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April's Lady: A Novel

by Duchess · English · Gutenberg #21641 · 680,672 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: April's Lady: A Novel

Author: Duchess


        
Release date: May 29, 2007 [eBook #21641]

Language: English

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Credits: Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Mary Meehan and the Online
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        file was produced from images generously made available
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        (www.canadiana.org))


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK APRIL'S LADY: A NOVEL ***




Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Mary Meehan and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions
(www.canadiana.org))









                              APRIL'S LADY.

                                A NOVEL.

                            BY "THE DUCHESS"

_Author of "Molly Bawn," "Phyllis," "Lady Branksmere," "Beauty's
Daughters," etc., etc._




Montreal:
JOHN LOVELL & SON,
23 St. Nicholas Street.


Entered according to Act of Parliament in the year 1890, by John Lovell
& Son, in the office of the Minister of Agriculture and Statistics at
Ottawa.




APRIL'S LADY.

    "Must we part? or may I linger?
      Wax the shadows, wanes the day."
    Then, with voice of sweetest singer,
      That hath all but died away,
    "Go," she said, but tightened finger
      Said articulately, "Stay!"




CHAPTER I.

     "Philosophy triumphs easily over past and over future evils, but
     present evils triumph over philosophy."


"A letter from my father," says Mr. Monkton, flinging the letter in
question across the breakfast-table to his wife.

"A letter from Sir George!" Her dark, pretty face flushes crimson.

"And _such_ a letter after eight years of obstinate silence. There! read
it," says her husband, contemptuously. The contempt is all for the
writer of the letter.

Mrs. Monkton taking it up, with a most honest curiosity, that might
almost be termed anxiety, reads it through, and in turn flings it from
her as though it had been a scorpion.

"Never mind, Jack!" says she with a great assumption of indifference
that does not hide from her husband the fact that her eyes are full of
tears. "Butter that bit of toast for me before it is _quite_ cold, and
give Joyce some ham. Ham, darling? or an egg?" to Joyce, with a forced
smile that makes her charming face quite sad.

"Have you two been married eight whole years?" asks Joyce laying her
elbows on the table, and staring at her sister with an astonished gaze.
"It seems like yesterday! What a swindler old Time is. To look at
Barbara, one would not believe she could have been _born_ eight years
ago."

"Nonsense!" says Mrs. Monkton laughing, and looking as pleased as
married women--even the happiest--always do, when they are told they
look _un_married. "Why Tommy is seven years old."

"Oh! That's nothing!" says Joyce airily, turning her dark eyes, that are
lovelier, if possible, than her sister's, upon the sturdy child who is
sitting at his father's right hand. "Tommy, we all know, is much older
than his mother. Much more advanced; more learned in the wisdom of
_this_ world; aren't you, Tommy?"

But Tommy, at this present moment, is deaf to the charms of
conversation, his young mind being nobly bent on proving to his sister
(a priceless treasure of six) that the salt-cellar planted between them
belongs _not_ to her, but to him! This sounds reasonable, but the
difficulty lies in making Mabel believe it. There comes the pause
eloquent at last, and then, I regret to say, the free fight!

It might perhaps have been even freer, but for the swift intervention of
the paternal relative, who, swooping down upon the two belligerents with
a promptitude worthy of all praise, seizes upon his daughter, and in
spite of her kicks, which are noble, removes her to the seat on his left
hand.

Thus separated hope springs within the breasts of the lookers-on that
peace may soon be restored; and indeed, after a sob or two from Mabel,
and a few passes of the most reprehensible sort from Tommy (entirely of
the facial order), a great calm falls upon the breakfast-room.

"When I was your age, Tommy," says Mr. Monkton addressing his son, and
striving to be all that the orthodox parent ought to be, "I should have
been soundly whipped if I had behaved to my sister as you have just now
behaved to yours!"

"You _haven't_ a sister," says Tommy, after which the argument falls
flat. It is true, Mr. Monkton is innocent of a sister, but how did the
little demon remember that so _apropos_.

"Nevertheless," said Mr. Monkton, "if I _had_ had a sister, I _know_ I
should not have been unkind to her."

"Then she'd have been unkind to you," says Tommy, who is evidently not
afraid to enter upon a discussion of the rights and wrongs of mankind
with his paternal relative. "Look at Mabel! And I don't care _what_ she
says," with a vindictive glance at the angelic featured Mabel, who
glares back at him with infinite promise of a future settlement of all
their disputes in her ethereal eyes. "'Twas _my_ salt-cellar, not hers!"

"Ladies first--pleasure afterwards," says his father somewhat idly.

"Oh _Freddy_!" says his wife.

"Seditious language _I_ call it," says Jocelyne with a laugh.

"Eh?" says Mr. Monkton. "Why what on earth have I been saying now. I
quite believed I was doing the heavy father to perfection and teaching
Tommy his duty."

"Nice duty," says Jocelyne, with a pretence of indignation, that makes
her charming face a perfect picture. "Teaching him to regard us as
second best! I like that."

"Good heavens! did I give that impression? I must have swooned," says
Mr. Monkton penitently. "When last in my senses I thought I had been
telling Tommy that he deserved a good whipping; and that if good old
Time could so manage as to make me my own father, he would assuredly
have got it."

"Oh! _your_ father!" says Mrs. Monkton in a low tone; there is enough
expression in it, however, to convey the idea to everyone present that
in her opinion her husband's father would be guilty of any atrocity at a
moment's notice.

"Well, _'twas_ my salt-cellar," says Tommy again stoutly, and as if
totally undismayed by the vision of the grand-fatherly scourge held out
to him. After all we none of us feel things much, unless they come
personally home to us.

"Was it?" says Mr. Monkton mildly. "Do you know, I really quite fancied
it was mine."

"What?" says Tommy, cocking his ear. He, like his sister, is in a
certain sense a fraud. For Tommy has the face of a seraph with the heart
of a hardy Norseman. There is nothing indeed that Tommy would not dare.

"Mine, you know," says his father, even more mildly still.

"No, it wasn't," says Tommy with decision, "it was at _my_ side of the
table. _Yours_ is over there."

"Thomas!" says his father, with a rueful shake of the head that
signifies his resignation of the argument; "it is indeed a pity that I
am _not_ like my father!"

"Like him! Oh _no_," says Mrs. Monkton emphatically, impulsively; the
latent dislike to the family who had refused to recognize her on her
marriage with their son taking fire at this speech.

Her voice sounds almost hard--the gentle voice, that in truth was only
meant by Mother Nature to give expression to all things kind and loving.

She has leant a little forward and a swift flush is dyeing her cheek.
She is of all women the youngest looking, for her years; as a matron
indeed she seems absurd. The delicate bloom of girlhood seems never to
have left her, but--as though in love of her beauty--has clung to her
day by day. So that now, when she has known eight years of married life
(and some of them deeply tinctured with care--the cruel care that want
of money brings), she still looks as though the morning of womanhood was
as yet but dawning for her.

And this is because love the beautifier went with her all the way! Hand
in hand he has traveled with her on the stony paths that those who marry
must undoubtedly pursue. Never once had he let go his hold, and so it
is, that her lovely face has defied Time (though after all that
obnoxious Ancient has not had yet much opportunity given him to spoil
it), and at twenty-five she looks but a little older than her sister,
who is just eighteen, and seven years younger than she is.

Her pretty soft grey Irish eyes, that are as nearly _not_ black as it is
possible for them to be, are still filled with the dews of youth. Her
mouth is red and happy. Her hair--so distinctly chestnut as to be almost
guilty of a shade of red in it here and there--covers her dainty head in
rippling masses, that fall lightly forward, and rest upon a brow,
snow-white, and low and broad as any Greek's might be.

She had spoken a little hurriedly, with some touch of anger. But quick
as the anger was born, so quickly does it die.

"I shouldn't have said that, perhaps," says she, sending a little
tremulous glance at her husband from behind the urn. "But I couldn't
help it. I can't _bear_ to hear you say you would like to be like him."

She smiles (a little, gentle, "don't-be-angry-with-me" smile, scarcely
to be resisted by any man, and certainly not by her husband, who adores
her). It is scarcely necessary to record this last fact, as all who run
may read it for themselves, but it saves time to put it in black and
white.

"But why not, my dear?" says Mr. Monkton, magisterially. "Surely,
considering all things, you have reason to be deeply grateful to Sir
George. Why, then, abuse him?"

"Grateful! To Sir George! To your father!" cries his wife, hotly and
quick, and----

"Freddy!" from his sister-in-law brings him to a full stop for a moment.

"Do you mean to tell me," says he, thus brought to bay, "that you have
nothing to thank Sir George for?" He is addressing his wife.

"Nothing, nothing!" declares she, vehemently, the remembrance of that
last letter from her husband's father, that still lies within reach of
her view, lending a suspicion of passion to her voice.

"Oh, my dear girl, _consider_!" says Mr. Monkton, lively reproach in his
tone. "Has he not given you _me_, the best husband in Europe?"

"Ah, what it is to be modest," says Joyce, with her little quick
brilliant laugh.

"Well, it's not true," says Mrs. Monkton, who has laughed also, in spite
of herself and the soreness at her heart. "He did _not_ give you to me.
You made me that gift of your own free will. I have, as I said before,
nothing to thank him for."

"I always think he must be a silly old man," says Joyce, which seems to
put a fitting termination to the conversation.

The silence that ensues annoys Tommy, who dearly loves to hear the human
voice divine. As expressed by himself first, but if that be
impracticable, well, then by somebody else. _Anything_ is better than
dull silence.

"Is he that?" asks he, eagerly, of his aunt.

Though I speak of her as his aunt, I hope it will not be misunderstood
for a moment that Tommy totally declines to regard her in any
reverential light whatsoever. A playmate, a close friend, a confidante,
a useful sort of person, if you will, but certainly not an _aunt_, in
the general acceptation of that term. From the very first year that
speech fell on them, both Mabel and he had refused to regard Miss
Kavanagh as anything but a confederate in all their scrapes, a friend to
rejoice with in all their triumphs; she had never been aunt, never,
indeed, even so much as the milder "auntie" to them; she had been
"Joyce," only, from the very commencement of their acquaintance. The
united commands of both father and mother (feebly enforced) had been
insufficient to compel them to address this most charming specimen of
girlhood by any grown up title. To them their aunt was just such an one
as themselves--only, perhaps, a little _more_ so.

A lovely creature, at all events, and lovable as lovely. A little
inconsequent, perhaps at times, but always amenable to reason, when put
into a corner, and full of the glad, laughter of youth.

"Is he what?" says she, now returning Tommy's eager gaze.

"The best husband in Europe. He _says_ he's that," with a doubtful stare
at his father.

"Why, the _very_ best, of course," says Joyce, nodding emphatically.
"Always remember that, Tommy. It's a good thing to _be_, you know.
_You'll_ want to be that, won't you?"

But if she has hoped to make a successful appeal to Tommy's noble
qualities (hitherto, it must be confessed, carefully kept hidden), she
finds herself greatly mistaken.

"No, I won't," says that truculent person distinctly. "I want to be a
big general with a cocked hat, and to kill people. I don't want to be a
husband _at all_. What's the good of that?"

"To pursue the object would be to court defeat," says Mr. Monkton
meekly. He rises from the table, and, seeing him move, his wife rises
too.

"You are going to your study?" asks she, a little anxiously. He is about
to say "no" to this, but a glance at her face checks him.

"Yes, come with me," says he instead, answering the lovely silent appeal
in her eyes. That letter has no doubt distressed her. She will be
happier when she has talked it over with him--they two alone. "As for
you, Thomas," says his father, "I'm quite aware that you ought to be
consigned to the Donjon keep after your late behavior, but as we don't
keep one on the premises, I let you off this time. Meanwhile I haste to
my study to pen, with the assistance of your enraged mother, a letter to
our landlord that will induce him to add one on at once to this
building. After which we shall be able to incarcerate you at our
pleasure (but _not_ at yours) on any and every hour of the day."

"Who's Don John?" asks Tommy, totally unimpressed, but filled with
lively memories of those Spaniards and other foreign powers who have
unkindly made more difficult his hateful lessons off and on.




CHAPTER II.

     "No love lost between us."


"Well," says Mr. Monkton, turning to his wife as the study (a rather
nondescript place) is reached. He has closed the door, and is now
looking at her with a distinctly quizzical light in his eyes and in the
smile that parts his lips. "Now for it. Have no qualms. I've been
preparing myself all through breakfast and I think I shall survive it.
You are going to have it out with me, aren't you?"

"Not with _you_," says she, returning his smile indeed, but faintly, and
without heart, "that horrid letter! I felt I _must_ talk of it to
someone, and----"

"_I_ was that mythical person. I quite understand. I take it as a
special compliment."

"I know it is hard on you, but when I am really vexed about anything,
you know, I always want to tell you about it."

"I should feel it a great deal harder if you _didn't_ want to tell me
about it," says he. He has come nearer to her and has pressed her into a
chair--a dilapidated affair that if ever it _had_ a best day has
forgotten it by now--and yet for all that is full of comfort. "I am only
sorry"--moving away again and leaning against the chimney piece--"that
you should be so foolish as to let my father's absurd prejudices annoy
you at this time of day."

"He will always have it in his power to annoy me," says she quickly.
"That perhaps," with a little burst of feeling, "is why I can't forgive
him. If I could forget, or grow indifferent to it all, I should not have
this _hurt_ feeling in my heart. But he is your father, and though he is
the most unjust, the cruellest man on earth, I still hate to think he
should regard me as he does."

"There is one thing, however, you do forget," says Mr. Monkton gravely.
"I don't want to apologize for him, but I would remind you that he has
never seen you."

"That's only an aggravation of his offence," her color heightening; "the
very fact that he should condemn me unseen, unheard, adds to the wrong
he has done me instead of taking from it." She rises abruptly and begins
to pace up and down the room, the hot Irish blood in her veins afire.
"No"--with a little impatient gesture of her small hand--"I _can't_ sit
still. Every pulse seems throbbing. He has opened up all the old wounds,
and----" She pauses and then turns upon her husband two lovely flashing
eyes. "Why, _why_ should he suppose that I am vulgar, lowly born, unfit
to be your wife?"

"My darling girl, what can it matter what he thinks? A ridiculous
headstrong old man in one scale, and----"

"But it does matter. I want to _convince_ him that I am not--not--what
he believes me to be."

"Then come over to England and see him."

"No--never! I shall never go to England. I shall stay in Ireland always.
My own land; the land whose people he detests because he knows nothing
about them. It was one of his chief objections to your marriage with me,
that I was an Irish girl!"

She stops short, as though her wrath and indignation and contempt is too
much for her.

"Barbara," says Monkton, very gently, but with a certain reproach, "do
you know you almost make me think that you regret our marriage."

"No, I don't," quickly. "If I talked for ever I shouldn't be able to
make you think _that_. But----" She turns to him suddenly, and gazes at
him through large eyes that are heavy with tears. "I shall always be
sorry for one thing, and that is--that you first met me where you did."

"At your aunt's? Mrs. Burke's?"

"She is _not_ my aunt," with a little frown of distaste; "she is nothing
to me so far as blood is concerned. Oh! Freddy." She stops close to him,
and gives him a grief-stricken glance. "I wish my poor father had been
alive when first you saw me. That we could have met for the first time
in the old home. It was shabby--faded"--her face paling now with intense
emotion. "But you would have known at once that it _had been_ a fine old
place, and that the owner of it----" She breaks down, very slightly,
almost imperceptibly, but Monkton understands that even one more word is
beyond her.

"That the owner of it, like St. Patrick, came of decent people," quotes
he with an assumption of gaiety he is far from feeling. "My good child,
I don't want to see _anyone_ to know that of you. You carry the sign
manual. It is written in large characters all over you."

"Yet I wish you had known me before my father died," says she, her grief
and pride still unassuaged. "He was so unlike anybody else. His manners
were so lovely. He was offered a baronetcy at the end of that Whiteboy
business on account of his loyalty--that nearly cost him his life--but
he refused it, thinking the old name good enough without a handle to
it."

"Kavanagh, we all know, is a good name."

"If he had accepted that title he would have been as--the same--as your
father!" There is defiance in this sentence.

"_Quite_ the same!"

"No, no, he would not," her defiance now changes into, sorrowful
honesty. "Your father has been a baronet for _centuries_, my father
would have only been a baronet for a few years."

"For centuries!" repeats Mr. Monkton with an alarmed air. There is a
latent sense of humor (or rather an appreciation of humor) about him
that hardly endears him to the opposite sex. His wife, being Irish,
condones it, because she happens to understand it, but there are
moments, we all know, when even the very best and most appreciative
women refuse to understand _anything_. This is one of them. "Condemn my
father if you will," says Mr. Monkton, "accuse him of all the crimes in
the calendar, but for _my_ sake give up the belief that he is the real
and original Wandering Jew. Debrett--Burke--either of those immaculate
people will prove to you that my father ascended his throne in----"

"You can laugh at me if you like, Freddy," says Mrs. Monkton with
severity tempered with dignity; "but if you laughed until this day month
you couldn't make me forget the things that make me unhappy."

"I don't want to," says Mr. Monkton, still disgracefully frivolous.
"_I'm_ one of the things, and yet----"

"Don't!" says his wife, so abruptly, and with such an evident
determination to give way to mirth, coupled with an equally strong
determination to give way to tears, that he at once lays down his arms.

"Go on then," says he, seating himself beside her. She is not in the
arm-chair now, but on an ancient and respectable sofa that gives ample
room for the accommodation of two; a luxury denied by that old
curmudgeon the arm-chair.

"Well, it is this, Freddy. When I think of that dreadful old woman, Mrs.
Burke, I feel as though you thought she was a fair sample of the rest of
my family. But she is _not_ a sample, she has nothing to do with us. An
uncle of my mother married her because she was rich, and there her
relationship to us began and ended."

"Still----"

"Yes, I know, you needn't remind me, it seems burnt into my brain, I
know she took us in after my father's death, and covered me and Joyce
with benefits when we hadn't a penny in the world we could call our own.
I quite understand, indeed, that we should have starved but for her, and
yet--yet--" passionately, "I cannot forgive her for perpetually
reminding us that we had _not_ that penny!"

"It must have been a bad time," says Monkton slowly. He takes her hand
and smoothes it lovingly between both of his.

"She was vulgar. That was not her fault; I forgive her that. What I
can't forgive her, is the fact that you should have met me in her
house."

"A little unfair, isn't it?"

"Is it? You will always now associate me with her!"

"I shan't indeed. Do you think I have up to this? Nonsense! A more
absurd amalgamation I couldn't fancy."

"She was not one of us," feverishly. "I have never spoken to you about
this, Freddy, since that first letter your father wrote to you just
after our marriage. You remember it? And then, I couldn't explain
somehow--but now--this last letter has upset me dreadfully; I feel as if
it was all different, and that it was my duty to make you aware of the
_real_ truth. Sir George thinks of me as one beneath him; that is not
true. He may have heard that I lived with Mrs. Burke, and that she was
my aunt; but if my mother's brother chose to marry a woman of no family
because she had money,"--contemptuously, "that might disgrace _him_, but
would not make her kin to _us_. You saw her, you--" lifting distressed
eyes to his--"you thought her dreadful, didn't you?"

"I have only had one thought about her. That she was good to you in your
trouble, and that but for her I should never have met you."

"That is like you," says she gratefully, yet impatiently. "But it isn't
enough. I want you to understand that she is quite unlike my own _real_
people--my father, who was like a prince," throwing up her head, "and my
uncle, his brother."

"You have an uncle, then?" with some surprise.

"Oh no, _had_," sadly.

"He is dead then?"

"Yes. I suppose so. You are wondering," says she quickly, "that I have
never spoken to you of him or my father before. But I _could_ not. The
thought that your family objected to me, despised me, seemed to compel
me to silence. And you--you asked me very little."

"How could I, Barbara? Any attempt I made was repulsed. I thought it
kinder to----"

"Yes--I was wrong. I see it now. But I couldn't bear to explain myself.
I told you what I could about my father, and that seemed to me
sufficient. Your people's determination to regard me as impossible tied
my tongue."

"I don't believe it was that," says he laughing. "I believe we were so
happy that we didn't care to discuss anything but each other. Delightful
subjects full of infinite variety! We have sat so lightly to the world
all these years, that if my father's letter had not come this morning I
honestly think we should never have thought about him again."

This is scarcely true, but he is bent on giving her mind a happier turn
if possible.

"What's the good of talking to me like that, Freddy," says she
reproachfully. "You know one never forgets anything of that sort. A
slight I mean; and from one's own family. You are always thinking of it;
you know you are."

"Well, not always, my dear, certainly--" says Mr. Monkton temporizing.
"And if even I _do_ give way to retrospection, it is to feel indignant
with both my parents."

"Yes; and I don't want you to feel like that. It must be dreadful, and
it is my fault. When I think how I felt towards my dear old dad, and my
uncle--I----"

"Well, never mind that. I've got you, and without meaning any gross
flattery, I consider you worth a dozen dads. Tell me about your uncle.
He died?"

"We don't know. He went abroad fifteen years ago. He must be dead I
think, because if he were alive he would certainly have written to us.
He was very fond of Joyce and me; but no letter from him has reached us
for years. He was charming. I wish you could have known him."

"So do I--if you wish it. But--" coming over and sitting down beside
her, "don't you think it is a little absurd, Barbara, after all these
years, to think it necessary to tell me that you have good blood in your
veins? Is it not a self-evident fact; and--one more word dearest--surely
you might do me the credit to understand that I could never have fallen
in love with anyone who hadn't an ancestor or two."

"And yet your father----"

"I know," rising to his feet, his brow darkening. "Do you think I don't
suffer doubly on your account? That I don't feel the insolence of his
behavior toward you _four-fold_? There is but one excuse for him and my
mother, and that lies in their terrible disappointment about my
brother--their eldest son."

"I know; you have told me," begins she quickly, but he interrupts her.

"Yes, I have been more open with you than you with me. _I_ feel no pride
where you are concerned. Of course my brother's conduct towards them is
no excuse for their conduct towards you, but when one has a sore heart
one is apt to be unjust, and many other things. You know what a
heart-break he has been to the old people, _and is_! A gambler, a
dishonorable gambler!" He turns away from her, and his nostrils dilate a
little; his right hand grows clenched. "Every spare penny they possess
has been paid over to him of his creditors, and they are not
over-burdened with riches. They had set their hearts on him, and all
their hopes, and when he failed them they fell back on me. The name is
an old one; money was wanted. They had arranged a marriage for me, that
would have been worldly wise. I _too_ disappointed them!"

"Oh!" she has sprung to her feet, and is staring at him with horrified
eyes. "A marriage! There was someone else! You accuse me of want of
candor, and now, you--did you ever mention this before?"

"Now, Barbara, don't be the baby your name implies," says he, placing
her firmly back in her seat. "I _didn't_ marry that heiress, you know,
which is proof positive that I loved you, not her."

"But she--she--" she stammers and ceases suddenly, looking at him with a
glance full of question. Womanlike, everything has given way to the
awful thought, that this unknown had not been unknown to him, and that
perhaps he had admired--loved----

"Couldn't hold a candle to you," says he, laughing in spite of himself
at her expression which, indeed, is nearly tragic. "You needn't
suffocate yourself with charcoal because of her. She had made her pile,
or rather her father had, at Birmingham or elsewhere, I never took the
trouble to inquire, and she was undoubtedly solid in _every way_, but I
don't care for the female giant, and so I--you know the rest, I met
_you_; I tell you this only to soften your heart, if possible, towards
these lonely, embittered old people of mine."

"Do you mean that when your brother disappointed them that they----" she
pauses.

"No. They couldn't make me their heir. The property is strictly entailed
(what is left of it); you need not make yourself miserable imagining you
have done me out of anything more than their good-will. George will
inherit whatever he has left them to leave."

"It is sad," says she, with downcast eyes.

"Yes. He has been a constant source of annoyance to them ever since he
left Eton."

"Where is he now?"

"Abroad, I believe. In Italy, somewhere, or France--not far from a
gaming table, you may be sure. But I know nothing very exactly, as he
does not correspond with me, and that letter of this morning is the
first I have received from my father for four years."

"He must, indeed, hate me," says she, in a low tone. "His elder son such
a failure, and you--he considers you a failure, too."

"Well, _I_ don't consider myself so," says he, gaily.

"They were in want of money, and you--you married a girl without a
penny."

"I married a girl who was in herself a mine of gold," returns he, laying
his hands on her shoulders and giving her a little shake. "Come, never
mind that letter, darling; what does it matter when all is said and
done?"

"The first after all these years; and the, _last_--you remember it? It
was terrible. Am I unreasonable if I remember it?"

"It was a cruel letter," says he slowly; "to forget it would be
impossible, either for you or me. But, as I said just now, how does it
affect us? You have me, and I have you; and they, those foolish old
people, they have----" He pauses abruptly, and then goes on in a changed
tone, "their memories."

"Oh! and sad ones!" cries she, sharply, as if hurt. "It is a terrible
picture you have conjured up. You and I so happy, and they--Oh! _poor_
old people!"

"They have wronged you--slighted you--ill-treated you," says he, looking
at her.

"But they are unhappy; they must be wretched always about your brother,
their _first_ child. Oh! what a grief is theirs!"

"What a heart is _yours_!" says he, drawing her to him. "Barbara! surely
I shall not die until they have met you, and learned why I love you."




CHAPTER III.

    "It was a lover and his lass
        With a hey and a ho, and a hey-nonino!
    That o'er the green cornfield did pass
    In the Spring-time, the only pretty ring-time,
        When birds do sing hey-ding-a-ding,
        Sweet lovers love the Spring."


Joyce is running through the garden, all the sweet wild winds of heaven
playing round her. They are a little wild still. It is the end of lovely
May, but though languid Summer is almost with us, a suspicion of her
more sparkling sister Spring fills all the air.

Miss Kavanagh has caught up the tail of her gown, and is flying as if
for dear life. Behind her come the foe, fast and furious. Tommy, indeed,
is now dangerously close at her heels, armed with a ferocious-looking
garden fork, his face crimson, his eyes glowing with the ardor of the
chase; Mabel, much in the background, is making a bad third.

Miss Kavanagh is growing distinctly out of breath. In another moment
Tommy will have her. By this time he has fully worked himself into the
belief that he is a Red Indian, and she his lawful prey, and is prepared
to make a tomahawk of his fork, and having felled her, to scalp her
_somehow_, when Providence shows her a corner round a rhododendron bush
that may save her for the moment. She makes for it, gains it, turns it,
dashes round it, and _all but_ precipitates herself into the arms of a
young man who has been walking leisurely towards her.

He is a tall young man, not strictly handsome, but decidedly good to
look at, with honest hazel eyes, and a shapely head, and altogether very
well set up. As a rule he is one of the most cheerful people alive, and
a tremendous favorite in his regiment, the ---- Hussars, though just now
it might suggest itself to the intelligent observer that he considers he
has been hardly used. A very little more haste, and that precipitation
_must_ have taken place. He had made an instinctive movement towards her
with protective arms outstretched; but though a little cry had escaped
her, she had maintained her balance, and now stands looking at him with
laughing eyes, and panting breath, and two pretty hands pressed against
her bosom.

Mr. Dysart lets his disappointed arms fall to his sides, and assumes the
aggrieved air of one who has been done out of a good thing.

"You!" says she, when at last she can speak.

"I suppose so," returns he discontentedly. He might just as well have
been anyone else, or anywhere else--such a chance--and _gone_!

"Never were you so welcome!" cries she, dodging behind him as Tommy,
fully armed, and all alive, comes tearing round the corner. "Ah, ha,
Tommy, _sold_! I've got a champion now. I'm no longer shivering in my
shoes. Mr. Dysart will protect me--_won't_ you, Mr. Dysart?" to the
young man, who says "yes" without stirring a muscle. The heaviest bribe
would not have induced him to move, because, standing behind him, she
has laid her dainty fingers on his shoulders, from which safe position
she mocks at Tommy with security. Were the owners of the shoulders to
stir, the owners of the fingers might remove the delightful members.
Need it be said that, with this awful possibility before him, Mr. Dysart
is prepared to die at his post rather than budge an inch.

And, indeed, death seems imminent. Tommy charging round the
rhododendron, finding himself robbed of his expected scalp, grows
frantic, and makes desperate passes at Mr. Dysart's legs, which that
hero, being determined, as I have said, not to stir under any
provocation, circumvents with a considerable display of policy, such as:

"I say, Tommy, old boy, is that you? How d'ye do? Glad to see me, aren't
you?" This last very artfully with a view to softening the attacks. "You
don't know what I've brought you!" This is more artful still, and
distinctly a swindle, as he has brought him nothing, but on the spot he
determines to redeem himself with the help of the small toy-shops and
sweety shops down in the village. "Put down that fork like a good boy,
and let me tell you how----"

"Oh, _bother_ you!" says Tommy, indignantly. "I'd have had her only for
you! What brought you here now? Couldn't you have waited a bit?"

"Yes! what brought you?" says Miss Kavanagh, most disgracefully going
over to the other side, now that danger is at an end, and Tommy has
planted his impromptu tomahawk in a bed close by.

"Do you want to know?" says he quickly.

The fingers have been removed from his shoulders, and he is now at
liberty to turn round and look at the charming face beside him.

"No, no!" says she, shaking her head. "I've been rude, I suppose. But it
is such a wonderful thing to see you here so soon again."

"Why should I not be here?"

"Of course! That is the one unanswerable question. But you must confess
it is puzzling to those who thought of you as being elsewhere."

"If you are one of 'those' you fill me with gratitude. That you should
think of me even for a moment----"

"Well, I haven't been thinking much," says she, frankly, and with the
most delightful if scarcely satisfactory little smile: "I don't believe
I was thinking of you at all, until I turned the corner just now, and
then, I confess, I was startled, because I believed you at the
Antipodes."

"Perhaps your belief was mother to your thought."

"Oh, no. Don't make me out so nasty. Well, but _were_ you there?"

"Perhaps so. Where are they?" asks he gloomily. "One hears a good deal
about them, but they comprise so many places that now-a-days one is
hardly sure where they exactly lie. At all events no one has made them
clear to me."

"Does it rest with me to enlighten you?" asks she, with a little
aggravating half glance from under her long lashes; "well--the North
Pole, Kamtschatka, Smyrna, Timbuctoo, Maoriland, Margate----"

"We'll stop there, I think," says he, with a faint grimace.

"There! At Margate? No, thanks. _You_ can, if you like, but as for
me----"

"I don't suppose you would stop anywhere with me," says he. "I have
occasional glimmerings that I hope mean common sense. No, I have not
been so adventurous as to wander towards Margate. I have only been to
town and back again."

"What town?"

"Eh? What town?" says he astonished. "_London_, you know."

"No, I don't know," says Miss Kavanagh, a little petulantly. "One would
think there was only one town in the world, and that all you English
people had the monopoly of it. There are other towns, I suppose. Even we
poor Irish insignificants have a town or two. Dublin comes under that
head, I suppose?"

"Undoubtedly. Of _course_," making great haste to abase himself. "It is
mere snobbery our making so much of London. A kind of despicable cant,
you know."

"Well, after all, I expect it is a big place in every way," says Miss
Kavanagh, so far mollified by his submission as to be able to allow him
something.

"It's a desert," says Tommy, turning to his aunt, with all the air of
one who is about to impart to her useful information. "It's raging with
wild beasts. They roam to and fro and are at their wits' ends----" here
Tommy, who is great on Bible history, but who occasionally gets mixed,
stops short. "Father says they're there," he winds up defiantly.

"Wild beasts!" echoes Mr. Dysart, bewildered. "Is _this_ the teaching
about their Saxon neighbors that the Irish children receive at the hands
of their parents and guardians. Oh, well, come now, Tommy, really, you
know----"

"Yes; they are there," says Tommy, rebelliously. "_Frightful_ beasts!
_Bears!_ They'd tear you in bits if they could get at you. They have no
reason in them, father says. And they climb up posts, and roar at
people."

"Oh, nonsense!" says Mr. Dysart. "One would think we were having a
French Revolution all over again in England. Don't you think," glancing
severely at Joyce, who is giving way to unrestrained mirth, "that it is
not only wrong, but dangerous, to implant such ideas about the English
in the breasts of Irish children? There isn't a word of truth in it,
Tommy."

"There _is_!" says Monkton, junior, wagging his head indignantly.
"Father _told_ me."

"Father told us," repeats the small Mabel, who has just come up.

"And father says, too, that the reason that they are so wicked is
because they want their freedom!" says Tommy, as though this is an
unanswerable argument.

"Oh, I see! The socialists!" says Mr. Dysart. "Yes; a troublesome pack!
But still, to call them wild beasts----"

"They _are_ wild beasts," says Tommy, prepared to defend his position to
the last. "They've got _manes_, and _horns_, and _tails_!"

"He's romancing," says Mr. Dysart looking at Joyce.

"He's not," says she demurely. "He is only trying to describe to you the
Zoological Gardens. His father gives him a graphic description of them
every evening, and--the result you see."

Here both she and he, after a glance at each other, burst out laughing.

"No wonder you were amused," says he, "but you might have given me a
hint. You were unkind to me--as usual."

"Now that you have been to London," says she, a little hurriedly, as if
to cover his last words and pretend she hasn't heard them, "you will
find our poor Ireland duller than ever. At Christmas it is not so bad,
but just _now_, and in the height of your season, too,----"

"Do you call this place dull?" interrupts he. "Then let me tell you you
misjudge your native land; this little bit of it, at all events. I think
it not only the loveliest, but the liveliest place on earth."

"You are easily pleased," says she, with a rather embarrassed smile.

"He isn't!" says Tommy, breaking into the conversation with great
aplomb. He has been holding on vigorously to Mr. Dysart's right hand for
the last five minutes, after a brief but brilliant skirmish with Mabel
as to the possession of it--a skirmish brought to a bloodless conclusion
by the surrender, on Mr. Dysart's part, of his left hand to the weaker
belligerent. "He hates Miss Maliphant, nurse says, though Lady Baltimore
wants him to marry her, and she's a fine girl, nurse says, an' raal
smart, and with the gift o' the gab, an' lots o' tin----"

"_Tommy!_" says his aunt frantically. It is indeed plain to everybody
that Tommy is now quoting nurse, _au naturel_, and that he is betraying
confidences in a perfectly reckless manner.

"Don't stop him," says Mr. Dysart, glancing at Joyce's crimson cheeks
with something of disfavor. "'What's Hecuba to me, or I to Hecuba?' I
_defy_ you," a little stormily, "to think I care a farthing for Miss
Maliphant or for any other woman on earth--_save one_!"

"Oh, you mustn't press your confidences on me," says she, smiling and
dissembling rather finely; "I know nothing. I accuse you of nothing.
Only, Tommy, you were a little rude, weren't you?"

"I wasn't," says Tommy, promptly, in whom the inborn instinct of
self-defence has been largely developed. "It's true. Nurse says she has
a voice like a cow. Is _that_ true?" turning, unabashed to Dysart.

"She's expected at the Castle, next week. You shall come up and judge
for yourself," says he, laughing. "And," turning to Joyce, "you will
come, too, I hope."

"It is manners to wait to be asked," returns she, smiling.

"Oh, as for that," says he, "Lady Baltimore crossed last night with me
and her husband. And here is a letter for you." He pulls a note of the
cocked hat order out of one of his pockets.




CHAPTER IV.

    "Tell me where is fancy bred,
    Or in the heart, or in the head?
    How begot, how nourished?
                Reply, reply."


"An invitation from Lady Baltimore," says Joyce, looking at the big red
crest, and coloring slightly.

"Yes."

"How do you know?" asks she, rather suspiciously.

The young man raises his hands and eyes.

"I _swear_ I had nothing to do with it," says he, "I didn't so much as
hint at it. Lady Baltimore spent her time crossing the Channel in
declaring to all who were well enough to hear her, that she lived only
in the expectation of soon seeing you again."

"Nonsense!" scornfully; "it is only a month ago since I was staying
there, just before they went to London. By the bye, what brings them
home now? In the very beginning of their season?"

"_I_ don't know. And it is as well not to inquire perhaps. Baltimore and
my cousin, as all the world knows, have not hit it off together. Yet
when Isabel married him, we all thought it was quite an ideal marriage,
they were so much in love with each other."

"Hot love soon cools," says Miss Kavanagh in a general sort of way.

"I don't believe it," sturdily, "if it's the right sort of love.
However, to go back to your letter--which you haven't even deigned to
open--you _will_ accept the invitation, won't you?"

"I don't know," hesitating.

"Oh! I say, _do_ come! It is only for a week, and even if it does bore
you, still, as a Christian, you ought to consider how much, even in that
short time, you will be able to add to the happiness of your fellow
creatures."

"Flattery means insincerity," says she, tilting her chin, "keep all that
sort of thing for your Miss Maliphant; it is thrown away upon me."

"_My_ Miss Maliphant! Really I must protest against your accrediting me
with such a possession. But look here, _don't_ disappoint us all; and
you won't be dull either, there are lots of people coming. Dicky Brown,
for one."

"Oh! will he be there?" brightening visibly.

"Yes," rather gloomily, and perhaps a little sorry that he has said
anything about Mr. Browne's possible arrival--though to feel jealousy
about that social butterfly is indeed to sound the depths of folly; "you
like him?"

"I _love_ him," says Miss Kavanagh promptly and with sufficient
enthusiasm to restore hope in the bosom of any man except a lover.

"He is blessed indeed," says he stiffly. "Beyond his deserts I can't
help thinking. I really think he is the biggest fool I ever met."

"Oh! not the biggest, surely," says she, so saucily, and with such a
reprehensible tendency towards laughter, that he gives way and laughs
too, though unwillingly.

"True. I'm a bigger," says he, "but as that is _your_ fault, you should
be the last to taunt me with it."

"Foolish people always talk folly," says she with an assumption of
indifference that does not hide her red cheeks. "Well, go on, who is to
be at the Court besides Dicky?"

"Lady Swansdown."

"I like her too."

"But not so well as you like Dicky, _you_ love him according to your own
statement."

"Don't be matter-of-fact!" says Miss Kavanagh, giving him a
well-deserved snub. "Do you always say exactly what you mean?"

"Always--to _you_."

"I daresay you would be more interesting if you didn't," says she, with
a little, lovely smile, that quite spoils the harshness of her words. Of
her few faults, perhaps the greatest is, that she seldom knows her own
mind, where her lovers are concerned, and will blow hot and cold, and
merry and sad, and cheerful, and petulant all in one breath as it were.
Poor lovers! they have a hard time of it with her as a rule. But youth
is often so, and the cold, still years, as they creep on us, with dull
common sense and deadly reason in their train, cure us all too soon of
our pretty idle follies.

Just now she was bent on rebuffing him, but you see her strength failed
her, and she spoiled her effect by the smile she mingled with the
rebuff. The smile indeed was so charming that he remembers nothing but
it, and so she not only gains nothing, but loses something to the other
side.

"Well, I'll try to mend all that," says he, but so lovingly, and with
such unaffected tenderness, that she quails beneath his glance. Coquette
as undoubtedly Nature has made her, she has still so gentle a soul
within her bosom that she shrinks from inflicting _actual_ pain. A pang
or two, a passing regret to be forgotten the next hour--or at all events
in the next change of scene--she is not above imparting, but when people
grow earnest like--like Mr. Dysart for example--they grow troublesome.
And she hasn't made up her mind to marry, and there are other people----

"The Clontarfs are to be there too," goes on Dysart, who is a cousin of
Lady Baltimore's, and knows all about her arrangements; "and the
Brownings, and Norman Beauclerk."

"The--Clontarfs," says Joyce, in a hurried way, that might almost be
called confused; to the man who loves her, and who is watching her, it
is quite plain that she is not thinking of Lord and Lady Clontarf, who
are quite an ordinary couple and devoted to each other, but of that last
name spoken--Norman Beauclerk; Lady Baltimore's brother, a man,
handsome, agreeable, aristocratic--the man whose attentions to her a
month ago had made a little topic for conversation amongst the country
people. Dull country people who never go anywhere or see anything beyond
their stupid selves, and who are therefore driven to do something or
other to avoid suicide or the murdering of each other; gossip unlimited
is their safety valve.

"Yes, and Beauclerk," persists Dysart, a touch of despair at his heart;
"you and he were good friends when last he was over, eh?"

"I am generally very good friends with everybody; not an altogether
desirable character, not a strong one," says she smiling, and still
openly parrying the question.

"You liked Beauclerk," says he, a little doggedly perhaps.

"Ye--es--very well."

"Very _much_! Why can't you be _honest_!" says he flashing out at her.

"I don't know what you mean," coldly. "If, however, you persist on my
looking into it, I--" defiantly--"yes, I _do_ like Mr. Beauclerk very
much."

"Well, I don't know what you see in that fellow."

"Nothing," airily, having now recovered herself, "that's his charm."

"If," gravely, "you gave that as your opinion of Dicky Browne I could
believe you."

She laughs.

"Poor Dicky," says she, "what a cruel judgment; and yet you are right;"
she has changed her whole manner, and is now evidently bent on restoring
him to good humor, and compelling him to forget all about Mr. Beauclerk.
"I must give in to you about Dicky. There isn't even the vaguest
suggestion of meaning about _him_. I--" with a deliberate friendly
glance flung straight into his eyes--"don't often give in to you, do I?"

On this occasion, however, her coquetry--so generally successful--is
completely thrown away. Dysart, with his dark eyes fixed
uncompromisingly upon hers, makes the next move--an antagonistic one.

"You have a very high opinion of Beauclerk," says he.

"Have I?" laughing uneasily, and refusing to let her rising temper give
way. "We all have our opinions on every subject that comes under our
notice. You have one on this subject evidently."

"Yes, but it is not a high one," says he unpleasantly.

"After all, what does that matter? I don't pretend to understand you. I
will only suggest to you that our opinions are but weak things--mere
prejudices--no more."

"I am not prejudiced against Beauclerk, if you mean that," a little
hotly.

"I didn't," with a light shrug. "Believe me, you think a great deal more
about him than I do."

"Are you sure of that?"

"I am at all events sure of one thing," says she quickly darting at him
a frowning glance, "that you have no right to ask me that question."

"I have not indeed," acknowledges he stiffly still, but with so open an
apology in his whole air that she forgives him. "Many conflicting
thoughts led me astray. I must ask your pardon."

"Why, granted!" says she. "And--I was cross, wasn't I? After all an old
friend like you might be allowed a little laxity. There, never mind,"
holding out her hand. "Let us make it up."

Dysart grasps the little extended hand with avidity, and peace seems
restored when Tommy puts an end to all things. To anyone acquainted with
children I need hardly remark that he has been listening to the
foregoing conversation with all his ears and all his eyes and every bit
of his puzzled intelligence.

"Well, go on," says he, giving his aunt a push when the friendly
hand-shake has come to an end.

"Go on? Where?" asks she, with apparent unconcern but a deadly
foreboding at her breast. She knows her Tommy.

"You _said_ you were going to make it up with him!" says that hero,
regarding her with disapproving eyes.

"Well, I have made it up."

"No, you haven't! When you make it up with me you always kiss me! Why
don't you kiss him?"

Consternation on the part of the principal actors. Dysart, strange to
say, is the first to recover.

"Why indeed?" says he, giving way all at once to a fatal desire for
laughter. This, Miss Kavanagh, being vexed with herself for her late
confusion, resents strongly.

"I am sure, Tommy," says she, with a mildness that would not have
imposed upon an infant, "that your lesson hour has arrived. Come, say
good-bye to Mr. Dysart, and let us begin at once. You know I am going to
teach you to-day. Good-bye, Mr. Dysart--if you want to see Barbara, you
will find her very probably in the study."

"Don't go like this," says he anxiously. "Or if you _will_ go, at least
tell me that you will accept Lady Baltimore's invitation."

"I don't know," smiling coldly. "I think not. You see I was there for
such a _long_ time in the beginning of the year, and Barbara always
wants me, and one should not be selfish you know."

"One should not indeed!" says he, with slow meaning. "What answer, then,
must I give my cousin? You know," in a low tone, "that she is not
altogether happy. You can lighten her burden a little. She is fond of
you."

"I can lighten Barbara's burden also. Think me the very incarnation of
selfishness if you will," says she rather unjustly, "but still, if
Barbara says 'don't go,' I shall stay here."

"Mrs. Monkton won't say that."

"Perhaps not," toying idly with a rose, in such a careless fashion as
drives him to despair. Brushing it to and fro across her lips she seems
to have lost all interest in the question in hand.

"If she says to you 'go,' how then?"

"Why then--I may still remain here."

"Well stay then, of course, if you so desire it!" cries he angrily. "If
to make all your world _un_happy is to make you happy, why be so by all
means."

"_All_ my world! Do you suppose then that it will make Barbara and
Freddy unhappy to have my company? What a gallant speech!" says she,
with a provoking little laugh and a swift lifting of her eyes to his.

"No, but it will make other people (more than _twice_ two) miserable to
be deprived of it."

"Are you one of that quartette?" asks she, so saucily, yet withal so
merrily that the hardest-hearted lover might forgive her. A little
irresistible laugh breaks from her lips. Rather ruefully he joins in it.

"I don't think I need answer that question," says he. "To you at all
events."

"To me of all people rather," says she still laughing, "seeing I am the
interested party."

"No, that character belongs to me. You have no interest in it. To me it
is life or death--to--you----"

"No, no, you mustn't talk to me like that. You know I forbid you last
time we met, and you promised me to be good."

"I promised then the most difficult thing in the world. But never mind
me; the principal thing is, your acceptance or rejection of that note.
Joyce!" in a low tone, "_say_ you will accept it."

"Well," relenting visibly, and now refusing to meet his eyes, "I'll ask
Barbara, and if she says I may go I----" pause.

"You will then accept?" eagerly.

"I shall then--think about it."

"You look like an angel," says he, "and you have the heart of a flint."

This remark, that might have presumably annoyed another girl, seems to
fill Miss Kavanagh with mirth.

"Am I so bad as that?" cries she, gaily. "Why I shall make amends then.
I shall change my evil ways. As a beginning, see here. If Barbara says
go to the Court, go I will. Now, stern moralist! where are you?"

"In the seventh heaven," says he, promptly. "Be it a Fool's Paradise or
otherwise, I shall take up my abode there for the present. And now you
will go and ask Mrs. Monkton?"

"In what a hurry to get rid of me!" says this coquette of all coquettes.
"Well, good-bye then----"

"Oh no, don't go."

"To the Court? Was ever man so unreasonable? In one breath 'do' and
'don't'!"

"Was ever woman so tormenting?"

"Tormenting? No, so discerning if you will, or else so----"

"Adorable! You can't find fault with _that_ at all events."

"And therefore my mission is at an end! Good-bye, again."

"Good-bye." He is holding her hand as though he never means to let her
have it again. "That rose," says he, pointing to the flower that had
kissed her lips so often. "It is nothing to you, you can pick yourself
another, give it to me."

"I can pick you another too, a nice fresh one," says she. "Here," moving
towards a glowing bush; "here is a bud worth having."

"Not that one," hastily. "Not one this garden, or any other garden
holds, save the one in your hand. It is the only one in the world of
roses worth having."

"I hate to give a faded gift," says she, looking at the rose she holds
with apparent disfavor.

"Then I shall take it," returns he, with decision. He opens her pretty
pink palm, releases the dying rosebud from it and places it triumphantly
in his coat.

"You haven't got any manners," says she, but she laughs again as she
says it.

"Except bad ones you should add."

"Yes, I forgot that. A point lost. Good-bye now, good-bye indeed."

She waves her hand lightly to him and calling to the children runs
towards the house. It seems as if she has carried all the beauty and
brightness and sweetness of the day with her.

As Dysart turns back again, the afternoon appears grey and gloomy.




CHAPTER V.

    "Look ere thou leap, see ere thou go."


"Well, Barbara, can I go?"

"I don't know"--doubtfully. There is a cloud on Mrs. Monkton's brow, she
is staring out of the window instead of into her sister's face, and she
is evidently a little distressed or uncertain. "You have been there so
lately, and----"

"You want to say something," says the younger sister, seating herself on
the sofa, and drawing Mrs. Monkton down beside her. "Why don't you do
it?"

"You can't want to go so very much, can you now?" asks the latter,
anxiously, almost entreatingly.

"It is I who don't know this time!" says Joyce, with a smile. "And
yet----"

"It seems only like yesterday that you came back after spending a month
there."

"A yesterday that dates from six weeks ago," a little reproachfully.

"I know. You like being there. It is a very amusing house to be at. I
don't blame you in any way. Lord and Lady Baltimore are both charming in
their ways, and very kind, and yet----"

"There, don't stop; you are coming to it now, the very heart of the
meaning. Go on," authoritatively, and seizing her sister in her arms,
"or I'll _shake_ it out of you."

"It is this then," says Mrs. Monkton slowly. "I don't think it is a
_wise_ thing for you to go there so often."

"Oh Barbara! Owl of Wisdom as thou art, why not?" The girl is laughing,
yet a deep flush of color has crept into each cheek.

"Never mind the why not. Perhaps it is unwise to go _anywhere_ too
often; and you must acknowledge that you spent almost the entire spring
there."

"Well, I hinted all that to Mr. Dysart."

"Was he here?"

"Yes. He came down from the Court with the note."

"And--who else is to be there?"

"Oh! the Clontarfs, and Dicky Browne, and Lady Swansdown and a great
many others."

"Mr. Beauclerk?" she does not look at Joyce as she asks this question.

"Yes."

A little silence follows, broken at last by Joyce.

"_May_ I go?"

"Do you think it is the best thing for you to do?" says Mrs. Monkton,
flushing delicately. "_Think_, darling! You know--you _must_ know,
because you have it always before you," flushing even deeper, "that to
marry into a family where you are not welcomed with open heart is to
know much private discomfiture."

"I know this too," says the girl, petulantly, "that to be married to a
man like Freddy, who consults your lightest wish, and is your lover
always, is worth the enduring of anything."

"I think that too," says Mrs. Monkton, who has now grown rather pale.
"But there is still one more thing to know--that in making such a
marriage as we have described, a woman lays out a thorny path for her
husband. She separates him from his family, and as all good men have
strong home ties, she naturally compels him to feel many a secret pang."

"But he has his compensations. Do you think if Freddy got the chance, he
would give you up and go back to his family?"

"No--not that. But to rejoice in that thought is to be selfish. Why
should he not have my love and the love of his people too? There is a
want somewhere. What I wish to impress upon you, Joyce, is this, that a
woman who marries a man against his parents' wishes has much to regret,
much to endure."

"I think you are ungrateful," says the girl a little vehemently. "Freddy
has made you endure nothing. You are the happiest married woman I know."

"Yes, but I have made _him_ endure a great deal," says Mrs. Monkton in a
low tone. She rises, and going to the window, stands there looking out
upon the sunny landscape, but seeing nothing.

"Barbara! you are crying," says Joyce, going up to her abruptly, and
folding her arms round her.

"It is nothing, dear. Nothing at all, darling. Only--I wish he and his
father were friends again. Freddy is too good a man not to regret the
estrangement."

"I believe you think Freddy is a little god!" says Joyce laughing.

"O! not a _little_ one," says Mrs. Monkton, and as Freddy stands six
foot one in his socks, they both laugh at this.

"Still you don't answer me," says the girl presently. "You don't say
'you may' or 'you shan't'--which is it to be, Barbara?"

Her tone is distinctly coaxing now, and as she speaks she gives her
sister a little squeeze that is plainly meant to press the desired
permission out of her.

Still Mrs. Monkton hesitates.

"You see," says she temporizing, "there are so many reasons. The Court,"
pausing and flushing, "is not _quite_ the house for so young a girl as
you."

"Oh Barbara!"

"You can't misunderstand me," says her sister with agitation. "You know
how I like, _love_ Lady Baltimore, and how good Lord Baltimore has been
to Freddy. When his father cast him off there was very little left to us
for beginning housekeeping with, and when Lord Baltimore gave him his
agency--Oh, _well_! it isn't likely we shall either of us forget to be
grateful for _that_. If it was only for ourselves I should say nothing,
but it is for you, dear; and--this unfortunate affair--this determined
hostility that exists between Lord and Lady Baltimore, makes it
unpleasant for the guests. You know," nervously, "I hate gossip of any
sort, but one must defend one's own."

"But there is nothing unpleasant; one sees nothing. They are charming to
each other. I have been staying there and I know."

"Have I not stayed there too? It is impossible Joyce to fight against
facts. All the world knows they are not on good terms."

"Well, a great many other people aren't perhaps."

"When they aren't the tone of the house gets lowered. And I have noticed
of late that they have people there, who----"

"Who what, Barbara?"

"Oh yes, I _know_ they are all right; they are received everywhere, but
are they good companions for a girl of your years? It is not a healthy
atmosphere for you. They are rich people who think less of a hundred
guineas than you do of five. Is it wise, I ask you again to accustom
yourself to their ways?"

"Nonsense, Barbara!" says her sister, looking at her with a growing
surprise. "That is not like you. Why should we despise the rich, why
should we seek to emulate them? Surely both you and I have too good
blood in our veins to give way to such follies." She leans towards Mrs.
Monkton, and with a swift gesture, gentle as firm, turns her face to her
own.

"Now for the real reason," says she.

Unthinkingly she has brought confusion on herself. Barbara, as though
stung to cruel candor, gives her the real reason in a sentence.

"Tell me this," says she, "which do you like best, Mr. Dysart, or Mr.
Beauclerk?"

Joyce, taking her arm from round her sister's neck, moves back from her.
A deep color has flamed into her cheeks, then died away again. She looks
quite calm now.

"What a question," says she.

"Well," feverishly, "answer it."

"Oh, no," says the girl quickly.

"Why not? Why not answer it to me, your chief friend? You think the
question indelicate, but why should I shrink from asking a question on
which, perhaps, the happiness of your life depends? If--if you have set
your heart on Mr. Beauclerk----" She stops, checked by something in Miss
Kavanagh's face.

"Well, what then?" asks the latter coldly.

"It will bring you unhappiness. He is Lady Baltimore's brother. She
already plans for him. The Beauclerks are poor--he is bound to marry
money."

"That is a good deal about Mr. Beauclerk, but what about the other
possible suitor whom you suppose I am madly in love with?"

"Don't talk to me like that, Joyce. Do you think I have anything at
heart except your interests? As to Mr. Dysart, if you like _him_, I
confess I should be glad of it. He is only a cousin of the Baltimores,
and of such moderate means that they would scarcely object to his
marrying a penniless girl."

"You rate me highly," says Joyce, with a sudden rather sharp little
laugh. "I am good enough for the cousin--I am _not_ good enough for the
brother, who may reasonably look higher."

"Not higher," haughtily. "He can only marry a girl of good birth. _You_
are that, but he, in his position, will look for money, or else his
people will look for it for him. Whereas, Mr. Dysart----"

"Yes, you needn't go over it all. Mr. Dysart is about on a level with
me, he will _never_ have any money, neither shall I." Suddenly she looks
round at her sister, her eyes very bright. "Tell me then," says she,
"what does it all come to? That I am bound to refuse to marry a man
because he has money, and because I have none."

"That is not the argument," says Barbara anxiously.

"I think it is."

"It is not. I advise you strongly not to think of Mr. Beauclerk, yet
_he_ has no money to speak of."

"He has more than Freddy."

"But he is a different man from Freddy--with different tastes, different
aspirations, different----He's different," emphatically, "in _every_
way!"

"To be different from the person one loves is not to be a bad man," says
Joyce slowly, her eyes on the ground.

"My dear girl, who has called Mr. Beauclerk a bad man?"

"You don't like him," says Miss Kavanagh, still more slowly, still with
thoughtful eyes downcast.

"I like Mr. Dysart better if you mean that."

"No, I don't mean that. And, besides, that is no answer."

"Was there a question?"

"Yes. Why don't you like Mr. Beauclerk?"

"Have I said I didn't like him?"

"Not in so many words, but----Well, why don't you?"

"I don't know," rather lamely.

Miss Kavanagh laughs a little satirically, and Mrs. Monkton, objecting
to mirth of that description, takes fire.

"Why do you _like_ him?" asks she defiantly.

"I don't know either," returns Joyce, with a rueful smile. "And after
all I'm not sure that I like him so _very_ much. You evidently imagine
me to be head over ears in love with him, yet I, myself, scarcely know
whether I like him or not."

"You always look at him so kindly, and you always pull your skirts aside
to give him a place by your side."

"I should do that for Tommy."

"Would you? That would be _too_ kind," says Tommy's mother, laughing.
"It would mean ruin to your skirts in two minutes."

"But, consider the gain. The priceless scraps, of wisdom I should hear,
even whilst my clothes were being demolished."

This has been a mere interlude, unintentional on the part of either,
and, once over, neither knows how to go on. The question _must_ be
settled one way or the other.

"There is one thing," says Mrs. Monkton, at length, "You certainly
prefer Mr. Beauclerk to Mr. Dysart."

"Do I? I wish I knew as much about myself as you know about me. And,
after all, it is of no consequence whom I like. The real thing
is----Come, Barbara, you who know so much can tell me this----"

"Well?" says Mrs. Monkton, seeing she has grown very red, and is
evidently hesitating.

"No. This absurd conversation has gone far enough. I was going to ask
you to solve a riddle, but----"

"But what?"

"You are too serious about it."

"Not _too_ serious. It is very important."

"Oh, Barbara, do you _know_ what you are saying?" cries the girl with an
angry little stamp, turning to her a face pale and indignant. "You have
been telling me in so many words that I am in love with either Mr.
Beauclerk or Mr. Dysart. Pray now, for a change, tell me which of them
is in love with _me_."

"Mr. Dysart," says Barbara quietly.

Her sister laughs angrily.

"You think everybody who looks at me is in love with me."

"Not _every_one!"

"Meaning Mr. Beauclerk."

"No," slowly. "I think he likes you, too, but he is a man who will
always _think_. You know he has come in for that property in Hampshire
through his uncle's death, but he got no money with it. It is a large
place, impossible to keep up without a large income, and his uncle left
every penny away from him. It is in great disrepair, the house
especially. I hear it is falling to pieces. Mr. Beauclerk is an
ambitious man, he will seek means to rebuild his house."

"Well what of that? It is an interesting bit of history, but how does it
concern me? Take that troubled look out of your eyes, Barbara. I assure
you Mr. Beauclerk is as little to me as I am to him."

She speaks with such evident sincerity, with such an undeniable belief
in the truth of her own words, that Mrs. Monkton, looking at her and
reading her soul through her clear eyes, feels a weight lifted from her
heart.

"That is all right then," says she simply. She turns as if to go away,
but Miss Kavanagh has still a word or two to say.

"I may go to the Court?" says she.

"Yes; I suppose so."

"But you won't be vexed if I go, Barbie?"

"No; not now."

"Well," slipping her arm through hers, with an audible sigh of delight.
"_That's_ settled."

"Things generally _do_ get settled the way you want them to be," says
Mrs. Monkton, laughing. "Come, what about your frocks, eh?"

From this out they spend a most enjoyable hour or two.




CHAPTER VI.

    "Or if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,
    That leaves look pale, thinking the winter's near."


The visit to the Court being decided on, Miss Kavanagh undertakes life
afresh, with a joyous heart. Lord and Lady Baltimore are the best host
and hostess in the world, and a visit to them means unmixed pleasure
while it lasts. The Court is, indeed, the pleasantest house in the
county, the most desirable in all respects, and the gayest. Yet, strange
and sad to add, happiness has found no bed within its walls.

This is the more remarkable in that the marriage of Lord and Lady
Baltimore had been an almost idealistic one. They had been very much in
love with each other. All the hosts of friends and relations that
belonged to either side had been delighted with the engagement. So many
imprudent marriages were made, so many disastrous ones; but _here_ was a
marriage where birth and money went together, and left no guardians or
parents lamenting. All Belgravia stood still and stared at the young
couple with genuine admiration. It wasn't often that love, pure and
simple, fell into their midst, and such a _satisfactory_ love too! None
of your erratic darts that struck the wrong breasts, and created
confusion for miles round, but a thoroughly proper, respectable winged
arrow that pierced the bosoms of those who might safely be congratulated
on the reception of it.

They had, indeed, been very much in love with each other. Few people
have known such extreme happiness as fell to their lot for two whole
years. They were wrapt up in each other, and when the little son came at
the end of that time, _nothing_ seemed wanted. They grew so strong in
their belief in the immutability of their own relations, one to the
other, that when the blow fell that separated them, it proved a very
lightning-stroke, dividing soul from body.

Lady Baltimore could be at no time called a beautiful woman. But there
is always a charm in her face, a strength, an attractiveness that might
well defy the more material charms of a lovelier woman than herself.
With a soul as pure as her face, and a mind entirely innocent of the
world's evil ways--and the sad and foolish secrets she is compelled to
bear upon her tired bosom from century to century--she took with a
bitter hardness the revelations of her husband's former life before he
married her, related to her by--of course--a devoted friend.

Unfortunately the authority was an undeniable one. It was impossible for
Lady Baltimore to refuse to believe. The past, too, she might have
condoned; though, believing in her husband as she did, it would always
have been bitter to her, but the devoted friend--may all such meet their
just reward!--had not stopped there; she had gone a step further, a
fatal step; she had told her something that had _not_ occurred since
their marriage.

Perhaps the devoted friend believed in her lie, perhaps she did not.
Anyway, the mischief was done. Indeed, from the beginning seeds of
distrust had been laid, and, buried in so young and unlearned a bosom,
had taken a fatal grip.

The more fatal in that there was truth in them. As a fact, Lord
Baltimore had been the hero of several ugly passages in his life. His
early life, certainly; but a young wife who has begun by thinking him
immaculate, would hardly be the one to lay stress upon _that_. And when
her friend, who had tried unsuccessfully to marry Lord Baltimore and had
failed, had in the kindliest spirit, _of course_, opened her eyes to his
misdoings, she had at first passionately refused to listen, then _had_
listened, and after that was ready to listen to anything.

One episode in his past history had been made much of. The sorry heroine
of it had been an actress. This was bad enough, but when the
disinterested friend went on to say that Lord Baltimore had been seen in
her company only so long ago as last week, matters came to a climax.
That was a long time ago from to-day, but the shock when it came
shattered all the sacred feelings in Lady Baltimore's heart. She grew
cold, callous, indifferent. Her mouth, a really beautiful feature, that
used to be a picture of serenity and charity personified, hardened. She
became austere, cold. Not difficult, so much as unsympathetic. She was
still a good hostess, and those who had known her _before_ her
misfortune still loved her. But she made no new friends, and she sat
down within herself, as it were, and gave herself up to her fate, and
would probably have died or grown reckless but for her little son.

And it was _after_ the birth of this beloved child that she had been
told that _her_ husband had again been seen in company with Madame
Istray; _that_ seemed to add fuel to the fire already kindled. She could
not forgive that. It was proof positive of his baseness.

To the young wife it was all a revelation, a horrible one. She had been
so stunned by it, that she, accepted it as it stood, and learning that
the stories of his life _before_ marriage were true, had decided that
the stories told of his life _after_ marriage were true also. She was
young, and youth is always hard.

To her no doubt remained of his infidelity. She had come of a brave old
stock, who, if they could not fight, could at least endure in silence,
and knew well the necessity of keeping her name out of the public mouth.
She kept herself well in hand, therefore, and betrayed nothing of all
she had been feeling. She dismissed her friend with a gentle air,
dignified, yet of sufficient haughtiness to let that astute and now
decidedly repentant lady know that never again would she enter the doors
of the Court, or any other of Lady Baltimore's houses; yet she
restrained herself all through so well that, even until the very end
came, her own husband never knew how horribly she suffered through her
disbelief in him.

He thought her heartless. There was no scandal, no public separation.
She said a word or two to him that told him what she had heard, and when
he tried to explain the truths of that last libel that had declared him
unfaithful to her since her marriage, she had silenced him with so cold,
so scornful, so contemptuous a glance and word, that, chilled and
angered in his turn, he had left her.

Twice afterwards he had sought to explain matters, but it was useless.
She would not listen; the treacherous friend, whom she never betrayed,
had done her work well. Lady Baltimore, though she never forgave _her_,
would not forgive her husband either; she would make no formal attempt
at a separation. Before the world she and he lived together, seemingly
on the best terms; at all events on quite as good terms as most of their
acquaintances; yet all the world knew how it was with them. So long as
there are servants, so long will it be impossible to effectually conceal
our most sacred secrets.

Her friends, when the Baltimores went to visit them, made arrangements
to suit them. It was a pity, everybody said, that such complications
should have arisen, and one would not have expected it from Isabel, but
then she seemed so cold, that probably a climax like that did not affect
her as much as it might another. She was so entirely wrapped up in her
boy--some women were like that--a child sufficed them. And as for Lord
Baltimore--Cyril--why----Judgment was divided here; the women taking his
part, the men hers. The latter finding an attraction hardly to be
defined in her pure, calm, rather impenetrable face, that had yet a
smile so lovely that it could warm the seemingly cold face into a
something that was more effective than mere beauty. It was a wonderful
smile, and, in spite of all her troubles, was by no means rare. Lady
Baltimore, they all acknowledged, was a delightful guest and hostess.

As for Lord Baltimore, he--well, he would know how to console himself.
Society, the crudest organization on earth, laughed to itself about him.
He had known how to live before his marriage; now that the marriage had
proved a failure, he would still know how to make life bearable.

In this they wronged him.




CHAPTER VII.

     "Ils n'employent les paroles qué pour déguiser leurs
     pensées."--VOLTAIRE.


Even the most dyspeptic of the guests had acknowledged at breakfast,
some hours ago now, that a lovelier day could hardly be imagined. Lady
Baltimore, with a smile, had agreed with him. It was, indeed, impossible
not to agree with him. The sun was shining high in the heavens, and a
soft, velvetty air blew through the open windows right on to the table.

"What shall we do to-day?" Lady Swansdown, one of the guests, had asked,
addressing her question to Lord Baltimore, who just then was helping his
little son to porridge.

Whatever she liked.

"Then _nothing_!" says she, in that soft drawl of hers, and that little
familiar imploring, glance of hers at her hostess, who sat behind the
urn, and glanced back at her ever so kindly.

"Yes, it was too warm to dream of exertion; would Lady Swansdown like,
to remain at home then, and dream away the afternoon in a hammock?"

"Dreams were delightful; but to dream _alone_----"

"Oh, no; they would all, or at least most of them, stay with her." It
was Lady Baltimore who had said this, after waiting in vain for her
husband to speak--to whom, indeed, Lady Swansdown's question had been
rather pointedly addressed.

So at home they all had stayed. No one being very keen about doing
anything on a day so sultry.

Yet now, when luncheon is at an end, and the day still heavy with heat,
the desire for action that lies in every breast takes fire. They are all
tired of doing nothing. The Tennis-courts lie invitingly empty, and
rackets thrust themselves into notice at every turn; as for the balls,
worn out from _ennui_, they insert themselves under each arched instep,
threatening to bring the owners to the ground unless picked up and made
use of.

"Who wants a beating?" demands Mr. Browne at last, unable to pretend
lassitude any longer. Taking up a racket he brandishes it wildly,
presumably to attract attention. This is necessary. As a rule nobody
pays any attention to Dicky Browne.

He is a nondescript sort of young man, of the negative order; with no
features to speak of, and a capital opinion of himself. Income vague.
Age unknown.

"Well! That's _one_ way of putting it," says Miss Kavanagh, with a
little tilt of her pretty chin.

"Is it a riddle?" asks Dysart. "If so I know it. The answer is--Dicky
Browne."

"Oh, I _like_ that!" says Mr. Browne unabashed. "See here, I'll give you
plus fifteen, and a bisque, and start myself at minus thirty, and beat
you in a canter."

"Dear Mr. Browne, consider the day! I believe there are such things as
sunstrokes," says Lady Swansdown, in her sweet treble.

"There are. But Dicky's all right," says Lord Baltimore, drawing up a
garden chair close to hers, and seating himself upon it. "His head is
safe. The sun makes no impression upon granite!"

"Ah, _granite_! that applies to a heart not a head," says Lady
Swansdown, resting her blue eyes on Baltimore's for just a swift second.

It is wonderful, however, what her eyes can do in a second. Baltimore
laughs lightly, returns her glance four-fold, and draws his chair a
quarter of an inch closer to hers. To move it more than that would have
been an impossibility. Lady Swansdown makes a slight movement. With a
smile seraphic as an angel's, she pulls her lace skirts a little to one
side, as if to prove to Baltimore that he has encroached beyond his
privileges upon her domain. "People should not _crush_ people. And _why_
do you want to get so very close to me?" This question lies within the
serene eyes she once more raises to his.

She is a lovely woman, blonde, serene, dangerous! In each glance she
turns upon the man who happens at any moment to be next to her, lies an
entire chapter on the "Whole Art of Flirtation." Were she reduced to
penury, and the world a little more advanced in its fashionable ways,
she might readily make a small fortune in teaching young ladies "How to
Marry Well." No man could resist her pupils, once properly finished by
her and turned out to prey upon the stronger sex. "The Complete Angler"
would be a title they might filch with perfect honor and call their own.

She is a tall beauty, with soft limbs, graceful as a panther, or a cat.
Her eyes are like the skies in summer time, her lips sweet and full. The
silken hair that falls in soft masses on her Grecian brow is light as
corn in harvest, and she has hands and feet that are absolutely
faultless. She has even more than all these--a most convenient husband,
who is not only now but apparently always in a position of trust abroad.
Very _much_ abroad. The Fiji, or the Sandwich Islands for choice. One
can't hear from those centres of worldly dissipation in a hurry. And
after all, it really doesn't very much matter _where_ he is!

There had been a whisper or two in the County about her and Lord
Baltimore. Everybody knew the latter had been a little wild since his
estrangement with his wife, but nothing to signify very much--nothing
that one could lay one's finger on, until Lady Swansdown had come down
last year to the Court. Whether Baltimore was in love with her was
uncertain, but all were agreed that she was in love with him. Not that
she made an _esclandre_ of any sort, but _one could see_! And still! she
was such a friend of _Lady_ Baltimore's--an old friend. They had been
girls together--that was what was so wonderful! And Lady Baltimore made
very much of her, and treated her with the kindliest observances,
and----But one had often heard of the serpent that one nourished in
one's bosom only that it might come to life and sting one! The County
grew wise over this complication; and perhaps when Mrs. Monkton had
hinted to Joyce of the "odd people" the Baltimores asked to the Court,
she had had Lady Swansdown in her mind.

"Whose heart?" asks Baltimore, _à propos_ of her last remark. "Yours?"

It is a leading remark, and something in the way it is uttered strikes
unpleasantly on the ears of Dysart. Baltimore is bending over his lovely
guest, and looking at her with an admiration too open to be quite
respectful. But she betrays no resentment. She smiles back at him indeed
in that little slow, seductive way of hers, and makes him an answer in a
tone too low for even those nearest to her to hear. It is a sort of
challenge, a tacit acknowledgment that they two are alone even in the
midst of all these tiresome people.

Baltimore accepts it. Of late he has grown a little reckless. The
battling against circumstances has been too much for him. He has gone
under. The persistent coldness of his wife, her refusal to hear, or
believe in him, has had its effect. A man of a naturally warm and kindly
disposition, thrown thus back upon himself, he has now given a loose
rein to the carelessness that has been a part of his nature since his
mother gave him to the world, and allows himself to swim or go down with
the tide that carries his present life upon its bosom.

Lady Swansdown is lovely and kind. Always with that sense of injury full
upon him, that half-concealed but ever-present desire for revenge upon
the wife who has so coldly condemned and cast him aside, he flings
himself willingly into a flirtation, ready made to his hand, and as
dangerous as it seems light.

His life, he tells himself, is hopelessly embittered. The best things in
it are denied him; he gives therefore the more heed to the honeyed words
of the pretty creature near him, who in truth likes him too well for her
own soul's good.

That detested husband of hers, out there _somewhere_, the only thought
she ever gives him is when she remembers with horror how as a young girl
she was sold to him. For years she had believed herself heartless--of
all her numerous love affairs not one had really touched her until now,
and _now_ he is the husband of her oldest friend; of the one woman whom
perhaps in all the world she really respects.

At times her heart smites her, and a terrible longing to go away--to
die--to make an end of it--takes possession of her at other times. She
leans towards Baltimore, her lovely eyes alight, her soft mouth smiling.
Her whispered words, her only half-averted glances, all tell their tale.
Presently it is clear to everyone that a very fully developed flirtation
is well in hand.

Lady Baltimore coming across the grass with a basket in one hand and her
little son held fondly by the other, sees and grasps the situation.
Baltimore, leaning over Lady Swansdown, the latter lying back in her
lounging chair in her usual indolent fashion, swaying her feather fan
from side to side, and with white lids lying on the azure eyes.

Seeing it all, Lady Baltimore's mouth hardens, and a contemptuous
expression destroys the calm dignity of her face. For the moment _only_.
Another moment, and it is gone: she has recovered herself. The one sign
of emotion she has betrayed is swallowed up by her stern determination
to conceal all pain at all costs, and if her fingers tighten somewhat
convulsively on those of her boy's, why, who can be the wiser of _that_?
No one can see it.

Dysart, however, who is honestly fond of his cousin, has mastered that
first swift involuntary contraction of the calm brow, and a sense of
indignant anger against Baltimore and his somewhat reckless companion
fires his blood. He springs quickly to his feet.

Lady Baltimore, noting the action, though not understanding the motive
for it, turns and smiles at him--so controlled a smile that it quiets
him at once.

"I am going to the gardens to try and cajole McIntyre out of some
roses," says she, in her sweet, slow way, stopping near the first group
she reaches on the lawn--the group that contains, amongst others, her
husband, and----her friend. She would not willingly have stayed where
they were, but she is too proud to pass them by without a word. "Who
will come with me? Oh! _no_," as several rise to join her, laughing,
though rather faintly. "It is not compulsory--even though I go alone, I
shall feel that I am equal to McIntyre."

Lord Baltimore had started as her first words fell upon his ears. He had
been so preoccupied that her light footfalls coming over the grass had
not reached him, and her voice, when it fell upon the air, gave him a
shock. He half rises from his seat:

"Shall I?" he is beginning, and then stops short, something in her face
checking him.

"_You!_" she conquers herself a second later; all the scorn and contempt
is crushed, by sheer force of will, out of look and tone, and she goes
on as clearly, and as entirely without emotion, as though she were a
mere machine--a thing she has taught herself to be. "Not you," she says
gaily, waving him lightly from her. "You are too useful here"--as she
says this she gives him the softest if fleetest smile. It is a
masterpiece. "You can amuse one here and there, whilst I--I--I want a
girl, I think," looking round. "Bertie,"--with a fond, an almost
passionate glance at her little son--"always likes one of his
sweethearts (and they are many) to accompany him when he takes his walks
abroad."

"Like father, like son, I daresay. Ha, ha!" laughs a fatuous youth--a
Mr. Courtenay--who lives about five miles from the Court, and has
dropped in this afternoon, very unfortunately, it must be confessed, to
pay his respects to Lady Baltimore. Fools always hit on the truth!
_Why_, nobody knows, except the heavens above us--but so it is. Young
Courtenay, who has heard nothing of the unpleasant relations existing
between his host and hostess, and who would be quite incapable of
understanding them if he _had_ heard, now springs a remark upon the
assembled five or six people present that almost reduces them to powder.

Dysart casts a murderous glance at him.

"A clever old proverb," says Lady Baltimore lightly. She is apparently
the one unconcerned person amongst them. "I always like those old
sayings. There is so much truth in them."

She has forced herself to say this; but as the words pass her lips she
blanches perceptibly. As if unable to control herself she draws her
little son towards her; her arms tighten round him. The boy responds
gladly to the embrace, and to those present who know nothing, it seems
the simplest thing in the world. The mother,--the child; naturally they
would caress each other on each and every occasion. The agony of the
mother is unknown to them; the fear that her boy, her treasure, may
inherit something of his father, and in his turn prove unfaithful to the
heart that trusts him.

It is a very little scene, scarcely worth recording, yet the anguish of
a strong heart lies embodied in it.

"If you are going to the gardens, Lady Baltimore, let me go with you,"
says Miss Maliphant, rising quickly and going toward her. She is a big,
loud girl, with money written all over her in capital letters, but Dicky
Browne watching her, tells himself she has a good heart. "I should
_love_ to go there with you and Bertie."

"Come, then," says Lady Baltimore graciously. She makes a step forward;
little Bertie, as though he likes and believes in her, thrusts his small
fist into the hand of the Birmingham heiress, and thus united, all three
pass out of sight.




CHAPTER VIII.

     "I have no other but a woman's reason: I think him so, because I
     think him so."


When a corner near the rhododendrons has concealed them from view,
Dysart rises from his seat and goes deliberately over to where Lady
Swansdown is sitting. She is an old friend of his, and he has therefore
no qualms about being a little brusque with her where occasion demands
it.

"Have a game?" says he. His suggestion is full of playfulness, his tone,
however, is stern.

"Dear Felix, why?" says she, smiling up at him beautifully. There is
even a suspicion of amusement in her smile.

"A change!" says he. His words this time might mean something, his tone
anything. She can read either as she pleases.

"True!" says she laughing. "There is nothing like change. You have
wakened me to a delightful fact. Lord Baltimore," turning languidly to
her companion, who has been a little _distrait_ since his wife and son
passed by him. "What do you say to trying a change for just we two.
Variety they _say_ is charming, shall we try if shade and coolness and
comfort are to be found in that enchanting glade down there?" She points
as she speaks to an opening in the wood where perpetual twilight seems
to reign, as seen from where they now are sitting.

"If you will," says Baltimore, still a little vaguely. He gets up,
however, and stretches his arms indolently above his head as one might
who is flinging from him the remembrance of an unpleasant dream.

"The sun here is intolerable," says Lady Swansdown, rising too. "More
than one can endure. Thanks, dear Felix, for your suggestion. I should
never have thought of the glade if you hadn't asked me to play that
impossible game."

She smiles a little maliciously at Dysart, and, accompanied by Lord
Baltimore, moves away from the assembled groups upon the lawn to the dim
recesses of the leafy glade.

"_Sold!_" says Mr. Browne to Dysart. It is always impossible to Dicky to
hold his tongue. "But you needn't look so cut up about it. 'Tisn't good
enough, my dear fellow. I know 'em both by heart. Baltimore is as much
in love with her as he is with his Irish tenants, but his imagination is
his strong point, and it pleases him to think he has found at last for
the twentieth time a solace for all his woes in the disinterested love
of somebody, it really never much matters who."

"There is more in it than _you_ think," says Dysart gloomily.

"Not a fraction!" airily.

"And what of her? Lady Swansdown?"

"Of her! Her heart has been in such constant use for years that by this
time it must be in tatters. Give up thinking about that. Ah! here is my
beloved girl again!" He makes an elaborate gesture of delight as he sees
Joyce advancing in his direction. "_Dear_ Joyce!" beaming on her, "who
shall say there is nothing in animal magnetism. Here I have been just
talking about you to Dysart, and telling him what a lost soul I feel
when you're away, and instantly, as if in answer to my keen desire, you
appear before me."

"Why aren't you playing tennis?" demands Miss Kavanagh, with a cruel
disregard of this flowery speech.

"Because I was waiting for you."

"Well, I'll beat you," says she, "I always do."

"Not if you play on my side," reproachfully.

"What! Have you for a _partner_! Nonsense, Dicky, you know I shouldn't
dream of that. Why it is as much as ever you can do to put the ball over
the net."

"'Twas ever thus,'" quotes Mr. Browne mournfully. "The sincerest worship
gains only scorn and contumely. But never mind! the day will come!----"

"To an end," says Miss Kavanagh, giving a finish to his sentence never
meant. "That," cheerfully, "is just what I think. If we don't have a
game now, the shades of night will be on us before we can look round
us."

"Will you play with me?" says Dysart.

"With pleasure. Keep your eye on this near court, and when this game is
at an end, call it ours;" she sinks into a chair as she speaks, and
Dysart, who is in a silent mood, flings himself on the grass at her feet
and falls into a reverie. To be conversational is unnecessary, Dicky
Browne is on the spot.

       *       *       *       *       *

Hotter and hotter grows the sun; the evening comes on apace; a few
people from the neighboring houses have dropped in; Mrs. Monkton amongst
others, with Tommy in tow. The latter, who is supposed to entertain a
strong affection for Lady Baltimore's little son, no sooner, however,
sees Dicky Browne than he gives himself up to his keeping. What the
attraction is that Mr. Browne has for children has never yet been
clearly defined. It is the more difficult to arrive at a satisfactory
conclusion about it, in that no child was ever yet left in his sole care
for ten minutes without coming to blows, or tears, or a determined
attempt at murder or suicide.

His mother, seeing Tommy veering towards this uncertain friend, turns a
doubtful eye on Mr. Browne.

"Better come with me, Tommy," says she, "I am going to the gardens to
find Lady Baltimore. She will have Bertie with her."

"I'll stay with Dicky," says Tommy, flinging himself broadcast on Mr.
Brown's reluctant chest, that gives forth a compulsory "Wough" as he
does so. "He'll tell me a story."

"Don't be unhappy, Mrs. Monkton," says the latter, when he has recovered
a little from the shock--Tommy is a well-grown boy, with a sufficient
amount of adipose matter about him to make his descent felt. "I'll
promise to be careful. Nothing French I assure you. Nothing that could
shock the young mind, or teach it how to shoot in the wrong direction.
My tales are always strictly moral."

"Well, Tommy, be _good_!" says Mrs. Monkton with a last imploring glance
at her son, who has already forgotten her existence, being lost in a
wild wrestling match with his new friend. With deep forebodings his
mother leaves him and goes upon her way. Passing Joyce, she says in a
low whisper:

"Keep an eye on Tommy."

"Both eyes if you like," laughing. "But Dicky, in spite of his evil
reputation, seldom goes to extremes."

"Tommy does, however," says Mrs. Monkton tritely.

"Well--I'll look after him."

And so perhaps she might have done, had not a light step sounding just
behind her chair at this moment caused her to start--to look round--to
forget all but what she now sees.

He is a very aristocratic-looking man, tall, with large limbs, and big
indeed, in every way. His eyes are light, his nose a handsome Roman, his
forehead massive, and if not grand in the distinctly intellectual way,
still a fine forehead and impressive. His hands are of a goodly size,
but exquisitely proportioned, and very white, the skin almost delicate.
He is rather like his sister, Lady Baltimore, and yet so different from
her in every way that the distinct resemblance that is surely there
torments the observer.

"_Why!_" says Joyce. It is the most foolish exclamation and means
nothing, but she finds herself a little taken off her guard. "I didn't
know you were here!" She has half risen.

"Neither did I--how d'ye do, Dysart?--until half an hour ago. Won't you
shake hands?"

He holds out his own hand to her as he speaks. There is a quizzical
light in his eyes as he speaks, nothing to offend, but one can see that
he finds amusement in the fact that the girl has been so much impressed
by his unexpected appearance that she has even forgotten the small usual
act of courtesy with which we greet our friends. She had, indeed, been
dead to everything but his coming.

"You came----" falters she, stammering a little, as she notes her
mistake.

"By the mid-day train; I gave myself just time to snatch a sandwich from
Purdon (the butler), say a word or two to my sister, whom I found in the
garden, and then came on here to ask you to play this next game with
me."

"Oh! I am so sorry, but I have promised it to----"

The words are out of her mouth before she has realized the fact that
Dysart is listening--Dysart, who is lying at her feet, watching every
expression in her mobile face. She colors hotly, and looks down at him
confused, lovely.

"I didn't mean--_that_!" says she, trying to smile indifferently,
"Only----"

"_Don't!_" says Dysart, not loudly, not curtly, yet in so strange and
decided a way that it renders her silent. "You mustn't mind me," says
he, a second later, in his usual calm tone. "I know you and Beauclerk
are wonderful players. You can give me a game later on."

"A capital arrangement," says Beauclerk, comfortably sinking into a
chair beside her, with all the lazy manner of a man at peace with
himself and his world, "especially as I shall have to go in presently to
write some letters for the evening post."

He places his elbows on the arms of the chair, brings the ends of his
fingers together, and beams admiringly at Joyce over the tops of them.

"How busy you always are," says she, slowly.

"Well you see, this appointment, or, rather, the promise of it, keeps me
going. Tremendous lot of interest to work up. Good deal of bother, you
know, but then, beggars--eh?--can't be choosers, can they? And I should
like to go to the East; that is, if----"

He pauses, beams again, and looks boldly into Miss Kavanagh's eyes. She
blushes hotly, and, dropping her fan, makes a little attempt to pick it
up again. Mr. Beauclerk makes another little attempt, and so manages
that his hand meets hers. There is a slight, an almost benevolent
pressure.

Had they looked at Dysart as they both resumed their places, they could
have seen that his face is white as death. Miss Kavanagh, too, looks a
little pale, a little uncertain, but as a whole nervously happy.

"I've been down at that old place of mine," goes on Mr. Beauclerk.
"Terrible disrepair--take thousands to put it in any sort of order. And
where's one to get them? That's the one question that has got no answer
now-a-days. Eh, Dysart?"

"There is an answer, however," says Dysart, curtly, not looking at him.

"Ah, well, I suppose so. But I haven't heard it yet."

"Oh, yes, I think you have," says Dysart, quite politely, but grimly,
nevertheless.

"Dear fellow, how? where? unless one discovers a _mine_ or an African
diamond-field?"

"Or an heiress," says Dysart, incidentally.

"Hah! lucky dog, that comes home to _you_," says Beauclerk, giving him a
playful pat on his shoulder, and stooping from his chair to do it, as
Dysart still sits upon the grass.

"Not to me."

"No? You _will_ be modest? Well, well! But talking of that old place, I
assure you, Miss Kavanagh, it worries me--it does, indeed. It sounds
like one's _duty_ to restore it, and still----"

"There are better things than even an old place," says Dysart.

"Ah! you haven't one you see," cries Beauclerk, with the utmost
geniality. "If you had----I really think if you had you would understand
that it requires a sacrifice to give it up to moths and rust and ruin."

"I said there were better things than old places," says Dysart doggedly,
never looking in his direction. "And if there are, _make_ a sacrifice."

"Pouf! Lucky fellows like you--gay soldier lads--with hearts as light as
sunbeams, can easily preach; but sacrifices are not so easily made.
There is that horrid word, Duty! And a man must sometimes _think_!"

Joyce, as though the last word has struck some answering chord that
wounds her as it strikes, looks suddenly at him. _What_ was it Barbara
had said? "He was a man who would always _think_,"--is he thinking
now--even now--at this moment?--is he weighing matters in his mind?

"Hah!" says Beauclerk rising and pointing to the court nearest them;
"_that_ game is over. Come on, Miss Kavanagh, let us go and get our
scalps. I say, Dysart, will you fight it out with us?"

"No thanks."

"Afraid?" gaily.

"Of you--no," smiling; the smile is admirably done, and would be taken
as the genuine article anywhere.

"Of Miss Kavanagh; then?"

For a brief instant, and evidently against his wish, Dysart's eyes meet
those of Joyce.

"Perhaps," says he.

"A poor compliment to me," says Beauclerk, with his pleasant laugh that
always rings _so_ softly. "Well, never mind; I forgive you. Get a good
partner, my dear fellow, and _she_ may pull you through. You see I
depend entirely upon mine," with a glance at Joyce, full of expression.
"There's Miss Maliphant now--she'd make a good partner if you like."

"I shouldn't," says Dysart, immovably.

"She plays a good game, I can tell you."

"So do you," says Dysart.

"Oh, now, Dysart, don't be sarcastic," says Beauclerk laughing. "I
believe you are afraid of me, not of Miss Kavanagh, and that's why you
won't play. But if you were to put yourself in Miss Maliphant's hands, I
don't say but that you would have a chance of beating me."

"I shall beat you by myself or not at all," says Dysart suddenly, and
for the first time looking fair at him.

"A single, you mean?"

"Yes, a single."

"Well--we shall see," says Beauclerk. "Hah, there is Courtenay. Come
along, Miss Kavanagh, we must make up a set as best we may, as Dysart is
too lazy to face us."

"The next game is ours, Mr. Dysart, remember," says she, glancing at
Dysart over her shoulder. There is a touch of anxiety in her eyes.

"I _always_ remember," says he, with a rather ambiguous smile. What is
he remembering now? Joyce's mouth takes a grave curve as she follows
Beauclerk down the marble steps that lead to the tennis-ground below.

The evening has grown very still. The light wind that all day long has
sung among the leaves has gone to sleep. Only the monotonous countings
of the tennis players can be heard. Suddenly above these, another sound
arises. It is _not_ the voice of the charmer. It is the voice of Tommy
in full cry, and mad with a desire to gain the better of the argument
now going on between him and Mr. Browne. Mr. Browne is still, however,
holding his own. He generally does. His voice grows eloquent. _All_ can
hear.

"I shall tell my story, Tommy, in my own way, or I shall not tell it at
all!" The dignity that Mr. Browne throws into this threat is hardly to
be surpassed.




CHAPTER IX.

    "Sweet food of sweetly uttered knowledge."


"Tisn't right," says Tommy.

"_I_ think it is. If you kindly listen to it once again, and give your
entire attention to it, you will see how faulty is the ignorant
conclusion to which you have come."

"I'm not one bit ignorant," says Tommy indignantly. "Nurse says I'm the
dickens an' all at my Bible, and that I know Genesis better'n _she_
does."

"And a very engaging book it is too," says Mr. Browne, "but it isn't
everything. What _you_ want to study, my good boy, is natural history.
You are very ignorant about that, at all events."

"A cow _couldn't_ do it," says Tommy.

"History says she can. Now, listen again. It is a grand old poem, and I
am grieved and distressed, Thomas, to find that you refuse to accept it
as one of the gems of truth thrown up to us out of the Dark Ages. Are
you ready?

    "'Diddle-dee, diddle-dee dumpty,
    The cow ran up the plum-tree.
    Half-a-crown to fetch her----'"

"She _didn't_--'twas the _cat_," cries Tommy.

"Not in _my_ story," says Mr. Browne, mildly but firmly.

"A cow _couldn't_ go up a plum-tree," indignantly.

"She could in _my_ story," persists Mr. Browne, with all the air of one
who, even to avoid unpleasantness, would not consent to go against the
dictates of his conscience.

"She _couldn't_, I tell you," roars Tommy, now thoroughly incensed. "She
couldn't _climb_. Her horns would stick in the branches. She'd be too
_heavy_!"

"I admit, Thomas," says Mr. Browne gravely, "that your argument sounds
as though there were some sense in it. But who am I that I should dare
to disbelieve ancient history? It is unsafe to throw down old landmarks,
to blow up the bulwarks of our noble constitution. Beware, Tommy! never
tread on the tail of Truth. It may turn and rend you."

"Her name isn't Truth," says Tommy. "Our cow's name is Biddy, and she
never ran up a tree in her life."

"She's young," says Mr. Browne. "She'll learn. So are _you_--_you'll_
learn. And remember this, my boy, always respect old legends. A
disregard for them will so unsettle you that finally you will find
yourself--at the foot of the gallows in all human probability. I
suppose," sadly, "that you are even so far gone in scepticism as to
doubt the glorious truth of the moon's being made of green cheese?"

"Father says that's nonsense," says Tommy promptly, and with an air of
triumph, "and father always knows."

"I blush for your father," says Mr. Browne with increasing melancholy.
"Both he and you are apparently sunk in heathen darkness. Well, well; we
will let the question of the moon go by, though I suppose you know,
Tommy, that the real and original moon first rose in Cheshire."

"No, I don't," says Tommy, with a militant glare. "There was once a
Cheshire cat; there never was a Cheshire moon."

"I suppose you will tell me next there never was a Cheshire cheese,"
says Mr. Browne severely. "Don't you see the connection? But never mind.
Talking of cats brings us back to our mutton, and from thence to our
cow. I do hope, Tommy, that for the future you will, at all events,
_try_ to believe in that faithful old animal who skipped so gaily up and
down, and hither and thither, and in and out, and all about, that
long-suffering old plum-tree."

"She never did it," says Tommy stamping with rage and now nearly in
tears. "I've books--I've books, and 'tisn't in _any_ of them."

"It is in _my_ book," says Mr. Browne, who ought to be ashamed of
himself.

"I don't believe you ever _read_ a book," screams Tommy furiously.
"'Twas the cat--the cat--the cat!"

"No; 'twas the horned cow," says Mr. Browne, in a sepulchral tone,
whereat Tommy goes for him.

There is a wild and desperate conflict. Tooth and nail Tommy attacks,
the foe, fists and legs doing very gallant service. There would indeed
have been a serious case of assault and battery for the next Court day,
had not Providence sent Mrs. Monkton on the scene.

"Oh, Tommy!" cries she, aghast. It is presumably Tommy, though, as he
has his head thrust between Mr. Browne's legs, and his feet in mid air,
kicking with all their might, there isn't much of him by which to prove
identification. And--"Oh, Dicky," says, she again, "how _could_ you
torment him so, when you know how easy it is to excite him. See what a
state he is in!"

"And what about me?" demands Mr. Browne, who is weak with laughter. "Is
no sympathy to be shown me? See what a state _I'm_ in. I'm black and
blue from head to heel. I'm at the point of death!"

"Nonsense! you are all right, but look at _him_! Oh! Tommy, what a
terrible boy you are. And you promised me if I brought you, that
you----Just look at his clothes!"

"Look at _mine_!" says Mr. Browne. "My best hat is done for, and I'm
afraid to examine my trousers. _You_ might tell me if there is a big
rent anywhere. No? Eh? Well--if you won't I must only risk it. But I
feel tattered and torn. By-the-bye, Tommy, that's part of another old
story. I'll tell you about it some day."

"Come with me, Tommy," says his mother, with awful severity. She holds
out her hand to her son, who is still glaring at Dicky with an undying
ferocity. "You are a naughty boy, and I'm sure your father will be angry
with you when he hears of this."

"Oh, but he must not hear of it, must he, Tommy?" says Mr. Browne, with
decision, appealing to his late antagonist as airily, as utterly without
_arrière pensée_ as though no unpleasant passages have occurred between
them. "It's awfully good of you to desire our company, Mrs. Monkton, but
really on the whole I think----"

"It is Tommy I want," says Mrs. Monkton still with a meaning eye.

"Where Tommy goes, I go," says Mr. Browne, firmly. "We are wedded to
each other for the day. Nothing shall part us! Neither law nor order.
Just now we are going down to the lake to feed the swans with the
succulent bun. Will you come with us?"

"You are very uncertain, Dicky," says Mrs. Monkton, regarding Mr. Browne
with a gravity that savors of disapproval. "How shall I be sure that if
you take him to the lake you will not let him drown himself?"

"He is far more likely to drown me," says Mr. Browne. "Come along,
Tommy, the biscuits are in the hall, and the lake a quarter of a mile
away. The day waneth; let us haste--let us haste!"

"Where has Dicky gone?" asks Joyce, who has just returned victorious
from her game.

"To the lake with Tommy. I have been imploring him not to drown my son,"
says Mrs. Monkton with a rather rueful smile.

"Oh, he won't do that. Dicky is erratic, but pretty safe, for all that.
And he is fond of Tommy."

"He teases him, however, beyond endurance."

"That is because he _does_ like him."

"A strange conclusion to arrive at, surely," says Dysart, looking at
her.

"No. If he didn't like him, he wouldn't take the trouble," says she,
nonchalantly. She is evidently a little _distrait_. She looks as though
she wanted something.

"You won your game?" says her sister, smiling at her.

"Yes, quite a glorious victory. They had only two games out of the six;
and you know Miss Connor plays very well."

"Where is Mr. Beauclerk?"

"Gone into the house to write some letters and telegrams."

"Norman, do you mean?" asks Lady Baltimore, coming up at this moment,
her basket full of flowers, and minus the little son and the heiress;
"he has just gone into the house to hear Miss Maliphant sing. You know
she sings remarkably well, and that last song of Milton Wettings suits
her so entirely. Norman is very fond of music. Have you had a game,
Joyce?"

"Yes, and won it," says Joyce, smiling back at her, though her face has
paled a little. _Had_ she won it?

"Well, I must take these into the house before they fade. Righton wants
them for the dinner-table," says Lady Baltimore. A little hurried note
has crept into her voice. She turns away somewhat abruptly. Lord
Baltimore and Lady Swansdown have just appeared in view, Lady Swansdown
with a huge bunch of honeysuckle in her hand, looking very picturesque.

Baltimore, seeing his wife move towards the house, and Lady Swansdown
displaying the spoils of her walk to Dysart, darts quickly after her.

"Let me carry that burden for you," says he, laying his hand upon the
basket of flowers.

"No, oh! no, thank you," says Lady Baltimore, glancing up at him for
just a moment, with a little curious expression in her eyes. "I have
carried it quite a long time. I hardly feel it now. No; go back to the
lawn to Lady Swansdown--see; she is quite alone at this moment. You will
be doing me a real service if you will look after our guests."

"As you will," says Baltimore, coldly.

He turns back with a frown, and rejoins those he had left.

Joyce is talking to Lady Swansdown in her prettiest way--she seems,
indeed, exceptionally gay even for her, who, as a rule, is the life of
every party. Her spirits seem to have risen to quite an abnormal height,
and her charming laugh, soft as it is sweet, rings gaily. With the
advent of Baltimore, however, Lady Swansdown's attention veers aside,
and Joyce, feeling Dysart at her elbow, turns to him.

"We postponed _one_ game, I think," says she. "Well--shall we play the
next?"

"I am sorry," says he, deliberately, "but I think not." His eyes are on
the ground.

"No?" says she, coloring warmly. There is open surprise in her glance.
That he should refuse to accept an advance from her seems truly beyond
belief.

"You must forgive me," says he, deliberately still. He had sworn to
himself that he would not play second fiddle on _this_ occasion at all
events, and he holds himself to his word. "But I feel as if I could not
play to-day. I should disgrace you. Let me get you another partner.
Captain Grant is out there, he----"

"Thank you. I shall be able to provide myself with a partner when I want
one," interrupts she, haughtily, turning abruptly away.




CHAPTER X.

    "Nature has sometimes made a fool."


The fiddles are squeaking, the 'cellos are groaning, the man with the
cornet is making a most ungodly row. As yet, the band have the ballroom
all to themselves, and are certainly making the most of their time. Such
unearthly noises rarely, if ever, have been heard in it before. Why they
couldn't have tuned their instruments before coming is a question that
fills the butler's mind with wrath, but perhaps the long journey down
from Dublin would have untuned them all again, and left the players of
them disconsolate.

The dismal sounds penetrate into the rooms right and left of the
ballroom, but fail to kill the melancholy sweetness of the dripping
fountains or the perfume of the hundred flowers that gave their sleeping
draughts to all those who chose to come and inhale them. Mild draughts
that please the senses without stealing them.

The sounds even penetrate to the library, where Joyce is standing before
the low fire, that even in this July evening burns upon the hearth,
fastening her long gloves. She had got down before the others, and now,
finding the room empty, half wishes herself back again upstairs. But she
is so young, so full of a fresh delight in all the gaiety around her,
that she had hurried over her dressing, and, with the first dismal
sounds of the toning, had turned her steps its way.

The library seems cold to her, bare, unfriendly. Had she expected to
meet somebody there before her--somebody who had promised to get a fresh
tie in a hurry, but who had possibly forgotten all about it in the joy
of an after-dinner cigar?

It seems a long time since that first day when she had been startled by
his sudden reappearance at the Court. A long, _long_ time. Soon this
last visit of hers to the Court must come to an end. The Baltimores will
be going abroad in a fortnight or so--and he with them. The summer is
waning--dreary autumn coming. He will go--and----

A sense of dissatisfaction sits heavily on her, toning down to rather a
too cruel a degree the bright expectancy of her face. He had _said_ he
would come, and now----She drums in a heavy-hearted listless fashion on
the table with the tips of her pale gloves, and noticing, half
consciously in so doing, that they have not been sufficiently drawn up
her arm, mechanically fits them closer to the taper fingers.

Certainly he had said he would be here. "Early you know. Before the
others can get down." A quick frown grows upon her forehead, and now
that the fingers are quiet, the little foot begins to beat a tattoo upon
the ground. Leaning against the table in a graceful attitude, with the
lamplight streaming on her pretty white frock, she gives a loose rein to
her thoughts.

They are a little angry, a little frightened perhaps. During the past
week had he not said many things that in the end proved void of meaning.
He had haunted her in a degree, at certain hours, certain times, had
loitered through gardens, lingered in conservatories by her side,
whispered many things--looked so very many more. But----

There were other times, other opportunities for philandering (_she_ does
not give it this unpleasant name); how has he spent them?--A vague
thought of Miss Maliphant crosses her mind. That he laughs at the plain,
good-natured heiress to her (Joyce), had not prevented the fact that he
is very attentive to her at times. Principally such times as when Joyce
may reasonably be supposed to be elsewhere. Human reason, however, often
falls short of the mark, and there have been unsuspected moments during
the past week when Miss Kavanagh has by chance appeared upon the scene
of Mr. Beauclerk's amusements, and has found that Miss Maliphant has had
a good deal to do with them. But then--"That poor, good girl you know!"
Here, Beauclerk's joyous laugh would ring forth for Joyce's benefit.
"_Such_ a good girl; and so--er--_don't_ you know!" He was certainly
always a little vague. He didn't explain himself. Miss Kavanagh, looking
back on all he had ever said against the heiress, is obliged to confess
to herself that the great "er" had had to express everything. Contempt,
dislike, kindly disdain--he was always _kindly_--he made quite a point
of _that_. Truly, thinks Miss Kavanagh to herself after this
retrospective glance, "er" is the greatest word in the English language!

And so it is. It declares. It conceals. It conveys a laugh. It suggests
a frown. It helps a sorrowful confession. It adorns a lame one. It is
kindly, as giving time. It is cruel, as being full of sarcasm. It----In
fact what is it it _cannot_ do?

Joyce's feet have grown quite steady now. She has placed her hands on
the table behind her, and thus compelled to lean a little forward,
stands studying the carpet without seeing it. A sense of anger, of
_shame_ against herself is troubling her. If he should _not_ be in
earnest! If he should not--like her as she likes him!

She rouses herself suddenly as if stung by some thought. "Like" _is_ the
word. It has gone no deeper yet. It _shall_ not. He is handsome, he has
his charm, but if she is not all the world to him, why, he shall not be
all the world to _her_. If it is money he craves, for the restoration of
that old home of his, why money let it be. But there, shall not be the
two things, the desire of one for filthy lucre, the desire of the other
for love. He shall decide.

She has grown very pale. She has drawn herself up to her full height,
and her lips are pressed together. And now a strange thought comes to
her. If--_if_ she loved him, could she bear thus to analyze him. To take
him to pieces, to dissect him as it were? Once again that feeling of
fear oppresses her. Is she so cold, so deliberate in herself that she
suspects others of coldness. After all--if he does love her--if he only
hesitates because----

_A step outside the door!_

Instinctively she glances at one of the long mirrors that line the walls
from floor to ceiling. Involuntarily her hands rush to her head. She
gives a little touch to her gown. And now is sitting in a
lounging-chair, a little pale still perhaps, but in all other respects
the very picture of unconsciousness. It is--it must be----

It isn't, however.

Mr. Browne, opening the door in his own delightfully breezy fashion that
generally plays old Harry with the hinges and blows the ornaments off
the nearest tables, advances towards her with arms outspread, and the
liveliest admiration writ upon his features, which, to say the truth,
are of goodly proportions.

"Oh! Thou wonder of the world!" cries he in accents ecstatic. He has
been reading "Cleopatra" (that most charming of books) assiduously for
the past few days, during which time he has made himself an emphatic
nuisance to his friends: perpetual quotations, however apt or salutary,
proving as a rule a bore.

"That will do, Dicky! We _all_ know about that," says Miss Kavanagh, who
is a little unnerved, a little impatient perhaps. Mr. Browne, however,
is above being snubbed by anyone. He continues on his way rejoicing.

"Thou living flame!" cries he, making what he fondly supposes to be a
stage attitude. "Thou thing of beauty. Though _fleshpot of Egypt_!"

He has at last surpassed himself! He stands silent waiting for the
plaudits of the crowd. The crowd, however, is unappreciative.

"Nonsense!" says Miss Kavanagh shortly. "I wonder you aren't tired of
_making_ people tired. Your eternal quotations would destroy the
patience of an anchorite. And as for that last sentence of yours, you
know very well it isn't in Rider Haggard's book. He'd have been ashamed
of it."

"_Would_ he? Bet you he wouldn't! And if it isn't in his book, all I can
say is it ought to have been. Mere oversight leaving it out. He _will_
be sorry if I drop him a line about it. Shouldn't wonder if it produced
a new edition. But for my part, I believe it _is_ in the book.
Fleshpots, Egypt, you know; hardly possible to separate 'em now from the
public mind."

"Well; he could separate them any way. There isn't a single word about
them in the book from start to finish."

"No? D'ye say so?" Here Mr. Browne grows lost in thought.
"Fleshpots--pots--hot pots; hot _potting_! Hah!" He draws himself
together with all the manner of one who has gone down deep into a thing,
and comes up from it full of knowledge. "I've 'mixed those babies up,'"
says he mildly. "But still I can hardly believe that that last valuable
addition to Mr. Haggard's work is all my own."

"Distinctly your own," with a suggestion of scorn, completely thrown
away upon the receiver of it.

"D'ye say so! By Jove! And very neat too! Didn't think I had it in me.
After all to write a book is an easy matter; here am I, who never
thought about it, was able to form an entire sentence full of the most
exquisite wit and humor without so much as knowing I was doing it. Tell
you what, Joyce, I'll send it to the author with a card and my
compliments you know. Horrid thing to be _mean_ about anything, and if I
can help him out with a 999th edition or so, I'll be doing him a good
turn. Eh?"

"I suppose you think you are amusing," says Miss Kavanagh, regarding him
with a critical eye.

"My good child, I _know_ that expression," says Mr. Browne, amiably. "I
know it by heart. It means that you think I'm a fool. It's politer
now-a-days to look things than to say them, but wait awhile and you'll
_see_. Come; I'll bet you a shilling to a sovereign that he'll be
delighted with my suggestion, and put it into his next edition without
delay. No charge! Given away! The lot for a penny-three-farthings. In
fact, I make it a present to him. Noble, eh? Give it to him for
_nothing_!"

"About its price," says Miss Kavanagh thoughtfully.

"Think you so? You are dull to-night, Jocelyne. Flashes of wit pass you
by without warming you. Yet I tell you this idea that has flowed from my
brain is a priceless one. Never mind the door--he's not coming yet.
Attend to me."

"_Who's_ not coming?" demands she, the more angrily in that she is
growing miserably aware of the brilliant color that is slowly but surely
bedecking her cheeks.

"Never mind! It's a mere detail; attend to _me_ and I entreat you," says
Mr. Browne, who is now quite in his element, having made sure of the
fact that she is expecting somebody. It doesn't matter in the least who
to Mr. Browne, expectation is the thing wherein to catch the
embarrassment of Miss Kavanagh, and forthwith he sets himself gaily to
the teazing of her.

"Attend to _what_?" says she with a little frown.

"If you had studied your Bible, Jocelyne, with that care that I should
have expected from you, you would have remembered that forty odd years
the Israelites hankered after those very fleshpots of Egypt to which I
have been alluding. Now I appeal to you, as a sensible girl, would
anybody hanker after anything for forty odd years (_very_ odd years as
it happens), unless it was to their advantage to get it; unless, indeed,
the object pursued was _priceless_!"

"You ask too much of _this_ sensible girl," says Miss Kavanagh, with a
carefully manufactured yawn. "Really, dear Dicky, you must forgive me if
I say I haven't gone into it as yet, and that I don't suppose I shall
ever _see_ the necessity for going into it."

"But, my good child, you must see that those respectable people, the
Israelites, wouldn't have pursued a mere shadow for forty years."

"That's just what I _don't_ see. There are such a number of fools
everywhere, in every age, that one couldn't tell."

"This is evasion," says Mr. Browne sternly. "To bring you face to face
with facts must be my very unpleasant if distinct duty. Joyce, do you
dare to doubt for one moment that I speak aught but the truth? Will you
deny that Cleopatra, that old serpent of the----"

"Ha--ha--ha," laughs Joyce ironically. "I wish she could hear you. Your
life wouldn't be worth a moment's purchase."

"Mere slip. Serpent of _old_ Nile. Doesn't matter in the least," says
Mr. Browne airily, "because she couldn't hear me as it happens. My dear
girl, follow out the argument. Cleopatra, metaphorically speaking, was a
fleshpot, because the world hankered after her. And--you're another."

"Really, Dicky, I must protest against your talking slang to me."

"Where does the slang come in? You're another fleshpot. I meant to
say--or convey--because _we_ all hanker after you."

"Do you?" with rising wrath. "May I ask what hankering means?"

"You had better not," says Mr. Browne mysteriously. "It was one of the
rites of Ancient Kem!"

"Now there is _one_ thing, Dicky," says Miss Kavanagh, her wrath boiling
over. "I won't be called names. I won't be called a _fleshpot_. You'll
draw the line there if you please."

"My dear girl, why not? Those delectable pots must have been
_bric-à-brac_ of the most _recherché_ description. Of a most delicate
shape, no doubt. Of a pattern, tint, formation, general get up--not to
be hoped for in these prosaic days."

"Nonsense," indignantly. She is fairly roused now, and Mr. Browne
regarding her with a proud eye, tells himself he is about to have his
reward at last. "You know very well that the term 'fleshpots' referred
to what was _in_ the pots, not to the pots themselves."

"That's all you know about it. That's where your fatal ignorance comes
in, my poor Joyce," says he, with immense compassion. "Search your Bible
from cover to cover, and I defy you to find a single mention of the
contents of those valuable bits of _bric-à-brac_. Of flesh_pots_--heavy
emphasis on the _pots_--and ten fingers down at once if you please--we
read continually as being hankered after by the Israelites, who then, as
now, were evidently avid collectors."

"You've been having champagne, Dicky," says Miss Kavanagh, regarding him
with a judicial eye.

"So have you. But I can't see what that excellent beverage has got to do
with the ancient Jews. Keep to the point. Did you ever hear that they
expressed a longing for the _flesh_ of Egypt? No. So far so good. The
pots themselves were the objects of their admiration. During that
remarkable run of theirs through the howling wilderness they, one and
all, to a _man_, betrayed the true æsthetic tendency. They raved
incessantly for the girl--I beg pardon--the _land_ they had left behind
them. The land that contained those priceless jars."

"I wonder how you can be so silly," says Miss Kavanagh disdainfully.
Will he _never_ go away! If he stays, and if--the other--comes----

"Silly! my good child. _How_ silly! Why everything goes to prove the
probability of my statement. The taste for articles of _vertu_--for
antiquities--for fossils of all descriptions that characterized them
then, has lived to the present day. _Then_ they worried after old china,
and who shall deny that now they have an overwhelming affection for old
clo'."

"Well; your folly doesn't concern me," says Miss Kavanagh, gathering up
her skirts with an evident intention of shaking off the dust of his
presence from her feet and quitting him.

"I am sorry that you should consider it folly," says Mr. Browne
sorrowfully. "I should not have said so much about it perhaps but that I
wanted to prove to you that in calling _you_ a fleshpot I only meant
to----"

"I won't be called that," interrupts Miss Kavanagh angrily. "It's
_horrid_! It makes me feel quite _fat_! Now, once for all, Dicky, I
forbid it. I won't have it."

"I don't see how you are to get out of it," says Mr. Browne, shaking his
head and hands in wild deprecation. "Fleshpots were desirable
articles--you're another--ergo--you're a fleshpot. See the argument?"

"No I don't," indignantly. "I see only you--and--I wish I _didn't_."

"Very rude; _very_!" says Mr. Browne, regretfully. "Yet I entreat thee
not to leave me without one other word. Follow up the argument--_do_.
Give me an answer to it."

"Not one," walking to the door.

"That's because it is unanswerable," says Mr. Browne complacently. "You
are beaten, you----"

There is a sound outside the door; Joyce with her hand on the handle of
it, steps back and looks round nervously at Dicky. A quick color has
dyed her cheeks; instinctively she moves a little to one side and gives
a rapid glance into a long mirror.

"I don't think really he could find a fault," says Mr. Browne
mischievously. "I should think there will be a good deal of hankering
going on to-night."

Miss Kavanagh has only just barely time to wither him, when Beauclerk
comes hurriedly in.




CHAPTER XI.

    "Thinkest thou there are no serpents in the world
    But those who slide along the grassy sod,
    And sting the luckless foot that presses them?
    There are, who in the path of social life
    Do bask their spotted skins in fortune's son,
    And sting the soul."


"Oh, there you are," cries he jovially. "Been looking for you
everywhere. The music has begun; first dance just forming. Gay and
lively quadrille, you know--country ball wouldn't know itself without a
beginning like that. Come; come on."

Nothing can exceed his _bonhomie_. He tucks her hand in the most
delightfully genial, appropriative fashion under his arm, and with a
beaming nod to Mr. Browne (he never forgets to be civil to anybody)
hurries Joyce out of the room, leaving the astute Dicky gazing after him
with mingled feelings in his eye.

"Deuce and all of a smart chap," says Mr. Browne to himself slowly. "But
he'll fall through some day for all that, I shouldn't wonder."

Meantime Mr. Beauclerk is still carrying on a charming recitative.

"_Such a bore!_" he is saying, with heartfelt disgust in his tone. It is
really wonderful how he can _always_ do it. There is never a moment when
he flags. He is for ever up to time as it were, and equal to the
occasion. "I'm afraid you rather misunderstood me just now, when I said
I'd been looking for you--but the fact is, Browne's such an ass, if he
knew we had made an appointment to meet in the library, he'd have brayed
the whole affair to any and every one."

"Was there an appointment?" says Miss Kavanagh, who is feeling a little
unsettled--a little angry with herself perhaps.

"No--no," with a delightful acceptation of her rebuke. "You are right as
ever. I was wrong. But then, you see, it gave me a sort of joy to
believe that our light allusion to a possible happy half-hour before the
turmoil of the dance began might mean something _more_--something----Ah!
well never mind! Men are vain creatures; and after all it would have
been a happy half-hour to me _only_!"

"Would it?" says she with a curious glance at him.

"_You_ know that!" says he, with the full and earnest glance he can turn
on at a second's notice without the slightest injury to heart or mind.

"I don't indeed."

"Oh well, you haven't time to think about it perhaps. I found you very
fully occupied when--at last--I was able to get to the library. Browne
we all know is a very--er--lively companion--if rather wanting in the
higher virtues."

"'_At last_,'" says she quoting his words. She turns suddenly and looks
at him, a world of inquiry in her dark eyes. "I hate pretence," says she
curtly, throwing up her young head with a haughty movement. "You said
you would be in the library at such an hour, and though I did not
_promise_ to meet you there, still, as I happened to be dressed earlier
than I believed possible, I came down, and you----? Where were you?"

There is a touch of imperiousness in that last question that augurs
badly for a false wooer; but the imperiousness suits her. With her
pretty chin uptilted, and that little scornful curve upon her lips, and
her lovely eyes ablaze, she looks indeed "a thing of beauty." Beauclerk
regards her with distinct approbation. After all--had she even _half_
the money that the heiress possesses, _what_ a wife she would make. And
it isn't decided yet one way or the other; sometimes Fate is kind. The
day may come when this delectable creature may fall to his portion.

"I can see you are thinking hard things of me," says he reproachfully;
"but you little know how I have been passing the time I had so been
looking forward to. Time to be passed with _you_. That old Lady
Blake--she _would_ keep me maundering to her about that son of hers in
the Mauritius; _you_ know he and I were at St. Petersburg together. I
couldn't get away. You blame me--but what was I to do? An old
woman--unhappy----"

"Oh no. You were _right_," says Joyce quickly. How good he is after all,
and how unjustly she had been thinking of him. So kind, so careful of
the feelings of a tiresome old woman. How few men are like him. How few
would so far sacrifice themselves.

"Ah, you see it like that!" says, Mr. Beauclerk, not triumphantly, but
so modestly that the girl's heart goes out to him even more. How
_generous_ he is! Not a word of rebuke to her for her vile suspicion of
him.

"Why you put me into good spirits again," says he laughing gaily. "We
must make haste, I fear, if we would save the first dance."

"Oh yes--come," says Joyce going quickly forward. Evidently he is going
to ask her for the first dance! That _shows_ that he prefers her to----

"I'm so glad you have been able to sympathize with me about my last
disappointment," says Beauclerk. "If you hadn't--if you had had even one
hard thought of me, I don't know _how_ I should have been able to endure
what still lies before me. I am almost raging with anger, but when one's
sister is in question----"

"You mean?" say Joyce a little faintly.

"Oh, you haven't heard. I am so annoyed myself about it, that I fancied
everybody knew. You know I hoped that you would have been good enough to
give me the first dance, but when Isabel asked me to dance it with that
dreadful daughter of Lady Dunscombe's, what _could_ I do, now I ask
you?" appealing to her with hands and eyes. "What _could_ I do?"

"Obey, of course," says she with an effort, but a successful one. "You
must hurry too, if you want to secure Miss Dunscombe."

"Ah; what a misfortune it is to be the brother of one's hostess," says
he, with a sort of comic despair. His eyes are centred on her face,
reading her carefully, and with much secret satisfaction;--rapid as that
slight change upon her face had been, he had seen and noted it.

"It couldn't possibly be a misfortune to be Lady Baltimore's brother,"
says she smiling. "On the contrary, you are to be congratulated."

"Not just at this moment surely!"

"At this or any other moment. Ah!"--as they enter the ballroom. "The
room is already fuller than I thought. Engaged, Mr. Blake?" to Lord
Blake's eldest son. "No, not for this. Yes, with pleasure."

She makes a little charming inclination of her head to Beauclerk, and
laying her hand on Mr. Blake's arm, moves away with him to where a set
is already forming at the end of the room. It is without enthusiasm she
takes her place with Dysart and one of the O'Donovan girls as
_vis-à-vis_, and prepares to march, retreat, twist and turn with the
best of them.

"A dull old game," she is irreverently terming the quadrilles--that
massing together of inelegant movements so dear to the bucolic
mind--that saving clause for the old maids and the wall-flowers; when a
little change of position shows her the double quartette on the right
hand side of the magnificent ballroom.

She had been half through an unimportant remark to Mr. Blake, but she
stops short now and forgets to finish it. Her color comes and goes. The
sides are now prancing through _their_ performance, and she and her
partner are standing still. Perhaps--_perhaps_ she was mistaken; with
all these swaying idiots on every side of her she might well have mixed
up one man's partner with another; and Miss Dunscombe (she had caught a
glimpse of her awhile ago) was surely in that set on the right hand
side.

She stoops forward, regardless--_oblivious_--of her partner's surprised
glance, who has just been making a very witty remark, and being a rather
smart young man, accustomed to be listened to, is rather taken aback by
her open indifference.

A little more forward she leans; yes, _now_--the couples part--for one
moment the coast lies clear. She can see distinctly. Miss Dunscombe is
indeed dancing in that set but _not_ as Mr. Beauclerk's partner. Miss
Maliphant has secured that enviable _rôle_.

Even as Joyce gazes, Beauclerk, turning his head, meets her earnest
regard. He returns it with a beaming smile. Miss Maliphant, whose duty
it is at this instant to advance and retire and receive without the
support of a chaperone the attacks of the bold, bad man opposite, having
moved out of Beauclerk's sight, the latter, with an expressive glance
directed at Joyce, lifts his shoulders forlornly, and gives a
serio-comic shrug of his shoulders. All to show now bored a being he is
at finding himself thus the partner of the ugly heiress! It is all done
in a second. An inimitable bit of acting--but unpleasant.

Joyce draws herself up. Her eyes fall away from his; unless the distance
is too far, the touch of disdain that lies in them should have
disconcerted even Mr. Beauclerk. Perhaps it has!

"Our turn?" says she, giving her partner a sudden beautiful glance full
of fire--of life--of something that he fails to understand, but does
_not_ fail to consider charming. She smiles; she grows radiant. She is a
different being from a moment ago. How could he--Blake--have thought her
stupid. How she takes up every word--and throws new meaning into it--and
_what_ a laugh she has! Low-sweet--merry--music to its core!

Beauclerk in his turn finds a loop-hole through which to look at her,
and is conscious of a faint feeling of chagrin. She oughtn't to have
taken it like that. To be a little pensive--a little sad--that would
have shewn a right spirit. Well--the night is long. He can play his game
here and there. There is plenty of time in which to regain lost ground
with one--to gain fresh ground with the other. Joyce will forgive
him--when she hears _his_ version of it.




CHAPTER XII.

    "If thou canst see not, hast thou ears to hear?--Or
    is thy soul too as a leaf that dies?"


"Well, after all, life has its compensations," says Mr. Beauclerk,
sinking upon the satin lounge beside Miss Kavanagh, and giving way to a
rapturous sigh. He is looking very big and very handsome. His
close-cropped eminently aristocratic head is thrown a little back, to
give full play to the ecstatic smile he is directing at Joyce.

She bears it wonderfully. She receives it indeed with all the amiable
imbecility of a person who doesn't understand what on earth you are
talking about. Whether this reception of his little opening speech--so
carefully prepared--puzzles or nettles Mr. Beauclerk there is no way of
learning. He makes no sign.

"I thought I should never be able to get a dance with you; you
see,"--smiling--"when one is the belle of the evening, one grows
difficult. But you _might_ have kept a fifth or sixth for a poor
outsider like me. An old friend too."

"Old friends don't count at a dance, I'm afraid," says she, with a smile
as genial as his own; "though for the matter of that you could have had
the first; _no one_--hard as it may be to make you believe it--had asked
the belle of the evening for that."

This is not quite true. Many had asked for it, Dysart amongst others;
but she had kept it open for--the one who didn't want it. However, fibs
of this sort one blinks at where pretty girls are the criminals. Her
tone is delicately sarcastic. She would willingly suppress the sarcasm
altogether as beneath her, but she is very angry; and when a woman is
angry there is generally somebody to pay.

"Oh! that _first_!" says he, with a gesture of impatience. "I shan't
forgive Isabel in a hurry about that; she ruined my evening--up to
_this_. However," throwing off as it were unpleasant memories by a shake
of his head, "don't let me spoil my one good time by dwelling upon a bad
one. Here I am now, at all events; here is comfort, here is peace. The
hour I have been longing for is mine at last."

"It might have been yours considerably earlier," says Miss Kavanagh with
very noteworthy deliberation, unmoved by his lover-like glances, which
after all have more truth in them than most of his declarations. She
sits playing with her fan, and with a face expressionless as any sphinx.

"Oh! my _dear_ girl!" says Mr. Beauclerk reproachfully, "how can you say
that! You know in one's sister's house one must--eh? And she laid
positive commands on me----"

"To dance the first dance with Miss Maliphant?"

"Now, that's not like you," says Mr. Beauclerk very gently. "It's not
just. When I found Miss Dunscombe engaged for that ridiculous quadrille,
what could I do? _You_ were engaged to Blake. I was looking aimlessly
round me, cursing my luck in that I had not thrown up even my sister's
wishes and secured before it was too late the only girl in the room I
cared to dance with when Isabel came again. 'Not dancing,' says she;
'and there's Miss Maliphant over there, partnerless!'"

He tells all this with as genuine an air as if it was not false from
start to finish.

"You _know_ Isabel," says he, laughing airily; "she takes the oddest
fancies at times. Miss Maliphant is her latest craze. Though what she
can see in her----A _nice_ girl. Thoroughly nice--essentially _real_--a
little _too_ real perhaps," with a laugh so irresistible that even Miss
Kavanagh against her will is compelled to join in it.

"Honest all through, I admit; but as a _waltzer_! Well, well, we
shouldn't be too severe--but really, there you know, she leaves
_everything_ to be desired. And I've been victimized not once, but
twice--_three_ times."

"It is nothing remarkable," says Miss Kavanagh, coldly. "Many very
charming girls do not dance well. It is a gift."

"A very precious one. When a charming girl can't waltz, she ought to
learn how to sit down charmingly, and not oppress innocent people. As
for Miss Maliphant!" throwing out his large handsome hands expressively,
"_she_ certainly should not dance. Her complexion doesn't stand it. Did
you notice her?"

"No," icily.

"Ah, you wouldn't, you know. I could see how thoroughly well occupied
_you_ were! Not a thought for even an old friend; and besides you're a
girl in ten thousand. Nothing petty or small about you. Now, another
woman would not have failed to notice the fatal tendency towards
rubicundity that marks Miss Maliphant's nose whenever----"

"I do so dislike discussing people behind their backs," says Miss
Kavanagh, slowly. "I always think it is so _unfair_. They can't defend
themselves. It is like maligning the dead."

"Miss Maliphant isn't dead at all events. She is dreadfully alive," says
Mr. Beauclerk, totally unabashed. He laughs gaily. To refuse to be
lectured was a rule he had laid down for his own guidance early in life.
Those people who will not see when they ought to be offended have
generally the best of the game.

"Would you have her dead?" asks Joyce, with calm interrogation.

"I don't remember saying I would have her _any_ way," says he, still
evidently clinging to the frivolous mood. "And at all events I wouldn't
have her _dancing_. It disagrees with her nose. It makes her suggestive;
it betrays one into the making of bad parodies. One I made to-night when
looking at her; I couldn't resist it. For once in her life you see she
was irresistible. Hear it. 'Oh! my love's got a red, red nose!' Ha! ha!
Not half bad, eh? It kept repeating itself in my brain all the time I
was looking at her."

"I thought you liked her," says Joyce, lifting her large dark eyes for
the first time to his. Beautiful eyes! a little shocked now--a little
cold--almost entreating. Surely, surely, he will not destroy her ideal
of him.

"You think I am censorious," says he readily, "cruel almost; but to
_you_"--with delicate flattery--"surely I may speak to _you_ as I would
speak to no other. May I not?" He leans a little forward, and compelling
the girl's reluctant gaze, goes on speaking. It chafes him that she
should put him on his defence; but some _one_ divine instinct within him
warns him not to break with her entirely. "Still," says he, in a low
tone, always with his eyes on hers, "I see that you condemn me."

"Condemn you! No! Why should _I_ be your judge?"

"You _are_, however--and my judge and jury too. I cannot bear to think
that you should despise me. And all because of that wretched girl."

"I don't despise you," says the girl, quickly. "If you were really
despicable I should not like you as well as I do; I am only sorry that
you should say little unkind things of a girl like Miss Maliphant, who,
if not beautiful, is surely to be regarded in a very kindly light."

"Do you know," says Mr. Beauclerk, gently, "I think you are the one
sweet character in the world." There is a great amount of belief in his
tone, perhaps half of it is honest. "I never met any one like you. Women
as a rule are willing to tear each other to pieces but you--you condone
all faults; that is why I----"

A pause. He leans forward. His eyes are eloquent; his tongue alone
refrains from finishing the declaration that he had begun. To the girl
beside him, however, ignorant of subterfuge, unknowing of the wiles that
run in and out of society like a thread, his words sound sweet--the
sweeter for the very hesitation that accompanies them.

"I am not so perfect as you think me," says she, rather sadly--her voice
a little faint.

"That is true," says he quickly, as though compelled against his will to
find fault with her. "A while ago you were angry with me because I was
driven to waste my time with people uncongenial to me. _That_ was unfair
if you like." He throws her own accusation back at her in the gentlest
fashion. "I danced with this, that, and the other person it is true, but
do you not know where my heart was all this time?"

He pauses for a moment, just long enough to make more real his question,
but hardly long enough to let her reply to it. To bring matters to a
climax, would not suit him at all.

"Yes, you _do_ know," says he, seeing her about to speak. "And _yet_ you
misjudge me. If--if I were to tell you that I would rather be with you
than with any other woman in the world, you would believe me, wouldn't
you?"

He stoops over her, and taking her hand presses it fondly, lingeringly.
"Answer me."

"Yes," says Joyce in a low tone. It has not occurred to her that his
words are a question rather than an asseveration. That he loves her,
seems to her certain. A soft glow illumines her cheeks; her eyes sink
beneath his; the idea that she is happy, or at all events _ought_ to be
happy, fills her with a curious wonderment. Do people always feel so
strange, so surprised, so _unsure_, when love comes to them?

"Yet you _did_ doubt," says Beauclerk, giving her hand a last pressure,
and now nestling back amongst his cushions with all the air of a man who
has fought and conquered and has been given his reward. "Well, don't let
us throw an unpleasant memory into this happy hour. As I have said,"
taking up her fan and idly, if gracefully, waving it to and fro, "after
all the turmoil of the fight it is sweet to find oneself at last in the
haven where one would be."

He is smiling at Joyce--the gayest, the most candid smile in the world.
Smiles become him. He is looking really handsome and _happy_ at finding
himself thus alone with her. Sincerity declares itself in every line of
his face. Perhaps he _is_ as sincere as he has ever yet been in his
life. The one thing that he unquestionably does regard with interest
beyond his own poor precious bones, is the exquisite bit of nature's
workmanship now sitting beside him.

At this present moment, in spite of his flattering words, his smiles and
telling glances, she is still a little cold, a little uncertain, a phase
of manner that renders her indescribably charming to the one watching
her.

Beauclerk indeed is enjoying himself immensely. To a man of his
temperament to be able to play upon a nature as fine, as honest, as pure
as Joyce's is to know a keen delight. That the girl is dissatisfied,
vaguely, nervously dissatisfied, he can read as easily as though the
workings of her soul lay before him in broad type, and to assuage those
half-defined misgivings of hers is a task that suits him. He attacks it
_con amore_.

"How silent you are," says he, very gently, when he has let quite a long
pause occur.

"I am tired, I think."

"Of me?"

"No."

"Of what then?" He has found that as a rule there is nothing a woman
likes better than to be asked to define her own feelings, Joyce,
however, disappoints him.

"I don't know. Sitting up so late I suppose."

"Look here!" says he, in a voice so full of earnest emotion that Joyce
involuntarily stares at him; "_I_ know what is the matter with you. You
are fighting against your better nature. You are _trying_ to be
ungenerous. You are trying to believe what you know is not true. Tell
me--_honestly_ mind--are you not forcing yourself to regard me as a
monster of insincerity?"

"You are wrong," says she, slowly. "I am forcing myself, on the
contrary, to believe you a very giant of sincerity."

"And you find that difficult?"

"Yes."

An intense feeling of admiration for her sways Beauclerk. How new a
thing to find a girl so beautiful, with so much intelligence. Surely
instinct is the great lever that moves humanity. Why has not this girl
the thousands that render Miss Maliphant so very desirable? What a
_bêtise_ on the part of Mother Nature. Alas! it would be too much to
expect from that niggardly Dame. Beauty, intelligence, wealth! All
rolled into one personality. Impossible!

"You are candid,'" says he, his tone sorrowful.

"That is what one should always be," says she in turn.

"You are _too_ stern a judge. How shall I convince you," exclaims
he--"of _what_ he leaves open? If I were to swear----"

"_Do_ not," says she quickly.

"Well, I won't. But Joyce!" He pauses, purposely. It is the first time
he has ever called her by her Christian name, and a little soft color
springs into the girl's cheeks as she hears him. "You know," says he,
"you _do_ know?"

It is a question; but _again_ what? _What_ does she know? He had
accredited her with remarkable intelligence a moment ago, but as a fact
the girl's knowledge of life is but a poor thing in comparison with that
of the man of the world. She belies her intelligence on the spot.

"Yes, I think I do," says she shyly. In fact she is longing to believe,
to be sure of this thing, that to her is so plain that she has omitted
to notice that he has never put it into words.

"You will trust in me?" says he.

"Yes, I trust you," says she simply.

Her pretty gloved hand is lying on her lap. Raising it, he presses it
passionately to his lips. Joyce, with a little nervous movement,
withdraws it quickly. The color dies from her lips. Even at this supreme
moment does Doubt hold her in thrall!

Her face is marvelously bright and happy, however, as she rises
precipitately to her feet, much to Beauclerk's relief. It has gone quite
far enough he tells himself--five minutes more and he would have found
himself in a rather embarrassing position. Really these pretty girls are
very dangerous.

"Come, we must go back to the ballroom," says she gaily. "We have been
here an unconscionable time. I am afraid my partner for this dance has
been looking for me, and will scarcely forgive my treating him so badly.
If I had only told him I _wouldn't_ dance with him he might have got
another partner and enjoyed himself."

"Better to have loved and lost," quotes Beauclerk in his airiest manner.
It is _so_ airy that it strikes Joyce unpleasantly. Surely after
all--after----She pulls herself together angrily. Is she _always_ to
find fault with him? Must she have his whole nature altered to suit her
taste?

"Ah, there is Dicky Browne," says she, glancing from where she is now
standing at the door of the conservatory to where Mr. Browne may be seen
leaning against a curtain with his lips curved in a truly benevolent
smile.




CHAPTER XIII.

    "Now the nights are all past over
    Of our dreaming, dreams that hover
    In a mist of fair false things:
    Night's afloat on wide wan wings."


"Why, so it is! Our _own_ Dicky, in the flesh and an admirable temper
apparently," says Mr. Beauclerk. "Shall we come and interview him?"

They move forward and presently find themselves at Mr. Browne's elbow;
he is, however, so far lost in his kindly ridicule of the poor silly
revolving atoms before him, that it is not until Miss Kavanagh gives his
arm a highly suggestive pinch that he learns that she is beside him.

"_Wough!_" says he, shouting out this unclassic if highly expressive
word without the slightest regard for decency. "_What_ fingers you've
got! I really think you might reserve that kind of thing for Mr. Dysart.
_He'd_ like it."

This is a most infelicitous speech, and Miss Kavanagh might have
resented it, but for the strange fact that Beauclerk, on hearing it,
laughs heartily. Well, if _he_ doesn't mind, it can't matter, but how
silly Dicky can be! Mr. Beauclerk continues to laugh with much
enjoyment.

"Try him!" says he to Miss Kavanagh, with the liveliest encouragement in
his tone. If it occurs to her that, perhaps, lovers, as a rule, do not
advise their sweethearts to play fast and loose with other men, she
refuses to give heed to the warning. He is not like other men. He is not
basely jealous. He knows her. He trusts her. He had hinted to her but
just now, so very, very kindly that _she_ was suspicious, that she must
try to conquer that fault--if it is hers. And it is. There can be no
doubt of that. She had even distrusted _him_!

"Is that your advice?" asks Mr. Browne, regarding him with a rather
piercing eye. "Capital, _under the circumstances_, but rather,
eh?----Has it ever occurred to you that Dysart is capable of a good deal
of feeling?"

"So few things occur to me, I'm ashamed to say," says Beauclerk,
genially. "I take the present moment. It is all-sufficing, so far as I'm
concerned. Well; and so you tell me Dysart has feeling?"

"Yes; I shouldn't advise Miss Kavanagh to play pranks with him," says
Dicky, with a pretentiously rueful glance at the arm she has just
pinched so very delicately.

"You're a poor soldier!" says she, with a little scornful uptilting of
her chin. "You wrong Mr. Dysart if you think he would feel so slight an
injury. What! A mere touch from _me_!"

"Your touch is deadlier than you know, perhaps," says Mr. Browne,
lightly.

"What a slander!" says Miss Kavanagh, who, in spite of herself, is
growing a little conscious.

"Yes; isn't it?" says Beauclerk, to whom she has appealed. "As for
me----" He breaks off suddenly and fastens his gaze severely on the
other side of the room. "By Jove! I had forgotten! There is my partner
for this dance looking daggers at me. Dear Miss Kavanagh, you will
excuse me, won't you? Shall I take you to your chaperone, or will you
let Browne have the remainder of this waltz?"

"I'll look after Miss Kavanagh, if she will allow me," says Dicky,
rather drily. "Will you?" with a quizzical glance at Joyce.

She makes a little affirmative sign to him, returns Beauclerk's parting
bow, and, still with a heart as light as a feather, stands by Mr.
Browne's side, watching in silence the form of Beauclerk as it moves
here and there amongst the crowd. What a handsome man he is! How
distinguished! How tall! How big! Every other man looks dwarfed beside
him. Presently he disappears into an anteroom, and she turns to find Mr.
Browne, for a wonder, as silent as herself, and evidently lost in
thought.

"What are you thinking of?" asks she.

"Of you!"

"Nonsense! What were you doing just then when I spoke to you?"

"I have told you."

"No, you haven't. What _were_ you doing?"

"_Hankering!_" says Mr. Browne, heavily.

"_Dicky!_" says she indignantly.

"Well; what? Do you suppose a fellow gets rid of a disease of that sort
all in a minute? It generally lasts a good month, I can tell you. But
come; that 'Beautiful Star' of yours, that 'shines in your heaven so
bright,' has given you into my charge. What can I do for you?"

"Deliver me from the wrath of that man over there," says Miss Kavanagh,
indicating Mr. Blake, who, with a thunderous brow, is making his way
towards her. "The last was his. I forgot all about it. Take me away,
Dicky; somewhere, anywhere; I know he's got a horrid temper, and he is
going to say uncivil things. Where" (here she meanly tries to get behind
Mr. Browne) "_shall_ we go."

"Right through this door," says Mr. Browne, who, as a rule, is equal to
all emergencies. He pushes her gently towards the conservatory she has
just quitted, that has steps leading from it to the illuminated gardens
below, and just barely gets her safely ensconced behind a respectable
barricade of greenery before Mr. Blake arrives on the spot they have
just vacated.

They have indeed the satisfaction of seeing him look vaguely round,
murmur a gentle anathema or two, and then resign himself to the
inevitable.

"He's gone!" says Miss Kavanagh, with a sigh of relief.

"To perdition!" says Mr. Browne in an awesome tone.

"I really wish you wouldn't, Dicky," says Joyce.

"Why not? You seem to think men's hearts are made of adamant! A moment
ago you sneered at _mine_, and now----By Jove! Here's Baltimore--and
alone, for a wonder."

"Well! _His_ heart is adamant!" says she softly.

"Or hers--which?"

"Of course--manlike--you condemn our sex. That's why I'm glad I'm not a
man."

"Why? Because, if you were, you would condemn your present sex?"

"_Certainly_ not! Because I wouldn't be of an unfair, mean, ungenerous
disposition for the world."

"Good old Jo!" says Mr. Browne, giving her a tender pat upon the back.

By this time Baltimore has reached them.

"Have you seen Lady Baltimore anywhere?" asks he.

"Not quite lately," says Dicky; "last tune I saw her she was dancing
with Farnham."

"Oh--after that she went to the library," says Joyce quickly. "I fancy
she may be there still, because she looked a little tired."

"Well, she had been dancing a good deal," says Dicky.

"Thanks. I dare say I'll find her," says Baltimore, with an air of
indifference, hurrying on.

"I hope he will," says Joyce, looking after him.

"I hope so too--and in a favorable temper."

"You're a cynic, Dicky, under all that airy manner of yours," says Miss
Kavanagh severely. "Come out to the gardens, the air may cool your
brain, and reduce you to milder judgments."

"Of Lady Baltimore?"

"Yes."

"Truly I do seem to be sitting in judgment on her and her family."

"Her _family_! What has Bertie done?"

"Oh, there is more family than Bertie," says Mr. Browne. "She has a
brother, hasn't she?"

       *       *       *       *       *

Meantime Lord Baltimore, taking Joyce's hint, makes his way to the
library, to find his wife there lying back in a huge arm-chair. She is
looking a little pale. A little _ennuyée_; it is plain that she has
sought this room--one too public to be in much request--with a view to
getting away for a little while from the noise and heat of the ballroom.

"Not dancing?" says her husband, standing well away from her. She had
sprung into a sitting posture the moment she saw him, an action that has
angered Baltimore. His tone is uncivil; his remark, it must be
confessed, superfluous. _Why_ does she persist in treating him as a
stranger? Surely, on whatever bad terms they may be, she need not feel
it necessary to make herself uncomfortable on his appearance. She has
evidently been enjoying that stolen lounge, and _now_----

The lamplight is streaming full upon her face. A faint color has crept
into it. The white velvet gown she is wearing is hardly whiter than her
neck and arms, and her eyes are as bright as her diamonds; yet there is
no feature in her face that could be called strictly handsome. This,
Baltimore tells himself, staring at her as he is, in a sort of insolent
defiance of the cold glance she has directed at him. No; there is no
beauty about that face; distinctly bred, calm and pure, it might
possibly be called charming by those who liked her, but nothing more.
She is not half so handsome as--as--any amount of other women he knows,
and yet----

It increases his anger towards her tenfold to know that in her secret
soul she has the one face that to _him_ is beautiful, and ever _will_ be
beautiful.

"You see," says she gently, and with an expressive gesture, "I longed
for a moment's pause, so I came here. Do they want me?" She rises from
her seat, looking very tall and graceful. If her face is not strictly
lovely, there is, at all events, no lack of loveliness in her form.

"I can't answer for 'they,'" says Baltimore, "but"----he stops dead
short here. If he _had_ been going to say anything, the desire to carry
out his intention dies upon the spot. "No, I am not aware that 'they' or
anybody wants you particularly at this moment. Pray sit down again."

"I have had quite a long rest already."

"You look tired, however. _Are_ you?"

"Not in the least."

"Give me this dance," then says he, half mockingly, yet with a terrible
earnestness in his voice.

"Give it to _you_! Thank you. No."

"Fearful of contamination?" with a smiling sneer.

"Pray spare me your jibes," says she very coldly, her face whitening.

"Pray spare me your presence, you should rather say. Let us have the
truth at all hazards. A saint like you should be careful."

To this she makes him no answer.

"What!" cries he, sardonically; "and will you miss this splendid
opportunity of giving a sop to your Cerberus? Of conciliating your
bugbear? your _bête noire_? your _fear of gossip_?"

"I fear nothing"--icily.

"You do, however. Forgive the contradiction," with a sarcastic
inclination of the head. "But for this fear of yours you would have cast
me off long ago, and bade me go to the devil as soon as--nay, the sooner
the better. And indeed if it were not for the child----By the bye, do
you forget I have a hold on _him_--a stronger than yours?"

"I _forget_ nothing either," returns she as icily as before; but now a
tremor, barely perceptible, but terrible in its intensity, shakes her
voice.

"Hah! You need not tell me _that_. You are relentless as--well, 'Fate'
comes in handy," with a reckless laugh. "Let us be conventional by all
means, and it is a good old simile, well worn! You decline my proposal
then? It is a sensible one, and should suit you. Dance with me to-night,
when all the County is present, and Mother Grundy goes to bed with a
sore heart. Scandal lies slain. All will cry aloud: '_There they go!_
Fast friends in spite of all the lies we have heard about them.' Is it
possible you can deliberately forego so great a chance of puzzling our
neighbors?"

"I can."

"Why, where is your sense of humor? One trembles for it! To be able to
deceive them all so deliriously; to send them home believing us on good
terms, a veritable loving couple"--he breaks into a curious laugh.

"This is too much," says she, her face now like death. "You would insult
me! Believe me, that not to spare myself all the gossip with which the
whole world could hurt me would I endure your arm around my waist!"

His short-lived, most unmirthful mirth has died from him, he has laid a
hand upon the table near him to steady himself.

"You are candid, on my soul," says he slowly.

She moves quickly towards the door, her velvet skirt sweeping over his
feet as she goes by--the perfume of the violets lying in her bosom
reaches him.

Hardly knowing his own meaning, he puts out his hand and catches her by
her naked arm, just where the long glove ceases above the elbow.

"Isabel, give me this dance," says he a little wildly.

"_No!_"

She shakes herself free of him. A moment her eyes blaze into his. "No!"
she says again, trembling from head to foot. Another moment, and the
door has closed behind her.




CHAPTER XIV.

    "The old, old pain of earth."


It is now close upon midnight--that midnight of the warmer months when
day sets its light finger on the fringes of it. There is a sighing
through the woods, a murmur from the everlasting sea, and though Diana
still rides high in heaven with her handmaiden Venus by her side, yet in
a little while her glory will be departed, and her one rival, the sun,
will push her from her throne.

The gleaming lamps among the trees-are scarcely so bright as they were
an hour ago, the faint sighing of the wind that heralds the morning is
shaking them to and fro. A silly bird has waked, and is chirping in a
foolish fashion among the rhododendrons, where, in a secluded path,
Joyce and Dicky Browne are wandering somewhat aimlessly. Before them
lies a turn in the path that leads presumably into the dark wood,
darkest of all at this hour, and where presumably, too, no one has
ventured, though one should never presume about hidden corners.

"I can't think what you see in him," says Mr. Browne, after a big pause.
"I'd say nothing if his face wasn't so fat, but if I were you, that
would condemn him in my eyes."

"I can't see that his face is fatter than yours," says Miss Kavanagh,
with what she fondly believes perfect indifference.

"Neither is it," says Mr. Browne meekly, "but my dear girl, there lies
the gist of my argument. You have condemned me. All my devotion has been
scouted by you. I don't pretend to be the wreck still that once by your
cruelty you made me, but----"

"Oh, that will do," says Joyce, unfeelingly. "As for Mr. Beauclerk, I
don't know why you should imagine I see anything in him."

"Well, I confess I can't quite understand it myself. He couldn't hold a
candle to--er--well, several other fellows I could name, myself not
included, Miss Kavanagh, so that supercilious smile is thrown away. He
may be good to look at, there is certainly plenty of him on which to
feast the eye, but to fall in love with----"

"What do you mean, Dicky? What are you speaking about--do you know?
You," with a deadly desire to insult him, "must be in love yourself
to--to maunder as you are doing?"

"I'm not," says Mr. Browne, "that's the queer part of it. I don't know
what's the matter with me. Ever since you blighted me, I have lain
fallow, as it were. I," dejectedly, "haven't been in love for quite a
long, long time now. I miss it--I can't explain it. I can't be well, can
I? I," anxiously, "I don't look well, do I?"

"I never saw you looking better," with unkind force.

"Ah!" sadly, "that's because you don't give your attention to me. It's
my opinion that I'm fading away to the land o' the leal, like old
What-you-may-call-'em."

"If that's the way he did it, it must have taken him some time. In fact,
he must be still at it," says Miss Kavanagh, heartlessly.

By this time they had come to the end of the walk, and have turned the
corner. Before them lies a small grass plot surrounded by evergreens, a
cosy nook not to be suspected by any one until quite close upon it. It
bursts upon the casual pedestrian, indeed, as a charming surprise. There
is something warm, friendly, confidential about it--something safe.
Beyond lies the gloomy wood, embedded in night, but here the moonbeams
play. Some one with a thoughtful care for loving souls has placed in
this excellent spot for flirtation a comfortable garden seat, just
barely large enough for two, sternly indicative of being far too small
far the leanest three.

Upon this delightful seat four eyes now concentrate themselves. As if by
one consent, although unconsciously, Mr. Browne and his companion come
to a dead stop. The unoffending seat holds them in thrall.

Upon it, evidently on the best of terms with each other, are two people.
One is Miss Maliphant, the other Mr. Beauclerk. They are whispering
"soft and low." Miss Maliphant is looking, perhaps, a little
confused--for her--and the cause of the small confusion is transparent.
Beauclerk's hand is tightly closed over hers, and even as Dicky and Miss
Kavanagh gaze spellbound at them, he lifts the massive hand of the
heiress and imprints a lingering kiss upon it.

"Come away," says Dicky, touching Joyce's arm. "Run for your life, but
softly."

He and she have been standing in shadow, protected from the view of the
other two by a crimson rhododendron. Joyce starts as he touches her, as
one might who is roused from an ugly dream, and then follows him
swiftly, but lightly, back to the path they had forsaken.

She is trembling in a nervous fashion, that angers herself cruelly, and
something of her suppressed emotion becomes known to Mr. Browne.
Perhaps, being a friend of hers, it angers him, too.

"What strange freaks moonbeams play," says he, with a truly delightful
air of saying nothing in particular. "I could have sworn that just then
I saw Beauclerk kissing Miss Maliphant's hand."

No answer. There is a little silence, fraught with what angry grief who
can tell? Dicky, who is not all froth, and is capable of a liking here
and there, is conscious of, and is sorry for, the nervous tremor that
shakes the small hand he has drawn within his arm; but he is so far a
philosopher that he tells himself it is but a little thing in her life;
she can bear it; she will recover from it; "and in time forget that she
had been ever ill," says this good-natured skeptic to himself.

Joyce, who has evidently been struggling with herself, and has now
conquered her first feeling, turns to him.

"You should not condemn the moonbeams unheard," says she, bravely, with
the ghost of a little smile. "The evidence of two impartial witnesses
should count in their favor."

"But, my dear girl, consider," says Mr. Browne, mildly. "If it had been
anyone else's hand! I could then accuse the moonbeams of a secondary
offense, and say that their influence alone, which we all know has a
maddening effect, had driven him to so bold a deed. But not madness
itself could inspire me with a longing to kiss her hand."

"She is a very good girl, and I like her," says Joyce, with a suspicious
vehemence.

"So do I; so much, indeed, that I should shrink from calling her a good
girl. It is very damnatory, you know. You could hardly say anything more
prejudicial. It at once precludes the idea of her having any such minor
virtues as grace, beauty, wit, etc. Well, granted she is 'a good girl,'
that doesn't give her pretty hands, does it? As a rule, I think that all
good girls have gigantic points. I don't think I would care to kiss Miss
Maliphant's hands, even if she would let me."

"She is a very honest, kind-hearted girl," says Miss Kavanagh a little
heavily. It suggests itself to Mr. Browne that she has not been
listening to him.

"And a very rich one."

"I never think about that when I am with her. I couldn't."

"Beauclerk could," says Mr. Browne, tersely.

There is another rather long silence, and Dicky is beginning to think he
has gone a trifle too far, and that Miss Kavanagh will cut him
to-morrow, when she speaks again. Her tone is composed, but icy enough
to freeze him.

"It is a mistake," says she, "to discuss people towards whom one feels a
natural antagonism. It leads, one, perhaps, to say more than one
actually means. One is apt to grow unjust. I would never discuss Mr.
Beauclerk if I were you. You don't like him."

"Well," says Mr. Browne, thoughtfully, "since you put it to me, I
confess I think he is the most rubbishy person I ever met!"

After this sweeping opinion, conversation comes to a deadlock. It is not
resumed. Reaching the stone steps leading to the conservatory, they
ascend them in silence, and reach that perfumed retreat to find Dysart
on the threshold.

"Oh, there you are!" cries he to Miss Kavanagh. "I thought you lost for
good and all!" His face has lighted up. Perhaps he feels a sense of
relief at finding her with Dicky, who is warranted harmless. He looks
almost handsome, better than handsome! The very soul of honesty shines,
in his kind eyes.

"Oh! it is hard to lose what nobody wants," says Joyce in a would-be
playful tone, but something in the drawn, pained lines about her mouth
belies her mirth. Dysart, after a swift examination of her face, takes
her hand and draws it within his arm.

"The last was our dance," says he.

"Speak kindly of the dead," says Mr. Browne, as he beats a hasty
retreat.




CHAPTER XV.

    "Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly;
    Most friendship is feigning, most loving is folly."


"Did you forget?" asks Dysart, looking at her.

"Forget?"

"That the last dance was mine?"

"Oh, was it? I'm so sorry. You must forgive me," with a feverish attempt
at gayety, "I will try to make amends. You shall have this one instead,
no matter to whom it may belong. Come. It is only just begun, I think."

"Never mind," says Dysart, gently. "We won't dance this, I think. It is
cool and quiet here, and you are tired."

"Oh, so tired," returns she with a little sudden pathetic cry, so
impulsive, so inexpressible that it goes to his heart.

"Joyce! what is it?" says he, quickly. "Here, come and sit down. No, I
don't want an answer. It was an absurd question. You have overdone it a
little, that is all."

"Yes, that is all!" She sinks heavily into the seat he has pointed out
to her, and lets her head fall back against the cushions. "However, when
you come to think of it, that means a great deal," says she, smiling
languidly.

"There, don't talk," says he. "What is the good of having a friend if
you can't be silent with him when it so pleases you. That," laughing,
and arranging the cushions behind her head, "is one for you and two for
myself. I, too, pine for a moment when even the meagre 'yes' and 'no'
will not be required of me."

"Oh, no," shaking her head. "It is all for me and nothing for yourself!"
she pauses, and putting out her hand lays it on his sleeve. "I think,
Felix," says she, softly, "you are the kindest man I ever met."

"I told you you felt overdone," says he, laughing as if to hide the
sudden emotion that is gleaming in his eyes. He presses the hand resting
on his arm very gently, and then replaces it in her lap. To take
advantage of any little kindness she may show him now, when it is plain
that she is suffering from some mental excitement, grief or anger, or
both, would seem base to him.

She has evidently accepted his offer of silence, and lying back in her
soft couch stares with unseeing eyes at the bank of flowers before her.
Behind her tall, fragrant shrubs rear themselves, and somewhere behind
her, too, a tiny fountain is making musical tinklings. The faint, tender
glow of a colored lamp gleams from the branches of a tropical tree close
by, and round it pale, downy moths are flitting, the sound of their
wings, as every now and then they approach too near the tempting glow
and beat them against the Japanese shade, mingling with the silvery fall
of the scented water.

The atmosphere is warm, drowsy, a little melancholy. It seems to seize
upon the two sitting within its seductive influence, and threatens to
waft them from day dreams into dreams born of idle slumber. The rustle
of a coming skirt, however, a low voice, a voice still lower whispering
a reply, recalls them both to the fact that rest, complete and perfect,
is impossible under the circumstances.

A little opening among the tall evergreens upon their right shows them
Lord Baltimore once more, but this time not alone. Lady Swansdown is
with him.

She is looking rather lovelier than usual, with that soft tinge of red
upon her cheeks born of her last waltz, and her lips parted in a happy
smile. The subdued lights of the many lamps falling on her satin gown
rest there as if in love with its beauty. It is an old shade made new, a
yellow that is almost white, and has yet a tinge of green in it. A
curious shade, difficult, perhaps, to wear with good effect; but on Lady
Swansdown it seems to reign alone as queen of all the toilets in the
rooms to-night. She looks, indeed, like a perfect picture stepped down
from its canvas, "a thing of beauty," a very vision of delight.

She seems, indeed, to Joyce watching her--Joyce who likes her--that she
has grown beyond herself (or rather into her own real self) to-night.
There is a touch of life, of passionate joy, of abandonment, of hope
that has yet a sting in it, in all her air, that, though not understood
of the girl, is still apparent.

The radiant smile that illumines her beautiful face as she glances up at
Baltimore--who is bending over her in more lover-like fashion than
should be--is still making all her face a lovely fire as she passes out
of sight down the steps that lead to the lighted gardens--the steps that
Joyce had but just now ascended.

The latter is still a little wrapt in wonder and admiration, and some
other thought that is akin to trouble, when Dysart breaks in upon her
fancies.

"I am sorry about that," says he, bluntly, indicating with a nod of his
head the departing shadows of the two who have just passed out. There
are no fancies about Dysart. Nothing vague.

"Yes; it is a pity," says Joyce, hurriedly.

"More than that, I think."

"Something ought to be done," nervously.

"Yes," flushing hotly; "I know--I know what you mean"--she had meant
nothing--"but it is so difficult to know what to do, and--I am only a
cousin."

"Oh, I wasn't thinking of you. I wasn't, really," says she, a good deal
shocked. "As you say, why should you speak, when----"

"There is Beauclerk," says Dysart, quickly, as if a little angry with
somebody, but certainly not with her. "How can he stand by and see it?"

"Perhaps he doesn't see it," says she in a strange tone, her eyes on the
marble flooring. It seems to herself that the words are forced from her.
"Because--because he has----"

She brings her hands tightly together, so tightly that she reduces the
feathers on the fan she is holding to their last gasp. Because she is
now disappointed in him; because he has proved himself, perhaps,
unstable, deceptive to the heart's core, is she to vilify, him? A
thousand times no! That would be, indeed, to be base herself.

"Perhaps not," says Dysart, drily. In his secret heart this defence of
his rival is detestable to him. Something in her whole manner when she
came in from the garden had suggested to him the possibility that she
had at last found him out. Dysart would have been puzzled to explain how
Beauclerk was supposed to be "found out" or for what, but that he was
liable to discovery at any moment on some count or counts unknown, was
one of his Christian beliefs. "Perhaps not," says he. "And yet I cannot
help thinking that a matter so open to all must be patent to him."

"But," anxiously, "is it so open?"

"I leave that to your own judgment," a little warmly. "You," with rather
sharp question, "are a friend of Isabel's?"

"Yes, yes," quickly. "You know that. But----"

"But?" sternly.

"I like Lady Swansdown, too," says she, with some determination. "I find
it hard to believe that she can--can----"

"Be false to her friend," supplements he. "Have you yet to learn that
friendship ends where love begins?"

"You think----?"

"That she is in love with Baltimore."

"And he?"

"Oh!" contemptuously; "who shall gauge the depth of his heart? What can
he mean?" he has risen and is now pacing angrily up and down the small
space before her. "He used to be such a good fellow, and now----Is he
dead to all sense of honor, of honesty?"

"He is a man," says Joyce, coldly.

"No. I deny that. Not a true man, surely."

"Is there a true man?" says she. "Is there any truth, any honesty to be
found in the whole wide world?"

She too has risen now, and is standing with her large dark eyes fixed
almost defiantly on his. There is something so strange, so wild, so
unlike her usual joyous, happy self in this outburst, in her whole
attitude, that Dysart regards her with an astonishment that is largely
tinctured with fear.

"I don't know what is in your mind," says he, calmly; "something out of
the common has occurred to disturb you so much, I can guess, but,"
looking at her earnestly, "whatever it maybe, I entreat you to beat it
under. Conquer it; do not let it conquer you. There must be evil in the
world, but never lose sight of the good; that must be there, just as
surely. Truth, honor, honesty, are no fables; they are to be found
everywhere. If not in this one, then in that. Do not lose faith in
them."

"You think me evidently in a bad way," says she, smiling faintly. She
has recovered herself in part, but though she tries to turn his earnest
words into a jest, one can see that she is perilously near to tears.

"You mean that I am preaching to you," says he, smiling too. "Well, so I
am. What right has a girl like you to disbelieve in anything? Why,"
laughing, "it can't be so very long ago since you believed in fairies,
in pixies, and the fierce dragons of our childhood."

"I don't know that I am not a believer in them still," says she. "In the
dragons, at all events. Evil seems to rule the world."

"Tut!" says he. "I have preached in vain."

"You would have me believe in good only," says she. "You assure me very
positively that all the best virtues are still riding to and fro,
redeeming the world, with lances couched and hearts on fire. But where
to find them? In you?"

It is a very gentle smile she gives him as she says this.

"Yes: so far, at least, as you are concerned," says he, stoutly. "I
shall be true and honest to you so long as my breath lives in my body.
So much I can swear to."

"Well," says she, with a rather meagre attempt at light-heartedness,
"you almost persuade me with that truculent manner of yours into
believing in you at all events, or is it," a little sadly, "that the
ways of others drive me to that belief? Well," with a sigh, "never mind
how it is, you benefit by it, any way."

"I don't want to force your confidence," says Dysart; "but you have been
made unhappy by somebody, have you not?"

"I have not been made happy," says she, her eyes on the ground. "I don't
know why I tell you that. You asked a hard question."

"I know. I should have been silent, perhaps, and yet----"

At this moment the sound of approaching footsteps coming up the steps
startles them.

"Joyce!" says he, "grant me one request."

"One! You rise to tragedy!" says she, as if a little amused in spite of
the depression under which she is so evidently laboring. "Is it to be
your last, your dying prayer?"

"I hope not. Nevertheless I would have it granted."

"You have only to speak," says she, with a slight gesture that is half
mocking, half kindly.

"Come with me after luncheon, to-morrow, up to St. Bridget's Hill?"

"Is that all? And to throw such force into it. Yes, yes; I shall enjoy a
long walk like that."

"It is not because of the walk that I ask you to go there with me," says
Dysart, the innate honesty that distinguishes him compelling him to lay
bare to her his secret meaning. "I have something to say to you. You
will listen?"

"Why should I not?" returns she, a little pale. He might, perhaps, have
said something further, but that now the footsteps sound close at hand.
A glance towards the door that leads from the fragrant night into the
still more perfumed air within reveals to them two figures.

Mr. Beauclerk and Miss Maliphant come leisurely forward. The blood
receding to Joyce's heart leaves her cold and singularly calm.




CHAPTER XVI.

    "Out of the day and night
    A joy has taken flight."

    "Life, I know not what thou art."


"You two," cries Miss Maliphant pleasantly, in her loud, good-natured
voice. She addresses them as though it has been borne in upon her by
constant reminding that Joyce and Dysart are for the best of all reasons
generally to be found together. There is something not only genial, but
sympathetic in her tones, something that embarrasses Dysart, and angers
Joyce to the last degree. "Well, I'm glad to have met you for one moment
out of the hurly-burly," goes on the massive heiress to Joyce, with the
friendliest of smiles. "I'm off at cock-crow, you know, and so mightn't
have had the opportunity of saying good-bye to you, but for this
fortunate meeting."

"To-morrow?" says Joyce, more with the manner of one who feels she must
say something than from any desire to say it.

"Yes, and so early that I shall not have it in my power to bid farewell
to any one. Unless, indeed," with a glance at Beauclerk, meant, perhaps,
to be coquettish, but so elephantine in its proportions as to be almost
anything in the world but that, "some of my friends may wish to see the
sun rise."

"We shall miss you," says Joyce, gracefully, though with an effort.

"Just what I've been saying," breaks in Beauclerk at this juncture, who
hitherto has been looking on, with an altogether delightful smile upon
his handsome face. "We shall all miss Miss Maliphant. It is not often
that one meets with an entirely genial companion. My sister is to be
congratulated on securing such an acquisition, if only for a short
time."

Joyce, lifting her eyes, stares straight at him. "For a short time!"
What does that mean? If Miss Maliphant is to be Lady Baltimore's
sister-in-law, she will undoubtedly secure her for a lifetime!

"Oh, you are too good," says Miss Maliphant, giving him a playful flick
with her fan.

"Well, what would you have me say?" persists Beauclerk still lightly,
with wonderful lightness, in fact, considering the weight of that
playful tap upon his bent knuckles. "That we shall not be sorry? Would
you have me lie, then? Fie, fie, Miss Maliphant! The truth, the truth,
and nothing but the truth! At all risks and hazards!" here he almost
imperceptibly sends flying a shaft from his eyes at Joyce, who receives
it with a blank stare. "We shall, I assure you, be desolated when you
go, specially Isabel."

This last pretty little speech strikes Dysart as being specially neat:
This putting the onus of the regret on to Isabel's shoulders. All
through, Beauclerk has been careful to express himself as one who is an
appreciative friend of Miss Maliphant, but nothing more; yet so guarded
are these expressions, and the looks that accompany them, that Miss
Maliphant might be pardoned if she should read a warmer feeling in them.

A sensation of disgust darkens his brow.

"I must say you are all very nice to me," says the heiress complacently.
Poor soul! No doubt, she believes in every bit of it, and a large course
of kow-towing from the world has taught her the value of her pile.
"However," with true Manchester grace, "there's no need for howling over
it. We'll all meet again, I dare say, some time or other. For one thing,
Lady Baltimore has asked me to come here again after Christmas;
February, I dare say."

"So glad!" murmurs Joyce rather vaguely.

"So you see," said Miss Maliphant with ponderous gayety, "that we are
all bound to put in a second good time together; you're coming, I know,
Mr. Dysart, and Miss Kavanagh is always here, and Mr. Beauclerk "--with
a languishing glance at that charming person, who returns it in the most
open manner--"has promised me that he will be here to meet me."

"Well, if I can, you know," says he, now beaming at her.

"How's that?" says the heiress, turning promptly upon him. It is strange
how undesirable the very richest heiress can be at times. "Why, it's
only just this instant that you told me nothing would keep you away from
the Court next spring. What d'ye mean?"

She brings him to book in a most uncompromising fashion; a fashion that
betrays unmistakably her plebeian origin. Dysart, listening, admires her
for it. Her rough and ready honesty seems to him preferable to the best
bred shuffling in the world.

"Did I say all that?" says Beauclerk lightly, coloring a little,
nevertheless, as he marks the fine smile that is curling Joyce's lips.
"Why, then," gayly, "if I said it, I meant it. If I hesitated about
indorsing my intentions publicly, it is because one is never sure of
happiness beforehand; believe me, Miss Maliphant," with a little bow-to
her, but with a direct glance at Joyce, "every desire I have is centered
in the hope that next spring may see me here again."

"Well, I expect we all have the same wish," says Miss Maliphant
cheerfully, who has not caught that swift glance at Joyce. "I'm sure I
hope that nothing will interfere with my coming here in February."

"It is agreed, then," says Beauclerk, with a delightfully comprehensive
smile that seems to take in every one, even the plants and the dripping
fountain and the little marble god in the corner, who is evidently
listening with all his might. "We all meet here again early next year if
the fates be propitious. You, Dysart, you pledge yourself to join our
circle then?"

"I pledge myself," says Dysart, fixing a cold gaze on him. It is so
cold, so distinctly hostile, that Beauclerk grows uncomfortable beneath
it. When uncomfortable his natural bias leads him towards a display of
bonhomie.

"Here we have before us a prospect to cheer the soul of any man,"
declares he, shifting his eyes from Dysart to Miss Maliphant.

"It cheers me certainly," responds that heavy maiden with alacrity. "I
like to think we shall all meet again."

"Like the witches in Macbeth," says Joyce, indifferently.

"But not so malignantly, I hope," says the heiress brilliantly, who,
like most worthy people, can never see beyond her own nose. "For my part
I like old friends much better than new." She looks round for the
appreciation that should attend this sound remark, and is gratified to
find Dysart is smiling at her. Perhaps the core of that smile might not
have been altogether to her taste--most cores are difficult of
digestion. To her, to whom all things are new, where does the flavor of
the old come in?

Beauclerk is looking at Joyce.

"I hope the prospect cheers you too," says he a little sharply, as if
nettled by her determined silence and bent on making her declare
herself. "You, I trust, will be here next February."

"Sure to be!" says she with an enigmatical smile. "Not a jot or tittle
of your enjoyments will be lost to you in the coming year. Both your
friends--Miss Maliphant and I--will be here to welcome you when you
return."

Something in her manner, in the half-defiant light in her eyes, puzzles
Beauclerk. What has happened to her since they last were together? Not
more than an hour ago she had seemed--er--well. Inwardly he smiles
complacently. But now. Could she? Is it possible? Was there a chance
that----

"Miss Kavanagh," begins he, moving toward her. But she makes short work
of his advance.

"I repent," says she, turning a lovely, smiling face on Dysart. "A while
ago I said I was too tired to dance. I did myself injustice. That
waltz--listen to it"--lifting up an eager finger--"would it not wake an
anchorite from his ascetic dreams? Come. There is time.".

She has sprung to her feet--life is in every movement. She slips her arm
into Dysart's. Not understanding--yet half understanding, moves with
her--his heart on fire for her, his puzzlement rendering him miserable.

Beauclerk, with that doubt of what she really knows full upon him, is
wiser. Without hesitation he offers his arm to Miss Maliphant; and, so
swift is his desire to quit the scene, he passes Dysart and Joyce, the
latter having paused for a moment to recover her fan.

"You see!" says Beauclerk, bending over the heiress, when a turn in the
conservatory has hidden him from the view of those behind. "I told you!"
He says nothing more. It is the veriest whisper, spoken with an
assumption of merriment very well achieved. Yet, if she would have
looked at him, she could have seen that his very lips are white. But as
I have said, Miss Maliphant's mind has not been trained to the higher
courses.

"Yes. One can see!" laughs she happily. "And it is charming, isn't it?
To find two people thoroughly in love with each other now-a-days, is to
believe in that mad old world of romance of which we read. They're very
nice too, both of them. I do like Joyce. She's one in a thousand, and
Mr. Dysart is just suited to her. They are both thorough! There's no
nonsense about them. Now that you have pointed it out to me, I think I
never saw two people so much in love with each other as they."

Providentially, she is looking away from him to where a quadrille is
forming in the ballroom, so that the deadly look of hatred that adorns
his handsome face is unknown to her.

       *       *       *       *       *

Meantime, Joyce, with that convenient fan recovered, is looking with sad
eyes at Dysart.

"Come; the music will soon cease," says she.

"Why do you speak to me like that?" cries he vehemently. "If you don't
want to dance, why not say so to me? Why not trust me? Good heavens! if
I were your bitterest enemy you could not treat me more distantly. And
yet--I would die to make you happy."

"Don't!" says she in a little choking sort of way, turning her face from
him. She struggles with herself for a moment, and then, still with her
face averted, says meekly: "Thank you, then. If you don't mind, I should
rather not dance any more to-night."

"Why didn't you say that at first?" says he, with a last remnant of
reproach. "No; there shall be no more dancing to-night for either you or
me. A word, Joyce!" turning eagerly toward her, "you won't forget your
promise about that walk to-morrow?"

"No. No, indeed."

"Thank you!"

They are sitting very close together, and almost insensibly his hand
seeks and finds hers. It was lying idle on her lap, and lifting it, he
would have raised it to his lips, but with a sharp, violent action she
wrests it from him, and, as a child might, hides it behind her.

"If you would have me believe in you----No, no, not that," says she, a
little incoherently, her voice rendering her meaning with difficulty.
Dysart, astonished, stands back from her, waiting for something more;
but nothing comes, except two large tears, that steal heavily,
painfully, down her cheeks.

She brushes them impatiently away.

"Forgive me," she says, somewhat brokenly. "To you, who are so good to
me, I am unkind, while to those who are unkind to me I----" She is
trying to rally. "It was a mere whim, believe me. I have always hated
demonstrations of any sort, and why should you want to kiss my hand?"

"I shouldn't," says he. "If----" His eyes have fallen from her eyes to
her lips.

"Never mind," says she; "I didn't understand, perhaps. But why can't you
be content with things as they are?"

"Are you content with them?"

"I think so. I have been examining myself, and honestly I think so,"
says she a little feverishly.

"Well, I'm not," returns he with decision. "You must give me credit for
a great private store of amiability, if you imagine that I am satisfied
to take things as they now exist--between you and me!"

"You have your faults, you see, as well as another," says she with a
frown. "You are persistent! And the worst of it is that you are
generally right." She frowns again, but even while frowning glances
sideways from under her long lashes with an expression hardly uncivil.
"That is the worst crime in the calendar. Be wrong sometimes, an' you
love me, it will gain you a world of friends."

"If it could gain me your love in return, I might risk it," says he
boldly. "But that is hopeless I'm afraid," shaking his head. "I am too
often in the wrong not to know that neither my many frailties nor my few
virtues can ever purchase for me the only good thing on which my soul is
set."

"I have told you of one fault, now hear another," says she capriciously.
"You are too earnest! What," turning upon him passionately, as if a
little ashamed of her treatment of him, "is the use of being earnest?
Who cares? Who looks on, who gives one moment to the guessing of the
meaning that lies beneath? To be in earnest in this life is merely to be
mad. Pretend, laugh, jest, do anything, but be what you really are, and
you will probably get through the world in a manner, if not satisfactory
to yourself, at all events to '_les autres_.'"

"You preach a crusade against yourself," says he gently. "You preach
against your own conscience. You are the least deceptive person I know.
Were you to follow in the track you lay out for others, the cruelty of
it would kill you.

    "To your own self be true,
    And----"

"Yes, yes; I know it all," says she, interrupting him with some
irritation. "I wish you knew how--how unpleasant you can be. As I tell
you, you are always right. That last dance--it is true--I didn't want to
have anything to do with it; but for all that I didn't wish to be told
so. I merely suggested it as a means of getting rid of----"

"Miss Maliphant," says Dysart, who is feeling a little sore. The
disingenuousness of this remark is patent to her.

"No; Mr. Beauclerk," corrects she, coldly.

"Forgive me," says Dysart quickly, "I shouldn't have said that. Well,"
drawing a long breath, "we have got rid of them, and may I give you a
word of advice? It is disinterested because it is to my own
disadvantage. Go to your room--to your bed. You are tired, exhausted.
Why wait to be more so. Say you will do as I suggest."

"You want to get rid of me," says she with a little weary smile.

"That is unworthy of an answer," gravely; "but if a 'yes' to it will
help you to follow my advice, why, I will say it. Come," rising, "let
me take you to the hall."

"You shall have your way," says she, rising too, and following him.

A side door leading to the anteroom on their left, and thus skirting the
ballroom without entering it, brings them to the foot of the central
staircase.

"Good-night," says Dysart in a low tone, retaining her hand for a
moment. All round them is a crowd separated into twos and threes, so
that it is impossible to say more than the mere commonplace.

"Good night," returns she in a soft tone. She has turned away from him,
but something in the intense longing and melancholy of his eyes compels
her to look back again. "Oh, you have been kind! I am not ungrateful,"
says she with sharp contrition.

"Joyce, Joyce! Let me be the grateful one," returns he. His voice is a
mere whisper, but so fraught is it with passionate appeal that it rings
in her brain for long hours afterward.

Her eyes fall beneath his. She moves silently away. What can she say to
him?

It is with a sense of almost violent relief that she closes the door of
her own room behind her, and knows herself to be at last alone.




CHAPTER XVII.

    "And vain desires, and hopes dismayed,
    And fears that cast the earth in shade,
        My heart did fret."


Night is waning! Dies pater, Father of Day, is making rapid strides
across the heavens, creating havoc as he goes. Diana faints! the stars
grow pale, flinging, as they die, a last soft glimmer across the sky.

Now and again a first call from the birds startles the drowsy air. The
wood dove's coo, melancholy sweet--the cheep-cheep of the robin--the
hoarse cry of the

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