteen shillings and ninepence in his pocket, wondering blindly what
+the end of it all would be, but no more dreaming of begging from those
+who had known him formerly than of leaping off Waterloo Bridge. Perhaps
+not half so much.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVII.
+
+WHAT CHARLES DID WITH HIS LAST EIGHTEEN SHILLINGS.
+
+
+Charles's luck seemed certainly to have deserted him at last. And that
+is rather a serious matter, you see; for, as he had never trusted to
+anything but luck, it now follows that he had nothing left to trust to,
+except eighteen shillings and ninepence and his little friend the
+cornet, who had come home invalided and was living with his mother in
+Hyde Park Gardens. Let us hope, reader, that you and I may never be
+reduced to the patronage of a cornet of Hussars, and eighteen shillings
+in cash.
+
+It was a fine frosty night, and the streets were gay and merry. It was a
+sad Christmas for many thousands; but the general crowd seemed
+determined not to think too deeply of these sad accounts which were
+coming from the Crimea just now. They seemed inclined to make Christmas
+Christmas, in spite of everything; and perhaps they were right. It is
+good for a busy nation like the English to have two great festivals, and
+two only, the object of which every man who is a Christian can
+understand, and on these occasions to put in practice, to the best of
+one's power, the lesson of goodwill towards men which our Lord taught
+us. We English cannot stand too many saints' days. We decline to stop
+business for St. Blaise or St. Swithin; but we can understand Christmas
+and Easter. The foreign Catholics fiddle away so much time on saints'
+days that they are obliged to work like the Israelites in bondage on
+Sunday to get on at all. I have as good a right to prophesy as any other
+freeborn Englishman who pays rates and taxes; and I prophesy that, in
+this wonderful resurrection of Ireland, the attendance of the male
+population at Church on week-days will get small by degrees and
+beautifully less.
+
+One man, Charles Ravenshoe, has got to spend his Christmas with eighteen
+shillings and a crippled left arm. There is half a million of money or
+so, and a sweet little wife, waiting for him if he would only behave
+like a rational being; but he will not, and must take the consequences.
+
+He went westward, through a kind of instinct, and he came to Belgrave
+Square, where a certain duke lived. There were lights in the windows.
+The duke was in office, and had been called up to town. Charles was glad
+of this; not that he had any business to transact with the duke, but a
+letter to deliver to the duke's coachman.
+
+This simple circumstance saved him from being much nearer actual
+destitution than I should have liked to see him. The coachman's son had
+been wounded at Balaclava, and was still at Scutari, and Charles brought
+a letter from him. He got an English welcome, I promise you. And, next
+morning, going to Hyde Park Gardens, he found that his friend the cornet
+was out of town, and would not be back for a week. At this time the
+coachman became very useful. He offered him money, house-room,
+employment, everything he could possibly get for him; and Charles
+heartily and thankfully accepted house-room and board for a week.
+
+At the end of a week he went back to Hyde Park Gardens. The cornet was
+come back. He had to sit in the kitchen while his message was taken
+upstairs. He merely sent up his name, said he was discharged, and asked
+for an interview.
+
+The servants found out that he had been at the war, in their young
+master's regiment, and they crowded round him, full of sympathy and
+kindness. He was telling them how he had last seen the cornet in the
+thick of it on the terrible 25th, when they parted right and left, and
+in dashed the cornet himself, who caught him by both hands.
+
+"By gad, I'm so glad to see you. How you are altered without your
+moustache! Look you here, you fellows and girls, this is the man that
+charged up to my assistance when I was dismounted among the guns, and
+kept by me, while I caught another horse. What a cropper I went down,
+didn't I? What a terrible brush it was, eh? And poor Hornby, too! It is
+the talk of Europe, you know. You remember old Devna, and the galloping
+lizard, eh?"
+
+And so on, till they got upstairs; and then he turned on him, and said,
+"Now, what are you going to do?"
+
+"I have got eighteen shillings."
+
+"Will your family do nothing for you?"
+
+"Did Hornby tell you anything about me, my dear sir?" said Charles,
+eagerly.
+
+"Not a word. I never knew that Hornby and you were acquainted, till I
+saw you together when he was dying."
+
+"Did you hear what we said to one another?"
+
+"Not a word. The reason I spoke about your family is, that no one, who
+had seen so much of you as I, could doubt that you were a gentleman.
+That is all. I am very much afraid I shall offend you----"
+
+"That would not be easy, sir."
+
+"Well, then, here goes. If you are utterly hard up, take service with
+me. There."
+
+"I will do so with the deepest gratitude," said Charles. "But I cannot
+ride, I fear. My left arm is gone."
+
+"Pish! ride with your right. It's a bargain. Come up and see my mother.
+I must show you to her, you know, because you will have to live here.
+She is deaf. Now you know the reason why the major used to talk so
+loud."
+
+Charles smiled for an instant; he did remember that circumstance about
+the cornet's respected and gallant father. He followed the cornet
+upstairs, and was shown into the drawing-room, where sat a very handsome
+lady, about fifty years of age, knitting.
+
+She was not only stone deaf, but had a trick of talking aloud, like the
+old lady in "Pickwick," under the impression that she was only thinking,
+which was a very disconcerting habit indeed. When Charles and the cornet
+entered the room, she said aloud, with amazing distinctness, looking
+hard at Charles, "God bless me! Who has he got now? What a fine
+gentlemanly-looking fellow. I wonder why he is dressed so shabbily."
+After which she arranged her trumpet, and prepared to go into action.
+
+"This, mother," bawled the cornet, "is the man who saved me in the
+charge of Balaclava."
+
+"Do you mean that that is trooper Simpson?" said she.
+
+"Yes, mother."
+
+"Then may the blessing of God Almighty rest upon your head!" she said to
+Charles. "That time will come, trooper Simpson, when you will know the
+value of a mother's gratitude. And when that time comes think of me. But
+for you, trooper Simpson, I might have been tearing my grey hair this
+day. What are we to do for him, James? He looks ill and worn. Words are
+not worth much. What shall we do?"
+
+The cornet put his mouth to his mother's trumpet, and in an apologetic
+bellow, such as one gets from the skipper of a fruit brig, in the Bay of
+Biscay, O! when he bears up to know if you will be so kind as to oblige
+him with the longitude; roared out:
+
+"He wants to take service with me. Have you any objection?"
+
+"Of course not, you foolish boy," said she. "I wish we could do more for
+him than that." And then she continued, in a tone slightly lowered, but
+perfectly audible, evidently under the impression that she was thinking
+to herself: "He is ugly, but he has a sweet face. I feel certain he is a
+gentleman who has had a difference with his family. I wish I could hear
+his voice. God bless him! he looks like a valiant soldier. I hope he
+won't get drunk, or make love to the maids."
+
+Charles had heard every word of this before he had time to bow himself
+out.
+
+And so he accepted his new position with dull carelessness. Life was
+getting very worthless.
+
+He walked across the park to see his friend the coachman. The frost had
+given, and there was a dull dripping thaw. He leant against the railings
+at the end of the Serpentine. There was still a great crowd all round
+the water; but up the whole expanse there were only four skaters, for
+the ice was very dangerous and rotten, and the people had been warned
+off. One of the skaters came sweeping down to within a hundred yards of
+where he was--a reckless, headlong skater, one who would chance drowning
+to have his will. The ice cracked every moment and warned him, but he
+would not heed, till it broke, and down he went; clutching wildly at the
+pitiless, uptilted slabs which clanked about his head, to save himself;
+and then with a wild cry disappeared. The icemen were on the spot in a
+minute; and, when five were past, they had him out, and bore him off to
+the receiving-house. A gentleman, a doctor apparently, who stood by
+Charles, said to him, "Well, there is a reckless fool gone to his
+account, God forgive him!"
+
+"They will bring him round, won't they?" said Charles.
+
+"Ten to one against it," said the doctor. "What right has he to
+calculate on such a thing, either? Why, most likely there will be half a
+dozen houses in mourning for that man to-morrow. He is evidently a man
+of some mark. I can pity his relations in their bereavement, sir, but I
+have precious little pity for a reckless fool."
+
+And so Charles began to serve his friend the cornet, in a way--a very
+poor way, I fear, for he was very weak and ill, and could do but little.
+The deaf lady treated him like a son, God bless her! but Charles could
+not recover the shock of his fever and delirium in the Crimea. He grew
+very low-spirited and despondent by day, and worst of all, he began to
+have sleepless nights--terrible nights. In the rough calculation he had
+made of being able to live through his degradation, and get used to it,
+he had calculated, unwittingly, on perfect health. He had thought that
+in a few years he should forget the old life, and become just like one
+of the grooms he had made his companions. This had now become
+impossible, for his health and his nerve were gone.
+
+He began to get afraid of his horses; that was the first symptom. He
+tried to fight against the conviction, but it forced itself upon him.
+When he was on horseback, he found that he was frightened when anything
+went wrong; his knees gave way on emergency, and his hand was
+irresolute. And, what is more, be sure of this, that, before he
+confessed the fact to himself, the horses had found it out, and "taken
+action on it," or else may I ride a donkey, with my face towards the
+tail, for the rest of my life.
+
+And he began to see another thing. Now, when he was nervous, in ill
+health, and whimsical, the company of men among whom he was thrown as
+fellow-servants became nearly unbearable. Little trifling acts of
+coarseness, unnoticed when he was in good health and strong, at the time
+he was with poor Hornby, now disgusted him. Most kind-hearted young
+fellows, brought up as he had been, are apt to be familiar with, and
+probably pet and spoil, the man whose duty it is to minister to their
+favourite pleasures, be he gamekeeper, or groom, or cricketer, or
+waterman. Nothing can be more natural, or, in proper bounds, harmless.
+Charles had thought that, being used to these men, he could live with
+them, and do as they did. For a month or two, while in rude coarse
+health, he found it was possible; for had not Lord Welter and he done
+the same thing for amusement? But now, with shattered nerves, he found
+it intolerable. I have had great opportunities of seeing gentlemen
+trying to do this sort of thing--I mean in Australia--and, as far as my
+experience goes, it ends in one of two ways. Either they give it up as a
+bad job, and assume the position that superior education gives them, or
+else they take to drink, and go, not to mince matters, to the devil.
+
+What Charles did, we shall see. Nobody could be more kind and
+affectionate than the cornet and his deaf mother. They guessed that he
+was "somebody," and that things were wrong with him; though, if he had
+been a chimney-sweep's son, it would have made no difference to them,
+for they were "good people." The cornet once or twice invited his
+confidence; but he was too young, and Charles had not the energy to tell
+him anything. His mother, too, asked him to tell her if anything was
+wrong in his affairs, and whether she could help him; and possibly he
+might have been more inclined to confide in her, than in her son. But
+who could bellow such a sad tale of misery through an ear-trumpet? He
+held his peace.
+
+He kept Ellen's picture, which he had taken from Hornby. He determined
+he would not go and seek her. She was safe somewhere, in some Catholic
+asylum. Why should he re-open her grief?
+
+But life was getting very, very weary business. By day, his old
+favourite pleasure of riding had become a terror, and at night he got no
+rest. Death forty good years away, by all calculation. A weary time.
+
+He thought himself humbled, but he was not. He said to himself that he
+was prevented from going back, because he had found out that Mary was in
+love with him, and also because he was disgraced through his sister; and
+both of these reasons were, truly, most powerful with him. But, in
+addition to this, I fear there was a great deal of obstinate pride,
+which thing is harder to beat out of a man than most things.
+
+And, now, after all this half-moralising narrative, an important fact or
+two. The duke was very busy, and stayed in town, and, as a consequence,
+the duke's coachman. Moreover, the duke's coachman's son came home
+invalided, and stayed with his father; and Charles, with the hearty
+approval of the cornet, used to walk across the park every night to see
+him, and talk over the campaign, and then look in at the Servants' Club,
+of which he was still a member. And the door of the Servants' Club room
+had glass windows to it. And I have noticed that anybody who looks
+through a glass window (under favourable circumstances) can see who is
+on the other side. I have done it myself more than once.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVIII.
+
+THE NORTH SIDE OF GROSVENOR SQUARE.
+
+
+John Marston's first disappointment in life had been his refusal by
+Mary. He was one of those men, brought up in a hard school, who get,
+somehow, the opinion that everything which happens to a man is his own
+fault. He used to say that every man who could play whist could get a
+second if he chose. I have an idea that he is in some sort right. But he
+used to carry this sort of thing to a rather absurd extent. He was apt
+to be hard on men who failed, and to be always the first to say, "If he
+had done this, or left that alone, it would not have been so," and he
+himself, with a calm clear brain and perfect health, had succeeded in
+everything he had ever tried at, even up to a double first. At one point
+he was stopped. He had always given himself airs of superiority over
+Charles, and had given him advice, good as it was, in a way which would
+have ruined his influence with nine men out of ten; and suddenly he was
+brought up. At the most important point in life, he found Charles his
+superior. Charles had won a woman's love without knowing it, or caring
+for it; and he had tried for it, and failed.
+
+John Marston was an eminently noble and high-minded man. His faults were
+only those of education, and his faults were very few. When he found
+himself rejected, and found out why it was so--when he found that he was
+no rival of Charles, and that Charles cared naught for poor Mary--he
+humbly set his quick brain to work to find out in what way Charles, so
+greatly his inferior in intellect, was superior to him in the most
+important of all things. For he saw that Charles had not only won Mary's
+love, but the love of every one who knew him; whereas he, John Marston,
+had but very few friends.
+
+And, when he once set to work at this task, he seemed to come rapidly to
+the conclusion that Charles was superior to him in everything except
+application. "And how much application should I have had," he concluded,
+"if I had not been a needy man?"
+
+So you see that his disappointment cured him of what was almost his only
+vice--conceit. Everything works together for good, for those who are
+really good.
+
+Hitherto, John Marston has led only the life that so many young
+Englishmen lead--a life of study, combined with violent, objectless,
+physical exertion as a counterpoise. He had never known what enthusiasm
+was, as yet. There was a vast deal of it somewhere about him; in his
+elbows or his toes, or the calves of his legs, or somewhere, as events
+prove. If I might hazard an opinion, I should say that it was stowed
+away somewhere in that immensely high, but somewhat narrow, forehead of
+his. Before he tried love-making, he might have written the calmest and
+most exasperating article in the _Saturday Review_. But, shortly after
+that, the tinder got a-fire; and the man who set it on fire was his
+uncle Smith, the Moravian missionary.
+
+For this fellow, Smith, had, as we know, come home from Australia with
+the dying words of his beautiful wife ringing in his ears: "Go home from
+here, my love, into the great towns, and see what is to be done there."
+And he had found his nephew, John Marston. And, while Marston listened
+to his strange, wild conversation, a light broke in upon him. And what
+had been to him merely words before this, now became glorious,
+tremendous realities.
+
+And so those two had gone hand in hand down into the dirt and profligacy
+of Southwark, to do together a work the reward of which comes after
+death. There are thousands of men at such work now. We have no more to
+do with it than to record the fact, that these two were at it heart and
+hand.
+
+John Marston's love for Mary had never waned for one instant. When he
+had found that, or thought he had found that, she loved Charles, he had,
+in a quiet, dignified way, retired from the contest. He had determined
+that he would go away, and work at ragged schools, and so on, and try to
+forget all about her. He had begun to fancy that his love was growing
+cool, when Lord Saltire's letter reached him, and set it all a-blaze
+again.
+
+This was unendurable--that a savage from the southern wilds should step
+in like this, without notice. He posted off to Casterton.
+
+Mary was very glad to see him; but he had proposed to her once, and,
+therefore, how could she be so familiar with him as of yore?
+Notwithstanding this, John was not so very much disappointed at his
+reception; he had thought that matters were even worse than they were.
+
+After dinner, in the drawing-room, he watched them together. George
+Corby was evidently in love. He went to Mary, who was sitting alone, the
+moment they came from the dining-room. Mary looked up, and caught his
+eyes as he approached; but her eyes wandered from him to the door, until
+they settled on John himself. She seemed to wish that he would come and
+talk to her. He had a special reason for not doing so: he wanted to
+watch her and George together. So he stayed behind, and talked to Lord
+Hainault.
+
+Lord Saltire moved up beside Lady Ascot. Lady Hainault had the three
+children--Archy in her lap, and Gus and Flora beside her. In her high
+and mighty way she was amusing them, or rather trying to do so. Lady
+Hainault was one of the best and noblest women in the world, as you have
+seen already; but she was not an amusing person. And no one knew it
+better than herself. Her intentions were excellent: she wanted to leave
+Mary free from the children until their bed-time, so that she might talk
+to her old acquaintance, John Marston; for, at the children's bed-time,
+Mary would have to go with them. Even Lady Hainault, determined as she
+was, never dared to contemplate putting those children to bed without
+Mary's assistance. She was trying to tell them a story out of her own
+head, but was making a dreadful mess of it; and she was quite conscious
+that Gus and Flora were listening to her with contemptuous pity.
+
+So they were disposed. Lord Saltire and Lady Ascot were comfortably out
+of hearing. We had better attend to them first, and come round to the
+others afterwards.
+
+Lady Ascot began. "James," she said, "it is perfectly evident to me that
+you sent for John Marston."
+
+"Well, and suppose I did?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"Well, then, why did you do so?"
+
+"Maria," said Lord Saltire, "do you know that sometimes you are
+intolerably foolish? Cannot you answer that question for yourself?"
+
+"Of course I can," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Then why the deuce did you ask me?"
+
+That was a hard question to answer, but Lady Ascot said:
+
+"I doubt if you are wise, James. I believe it would be better that she
+should go to Australia. It is a very good match for her."
+
+"It is not a good match for her," said Lord Saltire, testily. "To begin
+with, first-cousin marriages are an invention of the devil. Third and
+lastly, she sha'n't go to that infernal hole. Sixthly, I want her, now
+our Charles is dead, to marry John Marston; and, in conclusion, I mean
+to have my own way."
+
+"Do you know," said Lady Ascot, "that he proposed to her before, and was
+rejected?"
+
+"He told me of it the same night," said Lord Saltire. "Now, don't talk
+any more nonsense, but tell me this: Is she bitten with that young
+fellow?"
+
+"Not deeply, as yet, I think," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Which of them has the best chance?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"James," said Lady Ascot, repeating his own words, "do you know that
+sometimes you are intolerably foolish? How can I tell?"
+
+"Which would you bet on, Miss Headstall?" asked Lord Saltire.
+
+"Well, well!" said Lady Ascot, "I suppose I should bet on John Marston."
+
+"And how long are you going to give Sebastopol, Lord Hainault?" said
+John Marston.
+
+"What do you think about the Greek Kalends, my dear Marston?" said Lord
+Hainault.
+
+"Why, no. I suppose we shall get it at last. It won't do to have it said
+that England and France----"
+
+"Say France and England just now," said Lord Hainault.
+
+"No, I will not. It must not be said that England and France could not
+take a Black Sea fortress."
+
+"We shall have to say it, I fear," said Lord Hainault. "I am not quite
+sure that we English don't want a thrashing."
+
+"I am sure we do," said Marston, "But we shall never get one. That is
+the worst of it."
+
+"My dear Marston," said Lord Hainault, "you have a clear head. Will you
+tell me this: Do you believe that Charles Ravenshoe is dead?"
+
+"God bless me, Lord Hainault, have you any doubts?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"So have I," said Marston, turning eagerly towards him. "I thought you
+had all made up your minds. If there is any doubt, ought we not to
+mention it to Lord Saltire?"
+
+"I think that he has doubts himself. I may tell you that he has secured
+to him, in case of his return, eighty thousand pounds."
+
+"He would have made him his heir, I suppose," said John Marston; "would
+he not?"
+
+"Yes: I think I am justified in saying Yes."
+
+"And so all the estates go to Lord Ascot, in any case?"
+
+"Unless in case of Charles's re-appearance before his death; in which
+case I believe he will alter his will."
+
+"Then if Charles be alive, he had better keep out of Lord Ascot's way on
+dark nights, in narrow lanes," said John Marston.
+
+"You are mistaken there," said Lord Hainault, thoughtfully. "Ascot is a
+bad fellow. I told him so once in public, at the risk of getting an
+awful thrashing. If it had not been for Mainwaring I should have had
+sore bones for a twelvemonth. But--but--well, I was at Eton with Ascot,
+and Ascot was and is a great blackguard. But, do you know, he is to some
+a very affectionate fellow. You know he was adored at Eton."
+
+"He was not liked at Oxford," said Marston. "I never knew any good of
+him. He is a great rascal."
+
+"Yes," said Lord Hainault, "I suppose he is what you would call a great
+rascal. Yes; I told him so, you know. And I am not a fighting man, and
+that proves that I was strongly convinced of the fact, or I should have
+shirked my duty. A man in my position don't like to go down to the House
+of Lords with a black eye. But I doubt if he is capable of any deep
+villainy yet. If you were to say to me that Charles would be unwise to
+allow Ascot's wife to make his gruel for him, I should say that I agreed
+with you."
+
+"There you are certainly right, my lord," said John Marston, smiling.
+"But I never knew Lord Ascot spare either man or woman."
+
+"That is very true," said Lord Hainault. "Do you notice that we have
+been speaking as if Charles Ravenshoe were not dead?"
+
+"I don't believe he is," said John Marston.
+
+"Nor I, do you know," said Lord Hainault; "at least only half. What a
+pair of ninnies we are! Only ninety men of the 140th came out of that
+Balaclava charge. If he escaped the cholera, the chances are in favour
+of his having been killed there."
+
+"What evidence have we that he enlisted in that regiment at all?"
+
+"Lady Hainault's and Mary's description of his uniform, which they never
+distinctly saw for one moment," said Hainault. "_Violà tout._"
+
+"And you would not speak to Lord Saltire?"
+
+"Why, no. He sees all that we see. If he comes back, he gets eighty
+thousand pounds. It would not do either for you or me to press him to
+alter his will. Do you see?"
+
+"I suppose you are right, Lord Hainault. Things cannot go very wrong
+either way. I hope Mary will not fall in love with that cousin of hers,"
+he added, with a laugh.
+
+"Are you wise in persevering, do you think?" said Lord Hainault, kindly.
+
+"I will tell you in a couple of days," said John Marston. "Is there any
+chance of seeing that best of fellows, William Ravenshoe, here?"
+
+"He may come tumbling up. He has put off his wedding, in consequence of
+the death of his half-brother. I wonder if he was humbugged at Varna?"
+
+"Nothing more likely," said Marston. "Where is Lord Welter?"
+
+"In Paris--plucking geese."
+
+Just about this time, all the various groups in the drawing-room
+seemed to come to the conclusion that the time had arrived for
+new combinations, to avoid remarks. So there was a regular
+pass-in-the-corner business. John Marston went over to Mary; George
+Corby came to Lord Hainault; Lord Saltire went to Lady Hainault, who had
+Archy asleep in her lap; and Gus and Flora went to Lady Ascot.
+
+"At last, old friend," said Mary to John Marston. "And I have been
+watching for you so long. I was afraid that the time would come for the
+children to go to bed, and that you would never come and speak to me."
+
+"Lord Hainault and I were talking politics," said Marston. "That is why
+I did not come."
+
+"Men must talk politics, I suppose," said Mary. "But I wish you had come
+while my cousin was here. He is so charming. You will like him."
+
+"He seems to be a capital fellow," said Marston.
+
+"Indeed he is," said Mary. "He is really the most lovable creature I
+have met for a long time. If you would take him up, and be kind to him,
+and show him life, from the side from which _you_ see it, you would be
+doing a good work; and you would be obliging _me_. And I know, my dear
+friend, that you like to oblige me."
+
+"Miss Corby, you know that I would die for you."
+
+"I know it. Who better? It puzzles me to know what I have done to earn
+such kindness from you. But there it is. You will be kind to him."
+
+Marston was partly pleased and partly disappointed by this conversation.
+Would you like to guess why? Yes. Then I will leave you to do so, and
+save myself half a page of writing.
+
+Only saying this, for the benefit of inexperienced novel-readers, that
+he was glad to hear her talk in that free and easy manner about her
+cousin; but would have been glad if she had not talked in that free and
+easy manner to himself. Nevertheless, there was evidently no harm done
+as yet. That was a great cause of congratulation; there was time yet.
+
+Gus and Flora went over to Lady Ascot. Lady Ascot said, "My dears, is it
+not near bed-time?" just by way of opening the conversation--nothing
+more.
+
+"Lawks a mercy on me, no," said Flora. "Go along with you, do, you
+foolish thing."
+
+"My dear! my dear!" said Lady Ascot.
+
+"She is imitating old Alwright," explained Gus. "She told me she was
+going to. Lord Saltire says, 'Maria! Maria! Maria!--you are intolerably
+foolish, Maria!'"
+
+"Don't be naughty, Gus," said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Well, so he did, for I heard him. Don't mind us; we don't mean any
+harm. I say, Lady Ascot, has she any right to bite and scratch?"
+
+"Who?" said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Why, that Flora. She bit Alwright because she wouldn't lend her Mrs.
+Moko."
+
+"Oh, you dreadful fib!" said Flora. "Oh, you wicked boy! you know where
+you'll go to if you tell such stories. Lady Ascot, I didn't bite her; I
+only said she ought to be bit. She told me that she couldn't let me have
+Mrs. Moko, because she was trying caps on her. And then she told nurse
+that I should never have her again, because I squeezed her flat. And so
+she told a story. And it was not I who squeezed her flat, but that boy,
+who is worse than Ananias and Sapphira. And I made a bogey of her in the
+nursery door, with a broom and a counterpane, just as he was coming in.
+And he shut the door on her head, and squeezed a piece of paint off her
+nose as big as half-a-crown."
+
+Lady Ascot was relieved by being informed that the Mrs. Moko aforesaid
+was only a pasteboard image, the size of life, used by the lady's maid
+for fitting caps.
+
+There were many evenings like this; a week or so was passed without any
+change. At last there was a move towards London.
+
+The first who took flight was George Corby. He was getting dissatisfied,
+in his sleepy semi-tropical way, with the state of affairs. It was
+evident that, since John Marston's arrival, he had been playing, with
+regard to Mary, second fiddle (if you can possibly be induced to pardon
+the extreme coarseness of the expression). One day, Lord Saltire asked
+him to take him for a drive. They went over to dismantled Ranford, and
+Lord Saltire was more amusing than ever. As they drove up through the
+dense larch plantation, on the outskirt of the park, they saw Marston
+and Mary side by side. George Corby bit his lip.
+
+"I suppose there is something there, my lord?" said he.
+
+"Oh dear, yes; I hope so," said Lord Saltire. "Oh, yes, that is a very
+old affair."
+
+So George Corby went first. He did not give up all hopes of being
+successful, but he did not like the way things were going. His English
+expedition was not quite so pleasant as he intended it to be. He, poor
+fellow, was desperately in love, and his suit did not seem likely to
+prosper. He was inclined to be angry with Lord Saltire. "He should not
+have let things go so far," thought George, "without letting him know;"
+quite forgetting that the mischief was done before Lord Saltire's
+arrival.
+
+Lord Saltire and John Marston moved next. Lord Saltire had thought it
+best to take his man Simpson's advice, and move into his house in Curzon
+Street. He had asked John to come with him.
+
+"It is a very nice little house," he said; "deuced well aired, and that
+sort of thing; but I know I shall have a creeping in my back when I go
+back for the first week, and fancy there is a draught. This will make me
+peevish. I don't like to be peevish to my servants, because it is
+unfair; they can't answer one. I wish you would come and let me be
+peevish to you. You may just as well. It will do you good. You have got
+a fancy for disciplining yourself, and all that sort of thing; and you
+will find me capital practice for a week or so in a fresh house. After
+that I shall get amiable, and then you may go. You may have the use of
+my carriage, to go and attend to your poor man's plaster business in
+Southwark, if you like. I am not nervous about fever or vermin. Besides,
+it may amuse me to hear all about it. And you can bring that cracked
+uncle of yours to see me sometimes; his Scriptural talk is very
+piquant."
+
+Lord and Lady Hainault moved up into Grosvenor Square too, for
+Parliament was going to meet rather early. They persuaded Lady Ascot to
+come and stay with them.
+
+After a few days, William made his appearance. "Well, my dear
+Ravenshoe," said Lord Hainault, "and what brings you to town?"
+
+"I don't know," said William. "I cannot stay down there. Lord Hainault,
+do you know I think I am going cracked?"
+
+"Why, my dear fellow, what do you mean?"
+
+"I have got such a strange fancy in my head, I cannot rest."
+
+"What is your fancy?" said Lord Hainault. "Stay; may I make a guess at
+it?"
+
+"You would never dream what it is. It is too mad."
+
+"I will guess," said Lord Hainault. "Your fancy is this:--You believe
+that Charles Ravenshoe is alive, and you have come up to London to take
+your chance of finding him in the streets."
+
+"But, good God!" said William, "how have you found this out? I have
+never told it even to my own sweetheart."
+
+"Because," said Lord Hainault, laying his hand on his shoulder, "I and
+John Marston have exactly the same fancy. That is why."
+
+And Charles so close to them all the time. Creeping every day across the
+park to see the coachman and his son. Every day getting more hopeless.
+All energy gone. Wit enough left to see that he was living on the
+charity of the cornet. There were some splinters in his arm which would
+not come away, and kept him restless. He never slept now. He hesitated
+when he was spoken to. Any sudden noise made him start and look wild. I
+will not go on with the symptoms. Things were much worse with him than
+we have ever seen them before. He, poor lad, began to wonder whether it
+would come to him to die in a hospital or----
+
+Those cursed bridges! Why did they build such things? Who built them?
+The devil. To tempt ruined, desperate men, with ten thousand fiends
+gnawing and sawing in their deltoid muscles, night and day. Suppose he
+had to cross one of these by night, would he ever get to the other side?
+Or would angels from heaven come down and hold him back?
+
+The cornet and his mother had a conversation about him. Bawled the
+cornet into the ear-trumpet:
+
+"My fellow Simpson is very bad, mother. He is getting low and nervous,
+and I don't like the looks of him."
+
+"I remarked it myself," said the lady. "We had better have Bright. It
+would be cheaper to pay five guineas, and get a good opinion at once."
+
+"I expect he wants a surgeon more than a doctor," said the cornet.
+
+"Well, that is the doctor's business," said the old lady. "Drop a line
+to Bright, and see what he says. It would be a burning shame, my
+dear--enough to bring down the wrath of God upon us--if we were to let
+him want for anything, as long as we have money. And we have plenty of
+money. More than we want. And if it annoys him to go near the horses, we
+must pension him. But I would rather let him believe that he was earning
+his wages, because it might be a weight on his mind if he did not. See
+to it the first thing in the morning. Remember Balaclava, James!
+Remember Balaclava! If you forget Balaclava, and what trooper Simpson
+did for you there, you are tempting God to forget you."
+
+"I hope He may when I do, mother," shouted the cornet. "I remember
+Balaclava--ay, and Devna before."
+
+There are such people as these in the world, reader. I know some of
+them. I know a great many of them. So many of them, in fact, that this
+conclusion has been forced upon me--that the world is _not_ entirely
+peopled by rogues and fools; nay, more, that the rogues and fools form a
+contemptible minority. I may become unpopular, I may be sneered at by
+men who think themselves wiser for coming to such a conclusion; but I
+will not retract what I have said. The good people in the world
+outnumber the bad, ten to one, and the ticket for this sort of belief is
+"Optimist."
+
+This conversation between the cornet and his mother took place at
+half-past two. At that time Charles had crept across the park to the
+Mews, near Belgrave Square, to see his friend the duke's coachman and
+his son. May I be allowed, without being accused of writing a novel in
+the "confidential style," to tell you that this is the most important
+day in the whole story.
+
+At half-past two, William Ravenshoe called at Lord Hainault's house in
+Grosvenor Square. He saw Lady Ascot. Lady Ascot asked him what sort of
+weather it was out of doors.
+
+William said that there was a thick fog near the river, but that on the
+north side of the square it was pleasant. So Lady Ascot said she would
+like a walk, if it were only for ten minutes, if he would give her his
+arm; and out they went.
+
+Mary and the children came out too, but they went into the square. Lady
+Ascot and William walked slowly up and down the pavement alone, for Lady
+Ascot liked to see the people.
+
+Up and down the north side, in front of the house. At the second turn,
+when they were within twenty yards of the west end of the square, a tall
+man with an umbrella over his shoulder came round the corner, and leant
+against the lamp-post. They both knew him in an instant. It was Lord
+Ascot. He had not seen them. He had turned to look at a great
+long-legged chestnut that was coming down the street, from the right,
+with a human being on his back. The horse was desperately vicious, but
+very beautiful and valuable. The groom on his back was neither beautiful
+nor valuable, and was losing his temper with the horse. The horse was
+one of those horses vicious by nature--such a horse as Rarey (all honour
+to him) can terrify into submission for a short time; and the groom was
+a groom, not one of our country lads, every one of whose virtues and
+vices have been discussed over and over again at the squire's
+dinner-table, or about whom the rector had scratched his head, and had
+had into his study for private exhortation or encouragement. Not one of
+the minority. One of the majority, I fear very much. Reared, like a dog,
+among the straw, without education, without religion, without
+self-respect--worse broke than the horse he rode. When I think of all
+that was said against grooms and stable-helpers during the Rarey fever,
+I get very angry, I confess it. One man said to me, "When we have had a
+groom or two killed, we shall have our horses treated properly." Look to
+your grooms, gentlemen, and don't allow such a blot on the fair fame of
+England as some racing stables much longer, or there will be a heavy
+reckoning against you when the books are balanced.
+
+But the poor groom lost his temper with the horse, and beat it over the
+head. And Lord Ascot stayed to say, "D---- it all, man, you will never
+do any good like that," though a greater fiend on horseback than Lord
+Ascot I never saw.
+
+This gave time for Lady Ascot to say, "Come on, my dear Ravenshoe, and
+let us speak to him." So on they went. Lord Ascot was so busy looking at
+the horse and groom, that they got close behind him before he saw them.
+Nobody being near, Lady Ascot, with a sparkle of her old fun, poked him
+in the back with her walking-stick. Lord Ascot turned sharply and
+angrily round, with his umbrella raised for a blow.
+
+When he saw who it was, he burst out into a pleasant laugh. "Now, you
+grandma," he said, "you keep that old stick of yours quiet, or you'll
+get into trouble. What do you mean by assaulting the head of the house
+in the public streets? I am ashamed of you. You, Ravenshoe, you egged
+her on to do it. I shall have to punch your head before I have done. How
+are you both?"
+
+"And where have you been, you naughty boy?" said Lady Ascot.
+
+"At Paris," said that ingenuous nobleman, "dicing and brawling, as
+usual. Nobody can accuse me of hiding _my_ talents in a napkin, grandma.
+Those two things are all I am fit for, and I certainly do them with a
+will. I have fought a duel, too. A Yankee Doodle got it into his head
+that he might be impertinent to Adelaide; so I took him out and shot
+him. Don't cry, now. He is not dead. He'll walk lame though, I fancy,
+for a time. How jolly it is to catch you out here! I dread meeting that
+insufferable prig Hainault, for fear I should kick him. Give me her arm,
+my dear Ravenshoe."
+
+"And where is Adelaide?" said Lady Ascot.
+
+"Up at St. John's Wood," said he. "Do steal away, and come and see her.
+Grandma, I was very sorry to hear of poor Charles's death--I was indeed.
+You know what it has done for me; but, by Gad, I was very sorry."
+
+"Dear Welter--dear Ascot," said Lady Ascot, "I am sure you were sorry.
+Oh! if you would repent, my own dear. If you would think of the love
+that Christ bore you when He died for you. Oh, Ascot, Ascot! will
+nothing save you from the terrible hereafter?"
+
+"I am afraid not, grandma," said Lord Ascot. "It is getting too cold for
+you to stay out. Ravenshoe, my dear fellow, take her in."
+
+And so, after a kind good-bye, Lord Ascot walked away towards the
+south-west.
+
+I am afraid that John Marston was right. I am afraid he spoke the truth
+when he said that Lord Ascot was a savage, untameable blackguard.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIX.
+
+LORD ASCOT'S CROWNING ACT OF FOLLY.
+
+
+Lord Ascot, with his umbrella over his shoulder, swung on down the
+street, south-westward. The town was pleasant in the higher parts, and
+so he felt inclined to prolong his walk. He turned to the right into
+Park Lane.
+
+He was a remarkable-looking man. So tall, so broad, with such a mighty
+chest, and such a great, red, hairless, cruel face above it, that
+people, when he paused to look about him, as he did at each street
+corner, turned to look at him. He did not notice it; he was used it.
+And, besides, as he walked there were two or three words ringing yet in
+his ears which made him look less keenly than usual after the handsome
+horses and pretty faces which he met in his walk.
+
+"Oh, Ascot, Ascot! will nothing save you from the terrible hereafter?"
+
+"Confound those old women, more particularly when they take to religion.
+Always croaking. And grandma Ascot, too, as plucky and good an old soul
+as any in England--as good a judge of a horse as William Day--taking to
+that sort of thing. Hang it! it was unendurable. It was bad taste, you
+know, putting such ideas into a fellow's head. London was dull enough
+after Paris, without that."
+
+So thought Lord Ascot, as he stood in front of Dudley House, and looked
+southward. The winter sun was feebly shining where he was, but to the
+south there was a sea of fog, out of which rose the Wellington statue,
+looking more exasperating than ever, and the two great houses at the
+Albert Gate.
+
+"This London is a beastly hole," said he. "I have got to go down into
+that cursed fog. I wish Tattersall's was anywhere else." But he
+shouldered his umbrella again, and on he went.
+
+Opposite St. George's Hospital there were a number of medical students.
+Two of them, regardless of the order which should always be kept on Her
+Majesty's highway, were wrestling. Lord Ascot paused for a moment to
+look at them. He heard one of the students who were looking on say to
+another, evidently about himself--
+
+"By Gad! what preparations that fellow would cut up into."
+
+"Ah!" said another, "and wouldn't he cuss and d---- under the operation
+neither."
+
+"I know who that is," said a third. "That's Lord Ascot; the most
+infernal, headlong, gambling savage in the three kingdoms."
+
+So Lord Ascot, in the odour of sanctity, passed down into Tattersall's
+yard. There was no one in the rooms. He went out into the yard again.
+
+"Hullo, you sir! Have you seen Mr. Sloane?"
+
+"Mr. Sloane was here not ten minutes ago, my lord. He thought your
+lordship was not coming. He is gone down to the Groom's Arms."
+
+"Where the deuce is that?"
+
+"In Chapel Street, at the corner of the mews, my lord. Fust turning on
+the right, my lord."
+
+Lord Ascot had business with our old acquaintance, Mr. Sloane, and went
+on. When he came to the public-house mentioned (the very same one in
+which the Servants' Club was held, to which Charles belonged), he went
+into the bar, and asked of a feeble-minded girl, left accidentally in
+charge of the bar--"Where was Mr. Sloane?" And she said, "Upstairs, in
+the club-room."
+
+Lord Ascot walked up to the club-room, and looked in at the glass door.
+And there he saw Sloane. He was standing up, with his hand on a man's
+shoulder, who had a map before him. Right and left of these two men were
+two other men, an old one and a young one, and the four faces were close
+together; and while he watched them, the man with the map before him
+looked up, and Lord Ascot saw Charles Ravenshoe, pale and wan, looking
+like death itself, but still Charles Ravenshoe in the body.
+
+He did not open the door. He turned away, went down into the street, and
+set his face northward.
+
+So he was alive, and----There were more things to follow that "and" than
+he had time to think of at first. He had a cunning brain, Lord Ascot,
+but he could not get at his position at first. The whole business was
+too unexpected--he had not time to realise it.
+
+The afternoon was darkening as he turned his steps northwards, and began
+to walk rapidly, with scowling face and compressed lips. One or two of
+the students still lingered on the steps of the hospital. The one who
+had mentioned him by name before said to his fellows, "Look at that Lord
+Ascot. What a devil he looks! He has lost some money. Gad! there'll be
+murder done to-night. They oughtn't to let such fellows go loose!"
+
+Charles Ravenshoe alive. And Lord Saltire's will. Half a million of
+money. And Charley Ravenshoe, the best old cock in the three kingdoms.
+Of all his villainies--and, God forgive him, they were many--the one
+that weighed heaviest on his heart was his treatment of Charles. And
+now----
+
+The people turned and looked after him as he hurled along. Why did his
+wayward feet carry him to the corner of Curzon Street? That was not his
+route to St. John's Wood. The people stared at the great red-faced
+giant, who paused against the lamp-post irresolute, biting his upper lip
+till the blood came.
+
+How would they have stared if they had seen what I see.[11]
+
+There were two angels in the street that wretched winter afternoon, who
+had followed Lord Ascot in his headlong course, and paused here. He
+could see them but dimly, or only guess at their existence, but I can
+see them plainly enough.
+
+One was a white angel, beautiful to look at, who stood a little way off,
+beckoning to him, and pointing towards Lord Saltire's house; and the
+other was black, with its face hid in a hood, who was close beside him,
+and kept saying in his ear, "Half a million! half a million!"
+
+A strange apparition in Curzon Street, at four o'clock on a January
+afternoon! If you search the files of the papers at this period, you
+will find no notice of any remarkable atmospheric phenomena in Curzon
+Street that afternoon. But two angels were there, nevertheless, and Lord
+Ascot had a dim suspicion of it.
+
+A dim suspicion of it! How could it be otherwise, when he heard a voice
+in one ear repeating Lady Ascot's last words, "What can save you from
+the terrible hereafter?" and in the other the stealthy whisper of the
+fiend, "Half a million! half a million!"
+
+He paused, only for a moment, and then headed northward again. The black
+angel was at his ear, but the white one was close to him--so close, that
+when his own door opened, the three passed in together. Adelaide,
+standing under the chandelier in the hall, saw nothing of the two
+spirits; only her husband, scowling fiercely.
+
+She was going upstairs to dress, but she paused. As soon as Lord Ascot's
+"confidential scoundrel," before mentioned, had left the hall, she came
+up to him, and in a whisper, for she knew the man was listening, said:
+
+"What is the matter, Welter?"
+
+He looked as if he would have pushed her out of the way. But he did not.
+He said:
+
+"I have seen Charles Ravenshoe."
+
+"When?"
+
+"To-night."
+
+"Good God! Then it is almost a matter of time with us," said Adelaide.
+"I had a dim suspicion of this, Ascot. It is horrible. We are ruined."
+
+"Not yet," said Lord Ascot.
+
+"There is time--time. He is obstinate and mad. Lord Saltire might
+die----"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Either of them," she hissed out. "Is there no----"
+
+"No what?"
+
+"There is half a million of money," said Adelaide.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"All sorts of things happen to people."
+
+Lord Ascot looked at her for an instant, and snarled out a curse at her.
+
+John Marston was perfectly right. He was a savage, untameable
+blackguard. He went upstairs into his bedroom. The two angels were with
+him. They are with all of us at such times as these. There is no
+plagiarism here. The fact is too old for that.
+
+Up and down, up and down. The bedroom was not long enough; so he opened
+the door of the dressing-room; and that was not long enough; and so he
+opened the door of what had been the nursery in a happier household than
+his; and walked up and down through them all. And Adelaide sat below,
+before a single candle, with pale face and clenched lips, listening to
+his footfall on the floor above.
+
+She knew as well as if an angel had told her what was passing in his
+mind as he walked up and down. She had foreseen this crisis plainly--you
+may laugh at me, but she had. She had seen that if, by any wild
+conjunction of circumstances, Charles Ravenshoe were alive, and if he
+were to come across him before Lord Saltire's death, events would
+arrange themselves exactly as they were doing on this terrible evening.
+There was something awfully strange in the realisation of her morbid
+suspicions.
+
+Yes, she had seen thus far, and had laughed at herself for entertaining
+such mad fancies. But she had seen no further. What the upshot would be
+was hidden from her like a dark veil, black and impenetrable as the fog
+which was hanging over Waterloo Bridge at that moment, which made the
+squalid figure of a young, desperate girl show like a pale, fluttering
+ghost, leading a man whom we know well, a man who followed her, on the
+road to--what?
+
+The rest, though, seemed to be, in some sort, in her own hands. Wealth,
+position in the world, the power of driving her chariot over the necks
+of those who had scorned her--the only things for which her worthless
+heart cared--were all at stake.
+
+"He will murder me," she said, "_but he shall hear me_."
+
+Still, up and down, over head, his heavy footfall went to and fro.
+
+Seldom, in any man's life, comes such a trial as his this night. A good
+man might have been hard tried in such circumstances. What hope can we
+have of a desperate blackguard like Lord Ascot? He knew Lord Saltire
+hated him; he knew that Lord Saltire had only left his property to him
+because he thought Charles Ravenshoe was dead; and yet he hesitated
+whether or no he should tell Lord Saltire that he had seen Charles, and
+ruin himself utterly.
+
+Was he such an utter rascal as John Marston made him out? Would such a
+rascal have hesitated long? What could make a man without a character,
+without principle, without a care about the world's opinion, hesitate at
+such a time as this? I cannot tell you.
+
+He was not used to think about things logically or calmly: and so, as he
+paced up and down, it was some time before he actually arranged his
+thoughts. Then he came to this conclusion, and put it fairly before
+him--that, if he let Lord Saltire know that Charles Ravenshoe was alive,
+he was ruined; and that, if he did not, he was a villain.
+
+Let us give the poor profligate wretch credit for getting even so far as
+this. There was no attempt to gloss over the facts, and deceive himself.
+He put the whole matter honestly before him.
+
+He would be a fool if he told Lord Saltire. He would be worse than a
+fool, a madman--there was no doubt about that. It was not to be thought
+about.
+
+But Charles Ravenshoe!
+
+How pale the dear old lad looked. What a kind, gentle old face it was.
+How well he could remember the first time he ever saw him. At Twyford,
+yes; and, that very same visit, how he ran across the billiard-room, and
+asked him who Lord Saltire was. Yes. What jolly times there were down in
+Devonshire, too. Those Claycomb hounds wanted pace, but they were full
+fast enough for the country. And what a pottering old rascal Charley was
+among the stone walls. Rode through. Yes. And how he'd mow over a
+woodcock. Fire slap through a holly bush. Ha!
+
+And suppose they proved this previous marriage. Why, then he would be
+back at Ravenshoe, and all things would be as they were. But suppose
+they couldn't----
+
+Lord Ascot did not know that eighty thousand pounds were secured to
+Charles.
+
+By Gad! it was horrible to think of. That it should be thrown on him, of
+all men, to stand between old Charley and his due. If it were any other
+man but him----
+
+Reader, if you do not know that a man will act from "sentiment" long,
+long years after he has thrown "principle" to the winds, you had better
+pack up your portmanteau, and go and live five years or more among
+Australian convicts and American rowdies, as a friend of mine did. The
+one long outlives the other. The incarnate devils who beat out poor
+Price's brains with their shovels, when they had the gallows before
+them, consistently perjured themselves in favour of the youngest of the
+seven, the young fiend who had hounded them on.
+
+Why there never was such a good fellow as that Charley. That Easter
+vacation--hey! Among the bargees, hang it, what a game it was----I won't
+follow out his recollections here any further. Skittle-playing and
+fighting are all very well; but one may have too much of them.
+
+"I might still do this," thought Lord Ascot: "I might----"
+
+At this moment he was opposite the dressing-room door. It was opened,
+and Adelaide stood before him.
+
+Beautiful and terrible, with a look which her husband had, as yet, only
+seen shadowed dimly--a look which he felt might come there some day, but
+which he had never seen yet. The light of her solitary candle shone upon
+her pale face, her gleaming eyes, and her clenched lip; and he saw what
+was written there, and for one moment quailed.
+
+("If you were to say to me," said Lord Hainault once, "that Charles
+would be unwise to let Ascot's wife make his gruel for him, I should
+agree with you.")
+
+Only for one moment! Then he turned on her and cursed her.
+
+"What, in the name of hell, do you want here at this moment?"
+
+"You may murder me if you like, Ascot; but, before you have time to do
+that, you shall hear what I have got to say. I have been listening to
+your footsteps for a weary hour, and I heard irresolution in every one
+of them. Ascot, don't be a madman!"
+
+"I shall be soon, if you come at such a time as this, and look like
+that. If my face were to take the same expression as yours has now, Lady
+Ascot, these would be dangerous quarters for you."
+
+"I know that," said she. "I knew all that before I came up here
+to-night, Ascot. Ascot, half a million of money----"
+
+"Why, all the devils in the pit have been singing that tune for an hour
+past. Have you only endangered your life to add your little pipe to
+theirs?"
+
+"I have. Won't you hear me?"
+
+"No. Go away."
+
+"Are you going to do it."
+
+"Most likely not. You had better go away."
+
+"You might give him a hundred thousand pounds, you know, Ascot. Four
+thousand a year. The poor dear fellow would worship you for your
+generosity. He is a very good fellow, Ascot."
+
+"You had better go away," said he, quietly.
+
+"Not without a promise, Ascot. Think----"
+
+"Now go away. This is the last warning I give you. Madwoman!"
+
+"But, Ascot----"
+
+"Take care; it will be too late for both of us in another moment."
+
+She caught his eye for the first time, and fled for her life. She ran
+down into the drawing-room, and threw herself into a chair. "God
+preserve me!" she said; "I have gone too far with him. Oh, this lonely
+house!"
+
+Every drop of blood in her body seemed to fly to her heart. There were
+footsteps outside the door. Oh, God! have mercy on her; he was following
+her.
+
+Where were the two angels now, I wonder?
+
+He opened the door, and came towards her slowly. If mortal agony can
+atone for sin, she atoned for all her sins in that terrible half-minute.
+She did not cry out; she dared not; she writhed down among the gaudy
+cushions, with her face buried in her hands, and waited--for what?
+
+She heard a voice speaking to her. It was not his voice, but the kind
+voice of old Lord Ascot, his dead father. It said--
+
+"Adelaide, my poor girl, you must not get frightened when I get in a
+passion. My poor child, you have borne enough for me; I would not hurt a
+hair of your head."
+
+He kissed her cheek, and Adelaide burst into a passion of sobs. After a
+few moments those sobs had ceased, and Lord Ascot left her. He did not
+know that she had fainted away. She never told him that.
+
+Where were the angels now? Angels!--there was but one of them left.
+Which one was that, think you?
+
+Hurrah! the good angel. The black fiend with the hood had sneaked away
+to his torment. And, as Lord Ascot closed the door behind him, and sped
+away down the foggy street, the good one vanished too; for the work was
+done. Ten thousand fiends would not turn him from his purpose now.
+Hurrah!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Simpson," said Lord Saltire, as he got into bed that evening, "it won't
+last much longer."
+
+"What will not last, my lord?" said Simpson.
+
+"Why, me," said Lord Saltire, disregarding grammar. "Don't set up a
+greengrocer's shop, Simpson, nor a butter and egg shop, in Berkeley
+Street, if you can help it, Simpson. If you must keep a lodging-house, I
+should say Jermyn Street; but don't let me influence you. I am not sure
+that I wouldn't sooner see you in Brook Street, or Conduit Street. But
+don't try Pall Mall, that's a good fellow; or you'll be getting fast
+men, who will demoralise your establishment. A steady connection among
+government clerks, and that sort of person, will pay best in the long
+run."
+
+"My dear lord--my good old friend, why should you talk like this
+to-night?"
+
+"Because I am very ill, Simpson, and it will all come at once; and it
+may come any time. When they open Lord Barkham's room, at Cottingdean, I
+should like you and Mr. Marston to go in first, for I may have left
+something or another about."
+
+An hour or two after, his bell rang, and Simpson, who was in the
+dressing-room, came hurriedly in. He was sitting up in bed, looking just
+the same as usual.
+
+"My good fellow," he said, "go down and find out who rung and knocked at
+the door like that. Did you hear it?"
+
+"I did not notice it, my lord."
+
+"Butchers, and bakers, and that sort of people, don't knock and ring
+like that. The man at the door now brings news, Simpson. There is no
+mistake about the ring of a man who comes with important intelligence.
+Go down and see."
+
+He was not long gone. When he came back again, he said--
+
+"It is Lord Ascot, my lord. He insists on seeing you immediately."
+
+"Up with him, Simpson--up with him, my good fellow. I told you so. This
+gets interesting."
+
+Lord Ascot was already in the doorway. Lord Saltire's brain was as acute
+as ever; and as Lord Ascot approached him, he peered eagerly and
+curiously at him, in the same way as one scrutinises the seal of an
+unopened letter, and wonders what its contents may be. Lord Ascot sat
+down by the bed, and whispered to the old man; and, when Simpson saw his
+great coarse, red, hairless, ruffianly face actually touching that of
+Lord Saltire, so delicate, so refined, so keen, Simpson began to have a
+dim suspicion that he was looking on rather a remarkable sight. And so
+he was.
+
+"Lord Saltire," said Lord Ascot, "I have seen Charles Ravenshoe
+to-night."
+
+"You are quite sure?"
+
+"I am quite sure."
+
+"Ha! Ring the bell, Simpson." Before any one had spoken again, a footman
+was in the room. "Bring the major-domo here instantly," said Lord
+Saltire.
+
+"You know what you have done, Ascot," said Lord Saltire. "You see what
+you have done. I am going to send for my solicitor, and alter my will."
+
+"Of course you are," said Lord Ascot. "Do you dream I did not know that
+before I came here?"
+
+"And yet you came?"
+
+"Yes; with all the devils out of hell dragging me back."
+
+"As a matter of curiosity, why?" said Lord Saltire.
+
+"Oh, I couldn't do it, you know. I've done a good many dirty things; but
+I couldn't do that, particularly to that man. There are some things a
+fellow can't do, you know."
+
+"Where did you see him?"
+
+"At the Groom's Arms, Belgrave Mews; he was there not three hours ago.
+Find a man called Sloane, a horse-dealer; he will tell you all about
+him; for he was sitting with his hand on his shoulder. His address is
+twenty-seven, New Road."
+
+At this time the major-domo appeared. "Take a cab at once, and _fetch_
+me--you understand when I say _fetch_--Mr. Brogden, my solicitor. Mr.
+Compton lives out of town, but he lives over the office in Lincoln's
+Inn. If you can get hold of the senior partner, he will do as well. Put
+either of them in a cab, and pack them off here. Then go to Scotland
+Yard; give my compliments to inspector Field; tell him a horrible murder
+has been committed, accompanied by arson, forgery, and regrating, with a
+strong suspicion of sorning, and that he must come at once."
+
+That venerable gentleman disappeared, and then Lord Saltire said--
+
+"Do you repent, Ascot?"
+
+"No," said he. "D---- it all, you know, I could not do it when I came to
+think of it. The money would never have stayed with me, I take it.
+Good-night."
+
+"Good-night," said Lord Saltire; "come the first thing in the morning."
+
+And so they parted. Simpson said, "Are you going to alter your will
+to-night, my lord? Won't it be a little too much for you?"
+
+"It would be if I was going to do so, Simpson; but I am not going to
+touch a line of it. I am not sure that half a million of money was ever,
+in the history of the world, given up with better grace or with less
+reason. He is a noble fellow; I never guessed it; he shall have it--by
+Jove, he shall have it! I am going to sleep. Apologise to Brogden, and
+give the information to Field; tell him I expect Charles Ravenshoe here
+to-morrow morning. Good-night."
+
+Simpson came in to open the shutters next morning; but those shutters
+were not opened for ten days, for Lord Saltire was dead.
+
+Dead. The delicate waxen right hand, covered with rings, was lying
+outside on the snow-white sheet, which was unwrinkled by any death
+agony; and on the pillow was a face, beautiful always, but now more
+beautiful, more calm, more majestic than ever. If his first love, dead
+so many years, had met him in the streets but yesterday, she would not
+have known him; but if she could have looked one moment on the face
+which lay on that pillow, she would have seen once more the gallant
+young nobleman who came a-wooing under the lime-trees sixty years agone.
+
+The inspector was rapid and dexterous in his work. He was on Charles
+Ravenshoe's trail like a bloodhound, eager to redeem the credit which
+his coadjutor, Yard, had lost over the same case. But his instructions
+came to him three hours too late.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LX.
+
+THE BRIDGE AT LAST.
+
+
+The group which Lord Ascot had seen through the glass doors consisted of
+Charles, the coachman's son, the coachman, and Mr. Sloane. Charles and
+the coachman's son had got hold of a plan of the battle of Balaclava,
+from the _Illustrated London News_, and were explaining the whole thing
+to the two older men, to their great delight. The four got enthusiastic
+and prolonged the talk for some time; and, when it began to flag, Sloane
+said he must go home, and so they came down into the bar.
+
+Here a discussion arose about the feeding of cavalry horses, in which
+all four were perfectly competent to take part. The two young men were
+opposed in argument to the two elder ones, and they were having a right
+pleasant chatter about the corn or hay question in the bar, when the
+swing doors were pushed open, and a girl entered and looked round with
+that bold, insolent expression one only sees among a certain class.
+
+A tawdry draggled-looking girl, finely-enough dressed, but with
+everything awry and dirty. Her face was still almost beautiful; but the
+cheekbones were terribly prominent, and the hectic patch of red on her
+cheeks, and the parched cracked lips, told of pneumonia developing into
+consumption.
+
+Such a figure had probably never appeared in that decent aristocratic
+public-house, called the Groom's Arms, since it had got its licence. The
+four men ceased their argument and turned to look at her; and the
+coachman, a family man with daughters, said, "Poor thing!"
+
+With a brazen, defiant look she advanced to the bar. The barmaid, a very
+beautiful, quiet-looking, London-bred girl, advanced towards her,
+frightened at such a wild, tawdry apparition, and asked her mechanically
+what she would please to take.
+
+"I don't want nothing to drink, miss," said the girl; "least-ways, I've
+got no money; but I want to ask a question. I say, miss, you couldn't
+give a poor girl one of them sandwiches, could you? You would never miss
+it, you know."
+
+The barmaid's father, the jolly landlord, eighteen stone of good humour,
+was behind his daughter now. "Give her a porkpie, Jane, and a glass of
+ale, my girl."
+
+"God Almighty bless you, sir, and keep her from the dark places where
+the devil lies a-waiting. I didn't come here to beg--it was only when I
+see them sandwiches that it came over me--I come here to ask a question.
+I know it ain't no use. But you can't see him--can't see him--can't see
+him," she continued, sobbing wildly, "rattling his poor soul away, and
+not do as he asked you. I didn't come to get out for a walk. I sat there
+patient three days, and would have sat there till the end, but he would
+have me come. And so I came; and I must get back--get back."
+
+The landlord's daughter brought her some food, and as her eyes gleamed
+with wolfish hunger, she stopped speaking. It was a strange group. She
+in the centre, tearing at her food in a way terrible to see. Behind, the
+calm face of the landlord, looking on her with pity and wonder; and his
+pretty daughter, with her arm round his waist, and her head on his
+bosom, with tears in her eyes. Our four friends stood to the right,
+silent and curious--a remarkable group enough; for neither the duke's
+coachman, nor Mr. Sloane, who formed the background, were exactly
+ordinary-looking men; and in front of them were Charles and the
+coachman's son, who had put his hand on Charles's right shoulder, and
+was peering over his left at the poor girl, so that the two faces were
+close together--the one handsome and pale, with the mouth hidden by a
+moustache; the other, Charles's, wan and wild, with the lips parted in
+eager curiosity, and the chin thrust slightly forward.
+
+In a few minutes the girl looked round on them. "I said I'd come here to
+ask a question; and I must ask it and get back. There was a gentleman's
+groom used to use this house, and I want him. His name was Charles
+Horton. If you, sir, or if any of these gentlemen, know where I can find
+him, in God Almighty's name tell me this miserable night."
+
+Charles was pale before, but he grew more deadly pale now; his heart
+told him something was coming. His comrade, the coachman's son, held his
+hand tighter still on his shoulder, and looked in his face. Sloane and
+the coachman made an exclamation.
+
+Charles said quietly, "My poor girl, I am the man you are looking for.
+What, in God's name, do you want with me?" and, while he waited for her
+to answer, he felt all the blood in his body going towards his heart.
+
+"Little enough," she said. "Do you mind a little shoeblack boy as used
+to stand by St. Peter's Church?"
+
+"Do I?" said Charles, coming towards her. "Yes, I do. My poor little
+lad. You don't mean to say that you know anything about him?"
+
+"I am his sister, sir; and he is dying; and he says he won't die not
+till you come. And I come off to see if I could find you. Will you come
+with me and see him?"
+
+"Will I come?" said Charles. "Let us go at once. My poor little monkey.
+Dying, too!"
+
+"Poor little man," said the coachman. "A many times, I've heard you
+speak of him. Let's all go."
+
+Mr. Sloane and his son seconded this motion.
+
+"You mustn't come," said the girl. "There's a awful row in the court
+to-night; that's the truth. He's safe enough with me; but if you come,
+they'll think a mob's being raised. Now, don't talk of coming."
+
+"You had better let me go alone," said Charles. "I feel sure that it
+would not be right for more of us to follow this poor girl than she
+chooses. I am ready."
+
+And so he followed the girl out into the darkness; and, as soon as they
+were outside, she turned and said to him--
+
+"You'd best follow me from a distance. I'll tell you why; I expect the
+police wants me, and you might get into trouble from being with me.
+Remember, if I am took, it's Marquis Court, Little Marjoram Street, and
+it's the end house, exactly opposite you as you go in. If you stands at
+the archway, and sings out for Miss Ophelia Flanigan, she'll come to
+you. But if the row ain't over, you wait till they're quiet. Whatever
+you do, don't venture in by yourself, however quiet it may look; sing
+out for her."
+
+And so she fluttered away through the fog, and he followed, walking fast
+to keep her in sight.
+
+It was a dreadful night. The fog had lifted, and a moaning wind had
+arisen, with rain from the south-west. A wild, dripping, melancholy
+night, without rain enough to make one think of physical discomfort, and
+without wind enough to excite one.
+
+The shoeblacks and the crossing-sweepers were shouldering their brooms
+and their boxes, and were plodding homewards. The costermongers were
+letting their barrows stand in front of the public-houses, while they
+went in to get something to drink, and were discussing the price of
+vegetables, and being fetched out by dripping policemen, for obstructing
+her Majesty's highway. The beggars were gathering their rags together,
+and posting homewards; let us charitably suppose, to their bit of fish,
+with guinea-fowl and sea-kale afterwards, or possibly, for it was not
+late in February, to their boiled pheasant and celery sauce. Every one
+was bound for shelter but the policemen. And Charles--poor, silly,
+obstinate Charles, with an earl's fortune waiting for him, dressed as a
+groom, pale, wan, and desperate--was following a ruined girl, more
+desperate even than he, towards the bridge.
+
+Yes; this is the darkest part of my whole story. Since his misfortunes
+he had let his mind dwell a little too much on these bridges. There are
+very few men without a cobweb of some sort in their heads, more or less
+innocent. Charles had a cobweb in his head now. The best of men might
+have a cobweb in his head after such a terrible breakdown in his
+affairs as he had suffered; more especially if he had three or four
+splinters of bone in his deltoid muscle, which had prevented his
+sleeping for three nights. But I would sooner that any friend of mine
+should at such times take to any form of folly (such even as having
+fifty French clocks in the room, and discharging the butler if they did
+not all strike at once, as one good officer and brave fellow did) rather
+than get to thinking about bridges after dark, with the foul water
+lapping and swirling about the piers. I have hinted to you about this
+crotchet of poor Charles for a long time; I was forced to do so. I think
+the less we say about it the better. I call you to witness that I have
+not said more about it than was necessary.
+
+At the end of Arabella Row, the girl stopped, and looked back for him.
+The mews' clock was overhead, a broad orb of light in the dark sky. Ten
+minutes past ten. Lord Ascot was sitting beside Lord Saltire's bed, and
+Lord Saltire had rung the bell to send for Inspector Field.
+
+She went on, and he followed her along the Mall. She walked fast, and he
+had hard work to keep her in sight. He saw her plainly enough whenever
+she passed a lamp. Her shadow was suddenly thrown at his feet, and then
+swept in a circle to the right, till it overtook her, and then passed
+her, and grew dim till she came to another lamp, and then came back to
+his feet, and passed on to her again, beckoning him on to follow her,
+and leading her--whither?
+
+How many lamps were there? One, two, three, four; and then a man lying
+asleep on a bench in the rain, who said, with a wild, wan face, when the
+policeman roused him, and told him to go home, "My home is in the
+Thames, friend; but I shall not go there to-night, or perhaps
+to-morrow."
+
+"His home was in the Thames." The Thames, the dear old happy river. The
+wonder and delight of his boyhood. That was the river that slept in
+crystal green depths, under the tumbled boulders fallen from the chalk
+cliff, where the ivy, the oak, and the holly grew; and then went
+spouting, and raging, and roaring through the weirs at Casterton, where
+he and Welter used to bathe, and where he lay and watched kind Lord
+Ascot spinning patiently through one summer afternoon, till he killed
+the eight-pound trout at sundown.
+
+That was the dear old Thames. But that was fifty miles up the river, and
+ages ago. Now, and here, the river had got foul, and lapped about
+hungrily among piles, and barges, and the buttresses of bridges. And
+lower down it ran among mud banks. And there was a picture of one of
+them, by dear old H. K. Browne, and you didn't see at first what it was
+that lay among the sedges, because the face was reversed, and the limbs
+were----
+
+They passed in the same order through Spring Gardens into the Strand.
+And then Charles found it more troublesome than ever to follow the poor
+girl in her rapid walk. There were so many like her there: but she
+walked faster than any of them. Before he came to the street which leads
+to Waterloo Bridge, he thought he had lost her; but when he turned the
+corner; and as the dank wind smote upon his face, he came upon her,
+waiting for him.
+
+And so they went on across the bridge. They walked together now. Was she
+frightened, too?
+
+When they reached the other end of the bridge, she went on again to show
+the way. A long way on past the Waterloo Station, she turned to the
+left. They passed out of a broad, low, noisy street, into other streets,
+some quiet, some turbulent, some blazing with the gas of miserable
+shops, some dark and stealthy, with only one or two figures in them,
+which disappeared round corners, or got into dark archways as they
+passed. Charles saw that they were getting into "Queer Street."
+
+How that poor gaudy figure fluttered on! How it paused at each turning
+to look back for him, and then fluttered on once more! What innumerable
+turnings there were! How should he ever find his way back--back to the
+bridge?
+
+At last she turned into a street of greengrocers, and marine-store
+keepers, in which the people were all at their house doors looking out;
+all looking in one direction, and talking so earnestly to one another,
+that even his top-boots escaped notice: which struck him as being
+remarkable, as nearly all the way from Waterloo Bridge a majority of the
+populace had criticised them, either ironically; or openly, in an
+unfavourable manner. He thought they were looking at a fire, and turned
+his head in the same direction; he only saw the poor girl, standing at
+the mouth of a narrow entry, watching for him.
+
+He came up to her. A little way down a dark alley was an archway, and
+beyond there were lights, and a noise of a great many people shouting,
+and talking, and screaming. The girl stole on, followed by Charles a few
+steps, and then drew suddenly back. The whole of the alley, and the dark
+archway beyond, was lined with policemen. A brisk-looking, middle-sized
+man, with intensely black scanty whiskers, stepped out, and stood before
+them. Charles saw at once that it was the inspector of police.
+
+"Now then, young woman," he said sharply, "what are you bringing that
+young man here for, eh?"
+
+She was obliged to come forward. She began wringing her hands.
+
+"Mr. Inspector," she said, "sir, I wish I may be struck dead, sir, if I
+don't tell the truth. It's my poor little brother, sir. He's a dying in
+number eight, sir, and he sent for this young man for to see him, sir.
+Oh! don't stop us, sir. S'elp me----"
+
+"Pish!" said the inspector; "what the devil is the use of talking this
+nonsense to me? As for you, young man, you march back home double quick.
+You've no business here. It's seldom we see a gentleman's servant in
+such company in this part of the town."
+
+"Pooh! pooh! my good sir," said Charles; "stuff and nonsense. Don't
+assume that tone with me, if you will have the goodness. What the young
+woman says is perfectly correct. If you can assist me to get to that
+house at the further end of the court, where the poor boy lies dying, I
+shall be obliged to you. If you can't, don't express an opinion without
+being in possession of circumstances. You may detain the girl, but I am
+going on. You don't know who you are talking to."
+
+How the old Oxford insolence flashed out even at the last.
+
+The inspector drew back and bowed. "I must do my duty, sir. Dickson!"
+
+Dickson, in whose beat the court was, as he knew by many a sore bone in
+his body, came forward. He said, "Well, sir, I won't deny that the young
+woman is Bess, and perhaps she may be on the cross, and I don't go to
+say that what with flimping, and with cly-faking, and such like, she
+mayn't be wanted some day like her brother the Nipper was; but she is a
+good young woman, and a honest young woman in her way, and what she says
+this night about her brother is gospel truth."
+
+"Flimping" is a style of theft which I have never practised, and,
+consequently, of which I know nothing. "Cly-faking" is stealing
+pocket-handkerchiefs. I never practised this either, never having had
+sufficient courage or dexterity. But, at all events, Police-constable
+Dickson's notion of "an honest young woman in her way" seems to me to be
+confused and unsatisfactory in the last degree.
+
+The inspector said to Charles, "Sir, if gentlemen disguise themselves
+they must expect the police to be somewhat at fault till they open their
+mouths. Allow me to say, sir, that in putting on your servant's clothes
+you have done the most foolish thing you possibly could. You are on an
+errand of mercy, it appears, and I will do what I can for you. There's
+a doctor and a Scripture reader somewhere in the court now, so our
+people say. _They_ can't get out. I don't think you have much chance of
+getting in."
+
+"By Jove!" said Charles, "do you know that you are a deuced good fellow?
+I am sorry that I was rude to you, but I am in trouble, and irritated. I
+hope you'll forgive me."
+
+"Not another word, sir," said the inspector. "Come and look here, sir.
+You may never see such a sight again. _Our_ people daren't go in. This,
+sir, is, I believe, about the worst court in London."
+
+"I thought," said Charles, quite forgetting his top-boots, and speaking,
+"_de haut en bas_" as in old times--"I thought that your Rosemary Lane
+carried off the palm as being a lively neighbourhood."
+
+"Lord bless you," said the inspector, "nothing to this;--look here."
+
+They advanced to the end of the arch, and looked in. It was as still as
+death, but it was as light as day, for there were candles burning in
+every window.
+
+"Why," said Charles, "the court is empty. I can run across. Let me go; I
+am certain I can get across."
+
+"Don't be a lunatic, sir;" said the inspector, holding him tight; "wait
+till I give you the word, unless you want six months in Guy's Hospital."
+
+Charles soon saw the inspector was right. There were three houses on
+each side of the court. The centre one on the right was a very large
+one, which was approached on each side by a flight of three steps,
+guarded by iron railings, which, in meeting, formed a kind of platform
+or rostrum. This was Mr. Malone's house, whose wife chose, for family
+reasons, to call herself Miss Ophelia Flanigan.
+
+The court was silent and hushed, when, from the door exactly opposite to
+this one, there appeared a tall and rather handsome young man, with a
+great frieze coat under one arm, and a fire-shovel over his shoulder.
+
+This was Mr. Dennis Moriarty, junior. He advanced to the arch, so close
+to Charles and the inspector that they could have touched him, and then
+walked down the centre of the court, dragging the coat behind him,
+lifting his heels defiantly high at every step, and dexterously beating
+a "chune on the bare head of um wid the fire-shovel. Hurroo!"
+
+He had advanced half-way down the court without a soul appearing, when
+suddenly the enemy poured out on him in two columns, from behind two
+doorways, and he was borne back, fighting like a hero with his
+fire-shovel, into one of the doors on his own side of the court.
+
+The two columns of the enemy, headed by Mr. Phelim O'Neill, uniting,
+poured into the doorway after him, and from the interior of the house
+arose a hubbub, exactly as though people were fighting on the stairs.
+
+At this point there happened one of those mistakes which so often occur
+in warfare, which are disastrous at the time, and inexplicable
+afterwards. Can any one explain why Lord Lucan gave that order at
+Balaclava? No. Can any one explain to me why, on this occasion, Mr.
+Phelim O'Neill headed the attack on the staircase in person, leaving his
+rear struggling in confusion in the court, by reason of their hearing
+the fun going on inside, and not being able to get at it? I think not.
+Such was the case, however, and, in the midst of it, Mr. Malone, howling
+like a demon, and horribly drunk, followed by thirty or forty worse than
+himself, dashed out of a doorway close by, and before they had time to
+form line of battle, fell upon them hammer and tongs.
+
+I need not say that after this surprise in the rear, Mr. Phelim
+O'Neill's party had very much the worst of it. In about ten minutes,
+however, the two parties were standing opposite one another once more,
+inactive from sheer fatigue.
+
+At this moment Miss Ophelia Flanigan appeared from the door of No.
+8--the very house that poor Charles was so anxious to get to--and slowly
+and majestically advanced towards the rostrum in front of her own door,
+and ascending the steps, folded her arms and looked about her.
+
+She was an uncommonly powerful, red-faced Irishwoman; her arms were
+bare, and she had them akimbo, and was scratching her elbows.
+
+Every schoolboy knows that the lion has a claw at the end of his tail
+with which he lashes himself into fury. When the experienced hunter sees
+him doing that, he, so to speak, "hooks it." When Miss Flanigan's
+enemies saw her scratching her elbows, they generally did the same. She
+was scratching her elbows now. There was a dead silence.
+
+One woman in that court, and one only, ever offered battle to the
+terrible Miss Ophelia: that was young Mrs. Phaylim O'Nale. On the
+present occasion she began slowly walking up and down in front of the
+expectant hosts. While Miss Flanigan looked on in contemptuous pity,
+scratching her elbows, Mrs. O'Neill opened her fire.
+
+"Pussey, pussey!" she began, "kitty, kitty, kitty! Miaow, miaow!" (Mr.
+Malone had accumulated property in the cat's meat business.) "Morraow,
+ye little tabby divvle, don't come anighst her, my Kitleen Avourneen, or
+yill be convarted into sassidge mate, and sowld to keep a drunken
+one-eyed old rapparee, from the county Cark, as had two months for
+bowling his barrer sharp round the corner of Park Lane over a ould
+gineral officer, in a white hat and a green silk umbereller; and as
+married a red-haired woman from the county Waterford, as calls herself
+by her maiden name, and never feels up to fighting but when the licker's
+in her, which it most in general is, pussey; and let me see the one of
+Malone's lot or Moriarty's lot ather, for that matter, as will deny it.
+Miaow!"
+
+Miss Ophelia Flanigan blew her nose contemptuously. Some of the low
+characters in the court had picked her pocket.
+
+Mrs. O'Neill quickened her pace and raised her voice. She was beginning
+again, when the poor girl who was with Charles ran into the court and
+cried out, "Miss Flanigan! I have brought him; Miss Flanigan!"
+
+In a moment the contemptuous expression faded from Miss Flanigan's face.
+She came down off the steps and advanced rapidly towards where Charles
+stood. As she passed Mrs. O'Neill she said, "Whist now, Biddy O'Nale, me
+darlin. I ain't up to a shindy to-night. Ye know the rayson."
+
+And Mrs. O'Neill said, "Ye're a good woman, Ophelia. Sorra a one of me
+would have loosed tongue on ye this night, only I thought it might cheer
+ye up a bit after yer watching. Don't take notice of me, that's a dear."
+
+Miss Flanigan went up to Charles, and, taking him by the arm, walked
+with him across the court. It was whispered rapidly that this was the
+young man who had been sent for to see little Billy Wilkins, who was
+dying in No. 8. Charles was as safe as if he had been in the centre of a
+square of the Guards. As he went into the door, they gave him a cheer;
+and, when the door closed behind him, they went on with their fighting
+again.
+
+Charles found himself in a squalid room, about which there was nothing
+remarkable but its meanness and dirt. There were four people there when
+he came in--a woman asleep by the bed, two gentlemen who stood aloof in
+the shadow, and the poor little wan and wasted boy in the bed.
+
+Charles went up and sat by the bed; when the boy saw him he made an
+effort, rose half up, and threw his arms round his neck. Charles put his
+arm round him and supported him--as strange a pair, I fancy, as you
+will meet in many long days' marches.
+
+"If you would not mind, Miss Flanigan," said the doctor, "stepping
+across the court with me, I shall be deeply obliged to you. You, sir,
+are going to stay a little longer."
+
+"Yes, sir," said the other gentleman, in a harsh, unpleasant voice; "I
+shall stay till the end."
+
+"You won't have to stay very long, my dear sir," said the doctor. "Now,
+Miss Flanigan, I am ready. Please to call out that the doctor is coming
+through the court, and that, if any man lays a finger on him, he will
+exhibit croton and other drastics to him till he wishes he was dead, and
+after that, throw in quinine till the top of his head comes off.
+_Allons_, my dear madam."
+
+With this dreadful threat the doctor departed. The other gentleman, the
+Scripture reader, stayed behind, and sat in a chair in the further
+corner. The poor mother was sleeping heavily. The poor girl who had
+brought Charles, sat down in a chair and fell asleep with her head on a
+table.
+
+The dying child was gone too far for speech. He tried two or three
+times, but he only made a rattle in his throat. After a few minutes he
+took his arms from round Charles's neck, and, with a look of anxiety,
+felt for something by his side. When he found it he smiled, and held it
+towards Charles. Well, well; it was only the ball that Charles had given
+him----
+
+Charles sat on the bed, and put his left arm round the child, so that
+the little death's head might lie upon his breast. He took the little
+hand in his. So they remained. How long?
+
+I know not. He only sat there with the hot head against his heart, and
+thought that a little life, so strangely dear to him, now that all
+friends were gone, was fast ebbing away, and that he must get home again
+that night across the bridge.
+
+The little hand that he held in his relaxed its grasp, and the boy was
+dead. He knew it, but he did not move. He sat there still with the dead
+child in his arms, with a dull terror on him when he thought of his
+homeward journey across the bridge.
+
+Some one moved and came towards him. The mother and the girl were still
+asleep--it was the Scripture reader. He came towards Charles, and laid
+his hand upon his shoulder. And Charles turned from the dead child, and
+looked up into his face--into the face of John Marston.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXI.
+
+SAVED.
+
+
+With the wailing mother's voice in their ears, those two left the house.
+The court was quiet enough now. The poor savages who would not stop
+their riot lest they should disturb the dying, now talked in whispers
+lest they should awaken the dead.
+
+They passed on quickly together. Not one word had been uttered between
+them--not one--but they pushed rapidly through the worst streets to a
+better part of the town, Charles clinging tight to John Marston's arm,
+but silent. When they got to Marston's lodgings, Charles sat down by the
+fire, and spoke for the first time. He did not burst out crying, or
+anything of that sort. He only said quietly--
+
+"John, you have saved me. I should never have got home this night."
+
+But John Marston, who, by finding Charles, had dashed his dearest hopes
+to the ground, did not take things quite so quietly. Did he think of
+Mary now? Did he see in a moment that his chance of her was gone? And
+did he not see that he loved her more deeply than ever?
+
+"Yes," I answer to all these three questions. How did he behave now?
+
+Why, he put his hand on Charles's shoulder, and he said, "Charles,
+Charles, my dear old boy, look up and speak to me in your dear old
+voice. Don't look wild like that. Think of Mary, my boy. She has been
+wooed by more than one, Charles; but I think that her heart is yours
+yet."
+
+"John," said Charles, "that is what has made me hide from you all like
+this. I know that she loves me above all men. I dreamt of it the night I
+left Ravenshoe. I knew it the night I saw her at Lord Hainault's. And
+partly that she should forget a penniless and disgraced man like myself,
+and partly (for I have been near the gates of hell to-night, John, and
+can see many things) from a silly pride, I have spent all my cunning on
+losing myself--hoping that you would believe me dead, thinking that you
+would love my memory, and dreading lest you should cease to love Me."
+
+"We loved your memory well enough, Charles. You will never know how
+well, till you see how well we love yourself. We have hunted you hard,
+Charles. How you have contrived to avoid us, I cannot guess. You do not
+know, I suppose, that you are a rich man?"
+
+"A rich man?"
+
+"Yes. Even if Lord Saltire does not alter his will, you come into three
+thousand a year. And, besides, you are undoubtedly heir to Ravenshoe,
+though one link is still wanting to prove that."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"There is no reasonable doubt, although we cannot prove it, that your
+grandfather Petre was married previously to his marriage with Lady
+Alicia Staunton, that your father James was the real Ravenshoe, and that
+Ellen and yourself are the elder children, while poor Cuthbert and
+William----"
+
+"Cuthbert! Does he know of this? I will hide again; I will never
+displace Cuthbert, mind you."
+
+"Charles, Cuthbert will never know anything about it. Cuthbert is dead.
+He was drowned bathing last August."
+
+Hush! There is something, to me, dreadful in a man's tears. I dare say
+that it was as well, that night, that the news of Cuthbert's death
+should have made him break down and weep himself into quietness again
+like a child. I am sure it was for the best. But it is the sort of thing
+that good taste forbids one to dwell upon or handle too closely.
+
+When he was quiet again, John went on:
+
+"It seems incredible that you should have been able to elude us so long.
+The first intelligence we had of you was from Lady Ascot, who saw you in
+the Park."
+
+"Lady Ascot? I never saw my aunt in the Park."
+
+"I mean Adelaide. She is Lady Ascot now. Lord Ascot is dead."
+
+"Another of them!" said Charles. "John, before you go on, tell me how
+many more are gone."
+
+"No more. Lady Ascot and Lord Saltire are alive and well. I was with
+Lord Saltire to-day, and he was talking of you. He has left the
+principal part of his property to Ascot. But, because none of us would
+believe you dead, he has made a reservation in your favour of eighty
+thousand pounds."
+
+"I am all abroad," said Charles. "How is William?"
+
+"He is very well, as he deserves to be. Noble fellow! He gave up
+everything to hunt you through the world like a bloodhound and bring you
+back. He never ceased his quest till he saw your grave at Varna."
+
+"At Varna!" said Charles; "why, we were quartered at Devna."
+
+"At Devna! Now, my dear old boy, I am but mortal; do satisfy my
+curiosity. What regiment did you enlist in?"
+
+"In the 140th."
+
+"Then how, in the name of all confusion," cried John Marston, "did you
+miss poor Hornby?"
+
+"I did not miss Hornby," said Charles, quietly. "I had his head in my
+lap when he died. But now tell me, how on earth did you come to know
+anything about him?"
+
+"Why, Ascot told us that you had been his servant. And he came to see
+us, and joined in the chase with the best of us. How is it that he never
+sent us any intelligence of you?"
+
+"Because I never went near him till the film of death was on his eyes.
+Then he knew me again, and said a few words which I can understand now.
+Did he say anything to any of you about Ellen?"
+
+"About Ellen?"
+
+"Yes. Did Ascot ever say anything either?"
+
+"He told Lord Saltire, what I suppose you know----"
+
+"About what?"
+
+"About Ellen."
+
+"Yes, I know it all."
+
+"And that he had met you. Now tell me what you have been doing."
+
+"When I found that there was no chance of my remaining _perdu_ any
+longer, and when I found that Ellen was gone, why, then I enlisted in
+the 140th...."
+
+He paused here, and hid his face in his hands for some time. When he
+raised it again his eyes were wilder, and his speech more rapid.
+
+"I went out with Tom Sparks and the Roman-nosed bay horse; and we ran a
+thousand miles in sixty-three hours. And at Devna we got wood-pigeons;
+and the cornet went down and dined with the 42nd at Varna; and I rode
+the Roman-nosed bay, and he carried me through it capitally, I ask your
+pardon, sir, but I am only a poor discharged trooper. I would not beg,
+sir, if I could help it; but pain and hunger are hard things to bear,
+sir."
+
+"Charles, Charles, don't you know me?"
+
+"That is my name, sir. That is what they used to call me. I am no common
+beggar, sir. I was a gentleman once, sir, and rode a-horseback after a
+blue greyhound, and we went near to kill a black hare. I have a
+character from Lord Ascot, sir. I was in the light cavalry charge at
+Balaclava. An angry business. They shouldn't get good fellows to fight
+together like that. I killed one of them, sir. Hornby killed many, and
+he is a man who wouldn't hurt a fly. A sad business!"
+
+"Charles, old boy, be quiet."
+
+"When you speak to me, sir, of the distinction between the upper and
+lower classes, I answer you, that I have had some experience in that way
+of late, and have come to the conclusion that, after all, the gentleman
+and the cad are one and the same animal. Now that I am a ruined man,
+begging my bread about the streets, I make bold to say to you, sir,
+hoping that your alms may be none the less for it, that I am not sure
+that I do not like your cad as well as your gentleman, in his way. If I
+play on the one side such cards as my foster-brother William and Tom
+Sparks, you, of course, trump me with John Marston and the cornet. You
+are right; but they are all four good fellows. I have been to death's
+gate to learn it. I will resume my narrative. At Devna the cornet,
+besides wood-pigeons, shot a francolin----"
+
+It is just as well that this sort of thing did not come on when Charles
+was going home alone across the bridge; that is all I wished to call
+your attention to. The next morning, Lord and Lady Hainault, old Lady
+Ascot, William, Mary, and Father Tiernay, were round his bed, watching
+the hot head rolling from side to side upon the pillow, and listening to
+his half-uttered delirious babble, gazing with a feeling almost of
+curiosity at the well-loved face which had eluded them so long.
+
+"Oh, Hainault! Hainault!" said Lady Ascot, "to find him like this after
+all! And Saltire dead without seeing him! and all my fault, my fault. I
+am a wicked old woman; God forgive me!"
+
+Lord Hainault got the greatest of the doctors into a corner, and said:--
+
+"My dear Dr. B----, will he die?"
+
+"Well, yes," said the doctor; "to you I would sooner say yes than no,
+the chances are so heavy against him. The surgeons like the look of
+things still less than the physicians. You must really prepare for the
+worst."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXII.
+
+MR. JACKSON'S BIG TROUT.
+
+
+Of course, he did not die; I need not tell you that. B---- and P. H----
+pulled him through, and shook their honest hands over his bed. Poor
+B---- is reported to have winked on this occasion; but such a proceeding
+was so unlike him, that I believe the report must have come round to us
+through one of the American papers--probably the same one which
+represented the Prince of Wales hitting the Duke of Newcastle in the eye
+with a champagne cork.
+
+However, they pulled him through; and, in the pleasant spring-time, he
+was carried down to Casterton. Things had gone so hard with him, that
+the primroses were in blossom on the southern banks before he knew that
+Lord Saltire was dead, and before he could be made to understand that he
+was a rich man.
+
+From this much of the story we may safely deduce this moral, "That, if a
+young gentleman gets into difficulties, it is always as well for him to
+leave his address with his friends." But, as young gentlemen in
+difficulties generally take particularly good care to remind their
+friends of their whereabouts, it follows that this story has been
+written to little or no purpose. Unless, indeed, the reader can find for
+himself another moral or two; and I am fool enough to fancy that he may
+do that, if he cares to take the trouble.
+
+Casterton is built on arches, with all sorts of offices and kitchens
+under what would naturally be the ground floor. The reason why Casterton
+was built on arches (that is to say, as far as you and I are concerned)
+is this: that Charles, lying on the sofa in Lord Hainault's study, could
+look over the valley and see the river; which, if it had been built on
+the ground, he could not have done. From this window he could see the
+great weirs spouting and foaming all day; and, when he was carried up to
+bed, by William and Lord Hainault, he could hear the roar of them rising
+and pinking, as the night-wind came and went, until they lulled him to
+sleep.
+
+He lay here one day, when the doctors came down from London. And one of
+them put a handkerchief over his face, which smelt like chemical
+experiments, and somehow reminded him of Dr. Daubeny. And he fell
+asleep; and when he awoke, he was suffering pain in his left arm--not
+the old dull grinding pain, but sharper; which gradually grew less as
+he lay and watched the weirs at Casterton. They had removed the
+splinters of bone from his arm.
+
+He did not talk much in this happy quiet time. William and Lady Ascot
+were with him all day. William, dear fellow, used to sit on a footstool,
+between his sofa and the window, and read the _Times_ to him. William's
+education was imperfect, and he read very badly. He would read Mr.
+Russell's correspondence till he saw Charles's eye grow bright, and
+heard his breath quicken, and then he would turn to the list of
+bankrupts. If this was too sad he would go on to the share list, and
+pound away at that, till Charles went to sleep, which he generally did
+pretty quickly.
+
+About this time--that is to say, well in the spring--Charles asked two
+questions:--The first was, whether or no he might have the window open;
+the next, whether Lord Hainault would lend him an opera-glass?
+
+Both were answered in the affirmative. The window was opened, and Lord
+Hainault and William came in, bearing, not an opera-glass, but a great
+brass telescope, on a stand--a thing with an eight-inch object-glass,
+which had belonged to old Lord Hainault, who was a Cambridge man, and
+given to such vanities.
+
+This was very delightful. He could turn it with a move of his hand on to
+any part of the weirs, and see almost every snail which crawled on the
+burdocks. The very first day he saw one of the men from the paper-mill
+come to the fourth weir, and pull up the paddles to ease the water. The
+man looked stealthily around, and then raised a wheel from below the
+apron, full of spawning perch. And this was close time! Oho!
+
+Then, a few days after, came a tall, grey-headed gentleman, spinning a
+bleak for trout, who had with him a lad in top-boots, with a
+landing-net. And this gentleman sent his bait flying out here and there
+across the water, and rattled his line rapidly into the palm of his hand
+in a ball, like a consummate master, as he was. (King among fishermen,
+prince among gentlemen, you will read these lines, and you will be so
+good as to understand that I am talking of you.) And this gentleman spun
+all day and caught nothing.
+
+But he came the next day to the same place, and spun again. The great
+full south-westerly wind was roaring up the valley, singing among the
+budding trees, and carrying the dark, low, rainless clouds swiftly
+before it. At two, just as Lady Ascot and William had gone to lunch, and
+after Charles had taken his soup and a glass of wine, he, lying there,
+and watching this gentleman diligently, saw his rod bend, and his line
+tighten. The lad in the top-boots and the landing-net leaped up from
+where he lay; there was no doubt about it now. The old gentleman had got
+hold of a fish, and a big one.
+
+The next twenty minutes were terrible. The old gentleman gave him the
+but, and moved slowly down along the camp-shuting, and Charles followed
+him with the telescope, although his hand was shaking with excitement.
+After a time, the old gentleman began to wind up his reel, and then the
+lad, top-boots, and the landing-net, and all, slipped over the
+camp-shooting (will anybody tell me how to spell that word?
+_Camps-heading_ won't do, my dear sir, all things considered), and
+lifted the fish (he was nine pound) up among the burdocks at the old
+gentleman's feet.
+
+Charles had the whole group in the telescope--the old gentleman, the
+great trout, and the dripping lad, taking off his boots, and emptying
+the water out of them. But the old gentleman was looking to his right at
+somebody who was coming, and immediately there came into the field of
+the telescope a tall man in a velvet coat, with knee-breeches and
+gaiters, and directly afterwards, from the other side, three children
+and a young lady. The gentleman in the knee-breeches bowed to the young
+lady, and then they all stood looking at the trout.
+
+Charles could see them quite plainly. The gentleman in velveteen and
+small-clothes was Lord Ascot, and the young lady was Mary.
+
+He did not look through the telescope any more; he lay back, and tried
+to think. Presently afterwards old Lady Ascot came in, and settled
+herself in the window, with her knitting.
+
+"My dear," she said, "I wonder if I fidget you with my knitting-needles?
+Tell me if I do, for I have plenty of other work."
+
+"Not at all, dear aunt; I like it. You did nineteen rows this morning,
+and you would have done twenty-two if you had not dropped a stitch. When
+I get stronger I shall take to it myself. There would be too much
+excitement and over-exertion in it for me to begin just now."
+
+Lady Ascot laughed; she was glad to see him trying even such a feeble
+joke. She said--
+
+"My dear, Mr. Jackson has killed a trout in the weirs just now, nine
+pounds."
+
+"I know," said Charles; "I did not know the weight, but I saw the fish.
+Aunt, where is Welter--I mean, Ascot?"
+
+"Well, he is at Ranford. I suppose you know, my dear boy, that poor
+James left him nearly all his fortune. Nearly five hundred thousand
+pounds' worth, with Cottingdean and Marksworth together. All the Ranford
+mortgages are paid off, and he is going on very well, my dear. I think
+they ought to give him his marquisate. James might have had it ten times
+over, of course, but he used to say, that he had made himself the most
+notorious viscount in England, and that if he took an earldom, people
+would forget who he was."
+
+"I wish he would come to see me, aunt. I am very fond of Welter."
+
+I can't help it; he said so. Remember how near death's door he had been.
+Think what he had been through. How he had been degraded, and kicked
+about from pillar to post, like an old shoe; and also remember the state
+he was in when he said it. I firmly believe that he had at this time
+forgotten everything, and that he only remembered Lord Ascot as his old
+boy love, and his jolly college companion. You must make the best of it,
+or the worst of it for him, as you are inclined. He said so. And in a
+very short time Lady Ascot found that she wanted some more wool, and
+hobbled away to get it.
+
+After a time, Charles heard a man come into the room. He thought it was
+William; but it was not. This man came round the end of the sofa, and
+stood in the window before him. Lord Ascot.
+
+He was dressed as we know, having looked through Charles's telescope, in
+a velveteen coat, with knee breeches and leathern gaiters. There was not
+much change in him since the old times; only his broad, hairless face
+seemed redder, his lower jaw seemed coarser and more prominent, his
+great eyebrows seemed more lowering, his vast chest seemed broader and
+deeper, and altogether he looked rather more like a mighty, coarse,
+turbulent blackguard than ever.
+
+"Well, old cock," he said, "so you are on your back, hey?"
+
+"Welter," said Charles, "I am so glad to see you again. If you would
+help me up, I should like to look at you."
+
+"Poor old boy," said Lord Ascot, putting his great arm round him, and
+raising him. "So! there you are, my pippin. What a good old fellow you
+are, by Gad! So you were one of the immortal six hundred, hey? I thought
+you would turn up somewhere in Queer Street, with that infernal old hook
+nose of yours. I wish I had taken to that sort of thing, for I am fond
+of fighting. I think, now I am rich and respectable, I shall subsidise a
+prize-fighter to pitch into me once a fortnight. I wish I had been
+respectable enough for the army; but I should always have been in
+trouble with the commander-in-chief for dicing and brawling, I suppose.
+Well, old man, I am devilish glad to see you again. I am in possession
+of money which should have been yours. I did all I could for you,
+Charles; you will never know how much. I tried to repair the awful wrong
+I did you unconsciously. I did a thing in your favour I tremble to think
+of now, but which, God help me, I would do again. You don't know what I
+mean. If old Saltire had not died so quick, you would have known."
+
+He was referring to his having told Lord Saltire that he had seen
+Charles. In doing that, remember, he had thought that he was throwing
+half a million to the winds. I only tell you that he was referring to
+this, for fear you should not gather it from his own brutal way of
+speaking.
+
+I wonder how the balance will stand against Lord Ascot at last? Who ever
+could have dreamt that his strong animal affection for his old friend
+could have led him to make a sacrifice which many a more highly
+organised man would have evaded, glossing over his conscience by fifty
+mental subterfuges?
+
+"However, my dear fellow," he continued, "it comes to this: I have got
+the money; I shall have no children; and I shall make no will; therefore
+it all comes to you, if you outlive me. About the title I can't say. The
+lawyers must decide about that. No one seems to know whether or not it
+descends through the female branch. By-the-bye, you are not master of
+Ravenshoe yet, though there seems no doubt that grandma is right, and
+that the marriage took place. However, whether the estate goes to you or
+to William, I offer the same advice to both of you: if you get my money,
+don't spend it in getting the title. You can get into the House of
+Commons easy enough, if you seem to care about that sort of fun; and
+fellows I know tell me that you get much better amusement there for your
+money than in the other place. I have never been to the House of Lords
+since the night I took my seat. It struck me as being slow. The fellows
+say that there is never any chaff, or personalities, or calling to
+order, or that sort of thing there, which seem to me to be half the fun
+of the fair. But, of course, you know more about this than I."
+
+Charles, in a minute, when he had ineffectually tried to understand what
+Lord Ascot had been saying, collected his senses sufficiently to say:
+
+"Welter, old boy, look here, for I am very stupid. Why did you say that
+you should have no children?"
+
+"Of course I can't; have they told you nothing?"
+
+"Is Adelaide dead, Welter?" asked Charles, plucking at the buttons of
+his coat nervously.
+
+"They ought to have told you, Charles," said Lord Ascot, turning to the
+window. "Now tell me something. Have you any love left for her yet?"
+
+"Not one spark," said Charles, still buttoning and unbuttoning his coat.
+"If I ever am a man again, I shall ask Mary Corby to marry me. I ought
+to have done so sooner, perhaps. But I love your wife, Welter, in a way;
+and I should grieve at her death, for I loved her once. By Gad! yes; you
+know it. When did she die?"
+
+"She is not dead, Charles."
+
+"Now, don't keep me like this, old man; I can't stand it. She is no more
+to me than my sister--not so much. Tell me what is the matter at once;
+it can't be worse than what I think."
+
+"The truth is very horrible, Charles," said Lord Ascot, speaking slowly.
+"She took a fancy that I should buy back her favourite old Irish mare,
+'Molly Asthore,' and I bought it for her; and we went out hunting
+together, and we were making a nick, and I was getting the gate open for
+her, when the devil rushed it; and down they came on it together. And
+she broke her back--Oh, God! oh, God!--and the doctor says she may live
+till seventy, but that she will never move from where she lies--and just
+as I was getting to love her so dearly----"
+
+Charles said nothing; for with such a great brutal blackguard as Lord
+Ascot sobbing passionately at the window, it was as well to say nothing;
+but he thought, "Here's work to the fore, I fancy, after a life of
+laziness. I have been the object of all these dear soul's anxiety for a
+long time. She must take my place now."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXIII.
+
+IN WHICH GUS CUTS FLORA'S DOLL'S CORNS.
+
+
+That afternoon Charles said nothing more, but lay and looked out of the
+window at the rhododendrons just bursting into bloom, at the deer, at
+the rabbits, at the pheasants; and beyond, where the park dipped down so
+suddenly, at the river which spouted and foamed away as of old; and to
+the right, at the good old town of Casterton, and at the blue smoke from
+its chimneys, drifting rapidly away before the soft south-westerly wind;
+and he lay and looked at these and thought.
+
+And before sundown an arch arose in the west which grew and spread; an
+arch of pale green sky, which grew till it met the sun, and then the wet
+grass in the park shone out all golden, and the topmost cedar boughs
+began to blaze like burnished copper.
+
+And then he spoke. He said, "William, my dear old friend--loved more
+deeply than any words can tell--come here, for I have something to say
+to you."
+
+And good William came and stood beside him. And William looked at him,
+and saw that his face was animated, and that his eyes were sparkling.
+And he stood and said not a word, but smiled and waited for him to go
+on.
+
+And Charles said, "Old boy, I have been looking through that glass
+to-day, and I saw Mr. Jackson catch the trout, and I saw Welter, and I
+saw Mary; and I want you to go and fetch Mary here."
+
+And William straightway departed; and as he went up the staircase he met
+the butler, and he looked so happy, so radiant, and so thoroughly
+kind-hearted and merry, that the butler, a solemn man, found himself
+smiling as he drew politely aside to let him pass.
+
+I hope you like this fellow, William. He was, in reality, only a groom,
+say you. Well, that is true enough. A fellow without education or
+breeding, though highly born. But still, I hope you like him. I was
+forgetting myself a little, though. At this time he is master of
+Ravenshoe, with certainly nine, and probably twelve, thousand a year--a
+most eminently respectable person. One year's income of his would
+satisfy a man I know, very well, and yet I am talking of him
+apologetically. But then we novel writers have an unlimited command of
+money, if we could only realise it.
+
+However, this great capitalist went upstairs towards the nursery; and
+here I must break off, if you please, and take up the thread of my
+narrative in another place (I don't mean the House of Lords).
+
+In point of fact there had been a shindy (I use the word advisedly, and
+will repeat it)--a shindy, in the nursery that evening. The duty of a
+story-teller is to stick in a moral reflection wherever he can, and so
+at this place I pitchfork in this caution to young governesses, that
+nothing can be more incautious or reprehensible, than to give children
+books to keep them quiet without first seeing what these books are
+about.
+
+Mary was very much to blame in this case (you see I tell the truth, and
+spare nobody). Gus, Flora, and Archy had been out to walk with her, as
+we know, and had come home in a very turbulent state of mind. They had
+demanded books as the sole condition on which they would be good; and
+Mary, being in a fidget about her meeting with Lord Ascot, over the
+trout, and being not quite herself, had promptly supplied Gus with a
+number of _Blackwood's Magazine_, and Flora with a "Shakspeare."
+
+This happened early in the afternoon. Remember this; for if we are not
+particular in our chronology, we are naught.
+
+Gus turned to the advertisements. He read, among other things, a
+testimonial to a great corn-cutter, from a potentate who keeps a very
+small army, and don't mean any harm:--
+
+"(TRANSLATION.)
+
+      "Professor Homberg has cut my corns with a dexterity truly
+      marvellous.
+
+                (Signed) "NAPOLEON."
+
+From a country baronet:--
+
+      "I am satisfied with Professor Homberg.
+
+                (Signed) "PITCHCROFT COCKPOLE, Bart."
+
+From a bishop in the South Sea Islands:--
+
+      "Professor Homberg has cut my corns in a manner which does
+      equal honour to his head and his heart.
+
+                (Signed) "RANGEHAIETA."
+
+(His real name is Jones, but that is neither here nor there); and in the
+mean time Flora had been studying a certain part of "King Lear."
+
+Later in the afternoon, it occurred to Gus that he would like to be a
+corn-cutter and have testimonials. He proposed to cut nurse's corns, but
+she declined, assigning reasons. Failing here, he determined to cut
+Flora's doll's corns, and, with this view, possessed himself of her
+person during Flora's temporary absence.
+
+He began by snicking the corner of her foot off with nurse's scissors.
+Then he found that the sawdust dribbled out at the orifice. This was
+very delightful. He shook her, and it dribbled faster. Then he cut the
+other foot off and shook her again. And she, not having any stitches put
+in about the knee (as all dolls should), lost, not only the sawdust
+from her legs, but also from her stomach and body, leaving nothing but
+collapsed calico and a bust, with an undisturbed countenance of wax
+above all.
+
+At this time Flora had rushed in to the rescue; she felt the doll's
+body, and she saw the heap of sawdust; whereupon she, remembering her
+"King Lear," turned on him and said scornfully:
+
+"Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness." At this awful taunt, Gus
+butted her in the stomach, and she got hold of him by the hair. Archy,
+excited for the first time in his life, threw a box of ninepins at them,
+which exploded. Mary rushed in to separate them, and at the same moment
+in came William with a radiant face, and he quietly took Mary round the
+waist (like his impudence), and he said, "My dear creature, go down to
+Charles, and leave these Turks to me."
+
+And she left these Turks to him. And he sat on a chair and administered
+justice; and in a very few minutes, under the influence of that kind,
+happy, sunny face of his, Flora had kissed Gus, and Archy had cuddled up
+on his knee, and was sucking his thumb in peace.
+
+And going down to the hall, he found Lady Ascot hobbling up and down,
+taking her afternoon's exercise, and she said to him, "Ravenshoe, you
+best and kindest of souls, she is there with him now. My dear, we had
+better not move in this matter any more. I tried to dispossess you
+before I knew your worth and goodness, but I will do nothing now. He is
+rich, and perhaps it is better, my dear, that Ravenshoe should be in
+Papist hands--at least, in such hands as yours."
+
+He said, "My dear madam, I am not Ravenshoe. I feel sure that you are
+right. We must find Ellen."
+
+And Mary came out and came toward them; and she said, "Lady Ascot and
+Mr. Ravenshoe, Charles and I are engaged to be married."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXIV.
+
+THE ALLIED ARMIES ADVANCE ON RAVENSHOE.
+
+
+"How near the end we are getting, and yet so much to come! Never mind.
+We will tell it all naturally and straightforwardly, and then there will
+be nothing to offend you."
+
+By-and-bye it became necessary that Charles should have air and
+exercise. His arm was well. Every splinter had been taken out of it, and
+he must lie on the sofa no longer.
+
+So he was driven out through pleasant places, through the budding
+spring, in one of Lord Hainault's carriages. All the meadows had been
+bush-harrowed and rolled long ago, and now the orchises and fritillaries
+were beginning to make the grass look purple. Lady Hainault had a low
+carriage and a pair of small cobs, and this was given up to Charles;
+Lady Hainault's first coachman declined to drive her ladyship out in the
+daytime, for fear that the second coachman (a meritorious young man of
+forty) should frighten Charles by a reckless and inexperienced way of
+driving.
+
+Consequently Lady Hainault went a buying flannel petticoats and that
+sort of thing, for the poor people in Casterton and Henley, driven by
+her second coachman; and Charles was trundled all over the country by
+the first coachman, in a low carriage with a pair of cobs. But Lady
+Hainault was as well pleased with the arrangement as the old coachman
+himself, and so it is no business of ours. For the curious thing was,
+that no one who ever knew Charles would have hesitated for an instant in
+giving up to him his or her bed, or dinner, or carriage, or any other
+thing in this world. For people are great fools, you know.
+
+Perhaps the reason of it was, that every one who made Charles's
+acquaintance, knew by instinct that he would have cut off his right hand
+to serve them. I don't know why it was. But there is the fact.
+
+Sometimes Lady Ascot would go with him and sometimes William. And one
+day, when William was with him, they were bowling quietly along a
+by-road on the opposite side of the water from Henley. And in a secret
+place, they came on a wicked old gentleman, breaking the laws of his
+country, and catching perch in close time, out of a punt, with a chair,
+and a stone bottle, and a fisherman from Maidenhead, who shall be
+nameless, but who must consider himself cautioned.
+
+The Rajah of Ahmednuggur lives close by there; and he was reading the
+_Times_, when Charles asked the coachman to pull up, that he might see
+the sport. The Rajah's attention was caught by seeing the carriage
+stopped; and he looked through a double-barrelled opera-glass, and not
+only saw Charles and William in the carriage, but saw, through the
+osiers, the hoary old profligate with his paternoster pulling the perch
+out as fast as he could put his line in. Fired by a virtuous indignation
+(I wish every gentleman on the Thames would do likewise), he ran in his
+breeches and slippers down the lawn, and began blowing up like Old
+Gooseberry.
+
+The old gentleman who was fishing looked at the rajah's redbrick house,
+and said, "If my face was as ugly as that house, I would wear a green
+veil;" but he ordered the fisherman to take up the rypecks, and he
+floated away down stream.
+
+And as Charles and William drove along, Charles said, "My dear boy,
+there could not be any harm in catching a few roach. I should so like to
+go about among pleasant places in a punt once more."
+
+When they got home the head keeper was sent for. Charles told him that
+he would so much like to go fishing, and that a few roach would not make
+much difference. The keeper scornfully declined arguing about the
+matter, but only wanted to know what time Mr. Ravenshoe would like to
+go, adding, that any one who made objections would be brought up
+uncommon short.
+
+So William and he went fishing in a punt, and one day Charles said, "I
+don't care about this punt-fishing much. I wish--I wish I could get back
+to the trout at Ravenshoe."
+
+"Do you really mean that?" said William.
+
+"Ah, Willy!" said Charles. "If I could only see it again!"
+
+"How I have been waiting to hear you say that!" said William. "Come to
+your home with me; why, the people are wondering where we are. My
+darling bird will be jealous, if I stay here much longer. Come down to
+my wedding."
+
+"When are you to be married, William?"
+
+"On the same day as yourself," said William, sturdily.
+
+Said Charles, "Put the punt ashore, will you?" And they did. And
+Charles, with his nose in the air, and his chest out, walked beside
+William across the spring meadows, through the lengthening grass,
+through the calthas, and the orchises, and the ladies' slippers, and the
+cowslips, and the fritillaries, through the budding flower garden which
+one finds in spring among the English meadows, a hale, strong man. And
+when they had clomb the precipitous slope of the deer-park, Charles
+picked a rhododendron flower, and put it in his button-hole, and turned
+round to William, with the flush of health on his face, and said--
+
+"Brother, we will go to Ravenshoe, and you will be with your love. Shall
+we be married in London?"
+
+"In St. Petersburgh, if you like, now I see you looking your old self
+again. But why?"
+
+"A fancy of mine. When I remember what T went through in London through
+my own obstinacy, I should like to take my revenge on the place, by
+spending the happiest day of my life there. Do you agree?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Ask Lady Ascot and Mary and the children down to Ravenshoe. Lady
+Hainault will come too, but he can't. And have General Mainwaring and
+the Tiernays. Have as many of the old circle as we can get."
+
+"This is something like life again," said William. "Remember, Charles, I
+am not spending the revenues of Ravenshoe. They are yours. I know it. I
+am spending about £400 a year. When our grandfather's marriage is
+proved, you will provide for me and my wife, I know that. Be quiet. But
+we shall never prove that till we find Ellen."
+
+"Find Ellen!" exclaimed Charles, turning round. "I will not go near
+Ellen yet."
+
+"Do you know where she is?" asked William, eagerly.
+
+"Of course I do," said Charles. "She is at Hackney. Hornby told me so
+when he was dying. But let her be for a time."
+
+"I tell you," said William, "that I am sure that she knows everything.
+At Hackney!"
+
+The allied powers, General Mainwaring, Lady Ascot, Lord Hainault, and
+William, were not long before they searched every hole and corner of
+Hackney, in and out. There was only one nunnery there, but, in that
+nunnery, there was no young lady at all resembling Ellen. The priests,
+particularly Father Mackworth's friend Butler, gave them every
+assistance in their power. But it was no good.
+
+As Charles and William were in the railway carriage going westward,
+Charles said--
+
+"Well, we have failed to find Ellen. Mackworth, poor fellow, is still at
+Ravenshoe."
+
+"Yes," said William, "and nearly idiotic. All his fine-spun cobwebs cast
+to the winds. But he holds the clue to the mystery, or I am mistaken.
+The younger Tiernay takes care of him. He probably won't know you. But
+Charles, when you come into Ravenshoe, keep a corner for Mackworth."
+
+"He ought to be an honoured guest of the house as long as he lives,"
+said Charles. "You still persist in saying that Ravenshoe is mine."
+
+"I am sure it is," said William.
+
+And, at the same time, William wrote to two other people telling all
+about the state of affairs, and asking them to come and join the circle.
+And John Marston came across into my room, and said, "Let us go." And I
+said, "My dear John, we ought to go. It is not every day that we see a
+man, and such a man, risen from the dead, as Charles Ravenshoe."
+
+And so we went.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXV.
+
+FATHER MACKWORTH PUTS THE FINISHING TOUCH ON HIS GREAT PIECE OF
+EMBROIDERY.
+
+
+And so we went. At Ravenshoe were assembled General Mainwaring, Lady
+Ascot, Mary, Gus, Flora, Archy and nurse, William, Charles, Father
+Tiernay and Father Murtagh Tiernay, John Marston, and Tommy Cruse from
+Clovelly, a little fisherboy, cousin of Jane Evans's--Jane Evans, who
+was to be Mrs. Ravenshoe.
+
+It became necessary that Jane Evans should be presented to Lady Ascot.
+She was only a fisherman's daughter, but she was wonderfully beautiful,
+and gentle, and good. William brought her into the hall one evening,
+when every one was sitting round the fire; and he said, "My dear madam,
+this is my wife that is to be." Nothing more.
+
+And the dear old woman rose and kissed her, and said, "My love, how
+wonderfully pretty you are. You must learn to love me, you know, and you
+must make haste about it, because I am a very old woman, and I sha'n't
+live very long."
+
+So Jane sat down by Mary, and was at home, though a little nervous. And
+General Mainwaring came and sat beside her, and made himself as
+agreeable as very few men beside him know how to. And the fisherboy got
+next to William, and stared about with his great black eyes, like a deer
+in a flower-garden. (You caught that face capitally, Mr. Hook, if you
+will allow me to say so--best painter of the day!)
+
+Jane Evans was an immense success. She had been to school six months at
+Exeter, and had possibly been drilled in a few little matters; such as
+how to ask a gentleman to hold her fan; how to sit down to the piano
+when asked to sing (which she couldn't do); how to marshal her company
+to dinner; how to step into the car of a balloon; and so on. Things
+absolutely necessary to know, of course, but which had nothing to do
+with her success in this case; for she was so beautiful, gentle, and
+winning, that she might have done anything short of eating with her
+knife, and would have been considered nice.
+
+Had she a slight Devonshire accent? Well, well! Do you know, I rather
+like it. I consider it equally so good with the Scotch, my dear.
+
+I could linger and linger on about this pleasant spring at old
+Ravenshoe, but I must not. You have been my companion so long that I am
+right loth to part with you. But the end is very near.
+
+Charles had his revenge upon the trout. The first day after he had
+recovered from his journey, he and William went out and did most
+terrible things. William would not carry a rod, but gave his to the
+servant, and took the landing-net. That Ravenshoe stream carries the
+heaviest fish in Devonshire. Charles worked up to the waterfall, and got
+nineteen, weighing fourteen pounds. Then they walked down to the weir
+above the bridge, and then Charles's evil genius prompted him to say,
+"William, have you got a salmon-fly in your book?" And William told him
+that he had, but solemnly warned him of what would happen.
+
+Charles was reckless and foolish. He, with a twelve-foot trout rod, and
+thirty yards of line, threw a small salmon fly under the weir above the
+bridge. There was a flash on the water. Charles's poor little reel began
+screaming, and the next moment the line came "flick" home across his
+face, and he said, "By gosh, what a fool I was," and then he looked up
+to the bridge, and there was Father Mackworth looking at him.
+
+"How d'ye do, my dear sir," said Charles. "Glad to see you out. I have
+been trying to kill a salmon with trout tackle, and have done quite the
+other thing."
+
+Father Mackworth looked at him, but did not speak a word. Then he looked
+round, and young Murtagh Tiernay came up and led him away; and Charles
+got up on the road and watched the pair going home. And as he saw the
+tall narrow figure of Father Mackworth creeping slowly along, dragging
+his heels as he went, he said, "Poor old fellow, I hope he will live to
+forgive me."
+
+Father Mackworth, poor fellow, dragged his heels homeward; and when he
+got into his room in the priest's tower, Murtagh Tiernay said to him,
+"My dear friend, you are not angry with me? I did not tell you that he
+was come back, I thought it would agitate you."
+
+And Father Mackworth said slowly, for all his old decisive utterance was
+gone, "The Virgin bless you, you are a good man."
+
+And Father Mackworth spoke truth. Both the Tiernays were good fellows,
+though papists.
+
+"Let me help you off with your coat," said Murtagh, for Mackworth was
+standing in deep thought.
+
+"Thank you," said Mackworth. "Now, while I sit here, go and fetch your
+brother."
+
+Murtagh Tiernay did as he was told. In a few minutes our good jolly old
+Irish friend was leaning over Mackworth's chair.
+
+"Ye're not angry that we didn't tell ye there was company?" he said.
+
+"No, no," said Mackworth. "Don't speak to me, that's a good man. Don't
+confuse me. I am going. You had better send Murtagh out of the room."
+
+Father Murtagh disappeared.
+
+"I am going," said Mackworth. "Tiernay, we were not always good friends,
+were we?"
+
+"We are good friends, any way, now, brother," said Tiernay.
+
+"Ay, ay, you are a good man. I have done a wrong. I did it for the sake
+of the Church partly, and partly----well, I was very fond of Cuthbert. I
+loved that boy, Tiernay. And I spun a web. But it has all got confused.
+It is on this left side which feels so heavy. They shouldn't make one's
+brains in two halves, should they?"
+
+"Begorra no. It's a burning shame," said Father Tiernay, determining,
+like a true Irishman, to agree with every word said, and find out what
+was coming.
+
+"That being the case, my dear friend," said poor Mackworth, "give me the
+portfolio and ink, and we will let our dear brother Butler know, _de
+profundis clamavi_, that the time is come."
+
+Father Tiernay said, "That will be the proper course," and got him pen
+and ink, fully assured that another fit was coming on, and that he was
+wandering in his mind; but still watching to see whether he would let
+out anything. A true Irishman.
+
+Mackworth let out nothing. He wrote, as steadily as he could, a letter
+of two lines, and put it in an envelope. Then he wrote another letter of
+about three lines, and enclosed the whole in a larger envelope, and
+closed it. Then he said to Father Tiernay, "Direct it to Butler, will
+you, my dear friend; you quite agree that I have done right?"
+
+Father Tiernay said that he had done quite right; but wondered what the
+dickens it was all about. We soon found out. But we walked, and rode,
+and fished, and chatted, and played billiards, and got up charades with
+Lady Ascot for an audience; not often thinking of the poor paralytic
+priest in the lonely tower, and little dreaming of the mine which he was
+going to spring under our feet.
+
+The rows (there is no other expression) that used to go on between
+Father Tiernay and Lady Ascot were as amusing as anything I ever heard.
+I must do Tiernay the justice to say that he was always perfectly well
+bred, and also, that Lady Ascot began it. Her good temper, her humour,
+and her shrewdness were like herself; I can say no more. Tiernay dodged,
+and shuffled, and went from pillar to post, and was as witty and
+good-humoured as an Irishman can be; but I, as a staunch Protestant, am
+of opinion that Lady Ascot, though nearly ninety, had the best of it. I
+daresay good Father Tiernay don't agree with me.
+
+The younger Tiernay was always in close attendance on Mackworth. Every
+one got very fond of this young priest. We used to wait until Father
+Mackworth was reported to be in bed, and then he was sent for. And
+generally we used to make an excuse to go into the chapel, and Lady
+Ascot would come, defiant of rheumatism, and we would get him to the
+organ.
+
+And then--Oh, Lord! how he would make that organ speak, and plead, and
+pray, till the prayer was won. And then, how he would send aggregated
+armies of notes, marching in vast battalions one after another, out into
+space, to die in confused melody; and then, how he would sound the
+trumpet to recall them, and get no answer but the echo of the roof. Ah,
+well, I hope you are fond of music, reader.
+
+But one night we sent for him, and he could not come. And later we sent
+again, but he did not come; and the man we had sent, being asked, looked
+uneasy, and said he did not know why. By this time the ladies had gone
+to bed. General Mainwaring, Charles, William, John Marston, and myself,
+were sitting over the fire in the hall, smoking, and little Tommy Cruse
+was standing between William's knees.
+
+The candles and the fire were low. There was light outside from a
+clouded moon, so that one could see the gleam of the sea out of the
+mullioned windows. Charles was stooping down, describing the battle of
+the Alma on the hearthrug, and William was bending over, watching him,
+holding the boy between his knees, as I said. General Mainwaring was
+puffing his cigar, and saying, "Yes, yes; that's right enough;" and
+Marston and I were, like William, looking at Charles.
+
+Suddenly the boy gave a loud cry, and hid his face in William's bosom. I
+thought he had been taken with a fit. I looked up over General
+Mainwaring's head, and I cried out, "My God! what is this?"
+
+We were all on our legs in a moment, looking the same way. At the long
+low mullioned window which had been behind General Mainwaring. The
+clouded moonlight outside showed us the shape of it. But between us and
+it there stood three black figures, and as we looked at them, we drew
+one towards the other, for we were frightened. The General took two
+steps forward.
+
+One of the figures advanced noiselessly. It was dressed in black, and
+its face was shrouded in a black hood. In that light, with that silent,
+even way of approaching, it was the most awful figure I ever saw. And
+from under its hood came a woman's voice, the sound of which made the
+blood of more than one to stand still, and then go madly on again. It
+said:--
+
+"I am Ellen Ravenshoe. My sins and my repentance are known to some here.
+I have been to the war, in the hospitals, till my health gave way, and I
+came home but yesterday, as it were, and I have been summoned here.
+Charles, I was beautiful once. Look at this."
+
+And she drew her hood back, and we looked at her in the dim light.
+Beautiful once! Ay, but never so beautiful as now. The complexion was
+deadly pale, and the features were pinched, but she was more beautiful
+than ever. I declare I believe that if we had seen a ring of glory round
+her head at that moment none of us would have been surprised. Just then,
+her beauty, her nun's dress, and the darkness of the hall, assisted the
+illusion, probably; but there was really something saint-like and
+romantic about her, for an instant or so, which made us all stand
+silent. Alas! there was no ring of glory round her head. Poor Ellen was
+only bearing the cross; she had not won the crown.
+
+Charles was the first who spoke or moved; he went up to her, and kissed
+her, and said, "My sweet sister, I knew that if I ever saw you again I
+should see you in these weeds. My dear love, I am so glad to see you.
+And oh, my sister, how much more happy to see you dressed like that----"
+
+(Of course he did not use exactly those words, but words to that effect,
+only more passionate and even less grammatical. I am not a shorthand
+writer. I only give you the substance of conversations in the best prose
+I can command.)
+
+"Charles," said she, "I do right to wear weeds, for I am the widow
+of--(Never mind what she said; that sort of thing very properly jars on
+Protestant ears). I am a sister of the Society of Mercy of St. Bridget,
+and I have been to the East, as I told you: and more than once I must
+have been into the room where you lay, to borrow things, or talk with
+English Catholic ladies, and never guessed you were there. After Hornby
+had found me at Hackney, I got leave from Father Butler to join an Irish
+sisterhood; for our mother was Irish in speech and in heart, you
+remember, though not by birth. I have something to say--something very
+important. Father Mackworth, will you come here? Are all here intimate
+friends of the family? Will you ask any of them to leave the hall,
+Charles?"
+
+"Not one," said Charles. "Is one of those dark figures which have
+frightened us so much Father Mackworth? My dear sir, I am so sorry. Come
+to the fire; and who is the other?"
+
+"Only Murtagh Tiernay," said a soft voice.
+
+"Why did you stand out there these few minutes? Father Mackworth, your
+arm."
+
+William and Charles helped him in towards the fire. He looked terribly
+ill and ghastly. The dear old general took him from them, and sat him
+down in his own chair by the fire; and there he sat looking curiously
+around him, with the light of the wood fire and the candles strong on
+his face, while Ellen stood behind him, with her hood thrown back, and
+her white hands folded on her bosom. If you have ever seen a stranger
+group than we were, I should be glad to hear of it.
+
+Poor Mackworth seemed to think that it was expected of him to speak. He
+looked up to General Mainwaring, and he said--
+
+"I hope you are better of your wound, sir. I have had a sharp stroke of
+paralysis, and I have another coming on, sir, and my memory is going.
+When you meet my Lord Saltire, whom I am surprised to find absent
+to-night, you will tell him that I presented my compliments, and thought
+that he had used me very well on the whole. Had she not better begin,
+sir? or it may be too late; unless you would like to wait for Lord
+Saltire."
+
+Father Murtagh Tiernay knelt down and whispered to him.
+
+"Ay! ay!" he said, "Dead--ay! so he is, I had forgotten. We shall all be
+dead soon. Some of us will to hell, General, and some to heaven, and all
+to purgatory. I am a priest, sir. I have been bound body and soul to the
+Church from a child, and I have done things which the Church will
+disapprove of when they are told, though not while they are kept secret;
+and I tell them because the eyes of a dead man, of a man who was drowned
+bathing in the bay, haunt me day and night, and say, Speak
+out!--Murtagh!"
+
+Little Tiernay was kneeling beside him, and called his attention to him.
+
+"You had better give me the wine; for the end is getting very near. Tell
+her to begin."
+
+And while poor Mackworth was taking some wine (poor fellow, it was
+little enough he had taken in his lifetime), Ellen began to speak. I had
+some notion that we should know everything now. We had guessed the truth
+for a long while. We had guessed everything about Petre Ravenshoe's
+marriage. We believed in it. We seemed to know all about it, from Lady
+Ascot. No link was wanting in the chain of proof, save one, the name of
+the place in which that marriage took place. That had puzzled every one.
+Lady Ascot declared it was a place in the north of Hampshire, as you
+will remember, but every register had been searched there, without
+result. So conceive how we all stared at poor Ellen when she began to
+speak, wondering whether she knew as much as ourselves, or even more.
+
+"I am Miss Ravenshoe," she said quietly. "My brother Charles there is
+heir to this estate; and I have come here to-night to tell you so."
+
+There was nothing new here. We knew all about that. I stood up and put
+my arm through Charles Ravenshoe's, and William came and laid his hand
+upon my shoulder. The general stood before the fire, and Ellen went on.
+
+"Petre Ravenshoe was married in 1778 to Maria Dawson, and his son was
+James Ravenshoe, my father, who was called Horton, and was Densil
+Ravenshoe's gamekeeper. I have proof of this."
+
+So had we. We knew all this. What did she know more? It was intolerable
+that she was to stop just here, and leave the one awful point
+unanswered. I forgot my good manners utterly; I clutched Charles's arm
+tighter, and I cried out--
+
+"We know about the marriage, Miss Ravenshoe; we have known of it a long
+while. But where did it take place, my dear young lady? Where?"
+
+She turned on me and answered, wondering at my eagerness. _I_ had
+brought out the decisive words at last, the words that we had been dying
+to hear for sixth months; she said--
+
+"At Finchampstead, in Berkshire; I have a copy of the certificate with
+me."
+
+I let go of Charles's arm, and fell back in my chair. My connection with
+this story is over (except the trouble of telling it, which I beg you
+won't mention, for it has given me as much pleasure as it has you; and
+that, if you look at it in a proper point of view, is quite just, for
+very few men have a friend who has met with such adventures as Charles
+Ravenshoe, who will tell them all about it afterwards). I fell back in
+my chair, and stared at poor Father Mackworth as if he were a copper
+disk, and I was trying to get into a sufficiently idiotic state to be
+electro-biologised.
+
+"I have very little more to tell," said Ellen. "I was not aware that you
+knew so much. From Mr. William Marston's agitation, I conclude that I
+have supplied the only link which was missing. I think that Father
+Mackworth wishes to explain to you why he sent for me to come here
+to-night. If he feels himself able to do so now, I shall be glad to be
+dismissed."
+
+Father Mackworth sat up in his chair, and spoke at once. He had gathered
+himself up for the effort, and went through it well, though with halting
+and difficult speech.
+
+"I knew of Petre Ravenshoe's marriage from Father Clifford, with all the
+particulars. It had been confessed to him. He told it to me the day Mrs.
+Ravenshoe died, after Densil Ravenshoe had told me that his second son
+was to be brought up to the Protestant faith. I went to him in a furious
+passion, and he told me about this previous marriage which had been
+confessed to him, to quiet me. It showed me, that if the worst were to
+happen, and Cuthbert were to die, and Ravenshoe go to a Protestant, I
+could still bring in a Catholic as a last resource. For if Cuthbert had
+died, and Norah had not confessed about the changing of the children, I
+should have brought in James, and after him William, both Catholics,
+believing him to be the son of James and Norah. Do you understand?
+
+"Why did I not? I loved that boy Cuthbert. And it was told under seal of
+confession, and must not be used save in deadly extremity, and William
+was a turbulent boy. Which would have been the greater crime at that
+time? It was only a choice of evils, for the Church is very dear to me.
+
+"Then Norah confessed to me about the change of children, and then I
+saw, that by speaking of Petre Ravenshoe's marriage I should only bring
+in a Protestant heir. But I saw, also, that, by using her confession
+only, I could prove Charles Ravenshoe to be merely a gamekeeper's son,
+and turn him out into the world, and so I used it, sir. You used to
+irritate and insult me, sir," he said, turning to Charles, "and I was
+not so near death then as now. If you can forgive me, in God's name say
+so."
+
+Charles went over to him, and put his arm round him "Forgive you?" he
+said; "dear Mackworth, can you forgive me?"
+
+"Well, well!" he continued, "what have I to forgive, Charles? At one
+time, I thought if I spoke that it would be better, because Ellen, the
+only daughter of the house, would have had a great dower, as Ravenshoe
+girls have. But I loved Cuthbert too well. And Lord Welter stopped my
+even thinking of doing so, by coming to Ravenshoe. And--and--we are all
+gentlemen here. The day that you hunted the black hare, I had been
+scolding her for writing to him. And William and I made her mad between
+us, and she ran away to him. And she is with the army now, Charles. I
+should not fetch her back, Charles. She is doing very good work there."
+
+By this time she had drawn the black hood over her face, and was
+standing behind him, motionless.
+
+"I will answer any more questions you like to-morrow. Petre Ravenshoe's
+marriage took place at Finchampstead, remember. Charles, my dear boy,
+would you mind kissing me? I think I always loved you, Charles. Murtagh
+Tiernay, take me to my room."
+
+And so he went tottering away through the darkness. Charles opened the
+door for him. Ellen stood with her hood over her face, motionless.
+
+"I can speak like this with my face hidden," she said. "It is easy for
+one who has been through what I have, to speak. What I have been you
+know, what I am now is--(she used one of those Roman Catholic forms of
+expression, which are best not repeated too often). I have a little to
+add to this statement. William was cruel to me. You know you were. You
+were wrong. I will not go on. You were awfully unjust--you were horribly
+unjust. The man who has just left the room had some slight right to
+upbraid me. You had none. You were utterly wrong. Mackworth, in one way,
+is a very high-minded honourable man. You made me hate you, William. God
+forgive me. I have forgiven you now."
+
+"Yes; I was wrong," said William, "I was wrong. But Ellen, Ellen! before
+old friends, only with regard to the person."
+
+"When you treated me so ill, I was as innocent as your mother, sir. Let
+us go on. This man Mackworth knew more than you. We had some terrible
+scenes together about Lord Welter. One day he lost his temper, and
+became theatrical. He opened his desk and showed me a bundle of papers,
+which he waved in the air, and said they contained my future destiny.
+The next day I went to the carpenter's shop and took a chisel. I broke
+open his desk, and possessed myself of them. I found the certificate of
+Petre Ravenshoe's marriage. I knew that you, William, as I thought, and
+I were the elder children. But I loved Cuthbert and Charles better than
+you or myself, and I would not speak. When, afterwards, Father Butler
+told me while I was with Lord Welter, before I joined the sisters, of
+the astounding fact of the change of children, I still held my peace,
+because I thought Charles would be the better of penance for a year or
+so, and because I hesitated to throw the power of a house like this
+into heretic hands, though it were into the hands of my own brother.
+Mackworth and Butler were to some extent enemies, I think; for Butler
+seems not to have told Mackworth that I was with him for some time, and
+I hardly know how he found it out at last. Three days ago I received
+this letter from Mackworth, and after some hesitation I came. For I
+thought that the Church could not be helped by wrong, and I wanted to
+see that he concealed nothing. Here it is. I shall say no more."
+
+And she departed, and I have not seen her since. Perhaps she is best
+where she is. I got a sight of the letter from Father Mackworth. It ran
+thus--
+
+"Come here at once, I order you. I am going to tell the truth. Charles
+has come back. I will not bear the responsibility any longer."
+
+Poor Mackworth! He went back to his room, attended by the kind-hearted
+young priest, who had left his beloved organ at Segur, to come and
+attend to him. Lord Segur pished and pshawed, and did something more,
+which we won't talk about, for which he had to get absolution. But
+Murtagh Tiernay stayed at Ravenshoe, defying his lordship, and his
+lordship's profane oaths, and making the Ravenshoe organ talk to Father
+Mackworth about quiet churchyards and silent cloisters; and sometimes
+raging on until the poor paralytic priest began to see the great gates
+rolled back, and the street of the everlasting city beyond, crowded with
+glorious angels. Let us leave these two to their music. Before we went
+to town for the wedding, we were sitting one night, and playing at loo,
+in the hall. (Not guinea unlimited loo, as they used to play at Lord
+Welter's, but penny loo, limited to eighteen pence.) General Mainwaring
+had been looed in miss four times running, making six shillings (an
+almost impossible circumstance, but true), and Lady Ascot had been
+laughing at him so, that she had to take off her spectacles and wipe
+them, when Murtagh Tiernay came into the hall, and took away Charles,
+and his brother Father Tiernay.
+
+The game was dropped soon after this. At Ravenshoe there was an
+old-fashioned custom of having a great supper brought into the hall at
+ten. A silly old custom, seeing that every one had dined at seven.
+Supper was brought in, and every one sat down to table. All sorts of
+things were handed to one by the servants, but no one ate anything. No
+one ever did. But the head of the table was empty, Charles was absent.
+
+After supper was cleared away, every one drew in a great circle round
+the fire, in the charming old-fashioned way one sees very seldom now,
+for a talk before we went to bed. But nobody talked much. Only Lady
+Ascot said, "I shall not go upstairs till he comes back. General, you
+may smoke your cigar, but here I sit."
+
+General Mainwaring would not smoke his cigar, even up the chimney.
+Almost before he had time to say so, Charles and Father Tiernay came
+into the room, without saying a word, and Charles, passing through the
+circle, pushed the logs on the hearth together with his foot.
+
+"Charles," said Lady Ascot, "has anything happened?"
+
+"Yes, aunt."
+
+"Is he dead?"
+
+"Yes, aunt."
+
+"I thought so," said Lady Ascot, "I hope he has forgiven me any hard
+thoughts I had of him. I could have been brought to love that man in
+time. There were a great many worse men than he, sir," she added, in her
+old clear ringing tones, turning to Father Tiernay. "There were a great
+many worse men than he."
+
+"There were a great many worse men, Lady Ascot," said Father Tiernay.
+"There have been many worse men with better opportunities. He was a good
+man brought up in a bad school. A good man spoilt. General Mainwaring,
+you who are probably more honoured than any man in England just now, and
+are worthy of it; you who can't stop at a street corner without a crowd
+getting together to hurrah to you; you, the very darling of the nation,
+are going to Oxford to be made an honorary Doctor of Laws. And when you
+go into that theatre, and hear the maddening music of those boys' voices
+cheering you: then, general, don't get insane with pride, like Herod,
+but think what you might have been with Mackworth's opportunities."
+
+I think we all respected the Irishman for speaking up for his friend,
+although his speech might be extravagant. But I am sure that no one
+respected him more sincerely than our valiant, humble, old friend,
+General Mainwaring.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXVI.
+
+GUS AND FLORA ARE NAUGHTY IN CHURCH, AND THE WHOLE BUSINESS COMES TO AN
+END.
+
+
+Charles's purpose of being married in London held good. And I need not
+say that William's held good too.
+
+Shall I insult your judgment by telling you that the whole story of
+Petre Ravenshoe's marriage at Finchampstead was true? I think not. The
+register was found, the lawyers were busy down at Ravenshoe, for every
+one was anxious to get up to London, and have the two marriages over
+before the season was too far advanced.
+
+The memorabilia about this time at Ravenshoe, were--The weather was
+glorious. (I am not going to give you any more about the two capes, and
+that sort of thing. You have had those two capes often enough. And I am
+reserving my twenty-ninth description of the Ravenshoe scenery for the
+concluding chapter.) The weather, I say, was glorious. And I was always
+being fetched in from the river, smelling fishy, and being made to
+witness deeds. I got tired of writing my name. I may have signed away
+the amount of the national debt in triplicate, for anything I know (or
+care. For you can't get blood out of a stone). I signed some fifty of
+them, I think. But I signed two which gave me great pleasure.
+
+The first was a rent-charge on Ravenshoe of two thousand a year, in
+favour of William Ravenshoe. The second was a similar deed of five
+hundred a year in favour of Miss Ravenshoe. We will now have done with
+all this sordid business, and go on.
+
+The ladies had all left for town, to prepare for the ceremony. There was
+a bachelors' house at Ravenshoe for the last time. The weather was hot.
+Charles Ravenshoe, General Mainwaring, and the rest, were all looking
+out of the dining-room windows towards the sea, when we were astonished
+by seeing two people ride up on to the terrace, and stop before the
+porch.
+
+A noble-looking old gentleman, in a blue coat and brass buttons,
+knee-breeches and gaiters, on a cob, and a beautiful boy of sixteen on a
+horse. _I_ knew well enough who it was, and I said, Ho! But the others
+wondered. William would have known, had he been looking out of window
+just then, but by the time he got there, the old gentleman and the boy
+were in the porch, and two of Charles's men were walking the horses up
+and down.
+
+"Now, who the deuce is this?" said Charles. "They haven't come far; but
+I don't know them. I seem to know the old man, somehow; but I can't
+remember."
+
+We heard the old gentleman's heavy step along the hall, and then the
+door was thrown open, and the butler announced, like a true Devonshire
+man--
+
+"Mr. Humby to Hele!"
+
+The old gentleman advanced with a frank smile and took Charles's hand,
+and said, "Welcome home, sir; welcome to your own; welcome to Ravenshoe.
+A Protestant at Ravenshoe at last. After so many centuries."
+
+Everybody had grown limp and faint when they heard the awful name of
+Humby, that is to say, every one but me. Of course I had nothing to do
+with fetching him over. Not at all. This was the first time that a Humby
+had had friendly communication with a Ravenshoe for seven hundred and
+eighty-nine years. The two families had quarrelled in 1066, in
+consequence of John Humby having pushed against Kempion Ravenshoe, in
+the grand rush across the Senlac, at the battle of Hastings. Kempion
+Ravenshoe had asked John Humby where he was shoving to, and John Humby
+had expressed a wish to punch Kempion Ravenshoe's head (or do what went
+for the same thing in those times. I am no antiquarian). The wound was
+never healed. The two families located themselves on adjoining estates
+in Devonshire immediately after the Conquest, but never spoke till 1529,
+when Lionel Humby bit his thumb at our old friend, Alured Ravenshoe, in
+Cardinal Wolsey's antechamber, at Hampton, and Alured Ravenshoe asked
+him, what the devil he meant by that. They fought in Twickenham meadow,
+but held no relations for two hundred and fourteen years, that is to
+say, till 1745, when Ambrose Ravenshoe squeezed an orange at Chichester
+Humby, at an election dinner in Stonnington, and Body Fortescue went out
+as second to Chichester Humby, and Lord Segur to Ambrose Ravenshoe.
+After this the families did not speak again for one hundred and ten
+years, that is to say, till the time we are speaking of, the end of
+April, 1855, when James Humby to Hele frightened us all out of our wits,
+by coming into the dining-room at Ravenshoe, in a blue coat and brass
+buttons, and shaking hands with Charles, and saying, beside what I have
+written above--
+
+"Mrs. Humby and my daughters are in London for the season, and I go to
+join them the day after to-morrow. There has been a slight cloud between
+the two houses lately" (that is to say, as we know it, for seven hundred
+and eighty-nine years. But what is time?) "and I wish to remove it. I am
+not a very old man, but I have my whimsies, my dear sir. I wish my
+daughters to appear among Miss Corby's bridesmaids, and do you know, I
+fancy when you get to London that you will find the whole matter
+arranged."
+
+Who was to resist this? Old Humby went up in the train with all of us
+the next day but one. And if I were asked to pick out the most
+roystering, boisterous, jolly old county member in England, Scotland, or
+Ireland, I should pick out old Humby of Hele. What fun he made at the
+stations where the express stopped! The way he allowed himself to be
+fetched out of the refreshment-room by the guard, and then, at the last
+moment, engaged him in a general conversation about the administration
+of the line, until the station-master was mad, and an accident imminent,
+was worthy of a much younger man, to say the least. But then, in a blue
+coat and brass buttons, with drab small clothes, you may do anything.
+They are sure to take you for a swell. If I, William Marston, am ever
+old enough, and fat enough, and rich enough, I shall dress like that
+myself, for reasons. If my figure does not develop, I shall try black
+br--ch--s and gaiters, with a shovel hat, and a black silk waistcoat
+buttoned up under my throat. That very often succeeds. Either are better
+than pegtops and a black bowler hat, which strike no awe into the
+beholders.
+
+When we all got to town, we were, of course, very busy. There was a
+great deal of millinery business. Old Humby insisted on helping at it.
+One day he went to Madame Tulle's, in Conduit Street, with his wife and
+two daughters, and asked me to come too, for which I was sorry at first,
+for he behaved very badly, and made a great noise. We were in a great
+suite of rooms on the first floor, full of crinolines and that sort of
+thing, and there were a great many people present. I was trying to keep
+him quiet, for he was cutting a good many clumsy jokes, as an
+old-fashioned country squire will. Everybody was amused with him, and
+thoroughly appreciated his fun, save his own wife and daughters, who
+were annoyed; so I was trying to keep him quiet, when a tall,
+brown-faced, handsome young man came up to me and said--
+
+"I beg a thousand pardons; but is not your name Marston?"
+
+I said, "Yes."
+
+"You are a first cousin of John Marston, are you not?--of John Marston,
+whom I used to meet at Casterton?"
+
+I said, "Yes; that John Marston was my cousin." But I couldn't remember
+my man, for all that.
+
+"You don't remember me! I met you once at old Captain Archer's, at
+Lashbrook, for ten minutes. My wife has come here to buy fal-lals for
+Charles Ravenshoe's wedding. He is going to marry my cousin. My name is
+George Corby. I have married Miss Ellen Blockstrop, daughter of Admiral
+Blockstrop. Her eldest sister married young Captain Archer of the
+merchant service."
+
+I felt very faint, but I congratulated him. The way those Australians do
+business shames us old-country folk. To get over a heavy disappointment
+and be married in two months and a week is very creditable.
+
+"We bushmen are rough fellows," he said. (His manners were really
+charming. I never saw them beaten.) "But you old-country fellows must
+excuse us. Will you give me the pleasure of your acquaintance? I am sure
+you must be a good fellow, for your cousin is one of the best fellows I
+ever knew."
+
+"I should be delighted." And I spoke the truth.
+
+"I will introduce you to my wife directly," he said; "but the fact is,
+she is just now having a row with Madame Tulle, the milliner here. My
+wife is a deuced economical woman, and she wants to show at the
+Ravenshoe wedding in a white moiré-antique, which will only cost fifty
+guineas, and which she says will do for an evening dress in Australia
+afterwards. And the Frenchwoman won't let her have it for the purpose,
+because she says it is incorrect. And I hope to Gad the Frenchwoman will
+win, because my wife will get quite as good a gown to look at for twenty
+guineas or so."
+
+Squire Humby begged to be introduced. Which I did.
+
+"I am glad, sir," he said, "that my daughters have not heard your
+conversation. It would have demoralised them, sir, for the rest of their
+lives. I hope they have not heard the argument about the fifty-guinea
+gown. If they have, I am a ruined man. It was one of you Australians who
+gave twelve hundred guineas for the bull, 'Master Butterfly,' the day
+before yesterday?"
+
+"Well, yes," said George Corby, "I bought the bull. He'll pay, sir,
+handsomely, in our part of the world."
+
+"The devil he will," said Squire Humby. "You don't know an opening for a
+young man of sixty-five, with a blue coat and brass buttons, who
+understands his business, in your part of the country, do you?"
+
+And so on. The weddings took place at St. Peter's, Eaton Square. If the
+ghost of the little shoeblack had been hovering round the wall where he
+had played fives with the brass button, he might have almost heard the
+ceremony performed. Mary and Charles were not a handsome couple. The
+enthusiasm of the population was reserved for William and Jane Evans,
+who certainly were. It is my nature to be a Jack-of-all-trades, and so I
+was entrusted with old Master Evans, Jane's father, a magnificent old
+sea-king, whom we have met before. We two preferred to go to church
+quietly before the others, and he, refusing to go into a pew, found
+himself a place in the free seats, and made himself comfortable. So I
+went out into the porch, and waited till they came.
+
+I waited till the procession had gone in, and then I found that the tail
+of it was composed of poor Lord Charles Herries' children, Gus, Flora,
+and Archy, with their nurse.
+
+If a bachelor is worth his salt, he will make himself useful. I saw that
+nurse was in distress and anxious, so I stayed with her.
+
+Archy was really as good as gold till he met with his accident. He
+walked up the steps with nurse as quiet as possible. But even at first I
+began to get anxious about Gus and Flora. They were excited. Gus
+wouldn't walk up the steps; but he put his two heels together, and
+jumped up them one at a time, and Flora walked backwards, looking at him
+sarcastically. At the top step but one Gus stumbled; whereupon Flora
+said, "Goozlemy, goozlemy, goozlemy."
+
+And Gus said, "you wait a minute, my lady, till we get into church,"
+after which awful speech I felt as if I was smoking in a powder
+magazine.
+
+I was put into a pew with Gus, and Flora, and Archy. Nurse, in her
+modesty, went into the pew behind us.
+
+I am sorry to say that these dear children, with whom I had had no
+previous acquaintance, were very naughty. The ceremony began by Archy
+getting too near the edge of his hassock, falling off, pitching against
+the pew door, bursting it open, and flying out among the free seats,
+head foremost. Nurse, a nimble and dexterous woman, dashed out, and
+caught him up, and actually got him out of the church door before he had
+time to fetch his breath for a scream. Gus and Flora were left alone
+with me.
+
+Flora had a great scarlet and gold church service. As soon as she opened
+it, she disconcerted me by saying aloud, to an imaginary female friend,
+"My dear, there is going to be a collection; and I have left my purse on
+the piano."
+
+At this time, also, Gus, seeing that the business was well begun,
+removed to the further end of the pew, sat down on the hassock, and took
+from his trousers' pocket a large tin trumpet.
+
+I broke out all over in a cold perspiration as I looked at him. He saw
+my distress, and putting it to his lips, puffed out his cheeks. Flora
+administered comfort to me. She said, "You are looking at that foolish
+boy. Perhaps he won't blow it, after all. He mayn't if you don't look at
+him. At all events, he probably won't blow it till the organ begins; and
+then it won't matter so much."
+
+Matters were so hopeless with me that I looked at old Master Evans. He
+had bent down his head on to the rail of the bench before him. His
+beautiful daughter had been his only companion at home for many years,
+for his wife had died when Jane was a little bare-legged thing, who
+paddled in the surf. It had been a rise in life for her to marry Mr.
+Charles Ravenshoe's favourite pad-groom. And just now she had walked
+calmly and quietly up the aisle, and had stopped when she came to where
+he sat, and had pushed the Honiton-lace veil from her forehead, and
+kissed his dear old cheek: and she would walk back directly as Mrs.
+William Ravenshoe. And so the noble old privateer skipper had bent down,
+and there was nothing to be seen there but a grey head and broad
+shoulders, which seemed to shake.
+
+And so I looked up to the east end. And I saw the two couples kneeling
+before the clergyman. And when I, knowing everything as I did, saw
+Charles kneeling beside Mary Corby, with Lord Ascot, great burly, brutal
+giant, standing behind him, I said something which is not in the
+marriage service of the Church of England. After it all, to see him and
+her kneeling so quietly there together! We were all happy enough that
+day. But I don't think that any one was much happier than I. For I knew
+more than any one. And also, three months from that time, I married my
+present wife, Eliza Humby. And the affair had only been arranged two
+days. So I was in good spirits.
+
+At least I should have been, if it had not been for Lord Charles
+Herries' children. I wish those dear children (not meaning them any
+harm) had been, to put it mildly, at play on the village green, that
+blessed day.
+
+When I looked at Gus again, he was still on the hassock, threatening
+propriety with his trumpet. I hoped for the best. Flora had her
+prayer-book open, and was playing the piano on each side of it, with her
+fingers. After a time she looked up at me, and said out loud--
+
+"I suppose you have heard that Archy's cat has kittened?"
+
+I said, "No."
+
+"Oh, yes, it has," she said. "Archy harnessed it to his meal cart, which
+turns a mill, and plays music when the wheels go round; and it ran
+downstairs with the cart; and we heard the music playing as it went; and
+it kittened in the wood-basket immediately afterwards; and Alwright
+says she don't wonder at it; and no more do I; and the steward's-room
+boy is going to drown some. But you mustn't tell Archy, because, if you
+do, he won't say his prayers; and if he don't say his prayers, he will,"
+&c., &c. Very emphatically and in a loud tone of voice.
+
+This was very charming. If I could only answer for Gus, and keep Flora
+busy, it was wildly possible that we might pull through. If I had not
+been a madman, I should have noticed that Gus had disappeared.
+
+He had. And the pew door had never opened, and I was utterly
+unconscious. Gus had crawled up, on all fours, under the seat of the
+pew, until he was opposite the calves of his sister's legs, against
+which calves, _horresco referens_, he put his trumpet and blew a long
+shrill blast. Flora behaved very well and courageously. She only gave
+one long, wild shriek, as from a lunatic in a padded cell at Bedlam, and
+then, hurling her prayer-book at him, she turned round and tried to kick
+him in the face.
+
+This was the culminating point of my misfortunes. After this, they
+behaved better. I represented to them that every one was just coming out
+of the vestry, and that they had better fight it out in the carriage
+going home. Gus only made an impertinent remark about Flora's garters,
+and Flora only drew a short, but trenchant, historical parallel between
+Gus and Judas Iscariot; when the brides and bridegrooms came down the
+aisle, and we all drove off to Charles's house in Eaton Square.
+
+And so, for the first time, I saw all together, with my own eyes, the
+principal characters in this story. Only one was absent. Lord Saltire. I
+had seen him twice in my life, and once had the honour of a conversation
+with him. He was a man about five feet eleven, very broad shouldered,
+and with a very deep chest. As far as the animal part of him went, I
+came to the conclusion, from close and interested examination for twenty
+minutes, that he had, fifty or sixty years before, been a man with whom
+it would have been pleasanter to argue than to box. His make was
+magnificent. Phrenologically speaking, he had a very high square head,
+very flat at the sides: and, when I saw him, when he was nearly eighty,
+he was the handsomest old man I had ever seen. He had a florid, pure
+complexion. His face was without a wrinkle. His eyebrows were black, and
+his hair seemed to refuse to be grey. There was as much black as grey in
+it to the last. His eye was most extraordinary--a deep blue-grey. I can
+look a man as straight in the face as any one; but when Lord Saltire
+turned those eyes on me three or four times in the course of our
+interview, I felt that it was an effort to meet them. I felt that I was
+in the presence of a man of superior vitality to my own. We were having
+a talk about matters connected with Charles Ravenshoe, which I have not
+mentioned, because I want to keep myself, William Marston, as much out
+of this story as possible. And whenever this terrible old man looked at
+me, asking a question, I felt my eyebrows drawing together, and knew
+that I was looking _defiantly_ at him. He was the most extraordinary man
+I ever met. He never took office after he was forty. He played with
+politics. He was in heart, I believe (no one knows), an advanced Whig.
+He chose to call himself Tory. He played the Radical game very deep,
+early in life, and, I think, he got disgusted with party politics. The
+last thing the old Radical atheist did in public life was to rally up to
+the side of the Duke in opposition to the Reform Bill. And another fact
+about him is, that he had always a strong personal affection for Sir
+Francis.
+
+He was a man of contradictions, if one judges a man by Whig and Tory
+rules; but he was a great loss to the public business of the country. He
+might have done almost anything in public life, with his calm clear
+brain. My cousin John thinks that Lord Barkham's death was the cause of
+his retirement.
+
+So much about Lord Saltire. Of the other characters mentioned in this
+story, I will speak at once, just as I saw them sitting round the table
+at Charles and William Ravenshoe's wedding.
+
+I sat beside Eliza Humby. She was infinitely the most beautiful, clever,
+and amiable being that the world ever produced. (But that is my
+business, not yours.) Charles Ravenshoe sat at the head of the table,
+and I will leave him alone for a minute. I will give you my impressions
+of the other characters in this story, as they appeared to me.
+
+Mary was a very charming-looking little person indeed, very short, and
+with small features. I had never seen her before, and had never heard
+any one say that she was pretty. I thought her very pretty indeed. Jane
+Evans was an exceedingly beautiful Devonshire girl. My eye did not rest
+very long on her. It came down the table to William, and there it
+stopped.
+
+I got Eliza Humby to speak to him, and engage him in conversation while
+I looked at him. I wanted to see whether there was anything remarkable
+in his face, for a more remarkable instance of disinterested goodwill
+than his determining to find Charles and ruin himself, I never happened
+to have heard of.
+
+Well, he was very handsome and pleasing, with a square determined look
+about the mouth, such as men brought up among horses generally have.
+But I couldn't understand it, and so I spoke to him across Lizzie, and I
+said, casting good manners to the winds, "I should think that the only
+thing you regretted to-day was, that you had not been alongside of
+Charles at Balaclava;" and then I understood it, for when I mentioned
+Charles and Balaclava, I saw for one instant not a groom, but a poet.
+Although, being a respectable and well-conducted man, he has never
+written any poetry, and probably never will.
+
+Then I looked across the table at Lady Ascot. They say that she was
+never handsome. I can quite believe that. She was a beautiful old woman
+certainly, but then all old women are beautiful. Her face was very
+square, and one could see that it was capable of very violent passion;
+or could, knowing what one did, guess so. Otherwise there was nothing
+very remarkable about her except that she was a remarkably charming old
+lady. She was talking to General Mainwaring, who was a noble-looking old
+soldier.
+
+Nothing more. In fact, the whole group were less remarkable and
+tragical-looking than I thought they would have been. I was disappointed
+until I came to Lord Ascot, and then I could not take my eyes off him.
+
+There was tragedy enough there. There was coarse brutality and passion
+enough, in all conscience. And yet that man had done what he had done.
+Here was a puzzle with a vengeance.
+
+Lord Ascot, as I saw him now, for the first time, was simply a low-bred
+and repulsive-looking man. In stature he was gigantic, in every respect
+save height. He was about five feet nine, very deep about the chest. His
+hair was rather dark, cut close. His face was very florid, and perfectly
+hairless. His forehead was low. His eyes were small, and close together.
+His eyebrows were heavy, and met over his nose, which was short and
+square. His mouth was large; and when you came to his mouth, you came to
+the first tolerable feature in his face. When he was speaking to no one
+in particular, the under lip was set, and the whole face, I am sorry to
+say, was the sort of face which is quite as often seen in the dock, as
+in the witness-box (unless some gentleman has turned Queen's evidence).
+And this was the man who had risked a duke's fortune, because "There
+were some things a fellow couldn't do, you know."
+
+It was very puzzling till he began to speak about his grandmother, and
+then his lower lip pouted out, his eyebrows raised, his eyes were apart,
+and he looked a different man. Is it possible that if he had not been
+brought up to cock-fighting and horse-racing, among prize-fighters and
+jockeys, that he might have been a different man? I can't say, I am
+sure.
+
+Lord and Lady Hainault were simply a very high-bred, very handsome, and
+very charming pair of people. I never had the slightest personal
+acquaintance with either of them. My cousin knows them both very
+intimately, and he says there are not two better people in the world.
+
+Charles Ravenshoe rose to reply to General Mainwaring's speech,
+proposing the brides and bridegrooms, and I looked at him very
+curiously. He was pale, from his recent illness, and he never was
+handsome. But his face was the face of a man whom I should fancy most
+people would get very fond of. When we were schoolfellows at Shrewsbury,
+he was a tall dark-haired boy, who was always laughing, and kicking up a
+row, and giving his things away to other fellows. Now he was a tall,
+dark, melancholy-looking man, with great eyes and lofty eyebrows. His
+vivacity, and that carriage which comes from the possession of great
+physical strength, were gone; and while I looked at him, I felt ten
+years older. Why should I try to describe him further? He is not so
+remarkable a man as either Lord Ascot or William. But he was the best
+man I ever knew.
+
+He said a few kind hearty words, and sat down, and then Lord Ascot got
+up. And I took hold of Lizzie's hand with my left; and I put my right
+elbow on the table and watched him intensely, with my hand shading my
+face. He had a coat buttoned over his great chest, and as he spoke he
+kept on buttoning and unbuttoning it with his great coarse hand. He
+said--
+
+"I ain't much hand at this sort of thing. I suppose those two Marstons,
+confound them, are saying to themselves that I ought to be, because I am
+in the House of Lords. That John Marston is a most impudent beggar, and
+I shall expect to see his friend to-morrow morning. He always was, you
+know. He has thwarted me all through my life. I wanted Charles Ravenshoe
+to go to the deuce, and I'll be hanged if he'd let him. And it is not to
+be borne."
+
+There was a general laugh at this, and Lord Ascot stretched his hand
+across General Mainwaring, and shook hands with my cousin.
+
+"You men just go out of the room, will you?" (the servants departed, and
+Lord Ascot went to the door to see they were not listening. I thought
+some revelation was coming, but I was mistaken.) "You see I am obliged
+to notice strangers, because a fellow may say things among old friends
+which he don't exactly care to before servants.
+
+"It is all very well to say I'm a fool. That is very likely, and may be
+taken for granted. But I am not such a fool as not to know that a very
+strong prejudice exists against me in the present society."
+
+Every one cried out, "No, no!" Of all the great wedding breakfasts that
+season, this was certainly the most remarkable. Lord Ascot went on. He
+was getting the savage look on his face now.
+
+"Well, well! let that pass. Look at that man at the head of the
+table--the bridegroom. Look at him. You wonder that I did what I did.
+I'll tell you why. I love that fellow. He is what I call a man, General
+Mainwaring. I met that fellow at Twyford years ago, and he has always
+been the same to me since. You say I served him badly once. That is true
+enough. You insulted me once in public about it, Hainault. You were
+quite right. Say you, I should not talk about it to-day. But when we
+come to think how near death's gates some of us have been since then,
+you will allow that this wedding day has something very solemn about it.
+
+"My poor wife has broken her back across that infernal gate, and so she
+could not come. I must ask you all to think kindly of that wife of mine.
+You have all been very kind to her since her awful accident. She has
+asked me to thank you.
+
+"I rose to propose a toast, and I have been carried away by a personal
+statement, which, at every other wedding breakfast I ever heard of, it
+would be a breach of good manners to make. It is not so on this
+occasion. Terrible things have befallen every one of us here present.
+And I suppose we must try all of us to--hey!--to--hah!--well, to do
+better in future.
+
+"I rose, I said, to propose a toast. I rose to propose the most
+blameless and excellent woman I ever knew. I propose that we drink the
+health of my grandmother, Lady Ascot."
+
+And oh! but we leapt to our feet and drank it. Manners to the winds,
+after what we had gone through. There was that solemn creature, Lord
+Hainault, with his champagne glass in his hand, behaving like a
+schoolboy, and giving us the time. And then, when her dear grey head was
+bent down over the table, buried in her hands, my present father-in-law,
+Squire Humby, leapt to his feet like a young giant, and called out for
+three times three for Lord Ascot. And we had breath enough left to do
+that handsomely, I warrant you. The whole thing was incorrect in the
+highest degree, but we did it. And I don't know that any of us were
+ashamed of it afterwards.
+
+And while the carriages were getting ready, Charles said, would we walk
+across the square. And we all came with him. And he took us to a piece
+of dead white wall, at the east end of St. Peter's Church, opposite the
+cab-stand. And then he told us the story of the little shoeblack, and
+how his comical friendship for that boy had saved him from what it would
+not do to talk about.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But there is a cloud on Charles Ravenshoe's face, even now. I saw him
+last summer lying on the sand, and playing with his eldest boy. And the
+cloud was on him then. There was no moroseness, no hardness in the
+expression; but the face was not the merry old face I knew so well at
+Shrewsbury and Oxford. There is a dull, settled, dreaming melancholy
+there still. The memory of those few terrible months has cast its shadow
+upon him. And the shadow will lie, I fancy, upon that forehead, and will
+dim those eyes, until the forehead is smoothed in the sleep of death,
+and the eyes have opened to look upon eternity.
+
+Good-bye.
+
+
+WARD, LOCK AND BOWDEN, LTD., LONDON, NEW YORK AND MELBOURNE.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] The best banisters for sliding down are broad oak ones, with a rib
+in the middle. This new narrow sort, which is coming in, are wretched.
+
+[2] The short description of the University boat-race which begins this
+chapter was written two years ago, from the author's recollections of
+the race of 1852. It would do for a description of this year's race,
+quite as well as of any other year, substituting "Cambridge" for
+"Oxford," according to the year.
+
+[3] I mean C. M.
+
+[4] A fact with regard to one tribe, to the author's frequent confusion.
+Any number above two, whether of horses, cattle, or sheep, was always
+represented as being eighty-four. Invariably, too, with an adjective
+introduced after the word "four," which we don't use in a drawing-room.
+
+[5] Once for all, let me call every honest reader to witness, that,
+unless I speak in the first person, I am not bound to the opinions of
+any one of the characters in this book. I have merely made people speak,
+I think, as they would have spoken. Even in a story, consisting so
+entirely of incident as this, I feel it necessary to say so much, for no
+kind of unfairness is so common as that of identifying the opinions of a
+story-teller with those of his _dramatis personæ_.
+
+[6] As a matter of curiosity I tried to write this paragraph from the
+word "Mary," to the word "bosom," without using a single word derived
+from the Latin. After having taken all possible pains to do so, I found
+there were eight out of forty-eight. I think it is hardly possible to
+reduce the proportion lower, and I think it is undesirable to reduce it
+so low.
+
+[7] Which is a crib from Sir E. B. L. B. L.
+
+[8] The most famous voyage of the _Himalaya_, from Cork to Varna in
+twelve days with the Fifth Dragoon Guards, took place in June. The
+voyage here described, is, as will be perceived a subsequent one, but
+equally successful, apparently.
+
+[9] If one has to raise an imaginary regiment, one must put it in an
+imaginary place. The 17th Dragoons must try to forgive me.
+
+[10] These names actually occur, side by side, in my newspaper (_The
+Field_), to which I referred for three names. They are in training by
+Henry Hall, at Hambleton, in Yorkshire. Surely men could find better
+names for their horses than such senseless ones as these. I would that
+was all one had to complain of. I hope the noble old sport is not on its
+last legs. But one trembles to think what will become of it, when the
+comparatively few high-minded men who are keeping things straight are
+gone.
+
+[11] Perhaps a reference to "The Wild Huntsman" will stop all criticism
+at this point. A further reference to "Faust" will also show that I am
+in good company.
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41636 ***