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A Charming Fellow, Volume II

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Title: A Charming Fellow, Volume II

Author: Frances Eleanor Trollope


        
Release date: February 28, 2011 [eBook #35429]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35429

Credits: E-text prepared by Delphine Lettau, Mary Meehan, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries (http://www.archive.org/details/americana)


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Note: Project Gutenberg also has the other two volumes of this
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      Images of the original pages are available through
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A CHARMING FELLOW.

by

FRANCES ELEANOR TROLLOPE,

Author of "Aunt Margaret's Trouble," "Mabel's Progress," etc. etc.

In Three Volumes.

VOL. II.







London:
Chapman and Hall, 193, Piccadilly.
1876.

Charles Dickens and Evans,
Crystal Palace Press.




CHAPTER I.


"So you are to come to Switzerland with us next month, Ancram," said
Miss Kilfinane. She was seated at the piano in Lady Seely's
drawing-room, and Algernon was leaning on the instrument, and idly
turning over a portfolio of music.

"Yes; I hope your serene highness has no objection to that arrangement?"

"It would be of no use my objecting, I suppose!"

"Of none whatever. But it would be unpleasant."

"Oh, you would still go then, whether I liked it or not?"

"I'm afraid the temptation to travel about Europe in your company would
be too strong for me!"

"How silly you are, Ancram!" said Miss Kilfinane, looking up half shyly,
half tenderly. But she met no answering look from Algernon. He had just
come upon a song that he wanted to try, and was drawing it out from
under a heap of others in the portfolio.

"Look here, Castalia," he said, "I wish you would play through this
accompaniment for me. I can't manage it."

It will be seen that Algernon had become familiar enough with Miss
Kilfinane to call her by her Christian-name. And, moreover, he addressed
her in a little tone of authority, as being quite sure she would do what
he asked her.

"This?" she said, taking the song from his hand. "Why do you want to
sing this dull thing? I think Glueck is so dreary! And, besides, it isn't
your style at all."

"Isn't it? What is my style, I wonder?"

"Oh light, lively things are your style."

At the bottom of his mind, perhaps, Algernon thought so too. But it is
often very unpleasant to hear our own secret convictions uttered by
other people; and he did not like to be told that he could not sing
anything more solid than a French chansonette.

"Lady Harriet particularly wishes me to try this thing of Glueck's at her
house next Saturday," he said.

Miss Kilfinane threw down the song pettishly. "Oh, Lady Harriet," she
exclaimed. "I might have known it was her suggestion! She is so full of
nonsense about her classical composers. I think she makes a fool of you,
Ancram. I know it will be a failure if you attempt that song."

"Thank you very much, Miss Kilfinane! And now, having spoken your mind
on the subject, will you kindly play the accompaniment?"

Algernon picked up the piece of music, smoothed it with his hand, placed
it on the desk of the piano, and made a little mocking bow to Castalia.
His serenity and good humour seemed to irritate her. "I'm sick of Lady
Harriet!" she said, querulously, and with a shrug of the shoulders. The
action and the words were so plainly indicative of ill temper, that Lady
Seely, who waddled into the drawing-room at that moment, asked loudly,
"What are you two quarrelling about, eh?"

"Oh, what a shocking idea, my lady! We're not quarrelling at all,"
answered Algernon, raising his eyebrows, and smiling with closed lips.
He rarely showed his teeth when he smiled, which circumstance gave his
mouth an expression of finesse and delicate irony that was peculiar,
and--coupled with the candidly-arched brows--attractive.

"Well, it takes two to make a quarrel, certainly," returned my lady.
"But Castalia was scolding you, at all events. Weren't you now,
Castalia?"

Castalia deigned not to reply, but tossed her head, and began to run her
fingers over the keys of the piano.

"The fact is, Lady Seely," said Algernon, "that Castalia is so convinced
that I shall make a mess of this aria--which Lady Harriet Dormer has
asked me to sing for her next Saturday--that she declines to play the
accompaniment of it for me."

"Well, you ought to be immensely flattered, young jackanapes! She
wouldn't care a straw about some people's failures, would you, Castalia?
Would you mind, now, if Jack Price were to sing a song and make an awful
mess of it, eh?"

"As to that, it seems to me that Jack Price makes an awful mess of most
things he does," replied Castalia.

"Ah, exactly! So one mess more or less don't matter. But in the case of
our Admirable Crichton here, it is different."

"I think he is getting awfully spoiled," said Castalia, a little less
crossly. And there was absolutely a blush upon her sallow cheek.

"And that's the reason you snub him, is it? You see, Ancram, it's all
for your good, if Castalia is a little hard on you!"

Miss Kilfinane rose and left the room, saying that she must dress for
her drive.

"I think Castalia is harder on Lady Harriet than on me," said Algernon,
when Castalia was gone.

"Ah! H'm! Castalia has lots of good points, but--I daresay you have
noticed it--she is given to being a little bit jealous when she cares
about people. Now you show a decided liking for Lady Harriet's society,
and you crack up her grace, and her elegance, and her taste, and all
that. And sometimes I think poor Cassy don't quite like it, don't you
know?"

"What on earth can it matter to her?" cried Algernon. He knew that
Castalia was no favourite with my lady, and he flattered himself that he
was becoming a favourite with her. So he spoke with a little
half-contemptuous smile, and a shrug of impatience, when he asked, "What
on earth can it matter to her?"

But my lady did not smile. She threw her head back, and looked at
Algernon from under her half-closed eyelids.

"It's my opinion, young man, that it matters a good deal to Castalia,"
she said; "more than it would have mattered to me when I was a young
lady, I can tell you. But there's no accounting for tastes."

Then Lady Seely also left the room, having first bidden Algernon to come
and dine with her the next day.

Algernon was dumfoundered.

Not that he had not perceived the scornful Castalia's partiality for his
charming self; not that her submission to his wishes, or even his whims,
and her jealous anxiety to keep him by her side whenever there appeared
to be danger of his leaving it for the company of a younger or more
attractive woman, had escaped his observation. But Algernon was not
fatuous enough to consider himself a lady-killer. His native good taste
would alone have prevented him from having any such pretension. It was
ridiculous; and it involved, almost of necessity, some affectation. And
Algernon never was affected. He accepted Castalia's marked preference as
the most natural thing in the world. He had been used to be petted and
preferred all his life. But it truly had not entered into his head that
the preference meant anything more than that Castalia found him amusing,
and clever, and good-looking, and that she liked to keep so attractive a
personage to herself as much as possible. For Algernon had noted the
Honourable Castalia's little grudging jealousies, and he knew as well as
anybody that she did not like to hear him praise Lady Harriet, for whom,
indeed, she had long entertained a smouldering sort of dislike. But that
she should have anything like a tender sentiment for himself, and, still
more, that Lady Seely should see and approve it--for my lady's words
and manner implied no less--was a very astonishing idea indeed.

So astonishing was it, that after a while he came to the conclusion that
the idea was erroneous. He turned Lady Seely's words in his mind, this
way and that, and tried to look at them from all points of view, and--as
words will do when too curiously scrutinised--they gradually seemed to
take another and a different meaning, from the first obvious one which
had struck him.

"The old woman was only giving me a hint not to annoy Miss Kilfinane;
not to excite her peevish temper, or exasperate her envy."

But this solution would not quite do, either. "Lady Seely is not too
fond of Castalia," he said to himself. "Besides, I never knew her
particularly anxious to spare anyone's feelings. What the deuce did she
mean, I wonder?"

Algernon continued to wonder at intervals all the rest of the afternoon.
His mind was still busy with the same subject when he came upon Jack
Price, seated in the reading-room of the club, to which he had
introduced Algernon at the beginning of his London career, and of which
Algernon had since become a member. It was now full summer time. The
window was wide open, and the Honourable John Patrick was lounging in a
chair near it, with a newspaper spread out on his knees, and his eyes
fixed on a water-cart that was be-sprinkling the dusty street outside.
He looked very idle, and a little melancholy, as he sat there by
himself, and he welcomed Algernon with even more than his usual
effusion, asking him what he was going to do with himself, and offering
to walk part of the way towards his lodgings with him, when he was told
that Algernon must betake himself homeward. The offer was a measure of
Mr. Price's previous weariness of spirit; for, in general, he professed
to dislike walking.

"And how long is it since you saw our friend, Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs?" asked
Jack Price of Algernon, as they strolled along, arm-in-arm, on the shady
side of the way.

"Oh--I'm afraid it's rather a long time," said Algernon, carelessly.

"Ah, now that's bad, my dear boy. You shouldn't neglect people, you
know. And our dear Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs is exceedingly pleasant."

"As to neglecting her--I don't know that I have neglected
her--particularly. What more could I do than call and leave my card?"

"Call again. You wouldn't leave off going to Lady Seely's because you
happened not to find her at home once in a way."

"Lady Seely is my relation."

"H'm! Well, would you cut Lady Harriet Dormer for the same reason?"

"Cut her? But, my dear Mr. Price, you mustn't suppose that I have cut
Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs!"

"Come, now, my dear fellow, I'm a great deal older than you are, and
I'll take the liberty of giving you a bit of advice. Never offend
people, who mean to be civil, merely because they don't happen to amuse
you. What, the deuce, we can't live for amusement in this life!"

The moralising might be good, but the moralist was, Algernon thought,
badly fitted with his part. He was tempted to retort on his new mentor,
but he did not retort. He merely said, quietly:

"Has Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs been complaining of me, then?"

"Well, the truth is, she has--in an indirect kind of way; you
know--what?"

"I'll go and see her this evening. To-day is Thursday, isn't it? She has
one of her 'At home's' this evening."

Jack Price looked at the young man admiringly. "You're an uncommonly
sensible fellow!" said he. "I give you my honour I never knew a fellow
of your years take advice so well. By Jove! I wish I had had your common
sense when I was your age. It's too late for me to do any good now, you
know, what? And, in fact," (with a solemn lowering of his musical Irish
voice) "I split myself on the very rock I'm now warning you off. I never
was polite. And if any one told me to go to the right, sure it was a
thousand to one that I'd instantly bolt to the left!" And shaking his
head with a sad, regretful gesture, Jack Price parted from Algernon at
the corner of the street.

Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs received the truant very graciously that evening. She
knew that, during his absence from her parties, he had been admitted
into society, to which even her fashionable self could not hope to
penetrate. But, though this might be a reason for a little genteel
sneering at him behind his back, it was none whatever, Mrs.
Machyn-Stubbs considered, for giving him a cool reception when he did
grace her house with his presence. She said to several of her guests,
one after the other: "We have young Ancram Errington here to-night. He's
so glad to come to us, poor fellow, for my people's place is his second
home, down in the West of England. And, then, the Seelys think it nice
of us to take notice of him, don't you know? He is a relation of Lady
Seely's, and is quite in that set--the Dormers, and all those people.
Ah! you don't know them? They say he is to marry Castalia Kilfinane. But
we haven't spoken about it yet out of our own little circle. Her father
was Viscount Kauldkail, and married Lord Seely's youngest sister," and
so on, and so on with a set smile, and no expression whatever on her
smooth, fair face.

To Algernon himself she showed herself politely inquisitive on the
subject of his engagement to Castalia, and startled him considerably by
saying, when she found herself close to him for a few minutes near a
doorway:

"And are we really to congratulate you, Mr. Errington?"

"If you please, madam," answered Algernon, with a bright, amused smile
and an easy bow, "but I should like to know--if it be not indiscreet--on
what special subject? I am, indeed, to be congratulated on finding
myself here. But, then, you are hardly likely to be the person to do
it."

At that moment Algernon was wedged into a corner behind a fat old
gentleman, who was vainly struggling to extricate himself from the crowd
in front, by making a series of short plunges forward, the rebound of
which sent him back on to Algernon's toes with some violence. It was
very hot, and a young lady was singing out of tune in the adjoining
room; her voice floating over the murmur of conversation occasionally,
in a wailing long-drawn note. Altogether, it might have been suspected
by some persons that Mr. Ancram Errington was laughing at his hostess,
when he spoke of his position at that time as being one which called for
congratulation. But Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs was the sort of woman who
completely baffled irony by a serene incapability of perceiving it. And
she would sooner suspect you of maligning her, hating her, or insulting
her, than of laughing at her. To this immunity from all sense of the
ridiculous she owed her chief social successes; for there are occasions
when some obtuseness of the faculties is useful. Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs
tapped Algernon's arm lightly with her fan, as she answered, "Now Mr.
Errington, that's all very well with the outside world, but you
shouldn't make mysteries with us! I look upon you almost as a brother of
Orlando's, I do indeed."

"You're very kind, indeed, and I'm immensely obliged to you; but, upon
my word, I don't know what you mean by my making mysteries!"

"Oh, well, if you choose to keep your own counsel, of course you can do
so. I will say no more." Upon which Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs proceeded to say
a great deal more, and ended by plainly giving Algernon to understand
that the rumour of his engagement to Miss Castalia Kilfinane had been
pretty widely circulated during the last four or five weeks.

"Oh, Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs," said Algernon, laughing, "you surely never
believe more than a hundredth part of what you hear? There's Mr. Price
looking for me. I promised to walk home with him, it is such a lovely
night. Thank you, no; not any tea! Are you ever at home about four
o'clock? I shall take my chance of finding you. Good night."

Algernon was greatly puzzled. How and whence had the report of his
engagement to Castalia originated? He would have been less puzzled, if
not less surprised, had he known that the report had come in the first
place from Lady Seely herself, who had let fall little words and hints,
well understanding how they would grow and spread. He had not committed
himself in his answer to Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs. He had replied to her in
such a manner as to leave the truth or falsehood of the report she had
mentioned an open question. He felt the consciousness of this to be a
satisfaction. Some persons might say, "Well, but since the report was
false, why not say so?" But Algernon always, and, as it were,
instinctively, took refuge in the vague. A clear statement to which he
should appear to be bound would have irked him like a tight shoe; and
naturally so, since he was conscious that he should flexibly conform
himself to circumstances as they might arise, and not stick with
stubborn stupidity to any predetermined course of conduct, which might
prove to be inconvenient.

After saying "Good night" to his hostess he elbowed his way out of the
crowded rooms, and went downstairs side by side with Jack Price. The
latter knew everybody present, or thought he did. And as, when he did
happen to make a mistake and to greet enthusiastically some total
stranger whom he had never seen in his life before, he never
acknowledged it, but persisted in declaring that he remembered the
individual in question perfectly, although "the name, the name, my dear
sir, or madam, has quite escaped my wretched memory!" his progress
towards Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs's hall door was considerably impeded by the
nods, smiles, and shakes of the hand, which he scattered broadcast.

"There's Deepville," said he to Algernon, as they passed a tall, dark,
thin-faced man, with a stern jaw and a haughty carriage of the head.
"Don't you know Deepville? Ah, then you should! You should really. The
most delightful, lovable, charming fellow! He'd be enchanted to make
your acquaintance, Errington, quite enchanted. I can answer for him.
There's nothing in the world would give him greater pleasure, what?"

Algernon was by this time pretty well accustomed to Jack Price's habit
of answering for the ready ecstasies of all his acquaintances with
regard to each other, and merely replied that he dared to say Sir
Lancelot Deepville was a very agreeable person.

"And how's the fair Castalia?" asked Jack, when they were out in the
street.

"I believe she is quite well. I saw her this morning."

"Oh, I suppose you did," exclaimed Jack Price with a little smile, which
Algernon thought was to be interpreted by Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs's recent
revelations. But the next minute Jack added, very unexpectedly, "I had
some idea, at one time, that Deepville was making up to her. But it came
to nothing. She's a nice creature, is Castalia Kilfinane; a very nice
creature."

Algernon could not help smiling at this disinterested praise.

"I'm afraid she does not always behave quite nicely to you, Mr. Price,"
he said. And he said it with a little air of apology and proprietorship
which he would not have assumed yesterday.

"Oh, you're quite mistaken, my dear boy; she's as nice as possible with
me. I like Castalia Kilfinane. There's a great deal of good about her,
and she's well educated and clever in her way--not showy, you know,
what?--but--oh, a nice creature! There's a sort of bitter twang about
her, you know, that I like immensely."

"Oh, well," cried Algernon, laughing outright, "if you have a liking for
bitters, indeed----"

"Ah, but she doesn't mean it. It's just a little flavour--a little
_soupcon_. Oh, upon my word, I think Miss Kilfinane a thoroughly nice
creature. It was a pity about Deepville now, eh, what?"

"I wonder that you never thought of trying your fortune in that quarter
yourself, Mr. Price!" said Algernon, looking at him curiously, as they
passed within the glare of a street-lamp.

"Is it me? Ah, now, I thought everybody knew that I wasn't a marrying
man. Besides, there never was the least probability that Miss Kilfinane
would have had me--none in the world. Sure, she'd never think of looking
at a bald old bachelor like myself, what?"

Algernon did not feel called on to pursue the subject. But he had a
conviction that Jack Price would not, under any circumstances, have
given Miss Kilfinane the chance of accepting him.

The allusion, however, seemed to have touched some long-silent chord of
feeling in Jack, and set it vibrating. As they sat at supper together,
Jack reverted to the sage, mentor-like tone he had assumed that morning,
giving Algernon much sound advice of a worldly nature, and holding up
his own case as a warning to all young men who liked to "bolt to the
left when they were told to go to the right," and presenting himself in
the unusual light of a gloomy and disappointed person; and when a couple
of tumblers of hot punch smoked on the table, Jack grew tender and
sentimental.

"Ah, my dear Errington," he said, "I wish ye may never know what it is
to be a lonely old bachelor!"

"Lonely? Why you're the most popular man in London, out-and-out!"

"Popular! And what good does that do me? If I were dead to-morrow, who'd
care, do you think? Although that doesn't seem to me to be such a hard
case as people say. Sure, I don't want anyone to cry when I'm dead; but
I'd like 'em to care for me a little while I'm living. If I'd been my
own elder brother, now; or if I'd taken advantage of my opportunities,
and made a good fortune, as I might have done----But 'twas one scrape
after another I put my foot into. I did and said whatever came
uppermost. And you'll find, my dear boy, that it's the foolish things
that mostly do come uppermost."

"It's lucky that, amongst other foolish things, an imprudent marriage
never rose to the surface," said Algernon.

"Oh, but it did! Oh, devil a doubt about it!" The combined influence of
memory and hot punch brought out Jack's musical brogue with unusual
emphasis. "Only, there I couldn't carry out my foolish intentions. It
wasn't the will that was wanting, my dear boy."

"Providence looked after you on that occasion?"

"Providence or--or the other thing. Oh, I could tell you a love-story,
only you'd be laughing at me."

"Indeed, I would not laugh!"

"On my honour, I don't know why you shouldn't! I often enough have
laughed at myself. She was the sweetest, gentlest, most delicate little
creature!--Snowdrop I used to call her. And as for goodness, she was
steeped in it. You felt goodness in the air wherever she was, just as
you smell perfume all about when the hawthorns blossom in May. Ah! now
to think of me talking in that way, and my head as smooth as a
billiard-ball!"

"And--and how was it? Did your people interfere to prevent the match?"

"My people! Faith, they'd have screeched to be heard from here to there
if I'd made her the Honourable Mrs. Jack Price, and contaminated the
blood of the Prices of Mullingar. Did ye ever hear that my
great-grandfather was a whisky distiller? Bedad, he was then! And I
believe he manufactured good liquor, rest his soul! But I shouldn't have
cared for that, as ye may believe. But they got hold of her, and told
her that I was a roving, unsteady sort of fellow; and that was true
enough. And--and she married somebody else. The man she took wasn't as
good-looking as I was in those days. However, there's no accounting for
these things, you know. It's fate, what? destiny! And she told me, in
the pretty silver voice of hers, like a robin on a bough, that I had
better forget her, and marry a lady in my own station, and live happy
ever after. 'Mary,' said I, 'if I don't marry you I'll marry no woman,
gentle or simple.' She didn't believe me. And I don't know that I quite
believed myself. But so it turned out, you see, what? And so I was saved
from a _mesalliance_, and from having, maybe, to bring up a numerous
family on nothing a year; and the blood of the Prices of Mullingar is in
a fine state of preservation, and Mary never became the Honourable Mrs.
Jack Price. Honourable--bedad it's the Honourable Jack Price she'd have
made of me if she'd taken me; an honourabler Jack than I've been without
her, I'm afraid! D'ye know, Errington, I believe on my soul that, if I
had married Mary, and gone off with her to Canada, and built a
log-house, and looked after my pigs and my ploughs, I'd have been a
happy man. But there it is, a man never knows what is really best for
him until it's too late. We'll hope there are compensations to come,
what? Of all the dreary, cut-throat, blue-devilish syllables in the
English language, I believe those words 'too late' are the ugliest. They
make a fellow feel as if he was being strangled. So mind your p's and
q's, my boy, and don't throw away your chances whilst you've got 'em!"

And thus ended Jack Price's sermon on worldly wisdom.




CHAPTER II.


Minnie Bodkin had loyally tried to keep the promise she had given to the
Methodist preacher respecting Rhoda Maxfield, but in so trying she had
encountered many obstacles. In the first place, Rhoda, with all her
gentleness, was not frank, and she opposed a passive resistance to all
Minnie's efforts to win her confidence on the subject of Algernon.

"It is like poking a little frightened animal out of its hole, trying to
get anything from her!" said Minnie, impatiently.

Not that Rhoda's reticence was wholly due to timidity. She knew
instinctively that she was to be warned against giving her heart to
Algernon Errington; that she should hear him blamed; or, at least, that
the unreasonableness of trusting in his promises, or taking his boyish
love-making in serious earnest, would be safely set forth by Miss
Bodkin. Rhoda had not perceived any of the wise things which might be
said against her attachment to Algernon in the beginning, but now she
thought she perceived them all. And she was resolved, with a sort of
timid obstinacy, not to listen to them.

"I'm sure Algy's fond of me. And even if he has changed"--the
supposition brought tears into her eyes as the words framed themselves
in her mind--"I don't want to have him spoken unkindly of."

But, in truth, latterly her hopes had been out-weighing her fears. In
most of his letters to his mother Algernon had spoken of her, and had
sent her his love. He was making friends, and looking forward hopefully
to getting some definite position. Even her father spoke well of
Algernon now;--said how clever he was, and what grand acquaintance he
was making, and how sure he would be to succeed. And once or twice her
father had dropped a word which had set Rhoda's heart beating, and made
the colour rush into her face, for it seemed as if the old man had some
idea of her love for Algy, and approved it! All these circumstances
together made Minnie's task of mentor a rather hopeless one.

And then Minnie herself, although, as has been said, loyally anxious to
fulfil her promise to David Powell, began to think that he had overrated
the importance of interfering with Rhoda's love-story if love-story it
were. Powell lived in a state of exalted and, perhaps, overstrained
feeling, and attributed his own earnestness to slighter natures. Of
course, on the side of worldly wisdom there was much to be said against
Rhoda's fancying herself engaged to Algernon Errington. There was much
to be said; and yet Minnie did not feel quite sure that the idea was so
preposterous as Powell had appeared to think it. True, Mrs. Errington
was vain, and worldly, and ambitious for her son. True, Algernon was
volatile, selfish, and little more than twenty years of age. But still
there was one solid fact to be taken into account, which, Minnie
thought, might be made to outweigh all the obstacles to a marriage
between the two young people--the solid fact, namely, of old Maxfield's
money.

"If Algernon married a wife with a good dower, and if the wife were as
pretty, as graceful, and as well-mannered as Rhoda, I do not suppose
that anybody would concern himself particularly with her pedigree,"
thought Minnie. "And even if any one did, that difficulty would not be
insuperable, for I have no knowledge of Mrs. Errington, if within three
months of the wedding she had not invented a genealogy, only second to
her own, for her son's wife, and persuaded herself of its genuineness
into the bargain!"

As to those other convictions which would have made such a marriage
horrible to David Powell, even had it been made with the hearty
approval of all the godless world, Minnie did not share them. She did
not believe that Rhoda's character had any spiritual depth; and she
thought it likely enough that she would be able to make Algernon happy,
and to be happy as his wife. "Algy is not base, or cruel, or vicious,"
she said to herself. "He has merely the faults of a spoiled child. A
woman with more earnestness than Rhoda has would weary him; and a wiser
woman might, in the long run, be wearied by him. She is pretty, and
sufficiently intelligent to make a good audience, and so humble-minded
that she would never be exacting, but would gratefully accept any scraps
of kindness and affection which Algy might feel inclined to bestow on
her. And that would react upon him, and make him bestow bigger scraps
for the pleasure of being adored for his generosity."

And there were times when she felt very angry with Rhoda;--Rhoda, who
turned away from the better to choose the worse, and who was coldly
insensible to the fact that Matthew Diamond was in love with her. Nay,
had she been cognisant of the fact, she would, Minnie felt sure, have
shrank away from the grave, clever gentleman who, as it was, could win
nothing warmer from her than a sort of submissive endurance of his
presence, and a humble acknowledgment that he was very kind to take
notice of an ignorant little thing like her.

It was with strangely mingled feelings that Minnie, watching day by day
from her sofa or easy-chair, perceived the girl's utter indifference to
Diamond. How much would Minnie have given for one of those rare sweet
smiles to beam upon her, which were wasted on Rhoda's pretty, shy,
downcast face! How happy it would have made her to hear those clear,
incisive tones lowered into soft indistinctness for her ears, as they so
often were for Rhoda's, who would look timid and tired, and answer,
"Yes, sir," and "No, sir," until Minnie's nervous sympathy with
Diamond's disappointment, and irritation against him for being
disappointed, grew almost beyond her own control.

One May evening, when the cuckoo was sending his voice across the
purling Whit from distant Pudcombe Woods, and the hyacinths in Minnie's
special flower-stand were pouring out their silent even-song in waves of
perfume, five persons were sitting in Mrs. Bodkin's drawing-room, the
windows of which looked towards the west. They were listening to the
cuckoo, and smelling the sweet breath of the hyacinths, and gazing at
the rosy sky, and dropping now and then a soft word, which seemed to
enhance the sweetness and the silence of the room. The five persons were
Minnie Bodkin, Rhoda Maxfield, Matthew Diamond, Mr. Warlock (the curate
of St. Chad's), and Miss Chubb. The latter was embroidering something in
Berlin wools, as usual; but the peace of the place, and of the hour,
seemed to have fallen on her, as on the rest, and she sat with her work
in her lap, looking across the stand of hyacinths, very still and quiet.

The Reverend Peter also sat looking silently across the hyacinths, but
it was at the owner. Minnie's cheek rested on her thin white hand, and
her lustrous eyes had a far-away look in them, as they gazed out towards
Pudcombe Woods, where the cuckoo was calling his poet-loved syllables
with a sweet, clear tone, that seemed to have gathered all the spirit of
the spring into one woodland voice.

Rhoda sat beside the window, and was sewing very gently and noiselessly,
but seemingly intent upon her work, and unconscious that the eyes of Mr.
Diamond--who was seated close to Minnie's chair--were fixed upon her,
and that in some vague way he was attributing to her the perfume of the
flowers, and the melancholy-sweet note of the bird, and the melted
rubies of the western sky.

"What a sunset!" said Miss Chubb, breaking the silence. But she spoke
almost in a whisper, and her voice did not startle any ear. Mr.
Warlock, habituated to suppress his feelings and adapt his words to
those of his company, answered, after a little pause, "Lovely indeed! It
is an evening to awaken the sensibilities of a feeling heart."

"It makes me think of Manchester Square. We had some hyacinths in pots,
too, I remember, when I was staying with the Bishop of Plumbunn."

Miss Chubb's odd association of ideas was merely due to the fact that
her thoughts were flying back to the rose-garden of youth.

"Do you not like to hear the cuckoo, Miss Bodkin?" said Diamond, softly,
speaking almost in her ear. She started, and turned her head towards
him.

"Yes; no. I like it, although it makes me sad. I like it because it
makes me sad perhaps."

"All sights, and sounds, and scents seem to me to be combined this
evening into something sweeter than words can say."

"It is a fine evening, and the cuckoo is calling from Pudcombe Woods,
and my hyacinths are of a very good sort. It seems to me that words can
manage to say that much with distinctness!"

"What a pity," thought Diamond, "that head overshadows heart in this
attractive woman! She is too keen, too cool, too critical. A woman
without softness and sentiment is an unpleasant phenomenon. And I think
she has grown harder in her manner than she used to be." Then the
reflection crossed his mind that her health had been more frail and
uncertain than usual of late, and that she bore much physical suffering
with high courage; and the little prick of resentment he had begun to
feel was at once mollified. He answered aloud, with a slow smile, "Why,
yes, words may manage to say all that. I wonder if I may ask you a
question? It is one I have long wished to ask."

"You may, certainly."

"There are questions that should not be asked."

"I will trust you not to ask any such."

"Now when she looks and speaks like that, she is adorable!" thought
Diamond, meeting the soft light of Minnie's lovely, pathetic eyes, which
fell immediately before his own. "I wish I might have you for a friend,
Miss Bodkin," he said.

"I think you have your wish. I thought you knew you had it."

"Ah, yes; you are always good, and kind, and--and--but you--I will make
a clean breast of it, and pay you the compliment of telling you the
truth. I have thought latterly that you were hardly so cordial, so frank
in your kindness to me as you once were. It would matter nothing to me
in another person, but in you, a little shade of manner matters a great
deal. I don't believe there is another human being to whom I would say
so much. For I am--as perhaps you know--a man little given to thrust
myself where I am not welcome."

"You are about the proudest and most distant person I ever knew, and
require to be very obviously implored before you condescend to easy
friendship with anyone."

Minnie laughed, as she spoke, a little low rippling laugh, which she
ended with a forced cough, to hide the sob in her throat.

"No; not proud. You misjudge me; but it is true that I dread, almost
more than anything else, being deemed intrusive."

"If that fear has prevented you from putting the question to which you
have so long desired an answer, pray ask it forthwith."

"I think it has almost answered itself," said Diamond, bending over her,
and turning his chair so as to cut her and himself off still more from
the others. "I was going to ask you if I had unwittingly offended you in
any way, or if my frequent presence here were, for any reason, irksome
to you? It might well be so. And if you would say so candidly, believe
me, I should feel not the smallest resentment. Sorrow I should feel. I
can't deny it; but I should not cease to regard you as I have always
regarded you from the beginning of our acquaintance. How highly that is,
I have not the gift to tell; nor do you love the direct, broadly-spoken
praise that sounds like flattery, be it ever so sincere."

"No; please don't praise me," said Minnie, huskily. She was shadowed by
his figure as he sat beside her, and so he did not see the tears that
quivered in her eyes. After a second or two, during which she had passed
her handkerchief quickly, almost stealthily, across her face, she said,
"But your question, you say, has answered itself."

"I hope so; I hope I may believe that there is nothing wrong between
us."

"Nothing."

"I have not offended you in any way!"

"No."

"Nor unwittingly hurt you? I daresay I am awkward and abrupt sometimes."

"Pray believe that I have nothing in the world to blame you for."

"Thank you. I know you speak sincerely. Your friendship is very precious
to me."

She answered nothing, but hesitatingly put out her hand, which he
grasped for an instant, and would have raised to his lips, but that she
drew it suddenly away, murmuring something about her cushions being
awry, and trying tremblingly to rearrange them.

He moved the cushions that supported her shoulders with a tender,
careful touch, and placed them so that her posture in the
lounging-chair might be easier. She clasped her hands together and laid
her head back wearily.

"You don't know how precious your friendship is to me," he went on
lowering his voice still more. "I never had a sister. But I have often
thought how sweet the companionship of a sister must be. I am very much
alone in the world; and, if I dared, I would speak to you with fraternal
confidence."

"Pray speak so," answered Minnie, almost in a whisper. "I should
like--to be--of some comfort to you."

There was a silence. It was scarcely broken by Miss Chubb's murmured
remark to Mr. Warlock, that the moon was beginning to make a ring of
light behind the poplar trees on the other side of the Whit, like the
halo round the head of a saint. The twilight deepened, Rhoda's fingers
ceased to ply the needle, but she remained at the window looking over at
the moonlit poplars, while Miss Chubb's voice softly droned out some
rambling speech, which jarred no more on the quietude of the hour than
did the ripple of the river.

"You have been so good to her!" said Diamond suddenly, under cover of
this murmur; and then paused for a moment as if awaiting a reply. Minnie
did not speak. Presently he went on. "You know her and understand her
better than any of the people here."

"I think every one likes Rhoda," said Minnie at length.

"Yes," Diamond answered eagerly. "Yes; do they not? But it requires the
delicate tact of a refined woman to overcome her shyness. I never saw so
timid a creature. Has it not struck you as strange that she should have
come out from that vulgar home so entirely free from vulgarity?"

"Rhoda has great natural refinement."

"You appreciate her thoroughly. And, then, the repulsive and ludicrous
side of Methodism has not touched her at all. It is marvellous to me to
see her so perfect in grace and sweetness."

"I do not think that Methodism has ever taken deep hold on Rhoda."

"And yet it is strange that it should be so. She was exposed to the
influence of David Powell. And, although he has fine qualities, he is
ignorant and fanatical."

"His ignorance and fanaticism are mere spots on the sun!" cried Minnie.
And now, as she spoke, her voice was stronger, and she raised her head
from the cushion. "In his presence the Scripture phrase, 'A burning and
a shining light,' kept recurring to me. How poor and dark one's little
selfish self seems beside him!"

Diamond slightly raised his eyebrows as he answered, "Powell has
undoubtedly very genuine enthusiasm and fervour. But he might be a
dangerous guide to undisciplined minds."

"He would sacrifice himself, he does sacrifice himself, for
undisciplined and ungrateful minds, with whom, I own, my egotism could
not bear so patiently."

But it was not of Powell that Matthew Diamond wished to speak now. Under
the softening influences of the twilight, and the unaccustomed charm of
pouring out the fulness of his heart to such a confidante as Minnie, he
could talk of nothing but Rhoda.

"Perhaps I am a fool to keep singeing my wings," he said. "It may be all
in vain. But don't you believe that a strong and genuine love is almost
sure to win a woman's heart, provided the woman's heart is free to be
won?"

"Perhaps--provided----"

"And you do not think hers is free?"

"How can I answer you?"

"I know that Powell thought there was some one trifling with her
affections. It was on that subject that he begged for the interview with
you. I have never asked any questions about that interview, but I have
guessed since, from many little signs and tokens, that the person he had
in his mind was young Errington."

"Yes."

"Then the matter cannot be serious. He was little more than a boy when
he left Whitford."

"But Rhoda was turned nineteen when Algernon went away."

Diamond started eagerly forward, with his hand on the arm of the chair,
and fixing his eyes anxiously on her face, said:

"Minnie, tell me the truth! Do you think she cares for him?"

It was the first time he had ever addressed Minnie by her
Christian-name; and she marked the fact with a chilly feeling at the
heart. "You ask for the truth?" she said, sadly. "Yes; I do think so."

Diamond leant his head on his hand for a minute in silence. Then he
raised his face again and answered, "Thank you for answering with
sincerity. But I knew you would do no otherwise. This feeling for
Algernon must be half made up of childish memories. I cannot believe it
is an earnest sentiment that will endure."

"Nothing endures."

"If I know myself at all, my love will endure. I am a resolute man, and
do not much regard external obstacles. The only essential point is, can
she ever be brought to care for me?"

There was a pause.

"Do you think she might--some day?"

"Is that the only essential point?"

"Yes; to me it is so. I do believe that it would be for her happiness to
care for me, rather than for that selfish young fellow."

"And--for your happiness----?"

"Oh, of that I am not doubtful at all!"

"There's the moon above the poplar trees!" cried Miss Chubb. And as she
spoke a silver beam stole into the room and lighted one or two faces,
leaving the others in shadow. Amongst the faces so illuminated was
Minnie Bodkin's. "Did you ever see anything so beautiful as Minnie's
countenance in the moonlight?" whispered Miss Chubb to the curate. "She
looks like a spirit!"

Poor Mr. Warlock sighed. He had been envying Diamond his long
confidential conversation with the doctor's daughter. "She is always
beautiful," he replied. "But I think she looks unusually sad to-night."

"That's the moon, my dear sir! Bless you, it always gives a pensive
expression to the eyes; always!" And Miss Chubb cast her own eyes
upwards towards the sky as she spoke.

"Dear me, you have no lamp here!" said a voice, which, though mellow and
musical in quality, was too loud and out of harmony with the twilight
mood of the occupants of the drawing-room to be pleasant.

"Is not that silver lamp aloft there sufficient, Mrs. Errington?" asked
Diamond.

"Oh, good evening, Mr. Diamond," returned Mrs. Errington, with perhaps
an extra tone of condescension, for she thought in her heart that the
tutor was a little spoiled in Whitford society. "I can hardly make out
who's who. Oh, there's Miss Chubb and Mr. Warlock, and--oh, is that you,
Rhoda? Well, Minnie, I left your mamma giving the doctor his tea in the
study, and she sent me upstairs. And, if you have no objection, I should
like the lamp lit, for I am going to read you a letter from Algy."




CHAPTER III.


"Now isn't that charming?" said Mrs. Errington, finishing a paragraph
descriptive of some brilliant evening party at which Algernon had been
present, and looking round triumphantly at her audience.

"Very, indeed," said Minnie, who had been specially appealed to.

"Quite a graphic picture of the bow mong," said Miss Chubb. "I know all
about that sort of society, so I can answer for the correctness of
Algy's description."

Miss Chubb had the discretion to lower her voice as she made the latter
remark, so that no one heard it save Mr. Warlock, and thus Mrs.
Errington was not challenged to contradiction.

"How well Algernon writes," observed Mr. Diamond. "He has the trick of
the thing so neatly, and puts out what he has to say so effectively! I
wonder he has never thought of turning his pen to profit."

"My son, sir, has other views," returned Mrs. Errington loftily. "But as
to what you are pleased to call 'the trick of the thing,' I can assure
you that literary talent is hereditary in our family. I don't know, my
dear Minnie, whether you have happened to hear me mention it, but my
great uncle by the mother's side was a most distinguished author."

"Really?"

"What did he write?" asked Miss Chubb, with much distinctness. But Mrs.
Errington took no heed of the question. "And my own father's letters
were considered models of style," she continued. "A large number of them
are, I believe, still preserved in the family archives at Ancram Park."

"How did they come there?" asked Miss Chubb. "Unless he wrote letters to
himself, they must have been scattered about here and there."

"They were collected after his death, Miss Chubb. You may not be aware,
perhaps, that it is not an unfrequent custom to collect the
correspondence of eminent men. It was done in the case of Walpole.
And--Mr. Diamond will correct me if I am wrong--in that of the
celebrated Persian gentleman, whose letters are so well known. Mirza was
the name, I think?"

Miss Chubb felt herself on unsafe ground here, and did not venture
farther.

"Well, at all events, Algernon appears to be getting on admirably in
London," said the Reverend Peter, pacifically.

Minnie threw him an approving glance, for his good-natured words
dispelled a little cloud on Miss Chubb's brow, and brought down Mrs.
Errington from her high horse to the level of friendly sympathies. "Oh,
he is getting on wonderfully, dear fellow!" said she.

"I'm sure we are all glad to hear of Algy's doing well, and being happy.
He is such a nice, genial, unaffected creature! And never gave himself
any airs!" said Miss Chubb, with a sidelong toss of her head and a
little unnecessary emphasis.

"Oh no, my dear. That sort of vulgar pretension is not found among folks
who come of a real good ancient stock," replied Mrs. Errington, with
superb complacency.

"And we are not to have the pleasure of seeing Algernon back among us
this summer?" said Mr. Warlock. In general he shrank from much
conversation with Mrs. Errington, whom he found somewhat overwhelming;
but he would have nerved himself to greater efforts than talking to that
thick-skinned lady for the sake of a kind look from Minnie Bodkin.

"Oh, impossible! Quite out of the question. He is sorry, of course. And
I am sorry. But it would be cruel in him to desert poor dear Seely,
when he is so anxious to have him with him all the summer!"

"Is there anything the matter with Lord Seely?" asked Minnie.

"N--no, my dear. Nothing but a little overwork. The mental strain of a
man in his position is very severe, and he depends so on Algy! And so
does dear Lady Seely. I ought almost to feel jealous. They say openly
that they look on him quite as a son."

"It's a pity they haven't a daughter, isn't it?" said Miss Chubb.

Mrs. Errington did not catch the force of the hint. She answered
placidly, "They have an adopted daughter; a niece of my lord's, who is
almost always with them."

"Oh, indeed," said Diamond, quickly. "I had not heard that!"

Mrs. Errington bestowed a stolid, china-blue stare on him before
replying, "I daresay not, sir."

The fact was that Mrs. Errington had not known it herself until quite
recently; for Algernon, either mistrusting his mother's prudence--or for
some other reason--had passed lightly over Castalia's name in his
letters, and for some time had not even mentioned that she was an inmate
of Lord Seely's house. In his latter letters he had spoken of Miss
Kilfinane, but in terms purposely chosen to check, as far as possible,
any match-making flights of fancy, which his mother might indulge in
with reference to that lady.

"I am not sure, my dear," proceeded Mrs. Errington, turning to Minnie,
"whether I have happened to mention it to you, but Castalia--the
Honourable Castalia Kilfinane, only daughter of Lord Kauldkail--is
staying with the dear Seelys. But as she is rather sickly, and not very
young, she cannot, of course, be to them what Algy is."

"Oh! Not very young?" said Miss Chubb, in a tone of disappointment.

"Well, not very young, comparatively speaking, Miss Chubb. She might be
considered young compared with you and me, I daresay."

Fortunately, perhaps, for the preservation of peace, much imperilled by
this last speech of Mrs. Errington's, Dr. Bodkin and his wife here
entered the drawing-room. Although it was May, and the temperature was
mild for the season, a good fire blazed in the grate; and on the rug in
front of it Dr. Bodkin, after saluting the assembled company, took up
his accustomed station. Diamond rose, and stood leaning on the
mantel-shelf near to his chief (an action which Mrs. Errington viewed
with disfavour, as indicating on the part of the second master at the
Grammar School a too great ease, and absence of due subjection in the
presence of his superiors), and the Reverend Peter and Miss Chubb drew
their chairs nearer to the fireplace, thus bringing the scattered
members of the party into a more sociable circle. The doctor was
understood to object to his society being broken up into groups of two
or three, and to prefer general conversation; which, indeed, afforded
better opportunities for haranguing, and for looking at the company as a
class brought up for examination, and, if needful, correction, according
to the doctor's habit of mind. Only Rhoda remained at her window, apart
from the others, and Dr. Bodkin, seeing her there, called to her to come
nearer.

"What, little Primrose!" said the doctor, kindly. "Don't stay there
looking at the moon. She is chillier and not so cosy as the coal fire.
Draw the curtain, and shut her out, and come nearer to us all."

Rhoda obeyed, blushing deeply as she advanced within the range of the
lamp-light, and looking so pretty and timid that the doctor began
smilingly to murmur into Diamond's ear something about "_Hinnuleo
similis, non sine vano burarum et siluae metu_."

The doctor's prejudice against Rhoda had long been overcome, and she had
grown to be a pet of his, in so far as so awful a personage as the
doctor was capable of petting any one. To this result the conversion to
orthodoxy of the Maxfield family may have contributed. But, possibly,
Rhoda's regular attendance at St. Chad's might have been inefficacious
to win the doctor's favour, good churchman though he was, without some
assistance from her blooming complexion, soft hazel eyes, and graceful,
winning manners.

The girl came forward bashfully into the circle around the fire, and
nestled herself down on a low seat between Mrs. Errington and Mrs.
Bodkin. A month ago her place in that drawing-room would have been
beside Minnie's chair. But lately, by some subtle instinct, Rhoda had a
little shrunk from her former intimacy with the young lady. She was
sensitive enough to feel the existence of some unexpressed disapproval
of herself in Minnie's mind.

"We have been hearing a letter of Algernon's, papa," said Minnie.

"Have you? have you?"

"Mrs. Errington has been kind enough to read it to us."

The doctor left his post of vantage on the hearth-rug for an instant,
went to his daughter, and, bending down, kissed her on the forehead.
"Pretty well this evening, my darling?" said he. Minnie caught her
father's hand as he was moving away again and pressed it to her lips.
"Thank God for you and mother," she whispered. Minnie was not given to
demonstrations of tenderness, having been rather accustomed, like most
idolised children, to accept her parents' anxious affection as she
accepted her daily bread--that is to say, as a matter of course. But
there was something in her heart now which made her keenly alive to the
preciousness of that abounding and unselfish devotion.

"I think it is quite touching to see that father and daughter together,"
said Miss Chubb confidentially to her neighbour the curate. "So severe a
man as the doctor is in general! Quite the churchman! Combined with the
scholastic dignitary, you know. And yet, with Minnie, as gentle as a
woman."

As to Mr. Warlock, the tears were in his eyes, and he unaffectedly wiped
them away, answering Miss Chubb only by a nod.

"And what," said the doctor, when he had resumed his usual place, and
his usual manner, "what is the news from our young friend, Algernon?"

Mrs. Errington began to recapitulate some of the items in her son's last
letter--the "lords and ladies gay" whose society he frequented; the
brilliant compliments that were paid him by word and deed; and the
immense success which his talents and attractions met with everywhere.

"Yes; and Algernon is kindly received by other sorts and conditions of
men besides the aristocracy of this realm," said Minnie, with a little
ironical smile. "He has shone in evening receptions at Mrs.
Machyn-Stubbs's, and sipped lawyer Leadbeater's port-wine with
appreciative gusto."

"He has to be civil to people, you know, my dear," said Mrs. Errington,
smoothly. "It wouldn't do to neglect--a--a--persons who mean to be
attentive, merely because they are not quite in our own set."

"I trust not, indeed, madam!" exclaimed the doctor, with protruding lips
and frowning brow. "It would be exceedingly impolitic in Algernon to
turn away from proffered kindness. But I will not put the matter on that
ground. I should be sorry to think that a youth who has been--I may
say--formed and brought up under my tuition, could be capable of ignoble
and ungentlemanlike behaviour."

Mrs. Bodkin glanced a little apprehensively at Mrs. Errington after this
explosion of the doctor's. But that descendant of all the Ancrams had
not the slightest idea of being offended. She was smiling with much
complacency, and answered mellifluously to the doctor's thunder, "Thank
you, Dr. Bodkin. Now that is so nice in you to appreciate Algy as you
do! He is, and ever was, like his ancestors before him, the soul of
gentlemanliness."

"Algernon was always most popular, I'm sure," said Miss Chubb. "He was a
favourite with everybody. Such lively manners! And at home with all
classes!"

"Yes," said Diamond in a low voice. "_Superis Deorum gratus, et imis._"

"Now what may that mean?" asked Miss Chubb, who had quick ears.

"The words were applied to a mythological personage of very flexible
talents, madam," replied Diamond.

"Oh, mythological? Well, I never went very far into mythology. Now, it's
a singular circumstance, which has often struck me, and perhaps some of
you learned gentlemen may be able to explain it, that none of the
studies in 'ology' ever seemed to have much attraction for me; whereas
the 'ographies' always interested me very much. There was geography,
now. I used to know the names of all the European rivers when I was
quite a child. And orthography and biography. We had a translation of
Pluto's Lives at the rectory, and I was uncommonly fond of them. But, as
to the 'ologies,' I frankly own that I know nothing about them."

The effect of this speech of Miss Chubb's was much heightened by the
mute commentary of Dr. Bodkin's face during its utterance. When she came
to Pluto's Lives, the scholastic eyes rolled round on Mr. Diamond and
the curate with an expression of such helpless indignation, that the
former was driven to blow his nose with violence, in order to smother an
explosion of laughter. And even Mr. Warlock's sombre brow relaxed, and
he ventured to steal a smiling glance at Minnie.

But Minnie did not return the glance. She had shaded her eyes with her
hand, and was leaning back in her chair, unheeding the conversation that
was going on around her.

"But now, really, you know, there must be some reason for these things,
if philosophers could only find it out," pursued Miss Chubb, cheerfully.
"Mustn't there, Minnie?"

"Eh? I beg your pardon!"

"Oh you naughty, absent girl! You have not heard a word I've been
saying. I was merely remarking that----"

But at this point Dr. Bodkin's patience suddenly snapped. He found
himself unable silently to endure a recapitulation of Miss Chubb's views
as to the comparative attractions of the "ologies" and the "ographies;"
and he abruptly demanded of his wife, in the magisterial tones which
had often struck awe into the hearts of the lowest form, "Laura, are we
not to have our rubber before midnight? Pray make up the table in the
next room. There are--let me see!--Mrs. Errington, Miss Chubb, you will
take a hand, Laura? We are just a quartet." And the doctor, giving his
arm to Mrs. Errington, marched off to the whist-table.

On this occasion Mr. Warlock escaped being obliged to play. Indeed, the
curate's assistance at whist was only called into requisition when a
second table besides the doctor's had to be made up; for, although Dr.
Bodkin co-operated very comfortably with his curate in all church
matters, he found himself not altogether able to do so at the green
table, the Reverend Peter's notions of whist being confused and
elementary. To be sure, Mrs. Bodkin was not a much better player than
the curate; but then she offered the compensating advantage of
enduring an unlimited amount of scolding--whether as partner or
adversary--without resenting it.

So Diamond, and Warlock, and Minnie, and Rhoda remained in the big
drawing-room when their elders had left it. Minnie had the lamp shaded,
and the curtains opened, so that the full clear light of the climbing
moon poured freely into the room. Warlock timidly drew near to Miss
Bodkin's chair, and ventured to say a word or two now and then, to which
he received answers so kind and gracious, that the poor fellow's heart
swelled with gratitude, and perhaps with hope, for hope is very cunning
and stealthy, and hides herself under all sorts of unlikely feelings.

Minnie had grown much more gentle and patient with the awkward, plain,
rather dull curate of late. She listened to his talk and replied to it.
And all the while she was taking eager cognisance, with eye and ear, of
the two who sat side by side near the window, Diamond bending down to
speak softly to Rhoda, and the girl's delicate face, white and
sprite-like in the moonlight, turning now and then towards her companion
with a pretty, languid gesture. Once or twice Rhoda laughed at something
Diamond said to her. Her laugh was perhaps a little suggestive of
silliness, but it was low, and musical, and rippling; and it was not too
frequent.

Minnie sat with her hands clasped in her lap; and when she was carried
to her own room that night, Jane exclaimed, as she removed her young
mistress's ornaments, "Goodness, Miss Minnie, what have you done to
yourself? Why that diamond ring you wear has made a desperate mark in
your finger. It looks as if it had been driven right into the flesh, as
hard as could be!"

Minnie held up her thin white hand to the light, and looked at it
strangely.

"Ah!" said she, "I must have pressed and twisted the ring about,
unconsciously. I was thinking of something else."




CHAPTER IV.


Time passed, or seemed to pass, with unusual gentleness over Whitford.
If some of our acquaintances there had suddenly been called upon to
mention the changes that had taken place within two years, they would
perhaps have said at first that there had been none. But changes there
had been, nevertheless; and by a few dwellers in the little town they
had been keenly felt.

The second summer vacation after that happy holiday time which Rhoda had
passed with the Erringtons at Llanryddan arrived. A hot July, winged
with thunder-clouds, brooded over the meadows by the Whit. The shadow of
Pudcombe Woods was pleasant in the sultry afternoons, and the cattle
stood for hours knee-deep in dark pools, overhung by drooping boughs.
The great school-room at the Grammar School resounded no more with the
tread of young feet, or the murmur of young voices. It was empty, and
silent, and dusty; and an overgrown spider had thrown his grey tapestry
right across the oriel window, so that it was painted, warp and woof,
with brave purple and ruby blazonries from the old stained glass.

Dr. Bodkin and his family were away at a seaside place in the South of
England. Mr. Diamond had gone on a solitary excursion afoot. Even
Pudcombe Hall was deserted; although young Pawkins was expected to
return thither, later in the season, for the shooting. Rhoda Maxfield
had been sent to her half-brother Seth, at Duckwell Farm, to get strong
and sunburned; and as she was allowed to be by herself almost as much as
she wished--Mrs. Seth Maxfield being a bustling, active woman, who would
not have thought of suspending or modifying her daily avocations for the
sake of entertaining any visitor whatever--Rhoda spent her time, not
unhappily, in a sort of continuous day-dream, sitting with a book of
poetry under a hedge in the hayfield, or wandering with her little
nephew, Seth Maxfield the younger, in Pudcombe Woods, which were near
her brother's farm. She liked looking back better than looking forward,
perhaps; and enacted in her imagination many a scene that had occurred
at dear Llanryddan over and over again. But still there were many times
when she indulged in hopeful anticipations as to Algy's return. He had
come back to London after his foreign travel, and had spent another
brilliant season under the patronage of his great relations. And then a
rumour had reached Whitford that Lord Seely had at length obtained the
promise of a good post for him, and that he might be expected to revisit
Whitford in the autumn at latest. Mrs. Errington had been invited to a
country house of Lord Seely's, in Westmoreland, to meet her son, and had
set out on her visit in high spirits. Rhoda was thus cut off from
hearing frequently of Algernon, through his mother, but she looked
forward to seeing them together in September. Rhoda missed her friend
and patroness; but she missed her less at Duckwell than she would have
done in the dull house in the High Street.

On the whole, she was not unhappy during those sultry summer weeks.
Modest and humble-minded as she was, she had come to understand that she
was considered pretty and pleasing by the ladies and gentlemen whose
acquaintance she had made. No caressing words, no flattering epithets,
no pet names, had been bestowed upon her by her father's old friends and
companions. She was just simply Rhoda Maxfield to them; never
"Primrose," or "Pretty one," or "Rhoda dear;" and the Methodists,
however blind to her attractive qualities, had displayed considerable
vigilance in pointing out her backsliding, and exhorting her to make
every effort to become convinced of sin. Certainly the society of
ladies and gentlemen was infinitely more agreeable.

Then, too, there had dawned on her some idea that Mr. Diamond felt a
warm admiration for her--perhaps something even warmer than admiration.
Miss Chubb (who delighted to foster any amatory sentiments which she
might observe in the young persons around her, and was fond of saying,
with a languishing droop of her plump, rubicund, good-humoured
countenance, that she would not for the world see other young hearts
blighted by early disappointment, as hers had been) had dropped several
hints to that effect sufficiently broad to be understood even by the
bashful Rhoda. And, a little to her own surprise, Rhoda had felt
something like gratification, in consequence; Mr. Diamond was such a
very clever gentleman. Although he wasn't rich, yet everybody thought a
great deal of him. Even Dr. Bodkin (decidedly the most awful embodiment
of authority whom Rhoda had ever yet known) treated Mr. Diamond with
consideration. And Miss Minnie was his intimate friend. Rhoda had not
the least idea of ever reciprocating Mr. Diamond's sentiments. But she
could not help feeling that the existence of those sentiments increased
her own importance in the world. And she had a lurking idea that it
might, if known to Algy, increase her importance in his eyes also.

As to Mr. Diamond's part in the matter, Rhoda, to say truth, concerned
herself very little with that. Partly from a humble estimate of herself,
and partly from that maiden incapacity for conceiving the fire and force
of a masculine passion, which often makes girls pass for cruel who are
only childish, she never had thought of Mr. Diamond as seriously
suffering for her sake. But yet she was less cold and repellent to him
than she had once been. It is difficult not to thaw somewhat in the
presence of one whose words and looks make a genial atmosphere for that
sensitive plant--youthful vanity.

Rhoda's wardrobe, which by this time had become considerable in quantity
and tasteful in quality, was a great source of amusement to her. She
delighted to trim, and stitch, and alter, and busy her fingers with the
manufacture of bright-coloured bows of ribbon and dainty muslin frills.
Mrs. Seth looked contemptuous at what she called "Rhoda's finery," and
told her she would never do for a farmer's wife if she spent so much
time over a parcel of frippery. Seth Maxfield shook his head gravely,
and hoped that Rhoda was not given up utterly to worldliness and vanity;
but feared that she had learnt no good at St. Chad's church, but had
greatly backslided since the days of her attendance at chapel.

For the Seth Maxfields still belonged to the Wesleyan connexion, and
disapproved of the change that had taken place among the family at
Whitford. Not that Seth was a deeply religious man. But his father's
desertion of the Wesleyans appeared to him in the light of a party
defection. It was "ratting;" and ratting, as Seth thought, without the
excuse of a bribe.

"Look how well father has prospered!" he would say to his wife. "He's as
warm a man, is father, as 'ere a one in Whitford. And the Church folks
bought their tea and sugar of him all the same when he belonged to the
Society. But I don't believe the Society will spend their money with him
now as they did. So that's so much clean lost. I'm not so strict as
some, myself; nor I don't see the use of it. But I do think a man ought
to stick to what he's been brought up to. 'Specially when it's had the
manifest blessing of Providence! If the Lord was so well satisfied with
father being a Wesleyan, I think father might ha' been satisfied too."

Still there had been no quarrel between the Whitford Maxfields and those
of Duckwell. They came together so seldom that opportunities for
quarrelling were rare. And Seth had too great a respect for such
manifestations of Providential approbation as had been vouchsafed to his
father, to be willing to break entirely with the old man. So, when old
Max proposed to send Rhoda to the farm for a few weeks, he paying a
weekly stipend for her board, his son and his son's wife had at once
agreed to the proposition. And as they were not persons who brought
their religious theories into the practical service of daily life,
Rhoda's conscience was not disturbed by having a high and stern standard
of duty held up for her attainment at every moment.

The Wesleyan preacher at that time in the district was a frequent guest
at Duckwell Farm. And in the long summer evenings one or two neighbours
would occasionally drop in to the cool stone-flagged parlour, where
brother Jackson would read a chapter and offer up a prayer. And
afterwards there would be smoking of pipes and drinking of home-brewed
by the men; while Mrs. Seth and Rhoda would sit on a bench in the
apple-orchard, near to the open window of the parlour, and sew, and
talk, or listen to the conversation from within, as they pleased.

Rhoda perceived quickly enough that the Duckwell Farm species of
Methodism was very different from the Methodism of David Powell. Mr.
Jackson never said anything to frighten her. He talked, indeed, of sin,
and of the dangers that beset sinners; but he never spoke as if they
were real to him--as if he heard and saw all the terrible things he
discoursed of so glibly. Then Mr. Jackson was, Rhoda thought, a somewhat
greedy eater. He did not smoke, it was true; but he took a good share of
Seth's strong ale, and was not above indulging in gossip--perhaps to
please himself, perhaps to please Mrs. Seth Maxfield.

Rhoda drew a comparison in her own mind between brother Jackson and the
stately rector of St. Chad's, and felt much satisfaction at the contrast
between them. How much nicer it was to be a member of a Church of
England congregation; where one heard Dr. Bodkin or Mr. Warlock speak a
not too long discourse in correct English, and with that refined accent
which Rhoda's ear had learned to prize, and where the mellow old organ
made a quivering atmosphere of music that seemed to mingle with the
light from the painted windows; than to sit on a deal bench in a
white-washed chapel, and painfully keep oneself broad awake whilst
brother Jackson or brother Hinks bawled out a series of disjointed
sentences, beginning with "Oh!" and displaying a plentiful lack of
aspirates!

On the whole, perhaps, her stay at Duckwell Farm was a potent agent in
confirming Rhoda in orthodox views of religion.

Generally, as she sat beside Mrs. Seth in the parlour, or on the bench
outside the window, Rhoda withdrew her attention from the talk of
brother Jackson and the others. She could think her own thoughts, and
dream her own dreams, whilst she was knitting a stocking or hemming a
pinafore for little Seth. But sometimes a name was mentioned at these
meetings that she could not hear with indifference. It was the name of
David Powell.

The tone in which he was spoken of now was very opposite to the chorus
of praise which had accompanied every mention of him among the Whitford
Methodists, two years ago. There were rumours that he had defied the
authority of Conference, and intended to secede from the Society. He was
said to have been preaching strange doctrine in the remote parts of
Wales, and to have caused and encouraged extravagant manifestations,
such as were known to have prevailed at the preachings of Berridge and
Hickes, seventy or eighty years ago; and earlier still, at the first
open-air sermons of John Wesley himself, at Bristol. Brother Jackson
shook his head, and pursed up his lips at the rumours. He had never much
approved of Powell; and Seth Maxfield had distinctly disapproved of him.
Seth had been brought up in the old sleepy days, when members of the
Society in Whitford were comfortably undisturbed by the voice of an
"awakening" preacher. He had resented the fuss that had been made about
David Powell. He had been still more annoyed by his father's secession,
which he attributed to Powell's over zeal and presumption. And he, by
his own example, encouraged a hostile and critical tone in speaking of
the preacher.

There was, indeed, but one voice raised in his defence in the parlour
at Duckwell Farm. This was the voice of Richard Gibbs, the head groom at
Pudcombe Hall, who sometimes came over to Duckwell to join in the
prayer-meetings there. Although Richard Gibbs was but a servant, he was
a trusted and valued one; and he was received by the farmer and his wife
with considerable civility. Richard "knew his place," as Mrs. Seth said,
and was not "one of them as if you give 'em an inch they'll take an
ell." And then he had a considerable knowledge of farriery, and had more
than once given good advice to Farmer Maxfield respecting the treatment
of sick horses and cattle. Seth was fond of repeating that he himself
was "not so strict as some," finding, indeed, that a reputation for
strictness, in a Methodistical sense, put him at a disadvantage with his
fellow farmers on market-days. But whenever Richard Gibbs was spoken of,
he would add to this general disclaimer of peculiar piety on his own
part, "Not, mind you, but what there's some as conversion does a
wonderful deal for, to this day, thanks be! Why, there's Dicky Gibbs,
head-groom at Pudcombe Hall. Talk of blasphemers--well Dicky was a
blasphemer! And now his lips are as pure from evil speaking as my little
maid's there. And he's the only man I ever knew as had to do with horses
that wouldn't tell you a lie. At first, I believe, there was some at the
Hall--I name no names--didn't like Dicky's plain truths. There was a
carriage-horse to be sold, and Dicky spoke out and told this and that,
and young master couldn't get his price. But in the long run it answers.
Oh! I'm not against a fervent conversion, nor yet against conviction of
sin--for some."

So Richard Gibbs sat many a summer evening in the flagged parlour at
Duckwell Farm, and his melancholy, clean-shaven, lantern-jawed face was
a familiar spectacle at prayer-meetings there.

"I have been much grieved and exercised in spirit on behalf of brother
Powell,"' said Mr. Jackson, in his thick voice.

The expounding and the prayers were over. Seth had lighted his pipe; so
had Roger Heath, the baker, from Pudcombe village. A great cool jug of
ale stood on the table, and the setting sun sent his rays into the room,
tempered by a screen of jessamine and vine leaves that hung down outside
the window.

"Ah! And reason too!" said Seth gruffly. "He's been getting further and
further out of the right furrow this many a day."

"They do say," observed sour-faced Roger Heath, "that there's dreadful
scenes with them poor Welsh at his field-preachings. Men and women
stricken down like bullocks, and screechings and convulsions, like as if
they was all possessed with the devil."

"Lauk!" cried Mrs. Seth eagerly. "Why, how is that, then?"

Rhoda, listening outside, behind the screen of vine leaves at the open
window, could not repress a shudder at the thought that, had David
Powell shown this new power of his a year or two ago, she herself might
have been among the convulsed who bore testimony to his terrible
influence.

"How is that, Mrs. Maxfield?" returned Richard Gibbs. "Why, how can it
be, except by abounding grace!"

"Nay, Mr. Gibbs, but how dreadful it seems, don't it? Just think of
falling down in a fit in the open field!"

"Just think of living and dying unawakened to sin! Is not that a hundred
thousand times more dreadful?"

"I hope it don't need to roll about like Bedlamites to be awakened to a
sense of sin, Mr. Gibbs!" cried Seth Maxfield.

"The Lord forbid!" ejaculated brother Jackson.

"A likely tale!" added Mrs. Seth, cheerfully.

"I'm against all such doings," said Roger Heath, shaking his head.

"But if it be the Lord's doing, sir?" remonstrated Richard Gibbs,
speaking slowly, and with an anxious lack-lustre gaze at the
white-washed ceiling, as though counsel might be read there. "And I've
heard tell that John Wesley did the same at his field-preachings."

Brother Jackson hastily wiped his mouth, after a deep draught of ale,
before replying, "That was in the beginning, when such things may have
been needful. But now, I fear, they only bring scandal upon us, and
strengthen scoffers."

"I tell you what it is," said Seth, taking the pipe from his mouth, and
waving it up and down to emphasise his words, "it's my opinion as David
Powell's not quite--not quite right in his head."

"'Taint the first time that thought has crossed my mind," said the
baker, who had once upon a time been uneasy under the yoke of Powell's
stern views as to weights and measures.

"Of course," pursued Seth, argumentatively, "we've got to draw a line.
Religion is one thing and rampaging is another. From the first, when
Powell began rampaging, I mistrusted what it would come to."

"The human brain is a very delicate and mysterious organ," said brother
Jackson.

"Ah!" ejaculated Heath, with an air of profundity, as of one the extent
of whose acquaintance with the human brain was not easily to be set
forth in words, "you may well say so, sir. There you're right, indeed,
brother Jackson."

"Why, there it is!" cried Seth. "And Powell, he overtaxed the human
brain. It's like flying in the face of Providence almost, to want to go
so much beyond your neighbours. Why, he'd fast till he well-nigh starved
himself."

"But he gave all he spared from his own stomach to the poor," put in
Gibbs, looking sad and perplexed.

"I call all that rampaging," returned Seth, with a touch of his father's
obstinacy.

"Dr. Evans read out an account of these doings in Wales from a newspaper
in Mr. Barker the chemist's shop in Whitford last Saturday," said Heath.
"I heard it. And Dr. Evans said it was catching, and that such-like
excitement was dangerous, for you never know where it might end. And Dr.
Evans is of a Welsh family himself," he added, bringing out this clause,
as though it strikingly illustrated or elucidated the topic under
discussion.

Mrs. Seth drew her little boy close to her, and covered his curly poll
with her large maternal hand, as though to protect the little "human
brain" within from all danger. "Mercy me!" she said, "I hope Powell
won't come into these parts any more! I should be frightened to go to
chapel, or to let the children go either."

"Oh, you need not be alarmed, Mrs. Maxfield," said brother Jackson, with
a superior smile.

"Nay, but if it is catching, Mr. Jackson!" persisted the anxious
mother.

"Tut, lass! It isn't like measles!" said her husband.

The ale being by this time exhausted and the pipes smoked out, brother
Jackson rose to depart, and the baker went away with him. Seth Maxfield
detained Gibbs for a few minutes to ask his advice about a favourite
cart-horse.

"Well, Mr. Gibbs," said the housewife, when, the conference being over,
he bade her "Good evening," "and when are your folks coming back to the
Hall?"

"Not just yet, ma'am. Young master is gone to Westmoreland, I hear, to a
wedding at some nobleman's house there. He'll be back at Pudcombe for
the shooting."

"A wedding, eh?" said Mrs. Seth, with eager feminine interest in the
topic. "Not his own wedding, I suppose?"

"Oh no, ma'am. 'Tis some friend of his, I believe, that he knew at
Whitford; Erringham, I think the name is--a young gentleman that's going
to marry the nobleman's niece. The housekeeper at the Hall was telling
some of my fellow-servants about it the other day. But I'm ill at
remembering the chat I hear. And 'tis unprofitable work too. Good
evening, ma'am. Farewell, Seth," stooping down to pat the little one's
curly head. "May the Lord bless and keep you!"

Mrs. Seth stood out in the apple-orchard, with two of her children
clinging to her skirts, and held up her hand to shade her eyes as she
watched the departing figure of Richard Gibbs moving across the meadow,
in the rosy evening light. Then she turned to the wooden bench where
Rhoda was sitting, huddled together, with her work lying in her lap.
"You didn't come in to prayers, Rhoda," said her sister-in-law. "But,
however, you can hear it all just as well outside, as in. If it wasn't
for civility to Mr. Jackson, I'd liefer stay out here these fine summer
evenings, myself. And I was thinking--why, child, what a white face
you've got! Like a sheet of white paper, for all the world! And your
hands are quite cold, though it's been downright sultry! Mercy me, don't
go and get sick on our hands, Rhoda! What will your father say? Come,
you'd best get to bed, and I'll make you a hot posset myself."

Rhoda passively followed her sister-in-law to the fresh lavender-scented
chamber which she occupied; and she consented to go to bed at once. Her
head ached, she said, but she declined the hot posset, and only asked to
be left quiet.

"There's always some bother with girls of that delicate sort," said Mrs.
Seth to her husband, when she went downstairs again. "Rhoda's mother was
just such another; looked as if you might blow her away. I can't think
whatever made your father marry her! Not but Rhoda's a nice-tempered
girl enough, and very patient with the children. But, do you know,
Seth, I'm afraid she's got a chill or something, sitting out in the
orchard so late."

"What makes you think so?"

"Well, she had a queer, scared kind of look on her face."

"Nonsense! Catching cold don't make people look scared."

"Something makes her look scared, I tell you. It's either she's
sickening for some fever, or else she's seen a ghost!"




CHAPTER V.


(From Mrs. Errington to Mrs. Bodkin.)

"Long Fells, Westmoreland, July 26th, 18--.

"DEAR MRS. BODKIN,--Amid the tumult of feelings which have recently
agitated me, I yet cannot neglect to write to my good friends in
Whitford, and participate my emotions with those who have ever valued
and appreciated my darling boy, at this most important moment of his
life. It may perhaps surprise, but will, I am sure, gratify you to learn
that Algernon is to be married on this day week to the Honourable
Castalia Caroline Kilfinane, only daughter of the late Baron Kauldkail,
of Kauldkail, who is, though not a relation, yet a connection of our
own, being the niece of our dear cousin-in-law, Lord Seely. To say that
all my proudest maternal aspirations are gratified by such a match is
feebly to express what I feel. Birth (with me the first consideration,
dear Mrs. Bodkin, for I make no pretences with you, and confess that I
should have deplored Algernon's mating below himself in that respect),
elegance, accomplishments, and a devoted attachment to my son--these are
Castalia's merits in my eyes. You will forgive me for having said
nothing of this projected alliance until the last moment. The young
people did not wish it to be talked about. They had a romantic fancy to
have the wedding as quiet as possible, amid the rural beauties of this
most lovely scenery, and thus escape the necessity for inviting the
crowds of distinguished friends and connections on both sides of the
house, who would have had to be present had the marriage taken place in
London. That would have made it too pompous an affair to satisfy the
taste of our Castalia, who is sensitive refinement itself. The dear
Seelys are only too indulgent to the least wish of Algernon's, and they
at once agreed to keep the secret. What poor Lord and Lady Seely will do
when Algy leaves them I assure you I cannot imagine. It really grieves
me to contemplate how they will miss him. But, of course, I cannot but
rejoice selfishly to know that I shall have my dear children so near me.
For (you may, perhaps, have heard the news) Lord Seely has, by his
immense influence in the highest quarters, procured dear Algy an
appointment. And, as good fortune will have it, the appointment brings
him back to Whitford, among his dear and early friends. He is to be
appointed to the very arduous and responsible position of postmaster
there. But, important as this situation is, it is yet only to be
considered a stepping-stone to further advancement. Lord Seely wants
Algy in town, which is indeed his proper sphere. And the result of some
new ministerial combinations which are expected in certain quarters
will, there is no doubt, put him in the very foremost rank of rising
young diplomatists. But I must not say more even to you, dear Mrs.
Bodkin, for these are State secrets, which should be sacredly respected.

"This is a most lovely spot, and the house combines the simple elegance
of a cottage _ornee_ with the luxurious refinement that befits the
residence of a peer like Lord Seely. It is not, of course, fitted up
with the same magnificence as his town mansion, or even as his ancestral
place in Rutlandshire, but it is full of charms to the cultivated
spirit, and our dear young people are revelling in its romantic
quietude. There are very few guests in the house. By a kind thought of
Algy's, which I am sure you will appreciate, Orlando Pawkins is to be
best man at the wedding. The young man is naturally gratified by the
distinction, and our noble relatives have received him with that
affability which marks the truly high bred. There is also an Irish
gentleman, the Honourable John Patrick Price, who arrived last evening
in order to be present at the ceremony. He is one of the most celebrated
wits in town, and belongs to an Irish family of immense antiquity.
Castalia will have none of her own intimate young friends for
bridesmaids. To make a choice of one or two might have seemed invidious,
and to have eight or ten bridesmaids would have made the wedding too
ostentatious for her taste. Therefore she will be attended at the altar
by the two daughters of the village clergyman--simple, modest girls, who
adore her. The bride and bridegroom will leave us after the breakfast to
pass their honeymoon at the Lakes. I shall return forthwith to Whitford,
in order to make preparations for their reception. Lady Seely presses me
to remain with her for a time after the wedding, but I am impatient to
return to my dear Whitford friends, and share my happiness with them.

"Farewell, dear Mrs. Bodkin. Give my love to Minnie, who, I hope, has
benefited by the sea-breezes; and best regards to the doctor. Believe me
your very attached friend,

"SOPHIA AUGUSTA ERRINGTON.

"P.S. Do you happen to know whether Barker, the chemist, has that
cottage in the Bristol Road still to let? It might suit my dear
children, at least for a while."

       *       *       *       *       *

(From Miss Kilfinane to her cousin, Lady Louisa Marston.)

"Long Fells, 29th July.

"MY DEAR LOUISA,--I answer your last letter at once, for if I delay
writing, I may not have time to do so at all. There are still a thousand
things to be thought of, and my maid and I have to do it all, for you
know what Aunt Seely is. She won't stir a finger to help anybody. Uncle
Seely is very kind, but he has no say in the matter, nor, as far as that
goes, in any matter in his own house.

"You ask about the wedding. It will be very scrubby, thanks to my lady's
stinginess. She would have it take place in this out-of-the-way country
house, which they scarcely ever come to, in order to save the expense of
a handsome breakfast. There will be nobody invited but the parson and
the apothecary, I suppose. I hate Long Fells. It is the most
inconvenient house in the world, I do believe; and so out of repair that
my maid declares the rain comes through the roof on to her bed.

"Ancram's mother arrived last week. She was half inclined to be huffy at
first, when we told her our news, because she had been kept in the dark
till the last moment. But she has got over her sulks now, and makes the
best of it. I can see now that Ancram was right in keeping our
engagement secret from her as long as possible. She would have been a
dreadful worry, and told everybody. She is wonderfully like Lady Seely
in the face, only much better looking, and has a fine natural colour
that makes my lady's cheeks look as if they had been done by a house
painter.

"Ancram has invited an old Whitford acquaintance of his to be his best
man at the wedding. He says that as we are going to live there for a
time at least, it would never do to offend all the people of the place
by taking no notice of them. It would be like going into a hornet's
nest. And the young man in question has been civil to Ancram in his
school-boy days. He is a certain Mr. Pawkins, who lives at a place with
the delightful name of Pudcombe Hall. He is not so bad as I expected,
and is quiet and good-natured. If all the Whitfordians turn out as well
as he, I shall be agreeably surprised. But I fear they are a strange set
of provincial bumpkins. However, we shall not have to remain amongst
them long, for Uncle Val. has privately promised to move heaven and
earth to get Ancram a better position. You know he is to be postmaster
at Whitford. Only think of it! It would be absurd, if it were not such a
downright shame. And I more than suspect my lady of having hurried Uncle
Val. into accepting it for Ancram. I suppose she thinks anything is good
enough for us.

"I wish you could see Ancram! He is very handsome, and even more elegant
than handsome. And his manners are admitted on all hands to be charming.
It is monstrous to think of burying his talents in a poky little hole
like Whitford. But there is this to be said; if he hadn't got this
postmastership we could not have been married at all. For he is poor.
And you know what my great fortune is! I do think it is too bad that
people of our condition should ever be allowed to be so horribly poor.
The Government ought to do something for us.

"Uncle Val. has made me a handsome present of money to help to furnish
our house. I'm sure this is quite unknown to my lady. So don't say
anything about it among your people at home, or it may come round to
Lady S.'s ears, and poor Uncle Val. would get scolded. Give my love to
Aunt Julia and my cousins. I hope to see you all next season in town,
for Ancram and I have quite made up our minds not to stick in that nasty
little provincial hole all the year round. Mrs. Errington is to go back
there directly after the wedding, to see about a house for us, and get
things ready. Of course, if there's anything that I don't like, I can
alter it myself when I arrive.

"Good-bye, dear Louisa. Don't forget your affectionate cousin, who signs
herself (perhaps for the last time),

"C. C. KILFINANE."

       *       *       *       *       *

(From Orlando Pawkins to his sister, Mrs. Machyn-Stubbs.)

"Long Fells, Westmoreland. Monday evening.

"My DEAR JEMIMA,--I am sorry that you and Humphrey should have felt hurt
and thought I was making mysteries. But I assure you I was quite taken
by surprise when I got Errington's letter, telling me about his wedding,
and inclosing Lord Seely's invitation to me to come here. I knew nothing
about it before, I give you my word.

"You ask me to write you full details of the affair, and I am sure I
would if I could. But I don't know any more than the rest of the world.
I don't think much of Long Fells. The land is poor, and the house almost
tumbling to pieces. Lord Seely is uncommonly polite, but I don't much
like my lady. And she has a beast of a lap-dog that snaps at everybody.
Errington is the same as ever, only he looks so much older in these two
years. Any one would take him to be five or six and twenty, at least. As
to the bride, she don't take much notice of me, so I haven't got very
well acquainted with her. I ride about the country nearly all day long.
Lord Seely has provided me with a pretty decent mount. I shall be glad
when the wedding is over, and I can get away, for it's precious dull
here. Even your friend Jack Price seems moped and out of sorts, and goes
about singing, 'The heart that once truly loves never forgets,' or
something like that, enough to give a fellow the blue devils.

"I asked about what you wanted to know about the wedding dresses, but I
couldn't make out much from the answers I got. Miss Kilfinane is to wear
a white silk gown, trimmed with something or other that has a French
name. Perhaps you can guess what it is. The bridesmaids are fat,
freckled girls, the daughters of the parson. I think I have now given
you all the particulars I can.

"I wish you and Humphrey would come down to Pudcombe in September. Tell
him I can give him some fairish shooting, and will do all I can to make
you both comfortable. Believe me,

"Your affectionate brother, O. P."




CHAPTER VI.


It was the evening before the wedding. In a low long room that was dark
with black oak panelling, and gloomy, moreover, by reason of the
smallness of the ivy-framed casement at one end, which alone admitted
the daylight into it, Lord Seely sat before the hearth.

Although it was August there was a fire. There were few evenings of the
year when a fire was not agreeable at Long Fells; and one was certainly
agreeable on this especial evening. The day had been rainy. The whole
house seemed dark and damp. A few logs that had been laid on the top of
the coal fire sputtered and smoked drearily. My lord sat in a large
high-backed chair, which nearly hid his diminutive figure from view,
except on the side of the fireplace. His head was sunk on his breast;
his hands were plunged deep into his pockets; his legs were stretched
out towards the hearth; his whole attitude was undignified. It was such,
an attitude as few of his friends or acquaintances had ever seen him in,
for it was nearly impossible for Lord Seely to be unconscious or
careless of the effect he was producing in the presence of an observer.

He was now absorbed in thought, and was allowing his outer man to
express the nature of his musings. They were not pleasant musings, as
any spectator would at once have pronounced who should have seen his
posture, and his pursed mouth, and his eyebrows knitted anxiously under
the bald yellow forehead. The entrance even of a footman into the room
would have produced an instant change in Lord Seely's demeanour. But no
footman was there to see his lordship sunk in a brown study.

At length he raised his head and glanced out of the window. It had
ceased to rain, but the drops were still trickling down the window-panes
from the points of the ivy leaves; and it was already so dark that the
firelight began to throw fantastic shadows from the quaint old
furniture, and to shine with a dull red glow on the polished oak panels.
Lord Seely rang the bell.

"Has Mr. Errington returned?" he asked of the servant who appeared in
answer to the summons.

"Not yet, my lord."

"Tell them to beg Mr. Errington, with my compliments, to do me the
favour to step here before he dresses for dinner."

"Yes, my lord."

"Don't light that lamp! or, stay; yes, you may light it. Put the shade
over it, and place it behind me. Draw the curtains across the window.
Take care that my message is given to Mr. Errington directly he comes
home."

The servant withdrew. And Lord Seely, when he was left alone, began to
walk up and down the room with his hands behind him. Thus Algernon found
him when, in about ten minutes, he appeared, rosy and fresh from his
ride.

"I must apologise for my muddy condition," he cried gaily. "Pawkins and
I rode over to Applethwaite to get something for Castalia that was found
wanting at the last moment. And I am splashed to the eyebrows. But I
thought it best to come just as I was, as your lordship's message was
pressing."

"Thank you. I am much obliged to you, Ancram. It is not, in truth, that
there is any such immediate hurry for what I have to say, that it might
not have waited an hour or so; but I thought it likely that we might not
have so good an opportunity of speaking alone together."

Lord Seely seated himself once more in the high-backed chair, but in a
very different attitude from his former one. He was upright, majestic,
with one hand in his breast, and the other reclining on the arm of his
chair. But on his face might be read, by one who knew it well, traces of
trouble and of being ill at ease. Algernon read my lord's countenance
well enough. He stood leaning easily on the mantel-shelf, tapping his
splashed boot with his riding-whip, and looking down on Lord Seely with
an air of quiet expectation.

"I have been having a serious conversation with Castalia," said my lord,
after a preliminary clearing of his throat.

Algernon said, smilingly, "I hope you have not found it necessary to
scold her, my lord? The phrase, 'Having a serious conversation' with any
one, always suggests to my mind the administering of a reprimand."

"No, Ancram. No; I have not found it necessary to scold Castalia. I am
very much attached to her, and very anxious for her happiness. She is
the child of my favourite sister."

The old man's voice was not so firm as usual when he said this; and he
looked up at Algernon with an appealing look.

Algernon could be pleasant, genial, even affectionate in his manner--but
never tender. That was more than he could compass by any movement of
imitative sympathy. He had never even been able so to simulate
tenderness as to succeed in singing a pathetic song. Perhaps he had
learned that it was useless to make the attempt. At all events, he did
not now attempt to exhibit any answering tenderness to Lord Seely's look
and tone of unwonted feeling, in speaking of his dead sister's child.
His reply was hard, clear, and cheerful, as the chirp of a canary bird.

"I know you have always been extremely good to Castalia, my lord. We are
both of us very sensible of your kindness, and very much obliged by it."

"No, no," said my lord, waving his hand. "No, no, no. Castalia owes me
nothing. She has been to me almost as my own daughter. There can be no
talk of obligations between her and me."

Then he paused, for what appeared to be a long time. In the silence of
the room the damp logs hissed like whispering voices.

"Ancram," Lord Seely said at length, "Castalia is very much attached to
you."

"I assure you, my lord, I am very grateful to her."

"Ahem! Castalia's is not an expansive nature. She was, perhaps, too much
repressed and chilled in childhood, by living with uncongenial persons.
But she is responsive to kindness, and it develops her best qualities. I
will frankly own, that I am very anxious about her future. You will not
owe me a grudge for saying that much, Ancram?"

"I never owe grudges, my lord. But I trust you have no doubt of my
behaving with kindness to Castalia?"

"No, Ancram. No; I hope not. I believe not."

"I am glad of that; because--the doubt would come rather too late to be
of much use, would it not?"

Algernon spoke with his old bright smile; but two things were observable
throughout this interview. Firstly, that Algernon, though still
perfectly respectful, no longer addressed his senior with the winning,
cordial deference of manner which had so captivated Lord Seely in the
beginning of their acquaintance. Secondly, that Lord Seely appeared
conscious of some reason in the young man's mind for dissatisfaction,
and to be desirous of deprecating that dissatisfaction.

At the same time, there seemed to be in Lord Seely an undercurrent of
feeling struggling for expression. He had the air of a man who, knowing
himself to have right and reason on his side in the main, yet is aware
of a tender point in his case which an unscrupulous adversary will not
hesitate to touch, and which he nervously shrinks from having touched.
He winced at Algernon's last words, and answered rather hotly, "It would
be too late. Your insinuation is a just one. If I had any misgivings I
ought to have expressed them, and acted on them before. But the fact is
that this--the final arrangement of this marriage--took me in a great
measure by surprise."

"So it did me, my lord!"

Lord Seely had been gazing moodily at the fire. He now suddenly raised
his eyes and looked searchingly at Algernon. The young man's face wore
an expression of candid amusement. His arched eyebrows were lifted, and
he was smiling as unconcernedly as if the subject in hand touched
himself no jot.

"I give you my word," he continued lightly, "that when Lady Seely first
spoke to me about it, I was--oh, 'astonished' is no word to express what
I felt!"

A dark red flush came into Lord Seely's withered cheeks, and mounted to
his forehead. He dropped his eyes, and moved uneasily on his chair,
passing one hand through the tuft of grey hair that stood up above his
ear. Algernon went on, with an almost boyish frankness of manner:

"Of course, you know, I should hardly have ventured to aspire to such an
idea quite unassisted. And I believe I said something or other to my
lady--very stumblingly, I have no doubt, for I remember feeling very
much bewildered. I said some word about my being a poor devil with
nothing in the world to offer to a lady in Miss Kilfinane's
position--except, of course, my undying devotion. Only one cannot live
altogether on that. But Lady Seely was very sanguine, and saw no
difficulties. She said it could be managed. And she was right, you see.
Where there's a will, there's a way. And I am really to be married to
Castalia to-morrow. It seems too good to be true!"

Lord Seely rose and faced the young man; and as he did so, his lordship
looked really dignified; for the sincere feeling within him had for once
obliterated his habitual uneasy self-consciousness.

"Ancram," he said, "I am afraid, from what Castalia tells me, that you
are greatly dissatisfied with the position I have been able to procure
for you."

"Oh, my lord, Castalia ought not to have said so! If she can content
herself in it for a time, how can I venture to complain?"

"I am sorry to find," continued Lord Seely, "that your circumstances are
more seriously embarrassed than I thought."

"Are they, my lord? I profess I don't know how to disembarrass them!"

"You are in debt----"

"I had the honour of avowing as much to your lordship when my marriage
was first discussed; as you, doubtless, remember?"

"Yes; and you named a sum which I----"

"Which your lordship was kind enough to pay. Certainly."

"But it now appears that that sum did not cover the whole of your
liabilities, Ancram. Castalia tells me that you have been annoyed by
applications for money quite recently."

Algernon smiled, and put his head on one side, as if trying to recall a
half-forgotten fact. "Well," said he at length, "upon my word I have
forgotten the exact sum which I did name to your lordship, but I have no
doubt it was correct at the time. The worst of it is, that my debts have
this unfortunate peculiarity--they won't stay paid!"

"It is a great pity, Ancram, for a young man to get into the habit of
thinking lightly of debt. It is, in fact," continued his lordship,
growing graver and graver as he spoke, "a fatal habit of mind."

"My dear lord, I don't think lightly of it by any means! But, really--is
it not best to accept the inevitable with some cheerfulness?"

"'The inevitable,' Ancram?"

"Yes, my lord; in my position, debt was inevitable. I could not be a
member of your family circle, a frequent inmate of your house, doing the
things you did, going where you went, without incurring some expense."

It was no want of tact which made Algernon speak thus plainly and
coarsely. He did not fail (as his mother might have done) to perceive
that his words pained and mortified his hearer. He would by no means
have aimed such a shaft at Lady Seely, knowing that nature had
protected her feelings with a hide of some toughness; and knowing,
moreover, that my lady would unhesitatingly have flung back some verbal
missile, at least equally rough and heavy. But my lord was at once more
vulnerable and more scrupulous. And although Algernon was the last
person in the world to be guilty of gratuitous cruelty, yet, if one is
to fight, one had best use the most effective weapons, and take
advantage of any chink in the enemy's armour to drive one's javelin
home!

"I regret," said Lord Seely, with a little catching of the breath, like
a man who has received a cold douche, "I deplore that your intimacy with
my family should have led you into a false position."

"Not at all, my lord! My position in your family has been a very
pleasant one."

"I ought, perhaps--it was my duty--to have inquired more particularly
into your means, and to have ascertained whether they sufficed for the
life you were leading in London. You were very young, and without
experience. I--I reproach myself, Ancram."

"Don't do that, my lord! There is really no need. I'm sure nobody is the
worse for the few pounds I owe at this moment: not even my tailor, who
has cheated me handsomely, doing me the honour to treat me as one of
your lordship's own class!"

Lord Seely bent down his grey head and meditated with a pained and
anxious face. Then he looked up, and said:

"You know, Ancram, that I am not a rich man for one in my station."

Algernon bowed gracefully.

"Had I been so, I should have made a settlement upon Castalia; but,
although I have no daughters of my own to provide for," (with a little
sigh) "yet my property is very strictly tied up. There are claims on it,
too, of various sorts----" ("Lady Seely screws all she can out of him
for that nephew of hers," was Algy's mental comment.) "And, in brief, I
am not in a position to command any large sums of ready money. I believe
I said as much to you before?"

Algernon bowed again and smiled.

"Well, I repeat it now, in order to impress on you the fact, that
neither you nor Castalia must look to me for pecuniary help in the
future."

"Oh, my lord----"

"I do not say that Castalia might not have a right to ask such help of
me; but I merely assure you that it will be out of my power to grant it.
You, perhaps, scarcely realise how poor a man may be who has a fairly
large rent-roll?"

"I think I have begun to realise it, my lord."

Lord Seely looked quickly into the young man's face, but it was smiling
and inscrutable.

"Well," he resumed, "I will only add, that for this once, and presuming
your present debts are not heavy----"

"Oh dear no! A trifle."

"I will discharge them if you will let me have the amount accurately. I
have a great repugnance to the thought of Castalia--and you--beginning
your married life in debt."

"A thousand thanks. It will be better for us to start fair."

"I hope, Ancram, that you will use every endeavour to live clearly
within your means, and to make the best of your circumstances. The fact
is, this marriage has been hurried on----"

Algernon did not answer in words; but he gave an expressive shrug and
smile, which said, as plainly as possible, "I have not hurried it on!"

Lord Seely coloured deeply, and seemed to shrink bodily, as if he had
received a blow. He went on hastily, and with less than his usual
self-possession: "I--I have felt, rather than perceived, a--a little
touch of bitterness in your manner lately. There, there, we will not
quibble about the word! If not bitter, you have not been, at all events,
in the frame of mind I wished and hoped to find you in. You are young;
and youth is apt to be a little unreasonable in its expectations. I
own--I admit--that your worldly position will not be--a--exactly
brilliant. But I assure you that in these days there are many gentlemen
of good abilities, and industry, who would be glad of it."

"Oh, I am fully aware of my good fortune, my lord! Besides, you know,
this is only a stepping-stone."

"Yes; we--we hope so. But, Ancram--and this is what I had in my mind to
say to you frankly--don't neglect or despise the present employment, in
looking forward to something better."

"By no means!"

"For your own sake--your own sake, I earnestly advise you not to give
way to a feeling of discontent."

"Do I look discontented? Upon my word, your lordship is doing me
singular injustice!"

"There is a smiling discontent, as well as a frowning discontent: and I
don't know but that it is the worst of the two."

Algernon laughed outright.

"Well," said he, "you must own that it is a little difficult to give
satisfaction!"

His light smooth tone jarred disagreeably on Lord Seely. If the latter
had thought to make any impression on the young man, to draw from him
any outburst of feeling, he had signally failed. Algernon's words could
not be objected to, but the tone in which they were uttered was
completely nonchalant. His nonchalance increased in proportion to Lord
Seely's earnestness. A year ago Algernon would have brought his manner
into harmony with my lord's mood. He would have been grave, attentive,
eager to show his appreciation of my lord's kindness, and his value for
my lord's advice. But now there was some malice in his smiling
good-humour; a little cruelty in the brightness of his unruffled
serenity. He was genuinely tickled at seeing the pompous little nobleman
embarrassed in speaking to him, Algernon Errington, and he enjoyed what
comedy there might be in the situation none the less because his patron
suffered.

In truth, Algernon was discontented. His was not a gnawing, black sort
of discontent. He neither grew lean, nor yellow, nor morose; but his
irony was sometimes flavoured with acidity; and instead of being easily
tolerant of such follies as zeal, enthusiasm, or fervent reverence, he
was now apt to speak of them with a disdainful superiority. And he had,
too, an air of having washed his hands of any concern with his own
career; of laying the responsibility on Destiny, or whomsoever it might
concern; of awaiting, with sarcastic patience, the next turn of the
wheel--as if life were neither a battle nor a march, but a gigantic game
of rouge-et-noir, with terrible odds in favour of the bank.

Lord Seely was no match for this youth of two-and-twenty. Lord Seely had
intended to impress him deeply; to read him a lecture, in which Olympian
severity should be tempered by mercy; to convince him, by dignified and
condescending methods, of his great good fortune in having secured the
hand of Castalia Kilfinane of Kauldkail; and of his great
unreasonableness (not to say presumption) in not accepting that boon on
bended knee, instead of grumbling at being made postmaster of Whitford.
But in order to make an impression, it does not suffice to have tools
only; the surface to be impressed must also exist, and be adapted to the
operation. How impress the bright, cool, shining liquid bosom of a lake,
for instance? Oar and keel, pebble and arrow, wind and current, are
alike powerless to make a furrow that shall last.

Lord Seely laboured under the disadvantage, in this crisis, of feeling
for other persons with some keenness; a circumstance which frittered
away his power considerably, and made him vacillating. Algernon's
capacities for feeling were, on this occasion, steadily concentrated on
himself, and this gave his behaviour a solid consistency, which was felt
even beneath the surface-lightness of his manner.

"I hope," said Lord Seely, rather sadly than solemnly--"I do most
earnestly hope, Ancram, that you will be happy in this marriage!"

"Your lordship is very good. I assure you, I feel your goodness."

He said it as if he had been accepting an invitation to dinner.

"And--and that you will do your best to make Castalia happy?"

"You may rely on my doing my best."

"There are discrepancies, perhaps--disparities--but but those marriages
are not always the happiest in which the external circumstances on both
sides seem to be best matched. You are young. You are untrammelled. You
have no irrevocable past behind you to regret. I do not see--no, I do
not see why, with mutual regard and respect, you should not make a good
life of it."

"These are the most lugubrious nuptial felicitations that ever were
offered to a bridegroom, I should fancy!" thought Algernon. And he had
some difficulty in keeping his countenance, so vividly did he feel the
ludicrous aspect of his lordship's well-meant effort at "impressing"
him.

"I should feel some sense of responsibility if--if things were not to
turn out as brightly as we hope--and believe--and believe they will turn
out."

"Oh, don't distress yourself about that, my lord!" cried Algernon. (He
had very nearly said "don't apologise!") "There is the dressing-bell,"
he added, with alacrity, taking his hat up from the table. "If your
lordship has no further commands, I think I----"

"Yes; go, Ancram. I will not detain you longer. Remember," said Lord
Seely, taking the young man's hand between both his own, and speaking in
a tremulous voice, "remember, Ancram, that I wish to serve you. My
intention all along has been to do my best for you. You have been a very
pleasant inmate in my home. Ancram, be good to Castalia. For good or for
evil, you are her fate now. No one can come between you. Be good to
her."

"My dear lord, I beg you to believe that I will make Castalia's
happiness the study of my life. And--oh, I have no doubt we shall get on
capitally. With your interest, it can't be long before we get into a
better berth. I know you'll do your best for us, for Castalia's sake;
oh, and mine, too, I am happy to believe. Yes, certainly. I really am in
such a state of mud that I believe my very hair is splashed. It will
take me all the time there remains for dressing to get myself
presentably clean, positively. _Au revoir_, my lord. And thank you very,
very much."

With his jauntiest step, and brightest smile, Algernon left the room.

Lord Seely returned to his chair before the hearth, resumed his moody,
musing attitude, and sat there, alone, with his head sunk on his breast
until they called him to dinner.




CHAPTER VII.


In the first week of August Mrs. Errington returned to Whitford. She had
got over her annoyance at not having been intrusted sooner with the news
of Algernon's engagement to Miss Kilfinane. By dint of telling her
friends so, she had at last persuaded herself that she had been in the
secret all along; and, if she felt any other mortifications and
disappointments connected with her son's marriage, she kept them to
herself. But it is probable that she did not keenly feel any such. She
was not sensitive; and she did believe that, by connecting himself so
nearly with Lord Seely's family, Algernon was advancing his prospects of
success in the world. These sources of comfort, combined with an
excellent digestion, and the perennial gratification of contemplating
her own claims to distinction as contrasted with those of her
neighbours, kept the worthy lady in good spirits, and she returned to
Whitford in a kind of full blow of cheerfulness and importance.

Her reception there, at the outset, was, however, far from being what
she had looked forward to. She had written to Rhoda announcing the day
and hour of her arrival, and requesting that James Maxfield should meet
her at the "Blue Bell" inn, where the coach stopped, with a fly for the
conveyance of herself and her luggage to her old quarters. Mrs.
Errington had not previously written to Rhoda from Westmoreland, but she
had forwarded to her at different times two copies of the _Applethwaite
Advertiser_. In one of these journals a preliminary announcement of
Algernon's marriage had appeared under the heading of "Alliance in High
Life." In the second there was an account of the wedding, and the
breakfast, and the rejoicings in the village of Long Fells, which did
much credit to the imaginative powers of the writer. According to the
_Applethwaite Advertiser_, the ceremony had been imposing, the breakfast
sumptuous, and the village demonstrations enthusiastic.

Mrs. Errington had bought twenty copies of the newspaper for
distribution among her friends; and she pleased herself with thinking
how grateful the Maxfields would be to her for sending them the papers
with the interesting paragraphs marked in red ink. She also looked
forward with much complacency to having Rhoda for a listener to all her
narrations about the wedding and life at Long Fells, and the great
people whom she had met there. Rhoda was such a capital listener! And
then, besides and beyond all that, Mrs. Errington was fond of Rhoda, and
had more motherly warmth of feeling for her than she had as yet attained
to for her new daughter-in-law.

Mrs. Errington's head was stretched out of the coach-window as the
vehicle clattered up the archway of the "Blue Bell" inn. It was about
seven o'clock on a fine August evening, and there was ample light enough
for the traveller to distinguish all the familiar features of the
streets through which she passed. "James will be standing in the
inn-yard ready to receive me," she thought; "and I suppose the fly will
be waiting at the corner by the booking-office. I wonder whether the
driver will be the lame old man or young Simmons?" She was still
debating this question when the coach turned sharply round under the
archway, and stopped in the great rambling yard of the old-fashioned
"Blue Bell" inn.

Mrs. Errington got down unassisted; James Maxfield was not there. She
looked round in bewilderment, standing hot, dusty, and tired in the
yard, where, after a bustling waiter had tripped up to her to ask if she
wanted a room, and tripped away again, no one took any heed of her.

A fly was not to be had in Whitford at a moment's notice. After waiting
for some ten minutes, Mrs. Errington found there was nothing for it but
to walk to her lodgings. She left her luggage in the coach-office to be
called for, and set out carrying a rather heavy hand-bag, and hurrying
through the streets at a pace much quicker than her usual dignified rate
of moving. She wished not to be seen and recognised by any passing
acquaintance under circumstances so unfavourable to an impressive or
triumphant demeanour.

Arrived at Jonathan Maxfield's house, the aspect of things was not much
improved. Betty Grimshaw opened the door, and stared in surprise on
seeing Mrs. Errington. She had not been expected. Mr. Maxfield was over
at Duckwell at his son's farm. James was busy in the store-house. And as
for Rhoda, she was away on a visit to Miss Bodkin at the seaside, and
had been for some weeks. A letter? Oh, if a letter had come for Rhoda,
her father would have sent it on to her. It was a two days' post from
where she was to Whitford. And the newspapers? Betty did not know. She
had not seen them. Her brother-in-law had had them, she supposed. Yes;
she had heard that Mr. Algernon was married, or going to be married. The
servants from Pudcombe Hall had spoken of it when they came into the
shop. Jonathan had not said anything on the subject as far as she knew.
Mrs. Errington knew what Jonathan was. He never was given to much
conversation. And it was Betty's opinion, delivered very frankly, that
Jonathan grew crustier and closer as he got older. But wouldn't Mrs.
Errington like a cup of tea? Betty would have the kettle boiling in a
few minutes.

Mrs. Errington felt rather forlorn, as she entered her old sitting-room
and looked around her. It was trim and neat, indeed, and spotlessly
clean; but it had the chill, repellent look of an uninhabited apartment.
The corner cupboard was locked, and its treasure of old china hidden
from view. Algernon's books were gone from the shelf above the piano. A
white cloth was spread over the sofa, and the hearth-rug was turned
upside down, displaying a grey lining, instead of the gay-coloured
scraps of cloth.

She missed Rhoda. She had become accustomed to Algernon's absence from
the familiar room; but Rhoda's absence made a blank in it, that was
depressing. And perhaps Mrs. Errington herself was surprised to find how
dreary the place looked, without the girl's gentle face and modest
figure. She gladly accepted Betty Grimshaw's invitation to take her tea
downstairs in the comfortable, bright kitchen, instead of alone in the
melancholy gentility of her own sitting-room. Betty was as
wooden-faced, and grim, and rigid in her aspect as ever. But she was not
unfriendly towards her old lodger. And, moreover, she was entirely
respectful in her manner, holding it as a fixed article of her faith
that "gentlefolks born" were intended by Providence to be treated with
deference, and desiring to show that she herself had been trained to
becoming behaviour under the roof of a person of quality.

It was little more than nine o'clock when Mrs. Errington rose to go to
bed, being tired with her journey. As she did so, she said, "Mrs.
Grimshaw, will you get James to send a hand-cart for my luggage in good
time to-morrow?"

"Oh, your luggage?" returned Betty. "Well, do you think it is worth
while to send for it, if you're not going to stay?"

Mrs. Errington was so much astonished by this speech, that she sat down
again on the chair she had just quitted. Then, after a minute's pause,
her mind, which did not move very rapidly, arrived at what she supposed
to be the explanation of Betty's words. "Oh, I see," she said; "you took
it for granted that, on my son's marriage, I should leave you and join
him. But it is not so, my good soul. My daughter-in-law has implored me
to live with them, but I have refused. It is better for the young people
to be by themselves; and I prefer my own independence also. No, my good
Mrs. Grimshaw, I shall remain in my old quarters until Mr. Algernon
leaves Whitford for good. And perhaps, even then, I may not give you up
altogether, who knows?"

Betty hesitated for an instant before replying. "Then Jonathan has not
said anything to you about giving up the rooms?"

"Good gracious, no! I have not heard from Mr. Maxfield at all!"

"I suppose he didn't expect you back quite so soon. And--there, I'm sure
I won't take upon myself to speak for him. I shouldn't have got on with
my brother-in-law all these years if I hadn't made it a rule to try for
peace and quietness, and never interfere."

But Mrs. Errington persisting in her demand that Betty should explain
herself more fully, the latter at length confessed that, during the past
two or three weeks, Jonathan Maxfield had declared his intention of
getting rid of his lodger, and of not letting the first floor of his
house again. "Your sitting-room is to be kept as a kind of a
drawing-room for Rhoda, as I understand Jonathan," said she.

A drawing-room for Rhoda! Mrs. Errington could not believe her senses.
"Why, what is Mr. Maxfield thinking of?" she exclaimed.

"Oh, you don't know what a fuss Jonathan has been making lately about
Rhoda! Before you went away, you know, ma'am, as he had begun to spend
a deal of money on her clothes. And since then, more and more; it's been
all his talk as Rhoda was to be a lady. The notion has got stuck fast in
his head, and wild horses wouldn't drag it out."

Mrs. Errington rose very majestically. "I much fear," she said, "I much
fear that I am responsible for this delusion of your brother-in-law. I
have a little spoiled the girl, and taken too much notice of her. I
regret it now. But, really, Rhoda is such a sweet creature that I don't
know that I have been so very much to blame, either. It is true I have
introduced her to my friends, and brought her forward a little beyond
her station; but I little thought a man of Mr. Maxfield's common sense
would have been so utterly led away by kindly-meant patronage."

"Well, I don't know as it's so much that, ma'am," returned Betty, in a
matter-of-fact tone, "as it is that Jonathan has latterly been thinking
a deal about his money. And he knows money will do great things----"

"Money can never confer gentle birth, my good creature!"

"No, for sure, ma'am. That's what I say myself. I know my catechism, and
I was brought up to respect my superiors. But, you see, Jonathan's
heart is greatly set on his riches. He's a well-off man, is my
brother-in-law; more so than many folks think. He's been a close man all
his life. And, for that matter, he's close enough now in some things,
and screws me down in the housekeeping pretty tight. But for Rhoda he
seems to grudge nothing, and wants her to make a show and a splash
almost--if you can fancy such a thing of Jonathan! But there's no saying
how men will turn out; not even the old ones. I'm sure I often and often
thank my stars I've kept single--no offence to you, ma'am."

Mrs. Errington went to bed in a bewildered frame of mind. Tired as she
was, the news she had heard kept her awake for some time. Leave her
lodgings! Leave old Max's house, which had been her home for so many
years! It was incredible. And, indeed, before long she had made up her
mind to resist old Max's intention of turning her out. "I shall give him
a good talking to, to-morrow," she said to herself. "Stupid old man! He
really must not be allowed to make himself so absurd." And then Mrs.
Errington fell asleep.

But the next day old Max did not return to be talked to; nor the day
after that. James Maxfield went over to Duckwell, and came back bringing
a formal notice to Mrs. Errington to quit the lodgings, signed by his
father.

"What does this mean, James?" asked Mrs. Errington, with much emphasis,
and wide-open eyes. James did not know what it meant. He did not
apparently much care, either. He had never been on very friendly terms
with the Erringtons (having, indeed, come but seldom in contact with
them during all the time they had lived under the same roof with him),
and had, perhaps, been a little jealous in his sullen, silent way, of
their petting of Rhoda. At all events, on the present occasion, he was
not communicative nor very civil. He had performed his father's behests,
and he knew nothing more. His father was not coming back home just yet.
And James volunteered the opinion that he didn't mean to come back until
Mrs. Errington should be gone.

All this was strange and disagreeable. But Mrs. Errington was not of an
irritable or anxious temperament. And her self-complacency was of too
solid a kind to be much affected even by ruder rubs than any which could
be given by James Maxfield's uncouth bluntness. "I shall take no notice
whatever of this," she said, with serene dignity. "When your father
comes back, I shall talk to him. Meanwhile, I have a great many
important things to do."

The good lady did in truth begin at once to busy herself in seeking a
house for Algernon, and getting it furnished. There was but a month to
make all arrangements in, and all Mrs. Errington's friends who could by
any possibility be pressed into the service were required to assist
her. The Docketts; Rose and Violet McDougall; Mrs. Smith, the surgeon's
wife; and even Miss Chubb, were sent hither and thither, asked to write
notes, to make inquiries, to have interviews with landlords, and to take
as much trouble, and make as much fuss as possible, in the task of
getting ready an abode for Mr. and the Honourable Mrs. Algernon
Errington.

A house was found without much difficulty. It was a small isolated
cottage on the outskirts of the town, with a garden behind it which ran
down to the meadows bordering the Whit; and was the very house,
belonging to Barker the chemist, of which Mrs. Errington had written to
her friend Mrs. Bodkin.

It was really a very humble dwelling. But the rent of it was quite as
large as Algernon would be able to afford. Mrs. Errington said, "I
prefer a small place for them. If they took a more pretentious house,
they would be expected to entertain. And you know, my dear sir," (or
"madam," as the case might be) "that there is a great mixture in
Whitford society; and that would not suit my daughter-in-law, of course.
You perceive that, don't you?" And then the person so addressed might
flatter him or herself with the idea of belonging to the unmixed portion
of society.

Indeed, this terrible accusation of being "mixed" was one which Mrs.
Errington was rather fond of bringing against the social gatherings in
Whitford. And she had once been greatly offended, and a good deal
puzzled, by Mr. Diamond's asking her what objection there could be to
that; and challenging her to point out any good thing on earth, from a
bowl of punch upwards, which was not "mixed!" But however this might be,
no one believed at all that the mixture in Whitford society was the real
reason for young Errington's inhabiting so small a house. They knew
perfectly well that if Algernon's means had been larger, his house would
have been larger also.

And yet, Mrs. Errington's flourish was not without its effect on some
persons. They in their turn repeated her lamentations on the "mixture"
to such of their acquaintances as did not happen to be also her
acquaintances. And as there were very few individuals in Whitford either
so eccentric, or so courageous, as Mr. Diamond, this mysterious mixture
was generally acknowledged, with shrugs and head-shakings, to be a very
great evil indeed.

At the end of about a fortnight, old Max one day reappeared in his own
house, and marched upstairs to Mrs. Errington's sitting-room.

"Well, ma'am," said he, without any preliminary greeting whatsoever, "I
suppose you understood the written notice to quit, that I sent you? But
as my son James informs me that you don't seem to be taking any steps in
consequence of it, I've come to say that you will have to remove out of
my abode on the twenty-seventh of this month, and not a day later. So
you can act according to your judgment in finding another place to dwell
in."

Mrs. Errington was inspecting the contents of a packing-case which had
been sent from London by Lady Seely. It contained, as her ladyship said,
"some odds and ends that would be useful to the young couple." The only
article of any value in the whole collection was a porcelain vase, which
had long stood in obscurity on a side-table in Lord Seely's study, and
would not be missed thence. Lady Seely, at all events, would not miss
it, as she seldom entered the room; and therefore she had generously
added it to the odds and ends!

Mrs. Errington looked up, a little flushed with the exertion of stooping
over the packing-case, and confronted Mr. Maxfield. Her round, red
full-moon face contrasted in a lively manner with the old man's grey,
lank, harsh visage. The years, as they passed, did not improve old Max's
appearance. And as soon as she beheld him, Mrs. Errington was convinced
of the justice of Betty Grimshaw's remark, that her brother-in-law
seemed to have grown closer and crustier than ever of late.

"Why, Mr. Maxfield," said the lady, condescendingly, "how do you do? I
have been wanting to see you. Come, sit down, and let us talk matters
over."

Old Max stood in the doorway glaring at her. "I don't know, ma'am, as
there's any matters I want to talk over with you," he returned. "You had
better understand that I mean what I say. You'll find it more convenient
to believe me at once, and to act accordin'."

"Do you mean to say that you intend to turn me out, Mr. Maxfield?"

"I have given you a legal notice to quit, ma'am. You needn't call it
turning you out, unless you like."

He had begun to move away, when Mrs. Errington exclaimed, "But I really
don't comprehend this at all! What will Rhoda think of it?"

Maxfield stopped, hesitatingly, with his hand on the banisters at the
top of the landing. "Rhoda?" said he gruffly. "Oh, Rhoda has nothing to
say to it, one way or t'other."

"But I want to have something to say to her! I assure you it was a great
disappointment to me not to find Rhoda here on my return. I'm very fond
of her; and shall continue to be so, as long as she merits it. It is not
her fault, poor girl, if--other people forget themselves."

Maxfield took his hand off the banisters and turned round. "Since you're
so fond of Rhoda," he said, with a queer expression on his sour old
face, "you'll be glad to know where she is, and the company she's in."

"I know that she is at the seaside with my friends, Mrs. and Miss
Bodkin."

"She is at the seaside with _her_ friends, Mrs. and Miss Bodkin. Miss
Minnie is a real lady, and she understands how to treat Rhoda, and knows
that the Lord has made a lady of Rhoda by natur'."

Mrs. Errington stared in utter astonishment. The suspicion began to form
and strengthen itself in her mind that the old man was positively out of
his senses. If so, his insanity had taken an extremely unpleasant turn
for her.

"I really was not prepared for being turned out of my lodgings after all
these years," she said, reverting to the point that most nearly touched
herself.

"I've not been prepared for a many things as have happened after all
these years. But I'm ready to meet 'em when they come."

"Well, but now, Mr. Maxfield, let us see if we cannot make an
arrangement. If you have any different views about the rent, I----"

"The rent! What do you think your bit of a rent matters to me? I want
the rooms for the use of my daughter, Miss Maxfield, and there's an end
of it."

"Oh, he certainly cannot be in his right senses to address me in this
manner!" thought Mrs. Errington.

Maxfield went on, "I see you've got a box of rubbish there, littering
about the place. I give you warning not to unpack any more here, for out
everything 'll have to go on the twenty-seventh of this month, as sure
as my name's Jonathan Maxfield!"

"Mr. Maxfield! You are certainly forgetting yourself. Rubbish, indeed!
These are a few--a very few--of the valuable wedding presents sent to my
son and daughter by Lady Seely."

Old Max made a grating sound which was intended for a laugh, although
his bushy grey eyebrows were drawn together in a heavy frown the while.
Then he suddenly burst out in a kind of cold fury. "Pooh!" he cried.
"Presents! Valuable presents! You don't deceive anybody by that! Look
here--if the old carpet or any of the furniture in this room would be of
any assistance to you, you can take it! I'll give it to you--a free
gift! The place is going to be done up and new furnished for Miss
Maxfield. Furnished handsome, fit for a young lady of property. Fit for
a young lady that will have a sum o' money on the day she marries--if
I'm pleased with her choice--as 'll make some folks' mouths water. It
won't be reckoned by twenties, nor yet by hundreds, won't Miss
Maxfield's fortin'! You can take the old carpet, and mahogany table, and
the high-backed chairs, and put 'em among your valuable presents.
They're too old-fashioned for Miss Maxfield's drawing-room!" And with a
repetition of the grating laugh, old Max tramped heavily downstairs, and
was heard to bang the door of his own parlour.

Mrs. Errington sat motionless for nearly a quarter of an hour, staring
at the open door. "Mad!" she exclaimed at length, drawing a long breath.
"Quite mad! But I wonder if there is any truth in what he says about
Rhoda's money? Dear me, why she'll be quite a catch!"




CHAPTER VIII.


Meanwhile Rhoda, at Duckwell Farm, supposed herself to be too unhappy to
care much for anything. She did not have a fever, nor fall into a
consumption, nor waste away visibly; but she passed hours crying alone
in her own room, or sitting idle-handed, whilst her thoughts languidly
retraced the past, or strove to picture what sort of a lady Algernon's
wife might be. Headaches, pallid cheeks, and red eyes resulted from
these solitary hours. Mrs. Seth Maxfield wondered what had come to the
girl, having no suspicion that young Errington's marriage could be more
to Rhoda than an interesting subject for gossip.

Old Jonathan went over to Duckwell immediately after receiving the first
newspaper, sent by Mrs. Errington from Westmoreland.

The announcement of the intended wedding had taken him wholly by
surprise. It would be hard to say whether wrath or amazement
predominated in his mind, on first reading the paragraph which Mrs.
Errington had so complacently marked with red ink. But it is not at all
hard to say which feeling predominated within an hour after having read
it.

According to old Max's judgment, there was not one extenuating
circumstance in Algernon's behaviour; not one plea to be urged on his
behalf. Utter vindictive anger filled the old man's soul as he read. He
had been deceived, played upon, laughed at by this boy! That was the
first, and, perhaps, the most venomous of his mortifications. But many
other stinging thoughts rankled in his mind. David Powell had been
right! That was almost unendurable. As to Rhoda, old Max could not, in
the mood he was then in, contemplate her being bowed down by grief and
disappointment. He would have her raise her head, and revenge herself on
her faithless lover. He would have her successful, admired, and
prosperous. He would have her trample on Algernon's pride and poverty
with all the insolence of wealth. Even his beloved money, so hardly
earned, so eagerly hoarded, seemed to him, for the first time in his
life, to be of small account in comparison with a sentiment.

He took his Bible, and gloated over menaces of vengeance and threats of
destruction. Future condemnation was, no doubt, in store for Algernon
Errington. But that was too vague and too distant a prospect to appease
old Max's stomach for revenge. He wanted to see his enemy in the dust,
and that his enemy should be seen there by others. In the midst of his
reading, he suddenly recollected the acknowledgment he held of
Algernon's debt to him, and jumped up and ran to his strong-box to feast
his eyes on it. It seemed almost like a clear leading from on High that
the I.O.U. should come into his head just then, old Max thought. He was
not the first, nor the worst man who has wrested Scripture into the
service of his own angry passions.

Then he sent to order a gig from the "Blue Bell," and set out for
Duckwell Farm.

"I hope your father isn't sickening for any disease, or going to get a
stroke, or something," said Betty Grimshaw to her nephew James. "But I
never see anybody's face such a colour out of their coffin. It's a
greeny grey, that's what it is. And he was frowning like thunder."

But Jonathan Maxfield's disorder was not of the body. He arrived at
Duckwell unexpectedly, but his arrival did not cause any particular
surprise. He had business transactions to discuss with his son Seth, to
whom he had advanced money on mortgage. And then there was Rhoda staying
at the farm, and, of course, her father would like to see Rhoda.

Rhoda was called from her own room, and came down, pale and nervous.
She dreaded meeting her father. Did he, or did he not, know the news
from Westmoreland? It had only come to Duckwell Farm by means of Mr.
Pawkins's servants. It might possibly not yet have reached Whitford.

On his side, old Max took care to say nothing about the _Applethwaite
Advertiser_. He had destroyed that journal before leaving home, placing
it in the heart of the kitchen fire, and holding it there with the
poker, until the remains of it fluttered up the chimney in black,
impalpable fragments.

But old Max had brought another document in his pocket, which had been
placed in his hand just as he was starting in the gig. It was a letter
directed to Miss Rhoda Maxfield, High Street, Whitford. And this he
pulled out almost immediately on seeing Rhoda. A glance at her face
sufficed to show him that she was unhappy and dispirited. "She has heard
it!" he thought. And something like an anathema upon Algernon followed
the thought in his mind.

The old man's countenance was not so clearly read by his daughter;
indeed, she hardly raised her eyes to his, but received his kiss in
silence.

"I'm afraid, father, you'll not find Rhoda's looks doing us credit,"
said Mrs. Seth. "Why or wherefore I don't know, but these last days she
has been as peaky as can be."

"It's the heat, maybe," said old Max shortly and withdrew his own and
Mrs. Seth's attention from the girl, as she read the letter he handed to
her. Rhoda was grateful for this forbearance on her father's part,
although it fluttered her, too, a little, as proving that he was aware
of the cause of her dejection, and anxious to shield it from
observation.

The letter was from Minnie Bodkin. She had written it almost immediately
on hearing of Algernon's intended marriage. It invited Rhoda, if her
father would consent, to visit the Bodkins during the remainder of their
stay at the seaside. There was no word of allusion to the Erringtons in
the letter. Minnie only said, "Mamma and I remember that your cheeks had
lost their roses, somewhat, when we left Whitford. And we think that a
breath of sea-breeze may blow them back again. It is some time since you
had complete change of air. Tell Mr. Maxfield we will take good care of
you." And in a postscript Mrs. Bodkin had added, in her small running
hand, "Do come, my dear. We shall be very glad to have you. Dr. Bodkin
bids me send you his love."

It had been no slight effort of self-conquest which had made Minnie
Bodkin send for Rhoda, to stay with her at the seaside, and had enabled
her to endure the girl's daily presence, and to stand her friend in word
and deed, throughout the weeks which succeeded the announcement of
Algernon's marriage.

To be kind to Rhoda at a distance would have been pleasant enough.
Minnie would willingly, nay, gladly, have served the girl in any way
which should not have necessitated frequent personal communion with her.
But she told herself unflinchingly that if she really meant to keep her
promise to David Powell, she must do so at some cost of self-sacrifice.
The only efficacious thing she could do for Rhoda was to take her away
from Whitford scenes and Whitford people for a time; to take her out of
the reach of gossiping tongues and unsympathising eyes, and to give her
the support of a friendly presence when she should be obliged to face
Whitford once more. This would be efficacious help to Rhoda; and Minnie
resolved to give it to her. But it was a task to which she felt
considerable repugnance. There was an invisible barrier between herself
and pretty, gentle, winning Rhoda Maxfield.

It is curious to consider of how small importance to most of us actions
are, as compared with motives. And perhaps nothing contributes more to
hasty accusations of ingratitude than forgetfulness of this truth. We
are more affected by what people mean than by what they say, and by what
they feel than by what they do. Only when meaning and feeling
harmoniously inform the dry husk of words and deeds, can we bring our
hearts to receive the latter thankfully, however kind they may sound or
seem to uninterested spectators. The egotism of most of us is too
exacting to permit of our judging our friends' behaviour from any
abstract point of view; and to be done good to for somebody else's sake,
or even for the sake of a lofty principle, seldom excites very lively
satisfaction.

Thus Rhoda reproached herself for the unaccountable coldness with which
she received Miss Bodkin's kindness; having only a dim consciousness
that Miss Bodkin's kindness was prompted by motives excellent indeed,
but which had little to do with personal sympathy with herself.

She silently handed the letter to her father, and turned away to the
window. Mrs. Seth bustled out of the room, saying that she must get
ready "a snack of something" for Mr. Maxfield after his drive, and the
father and daughter were left alone together.

Jonathan Maxfield's face brightened wonderfully as he read Minnie's
gracious words. A glow of pleasure came over his hard features. But it
was not a very agreeable sort of pleasure to behold, being considerably
mingled with malicious triumph. Here was a well-timed circumstance
indeed! What could Powell, or such as Powell, say now? Let the
Erringtons behave as they might, it was clear henceforward that Rhoda
had not been received amongst gentlefolks solely on their account. His
girl was liked and made much of for her own sake.

"Well," said he, "this is a very pretty letter of Miss Minnie's; very
pretty indeed." He did not allow his voice to express his exultation,
but spoke in his usual harsh, grumbling tones.

"Yes," answered Rhoda, tremulously, "it is very kind of Miss Minnie, and
of dear Mrs. Bodkin; wonderfully kind! But I--I don't think I want to
go, father."

"Not want to go? Nonsense! That's mere idle nonsense. Of course you will
go. I shall take you down by the coach myself."

"Oh thank you, father, but--I really don't want change. I don't care
about going to the seaside."

The old man turned upon her almost savagely. "I say you shall go. You
must go. Are you to creep into a hole like a sick beast of the field,
and hide yourself from all eyes? There, there," he added in a gentler
tone, drawing her towards him, as he saw the tears begin to gather in
her eyes, "I am not chiding you, Rhoda. But it will be good for you to
accept this call from your kind friends. It will be good for mind and
body. You will be quiet there, among fresh scenes and fresh faces. And
you will return to Whitford in the company of these gentlefolks, who, it
is clear, are minded to stand your friends under all circumstances.
Seth's wife is a worthy woman, but she is not a companion for you,
Rhoda."

One phrase of this speech did seem to offer a glimpse of consolation to
Rhoda; the promise, namely, of quiet and fresh scenes, where she and her
belongings were utterly unknown. But her father did not know that Minnie
Bodkin understood her little love-story from first to last; and that
Minnie Bodkin's presence and companionship might not be calculated to
pour the waters of oblivion into her heart. Still she reflected, a day
must come when she would have to face Miss Minnie, and all the other
Whitford people who knew her. There was no chance of her dying at once
and being taken away from it all! And Rhoda's teaching had made her
shrink from the thought of desiring death, as from something vaguely
wicked. On the whole, it might be the best thing for her to go to the
Bodkins. She would better have liked to continue her solitary rambles in
Pudcombe Woods or the meadows at Duckwell; only that now the pain
awaited her, every evening, at the farm, of hearing Algernon's marriage
discussed and speculated on. She could not shut out the topic. On the
whole, then, it might be the best thing she could do, to get away from
Whitford gossip for a time.

These considerations Rhoda brought before her own mind, not with any
idea that they could avail to decide her line of conduct, but by way of
reconciling herself to the line of conduct she should be compelled to
take. It never entered her head that any resistance would be possible
when once her father had said, "You must go."

"Very well, father," she answered meekly, after a short pause.

The Bodkins' invitation was duly communicated to Seth and his wife. And
it was arranged that Rhoda should start from the farm without returning
to Whitford at all, as a cross road could be reached from Duckwell,
where the coach would stop to pick up passengers. "If there's any
garments you require, beyond those you have here, your aunt Betty shall
send them over by the carrier, to-morrow," said Mr. Maxfield.

Mrs. Seth protested (not without a spice of malice) that Rhoda could not
possibly want any more clothes, for that she was rigged out already fit
for a princess. Nevertheless there did arrive from Whitford several
fresh additions to Rhoda's wardrobe, inclosed in a brand-new black trunk
studded with brass-headed nails, and with the initials R. M. traced out
in the same shining materials on the lid.

"Your father's well-nigh soft-headed about that girl," said Mrs. Seth to
her husband, as they stood watching the father and daughter drive away
together.

"H'm!" grunted Seth.

His wife went on, "We may make up our minds as our little ones will
never be a penny the better for your father's money. I'm as sure as
sure, it'll all go to Rhoda."

"As to his will, you may be right," returned Seth. "But I have good
hopes that father will cancel that mortgage he holds on the home farm.
If he does that, we mustn't growl too much. 'Tis a good lump o' money.
And it would come a deal handier to me if I could have the land free
now, than if I waited for father's death. He's tough, is father. And the
Lord knows I don't wish him dead neither."

In this way Rhoda Maxfield went down to the seaside place where the
Bodkins were staying, spent about three weeks with them there, and
returned in their company to Whitford, to find Mrs. Errington no longer
an inmate of her father's house, the old sitting-room decorated and
re-furnished very smartly, and all the circle with whom she had become
acquainted at Dr. Bodkin's on the tiptoe of expectation to behold the
Honourable Mrs. Algernon Errington, whose arrival was looked forward to
with an amount of interest only understood by those who have ever lived
an unoccupied life in a remote provincial town.




CHAPTER IX.


We have already been present at more than one social gathering at Dr.
Bodkin's house. But these entertainments have been of an informal
character, and the guests at them all persons in the habit of meeting
each other very frequently. On Mr. and Mrs. Algernon Errington's arrival
in Whitford, after their marriage, Dr. and Mrs. Bodkin issued cards for
an evening party, and invited the leading personages of their
acquaintance to meet the bride and bridegroom.

Mrs. Errington was in high delight. She appreciated this attention from
her old friends very highly. Castalia, it was true, looked discontented
and disdainful about the whole affair; and demanded to know why she must
be dragged out to these people's stupid parties before she had had time
to turn round in her own house. But then, as Mrs. Errington reflected,
Castalia did not understand Whitford society. "The fact is, my dear,"
said her mother-in-law with suavity, "it may be all a very trumpery
business in your eyes, and after the circles you have moved in, but I
assure you it is considered a very desirable thing here to have the
_entree_ to Dr. Bodkin's. And then they scarcely ever entertain on a
showy scale; nothing but a few friends, tea and cake, your rubber, and a
tray afterwards. But, for this occasion, I hear there are great
preparations going on. They won't dance, because Minnie can't stand the
vibration. But there will be quite a large gathering. Of course, my
dear, it is not what I was accustomed to at Ancram Park. But they are
most kind, well-meaning people. And Minnie is highly accomplished; even
learned, I believe."

"I hate blue-stockings," returned Mrs. Algernon with a shrug.

"Oh! but Minnie is not the least blue in her manners! Indeed, her
knowing Greek has ever been a mystery to me; for I assure you she is
extremely handsome, and has, I think, the finest pair of eyes I ever saw
in my life. But I suppose it is accounted for by her affliction, poor
thing!"

Castalia had darted a quick, suspicious glance at her husband on hearing
of Minnie's beauty, but relapsed into languid indifference when she was
told that Miss Bodkin was a confirmed invalid, suffering from disease of
the spine.

In other circles Mrs. Errington was by no means so cool and
condescending in speaking of the doctor's projected party. The check
administered to her exultation by Castalia's chilly indifference only
caused a fuller ebullition of it in other directions. She overwhelmed
her new landlady by the magnitude and magnificence of her
"Ancramisms"--I have already asked permission to use the phrase in these
pages--and was looked up to by that simple soul as a very exalted
personage; for the new landlady was no other than the widow Thimbleby.

Mrs. Errington occupied the two rooms on the first-floor above Mr.
Diamond's parlours. The place was smaller and poorer altogether than
Maxfield's house, although it did not yield to it in cleanliness. Here
was Mrs. Errington's old blue china set forth on a side-table in the
little oblong drawing-room; and her work-box with its amber satin and
silver implements; and the faded miniatures hung over the mantelpiece.
Also there was a square of substantial, if somewhat faded, carpet in the
middle of Mrs. Thimbleby's threadbare drugget, a mahogany table, and a
roomy, comfortable easy-chair, all of which we have seen before.

In a word, Mrs. Errington had taken advantage of old Max's somewhat rash
offer, and had carried away with her such articles of furniture out of
her old quarters as she fancied might be useful.

Mrs. Errington took some credit to herself for her magnanimity in so
doing. "I could not refuse the poor man," she said to Mrs. Thimbleby. "I
have lived many years in his house, and although he was led away by
mistaken ambition to want his drawing-room for his own use, and
certainly did cause me great inconvenience at a moment when I was up to
my eyes in important business, yet I could not refuse to accept his
little peace-offering. A lady does not quarrel with that sort of person,
you know. And, poor old man, I believe he was dreadfully cut up at my
going away when it came to the point, and would have given anything to
keep me. But I said, 'No, Mr. Maxfield, that is impossible. I have made
other arrangements; and, in short, I cannot be troubled any more about
this matter. But to show that I bear no malice, and that I shall not
withdraw my countenance from your daughter, I am willing to accept the
trifles you press upon me.' He was a good deal touched by my taking the
things; poor, foolish, misguided old man!"

"Well, it was real Christian of you, ma'am," said simple Mrs. Thimbleby.

The day of the party at Dr. Bodkin's arrived; and there was as intense
an excitement connected with its advent as if it were to bring a county
ball, or even a royal drawing-room. Whether a satin train, lappets and
feathers, be intrinsically more important and worthy objects of anxiety
than a white muslin frock and artificial roses, I do not presume to
decide. Only I can unhesitatingly assert that the Misses Rose and Violet
McDougall could not have given their female attendant more trouble about
the preparation and putting on of the latter adornments--which formed
their simple and elegant attire on this occasion--if they had been
duchesses, and their gowns cloth of gold.

Miss Chubb, too, contemplated her new dress of a light blue colour, laid
out upon her bed, with great interest and satisfaction. And when her
toilet for the evening was completed, she had more little gummed rings
of hair on her cheeks and forehead than had ever before been beheld
there at one time.

The company began to assemble in Dr. Bodkin's drawing-rooms about
half-past eight o'clock. There were all our old acquaintances--Mr.
Smith, the surgeon, and his wife; Mr. and Mrs. Dockett, with Miss
Alethea, now promoted to long dresses and "grown-up" young-ladyhood.
There was Orlando Pawkins; Mr. Warlock, the curate; and Colonel
Whistler, with his charming nieces. Miss Chubb had dined with the
Bodkins in the middle of the day, and, after being of great assistance
to the mistress of the house in the preparation of her supper-table, had
returned to her own home to dress, and consequently arrived upon the
festive scene rather later than would otherwise have been the case. But
she was not the last guest to arrive. Mr. Diamond came in after her; and
so did one or two families from the neighbourhood of Whitford. ("County
people," Miss Chubb said in a loud whisper to Rose McDougall, who
replied snappishly, "Of course! We know them very well. Have visited
them for years.")

"This is a brilliant scene," said good-natured Miss Chubb, turning to
Mr. Warlock, whom Fate had thrown into her neighbourhood. Mr. Warlock
agreed with her that it was very brilliant; and, indeed, Dr. Bodkin's
drawing-rooms, well lighted with wax candles, and with abundance of
hot-house flowers tastefully arranged, and relieved against the rich
crimson and oak furniture, were exceedingly cheerful, pleasant, and
picturesque. There was an air of comfort and good taste about the
rooms--a habitable, home-like air--not always to be found in more
splendid dwellings.

On her crimson lounging-chair reclined Minnie Bodkin. Her dress was of
heavy cream-white silk, with gold ornaments. She wore nothing in her
abundant dark hair, and her pale face seemed to many who looked upon it
that evening to be more lovely than ever. Her lips had a tinge of red
in them, and her eyes were full of lustre. There was a suppressed
excitement about her looks and manner, which lighted up her
perfectly-moulded features with a strange beauty that struck all
observers. Even the McDougalls could not but admit that Minnie looked
very striking, but added that she was a little too theatrically got up,
didn't you think so? That was poor Minnie's failing. All for effect!
"And," added Rose, "she has a good foil in that little pink and white
creature who sits in the corner beside her chair, and never moves. I
suppose she is told to do it. But the idea of dressing that chit up in a
violet silk gown fit for a married woman! And she has no figure to carry
it off. I really think it rather a strong measure on the Bodkins' part
to ask us all to meet a girl of such very low origin on equal terms. But
there it is, you see! Poor dear Minnie delights in doing startling
things, unlike other people. And, of course, her parents refuse her
nothing."

Miss Rose's opinion of Rhoda Maxfield's insignificant appearance was
not, however, shared by many persons present. Several young gentlemen,
and more than one old gentleman, vied with each other in offering her
cups of tea, and paying her various little attentions according to their
opportunities. Even old Colonel Whistler, when he thought himself
unobserved by his nieces, sidled up to pretty Rhoda Maxfield, and was
heard to say to one of the "county" gentlemen, "She's the prettiest girl
I've seen this many a day, by George! And I know a pretty girl when I
see one, sir; or used to, once upon a time!"

To Rhoda, all the strangers who spoke and looked so kindly were merely
troublesome. Her colour went and came, her heart beat with anxiety. She
started nervously every time the door opened. She could think only of
Algernon and Algernon's wife. She made a silent and very earnest prayer
that she might be strengthened to sit still and quiet when they should
appear, for she had had serious apprehensions lest she should be
irresistibly impelled to start up and run away, as soon as she saw them.

It was in vain that young Mr. Pawkins hovered near her, inviting her to
accept his arm into the tea-room; it was in vain that old Colonel
Whistler softened his martinet voice to ask her, with paternal
tenderness, how she had enjoyed her stay at the seaside, and to say
that, if one might judge by her looks, she had derived great benefit
from the change of air. In the words of the song, "All men else seemed
to her like shadows." She was in a dream, with the consciousness of an
impending awakening, which she half longed for, half dreaded.

Two persons watched over her, and covered the mistakes she made in her
nervous trepidation. Matthew Diamond and Minnie Bodkin exerted
themselves to shield her from importunate observation, and to give her
time to recover her self-possession, if that might be possible. Diamond
was in good spirits. He could wait, he could be patient, he could be
silent now, with a good heart. Algernon's marriage had opened a bright
vista of hope before him; and perhaps he had never felt so disposed to
condone and excuse his old pupil's faults and failings as at the present
moment. "Minnie is a good creature," he thought, with a momentary,
grateful diversion of his attention from Rhoda, "to keep my timid birdie
so carefully under her wing! She might do it with a little more softness
of manner. But we cannot change people's natures."

Meanwhile Minnie reclined in her chair, watching his tender lingering
looks at Rhoda, and his complete indifference to everyone else, with a
heartache which might have excused even less "softness of manner" than
Diamond thought she displayed towards the girl beside her.

At length a little commotion, and movement among the persons standing
near the door, announced a new arrival. Rhoda felt sick, and grasped the
back of Minnie's chair so hard that her little glove was split by the
force of the pressure. But that horrible sensation passed away in a few
seconds. And then, looking up with renewed powers of seeing and hearing,
she perceived that Mrs. Errington had made her entrance alone, and was
holding forth in her mellow voice to Dr. and Mrs. Bodkin, and a knot of
other persons in the centre of the room.

Mrs. Errington was radiant. She nodded and smiled to one and another
with an almost royal suavity and condescension. She was attired in a
rich dove-coloured silk gown (Lord Seely's gift to her at her son's
wedding), and wore rose-coloured ribbons in her lace cap, and looked
altogether as handsome and happy a matron of her years as you would
easily find in a long summer's day.

"I have sent back the carriage for them, dear Mrs. Bodkin," she was
saying, when Rhoda gained self-possession enough to take account of her
words. "Naughty Castalia was not ready. So I said, 'My dear children, I
shall go on without you, and put in an appearance for one member of the
family at least!' So here I am. And my boy and girl will be here
directly. And how is dear Minnie?--How d'ye do, Colonel?--Good evening,
Miss Chubb.--Ah, Alethea! Papa and mamma quite well?--Oh, there she is!
How are you, my dear Minnie? But I need not ask, for I never saw you
looking so well?"

By this time Mrs. Errington had arrived at Minnie's chair, and stooped
to kiss her. Almost at the same moment she caught sight of Rhoda, who
shrank back a little, flushed and trembling. Mrs. Errington thought she
very well understood the cause of this, and thought to herself, "Poor
child, she is ashamed of her father's behaviour!"

"What, my pretty Rhoda!" she said aloud. And, drawing the girl to her,
kissed her warmly. "I'm very glad to see you again, child," continued
Mrs. Errington; "I began to fancy we were not to meet any more. You must
come and see me, and spend a long day. I suppose that won't be against
the laws of the Medes and Persians, eh?"

The familiar voice, the familiar looks, the kind manner of her old
friend, helped to put Rhoda at her ease. The fact, too, that Mrs.
Errington had no suspicion of her feelings was calming. Mrs. Errington
was not apt to suspect people of any feeling but gratification, when she
was talking to them.

In the full glow of her satisfaction Mrs. Errington even condescended to
be gracious to Matthew Diamond, who came forward to offer his
congratulations. "Why, yes, Mr. Diamond," said the good lady, "it is
indeed a marriage after my own heart. And I do not think I am blinded by
the partiality of a mother, when I say the bride's family are quite as
gratified at the alliance as I am. Do you know that one of Mrs.
Algernon's relatives is the Duke of Mackelpie and Brose? A distant
relative, it is true. But these Scotch clans, you know, call cousins to
the twentieth degree! His Grace sent Castalia a beautiful wedding
present: a cairn-gorm, set in solid silver. So characteristic, you know!
and so distinguished! No vulgar finery. Oh, the Broses and the
Kauldkails have been connected from time immemorial."

Then Colonel Whistler came up, and joined the circle round Mrs.
Errington's chair; and Miss Chubb, whose curiosity generally got the
better of her dignity when it came to a struggle between the two. To
them sauntered up Alethea Dockett on the arm of Mr. Pawkins. The latter,
finding it impossible to draw Rhoda into conversation, had
philosophically transferred his attentions to the smiling, black-eyed
Miss Alethea, much to the disgust and scorn of the McDougalls.

Mrs. Errington soon had a numerous audience around her chair, and she
improved the occasion by indulging in such flourishes as fairly
staggered her hearers. Her account of the bride's trousseau was almost
oriental in the splendour and boldness of its imagery. And Matthew
Diamond began to believe that, with very small encouragement, she might
be led on to endow her daughter-in-law with the roc's egg, which even
Aladdin could not compass the possession of, when a diversion took
place.

Algernon Errington appeared close behind Miss Chubb, and said, almost in
her ear, and in his old jaunty way, "Well, is this the way you cut an
old friend? Oh, Miss Chubb, I couldn't have believed it of you!"

The little spinster turned round quite fluttered, with both her fat
little hands extended. "Algy!" she cried. "But I beg pardon; I ought not
to call you by that familiar name now, I suppose!"

"By what name, then? I hope you don't mean to cut me in earnest!"

Then there was a general hand-shaking and exchange of greetings among
the group. Rhoda was still in her old place behind Minnie's chair, and
was invisible at first to one coming to the circle from the other end of
the room, as Algernon had done. But in a minute he saw her, and for once
his self-possession temporarily forsook him.

If he had walked into the sitting-room at old Max's, and seen Rhoda
there, in her accustomed place by his mother's knee, with the accustomed
needlework in her hand, and dressed in the accustomed grey stuff frock,
he might have accosted her with tolerable coolness and _aplomb_. The old
associations, which might have unnerved some soft-hearted persons, would
have strengthened Algernon by vividly recalling his own habitual
ascendancy and superiority over his former love. But instead of the
Rhoda he had been used to see, here was a lovely young lady, elegantly,
even richly, dressed, received among the chief personages of her little
world evidently on equal terms, and looking as gracefully in her right
place there as the best of them.

Algernon stood for a second, staring point-blank at her, unable to move
or to speak. His embarrassment gave her courage. Not less to her own
surprise than to that of the two who were watching her so keenly, she
rose from her chair, and held out her hand with the little torn glove on
it, saying in a soft voice, that was scarcely at all unsteady, "How do
you do, Mr. Errington?"

Algernon shook her proffered hand, and murmured something about having
scarcely recognised her. Then someone else began to speak to him, and he
turned away, as Rhoda resumed her seat, trembling from head to foot.

So the dreaded meeting was over! Let her see him again as often as she
might, no second interview could be looked forward to with the same
anxious apprehension as the first. She had seen Algernon once more! She
had spoken to him, and touched his hand!

It seemed very strange that no outward thing should have changed, when
such a moving drama had been going on within her heart! But not one of
the faces around her showed any consciousness that they had witnessed a
scene from the old, old story; that the clasp of those two young hands
had meant at once, "Hail!" and "Farewell!"--farewell to the sweet,
foolish dream, to the innocent tenderness of youth and maiden, to the
soft thrilling sense of love's presence, that was wont to fill so many
hours of life with a diffused sweetness, like the perfume of hidden
flowers!

No; the world seemed to go on much as usual. The McDougalls came
flouncing up close beside her, to tell Minnie that they had just been
introduced to "the Honourable Mrs. Errington;" and a very young
gentleman (one of Dr. Bodkin's senior scholars) asked Rhoda if she had
had any tea yet, and begged to recommend the pound-cake, from his own
personal experience.

"Go with Mr. Ingleby," said Minnie, authoritatively. "I put Miss
Maxfield under your charge, Ingleby, and shall hold you responsible for
her being properly attended to in the tea-room."

The lad, colouring with pleasure, led off the unresisting Rhoda. All her
force of will, all her courage, seemed to have been expended in the
effort of greeting Algernon. She simply obeyed Miss Bodkin with listless
docility. But, on reaching the tea-room, she was conscious that her
friend had done wisely and kindly in sending her away, for there were
but two persons there. One was Mr. Dockett, who was as inveterate a
tea-drinker as Doctor Johnson; and the other was the Reverend Peter
Warlock, hovering hungrily near the cake-basket. Neither of these
gentlemen took any special notice of her, and she was able to sit quiet
and unobserved. Her cavalier conscientiously endeavoured to fulfil Miss
Minnie's injunctions, but was greatly disappointed by the indifference
which Rhoda manifested to the pound-cake. However, he endeavoured to
make up for her shortcomings by devouring such a quantity of that
confection himself as startled even Dr. Bodkin's old footman, accustomed
to the appetites of many a generation of school-boys.

But all this time where was the bride? The party was given especially in
her honour, and to omit her from any description of it would be an
unpardonable solecism.

The Honourable Mrs. Algernon Ancram Errington sat on a sofa in the
principal drawing-room, with a discontented expression of countenance,
superciliously surveying the company through her eye-glass, and asking
where Algernon was, if he were absent from her side for five minutes.
Castalia was looking in better health than when we first had the honour
of making her acquaintance. She had grown a trifle stouter--or less
lean. Her sojourn in Westmoreland had been more favourable to her looks
than the fatigues of a London season, which, under other circumstances,
she would have been undergoing. Happiness is said to be a great
beautifier. And it was to be supposed that Castalia, having married the
man of her heart, was happy. But yet the fretful creases had not
vanished from her face; and there was even a more suspicious
watchfulness in her bright, deeply-set eyes than formerly.

Perhaps it may be well to record a few of the various verdicts passed on
the bride's manners and appearance by our Whitford friends after that
first evening. Possibly an impartial judgment may be formed from them;
but it will be seen that opinions were strongly conflicting.

Said Dr. Bodkin to his wife, "What can the boy have been thinking of to
marry that woman? A sickly, faded, fretful-looking person, nearly ten
years his senior! I can forgive a generous mistake, but not a mean one.
If he had run away with Ally Dockett from her boarding-school, it would,
no doubt, have been a misfortune, but--I don't know that one would have
loved him much the less!"

"Oh, doctor!"

"I am not counselling young gentlemen to run away with young ladies
from boarding-schools, my dear. But--I'm afraid this has been a marriage
wholly of interest and ambition on his side. Ah! I hoped better things
of Errington." And the doctor went on shaking his head for full a
minute.

Said Mrs. Smith to Mrs. Dockett, "What do you think of the bride?" Said
Mrs. Dockett to Mrs. Smith, "A stuck-up, unpleasant little thing! And I
do wish somebody would tell her to keep her gown on her shoulders. I
assure you, if I were to see my Ally half undressed in that fashion, I
should box her ears. And Ally has a very pretty pair of shoulders,
though I say it. She is not a bag of bones, like Mrs. Algernon, at all
events."

Said Miss Chubb to her old woman servant, "Well, the Honourable Mrs.
Algernon Errington is very _distangy_ looking, Martha. That's a French
word that means--means out of the common, aristocratic, you know. Very
_distangy_, certainly! But she lacks sentiment, in my opinion. And her
outline is very sharp, Martha. I prefer a rounder contour, both of face
and figure. Some of the ladies found fault with her because of her low
dress. But that--as I happen to know--is quite the custom with our upper
classes in town. Mrs. Figgins's--wife of the Bishop of Plumbunn, you
know, Martha--Mrs. Figgins's sister, who married Sir William Wick, of
the Honourable Company of Tallow Chandlers, I believe--that's a kind of
City society for dining sumptuously, Martha; you mustn't suppose it has
anything to do with selling tallow candles! Well, Lady Wick sat down to
dinner in low, every day of her life!"

Mr. Diamond and young Pawkins walked a little way together from the
doctor's house to the "Blue Bell" inn. The master of Pudcombe Hall, on
attempting to resume his acquaintance with the bride, had been received
with scant courtesy. But this was not so much because Castalia intended
to be specially uncivil to him, as because at that moment it happened,
unfortunately, that she saw her husband in a distant part of the room
talking to Minnie Bodkin with an air of animation.

"By Jove!" cried the ingenuous Pawkins, "I don't envy Errington. His
wife looks so uncommon ill-tempered, and turns up her honourable nose at
everybody."

"She does not turn up her nose at him," returned Diamond. "And Errington
will not be over sensitive on behalf of his friends."

"Oh, well! But she's so crabbed, somehow. One expects a bride to have
some kind of softness in her manners, and--hang it all, there's not a
particle of romance about her."

"My dear fellow, if there is in the United Kingdom a young man of
three-and-twenty who can comfortably dispense with romance in his wife,
our friend Errington is that young man."

"Oh, well! I know Errington's a very clever fellow, and all that, and
perhaps I'm a fool. But I--I shouldn't like my wife to be quite so cool
and cutting in her manners, that's all!"

"Neither should I. And perhaps I'm a fool!"

"Shouldn't you, now?" Orlando was encouraged by this admission on
Diamond's part, further, to express his opinion that it was all very
fine to stick "Honourable" before your name; but that, for his part, he
considered little Miss Maxfield to look fifty times more like a lady
than Mrs. Algernon. And as for good looks, there was, of course, no
comparison. And though Miss Maxfield was too shy and quiet, yet if you
offered her any little civility, she thanked you in such a sweet way
that a fellow felt as if he could do anything for her; whereas, some
women stare at a fellow enough to turn a fellow into stone.

But the Misses McDougall were enthusiastic in their praises of
Algernon's wife. They performed a sort of Carmen Amoeboeum after
this fashion:

_Rose._ "That sweet creature, the Honourable Mrs. Algernon! I can't get
her out of my head."

_Violet._ "Dear thing! What high-bred manners! And did she tell you that
we are positively related? The Mackelpies, you know, call cousins with
us. There was the branch that went off from the elder line of
Brose"--&c. &c. &c.

_Rose._ "Oh yes; one feels at home directly with people of one's own
class. How lucky Algernon has been to get such a wife, instead of some
chit of a girl who would have had no weight in society!"

_Violet._ "Yes; but she's quite young enough, Rose?"

_Rose._ "Oh, dear me, of course! But I meant that Algernon has shown his
sense in not selecting a bread-and-butter Miss. I own I detest
school-girls."

_Violet._ "She asked us to go and see her. Do you know I think we were
the only girls in the room she seemed to take to at all! Even Minnie
Bodkin, now--she was very cool, I thought, to Minnie."

_Rose._ "My dear child, how often have I told you that the people here
have quite a mistaken estimate of Minnie Bodkin? They have just spoiled
her. Her airs are really ludicrous. But directly a person of superior
birth comes to the place you see how it is! Perhaps you'll believe me
another time. I do think you were half inclined to fall down and worship
Minnie yourself!"

_Violet._ "Oh no; not that! But she is very clever, you know. And, in
spite of her affliction, I thought she looked wonderfully handsome
to-night."

_Rose._ (Sharply.) "Pshaw! She was dressed up like an actress. I saw the
look Mrs. Algernon gave her. How beautifully Mrs. Algernon had her hair
done!"

_Violet._ "And did you notice that little flounce at the bottom of her
dress?"----&c. &c.

_Both._ (Almost together.) "Isn't she charming, uncle?"

"Very," answered Colonel Whistler, twirling his moustaches. Then the
gallant gentleman, as he took his bed-candle, was heard to mutter
something which sounded like "d----d skinny!"




CHAPTER X.


"Love in a cottage" is a time-honoured phrase, which changes its
significance considerably, according to the lips that utter it. To some
persons, Love in a cottage would be suggestive of dreary obscurity,
privation, cold mutton, and one maid-of-all-work. To others, it might
mean a villa with its lawn running down to the Thames, a basket-phaeton
and pair of ponies, and the modest simplicity of footmen without powder.
To another class of minds, again, Love in a cottage might stand for a
comprehensive hieroglyph of honest affection, sufficiently robust to
live and thrive even on a diet of cold mutton, and warm-blooded enough
to defy the nip of poverty's east winds.

Lady Seely had joked, in her cheerful, candid way, with her niece-in-law
about her establishment in life, and had said, "Well, Castalia, you'll
have love in a cottage, at all events! Some people are worse off. And at
your age, you know (quite between ourselves), you must think yourself
lucky to get a husband at all."

Miss Kilfinane had made some retort to the effect that she did not
intend to remain all her life in a cottage, with or without love; and
that if Lord Seely could do nothing for Ancram, she (Castalia) had other
connections who might be more influential.

But, in truth, Castalia did think that she could be quite content to
live with Algernon Errington under a thatched roof; having only a
conventional and artificial conception of such a dwelling, derived
chiefly from lithographed drawing-copies. It was not, of course, that
Castalia Kilfinane did not know that thatched hovels are frequently
comfortless, ill-ventilated, "the noted haunt of" earwigs, and limited
in the accommodation necessary for a genteel family. But such knowledge
was packed away in some quite different department of her mind from that
which habitually contemplated her own personal existence, present and
future. Wiser folks than Castalia are apt to anticipate exceptions to
general laws in their own favour.

Castalia was undoubtedly in love with Algernon. That is to say, she
would have liked better to be his wife in poverty and obscurity, than to
accept a title and a handsome settlement from any other man whom she had
ever seen; although she would probably have taken the latter had the
chance been offered to her.

Nor is that bringing so hard an accusation against her as may at first
sight appear. She would have liked best to be Algernon's wife; but for
penniless Castalia Kilfinane to marry a poor man when she might have had
a rich one, would have required her to disregard some of the strongest
and most vital convictions of the persons among whom she lived. Let
their words be what they might, their deeds irrefragably proved that
they held poverty to be the one fatal, unforgiven sin, which so covered
any multitude of virtues as utterly to hide and overwhelm them. You
could no more expect Castalia to be impervious to this creed, than you
could expect a sapling to draw its nourishment from a distant soil,
rather than from the earth immediately around its roots. To be sure
there have been vigorous young trees that would strike out tough
branching fibres to an incredible distance, in search of the food that
was best for them. Such human plants are rare; and poor narrow-minded,
ill-educated Castalia was not of them.

Had she been much beloved, it is possible that she might have ripened
into sweetness under that celestial sunshine. But it was not destined to
be hers.

In some natures the giving even of unrequited love is beautifying to
the character. But I think that in such cases the beauty is due to that
pathetic compassion which blends with all love of a high nature for a
lower one. Do you think that all the Griseldas believe in their lords'
wisdom and justice? Do you fancy that the fathers of prodigal sons do
not oftentimes perceive the young vagabonds' sins and shortcomings with
a terrible perspicuity that pierces the poor fond heart like sharp
steel? Do you not know that Cordelia saw more quickly and certainly than
the sneering, sycophant courtiers, every weakness and vanity of the
rash, choleric old king? But there are hearts in which such knowledge is
transmuted not into bitter resentment, but into a yearning, angelic
pity. Only, in order to feel this pity, we must rise to some point above
the erring one. Now poor Castalia had been so repressed by "low
ambition," and the petty influences of a poverty ever at odds with
appearances, that the naturally weak wings of her spirit seemed to have
lost all power of soaring.

The earliest days Mrs. Algernon Errington spent in her new home were
passed in making a series of disagreeable discoveries. The first
discovery was that a six-roomed brick cottage is, practically, a far
less commodious dwelling than any she had hitherto lived in. The walls
of Ivy Lodge (that was the name of the little house, which had not a
twig of greenery to soften its bare red face) appeared so slight that
she fancied her conversation could be overheard by the passersby in the
road. The rooms were so small that her dress seemed to fill them to
overflowing, although those were not the days of crinolines and long
trains. The little staircase was narrow and steep. The kitchen was so
close to the living rooms that, at dinner-time, the whole house seemed
to exhale a smell of roast mutton. The stowing away of her wardrobe
taxed to the utmost the ingenuity of her maid. And the few articles of
furniture which Lady Seely had raked out from disused sitting-rooms,
appeared almost as Brobdingnagian in Ivy Lodge as real tables and chairs
would seem beside the furniture of a doll's house.

A second discovery--made very quickly after her arrival in Whitford--was
still more unpleasant. It was this: that a fine London-bred lady's-maid
is an inconvenient and unmanageable servant to introduce into a small
humble household. Poor Castalia "couldn't think what had come to
Slater!" And Slater went about with a thunderous brow and sulky mouth,
conveying by her manner a sort of contemptuous compassion for her
mistress, and a contempt by no means compassionate for everybody else in
the house.

The stout Whitford servant-of-all-work offended her beyond forgiveness,
on the very first day of their acquaintance, by bluntly remarking that
well-cooked bacon and cabbage was a good-enough dinner for anybody; and
that if Mrs. Slater had see'd as many hungry folks as she (Polly) had,
she would say her grace and fall-to with a thankful heart instead of
turning up her nose, and picking at good wholesome victuals with a fork!
Moreover, Polly was not in the least awe-stricken by Mrs. Slater's black
silk gown, or the gold watch she wore at her belt. She observed,
cheerfully, that such-like fine toggery was all very well at church or
chapel; and, for her part, she always had, and always would, put a bit
of a flower in her bonnet on Sundays, and them mississes as didn't like
it must get some one else to serve 'em. But, when she was about her
work, she liked to be dressed in working clothes. And a servant as
wanted to bring second-hand parlour manners into the kitchen seemed to
her a poor cretur'--neither fish, flesh, fowl, nor good red-herring.

All which indignities Slater visited on her mistress, finding it
impossible to disconcert or repress Polly, who only laughed heartily at
her genteelest flights.

But these things were not the worst. The worst was that Algernon showed
very plainly a disinclination to sympathise with his wife's annoyance,
and his intention of withdrawing himself from all domestic troubles, as
if he considered them to be clearly no concern of his. Mrs. Errington,
indeed, would have come to the rescue of her daughter-in-law, but
neither of Mrs. Algernon's servants were disposed to submit to Mrs.
Errington's authority. And the good lady was no more inclined than her
son to take trouble and expose herself to unpleasantness for any one
else's sake.

Castalia and her mother-in-law did not grow more attached to each other
the more intimate their acquaintance became. They had one sentiment in
common--namely, love for Algernon. But this sentiment did not tend to
unite them. Indeed--putting the rivalry of lovers out of the question,
of course--it would be a mistake to conclude that because A and B both
love C, therefore A and B must love each other. Mrs. Errington thought
that Castalia worried Algernon by complaints. Castalia thought that Mrs.
Errington was often a thorn in her son's side by reason of her
indulgence in the opposite feelings; that is to say, over-sanguine and
boastful prognostications.

"My dear Algy," his mother would say, "there is not the least doubt that
you have a brilliant career before you. Your talents were appreciated by
the highest in the land, directly you became known to them. It is
impossible that you should be left here in the shade. No, no; Whitford
won't hold you long. Of that I am certain!"

To which Castalia would reply that Whitford ought never to have held him
at all; that the post he filled there was absurdly beneath his standing
and abilities, and that Lord Seely would never have dreamt of offering
Ancram such a position if it had not been for my lady, who is the most
selfish, domineering woman in the world.

"I'm sorry to have to say it, Mrs. Errington, since she is your
relation. And you needn't suppose that she cares any the more for Ancram
because he's her far-away cousin. At most, she only looks upon him as a
kind of poor relation that ought to put up with anything. And she's
always abusing her own family. She said to Uncle Val, in my presence,
that the Ancrams could never be satisfied, do what you would for them;
so he might as well make up his mind to that, first as last. She told me
to my face, the week before I was married, that Ancram and I ought to go
down on our knees in thankfulness to her, for having got us a decent
living. That was pretty impudent from her to a Kilfinane, I think!"

Algernon laughed with impartial good-humour at his mother's
rose-coloured visions and his wife's gloomier views; but the good humour
was a little cynical, and his eyes had lost their old sparkle of
enjoyment; or, at least, it shone there far less frequently than
formerly.

As to his business--his superintendence of the correspondence, by
letter, between Whitford and the rest of the civilised world--that, it
must be owned, seemed to sit lightly on the new postmaster. There was an
elderly clerk in the office, named Gibbs. He was uncle to Miss Bodkin's
maid Jane and her brother the converted groom, and was himself a member
of the Wesleyan Society. Mr. Gibbs had been employed many years in the
Whitford Post-office, and understood the routine of its business very
well. Algernon relied on Mr. Gibbs, he said, and made himself very
pleasant in his dealings with that functionary. What was the use, he
asked, of disturbing and harassing a tried servant by a too restless
supervision? He thought it best, if you trusted your subordinates at
all, to trust them thoroughly.

And, certainly, Mr. Gibbs was very thoroughly trusted; so much so,
indeed, that all the trouble and responsibility of the office-work
appeared to be shifted on to his shoulders. Yet Mr. Gibbs seemed not to
be discontented with this state of things. Possibly he looked forward to
promotion. Algernon's wife and mother freely gave it to be understood in
the town that Whitford was not destined long to have the honour of
retaining Mr. Ancram Errington. Mr. Gibbs did the work; and, perhaps,
he hoped eventually to receive the pay. Why should he not step into the
vacant place of postmaster, when his chief should be translated to a
higher sphere?

I daresay that, in these times of general reform, of competitive
examinations and official purity, no such state of things could be
possible as existed in the Whitford Post-office forty odd years ago. I
have only faithfully to record the events of my story, and to express my
humble willingness to believe that, nowadays, "_nous avons change tout
cela_." I must, however, be allowed distinctly to assert, and
unflinchingly to maintain, that Algernon took no pains to acquire any
knowledge of his business; and that, nevertheless, the postal
communications between Whitford and the rest of the world appeared to go
on much as they had gone on during the reign of his predecessor.

Mr. Gibbs was a close, quiet man, grave and sparing of speech. He had
known something of the Erringtons for many years, having been a crony of
old Maxfield's once upon a time. Mr. Gibbs remembered seeing Algernon's
smiling, rosy face and light figure flitting through the long passage at
old Max's in his school-boy days. He remembered having once or twice met
the majestic Mrs. Errington in the doorway; and could recollect quite
well how the tinkling sound of the harpsichord and Algy's fresh young
voice used to penetrate into the back parlour on prayer-meeting nights,
and fill the pauses between Brother Jackson's nasal dronings or Brother
Powell's passionate supplications. Mr. Gibbs had not then conceived a
favourable idea of the Erringtons, looking on them as worldly and
unconverted persons, of whom Jonathan Maxfield would do well to purge
his house. But Mr. Gibbs kept his official life and his private life
very perfectly asunder, and he allowed no sectarian prejudices to make
him rusty and unmanageable in his relations with the new postmaster.

Then, Mr. Gibbs was not altogether proof against the charm of Algy's
manner. Once upon a time Algy had been pleasant to all the world, for
the sheer pleasure of pleasing. Years, in their natural course, had a
little hardened the ductility of his compliant manners--a little
roughened the smoothness of his once almost flawless temper. But
disappointment, and the--to Algernon--almost unendurable sense that he
stood lower in his friends' admiration (I do not say estimation) than
formerly, had changed him more rapidly than the mere course of time
would have done. Still, when Mr. Ancram Errington strongly desired to
attract, persuade, or fascinate, there were few persons who could resist
him. He found it worth while to fascinate Mr. Gibbs, desiring not only
that his clerk should carry his burden for him, but should carry it so
cheerfully and smilingly as to make him feel comfortable and complacent
at having made the transfer.

I have said that disappointment had changed Algernon. He was
disappointed in his marriage. It was not that he had been a victim to
any romantic illusions as regarded his wife. He had had his little
love-romance some time ago; had it, and tasted it, and enjoyed it as a
child enjoys a fairy tale, feeling that it belongs to quite another
realm from the everyday world of nursery dinners, Latin grammars, and
torn pinafores, and not in the least expecting to see Fanfreluche fly
down the chimney into the school-room, or to find Cinderella's glass
slipper on the stairs as he goes up to bed. Romances that touch the
fancy only, and in which the heart has no share, are easily put off and
on. Algernon had wilfully laid his romance aside, and did not regret it.
Castalia's lack of charm, and sweetness, and sympathy would not greatly
have troubled him--did he not know it all beforehand?--had she been able
to help him into a brilliant position, and to cause him to be received
and caressed by her noble relatives and the delightful world of
fashionable society. It was not that she failed to put any sunlight into
his days, and to fill his home with a sweet atmosphere of love and
trust. Algy would willingly enough have dispensed with that sort of
sunshine if he could but have had plenty of wax candles and fine
crystal lustres for them to sparkle in. Give him a handsome suite of
drawing-rooms, filled with the rich odours of pastille and pot-pourri,
and Algy would make no sickly lamentations over the absence of any
"sweet atmosphere" such as I have written of above. Only put his
attractive figure into a suitable frame, and he would be sure to receive
praise and sympathy enough, and to have a pleasant life of it.

No; he could not accuse himself of having been the victim of any
sentimental illusion in marrying Castalia. And yet he had been cheated!
He had bestowed himself without receiving the due _quid pro quo_. In a
word, he began to fear that it had not been worth his while to marry the
Honourable Miss Kilfinane. And sometimes the thought darted like a
twinge of pain through the young man's mind--might it not have been
worth his while to marry someone else?

"Someone else" was talked of as an heiress. "Someone else" was said by
the gossips to be so good a match that she might have her pick of the
town--aye, and a good chance among the county people! But Algernon
smothered down all vain and harassing speculations founded on an "if it
had been!" Neither did he by any means hopelessly resign himself to his
present position, nor despair of obtaining a better one. He persisted
in looking on his employment as merely provisional and temporary; so
that, in fact, the worse things became in his Whitford life, the less he
would do to mend them, taking every fresh disgust and annoyance as a new
reason why--according to any rationally conceivable theory of events--he
must speedily be removed to a region in which a gentleman of his
capacities for refined enjoyment might be free to exercise them,
untrammelled by vulgar cares.




CHAPTER XI.


It was true that Mrs. Algernon Errington had distinguished the Misses
McDougall, by her notice, above all the other ladies whom she met at Dr.
Bodkin's. The rest had by no means found favour in her eyes. Minnie
Bodkin she decidedly disapproved of. Ally Dockett was "a little
black-eyed, fat, flirting thing." The elder ladies were frumps, or
frights, or bores. Rhoda Maxfield she had scarcely seen. On the evening
of the Bodkins' party, Rhoda, as we know, had kept herself studiously in
the background.

Mrs. Errington intended to present Rhoda to her daughter-in-law as her
own especial pet and _protegee_, but a favourable moment for fulfilling
this intention did not offer itself. Rhoda had not distinctly expressed
any unwillingness to be taken to Ivy Lodge, and it could never enter
into Mrs. Errington's head to guess that she felt such unwillingness.
But in some way the project seemed to be eluded; so that Castalia had
been some weeks in Whitford without making the acquaintance of Miss
Maxfield, as she began to be called, even by some of those to whom she
had been "Old Max's little Rhoda" all her life.

Castalia, indeed, troubled her head very little about Rhoda, under
whatever style or title she might be mentioned. We may be sure that
Algernon never spoke to his wife of the old days at the Maxfields;
indeed, he eschewed all allusion to that name as much as possible.
Castalia knew from Mrs. Errington that there had been a young girl in
the house where she had lodged, the daughter of the grocer, who was her
landlord; but, being pretty well accustomed to Mrs. Errington's
highly-coloured descriptions of things and people, she had paid no
attention to that lady's praises of Rhoda's intelligence, good looks,
and pretty manners.

No; Castalia troubled not her head about Rhoda. But she was troubled
about Minnie Bodkin, of whom she became bitterly jealous. She did not
suppose, to be sure, that her husband had ever made love to Miss Bodkin;
but she was constantly tormented by the suspicion that Algernon was
admiring Minnie, and comparing her beauty, wit, and accomplishments with
those of his wife, to the disadvantage of the latter. Not that she
(Castalia) admired her. Far from it! But--she was just the sort of
person to be taking with men. She had such a forward, confident, showy
way with her!

Some speech of this sort being uttered in the presence of the Misses
McDougall, was seized upon, and echoed, and re-echoed, and made much of
by those young ladies, who pounced on poor Minnie, and tore her to
pieces with great skill and gusto. Violet, indeed, made a feeble protest
now and then on behalf of her friend; but how was she to oppose her
sister and that sweet Mrs. Algernon? And then, in conscience and
candour, she could not but admit that poor dear Minnie had many and
glaring faults.

In fact, Rose and Violet McDougall were installed as toadies in ordinary
to Castalia. They were her dearest friends; they called her by her
Christian-name; they flattered her weaknesses, and encouraged her worst
traits; not, we may charitably believe, with the full consciousness of
what they were doing. For her part, Castalia soon got into the habit of
liking to have these ladies about her. They performed many little
offices which saved her trouble; they were devoted to her interests, and
brought her news of the doings of the opposite faction. For there was an
opposite faction; or Castalia persuaded herself that there was. The
Bodkins were ranged in it, in her jealous fancy; and so were the
Docketts, and one or two more of Algernon's old friends. Miss Chubb she
considered to hover as yet on neutral ground. As to the unmarried
men--young Pawkins, Mr. Diamond, and the curate of St. Chad's--they were
not much taken into account in this species of subterranean warfare,
carried on with an arsenal of sneers, stares, slights, hints,
coolnesses, bridlings, envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness.

I have said that the warfare was subterranean; occult, as it were. Had
the enemy been actuated by similar feelings to those of Castalia and her
party, hostilities must have blazed up openly. But most of them did not
even know that they were being assailed. Among these unconscious ones
were Dr. and Mrs. Bodkin. Minnie had at times a suspicion that Algy's
wife disliked her. But then the manners of Algy's wife were not genial
or gracious to anyone, and Minnie could not but feel a certain
compassion for her, which extinguished resentment at her sour words and
ways.

With the rest of the Whitford society, the bride did not enter into
intimate, or even amicable, relations. She offended most of the worthy
matrons who called on her by merely returning her card, and not even
asking to be admitted to see them. As to offering any entertainment in
return for the hospitalities that were offered to her during the first
weeks that she dwelt in Whitford, that, Castalia said, was out of the
question. How could more than two persons sit at table in her little
dining-room? And how was it possible to receive company in Ivy Lodge?

But Whitford was not quite of her opinion in this matter. It was true
her rooms were small; but were they smaller than Mrs. Jones's, who gave
three tea-parties every year, and received her friends in detachments?
Why was Ivy Lodge less adapted for festive purposes than Dr. Smith's
house in the High Street?--a queer, ancient, crooked nook of a dwelling,
squeezed in between two larger neighbours, with a number of tiny dark
rooms like closets; in which, nevertheless, some of the best crumpets
and tea-cakes known to that community, not to mention little lobster
suppers in the season, had been consumed by the Smiths' friends with
much satisfaction. As Mrs. Dockett observed, it was not so much what you
gave as the spirit you gave it in that mattered! And she was not
ashamed, not she, to recall the time, in the beginning of Mr. Dockett's
career, when she had with her own hands prepared a welsh rabbit and a
jorum of spiced ale for a little party of friends, having nothing
better to offer them for supper. In a word, it was Whitford's creed that
even the most indigestible food, freely bestowed, might bless him that
gave and him that received; and that if the Algernon Erringtons did not
offer anyone so much as a cup of tea in their house, the real reason was
to be sought in the lady's proud reserve and a general state of feeling
which Mrs. Dockett described as "stuck-upishness."

Castalia was unaccustomed to walking, and disliked that exercise. Riding
was out of her power, no saddle-horse that would carry a lady being kept
for hire in Whitford, and the jingling old fly from the "Blue Bell" inn
was employed to carry her to such houses as she deigned to visit at. Her
mother-in-law's lodging was not very frequently honoured by her
presence. The stairs frightened her, she said; they were like a ladder.
Mrs. Thimbleby's oblong drawing-room was a horr

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