-i 
 
fyxull Winivmii^ I 
 
 pibat^g 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 
 
 Az-iQ^oo 
 
 ^iifja. 
 
 9724 
 
4TOIS WAELEIGH'S 
 FORTUNES. 
 
 ^ Kooel. 
 
 BY HOLME LEI!, 
 
 AUTBOB OF 
 
 "SYLVAN BOWS DAUGHTBBi" "KATHIE BKANDE," 
 &C., Ac. 
 
 u**^*^4^^*tr 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 HABPEB i BEOTHERS, PUBHSHEES» 
 
 rBANBLIH BQITAB]!. 
 
 1864. 
 
lo Oo« large Volume, 6vo. {In a/ew day$,) 
 Price $3 50. 
 
 With a Map of Easterji Equatorial Africa by Captain Speke j superior Illustrations, 
 
 chiefly from Prawings by Captain Grant j and Portrate, cagmved 
 
 on Sted, of Captains Speke and Qrant. 
 
 JOURNAL 
 
 OF THE 
 
 DISCOVERY OF THE SOURCE 
 
 dF 
 
 THE KILE, 
 
 By JOHN HANNING SPEKE, 
 
 Captain H. M. Indian Army. 
 
 Eztracta both. English Reviews. 
 
 Tba TOlame vhich Captain Speke has presented to the 
 urarld postMsea more than a geographical intereat. It is 
 » monument of peTsereraoce] courage, and temper dis- 
 placed under difficulties wl)ich have perhaps never been 
 eouated. — Times. 
 ucqueationahly the most novel and valuable book of 
 
 -^tmvel that has been given us these many years. * • • 
 From the moment of starting Captain Speke's Journal 
 laments a tale of strange, startling, and unbroken interest 
 to Its close. It is written without affectation or effort, in 
 B,^traightforward, lively, vigorous manner, that has in it 
 
 '.^e ^ear intelligence and truthfulness of a watchful ob- 
 
 b^fver and a genuine man. ' It could not be more engag- 
 ing or effective, and the reader gladly keeps his authors 
 fit^Cioating and instructive- company till the Journal is 
 
 |tt^ NvnamformM. •■ 
 
 B^'^Ovtain Speke has not written a noble book so much as 
 he lias done a noble deed. The volume which records his 
 
 ^plikt achievement is but the minor fact— the history of the 
 'discovery, not the discovery itself; yet even as a literary 
 
 ^arformance it is worthy of very high praise. It is wholly 
 free from the traces of book manufocture. * * * It is a great 
 
 . Moiy that is thus plainly told ; a story of which nearly, all 
 the interest lies in the strange facts related, and, more than 
 all. In the crowning fkct that frees us, in a large degree, 
 from a geographical puzr.le which had excited the curios- 
 ity gf mankind— of the most illnstrlons emperors and ccm- 
 mauities — from very early times. — AOutuBum. 
 
 TiUs volume of Captain Speke's, in which he establishes 
 beyond dispute his right to the honor of a discovery which 
 bad engaged the attention and curiosity of men from the 
 Saillest ages, is not only a record of that discovery— it is a 
 pionament of heroic persistency under circumstances the 
 most AppaUing, and a treasury of new and surprising 
 knowledge of many kinds. More enchanting than a fbiry 
 tale, more exciting than a n<^vel, its greatest charm is yet 
 that every word of It is true, and its thrilling revelations 
 fie recounted with a modesty whicli Is, we suppose, as 
 cluracteristic of true genius as it is of real bravery— 
 JDaiiy Sews. 
 
 Deeply interesting, not alone for the event which forms 
 its principal feature, but for the vast amount of informa- 
 tion, lucidly conveyed, which it affords as to the scenes 
 through which he journeyed and the people with whom 
 he was-lJrougbt Into contact. It is a graphic and at the 
 tame time modest and evidently unexaggerated nuratiTe 
 c^ facts. — Homing Pott. 
 
 This is a tremendous feat— yet not a tithe of its dangers, 
 difficulties, and terron are realised to the mind until after 
 a perusal of Caiitain Snake's artless but IhtiUlOf ntonittv*. 
 Seottman. 
 
 This thorough unconsciousness of all dangers or hard. 
 ships except as impediments to bis progress to the great 
 fountain-head, seems to have been his real protection 
 through t^e hundreds of days on every one of which no 
 respectable insurance-office i^ould have taken his U£b ct 
 any reasonable premium. As the fieicest wild lieaste are 
 said to be appalled by the eye that ^hows no imprsBsioa 
 either of risk or wrath, so the sanguinary potoitatea 
 among whom eur explorer went, demanding nothing but 
 a clear path to the head of the Nile, but determined to get 
 that, seem to have restrained in their amazement the nat- 
 ural impulses of their ferocity. — Blackumo^a Magcaeint, 
 
 To h»ve cleared up the great geographical myetray of 
 the sourees of the Nile, to have tracked that poetic stream 
 up to its long-hidden fountain, through regipns wholly 
 unknown to the white traveler, regions that nave flo 1(^ 
 been the theme of strange romance and legend — tliis^ 
 indeed a triumph for modem enterprise, and it is no won- 
 der that it has thrown all our geogiaphers into a ^iver of 
 excitement and curiosity.— «/bm» BuU. 
 
 It is a noble achievement that he has to relate, and he 
 relates it with manful simplicity. — Swn. 
 
 The directness, the clearness, the indifference to man* 
 ner, the very tmstylishness of his style, gives his work a 
 charm from beginning to end which does not allow it, Ig 
 the lengthiest of his descriptions, for a moment to pall on 
 the reader. — Dany Stvieui. 
 
 One of the most interesting books of travel ever com- 
 posed. — LoTuUm Beviea. 
 
 We may congratulate Captidn Speke not only on hwrlng 
 solved a great geographical problem by a remarkable e^ 
 ercise of tact, courage, and perseverence, but also on hav- 
 ing written a most ludd and forcible account of it.— . 
 OwtrcUlitn. 
 
 The narrative gives us a thrilling idea of British hardi- 
 hood, perseverance, and skill, and thus has an interest be- 
 yond that of the geographical question which it solves.— - 
 Chamber6''B JourrMl, 
 
 It was only f^om his own diaiy that the picture of pa> 
 tient energy and manly resolution could have been so well 
 brought out. It abonnds with very extraordinary inci- 
 dents ; and this graphic narrative affords probably a closer 
 insight into savage life than any more artistic production 
 could have given. — Quarterly Sevmo. 
 
 ilere is no book-making nor clap-trap points, but a 
 plain, straightforward, manly, record-beaimg truthful- 
 ness on its surface, and so instinct with life and color 
 that a series uf jienrpictnres are presented in wUch th^ 
 salient features of the people and the countries naaaeS 
 throngh ar« at onca ruogniiabla.— tSh^iVv (tn(i Ultrecm- 
 tOtSaittte. 
 
 HARPSR & BKOTBBRSI, PubUshera, Fnnklln SqpuuW) N«w Toxk. 
 
HARPER'S 
 
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HARPER'S LIBRARY OF SELECT NOVELS. 
 
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 240. The Wife's Evidence. By Wills 
 
AINIS WAELEIGH'S 
 FORTUNES. 
 
 % N0t)eL 
 
 BY HOLME LEE, 
 
 AtlTHOE OF 
 
 "SYLVAN HOLT'S DAUGHTER," "KATHIE BEANDE," 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 FEANKLIN SQUARE. 
 
 1 8 G 4. 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013532241 
 
ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FOETUMS. 
 
 PART FIEST. 
 
 THE ELDEE GENEEATION. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIRST. 
 
 HOME. 
 
 Glad Bight whenever new with old 
 Is joined through some dear home-born tie ; 
 
 The life of all that we behold 
 Depends upon that mystery. — Wordsworth. 
 
 I. 
 
 It was like a dream ! From her own win- 
 dow — the window of her own dear old room 
 at home — ^Rachel Withers was looking over the 
 wide moorland, wrapped in its rich purple Au- 
 gust mantle, where the sunset glowed with a 
 fervent heat, and the winds that were never still 
 frolicked roughly by in their breezy play ; over 
 the ripening corn-fields, and hilly pastures, and 
 warm-scented fir-woods to Hurtle-Force, where 
 the river rushed down the rocks in two great 
 silvery leaps, then, in a shallow, stone-encum- 
 bered bed, wound its devious way through the 
 beautiful little valley, past the church, past 
 Prior's Mill, under the steep arch of Riccall 
 bridge) by Brafferton and Floyd's Seat, to the 
 wider levels of the plain, where it was lost in a 
 hazy glory of gold and crimson evening clouds. 
 
 Oh ! the delight of being at home again in 
 these wild, familiar scenes. The people wel- 
 comed them back as they might have welcomed 
 kinsfolk, and an exile of six years had only 
 made their old pastor's children' love them bet- 
 ter. There was very little change either within 
 or without the rectory. A few faces of ancient 
 friends had disappeared, and some of the un- 
 kempt bairns had grown up into rough-hewn 
 men and women ; but there had been no whole- 
 sale emigrations such as occur in less isolated 
 places, and all the families were still where they 
 were. The parish wag wide and scattered, but 
 John Withers was vigorous, and hard walking 
 never came amiss to him, any more than it had 
 done to his father. He was off up the dale now 
 to the Hurtlemere House, where Sir William 
 Warleigh was staying for the shooting. Rachel 
 would have accompanied him, but they did not 
 know who was there besides ; Laurence they 
 were sure, was abroad, and the girls had not ap- 
 peared at church yet ; while sleek, crafty, velvet- 
 gloved Oliver with the claws was never a favor- 
 ite of hers. 
 
 lu-doors they were quite settled already. As 
 Mr. Brooke took the household plenishing off 
 their hands when they went away, so they had 
 
 taken it back off his widow's hands when she 
 was obliged to leave. Thus, each piece of fur- 
 niture was an intimate acquaintance, and as the 
 Brookes were a thrifty, cWldless couple, nothing 
 logked the worse for its alien service. The 
 carved oak that their parents gathered together 
 when they were married, suited the wainscoted 
 rooms ; for, if quaint and cumbrous, it was also 
 rich. It was a pleasure inexpressible for Rachel 
 to help John in putting the precious volumes of 
 their father's library up on their old shelves, 
 and, as nearly as they could recollect, in their 
 old places, until, now that they were arranged, 
 they looked as if they had never been away. 
 The garden had been beautifully kept in their 
 absence, and Kester Greaves, who was the 
 Brookes's odd man, remained with them in the 
 same capacity ; Mary Deane, the cook, also staid, 
 and Phemie, her cousin, as housemaid; and 
 they, with two dogs and a. cat, made up the 
 Withers's present domestic establishment. 
 
 Their old friends the Andersides were at 
 Brafferton still, but the gray curate was gone — 
 promoted to a parsonage of his own amongst 
 the Potteries — and a Mr. Gilsland worked in his 
 stead. He was a Trinity man, like John With- 
 ers, but took his degree a year earlier. Their 
 acquaintance was very slight while at Cambridge, 
 but they seemed disposed now to cultivate each 
 other's society ; and Mr. Gilsland congratulated 
 hitoself loudly on meeting with a civilized com- 
 panion amongst the barbarians, as he called the 
 canny dales' folk. Rachel was surprised that he 
 did not appreciate them more highly ; the rough 
 humor and strong practical sense that distin- 
 guished them were traits of character which she 
 thought most men would have valued. A plain, 
 home-spun race they undeniably were, and bluilt 
 and independent in their ways, but also they 
 were full of honest selfoespect, and of a simple, 
 sincere kindliness that usually proved most at- 
 tachable qualities between priest and people. 
 John Withers vowed that he would rather lay 
 his bones in the dust of Hurtledale than migrate 
 even to a bishopric, and of the same counsel 
 was his sister ; for oh ! how bonnie the familiar 
 landscape looked that night I howfreshly the na- 
 tive air blew in on her brow through the open 
 window r She could almost have cried for joy 
 when she thought they were at home once more 
 — at home once more ! 
 
 Their father had been rector of Hurtledale 
 
6 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 for nearly forty y^are, and had survived the loss 
 of his wife only three months, dying a few days 
 after his son's ordmation. John was Kachel's 
 elder by ten years ; he was the first-born of his 
 mother, and she was her little reckling. Of the 
 three children who came between them not one 
 outlived the perils of infancy. They left home, 
 therefore, in the early days of their mourning, 
 brother and sister, alone in the world, yet they 
 left it divided ; John to go to his first curacy in 
 Wales, and Rachel to encounter the unknown 
 hardships of life at school. It was terrible to 
 look forward to, but, after all, she was very 
 happy there. She would not have forgotten any 
 of the time between then and now if she could, 
 or any of the friends she found amongst her 
 young companions. There was great pleasure 
 in that enthusiasm of girls' love, and she count 
 ed those white days long on which their letters 
 came ; though she had begun to see that the 
 glory of it must soon pass away, and that already 
 two or three were falling off from the list, ab- 
 sorbed into hopes and cares and duties other 
 than thoge of visionary youth. 
 
 John laughed at her romance, but he had 
 quite as strong a genius for friendship as her- 
 self Were not Arthur Hill and he almost more 
 than brothers ? It was always gala-day when 
 they two met after ever so brief a separation, 
 and John was the better for it a whole moijfh 
 after. They were not likely to come together 
 at present, however, for Arthur Hill had just 
 gone abroad as traveling tutor with a young 
 Scotch nobleman, and was not to return to 
 Hurtledale for a year or more. John had hoped 
 to catch hun, were it only for a single day, be- 
 fore his departure ; but the first news he heard 
 when he arrived at the rectory with his sister 
 was, that Arthur Hill had been over the previous 
 evening to see if they were come, as he was set- 
 ting off to Carlisle to join his charge early on 
 the following day. This was a great disappoint- 
 ment to both, and it seemed the more grievous 
 that they had thus missed each other by only a 
 few hours. But except this one cross to their 
 anticipations, the Withers's had had a perfectly 
 happy return to Hurtledale. 
 
 Rachel Withers was a sensible, well-principled, 
 every-day young woman, not pretty, but pleas- 
 ing ; plump, rosy, good-humored, and healthy ; 
 not romantic to look at, but with a fund of real 
 romance in her heart. She was one of those hap- 
 py-tempered people who never quite outlive their 
 illusions. Any child of average expertness might 
 have taken her in, for she never suspected bad 
 motives or was afifilicted with mean suspicious. 
 She believed all the world to be as sincere, 
 straightforward, and kindly disposed as herself; 
 but do not from this argue her a fool. She was 
 only eighteen, and had lived her life hitherto 
 amongst honest people. 
 
 She esteemed it a happy fate to be elected 
 her brother's housekeeper on leaving school, in- 
 stead of having to turn out into the world to 
 fight her way amongst strangers — a possibihty 
 which judicious friends had considered it a duty 
 to keep well before her eyes during the progress 
 of her education, that she might be broken in to 
 the idea of work if it became practically desir- 
 able in the end that she should undertake it. 
 
 If John should marry, then the chances were 
 that she would have to go adrift on some course 
 of her own, for though she had a little money, 
 she had not a competence ; but that might be a 
 long day first, and as previsions of evil are fool- 
 ish, and she was of a cheerful disposition, she 
 put them resolutely away from her mind, and 
 would none of their harassment. 
 
 She soon began to have her share of the parish 
 work tolerably well in hand. There was no ex- 
 treme poverty amongst the people. It was pos- 
 sible to know the ways and means of every man, 
 woman, and child in the dale, and to prevent by 
 timely aid of one kind or another the sharp 
 pinch of such necessity as often cripples the 
 poor of great towns in seasons of scarcity. The 
 faces of the little ones at school were full and 
 ruddy enough, and when the bairns are not 
 pined things are never much amiss with the 
 locker at home. Her chief mis^ving as to how 
 she should get on in her office of purveyor of 
 the rectory charities, was that she could not 
 bear to see physical want of any kind without 
 wishing to relieve it ; and experienced persons 
 warned her that such appearances were apt to 
 be deceitful ; she could not offer a good book 
 and advice in lieu of bread and brands if signs 
 of hunger and a cold hearthstone met her eyes ; 
 and she would certainly rather give to six who 
 had no need, and who were taking her in, than 
 send one poor body faint and empty away. By 
 and by, like other beginners, she would learn to 
 discriminate between real and feigned or earned 
 distress, John encouragingly said, but mean- 
 while she must not expect to go quite scot-free 
 from mistakes^nd their vexatious consequences. 
 Mary Deane promised to be a great assistance 
 to her when she was in doubt or difficulty ; a 
 shrewd dales-woman herself; and many years 
 servant at the rectory, she was beforehand with 
 those who tried to impose on her young mis- 
 tress ; but at the same time she was always ready 
 with a good word for such as deserved one. 
 She mentioned Effie Benson, for instance, as a 
 worthy woman both meriting and requiring 
 little occasional helps. 
 
 " She puts on a fair face afore folk, but she's 
 worse off than a many that looks downright 
 starved," was Mary's testimony. "She's that 
 clean you might eat your dinner off of her stone 
 floor, and that proud she would not beg bit nor sup 
 if she were dying o' want. They are often that 
 way — them that has seen better days. There's 
 handsome things in her house, and the walls is 
 her own, and the roof's her own, and the patch 
 o' ground's her own, but I'm thinking that's well 
 nigh all she has except the four pounds o' rent 
 she gets for the paddock that's let to Robb at 
 Prior's Mill. And she's past work if ever she 
 were fit for much, which may be she wasn't. 
 She knitted socks for old master ; but Mr. 
 Withers doesn't happen to wear worsted socks ?" 
 Yes, he did, and that reminded Rachel that he 
 would want new ones for the coming winter : 
 therefore Efifie should have the pins and the yarn 
 to-morrow. 
 
 Then amongst those Mary would fain have 
 discouraged, there was Ally Wray, whom Rachel 
 recollected at perpetual feud with her old man, 
 since whose death she had come out quite a 
 changed character — at least as far as tongue 
 goes. When Rachel went to pay her her first 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 visit Ally whined, and shook her head, and 
 talked gooch/ in the most amazing manner ; la- 
 menting her dear Cranky — with whom she had 
 quarreled actively and passively every day of 
 his life — as if they had been the most affection- 
 ate and united couple in the dale. " Auld Cant," 
 Mary called her, and doled out her share of soup 
 with grumbling reluctance. Mr. Anderside had 
 a queer story against two of his nieces, simple, 
 worthy ladies, whom she had completely hood- 
 winked with her pious talk. They put her into 
 a pathetic little tract, and when they left Hur- 
 tledale, they sent copies of it to the school for 
 distribution ; since which revelation of her suc- 
 cessful pretenses, Ally had been esteemed by 
 her neighbors wickeder than ever ; indeed the 
 flimsy romance was a study more curious than 
 edifying to those who knew AUy's choice fami- 
 liar phrases, her fables and her hypocrisies ; but 
 Auld Cant though she was, Kachel would not 
 curtail her of her flannel or her soup, even at 
 Mary's indignant suggestion ; for she was nearly 
 destitute, and had only a half-witted son to work 
 for her. 
 
 The village school-mistress was a fagged, lean, 
 white little woman who always looked at the last 
 gasp of weariness ; but she contrived to get 
 through her business well, and to make the girls 
 neat, plain sewers. To Rachel's great satisfac- 
 tion she found none of them cobbling at bits of 
 coarse, muslin embroidery, and the most primi- 
 tive notions of usefulness still prevailed amongst 
 them. The schoolmaflter had also a jaded and 
 over-worked appearance, and he worried the 
 boys with too much preaching ; but he and his 
 wife were a respectable, worthy couple, and 
 when they had a better system to go upon, would 
 neither wear out themselves nor their scholars 
 so much as they had done. Mrs. Brooke con- 
 fessed to Rachel that she never could take a 
 real interest in the schools ; consequently they 
 were not well overlooked, and many things 
 would bear improvement. 
 
 Mr. Gilsland was pleased to laugh at what he 
 called Rachel's laborious energy as a reformer — 
 though indeed she had accomplished nothing 
 yet — and to predict speedy fatigue. "STew 
 brooms sweep clean," said he, speaking pro- 
 verbially ; " but they wear out and grow slack 
 at their work in time. For my part, I know no 
 more unthankful duty than that of trying to 
 raise the condition of these cloddish barbarians." 
 
 Rachel could not agree with him, neither 
 could John ; but then they had been born and 
 bred amongst the people, and were as familiar 
 with their sterling virtues as with their harsh 
 speech and rough manners. This Mr. Gilsland 
 was not. He had come amongst them a stran- 
 ger, apparently with preconceived notions of rus- 
 tical picturesqueness and simplicity ; and being 
 rudely disenchanted by his first impressions,, did 
 not seem to have cared to try whether the ore 
 below the surface was worth laboring or not ; 
 and thus he found no pleasure in a lot which had 
 some of the happiest opportunities in the world. 
 John Withers endeavored to convince him of 
 his error ; for he did not like to see a man fall- 
 ing weary of his duties, and yielding to discour- 
 agement without an effort to withstand its dead- 
 ening influence ; but his success' was very partial ; 
 for Mr. Gilsland was not a person easily moved 
 to give up a prejudice when his personal tastes 
 aiid refinements were involved therein. 
 
 When John Withers and his sister came home 
 again to Hurtledale, Mrs. Sara Grandage, Ra- 
 chel's godmamma, was away in Scotland, but she 
 presently returned, and on the morrow after 
 they heard of her arrival, they went over to pay 
 her a visit in her delicious old nest at Prior's 
 Bank. She vivaciously declared herself neither 
 a day older nor a day worse than when they left 
 her six years before, and was as full of pleasant 
 satirical speeches as ever. Bittersweet was the 
 old lady's name with them formerly, and Bitter- 
 sweet would she be as long as there was an atom 
 of her left. They found her in the garden, lean- 
 ing on her tall stick, and presiding over the la- 
 bors of three weeding boys, to whose diligence 
 she gave any thing but commendatory testimony. 
 
 " One boy is a boy," said she ; " two boys ai-e 
 half a boy, and three boys are no boy at all, un- 
 less you have your eye on them every moment." 
 And then she marshaled them round the bank, 
 pointing out her alterations, and confessing with 
 much truth that her pet shrubs took almost too 
 much exercise for health in their transplanting 
 and re-transplanting. The main features of the 
 place would continue always the same in their 
 romantic beauty, but every little detail seemed 
 to have undergone a change since the Withers' 
 saw it last. There was a new wild-flower walk 
 winding round by the river under the ash-trees 
 that was charming. Mrs. Sara Grandage had 
 had the plants brought from far and near, and 
 even from abroad to garnish it ; and in the 
 spring it looked like fairy-land with its splendor 
 of gentian and violet, prhnrose and anemone, 
 bluebell and daffodil, overhung and mingled 
 la with rare choice ferns which flourished luxuri- 
 antly in the warm, moist, sheltered nooks of the 
 rocks. Rachel felt tired after their three-mile 
 walk, but her godmamma was as brisk as a bee, 
 and kept them out full an hour in the suu before 
 she dared plead a reasonable fatigue. Twice 
 John tried to beguile her indoors, Ttiut she would 
 not go until she pleased, and then it was almost 
 time to set out on their return. She insisted, 
 however, on their remaining to drink tea, and 
 bribed John to consent by promising them the 
 pony carriage and Clip, her factotum, to drive 
 them home in the moonlight over the moor. 
 , Whether Bittersweet grew older or not must 
 be left to her own feelings, but she certainly 
 grew smaller in the world. As she sat perched 
 in her high-cushioned chair before the table, 
 daintily sipping her costly tea, Rachel thought 
 she had never seen any thing human so wee or 
 so witch-like. Malice twinkled in her bright 
 black eye, and what in other old folk's faces 
 would be called crow's-feet, in hers were the curls 
 of laughter and of merry mockery that had not 
 yet by any means mocked or laughed their last. 
 
 "Well, Johimy man," said she, after critic- 
 ally considering him for several silent minutes ; 
 " your beard is grown, and it is not red after 
 all — perhaps you are not such a pepper-box aa 
 you used to be ? Clip protests you are grand in 
 the pCilpit — six foot if yoU are an inch. And he 
 allows that you preach middlin\ I shall come 
 and l(ear you myself, though what a lad hke you 
 can have to tell an old woman who has known 
 sixty years of the ups and downs of the world I 
 cannot guess ! I hope you don't give more than 
 twenty minutes' sermon ? I never had much 
 
ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 taste for long sermons since I feel asleep under 
 your grandfather's, which had as many heads as 
 Hydra and always hummed over the hour. If 
 they could all have hummed together, it would 
 have abridged the discourse and have been a 
 mighty improvement." 
 
 The old lady then turned her pointed observa- 
 tion on Rachel, and was graciously pleased to 
 say^ that she had not come home spoilt, so far 
 as she could detect. "John has appropriated 
 more than his share of the family beauty, but 
 your face will wear well, Mistress Rachel," con- 
 tinued she. " It will wear well, and you will be 
 handsomer at eight-and-thirty than you are at 
 eighteen ; and eight-and-thirty is a very trying 
 period for a woman, let me tell you, especially 
 if she be single. I call it the grizzling age when 
 one is neither old nor young, and when whatever 
 is ugly in temper or character comes out and 
 stamps the countenance for the rest of a lifetime. 
 Cultivate your clieerfulness, my^dear^^andjour 
 feoultylff'jenjoying littleprcseut pleasures, and 
 yOffwlll find yourself "M sixty lively and evSF- 
 green still. "- 
 
 Then she gossiped of her friends and neigh- 
 bors near and remote ; told her young guests 
 how she thought Kitty Anderside had done fool- 
 ishly in refusing to accompany the gray curate 
 to the Potteries ; how Mr. Gilsland was not — 
 in her opinion — worth his shoe-leather as a hill- 
 pastor ; how Sir William Warleigh had driven 
 his elder son abroad by his persecutions ; how 
 Oliver had contracted a prudent marriage with a 
 well-dowered widow lady considerably older than 
 himself; and how, finally, the girls were just as 
 solitary and neglected as ever. 
 
 "Mrs. Darner Warleigh of Bristowe is their 
 one friend," said she ; " and even her daughters 
 do not go to Whinstane. In fact, no gentle- 
 woman but Mrs. Damer Warleigh ever does go 
 to Whinstane. Sir William boozes with his 
 grooms and other questionable company — the 
 only company he can command — and she would 
 stay away but for a promise she made to their 
 mother when she was dying. Somebody told 
 me they were up at the Hurtlemere House now 
 with their father, but I have never seen them 
 about ; perhaps he will not let them go beyond 
 the gates here any more than at Whinstane." 
 
 John Withers said he could not enlighten her. 
 When he paid his visit of ceremony Sir Wil- 
 liam was out in the woods, and the great pew 
 in the church had been unoccupied last Sunday. 
 Sir William had not called at the rectory since, 
 and they had seen no one from the Hurtlemere 
 House of whom they could inquire. But if the 
 girls were really there, he hoped Rachel would 
 see them soon and renew their' acquaintance. 
 
 The evening next after this, Mr. Anderside 
 spent at the rectory, and on some reference be- 
 ing made by Rachel Withers to Sir William 
 Warleigh and his peculiar ways, the old gentle- 
 man startled his host by exclaiming contemptu- 
 ously : "Sir William is a Warleigh by name 
 only — not one drop of the blood of that an- 
 cient and respectable stock flows in his veins ! 
 Colonel Warleigh of Penslaven picked him up 
 by mischance during a night-ride from his 
 cousin's house at Bristow — an ugly, wide- 
 mouthed, swarthy brat, dropped by some trav- 
 
 eling tinker's drab, and left to perish in the 
 snow. The Colonel was not commonly a hu- 
 mane man — rather the reverse, indeed — but he 
 heard the child squeal, dismounted, lifted it out 
 of the mire, and carried it home to Penslaven, 
 when the kitchen-wenches brought it up in con- 
 junction with the grooms until it developed 
 into the wickedest imp that perhaps ever came 
 on earth for the furtherance of its father's busi- 
 ness !" 
 
 This was one of the secrets that every body 
 knotss, and that nobody much cares to talk 
 about. The circumstances happened long be- 
 fore Rachel or John Withers was born — full 
 fifty years ago — ^but they were not of a nature 
 to be forgotten until after the lapse of genera- 
 tions. Neither John nor his sister had, how- 
 ever", any knowledge of them beyond common 
 report, which had clouded the origiml event 
 with a haze of supernatural tradition^the pro- 
 perty of every winter fireside story-teller in the 
 dales. They were glad, therefore, to have lit 
 upon an authentic source of information, and 
 Mr. Anderside was probably the most authentic 
 now in existence ; for he had been curate at 
 Penslaven when the incident took place. John 
 and Rachel both questioned him, and he told 
 them the story as far as he knew it; premising 
 that his old patron, t^e Colonel himself, had 
 done his utmost to envelop the beginnings of 
 it in mystery, and to discourage any inquiry 
 that might bave brought the simple facts to 
 light. 
 
 The world in general, and Colonel Warleigh's 
 near connections in particular, he said, excused 
 his eccentricities on the plea that he was rather 
 mad ; and some such plea was needed when, 
 having quarreled with his cousin Damer, and 
 being himself wifeless and childless, he devised 
 the mortifying expedient of educating his beg- 
 gar's brat, of giving him his name and making 
 him his heir. Thenceforward the misshapen 
 urchin was Master William Warleigh. Tailors 
 clothed him, tutors labored at him, toadies flat- 
 tered him, and he became a man — a man char- 
 acterized by a low shrewdness, a malignant 
 cunning, and a dastardly tyrannical spirit. In 
 due time Colonel Warleigh married him to a 
 very youthful, pretty, proud girl, who with her 
 little fortune had been unwisely committed to 
 his guardianship ; and she, having borne him 
 four children, and suffered his brutality twelve 
 years, broke her heart and died. There was a 
 portrait of her hanging still in the great draw- 
 ing-room at Whinstane Tower — a delicate, fair- 
 skinned, dark-eyed woman, handsome and im- 
 perious — the process of breaking such a wo- 
 man's heart must have been cruel, but Sir Wil- 
 liam did it. 
 
 One of the grewsome dales' legends said that 
 Lady Warleigh walked and wept still in the 
 great chambers at Whinstane Tower just as she 
 did in her lifetime ; and certain it was that from 
 the day of her burial the most intimate scene 
 of her endurance had been locked, barred, and 
 sealed against every' intruder, and her husband 
 betook himself for his nightly rest to a room in 
 the servants' quarters, where he lay upon a sofa 
 with a rug over him, and fire and candles burn- 
 ing all the year round. He had a right to be 
 haunted by an evil conscience if ever man had ; 
 but the vault in Penslaven Church must have 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 been far, far too welcome a refuge for hig wife 
 that she should ever be tempted to stray back 
 to Whmstane Tower, where her degrading mar- 
 tyrdom was undergone. 
 
 In answer to some further inquiries from 
 John Withers, Mr. Anderside told them that 
 Colonel Warleigh had lived long enough to fear 
 and distrust his adopted heir, pud to love and 
 cherish the little Laurence — eldest born son of 
 that ill-omened marriage. He paid a heavy 
 penalty for the indulgence of his vindictive ca- 
 prices ; for aa he grew old and feeble, he found 
 a bitter tyrant in Sir William — that graceless 
 savage in looks and manners, lower in all his 
 passions and instincts than the horse ^e rode, 
 or t}ie dogs he thrashed. When he died. Sir 
 William became undisputed master of Penslaven 
 and Whinstanedale ; master of four children, 
 living reminders of his half-murdered wife ; 
 master of a pack of hounds, and a pack of 
 servants, each one of whom, dogs as well as 
 men, was his superior. His baronetcy, a par- 
 
 ' liamentary bribe, his rank as county magnate 
 and member, and his power as a great landed 
 proprietor, made his name notorious. He was a 
 man hated and feared — a man to whom soon 
 none but the basest and most servile of his 
 class would extend the hand of fellowship. 
 Penslaven he let as soon as it became his own, 
 continuing to live on at Whinstane Tower with 
 his two sons and two daughters, who were grow- 
 ing up into men and women, while he was 
 scarcely past middle age ; for Colonel Warleigh 
 had married him to his unhappy wife very 
 young, and the children had been born early 
 and in rapid succession. 
 
 Mr. Hill, who got the living of Penslaven 
 when Mr. Anderside's rector wag removed to a 
 deanery, gave them all lessons together, and as 
 nature had not withheld from them; capacity, 
 they had made their profit out of them. He 
 considered them a very peculiar group of young 
 people. Nothing knew they of the facts of their 
 paternity. They contemplated the fine old 
 Warleigh portraits with undisturbed compla- 
 cency as the portraits of their veritable progen- 
 itors, and, apparently, never speculated how 
 such a boor as their father, with the flat head 
 and bull neck, could have sprung from that an- 
 cient and courtly stock. ■ They even picked out 
 Warleigh features and Warleigh traits of char- 
 acter in each other, and accounted for them by 
 line and rule of the family traditions — and it' 
 was undeniable that such -features and such 
 traits they actually possessed, though how they 
 came by them was an inexplicable enigma to 
 the gossips. 
 
 Rachel Withers had a dim recollection of the 
 girls as children, when she was a very little 
 child herself, and also of once seeing then: 
 mother in the fir-wood behind the Hurtlemere 
 
 ■ House, walking and talking with her own. This 
 was the last time Lady Warleigh was ever in 
 the dale. Two or three years later, John With- 
 ers and Laurence Warleigli struck up a staunch 
 alliance, which 'was periodically renewed when 
 Sir William came over in August, and brought 
 his family to remain a month. Boys and girls 
 both ran wild, and the young Withers with 
 them. Indeed, when they were all together, 
 they were not easy to keep within bounds. 
 Kachel remembered the fragile thing Grace was 
 
 very distinctly, and how Laurence used to carry 
 her piok-a-baok when she fell tired on their 
 rambles. Katherine was much stronger, and 
 very independent. She liked tlfem all except 
 Oliver, who, John used to say, was sly; she 
 did not know of her own knowledge that he 
 was sly, but she knew that he was cruel to ani- 
 mals, and that he had an ugly, sneering mouth, 
 like the picture of ApoUyon in Pilgrim! s Prog- 
 ress, and that they called him, even to his face, 
 "velvet-gloved Oliver with the claws." 
 
 Mr. Anderside spoke of Laurence Warleigh 
 as one who had originally the making of a fine 
 character in him. He had a, rash and hasty 
 temper, but he was affectionate and generous, 
 and there waa a warm-hearted sincerity about him 
 that Oliver totally lacked. Oliver, he said, was 
 always quiet and ready, with considerable abili- 
 ty, ambition, and guile. He had never come to 
 open quarrel with Sir William, as had done his 
 more impetuous brother, and long since he be- 
 gan to find his advantage in a wily forbearance. 
 Everybody about Whinstane knew who was the 
 favorite son. 
 
 Oliver also had fared better with respect to 
 education than Laurence ; he was sent to a pub- 
 lic school and afterward to Cambridge, while 
 Laurence was never away from the dales until 
 he was nearly twenty. At Mrs. Darner War- 
 leigh's instance, he was then permitted to go 
 abroad with a fit companion for three years of 
 foreign travel. Returning home at the expira- 
 tion of hig leave of absence, the coarse, domi- 
 neering habits of his father revolted him. He 
 found himself, though a man, still cheeked, 
 thwarted, and tasked like a school-boy. Inces- 
 sant quarrels arose, and his life at Whinstane 
 Tower became, at length, an existence of dull, 
 degrading misery. He first remonstrated, then 
 resisted, and finally — for peace sake, and be- 
 cause he saw no term to his persecutions — left 
 home altogether. Sir William refused to make 
 him any allowance, and for nearly seven years 
 he had been wandering to and fro the world, 
 subsisting on the little means he derived from 
 the sheepwalks of Hurtledale, which he pos- 
 sessed independent of his father. The old Hur- 
 tlemere House and two farms adjacent were be- 
 queathed to him by his godfather. Moor Murray, 
 a famous Nimrod m his generation, who lived 
 in those parts a life of contented savagery, and 
 died while Laurence was still a boy. Since 
 Moor Murray's death, the Hurtlemere House had 
 served humbly as a farmstead, two or three 
 apartments only being kept up for the use of 
 Sir William and those he brought over for the 
 shooting. 
 
 During the past year Sir William was said to 
 have frequently urged his elder son's return, 
 promising him a sufficient income if he would 
 marry and settle as the heir to great estates 
 should ; but Laurence either did not like the 
 lady of his father's selection, or else he found 
 the sweets of liberty more precious than the 
 bonds of Whinstane, howsoever shared and 
 gilded ; for hitherto he had invariably declined 
 compliance. No one who knew the coarse, ruf- 
 fianly man his father waSj could wonder at his 
 refusal. Mr. Anderside considered it wise iI^ 
 every way. 
 
 Oliver had married at three-and-twenty,, and 
 married satisfactorily to his father ; but he lived 
 
10 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 away from hcfme, and thus perhaps the more 
 easily kept on excellent terms with him. It 
 was asserted that Sir William would have dearly 
 liked to give him the privileges of an elder son 
 over Laurence's head, but Colonel Warleigh had 
 made the entail as strict as by law he could, and 
 not one stick or stone about Penslaven or Whin- 
 standale could be alienated without the heir's 
 consent. Lucky for him that it could not. 
 
 About the girls Mr. Anderside could tell Ea- 
 chel nothing ; he had not seen them for years — 
 never since Laurence went abroad for the first 
 time. They went nowhere into society, not even 
 to Bristowe, and were supposed to live secluded 
 as nuns. Girls, the old man called them, but 
 they were mature women ; Katherine being 
 twenty-four, and Grace only one year younger. 
 In experience and knowledge of the world, how- 
 ever, they were mere children. 
 
 Lady FouUs, the old colonel's half-sister, was 
 in being still, and still shut up in her turret at 
 Whinstane where he left her. But that fire and 
 fagot had eeased to - burn upon the gallows' 
 knowe, she might long ere this have made a 
 weird witch-light in the world; for lapse of 
 time had by no means sweetened her evil repu- 
 tation, and when folks mentioned her name they 
 uttered it with bated breath even yet. 
 
 Thus much of the popular history of the 
 Warleighs, antecedent to the date of the With- 
 ers's return to Hurtledale, Mr. Anderside made 
 known to his young friends, and it was pretty 
 nearly all there was to tell, except what was 
 conjectural. 
 
 Sir William Warleigh's daughters were with 
 him at the Hurtlemere House, as Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage had told her god-child, and the next 
 Sunday they appeared at church. On the fol- 
 lowing morning they called at the rectory ; it 
 was nearly ten years since Kachel had seen 
 them, and they met almost like strangers. 
 
 The sisters had both grown up with their 
 mother's proud, pure type of face, but they 
 looked shy and shivery, like women who have 
 never known the warm cherishing of aifection. 
 They appeared reserved, too — Katherine almost 
 Icily so — but Rachel fancied it was more from 
 habit, and the life they led, than from natural 
 disposition, and that it would wear oif on longer 
 acquaintance. John Withers was not at home 
 when they called, but as Rachel felt sure that 
 he would be disappointed at missing them, she 
 begged them to stay to luncheon ; but they de- 
 clined, and seemed immediately rather in haste 
 to be gone, which made her at once suspect that 
 this was a stolen visit — and so it was. Just as 
 they were taking leave, however, in John came, 
 and a delay necessarily ensued. He had one or 
 two reminiscences in common with them, which 
 Rachel did not share ; in particular they had Ar- 
 thur Hill to talk about, and John was glad to 
 hear later news of him than any he possessed. 
 
 By and by, Katherine thawed from her cold 
 demeanor, and Grace spoke out with an almost 
 childlike impulsiveness, when the newness of the 
 meeting was got over. Grace had an exceed- 
 ingly sweet, attractive amile, and only wanted a 
 little more ease and vivacity to be charming; 
 and from a certain expression and tone that be- 
 trayed her in speaking of Arthur Hill, Rachel 
 
 shrewdly imagined that, secluded as might be 
 the existence she and her sister were condemn- 
 ed to they were not quite shut out from natural 
 sympathies and interests. Finally, they were 
 prevailed on to eat their luncheon at the recto- 
 ry, and aftertatd John Withers and his sister 
 walked with them over the fell, nearly as far as 
 the Mere. Out of doors they expanded almost 
 into sociability, checking themselves now and 
 then as young people do who fear they are say- 
 ing tooi much, or making themselves over-famil- 
 iar. , They both evidently .possessed an undevel- 
 oped capacity for being happy, and tempers less 
 high and elastic would have suffered far more 
 than theirs had done from the unhealthy re- 
 straint and monotony of Whinstane. Through- 
 out the whole conyersation they never alluded 
 once to any thing that was unusual in their posi- 
 tion. They spoke of Laurence with great affec- 
 tion, and Grace hoped he would come home be- 
 fore Christmas ; Katherine said nothing of Tier 
 hopes, but from the sigh that followed her sis- 
 ter's words, Rachel felt sure she had no expect- 
 ation of his return — ^perhaps, even, she did not 
 desire it, or dreaded the renewal of the daily dis- 
 putes that had embittered their lives when thty 
 were together formerly. Oliver was not men- 
 tioned amongst them. 
 
 That the events within their experience had 
 been few, was manifest from the vividness with 
 which they recalled several half-forgotten ex- 
 ploits to the minds of their early playfellows. 
 Katherine asked if they remembered escaping 
 with Laurence and herself to the Force, and 
 paddling across the river, shoeless and stocking- 
 less, to be caught by their father on the other 
 side, and marched home in disgrace. Rachel — 
 a perfect tomboy in her childhood — recollected 
 it well as a tragical incident, attended with pen- 
 alties for disobedience, and serious warnings 
 that they would all come to be drowned some 
 day if they ventured on repeating the experi- 
 ment; recollected that, and much more, when 
 the chords of 'memory were thus pleasantly 
 struck. 
 
 "Oh! yes, I remember," said she, her face 
 brightening with the reflection of those sunny 
 days. "We were very happy when we were 
 little things. But that was a naughty prank, 
 and we did grievous penance for it, John and I. 
 Thenceforward we refrained from the river with 
 its strong eddies and deep pools, and were con- 
 tent with the lesser dangers of the High-beck, 
 where the slippery stepping-stones were » per- 
 petual temptation and dehght. I can hear mam- 
 ma's gentle admonition now, ' Children, you had 
 better come round by the bridge ;' and nurse's 
 shrill outcry of ' Bairns,, I'll no' ha' you wetting 
 your feet ! ' as we followed in single file over the 
 perilous crags. Many a fall and many a ducking 
 did we get when the beck was full, but we never 
 gave up the stepping-stones until we gave up 
 iome and all. Oh ! yes, I remember !" 
 - Even during the short time they were togeth- 
 er that morning, Rachel Withers found out that 
 the tastes of her companions were as simple as 
 their education had been narrow. " We have 
 no accomphshments — we can read," said Kath- 
 erine, with a peculiar smile, half sad, half mock- 
 ing, on her beautiful lip. " We can read, and 
 that is all." Yet two faces more refined and in- 
 telligent John Withers thought he had never seen. 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 11 
 
 They had just reached the stile into the fir- 
 wood, and were preparing to part, with mutual 
 expressions of pleasure at having renewed their 
 acquaintance, when Sir William Warleigh con- 
 fronted them, coming up the path with his gun 
 over his shoulder, and his dogs at his heels. 
 There was no time for evasion, and, perhaps, it 
 was as well ; though Katherine's heightened 
 color and Grace's timid eye betrayed that their 
 first impulse was to run away. He came close 
 before he appeared to recognize John Withers 
 and Kachel, and, touching his cap with ironical 
 civility, was about to pass on without a word, 
 when Katherine plucked up a sudden spirit, and 
 asked if he had forgotten them. No, he had 
 not forgotten them, replied the old bear, but he 
 was after birds of another feather just then. 
 And so he left them, looking uglier, more 
 ungainly, and more inhospitable in Rachel's 
 dismayed eyes than ever man looked before. 
 To his daughters, his behavior was a mere 
 matter of course. 
 
 " We shall come and see you again, if we 
 may," Grace said, nervously ; and Rachel re- 
 ^ed that she should be glad to see them 
 mienever they liked ; on which Katherine bade 
 her, if they did not present themselves at the 
 rectory any more, understand that they might 
 not walk so far alone — which both John and 
 she felt implied the probability of Sir William's 
 placing a veto on their acquaintance. Aiid with 
 that they parted. 
 
 Though Sir William Warleigh appeared to 
 live in a state of chronic suspicion of servants, 
 children, and all about him, he yet did not see 
 fit to lay any restrictions on his daughters' visits 
 to the rectory — a forbearance for which they 
 seemed hardly able to account, though they 
 took the fullest advantage of it. • They were 
 there nearly every day, and always found a 
 warm welcome both from Rachel and her 
 brother. It was so pleasant and cheering to be 
 with them, Katherine said, that when the time 
 came to go back to Whinstane, they should find 
 the Tower lonelier and drearier than ever. They 
 loved a good talk, and asked a thousand ques- 
 tions of the ways and manners of the world be- 
 yond the dales, which Rachel and, even John 
 could answer but very imperfectly — oast as their 
 lots had been in the quietest places. But they 
 were curiously ignorant, and found matter for 
 interest and speculation in the most trifling 
 details. Katherine had the stronger mind, of 
 the two, but Grace had the tenderer character. 
 Rachel was not mistaken in her sentimental 
 conjectures : Grace and Arthur Hill had a sort 
 of engagement pending between them, known 
 to his friends, but not yet confessed to Sir 
 William, and whether it would ever come to any 
 thing Grace despondently doubted. Intimacy 
 ripens fast amongst young people who begin it 
 with a friendly disposition, and before the girls 
 had known each other a week, they had had 
 this tender ^ubj^t under discussion a score of 
 times. -C-/ " — v-.--"^ — — -_-'^ 
 
 In a recent letter to John Withers, Arthur 
 Hill had told his story too, and asked his friend's 
 counsel and opinion ; but John, in reply, had de- 
 clared himself utterly inexperienced, and would 
 
 not accept the responsibility of advising him on 
 a matter so delicate and critical. This plea of 
 inexperience was not likely to be worth much 
 very long now, however, for John had begun to 
 sing Katheriue's praises in his sister's ears every 
 hour of the day ; and in their walks over the 
 moor, to take the girls home after their visits to 
 the rectory, they always paired off together, 
 leaving Rachel and Grace to cultivate each 
 other's conversation uninterruptedly. 
 
 One afternoon at this juncture, Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage, driving over to the rectory to see her 
 .god-daughter, arrived at the moment when the 
 sociable littlegroup were about to set off to the 
 Force. She, good-naturedly, refused to detain 
 them then, but, to indemnify herself for the pres- 
 ent disappointment, made them all promise to 
 go to Prior's Bank to luncheon on the follow- 
 ing day. 
 
 Rachel went in the morning early, but Johii 
 had business on hand which kept him at home 
 until afternoon ; when he arrived at last, how- 
 ever, he found Katherine and Grace Warleigh 
 both there, and sly old Bittersweet, from a 
 wicked glance she gave- him, betrayed herself as 
 archly suspicious of his budding sentiments : he 
 wondered whether Rachel had found him out, 
 and had been saying any thing. But no, Rachel 
 looked calm and innocent. Mr. Gilsland had 
 dropped in, and she was holding a little chat 
 very agreeably with him. Rachel was no spoil- 
 sport or premature meddler ; she had far too 
 much sympathy with her brother not to have 
 put a just interpretation on his much-talk of 
 Katherine, but she held her peace while she 
 wished him good luck. 
 
 They were in the middle of the sitting when 
 a carriage drove round to the door, and who 
 should enter but Mrs. Damer Warleigh of Bris- 
 towe. Her face of pleased surprise as she 
 scanned the gathering was delightful to behold, 
 and when she got Rachel Withers to herself for 
 a moment she whispered, squeezing her hand 
 with great energy : 
 
 " My dear, if you can be kind to those poor 
 girls, do." 
 
 Rachel replied that they all had the best dis- 
 position in the world to improve each other's 
 acquaintance. Mrs. Damer then inquired if 
 Sir William knew of it, and expressed her as- 
 tonishment that he had not peremptorily com- 
 manded its discontinuance ; she afterward, with 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage's connivance, took Grace to 
 talk to privately, and carried her off into the 
 garden, where secrets were told and comfort ad- 
 ministered. When they joined the party in the 
 drawing-room a quarter of an hour later, Grace 
 looked all the brighter and the better for her 
 out-pouring in the shrubbery — Mrs. Damer 
 had promised to befriend her cause when the 
 time and opportunity arrived, and she might be 
 relied on to do it. 
 
 She took her young kinswomen away with 
 her when she left, and drove to the Hurtlemere 
 House, though they warned her their father 
 would not be found in-doors. 
 
 " So much the better if he is not," replied 
 she, without the slightest circumlocution. " And 
 so much the pleasanter for all of us. I shall 
 have done my duty, and had my glimpse of you 
 girls without any annoyance. Now tell me how 
 you came to renew your acquaintance with John 
 
12 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 Withers and hi3 sister — I approve of it thor- 
 oughly." 
 
 And they told her, the talk lasting all the way 
 up the hill to the Hurtleniere House, and as long 
 as Mrs. Damer Warleigh's leisure would allow 
 her to listen to them afterward. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage was not the woman to 
 lose the opportunity for a little social criticism 
 when it fell in her way so conveniently as it did 
 that afternoon ; and as soon as the Bristowe car- 
 riage disappeared through the gates she began. 
 
 " The old generation is handsomer than the 
 new — ^neither of those girls will ever match Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh," said she, decisively. 
 
 John Withers admitted that she was a grand 
 specimen of old lady-hood, but he maintained 
 that Katherine was quite a^ fine-looking. 
 
 " Too pale and severe," interposed Mr. Gils- 
 land, in the tone of one who esteems himself a 
 connoisseur. " I prefer a bright, sunshiny beau- 
 ty, with more of color and less of the statu- 
 esque." 
 
 Kachel's godmamma flashed a wicked glance 
 in her face, and though, of course, the poor girl 
 knew perfectly well that the handsome curate's 
 remark could have no reference whatever to her, 
 she felt herself blushing abominably. And Bit- 
 tersweet's next words were not of a kind to cool 
 her conscious cheeks. " You prefer the dump- 
 ling order of beauty then, Mr. Gilsland !" Now 
 Dumpling was her pet name for Kaehel, though 
 she certainly had not qualified for it yet, what- 
 ever she might do, and the insinuation put her 
 still further out of countenance. 
 
 " Well, yes ; call it the dumpling order, if 
 you like," said he, "but rosebud order would 
 be prettier and more correctly descriptive," and 
 then, either with or without intention, he looked 
 aside at Rachel before her blush had gone down, 
 and began making inquiries about Sir William 
 Warleigh's reputed wesdth. 
 
 "He is as rich as Crossus and as niggard as a 
 Jew," replied Mrs. Sara Grandage, with ma- 
 licious meaning in her heart. "He can not but 
 be rich, for his income is vast, and Ivis expendi- 
 ture nothing. Neither of his sons has an allow- 
 ance from him, and I have heard him swear he 
 never will give any man sixpence with his 
 daughters. It would be a bad speculation to go 
 wooing to Whinstane Tower, Mr. Gilsland, very 
 bad." And here Bittersweet paused, with her 
 short, dry cough, which she contrived to mak.e 
 so significant. 
 
 As John Withers walked home with his sis- 
 ter in the cool of the evening, he was very 
 silent, turning over some serious thought in his 
 mind. At last he spoke, saying, reflectively : 
 
 "I am not sure that I like that Mr. Gilsland, 
 Rachel ; do you find him a pleasant person ?" 
 
 Rachel said, " Tes," but nothing more aloud. 
 In fact, she had conceived some slight prepos- 
 session in the handsome curate's favor, and her 
 brother's question startled her. 
 
 " So John does not like him — I wonder why," 
 she thought within herself; but no solution of 
 his dislike presented itself to her, and she 
 passed an evening of secret uneasiness and 
 perplexity. 
 
 When Katherine Warleigh told Rachel With- 
 ers that she and her sister possessed no accom- 
 
 plishments, she spoke literally. No attempt 
 had been made to give them the elegant educa- 
 tion suited to their rank ; they could not dance, 
 or draw, or play, or sing, or understand any 
 language but their own ; in that, however, they, 
 were so well versed that John Withers declared 
 them to be the best informed women in their 
 national literature that he had ever met with. 
 Katherine and he held long discussions on his- 
 tory, poetry, and romance, and with Grace's 
 appropriate quotations chiming in, the ti;io were 
 really very delightful for an ignoramus like Ra- 
 chel to listen to. While those girls had browsed 
 at large and at will in a vast library of good 
 authors, she had been drilling in the bald rou- 
 tine of classes. Sometimes she was more than 
 half inclined to wish she could exchange her 
 own careful training and pruning for their lux- 
 uriant neglect ; but John encouraged her to 
 supply her deficiencies in a methodical way, and 
 promised her a fair meed of success if she would 
 devote a portion of each day to a regular course 
 of study under his direction. This she gladly 
 acceded to; for she felt very vacant-minded 
 amongst well-read people. But school-br|^ 
 girls always do ; in fact, they have only just 
 learned how to learn when they are launched 
 on the world as finished an(f polished specimens 
 of womankind. 
 
 The month of August was now getting over 
 fast, ayd soon the rectory would lose its pleas- 
 ant visitors — pleasant they were in every sense 
 of the word. They had an air of taking refuge 
 with Rachel as it were, though she was so much 
 younger than themselves ; and with John's aid 
 she cheered them infinitely. They were not 
 like the same women they were a few weeks 
 back ; they looked not only brighter in spirits, 
 but better in health. 
 
 " Oh ! Whinstane is a weariful, weariful 
 place," said Katherine one day, in a moment 
 of sudden expansion. " I wish we were re- 
 maining at the Hurtlemere House through the 
 winter, that we might keep the benefit of your 
 so'cietyi" 
 
 John Withers and his sister heartily echoed 
 the wish. 
 
 On another occasion she said to Rachel : 
 
 " If we can obtain leave to invite you to the 
 Tower, will you come ?" 
 
 The question took Rachel by surprise, and 
 she glanced across at John who, for the instant, 
 seemed as much startled as herself. Katherine 
 saw the effect her unexpected demand had had 
 on both, and, sighing, added hurriedly : 
 
 "Perhaps it is useless to talk about any thing 
 so improbable. No one ever has been invited 
 to Whinstane within my memory, and papa is 
 not more hospitable than formerly." 
 
 Nothing further was said on the subject then, 
 but afterward, when John and Rachel were 
 alone, he asked her if she should hesitate about 
 going to Whinstane were the chance given her. 
 "Because," continued he, "I wish for my sake 
 you could and would." 
 
 "For your sake, Johnny?" echoed Rachel, 
 with a little pretense of ignorance to draw him 
 out ; and then he began to speak of Katherine, 
 and to tell her how he believed she was the one 
 woman in the world who would make his life 
 happy. 
 
 "Not yet. I have no intention of marrying 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 13 
 
 yet" he ran on. " I am not even sure that she 
 eaies for me or would consent if I asked her.' 
 
 Rachel was of opinion that she would, how- 
 ever; she thought the attraction was mutual; 
 but she did not know that it would be right for 
 her to say so, therefore she only reassured him 
 with a promise that she would not be instru- 
 mental in ending their friendsliip by refusing to 
 do any thing in reason that might be required 
 of her. 
 
 Whinstane Tower by all accounts could not 
 be the most delightful place in the world to stay 
 at, especially for a person so sensitive to the 
 proprieties of life as Rachel Withers; but the 
 risk of having to go there did not appear very 
 imminent at present ; therefore, though she 
 would have done that and much more to please 
 John or forward his interests, she set her mind 
 at ease about it. But her brother continued to 
 cherish the idea, and founded on it a good many 
 agreeable visions. Since Sir William \9'arleigh 
 had been pleased to give a tacit consent to his 
 daughters' intimacy at the rectory, it was within 
 the range of possibilities that he might encour.- 
 age it elsewhere. They had all met him one 
 evening on the fells a long distance from home, 
 and he had condescended so far as to inl'orm 
 them that there was a storm coming on. And 
 il) came — a terrific thunder-storm — before they 
 could gain any shelter. This thunder-storm it 
 was that brought John Withers's feelings to a 
 crisis, and his wits to a distinct determination 
 about his future life — Katherine was so beauti- 
 fully calm through the danger, while Rachel 
 was stunned and Grace nearly frightened to 
 death. He liad rxot fallen in love, as the saying 
 is, but he knew that Katherine suited him ; he 
 was nearly thirty years old, and what he wanted 
 in a wife was not a mere pretty sweeting or a 
 house-proud mother dignity, but a pleasant and 
 intelligent companion ; and this she had the ca- 
 pacity to be to him more than any woman he 
 had ever seen. 
 
 It would now have greatly relieved him to 
 know what might be Sir William Warleigh's 
 views about marrying his daughters ; and this 
 he saw no readier means of learning than 
 through his sister's keeping up at Whinstane 
 the intimacy that had opened so promisingly 
 at Hurtledale. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage always gave three gar- 
 den entertainments to her many friends during 
 the continuance of the warm long days, and on 
 the twenty-ninth of August she issued her invita- 
 tions for the last picnic of the season ; fixing it 
 for the fourth of September. The mountain-ash 
 berries were red ripe already- — earliest sign of 
 the coming cold ; and harvest once over, winter 
 came down on Hurtledale almost immediately. 
 
 There are few days long anticipated and an- 
 ticipated with eager pleasure that do not turn 
 out more or less of disappointments — and such 
 a day was this to John Withers and Sir William 
 Warleigh's daughters. 
 
 "We shall not fail to be there," were Kath- 
 erine's last words on the previous evening when 
 she parted with her friends at the etUe leading 
 into the fir-wood, and on reaching Prior's Bank 
 the first news they heard was, " You will not 
 see your friends from the Hurtlemere House to- 
 
 day — they went off to Whinstane before six 
 o'clock this morning. One of Sir William's 
 vicious caprices, I suppose !" 
 
 Of course, John's pleasure in the day was 
 gone, but Rachel made shift to enjoy it. Several 
 old friends were there whom they had not yet 
 seen since their return to Hurtledale — the 
 Grantleys, Carltons, and Mr. Crofts, the gray 
 curate, amongst the number, he in faithful at- 
 tendance on his cruel Kitty Anderside. And 
 Mr. Gilsland also appeared, though he had dis- 
 quieted Rachel's thoughts by telling her before- 
 hand be was afraid he should not be able to 
 come ; disquieted poor Rachel's thoughts ths^t 
 ran on the handsome curate now far more than 
 was discreet. 
 
 She could not quite make out why he was not 
 more popular in Hurtledale. Every body allow- 
 ed that he was clever and gentlemanlike, but he 
 was nowhere very cordially received. Only a. 
 few days ago at the rectory, Mr. Anderside, in 
 speaking of him to John, had said before her, 
 " Gilsland does not get on well with the people ; 
 they do not like his ways any more than he 
 likes theirs; and I fear the fault lies with him." 
 Now that struck her as unjust; why should the 
 fault lie with him any more than with them ? 
 or why should it not, as faults mostly do, lie on 
 both sides equally ? 
 
 He was not in his right place, and he could not 
 help feeling it and betraying that he felt it, she 
 said in his excuse ; and it was not very surpris- 
 ing that, after a public school and brilliant col- 
 lege life, a young man should find a narrow coun- 
 try society irksome. The only trait in him that 
 seemed to her unnatural was that he had so little 
 faith in himself or in his future prospects. He 
 appeared to have made up his mind already that 
 he should live and die a poor, obscure, neglect- 
 ed curate ; and poverty with obscurity wore the 
 guise of terrible evils to him. He and Rachel 
 had met very frequently on the neutral territory 
 of Prior's Bank, which was about midway be- 
 tween Braiferton and the rectory, arid whenever 
 they had met he had poured out to her his de- 
 sires, ambitions, dissatisfactions and grievances 
 with a very fluent eloquence. She was a tender- 
 hearted creature and had plenty of sympathy at 
 his service. Not so Mrs. Sara Grandage — she 
 had not common patience with him. 
 
 " What he wants is to walk straightway into 
 some fat living, and to sit down in lazy dignity 
 for the rest of his days," she said, very tartly 
 on one occasion, after he had entertained Ra- 
 chel and herself with half an hour of complain- 
 ings. "He is an inveterate grumbler and dis- 
 contented person. What i« he or what /jas he 
 that he should pretend to be above his position 
 here ? Let him deserve a higher and he will 
 get it." Bittersweet had had a varied experi- 
 ence of life, and she always declared ttat people 
 earned their precise deserts; they won what 
 they were worth, and if they were worth noth- 
 ing they won nothmg. Rachel heard, but re- 
 fused to accept this article of her godmamma's 
 worldly creed without further observation with 
 her own spectacles, because it bore hard on the 
 unsuccessful and unlucky, whose lot, she thought, 
 was heavy enough already without that last straw 
 to break their backs ; but there might be a gen- 
 eral truth in it too, she candidly allowed. 
 
 Rachel was a commonplace person herself, 
 
14 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 not given to chimeHcal troubles, and always pre- 
 ferring to behold the bright side of things ; but 
 that was temperament, constitutional cheerful- 
 ness, or what not. She would not have said 
 that fainting was affectation because she never 
 fainted, or that hysterics were rubbish because 
 she could not have gone off into a fit if she had 
 tried, or that low spirits were fancy because her 
 own were tolerably equal ; yet she had heard each 
 and all of these assertions made by the non-af- 
 flicted. One step it a time in life is enough for 
 most persons with the pleasures of hope before, 
 but there are some who can not rest content un- 
 less a good prospect lie assured in front. Of 
 these last was Mr. Gilsland, Rachel said, and 
 people called him self-seeking and disagreeable, 
 because he was ill at ease in a circle where he 
 did not feel himself appreciated, and where he 
 had no expectation of a change for the better. 
 In a congenial sphere, and amongst congenial 
 friends, she was sure he would be a pleasant 
 friend himself. It almost provoked her to hear 
 him spoken against — even John was not fair to 
 him, and had begun to declare that he was a 
 weariness to his spirit whenever he' joined him 
 for a walk on the moors. 
 
 " Of course," she went on, a little hotly and 
 hurriedly, when she saw -the shrewd sarcasm 
 with which Bittersweet heard her ; " of course 
 it is always wisest and safest to keep our little 
 trials to ourselves, and not draw too often on 
 the charity and consideration of our neighbors. 
 Sunshine is very naturally preferred to shade,, 
 and those people go fastest and farthest who ap- 
 ply themselves to making things smooth and 
 pleasant in this world. Perhaps Mr. Gilsland 
 will by and by learn the wisdom of not seeking 
 sympathy from such as have none to spare, and 
 of practicing ' silence about those aspirations 
 and desires which all the wishing in the universe 
 will not satisfy. John advises him to work, 
 work, work, as the best and only means of fill- 
 ing his mind and his time, and thus excluding 
 discontented reveries ; but John does not per- 
 ceive that Mr. Gilsland has none of his vigor, 
 energy, or love for active labor. They are dif- 
 ferently made. John throws himself into his 
 duty with all the eargemess that others spend 
 in the pursuit of pleasure, and his duty is abso- 
 lute pleasure to him, dear good fellow that he 
 is ; but to Mr. Gilsland the same routine is the 
 worst monotony of boredom !" Rachel was 
 quite out of breath between tears and excite- 
 ment when she came to the end of this little 
 oration, and Mrs. Sara Grandage, in her amazed 
 vexation at what her emotion betrayed, found 
 not a single word at the moment wherewith to 
 answer her. Rachel had excellent grounds for 
 what she stated respecting Mr. Gilsland's views 
 of work ; only the day before, with a rueful 
 smile, he had given her a very explicit descrip- 
 tion of his labors and his feelings. 
 
 "On Sunday," said he, "I preach twice to 
 the barbarians who nod and yawn in my very 
 face or sit open-mouthed and expectant, as if 
 my words were tangible things to be physically 
 swallowed and digested. Some few wave their 
 heads with responsive groanings that make me 
 imagine myself in Little Bethel, and the school- 
 master tattoos rapidly on the boys' heads to 
 keep them awake. When it is over, I go to my 
 lodgings, depressed with the idea that not one 
 
 soul of my congregation is the wiser or the bet- 
 ter for any word- of mine. I do not know how 
 to address these uncultured^ people ; I have 
 not the key to their prejudices or their tastes. 
 I can not be with them hail-fellow-well-met, like 
 worthy Mr. Anderside, who goes into their cot- 
 tages, and talks about their children, the pigs, 
 the potato crops, and the complaints with as 
 much interest and eloquence as he would be- 
 stow on matters of real significance. One old 
 soul tells me at every visit that all her aches and 
 pains proceed from ' habstraction on the brain !' 
 and another has an unfailing source of lamenta- 
 tion in her ' poor, dear inside.' It is my busi- 
 ness to listen and comfort, but I listen and am 
 dumb. I had no vocation for the Church, and 
 I ought never to have entered it." 
 
 Rachel did not ask him why then he had en- 
 tered it. It struck on her very painfully that 
 his heart was not in his work, and she knew as 
 ■^ell as any body that such work as his can not 
 be well done without good heart. She believed 
 him conscientious, she understood the perma- 
 nence of the holy orders he had taken upon him- 
 self, and she overflowed with feelings of pity 
 and kindness toward him. So when her god- 
 mamma Grandage or any one else spote of his 
 shortcomings in duty or his general discontent, 
 she ralHed to his defense, and said her say in 
 spite of them all. But if this good and guile- 
 leas damsel was deceived in the estimate she 
 formed of the handsome curate's character, 
 other persons were shrewd enough to take lum 
 at his just value, and that value was by no means 
 a high one. 
 
 Mr. Gilsland spoke truly when he said that he 
 had no vocation for the Church ; he had none — 
 none whatever. It was his vocation to be a 
 gentleman, or what he esteemed such ; and he 
 had gone into orders as the shortest and readi- 
 est cut to the position. Of mean birth, but as a 
 boy very beautiful and talented, he had found 
 wealthy patrons ; he had made his way through 
 a public school and had gone to college with an 
 exhibition. There, so far as scholarship went, 
 he did well, but his conduct was not such as se- 
 cures the confidence of friends. He had earned 
 the reputation of being a slippery person. Braf- 
 ferton was now his thitd curacy, and he was as 
 far from preferment as ever. The sphere did 
 not satisfy him ; he felt his powers wasted there, 
 he was ambitious of great things, but he was far 
 too much in haste ever to achieve permanent 
 success. 
 
 A mood of profound discouragement was upon 
 him at the time when John Withers and his sis- 
 ter returned to Hurtledale. Rachel crossed his 
 path, and a nevr road to honor opened before 
 him. He cast his eyes on her with mixed mo- 
 tives. In the first place she belonged to the 
 class of old-fashioned gentle-folks with whom he 
 was not, nor ever would be, cater-cousins; in 
 the second, she had money — ^gossip had magni- 
 fied it into quite a pretty fortune ; and in the 
 third, she was a gentle, pleasing person, young 
 and fresh, in whom he should no doubt have 
 skill to develop all wifely virtues. He thought 
 about her often, and soon fancied himself well 
 on the way to winning her favor. So he was 
 unfortunately — Rachel's heart was caught be- 
 twixt pity and sympathy, and was ready for a 
 surrender. He made a little sentimental pre- 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 15 
 
 tenae with himself and protested that he had 
 fallen it love with her too — but it was that sort 
 of falling which has an eye to ultimate safety. 
 He had looked and implied a lover's " trmtme /" 
 but he had never uttered a word that Rachel 
 could hold as a pledge that he was not fooling 
 her. Fooling her; the wicked thought never 
 entered her lionest little head or caused her hon- 
 est little heart a single pang! People might 
 think and say of him what they liked, but for 
 her part, she knew him to be an excellent, de- 
 lightful, most misunderstood, and misplaced per- 
 son — and when she said this she was in earnest. 
 
 People have such different ways of thinking 
 and feeling! Rachel remembered when they 
 \ left Hurtledale and John went to his curacy in 
 Wales, how they_ would have esteemed it one of 
 the happiest events possible could he have had 
 the office Mr. Gilsland now held ; but there nev- 
 er was a chance of such luck for him. The gray 
 curate had possessed it in peace and thankful- 
 ness for nearly twenty years, and was a man of 
 fifty before he got his parsonage in the Potteries. 
 
 After Mrs. Sara Grandage's party, by the by, 
 it was circulated amongst the gossips that Kitty 
 Anderside had reconsidered her decision, and 
 was going to join Mr. Crofts in his new cure 
 after all. She said to excuse herself — ^though 
 indeed she needed no excuse — that they had 
 worked together so long at Brafferton that she 
 could not get on alone ; and so had come to the 
 conclusion of going to help him where h'e was. 
 Rachel heartily wished her well, though she too 
 had her little stone to cast at Mr. Gilsland ; it 
 was brought to her sensitive ears that Kitty had 
 actually been heard to call him a " pragmaitical 
 piippy:" but she could not quite believe it. 
 "Pragmatical puppy," did not sound like one of 
 Kitty's gentle phrases — nevertheless, it was a 
 fact that Kitty said it. 
 
 It is always a rather melancholy time out of 
 doors when the dead leaves are rustling on the 
 roads and rotting in the ditches ; but Rachel 
 Withers enjoyed the long evenings with the cur- 
 tains drawn and fire and lamp ablaze ; especially 
 she enjoyed them when her brother had a friend 
 staying in the house. When the real winter set 
 in with frost and snow, they were rather too far 
 out of the world for visiting much ; but some- 
 times Mr. Anderside came over for a night, 
 and sometimes Mr. Gilsland, and a third face 
 made a cheerful variety by their hearth. It did 
 John good too-^'his sister was convinced of it, 
 though he professed to like quite as well being 
 alone ; which was, to say the least of it, inhos- 
 pitable. But the fact was, he gave a world of 
 thought just then to Katherine Warleigh, all the 
 more thought perhaps that she did not keep her 
 promise of writing. Six lines to tell Rachel 
 why they had left the Hurtlemere House so sud- 
 denly was all she had received since they return- 
 ed to Whinstane Tower. 
 
 That John should dream .of her was natural 
 enough^ and Rachel would have been the last 
 person in the world to complain of such pre- 
 occupation had it not made him unsociable with 
 other people. He positively would not ask Mr. 
 Gilsland to stay one gloomy October afternoon, 
 though Rachel was sure he expected an invita- 
 tion, and went away disappointed ; and when 
 
 she ventured to say it was hardly civil, he cut 
 her quite short, declaring that he did not want 
 Mr. Gilsland coming to the Rectory so often. 
 
 80 often / when it was she did not know how 
 long since his last call ! Ten days, said John, 
 but she was sure it must be more. And for her 
 part, she added with a little air of dignity, she 
 liked guests about the house. It was not as if 
 they were poor and could not afford to entertain 
 them ; then she should not care. And with that 
 she retired to her own room, and perhaps shed 
 a few tears as she pictured to herself the hand- 
 some curate breasting his lonely way over the 
 moors against the. wind, through the six dreary 
 miles that stretched between the churlish Rec- 
 tory and his dull lodgings in Brafferton, 
 
 Another day about this period she had a brisk 
 passage of words with Mrs. Sara Graiidage on 
 the same subject. Bittersweet took upon her- 
 self to ask her goddaughter what she could see 
 in Mr. Gilsland. 
 
 " He has a long figure, a pretty face, and looks 
 like Absalom," said she in her quizzing fashion. 
 "Put him on Ulao kid gloves and a diamond 
 ring on his finger, and give him a perfumed 
 handkerchief to use at pathetic moments, and 
 you have the very sweetest picture of a pet 
 parson." 
 
 So truly ill-natured of her, Rachel retorted ; 
 as if he chose his own face or could help being 
 handsome ! 
 
 But that was just Bittersweet's way — when 
 she conceived an antipathy to any person, she 
 could not acknowledge a single virtue or merit 
 he had. 
 
 " What do I see in him ? What does any 
 body see in any body ? What does he see in 
 me, that he should always peer over a roomful 
 with his short-sighted eyes until he discovers 
 my place, when .he makes straight for it as if 
 there were nobody else present? And some- 
 times I wish he would not, for it is so marked — 
 though you need not fancy I am ashamed of his 
 attentions ; for I am very far from that ! I am 
 not witty, or pretty, or in any way entertaining 
 beyond other young women, yet apparently he 
 prefers my society to theirs. And why should 
 not I prefer his ? I always do like people who 
 show a liking for me, and I always shall!" cried 
 Miss Defiance, with her head aloft. 
 
 Then she told her godmamma very irrever- 
 ently that she was welcome to have her fancies 
 and delusions like the rest of the world, but it 
 was perfectly preposterous for her or any body 
 to accuse Mr. Gilsland of having an eye to her 
 little shred of a fortune. 
 
 "And it is uncivil to me, too," added she, 
 indignantly ; " for if I am no better than other 
 girls, neither am I conspicuously worse. Why 
 may I not be supposed to have some small at- 
 tractions of my own, besides pounds, shillings, 
 and pence ?'' 
 
 Bittersweet enjoyed her wrath and actually 
 had the — what shall I call it ? — the abominable- 
 ness to say- to her face : 
 
 " You are cut out for an old maid. Dumpling. 
 Don't marry, and I'll leave you a nice little for- 
 tune ; marry, and I'll cut you off with a shil- 
 Img,!" 
 
 To tell any girl at eighteen she is cut out for 
 an old. maid ! If that is not sin, what is ? 
 
 Oh ! how Rachel fired up ! 
 
16 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 " How dare you say that, godmamma ? And 
 you married yourself !" cried slie. 
 
 " So I did, but it is a long while ago, and I 
 knew no better. I would not marry now^ I as- 
 sure you." 
 
 '■" You are an old woman, you are a hundred ! 
 And it is a shame of you to speak against mar- 
 rying when all the world makes a proverb for 
 goodness of your husband's name !" 
 " He was a rery philosophical person." 
 " I should think he had need to be !" retort- 
 ed Mistress Rachel, with epigrammatic point. 
 Bittersweet only laughed and the laugh brought 
 her goddaughter back to good-humor. "Per- 
 haps," said she more calmly, " I am rather 
 formal and Dutch to look at, but I am not all 
 starch ! I am sure I could be very fond of 
 somebody who was fond of me, and to elect 
 myself one of St. Catherine's maids before I 
 am twenty — N'o. You may promise me your 
 nice little fortune ten years hence if you choose, 
 but I'll make no treaty for It with you now ! I 
 would not if there were no Mr. Gilsland in the 
 world ! Not marry, indeed !" and the young 
 woman went off as stately as Queen Elizabeth's 
 ruff. 
 
 Independently of her own marrying or let- 
 ting it alone, Kachel Withers thoroughly enjoy- 
 ed a weddihg. People might say what they 
 liked about weddings being dull, melancholy, 
 and so forth, but she liked to see them ; and 
 when she was asked toward the end of October 
 to hold the gloves at Kitty Anderside's, she 
 was proud and delighted to accept the invita- 
 tion. 
 
 She told Mrs. Sara Grandage aftenvard that 
 she could not imagine what made the women 
 cry at weddings, and what they got into such a 
 state of tremulous excitement for. " It is al- 
 ways a risk, they say tragically. HisJe I it could 
 not have been much of a risk for Kitty Ander- 
 side or Mr. Crofts, who have been friends and 
 neighbors for twenty years; yet her kinsfolk 
 wept as if she were going to be carried to exe- 
 cution instead of to a comfortable parsonage 
 amongst the Potteries. I was glad to see she 
 had more sense than to cry herself, and Mr. 
 Crofts looked quite spruce and jubilant, only 
 his clothes fitted so ill. Kitty wore pearl gray 
 satin and a bonnet — a wreath and a vail would 
 have been absurd at her age, you know — and 
 very nice and pleasant she was, trying to make 
 every body feel as happy and as much at their 
 ease as herself." 
 
 John Withers and his sister went over to 
 Brafferton the evening before the wedding when 
 there was a family dinner-party, and a full gath- 
 ering of friends out of the town afterward. 
 The entertainment was rather dull and whispery, 
 and Mr. Gilsland was not there. Eachel could 
 not help thinking how much more lively and 
 agreeable a good dance would have made every 
 thing — but dancing was quite tabooed in the 
 Andersides' circle. 
 
 They had a beautiful morning for the wed- 
 ding, and the church was crowded ; all the 
 school-children forming double lines of rosy 
 faces up the center aisle. Nothing particular 
 happened except that old Miss Briggs, who was 
 second bridesmaid, was taken faint, and had to 
 be led into the vestry by John ; she said to ex- 
 cuse herself that the ceremony was so awful. 
 
 And it did sound very solemn even to Rachel 
 when she heard it read in church. She won- 
 dered how people who make marriages of con- 
 venience could stand and listen to that service ; 
 she thought there ought to be something special 
 for their occasions and quite different. 
 
 After breakfast the bride and bridegroom set 
 off on their journey home to the Parsonage 
 amongst the Potteries, and there was another 
 gathering in the evening — including the curate — 
 which was by many degrees more cheerful than 
 that of the night before. People seemed to 
 have got a weight off their spirits, and though 
 conversation was still the sole amusement, they 
 recovered their natural voices and ventured to 
 use them without dread of being considered 
 unfeeling — an inexpressible relief to the brides- 
 maids. 
 
 One morning about midway the mouth of 
 December a letter arrived at the rectory con- 
 taining the much-talked-of invitation to Whin- 
 stane,, which Rachel had given up as forgotten 
 and done with two months ago. It was Grace 
 Warleigh who wrote, but Katherine added a 
 postscript seconding her wishes very cordially. 
 " Can you come as soon as Christmas Day is 
 turned and remain with us a fortnight?" she 
 said. " Papa made no demur when we asked 
 him this unusual favor ; had we imagined he 
 would consent so readily we should have begged 
 for it long ere this." 
 
 John Withers kept his eyes on his sister with 
 a wistful earnestness as she read these lines 
 aloud, and said when she reached the end of 
 them, " You will go, Eachel ?" to which she 
 answered: "Oh! yes, to be sure!" as if she 
 quite enjoyed the idea ; which she certainly did 
 not, much as she liked their friends. But any 
 thing to please John ; so her acceptance was 
 written and dispatched forthwith. 
 
 They had had a steady, dull time during the 
 previous three weeks at the Rectory ; for the 
 winter had set in with terrible snow-storms, and 
 kept every body prisoners at home. A poor 
 old hawker had been found one Sunday morn- 
 ing frozen to death in the narrow lane between 
 Deepgyll and the Force, his pack under his 
 head, and his body half buried in the drift. 
 The roads were almost impassable except on 
 horseback, and the fells were one vast dazzling 
 blank of snow. There was another heavy fall 
 on the day Grace Warleigh's letter came, which 
 leveled the churchyard graves, and wrapt them 
 in beautiful new winding-sheets for Christmas. 
 It did not appear very clear to Eachel how, 
 under these circumstances, she was to get to 
 Whinstane Tower, eighteen miles off; but John 
 cooUy said : 
 
 " Where there was a will there was a way " 
 and after that, of course, she knew she should 
 go, even though she might have to fly through 
 the air on a broomstick ! 
 
 Rachel's own little affairs had made no par- 
 ticular progress since Kitty Anderside's wed- 
 ding. She had only seen Mr. Gilsland once dur- 
 ing the drear month of November, when she 
 met him accidentally in a shop at Brafferton • he 
 was very pleasant, as usual, but also, as usual 
 had a little grievance — ^he could not procure 
 any fresh butter. Rachel wished he did not 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 17 
 
 make so much ado about trifles — John would 
 have eaten dry bread for a twelvemonth before 
 he would have dreamt of complaining to Kathe- 
 rine Warleigh ! However, she promised to 
 speak to Robb's wife at the mill to send him 
 some, though she knew it was very scarce, and 
 not good at this season when the cows could get 
 no grass. The winter bade fair to be one of 
 more than common severity ; the hollies were 
 scarlet with berries even then for the frozen-out 
 birds, which was always taken in Hurtledale as a 
 sign of hard weather that would continue late 
 and long. 
 
 But that malicious old Bittersweet defeated 
 Rachel's kindly efforts for the curate's creature- 
 comforts ; she saw her a day or two after her 
 embassy to the miller's wife, and cried, mocking- 
 ly, wagging her head : " I have disappointed Mr. 
 Gilsland of his butter, Dumpling ; I want every 
 ounce dame Robb can make, and she dare not 
 offend me by selling it elsewhere. I am dehght- ' 
 ed to teach him a lesson of self-denial, and I 
 hope he may profit^y it. Have you got a lock 
 of his lovely hair yet ? Good-by, my dear, and 
 keep up your spirits !" 
 
 Since this, Rachel had not seen the curate 
 either at home or abroad ; but only two days 
 before Christmas, John, returning from Braffer- 
 ton toward dusk, called her into his study for a 
 bit of serious conversation. He had been over 
 to the Andersides', where he had met Mr. Gils- 
 land, and they had had some talk together. 
 " Some grave talk, Rachel, and about yoM," he 
 told her, and then stopped short, looking not a 
 little vexed. After a minute's pause, he asked, 
 abruptly : 
 
 " Do you really feel that you can care for that 
 man, Kafehel?" 
 
 ■ Rachel did not answer him ; she felt her col- 
 or come and go, and something rising in her 
 throat as if it would choke her. John was kind 
 and considerate, but he was woefully disappoint- 
 ed ; and there was a touch of impatience in his 
 voice, as he said, without pushing her to a con- 
 fession : " Then, I suppose, I must make him 
 welcome here more frequently. I will not as- 
 sume the responsibility of thwarting your fancy, 
 but I wish it had been for any body else I " 
 
 Rachel had been forced to see, almost from 
 the beginning of their acquaintance, that her 
 brother did not like Mr. Gilsland, and as he was 
 not apt to take up unfounded prejudices, she 
 now begged him to give her his reasons for it. 
 He could not exactly state to her one. Mr. 
 Gilsland's personal and professional character 
 were fair, he allowed, and his means would, 
 doubtless, improve ; his connections were un- 
 known, but then a man is himself, and not his 
 family. No, he did not object to him on the 
 score of his birth, though he should have prefer- 
 red seeing his sister marry a gentleman of con- 
 dition equal to her own, but he was afraid his 
 temper was queer ! 
 
 "All our tempers are queer sometimes," re- 
 joined Rachel, and the effort of speaking brought 
 back her self-possession. 
 
 Finally, John said, Mr. Gilsland had appealed 
 to him, as his sister's natural guardian, to per- 
 mit his visits at the Rectory, and that he did not 
 feel he had a right to forbid them if they were 
 agreeable to her. " We have always thought 
 you a little woman of sense," added he, more 
 B 
 
 cheerfully, perceiving that poor Rachel was a 
 little cast down by his opinion of her lover, 
 " and if you do not approve of him on closer 
 acquaintance, you can depute me to tell him so. 
 There need be no engagement yet, understand 
 that distinctly ; you must know each other bet- 
 ter first. He will have no opportunity of seeing 
 you before you go to Whinstane, so think the 
 matter over while you are there, and if you re- 
 turn home in your present frame of mind, then 
 he shall have leave to come." 
 
 If her brother had appeared in the least degree 
 pleased with her prospects, Rachel would have 
 been proud and happy beyond measure ; but, as 
 it was, she felt fretted with a host of uncomfort- 
 able fears. Still, atqp of them all, there sang in 
 her heart, ever and anon, that rejoicing cry, 
 " He loves me ! I knew he did, I knew he 
 did ! " which drowns every other voice when it 
 gets an utterance. John might be grave, and 
 Bittersweet might be sarcastic, but they could 
 only ruffle her on the surface while she had that 
 balm of comfort within. 
 
 And as soon as Christmas Day and the school- 
 feast wete over, Rachel packed up her traps, 
 left John to the tender mercies of Mary Deane 
 and Phemie; who promised to take good care of 
 him in her absence, and departed to Whinstane 
 in the jingling Brafferton chaise, and in a most 
 enviable mood of mind. She had received her 
 first letter from Mr. Gilsland, and had answered 
 it with joyous sincerity, and also she had receiv 
 ed a letter from Bittersweet, whom John had 
 apprised of the crisis in his sister's affairs. In 
 this letter, Rachel was apostrophized as " a be- 
 witched duckling, ready to run straight into 
 reynard's mouth, with a quack of tragical glee, 
 directly he opened it !" and informed that her 
 godmamma only waited her decision to send for 
 her lawyer to alter her will. 
 
 The young woman consulted her dignity, and 
 said she rmghi wait. 
 
 CHAPTER 'THE SECOND. 
 
 AT WHINSTANE TOWEK. 
 
 None serve him but constrained things whose liearts are 
 absent. Shaesfbarb. 
 
 I. 
 Rachel Withers could hardly believe that 
 it was real ; she felt as if at any moment she 
 might have woke up out of her dream, and 
 have found herself back at the homely, comfort- 
 able rectory. But, no, she was verily at Whin- 
 stane Tower. Katherine Warleigh was in the 
 adjoining room, probably fast asleep, and the 
 droning of Lady Foulis's organ drifted with the 
 sobs of the night gusts eerily round about the 
 walls. From the fullness of the sound, Rachel 
 knew that she must be playing with her window 
 wide, even at that hour and in that bitter frost. 
 Was the woman insensible to cold, or were these 
 midnight misereres to the winds of heaven parts 
 of an unfinished'penanee ? 
 
 Rachel had passed by the foot of her private 
 staircase that day, and had seen her servant 
 coming down — a dumb, old, faithful-looking soul, 
 who was, pefhaps, the only soul alive, besides 
 herself, who knew the core of her mystery. 
 Even Sir William Warleigh had no distinct un- 
 derstanding of it She had come back to Whin- 
 
18 
 
 ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 stane, after a year or two's absence, just about 
 the time when he was brought thither, and had 
 begun living then precisely as she was living 
 now, only she was young at that date, and at 
 this she was old. The dales' world gossiped 
 about her awfully long ago, but, when it had 
 said its say, seeing her no more, forgot her ; the 
 new generation rarely heard her name, or heard 
 it only as the echo of an unintelligible tragedy. 
 
 Katherine and Grace Warleigh, familiar with 
 the idea of her ever since they were born, had 
 neither interest nor curiosity on the matter. At 
 very long intervals, when they were children. 
 Lady Foulis sent for them, and they went re- 
 luctantly. She had possession of the eastern- 
 most turret for her life, and, on a stated day of 
 the year, Sir William saw her to pay her her 
 income, which was charged on the Penslaveu 
 lands. She was not mad, the girls assured Ra- 
 chel, whatever else she might be ; and Katherine 
 said she was certainly one of the old race — a 
 genuine Warleigh, born and bred ; for she had 
 the noble features, the full lips, and the resplen- 
 dent dark eyes that gleamed from many a state- 
 ly canvas in the picture-gallery. She was a 
 papist, and Grace's pet theory concerning her 
 was that she had been a nun, and had fled her 
 convent with some lover— loved not wisely, but 
 too well— and that being overtaken by swift re- 
 morse for her broken vows, she had thenceforth 
 given herself up to a voluntary imprisonment. 
 This speculation was as near the truth — and as 
 far from it — as many another that hovered round 
 the mystery of her name. 
 
 The life at Whinstane was, indeed, a life of 
 weariful stagnation — Rachel Withers could not 
 have endured it very long. They went down in 
 the morning to a surly breakfast in the gray 
 twilight — for Sir William kept the earliest hours, 
 and allowed no voice but his own to be heard 
 as he read his paper. They munched their toast 
 in silence, and made signals for sugar, or butter, 
 or bacon with the most stealthy carefulness, and 
 if in their transit to and fro the table, any ves- 
 sel clinked against another, his scowl was almost 
 as savage as a blow. Tet Grace declared he 
 was quite in a genial mood for him since the 
 news had come that Oliver's wife had brought 
 him a little son ; perhaps the. good effect of it 
 was wearing off now, however; for it was a 
 mouth old when Rachel arrived at the Tower ; 
 and he had begun to be desperately impatient 
 to hear from Laurence, in answer to a most 
 magnanimous proposal that he considered he 
 had made him ; and his vexation each morning 
 when the post-bag yielded up nothing but the 
 daily paper, was very apparent. 
 
 After breakfast was over, the young women 
 wandered into the wilderness of a library, and 
 cowered round the fire within the screen, talk- 
 ing in whispers — ^nobody at Whinstane seemed 
 to dare to speak in a natural tone except Sir 
 William, and Rachel was fast catching the timid 
 habit. There they monotonized nntil nearly 
 noon, when they, went into the park, and march- 
 ed up and down a path that had been swept for 
 them in the snow. The first morning they 
 walked as far as the rectory, and saw Mrs. Hill 
 for ten minutes — an event which had brighten- 
 ed Grace ever since. She read a letter from 
 Arthur, and communicated a message to his 
 mother for reply, and with this crumb of com- 
 
 fort was refreshed beyond belief Rachel wrote 
 to John afterward, and Katherine looked over 
 her shoulder for a minute or two while she was 
 doing so, but she sent no message to him ; per- 
 haps she was too shy, his sister thought, and 
 then wondered whether she really liked him ; 
 they were not long enough together for any 
 very profound attachment to be formed — if a 
 reasonable affection be an affair of time ; but 
 she believed sincerely that only opportunity 
 lacked to accomplish in Katherine's mind what 
 was already past changing in John's. 
 
 Luncheon made an incident in the middle of 
 the day. Sir William always presented himself 
 at the table if he were about the house, and 
 questioned his daughters straightly as to where 
 they had been and what they had done since 
 breakfast, invariably sneering andgrowhng over 
 the summary. They were not allowed to inter- 
 fere in the village school, or to share any part 
 of Mrs. Hill's parish work. There was not one 
 kind duty or office toward their poorer neigh- 
 bors in which they mightjengage. No Christ- 
 mas bounties were dispensed from the Tower as 
 from other great houses, and so cruelly strict 
 was Sir William's rule that never a cottager of 
 all his laboring tenants would have dared to 
 gather a fagot of broken sticks to warm his 
 frozen hearth. There was no hunting just now 
 because of the hard weather, but when the meet 
 was anywhere in the neighborhood, the girls 
 were forbidden to stir bey,ond the flower-gar- 
 dens. If Sir William had been the tenderest 
 father in the world, he could not have testified 
 more care over their every movement than he 
 did ; but his watchfulness arose from his habits 
 of mean suspicion, not out of an anxious- natural 
 affection, and it was irksome accordingly. 
 
 The afternoon was always inexpressibly long 
 and slow^ The wintry sky looked too heavy, 
 dreary, and cloud-laden to tempt any one forth 
 a second time in the day, and when luncheon 
 was over, the girls betook themselves to the 
 library again, and crooned through the old 
 stories till it was dark. AU the witch legends, 
 ghost tales, and secret family traditions of the 
 dales had found a storehouse in Katherine's 
 brain, and she delighted in airing her musty 
 possessions. This weird chat lasted them untQ 
 dinner, which was as silent and cheerless a meal 
 as breakfast. After that they saw Sir William 
 no more, and what became of him Rachel did 
 not care to inquire. They retreated to the \ 
 screened library hearth and the eerie phantom 
 talk ; and at ten o'clock they were supposed to 
 go to their rooms, and they did go ; and there 
 Rachel shivered and wrote down in her little 
 locked diary the no-events of the day until the 
 pen dropt from her stiffened fingers ; for a fire 
 was not allowed to her in her chamber, and her 
 friends were stinted to an inch of candle. Their 
 maid was a perfectly respectful, disagreeable 
 spy of a woman, who executed Sir William's 
 will as sternly as a jailer. 
 
 Oh ! any way of escape from such a life would 
 be a change for the better ! Rachel Withers 
 would rather have been the humblest working- 
 woman in the world, free to come and go, to 
 speak and breathe, than either of these two 
 Imprisoned creatures. They did not look so 
 haudaome as when they were in Hurtledale, and 
 enjoyed an occasional outlet for themselves. 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 19 
 
 Their features were drawn and set querulous- 
 ly, their eyea were scared, plaintive, anxious, 
 watchful. Surely the despotism of a household 
 tyrant is the chief curse women can have to 
 groan under ! All of cruelty that rumor attri- 
 buted to Sir William Warleigh fell short of what 
 Kachel saw his daughters daily endure. Filial 
 obedience to such a man could be no longer a 
 duty ; Laurence had broken from his yoke, 
 Oliver diplomatically evaded it, and the sooner 
 Katherine and Grace found deliverance from 
 his mastership the happier for all of them ! 
 With his leave or without his leave, Rachel 
 hoped and trusted that when the day came that 
 Arthur Hill and her brother John could give 
 them good homes and kind protection, they 
 would go without scruple or hesitation to the 
 care of those who loved them, and who would 
 make their lives worth living. And this doc- 
 trine she preached as well as believed ; perhaps, 
 if Sir William had been aware of it, he would 
 not have made her the welcome guest she was. 
 
 Laurence Warleigh was married — the news 
 reached Whinstane Tower on the morning of 
 New Tear's Day. 
 
 Sir William had just sworn at Katherine and 
 dragged the breakfast-table aslant toward the 
 fire when Nichols, the butler, brought in the 
 post-bag. His master snatched it roughly out 
 of the man's hands, and flung it upon the rug, 
 where Grace was kneeling to warm her thin 
 shivering person ; bidding her open it and give 
 him his Hmes, and look if there were any letter 
 from Laurence. Meanwhile he applied himself 
 to the strong ale and game-pie with which he 
 w-as accustomed to lay the foundation of his 
 "Ogre's breakfast; and when Ins son's missive 
 was timidly handed to him, he only laid down 
 his knife and fork to break the seal and flatten 
 tbe Sheet of paper open on the table, and then 
 resumed his weapons that he might satisfy his 
 hunger and his curiosity at one and the same 
 time. His daughters watched his' countenance 
 furtively as he read, and saw it change from its 
 animal coarseness and quiescence to a purple 
 and bloated rage. When he opened his mouth, 
 it was to stutter out a volley of frightful oaths 
 which made the young women quail and avert 
 their heads ; and having read the document to 
 an end, he tore it furiously in two, flung it 
 toward the fire, and leaving his meal unfinished, 
 dashed out of the room. 
 
 Rachel Withers held herself aloof while his 
 daughters brought their pale, terrified faces to- 
 gether, and speculated in whispers on what 
 Laurence's new offense could be ; but not until 
 they saw their father galloping down the avenue 
 at the top of his horse's speed, did they venture 
 to take up the fragments of their brother's let- 
 ter, and read it. Katherine sighed as she 
 perused the scant lines, and said the letter had 
 given Laurence some trouble to write, and was 
 not very conciliatory in tone. How could it be 
 conciliatory? pleaded Grace, and theA they 
 talked low and hopelessly on the further es- 
 trangement that was sure to ensue ; the younger 
 Bister wishing that Oliver were at home to pre- 
 vent it, and the elder professing to believe that 
 his interference would- do more harm than good. 
 
 Considering the importance of the intelligence 
 
 that Lauren<5e Warleigh's letter conveyed, it 
 was very cool, brief, and explicit ; but consider- 
 ing also the terms on which he stood with his 
 father it was as respectful as such unwelcome 
 news could possibly be. The young man began 
 by saying that the subject of his epistle would 
 surprise, and perhaps displease. Sir William, but 
 as concealment would now be equally wrong 
 and futile he had written to apprise him of his 
 marriage with a young and lovely woman, the 
 orphan and only daughter of Captain Gwynne, 
 a naval officer, who had died in her childhood, 
 bequeathing her to the care of his mother, the 
 only near relative she had. She was a Roman 
 Catholic, but a sincere, pious, good girl as ever 
 breathed ; without fortune, but of simple tastes 
 and habits. He wound up by mentioning that 
 for the present they proposed making their 
 home at the Hurtlemere House, and by express- 
 ing a hope that his sisters would be permitted to 
 visit them there. And that was all — he ac- 
 knowledged no breach of authority, and seemed 
 quite unconscious of any pardon being needed 
 for what he had done. 
 
 "Think of the Hurtlemere House in winter," 
 whispered Grace, drawing her breath with a 
 shudder through her closed teeth ; " that great 
 pine wood at the back, and nothing but the tarn 
 and snowy fells to look out upon. , They ought 
 to be very much in love to support that intolera- 
 ble dreariness — I hope they are !" 
 
 " I wish Laurence had not married in a Comer 
 as if he were ashamed of his choice," said 
 Katherine. 
 
 " Poor fellow !" sighed Grace; "he was so 
 persecuted — home was made so miserable to 
 him." 
 
 " Not more miserable than to us," responded 
 her sister ; and then they fell into a dreary 
 silence, and stood looking out at the skeleton 
 trees of the avenue and the snow-buried undu- 
 lations of the park, where had reigned for nearly 
 a month past as black a frost as any within the 
 memory of Whinstandale. 
 
 Sir William returned home at noon, his rage 
 cowed down, but full of a malignant disappoint- 
 ment and an implacable spite. From the wrath- 
 ful ejaculations that frothed over while he sat 
 with his daughters and guest at luncheon they 
 gathered that he had been to his agent to try 
 what he could do to punish his offending son, 
 and that he bad come back with the mortifying 
 assurrance that he could do nothing. Afterward 
 he bade Katherine write to her brother Oliver, 
 and command his immediate presence at Whin- 
 stane. 
 
 " A black beginning this for the New Tear,'' 
 thought poor Rachel, whose luck had set her in 
 the midst of this dismal episode. " Oh ! how 
 thankful shall I be when my visit is over, and I 
 return to the peace and kindly comforts of 
 home !" 
 
 The same afternoon about four o'clock, whUe 
 Katherine and she were prosing over the family 
 event by the library fire, Grace came running in 
 to say that Lady Foulis had sent for them, and 
 they must go immediately. The sisters (isap- 
 peared and Rachel was left alone— r-not for,many 
 minutes, however; for Katherine came back al- 
 most at once to tell her that she was wanted too. 
 Lady Foulis would hke to see the guest Sir Wil- 
 liam did not distrust, was the explanation of 
 
20 
 
 ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 this unexpected summons, and she obeyed it 
 with awakened curiosity. 
 
 The apartments occupied by Lady FouUs lay 
 all together in the north-eastern wing of the 
 Tower. They were approached by a separate 
 staircase, and the door by which they formerly 
 communicated with the great corridor had been 
 walled up. Katherine bade Rachel take heed to 
 her steps as they began to mount the spiral 
 stair ; for it was steep and gloomy, and when 
 they reached the top both were glad to pause 
 and take breath. Opposite to them was a door 
 standing ajar, through which shone the light of 
 a lamp, and when they had waited a moment the 
 staid-visaged woman whom Rachel had seen 
 once before looked out and bade them enter. 
 
 It would not be easy to say what Rachel ex- 
 pected to behold, but assuredly it was not what 
 she saw. Visions of sorceresses gray and terri- 
 ble, of witches wild and weird, of remorse-strick- 
 en penitents worn and wasted in living death, 
 had flitted momentarily before her imagination 
 as she climbed the turretrsteps ; but when the 
 servant opened an inner door, a rush of warm, 
 incense-perfumed air passed over her, and she 
 was ushered into a pretty octagon-shaped room, 
 half darkened by the crimson drapery of five 
 narrow high windows, and half lighted by the 
 ruddy gleam of fir-logs ablaze on the hearth. 
 Her first impression was as of a solemn, glow- 
 ing picture. 
 
 "This is our friend, Rachel Withers," said 
 Grace, coming forward, and taking her hand to 
 lead her to Lady Foulis, who sat erect in a high- 
 backed chair at one corner of the fireside. Each 
 gave the other a direct glance full of inquiry, 
 and then in obedience to a sign from Katherine 
 Rachel sat down by her on a bench of oak 
 which Grace had previously drawn toward the 
 hearth for her own accommodation. 
 
 What Lady Foulis saw in Rachel Withers 
 matters little here ; what Rachel saw in her was 
 a woman tall, straight, and stately ; a woman 
 verging on seventy or past it, with silver-white 
 hair crisped up in some bygone fashiouy and 
 covered with a kerchief of black lace tied loose- 
 ly over it. All her dress was of fine black 
 cloth, flowing and graceful ; her hands were 
 long, lean and fair, and her face was like many 
 another face in the gallery of portraits, only 
 more aged perhaps than any of those Warleigh 
 beauties were when they committed their charms 
 to the verdict of posterity — that is to say, her 
 face was like theirs in feature ; the curve of the 
 lips, though fallen, was as full ; the eyes, though 
 marred by time, were as large and as beautifully 
 cut ; but in the expression of her countenance 
 there was something very peculiar and not 
 pleasing. Rachel had heard tell of the second- 
 sight — she could have fancied that Lady Foulis 
 had that weird gift. 
 
 There was nothing supernatural in her sur- 
 roundings now, however — nothing but what 
 contributed to the general air of comfort and 
 convenience. Behind her chair was a curtain 
 drawn back from a tiny oratory in a recess of 
 the wall, graced and decked in the common way. 
 The organ, by means of which she disturbed 
 Rachel's nightly rest, occupied a corresponding 
 position behind the bench on which she was 
 seated with Katherine and Grace. A thick . 
 crimson carpet covered the middle of the stone 
 
 floor, and in the center of it was a table gar- 
 nished with books and works like that of any 
 other gentlewoinan. What the books were, Ra- 
 chel did not see ; Katherine suggested after- 
 ward books of necroniancy, and Grace books 
 of devotion ; perhaps they were both or neither, 
 or only books of general reading — they looked 
 like it — and Lady Foulis had occasional parcels 
 from the outside world which perhaps contained 
 them. She had letters too, notwithstanding 
 that she was a witch ; in fact, to keep up the 
 ghostly shimmer of a mystery we must not in- 
 spect it too closely. Before Rachel Withers had 
 been in her presence five minutes she began to 
 think her a person quite capable of being ex- 
 plained ; the agreeaJDle feeling was not perma- 
 nent, but during its cdntinuance it enabled her to 
 collect her faculties, and steady her nerves for 
 what might be to come. 
 
 " I revolved just long enough on the wheel of 
 fashion to have all the sentiment ground out of 
 me," were the first distinct words she heard 
 Lady FouMs utter. She was speaking to Grace 
 when Katherine and she entered, and at that 
 sentence interrupted herself to receive them. 
 Rachel hoped that when they were settled she 
 would resume what sounded like a reminiscence 
 of her early life ; but she did not ; she began on 
 quite another subject, on that which was occu- 
 pying the minds of the whole household — on 
 Laurence's marriage. 
 
 " Laurence Warleigh has taken to himself a 
 wife, and Whinstandale has lighted no bonfires 
 and rung no bells,"- said she. " It used not to be 
 so in the old time. We have a legend amongst 
 us that says, ' Bride unwelcomed, babe unblest.' 
 And Oliver is to come home and be king, is he, 
 velvet-gloved Oliver with the claws ?" Kather- 
 ine replied that she had written to him that day 
 by her father's orders. " And his ugly wife and 
 their boy — father and son, they will both stand 
 in better folks' shoon than their own," added 
 Lady Foulis, sneering with a tremulous, wither- 
 ed lip. 
 
 ' ' How do you know that Oliver's wife is ugly ?" 
 asked Grace. " We have none of us seen her." 
 
 " Did he not marry her for money ?" was the 
 answer. " But Laurence's bride is a beauty-^he 
 always had an eye for a sweet fair face, and he 
 married her for love." 
 
 " He was sure never to marry for any thing 
 lower or less," murmured Katherine. 
 
 While this conversation was passing, though 
 Rachel did not look at Lady Fouhs, and felt in- 
 deed strangely restrained from doing so, she was 
 conscious of the dark eyes intently watching 
 her, and was at length startled by her saying 
 with a quaint abruptness, " You are making 
 the best of the time present, yov are content 
 and happy now ?" to which she answered " Yes," 
 promptly enough, though the red flew into her 
 face and her pulse redoubled its speed. " That 
 is wise — the future is always unsure," rejoined 
 Lady Foulis, and then addressing Katherine and 
 Grace she said : " Tou, poor things, are having 
 your worst days here — your bright ones will 
 happen elsewhere !" « 
 
 " We have need to long for them," sighed 
 Katherine. " If they don't make haste we shall 
 be past enjoying them." 
 
 " Have patience yet ; they may not be so far 
 off as they seem." 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 21 
 
 All these words of Lady Foulia might be re- 
 garded either as gravely prophetical or as sim- 
 ple commonplaces, whichever her hearers liked ; 
 but it was good-by to Rachel Withers' compos- 
 ure ; she fell somber and silent, and was physi- 
 cally chilled as if a cold shadow enveloped lier. 
 Her two friends tallced on; told Lady Foulis 
 whom they had seen in Hurtledale, and what 
 ddightful hours they had spent at the rectory ; 
 and she listened, and put in little phrases in 
 quite a matter-of-fact way. All the time this 
 was transacting, Rachel felt or fancied in some 
 inexplicable manner that the weird woman's 
 thoughts were . bent upon herself; very foolish 
 she knew it was, but- she could not help it ; all 
 her nerves were strung up and in a state of high 
 excitement : the-imagination plays our judgment 
 strange tricks. 
 
 Lady Foulis did not detain her visitors very 
 long, and when she intimated their dismissal, she 
 rose and touched Rachel on the cheek, saying 
 that it was a lifetime ago since she had seen 
 any thing so round or~ so rosy ; Rachel's skin 
 crisped and shivered at her as one shivers at a 
 wicked story, and she wag thankful to get away 
 again, even to the dreary library ; but it was 
 ever so long before the ice of that caress was 
 melted out of her warm veins. 
 
 Katherine could not forbear smiling. " You 
 will go away and confirm Lady Foulis's reputa- 
 tion as a witch," said she. 
 
 Rachel shuddered Irrepressibly and replied 
 that, speaking in dales' parlance, she certainly 
 was not canny. 
 
 "No," agreed Grace. "She has a remark- 
 able influence. Wherever she draws it from or 
 whatever purpose she puts it to, she has an in- 
 fluence beyond the ordinary power of women. 
 I believe in witchcraft — the Bible admits it, you 
 know." 
 
 " I should like to be sure whether she has 
 really any foreknowledge of events, or whether 
 she merely casts out her oracular speeches by 
 way of cheering us," Katherine murmured, re- 
 flectively. 
 
 " She has always promised us some good ulti- 
 mately," said Grace ; " and whether her prom- 
 ises come true or not I am glad to dream over 
 them while we have so little that is pleasant 
 present with us." 
 
 Rachel said she had no faith in prognostics, 
 and Katherine said neither had she — she wished 
 she had— and then they entered on a discussion 
 thereof, tending to the conclusion that they were 
 all weaker than they were willing to admit. 
 They agreed that warnings of a spiritual na- 
 ture were perfectly ridiculous and impossible ; 
 but something within them deeper than reason 
 silently protested against their loudest assertions. 
 Their brains denied, but their nerves confessed 
 to the influence of mysteries beyond the reach 
 of their philosophy to explain. 
 
 " I don't believe in ghosts, yet I am mortally 
 afraid of them," shuddered Rachel, with a sen- 
 sation as of cold water running down her back. 
 " Lady Foulis's kiss was like a frost-blight — 
 and what did she mean about the future being 
 unsure?" Katherine advised her not to worry 
 herself with speculating on any dark sayings, 
 and fortunately she was not of the temper that 
 inclines to do it. 
 
 " As soon as I see the smoke of our blessed 
 
 Hurtledale chimneys, I shall be as blithe as a 
 bee once more," said she, rallying her courage ; 
 " but here I could positively learn to mope and 
 be miserable if I slept, or did not sleep rather, 
 within sound of that solemn organ — listen to the 
 dirge, it is moaning and sobbing through now. 
 Katie ! Grace ! I hope it won't be long 
 before some true knight comes riding this way 
 to carry you off from your haunted castle I" 
 
 Her friends laughed and asked why her wits 
 ran so much on wedding's — was it Laurence's 
 had set them a-gee ? She said no, and some- 
 how it came to pass during the next hour, that 
 the ghosttalk retired outside the screen, and 
 within it Rachel told them her little love story. 
 True was the sympathy and tender — but how, 
 why had she kept the beautiful secret from them 
 so long ? She had been with them four whole 
 days 1 • 
 
 Swiftly obedient to his father's summons, on 
 the third of January Oliver Warleigh arrived at 
 the Tower ; and terms for his permanent estab- 
 lishment there were soon made between them. 
 Katherine was very angry. She felt that Laur- 
 ence would not be forgiven now, and that they 
 should be more widely separated than ever. It 
 would be Oliver's interest to keep him away 
 from Whinstane, and what was Oliver's interest 
 nobofJy expected him to neglect. Be that as it 
 might, however, by the arrangements Sir Wil- 
 liam agreed to with his younger son, his daugh- 
 ters' lives could hardly foil to be changed for 
 the better. With a. sister-in-law living at the 
 Tower they must acquire a, certain measure of 
 liberty and society. Oliver stipulated for the 
 occupancy of the whole of the west wing, for 
 his separate table, servants, horses, and carriage, 
 all at Sir William's expense, and his demands 
 were granted without demur. 
 
 Laurence would thus be kept out of his right- 
 ful place, and it might be for a long, long term 
 of years — no one could foresee the end of it. 
 Grace thought that Oliver would never lend 
 himself to hinder a reconciliation when the 
 freshness of the offense wor^ offjiis father's 
 mind; but Katherine declared she would not 
 trust him unless it could be managed with ad- 
 vantage to himself Rachel Withers, being 
 placed in the midst of these changes, heard, if 
 she did not share in, the sisters' debates. Oli- 
 ver, after the momentary surprise of finding any 
 lady at Whinstane as a guest, was very gracious 
 to her ; but he impressed her no more favorably 
 now than formerly. It was singular how he 
 could be so polished and even fine-looking a 
 man, and yet have such a strange likeness to Sir 
 William. He asked her twenty questions about 
 John and about their return to Hurtledale, 
 and was pleased to say that as she had made 
 the good beginning of coming to the Tower as 
 a visitor, so he hoped to see her there again and 
 that frequently. Rachel's answer was courteous, 
 but there were mental reservations behind it — 
 of her own free will she would never see the 
 dreadful place again ! 
 
 Her fortnight was now drawing to an end, and 
 glad would she be to go home — there was no 
 place Uke it that she had found yet ! Mr. Gils- 
 land was there — ^that is, he was in Hurtledale. 
 She had thought about him incessantly since she 
 
22 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 came to Whinstane, a^d the conclusion of her 
 thinkings was that she really loved him, let his 
 faults in other people's eyes be what they might. 
 Mrs. Sara Graudage had written to her again in 
 her serious sarcastic vein, but it did not alter 
 her sentiments a bit ; of course, she felt with re- 
 gret that nobody agreed with her in them, but 
 she consoled herself with the reflection that hers 
 was probably not a singular case. 
 
 On her last night ^t the Tower, to the general 
 surprise, Lady Foulis' sent for her, again, and 
 sent for her alone. Katherine averred that she 
 was not mad and never had been, but on this 
 occasion Kachel certainly was relieved to find 
 that the sober attendant remained in the room 
 as long as she staid. Her talk was very wild 
 and incoherent, and while Rachel sat nervously 
 regarding her a strange idea shot into her mind 
 — Lady Foulis had «. look of Sir William and she 
 had a look of Oliver ; a rare expression came 
 into her face which at odd moments struck out 
 into a likeness and vanished ; some trick of fea- 
 ture — of lip or eye it must have been ; for when 
 she sought it, it was not there, and no sooner 
 had she said to herself "Again!" than it was 
 gone. She told Rachel in a dreamy, involved 
 sentence which it was not easy to undei;stand, 
 that she was to be mixed up in some mysterious 
 fashion with the fortunes .and misfortunes of 
 the Warleighs of Whinstandale. At present 
 her destiny seemed to run clear of theirs,' and 
 likely to run clear forever end a day, but she 
 hoped the weird woman's prediction meant good- 
 luck to John in his wooing of Katherine. But 
 the Sibyl, if Sibyl she were, was not in her in- 
 spired mood that night, she neither fired nor 
 froze her listener, who went away from her pres- 
 ence simply wondering how and why it had 
 made her so uncomfortable before. 
 
 " All my own exalted imagination, I suppose, 
 wrought up to expect witcheries and beguile- 
 meuts," soliloquized she. " A little more pre- 
 paration, and I might perhaps see ghosts, then 
 hear them speak, and believe them to be actual 
 visitants from another world ! It is just as well 
 that I am going away before my fancy has time 
 to get a wrj twist. I would not for any thing 
 become a mystical, visionary, phantomizing 
 body such as this old house might make of a ' 
 stronger mind than mine after a course of its 
 dullness, dreariness, and monotony. I have not 
 had one real good night's rest since I came ; but 
 to-morrow, to-morrow, to-morrow I go home, 
 and that comforting thought will rock me asleep, 
 in spite of Lady Foulis and her weariful organ !" 
 
 CHAPTER THE THIRD. 
 
 THE OLD H0BTLEMBRE HOUSE. 
 
 All houses wherein men have lived and died 
 Are haunted houses. LoNaFfiLLOW. 
 
 The old Hurtlemere House was not a gay 
 bower for a bride in the frozen days of mid- 
 winter, but Laurence Warleigh would have now 
 no other choice of a home. Rachel Withers 
 walked up there the day after her return home, 
 as Grace bad entreated her, to see what manner 
 of preparation Mistress Dobie had made for the 
 coming of her young master and his bride. She 
 had done her best, but Rachel thought the bouse 
 
 looked more solitary, gray, and weather-beaten, 
 more haunted, cold, and ghostly than ever house 
 looked before. The topmost slope of the fell 
 rose abruptly behind it, clad from base to brow 
 with dusky fir-woods ; in front lay the tarn, fed 
 by a thousand trickling rills from the moors, 
 while round and about swept the purple lines 
 of the mountains, like stem barriers to fence 
 out the world. In the season of flowers and 
 sunshine it had some of the sweetest charms of 
 solitude, but any place more wild or desolate in 
 the dead time of the year it would have been 
 difiScult to find, even in these lonely dales of the 
 bleak north-west. The lake was crisped over 
 with ice, and a long, lamentable blast went moan- 
 ing and wailing through the trees like the very 
 voice of despairing anguish. Every sight, every 
 sound gave her a presentiment of sorrow. Let 
 those laugh at presentiments who could, but she 
 never dared ! 
 
 And on the ensuing day happened such a 
 mischance ! They were really grieved, John 
 Withers and his sister, though it was not a very 
 momentous thing to be grieved about, perhaps. 
 They had arranged that Hnrtledale church bells, 
 at least, should ring Laurence Warleigh and his 
 bride a peal of welcome at their coming home, 
 but they did not arrive in the afternoon when 
 they were looked for, and as it grew dark, 
 Kester Greaves, tired of waiting in the «)ld, 
 went away to his comfortable fireside, and for- 
 got all about them. The next morning they 
 heard at the rectory that the young couple had 
 *rrived last night. 
 
 Of course, plentiful details were circulating 
 about the event already ; one wonders how such 
 details fly abroad; but Mistress Dobie dearly 
 loved a gossip, and had sympathetic cronies 
 enough to help her talk. Mrs. Sarah Grandage 
 was mightily interested to hear the earliest re- 
 port of the bride ; and from one source or an- 
 other she gleaned the fullest and most circum- 
 stantial particulars of every thing that had hap- 
 pened at the Hurtlemere House ; and when she 
 had got them well in hand she drove over to 
 luncheon at the rectory for the special purpose 
 of telling Rachel all "how and about it," as she 
 said ; and Rachel was quite as glad to listen as 
 Bittersweet to narrate. 
 
 It was nightfall when the young people reach- 
 ed their destination, having had twice to vary 
 their route to avoid the heavy snow-drifts that 
 blocked up the hollows of the hills. They 
 brought with them a south-country girl as maid, 
 who cried for the last six miles at the sight of 
 the dreary moors, for which she had exchanged 
 the sunny slopes of Surrey. The bride's spirits, 
 on the contary, rose buoyantly with every diffi- 
 culty and discomfort, and when the ramschackle 
 post-chaise, in which they had traveled from 
 Brafferton, rolled in at the gates, she laughed 
 and said it had been quite a merry, adventurous 
 coming home ! 
 
 Mathew Dobie and his wife, spruced up in 
 their Sunday best, received the young squire 
 and his bride at the door ; he, with his short 
 grunt meant to be expressive of welcome ; she, 
 with smiles, courtesies, and diffusive apologies 
 for the bitter weather, the time of night, and 
 every other unavoidable incident attending their 
 arrival; and then ushered them into the east 
 parloir, where all possible preparations had been 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 23 
 
 made for their reception. A fire of pine-knots 
 flashed in the wide range, and a round table 
 spread for dinner stood opposite the hearth, 
 irith chairs drawn up on either side. Big bush- 
 es of holly, twmkling with red, ripe berries, 
 were stuck above the chimney, and the spoils 
 of the chase, which were the appropriate deco- 
 rations of Moor Murray's house, had been re- 
 arranged on the wainscoted walls with a careful 
 eye to their effect. 
 
 The bride expressed herself as charmed with 
 the picturesque novelty of aU she saw : " It is 
 so quaint and cozy, Laurence, I like the look of 
 it," said she. " It has the air of the best room 
 at a country inn, such as heroes stop at in 
 romances !" 
 
 Then Laurence glanced round at the ruddy, 
 winterly scene, and paid Mistress Dobie a com- 
 pliment on her skill in educing comfort out of 
 such poor means as lay at her disposal, and 
 immediately settled himself in the unwieldy 
 chair opposite to that in which his wife had al- 
 ready ensconced herself to enjoy the genial 
 shine of the fire. She loosed her traveling 
 cloak and hood as she sat there, and put them 
 off,; and when all her golden hair fell down 
 upon her neck, and caught the glinting rays 
 about her cheeks, thiit blushed like roses from 
 the frosty air, worthy Mistress Dobie, used to 
 hard and homely outlines, pronounced her, with 
 enthusiasm, a real beauty, "fair as a flower and 
 •weet as spice !" 
 
 Thus far, all had gone delightfully. Laurence 
 laughed, and the bonnie bride turned to her 
 with some merry words of thanks, but, as she 
 spoke, there came over the silly old womah's 
 face a look of woeful dismay, and abruptly ex- 
 claiming that she must see about that slow lass, 
 Magsie, or dinner would be spoilt, she hurried 
 from the room and returned to the kitchen with 
 all the wholesome color bleached out of her 
 broad cheeks. Her husband was there, and 
 blameless scapegoat Magsie, roasting herself as 
 well as the game, and Lucy, the poor maid, who 
 had sunk down on the settle in the chimney- 
 nook, and sat wearing a countenance of inefia- 
 ble discontent and disgust. 
 
 Mistress Dobie entered the kitchen wringing 
 her hands and betraying other signs of extreme 
 distress, and when Mathew demanded what ailed 
 the woman — was she gone daft all at once ? she 
 answered him in a gust of sabs, " I've gotten a 
 shock, Mathew, I've getten a shock ! Why has 
 Master Laurence brought that pretty cretur to 
 this lonesome wilderness, so far fra .her aiu 
 country an her ain kin ? Is it likelings she'll 
 prosper here — a wee bit delicate bud up ov' our 
 bleak moors ? If he don't carry her awa', an' 
 that soon, worse'U come of it." 
 
 Mathew looked , provoked, and, took his pipe 
 out of his mouth, to bid her hold her foolish 
 tongue, and then replaced it, and puffed away 
 with serene philosophy ; but Lucy, whose eyes 
 still brimmed with tears, began to whimper, and 
 say it did seem a terrible lonesome spot to live 
 in — ^nothing but snow, water, and woods shut up 
 amongst mountains. 
 
 "It is a dowly, dowly spot, that it is," agreed 
 Mistress Dobie, with a glance that sparkled de- 
 fiance of Matthew, and a tongue that would not 
 be staid. " We can't see t' reek fra' a nee- 
 bor's chimley t' year in an' 't year out — for uee- 
 
 bors there's none ; an' only when t' wind seta 
 fair can we hear t' jow o' t' church bells. We 
 might be dwelling in a heathen land. I hard- 
 lings know how I've bidden to live here going 
 along o' thirty year, an' me a christian body that 
 alius enjoyed my privileges afore." 
 
 '' Thou's bidden to live here, Dolly, womaii, 
 acause i'se lived here, an' acause it's been thy 
 dooty," said her husband, with sententious grav- 
 ity. " An' now let's ha' no more prate nor clack, 
 but show this, lass to her missis's chaumer, for 
 they'll be wanting to rightle thersels afore din- 
 ner, pretty folks alius does. Come, bustle, 
 woman, bustle ; t' grass'll grow under thy feet, 
 an' this bod'll be ower done, backen an' baste 
 as Magsie will, if there's much langer to wait." 
 
 Thus peremptorily admonished. Mistress Dobie 
 led Lucy up the great draughty staircase, and 
 having made her acquainted with the geography 
 of her own and her mistress's rooms she left her 
 there and went down again to the kitchen, still 
 wearing her troubled air of mystery. Having 
 shut the door, and spied round furtively to make 
 sure that there was nobody within hearing but 
 her husband and Magsie, she drew near to Ma- 
 thew, who was refilling his pipe, and caused him 
 to suspend the operation of lighting it by uplift- 
 ing a solemn forefinger, and saying, in a voice 
 of compassionate awe ; 
 
 " She's doomed, Mathew, she's doomed, that 
 bonnie, bonnie thing ! Don't thou sneer. She 
 was smiling wi' her innicent lips, an' speaking 
 to me so soft an' sweet, when I see all at once 
 them white hands wavering aboon her head, like 
 as if they was blessing her. Thou might ha' 
 knocked me down wi' a feather, I was so fleyed. 
 An' thou knaws what it means, Mathew; I see 
 'em, I tell thee, I see 'em wi' my two eyes as 
 plain as I see Magsie now ! " 
 
 " Out woman, out ! can she see wi' her ten 
 toes ? What said I heed o' ghostiaes an' white 
 hands ? A blessing '11 harm her none, come it 
 fra' sperrit or come it fra' flesh. Don't let on 
 wi' no such stuff to yon bit o' a lass upstairs : 
 she's a faint-hearted body fra t' mak on her, an' 
 wad be for warning her lady, till, among ye, ye'd 
 scare her into t' churchyard. T' folly o' woman- 
 folk is fairly enew to drive a sensy man daft, an' 
 t' aulder they grows, t' sillier they gets — thatfs 
 my exper'ence." 
 
 With this shrewd remark, felt to be exhaustive 
 of the subject, Mathew restored his pipe to His 
 mouth and held his peace ; while Magsie, who 
 had listened open-mouthed and bewildered, let 
 the bird on the_spit burn — a catastrophe that 
 appealed so forcibly to Mistress Dobie's nose 
 and temper that she promptly discharged her 
 from her neglected duty, and superintended the 
 roast herself with a careful querulousness that left 
 her no further leisure for her phantom fears until 
 the dinner was duly served, and Master Laurence 
 and his fair young wife were shut up in the old 
 parlor to make the best of it. 
 
 Later in the evening she was summoned to 
 answer a question — Were the outer wooden shut- 
 ters made fast over the windows? Laurence 
 said his wife shivered, and felt an icy blast blow- 
 ing upon her head wherever she sat. Yes, the 
 shutters were all made fast, but the house was 
 full of draughts. Mistress Dobie told them, and 
 then added : " It's a bitter black frost, Master 
 Laurence, an' a nor-east wind to-night ; an' when 
 
24 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 that's t' case, there's gusts i' this room to rive t' 
 very hair off of ane's head. It don't become me 
 to advise, but I suld say this is hardlinga the 
 spot for a delicate south-bred lady." 
 
 " But a nor-east wind does not happen every 
 night," said the bride ; to which Mistress Dobie 
 responded: "It mostlings does. Hurtledale's a 
 lare place for cold weather. I say sometimes 
 when Winter leaves other folks he comes up here 
 an' stays wi' us, until we're fain indeed to see 
 his back when he does go — and go he doesn't 
 most years, not for good, till into May, an' he 
 alius shows us his blue neb again quite t' fore 
 end o' October." 
 
 The young wife only laughed at this and re- 
 joined that they would );ry to make him warm 
 and welcome ; and when Mistress Dobie went 
 back to Mathew in the kitchen she proclaimed 
 that Master Laurence's wife was the lady to draw 
 ,«unbeams out of cucumbers, and that whether 
 the White Hands meant mischief or not, her life, 
 while it lasted, was sure to be a happy one. 
 
 John Withers was not present when Bitter- 
 sweet detailed her story — detailed it at much 
 greater length than is recorded here, making it 
 sound extremely like the initial chapter of a ro' 
 mance ; so that Rachel had the pleasure of re- 
 peating it to him, which she did in spite of nu- 
 merous impatient ejaculations and a final verdict 
 that "Mistress Dobie was a superstitious old 
 goose, and ought to have her tongue tied if she 
 had no discretion in the use of it '! — a rather 
 strong remark' for the rector. 
 
 "It is very strange, but people always have 
 believed in the legend, of the White Hands that 
 haunt the old Hurtlemere House," said Kachel. 
 "Katheriue Warleigh was talking to me about 
 it one afternoon at Whinstane, and she would 
 have been quite annoyed had I expressed a 
 doubt of its truth." 
 
 John here actually went the length of saying 
 that he thought Katherine had more sense ! 
 
 " Old families are as tenacious of their ghost- 
 stories as of their personal honor," persisted Ra- 
 chel, who wanted to go on talking ; but John 
 took down a big book from its shelf, buried his 
 studious pate in it, and turned a deaf ear to her 
 little subsequent remarks, thus intimating to her 
 that the present was a time to be silent. 
 
 Rachel felt rather cross — John really some- 
 times treated her quite like a child ; and to re- 
 store herself to a sense ^of ease and dignity, she 
 went immediately to her desk and wrote Mr. 
 Gilsland a letter — he never wearied of her chat, 
 either in person or on paper. They were new 
 lovers, and oh! how delightful -it -was! 
 
 II. 
 
 Rachel Withers did .not hear from Whinstane, 
 though she wrote twice before the month was 
 out, and both John aad she then began to think 
 that all correspondence with Hurtledale would 
 be interdicted ; Sir William Warleigh might sus- 
 pect his daughters of opening a secret channel 
 of communication with their offending brother 
 through her if they wei'e allowed to exchange 
 letters. 
 
 During the interim they had seen the bride 
 twice, and were agreed that Laurenee Warleigh 
 had as fair an excuse for an imprudent marriage 
 as ever man possessed. Her name was Helena — 
 Nell, he called her. She was a bright beauty, 
 
 very happy and sprightly looking, with dark- 
 blue eyes, abundant golden-brown hair, delicate 
 features, and the sweetest little mouth in the 
 world — such a contrast to Laurence, who was a 
 big, massive fellow, burnt almost to an umber 
 shade. His complexion colored well, he ob- 
 served to John Withers, who was struck by his 
 Indian tint ; and then he told him that it was 
 thus enriched during a couple of years to and 
 fro the wild savannahs of America. He had 
 been a great traveler during his absence from 
 the dales, and was as pleasant and frank a com- 
 panion as any one could desire ; he always had 
 a fine temper, and his wandering life and vari- 
 ous hardships had not spoilt but mellowed it. 
 
 John Withers and Laurence Warleigh were 
 glad to meet again ; for as friends and compan- 
 ions, they had formerly suited each other to the 
 core ; Helena and Rachel also were sociably in- 
 clined, and while the young men talked togeth- 
 er of hair-breadth escapes and adventures in 
 worlds remote, they made acquaintance over 
 the world at home. They soon arrived at the 
 degree of intimacy implied by the use of Christ- 
 ian names ; for Laurence introduced Rachel to 
 his wife as an old playmate of his sisters', and 
 they took to each other straightway. 
 , All her life hitherto, Helena had spent in sun- 
 shiny, flowery cottages, lightsomely fitted and 
 furnished ; but the dusky glow of her ancient 
 rooms at the Hurtlemere House pleased her ro- 
 mantically. She had a vivid fancy and an ac- 
 tive imagination, both healthily toned and cheer- 
 ful. 
 
 On the first day of February, she was out of 
 the garden for the first time since they arrived. 
 The wind had dropped a little, and a pale sun- 
 shine gleamed taintly along the ridges of the 
 moors. Laurence still thought the cold almost 
 too severe, but she quite craved for a walk, and 
 he let her go. For some time they kept along 
 the hard frozen lane between high sheltering 
 banks and walls ; and then, at her special wish, 
 they essayed to climb the fell up a path that 
 was trodden daily, by Mathew Dobie, in going 
 to and fro to the sheepfold. Nothing but young 
 blood and young spirits could have kefit them 
 from freezing when they reached the brow ; for 
 the wind was keen and steely as a razor. Thence 
 Helena had a view of the dale-world beyond her 
 .bower of Hurtlemere. Laurence pointed out by 
 name three or four scattered villages in Mirk- 
 dale, as many lonely farmsteads, and two church- 
 towers. Then, bidding her carry her eye along 
 a certain line of moor to the far north, he said 
 she might see Penslaven and Whinstane Tower, 
 almost parallel With each other on the horizon • 
 but either her vision fell short, or the winter at- 
 mosphere was too hazy, for neither castle nor 
 tower could she discern — only sinuous waves of 
 mountains beyond mountains, and cloud upon 
 cloud, until mist and vapor, wood and hill were 
 all fused and melted together in one gray-pur- 
 plish shade. Two grand old feudal fortresses 
 scowled at each other across the wide valley 
 upon which they Jooked immediately down, and 
 a rapid, shallow river still ran its swift course 
 between the plains of snow in spite of the long 
 ^""°'' They almost raced down to the mere 
 
 frost. 
 
 again, arriving at home out of breath and in a 
 glow of exuberant spirits. Lucy ceased re- 
 pining at the sight of them, and Mistress Dobie 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 25 
 
 exclaimed in tlie warmth of her heart: "Bless 
 'em 1 it did her good to look at 'em ! If they 
 weren't aa blithe and happy as >■ pair of May 
 birds !" 
 
 That was in the morning — in the afternoon 
 snow fell again, and Helena worked while Lau- 
 rence read to her. When blind man's holiday 
 came in the twilight, instead of ordering candles, 
 they told stories over the flre — ghost-stories — 
 and Laurence, with his secluded northern breed- 
 ing, had, like his sisters,' many a flesh-creeping 
 tale to tell. These eldritch legends were rather 
 grewsome diet for Helena's nerves ; for though 
 they fascinated her, she confessed to Eachel 
 Withers half-laughing afterward that she was 
 afraid to go up-stairs without somebody at her 
 elbow when she had been listening to them. 
 
 The east parlor, which they chiefly occupied, 
 had the best look-out from the house, but it was 
 a very cold room. Helena frequently complain- 
 ed there of the icy draught blowing down on her 
 head, and professed that if it continued she must 
 take to wearing a little black skull-cap, like 
 Father Hurst, who used to come to her grand- 
 mamma's ; but Laurence laid a hand atop of 
 heisgolden curls and vowed he would never see 
 them hidden. 
 
 One afternoon, when John Withers and his 
 sister had gone up to the Hurtlemere House, 
 Rachel and Helena were left to themselves a 
 short time, while Laurerice carried John off into 
 the haU to inspect some newly arrived trophies 
 of his wild travels and hunting expeditions. In 
 their absence. Mistress Dobie presented herself 
 in quest of certain household commands, and 
 observing that Helena had thrown a handker- 
 chief over her head, she inquired, with an air 
 of heartfelt earnestness, if she were suffering 
 from a chill again. Helena admitted that she 
 was, on which the anxious worthy soul said in 
 a voice of solemn entreaty : " Oh ! if Master Lau- , 
 rence would pnly take heed in time and carry 
 you awa' fra Hurtlemere it would be well for 
 ye both. It arn't going to agree wi' you, an' 
 how is it likelings it suld? There's naught I 
 like less to hear young folks complain on than 
 creeps an' shivers o' the skin." Helena only 
 laughed, and said Mistress Dobie was an inhos- 
 pitable person who wanted to be rid of the 
 trouble of them. 
 
 " Nay, none so," protested she ; " the more 
 in a house the merrier, I alius say !" 
 
 " But I like Hurtlemere. I shall never cease 
 to like it. Laurence brought me home to it, 
 and home it will be as long as he chooses." 
 
 " I've discharged my conscience !" rejoined 
 Mistress Dobie, spreading forth her hands as if 
 putting aside a responsibility. " I've discharged 
 my conscience, and Miss Rachel there has heerd 
 me. Wilfu'ness has aye doom in it." 
 
 " You can tell ghost-stories, Mistress Dobie ; 
 I know you can !" cried Helena. "I hear it in 
 yoUr voice and see in your eyes !" 
 
 " Ntever speak lightly o' spiritual things," 
 said the dame, slowly shaking the head of re- 
 buke. "Ane misbeliever, like my Matt, is enow 
 in a house. Ance a ghost appear til' him an' 
 he'll doubt nae mair, none he! An' there's 
 that poor washed-out bit of a Lucy — she's for 
 saying slie don't believe i' no such logic nay- 
 ther." 
 
 " She has been taught that there is nothing 
 
 worse in the world than ourselves — grandmam- 
 ma always told us so when we were afraid of 
 going to bed in the twilight," replied Helena, 
 while dimples of fun played rosily about her 
 lips. > 
 
 " Oh ! but there is tho' !" exclaimed Mistress 
 Dobie in prompt and indignant denial of such a 
 monstrous assertion. "Letting alane t' gret 
 enemy o' us all — an' I suppose nobody 'ull dare 
 be so wicked as to go an' set it abroad as he^s 
 dead — there's folks upo' folks a lang sight worse 
 nor us. Does any body want to even my good 
 man wi' Black Bill o' Moorhus, who'll come to 
 be hanged if he only live till t' tow's twined ; 
 or me to that auld witch, Peggy Tristy, who 
 thrives by cursing her neebors uphill an' down 
 dale o' the Red Riggs ? Sure o' it, there's a 
 precious crew n' pinners a bonny sight worse 
 nor us. I'll Stan' to that whiles I can stan' at 
 a'." And having worked round to earthly views 
 and people. Mistress Dobie resumed her natural 
 voice, dropt her plaintive brows, and became 
 for a few moments a mere quick-tempered 
 woman of this world instead of a lugubrious 
 interpreter of the oracles of the other. But 
 the fascination of ghost-talk was upon her too 
 strongly for her yet to refrain her tongue from 
 it % for, after a pause to recover breath, she 
 began, to Rachel's exceeding dismay, to narrate 
 that old legend which attached to the Hurtle- 
 mere House. 
 
 " When any body iv' this house is marked 
 for death within the twelvemonth," said she, 
 solemnly ; " any body mind, there's two White 
 Hands appears aboon their heads, blessing 'em 
 continually. It was a lady iv" the gret civil 
 war times, they tell, as was blessing three sons 
 afore they went out to fight, when it was borne 
 in upon her heart that she suld never see ane o' 
 'epa more — an! she never did; for they was all 
 slain i' the battle. I've seen them hands myself — 
 I've seen 'em oft enew. I saw 'em ower Master 
 Laurence's mother the year she was taken ; an' 
 I saw 'em ower my own son — him as stout an' 
 hale a young man as ere a ane i' all t' dale. Yet 
 it came to pass ane December night when the 
 waters was out, and him coming home fra' 
 Brafferton market, he missed the causeway ^n' 
 fell into the river. We sought him high, an' 
 we sought him low, an' some said he'd 'listed 
 an' gone for a soldier ; his father, he hoped, but 
 / hoped never. Says I, ' I saw the White Hands 
 ower his head only the night afore he were lost, 
 an' alive to Hurtlemere ne'er will he come 
 back.' ' An' when t' flood went down they found 
 him where th' water had not been more nor two 
 feet deep. It was his doom ; I said nought. 
 He lies i' the churchyard upo' t' hiU, where/ 
 Mathew's kin lie — right-hand side as you go in 
 at t' yett. There's no stone — nought. But I 
 knows where my boy lies." 
 
 Helena looked very grave during this recital 
 of a well-known tragedy, which Rachel Withers 
 remembered as having happened when she was 
 a child ; but immediately it was ended she said, 
 "Dear Mistress Dobie, don't tell Lucy this 
 story; it would terrify her out of her senses. 
 She has been grieving to me already about the 
 haunted loneliness of this place, and I ctm not 
 bear to think of lesing her." ' 
 
 " She's but a wan-spirited body, arid I wouldn't 
 scare her for all i' the world," gasped Mistress 
 
ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 Dobie with a confusion which betrayed how her 
 tongue had outrun her discretion with Lucy and 
 the legend already. 
 
 Helena detected the fact, but she did not 
 driv6.the old gossip to an avowal, and when she 
 was left with Bachel alone, her only remark 
 was, that she thought such traditions as that of 
 the White Hands were the most fabulous non- 
 sense in the world. Of course, Kachel agreed 
 with her ; for whatever she might feel or fancy 
 in the mysterious atmosphere of Whinstane, in 
 the sunshine of Hurtledale she did not believe 
 in ghosts one bit. 
 
 They had some further talk on everyday mat- 
 ters until Laurence and John rejoined them 
 after their inspection of the wonderful bones 
 and skins, spoils of American plains and forests. 
 The rector and his sister then ended their visit 
 and went away, not a single allusion to Whin- 
 stane Tower having been spoken by any of the 
 party. Neither had it been mentioned on the 
 previous occasions of their meeting. 
 
 No carriage and but one rough cob entered 
 into the modest establishment of Laurence 
 Warleigh and his wife. The weather continued 
 terrible, and when she could not walk she staid 
 indoors altogether. She sewed and Laurence 
 read, but the winter days were long, and their 
 stock of books was soon exhausted. One day 
 early in March Laurence walked down to the 
 rectory to borrow something amusing, and car- 
 ried off Mmufield Park, 
 
 for the first time since his arrival with his 
 wife at the Hurtlemere House, John Withers 
 thought he looked out of spirits, and a very 
 little encouragement brought him, at last, to 
 speak of his father ; he said that he had taken 
 no notice of his marriage in any way — that all 
 the famUy indeed had treated the announce- 
 ment with silent contempt. 
 
 " It took them by surprise, but surely they 
 have had leisure to consider ofit by this time," 
 said he. " I am grieved for Nell that they have 
 not given her a welcome, and she feels it too. 
 I would go over, but I should not like to have 
 the, dogs set on me, which Sir William would 
 do without scruple if he were in a savage mood. 
 I have written to ask Mrs. Damer Warleigh to 
 come and cheer Nell out of her disappointment 
 as soon as the frost breaks up. The girls might 
 have written ; at any rate, they have no quarrel 
 with me ; and if Oliver be at Whinstane as I 
 am told he is, I can not imagine why I hear 
 nothing from him." 
 
 It was evident to John Withers that Laurence 
 Jaad no idea of the virulence of Sir William's 
 rage against him, and also that he had no dis- 
 trust of his brother Oliver. His was one of 
 those noble tempers that never suspects. And 
 who could warn him against his own flesh and 
 blood ? 
 
 It was about ten days subsequent to this, that 
 Eaohel Withers, after a week's confinement to 
 the swept walks in the garden and shrubbery, 
 one morning summoned courage to go up to the 
 Hurtlemere House by the cart-road. A hard 
 walk it was, and when she arrived there she 
 would have given any thing te escape ; but Mis- 
 trees Dobie, unwitting of aught amiss, received 
 her gladly, and ushered her into the east room ; 
 
 and when she entered, there, behold, was Helena 
 weeping, and Laurence at his wits' end to com- 
 fort her ! Rachel's first impulse was to retreat, 
 but Laurence called out to her not to run away ; 
 and while she stood hesitating and feeling 
 wretchedly awkward, Helena came forward and 
 declared sobbing that it was aU about nothing — 
 all about nothing, when these were the first 
 tears since their marriage ! 
 
 Like a pair of babies, they confessed them- 
 selves to Eachel, and in confessing were perhaps 
 a little comforted. It seemed that Laurence 
 had been writing a second letter to Mrs. Damer 
 Warleigh, and that when it was finished, he 
 tried to tempt Helena out for a walk ; but' she, 
 cowering over the fire, looked up at him with 
 pitiful eyes, and said: "No; the wind was so 
 loud, the frost so cold." He urged that she 
 had walked in worse weather; for though the 
 sky looked lowering, it was fair overhead and 
 crisp underfoot, while the sun had made several 
 attempts to escape from its curtain of clouds. 
 It would do her good, he said ; she was only 
 suffering from a little lazy fit. 
 
 Instead of answerinig him, she began to cry, 
 and when he besought her to tell him what ailed 
 her, she could only hide her pretty pathetic 
 face on his shoulder, and say she did not know. 
 He could not understand it in the least. She 
 went on weeping lamentably ; not with moans 
 Or hysterical shrieks, bjit as if a gradual flood 
 of tears had been long swelling in her heart, 
 and was now overflowing in spite of her. At 
 this crisis Eachel had the misfortune to intrude 
 upon them. Laurence had little experience of 
 women, or he would have known what an ease- 
 ment it is sometimes to be let alone to weep for 
 no ostensible cause ; so he began to fret ajid 
 fume, and to fancy that Helena was dissatisfied 
 and unhappy, and then he vowed he would car- 
 ry her away from Hurtledale forthwith. 
 
 At that she opened her lips, and said it was 
 over — ^her crying fit, she meant — and he must 
 not mind. But he would mind. He railed 
 against his father, against Oliver, against his 
 sisters, for what he called their cruel neglect, and 
 grew so bitter of speech at last, that Helena was 
 fain in her turn to assume the task of consoler ; 
 and brightening up, professed herself ashamed 
 of her childish outbreak, and wondered hardly 
 less than Laurence himself what had made her 
 give way to such foolishness. Finally, peace 
 was restored. \ 
 
 Sober-minded Eachel Withers went home 
 deeply grieved and anxious after what she had 
 witnessed ; she believed she understood it, but 
 she did not quite. Helena was no doubt feeling 
 the pain of her unacknowledged position ; for 
 she had that tenderness and cheerful kindness 
 of heart that suffer most from unfriendly ne- 
 glect. She knew when she married Laurence 
 that there was estrangement betwixt him and 
 his father, but she trusted to see it healed, and 
 counted with perfect confidence on his sisters 
 for her frequent companions. She was barely 
 seventeen years old, and until she saw Hurtle- 
 dale, she never saw lack of family affection. 
 Eachel Withers was good and thoughtful, but 
 she could not make of her the friend she looked 
 to find ready-made in Katherine and Grace ; 
 and as week after week went on, and Whinstane 
 was silent, and they made no sign, her disap- 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 27 
 
 pointment grew certainly very heavy. But 
 neither was it this that caused that overflow of 
 tears which Eachel saw ; what it was Helena 
 kept in her heart a secret — a secret even from 
 Laurence. 
 
 The sixth of April was a foregleam of spring. 
 When Rachel Withers rose that morning there 
 was no frost on the windows ; a rapid thaw had 
 set in, and the fell was marked in long furrows 
 of black and white ; the latter becoming nar- 
 rower and narrower as the sun gained in power, 
 until only here and there soiled patches lay on 
 the north side of a bush, a boulder, or a hollow 
 in the slopes. The sky was brilliant and cloud- 
 less, the wind hushed, and only the sound of the 
 hiU streams, flooded by the melting snows, and 
 running riot in their pebbly channels, broke the 
 delicious calm of the morning. 
 
 John Withers was pledged to a long round of 
 pastoral visits, and after Rachel's duties at home 
 and in the school were accomplished, she began 
 to think she could not do better than redeem a 
 promise she had made to Helena of spending 
 with her the first free morning she found at her 
 disposal ; she therefore set off and reached the 
 Hurtlemere House just as Helena was on the 
 point of starting with Lucy for a ramble in the 
 woods to see what they could discover in the 
 way of mosses and wild-flowers. She received 
 her very gladly, and explained that Laurence 
 had gone over to Brafferton, which made her 
 coming the more opportune. 
 
 "I have just been telling Lucy that the vio- 
 lets will be out at Everham now," Helena said. 
 "When grandmamma opens the breakfast-room 
 window of a morning before prayers, there 
 rushes in such a sweet perfume !" 
 
 " And the primroses in Beechwood !" ex- 
 claimed Lucy, brightening at the recollection. 
 " Oh ! what gatherings we did use to have !" 
 
 " We have wealth of wild-flowers too," .Rach- 
 el told them. " Here, comes Mathew Dobie — 
 ask him if we have not." 
 
 In answer to their questions the gruflf old far- 
 mer said : 
 
 " Yes, there was snowdrops, primroses, 'nim- 
 inies, daffydowndillies, blue-bells, king-cups, 
 cowslips, an' all sorts i' their seasons^ — t' woods 
 was like as if they were carpeted wi' 'em. An' 
 up o' t' muirs there was t' gorse, yaller as gould, 
 an' ruever no more out o' blossom than kissing 
 was out o' fashion ; an' i' August wasn't there t' 
 heather, like a rojfal king's robe o' purple — flow- 
 ers I ay, there was flowers i' plenty for them as 
 wanted 'em." 
 
 So they went up into the wood, splashing 
 through the marshy grass, Helena and Lucy 
 laughing and gay as a couple of holiday child- 
 ren. They rambled far and wide under the 
 trees, and staid out gathering beautiful mosses 
 and other treasures for more than two hours ; 
 and when they returned indoors Helena and 
 Rachel made themselves busy in decking the 
 east parlor with their spoils of greenery. Hele- 
 na was much more skillful at the tasteful task 
 than her companion ; it was astonishing what 
 pretty, ingenious pyramids she constructed with 
 a few roots of primroses, ready to burst into 
 bloom, mingled with snowdrops, all the mould 
 being hidden in rich, long-fronded moss. 
 
 They had concluded their work, Lucy had 
 cleared away the relics, and they were just about 
 to dispose themselves for a comfortable cose by 
 the fireside, when there appeared, advancing up 
 the avenue, a lady on i horseback, wrapt in a 
 heavy cloak, with the hood drawn over her 
 head, and attended by an elderly man-servant. 
 Rachel's first thought was of Katherine, but a, 
 second glance assured her that it was Mrs. Damer 
 Warleigh, of Bristowe. Mistress Dobie was al- 
 ready bustling out to receive her, and Helena 
 watched her dismount with mingled pleasure 
 and trepidation. 
 
 "What a disappointment that Laurence is 
 away !" whispered she ; and then they heard 
 the visitor's clear voice in the hall, saying : " So 
 your master is not at home ? . I am sorry for 
 that, but it is his wife I came to see chiefly. Tell 
 her I am here." 
 
 " An' fain she'll be, Mrs. Darner," was the dis- 
 tinct response. " You're the first o' Master 
 Laurence's kin that has thought it worth while 
 to come near her, poor young thing that she is !" 
 
 Then the door opened, and Helena met, with 
 a beating heart, first the gaze and then the warm 
 embrace of the dignified old lady, who kissed 
 her several times on both blushing cheeks be- 
 fore she let her go, perhaps because she knew 
 there were tears in the sweet veiled eyes. 
 
 " So, my dear, so," said she, soothingly, lift- 
 ing up her chin, and looking in the pretty face 
 very kindly, " you and I are going to be 
 friends." And then Helena, forcibly swallowing 
 down the sob that had risen in her throat, smil- 
 ed forth a real welcome. " Laurence is gone to 
 Brafiferton, I hear," Mrs. Damer went on, " and, 
 as he is not with us, the next best thing is to 
 sit down and talk about him." And, suiting the 
 action to the word, she let Helena and Rachel 
 take off her cloak, and being ensconced in an 
 easy-chair by the fire, she began — 
 
 "I hope you know that nothing but the 
 weather has kept me away so long," she said. 
 " Laurence is ^most my own boy, and I have 
 been anxious to see his wife ever since he 
 brought her up this wild Hurtledale, but the 
 frost has been enough to pinch an old woman to 
 death. However, when his letter reached me 
 this morning, I said to the squire, 'Nothing 
 shall binder me from going to see that pair of 
 babes in the wood to-day. Thomas shall saddle 
 me the mare, and I will ride over directly after 
 breakfast ; there is a moon, so expect me back 
 by bed-time, and not before.' And now, as 
 Laurence is at Brafferton, I can stay peaceably 
 to see him, and hear his plans. I trust he does 
 not intend to bury himself and you alive here 
 much longer, for I must protest strenuously 
 against that folly." 
 
 " We are very happy ; we like Hurtledale,'* 
 replied Helena, who was now wearing her sun- 
 niest face. " I do not care for the world." 
 
 " The world, the world, my innocent child, 
 what do you mean by the world? Solitude is 
 not good for young folks — you will mope and 
 grow weary. Living here always would be to 
 you like planting a rose-bush under the cold 
 shadow of a north wall, and bidding it bloom. 
 It would never bloom, my dear, it would pine 
 away and die. Then, Laurence is a young man, 
 and must have society after his kind or he will 
 be.spoilt. You are enough for each other to- 
 
28 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 day and to-morrow, and the day after to-morrow 
 in one sense, but there is virtue in variety, and 
 in dullness lie the seeds of many discontents. 
 Trust me, child, dullness will find its way to 
 Hurtlemere if you persist in making it your 
 permanent retreat." 
 
 " I am ready to do whatever Laurence wish- 
 es," replied Helena, cheerfully. " We have 
 amused ourselves very well so far, and spring is 
 coming. If I had his sisters for my companions 
 sometimes, I should have nothing left to desire." 
 
 Mrs. Damer Warleigh made no direct answer 
 to this remark, but encouraged Helena to speak 
 about her childhood, her grandmamma Gwynne, 
 and her bringing up at Everham, every word 
 she uttered reflecting her good feeling, good 
 sense, and sweetness of disposition. " 'Twas a 
 thousand pities she was a Roman Catholic !" 
 the kind old lady said to Rachel when they were 
 for a moment alone ; but that could not be im- 
 puted to her as a fault, and she adopted the fair 
 young wife straightway into her warm affections. 
 They all lunched together, and the afternoon 
 sped swiftly on, four o'clock arriving and bring- 
 ing Laurence with it almost before Helena had 
 had time to feel his absence long. His eager 
 greeting testified how welcome was this visit 
 from Mrs. Damer Warleigh, and after personal 
 inquiries and congratulations were over, he im- 
 mediately began to ask about the state of things 
 and feelings at Whinstane ; but in consideration 
 of his Innocent wife's presence, she gave the 
 briefest and most reluctant answers. 
 
 "Speak out," said he at last; "what is for 
 me is for Helena too; and Rachel Withers 
 knows all about us." 
 
 " Tour sisters never have been free- to do as 
 they would — you must remember that, Lau- 
 rence," replied Mrs. Damer in a deprecating 
 tone. "And they are as much under harsh 
 authority now as formerly." 
 
 Helena colored painfully, and looked up in 
 Laurence's face as he exclauned hotly, " Then 
 they do not mean to come over ?" 
 
 " Sir William has forbidden them — and per- 
 haps Oliver is not acting quite as he should. I 
 told him so myself." 
 
 " Oliver ! Has Oliver turned against me ? 
 He wrote fairly enough beforehand — was he not 
 to be trusted ?" 
 
 " He is not befriending your cause rum. He 
 is supreme at Whinstane — he and his Lady 
 Georgiana. Katherine is by no means in love 
 with her; indeed, they are quite antagonistic 
 spirits." 
 
 " Katherine has a will of her own, and can 
 exercise it on occasion. And so she is not com- 
 ing — neither she nor Grace ! Never mind, 
 Nell, we can live without them — ^let them go V 
 
 There was a very grieved look on the young 
 wife's downcast face at this conclusion to her 
 hopes of friends amongst Laurence's family. He 
 continued to speak on as if he made no account 
 of their neglect, but he did make very great 
 account of it indeed. He was deeply wounded 
 and mortified, for Helena's sake perhaps more 
 than for his own ; for though they had that love 
 between them which softens every despite of 
 fortune, still it was hard to have brought her so 
 far from home and familiar friends, to find only 
 the chilling shadow of avoidance and neglect 
 amongst his people. The heir's wife and un- 
 
 acknowledged — it was a very cruel position for 
 her indeed. 
 
 After a considerable pause, Mrs. Damer War- 
 leigh opened the subject of their having taken 
 up their abode at the Hurtlemere House. " We 
 shall stay here," Laurence replied. " We must 
 stay'here — we are lucky in possessing even such 
 a home as this independent of my father. And 
 Nell likes it — don't you, my darling ?" 
 
 "Better than any place in the whole wide 
 world," was the fervent response. 
 
 " It is nonsense to talk about m««<," said Mrs. 
 Damer again. " We all know that there are a 
 hundred ways and means by which the heir to 
 Penslaven and Whinstane might raise money if 
 he would — not that I advise you to resort to 
 wasteful expedients. I could not make out from 
 Oliver, whether Sir William is allowiilg you 
 any thing now or not." 
 
 " He has not given me sixpence since I left 
 the Tower last — Oliver knows that very well. 
 As for borrowing money, I do not care to con- 
 tract any obligations that must make me look 
 forward to my father's death for relief. We 
 are not people of luxurious habits, Nell and I, 
 and therefore we may get along here for a time 
 contentedly enough." 
 
 " Oh, yes !" murmured Helena, and gazed up 
 at him with a glorified love and confidence shin- 
 ing in her sweet face. 
 
 " I shall buy a pony to carry her about the 
 moors, and we shall remain in Hurtledale," con- 
 tinued Laurence, warming into a more cheerful 
 mood. " You and your girls will come over 
 now and then to see us, or if you do not — well ! 
 we shall live like Adam and Eve alone in Para- 
 dise." 
 
 " I do not remember that Eve enjoyed the 
 indulgence of a pony," replied Mrs. Damer 
 pleasantly. " However, you are both young, 
 happy and strong, and a year's seclusion can do 
 you no great harm. If Hurtledale should grow 
 weary -you are not under a vow to stay in it, but 
 can avail yourselves of the privilege of changing 
 your independent minds. It is a toil of a pleas- 
 ure for indifferent folks to get up here, and you 
 are sure to be left pretty much to your ow]^ 
 society ; but we will see you as often as we can, 
 though I must warn you that we have a grand 
 scheme pending at Bristowe. The squire has 
 all but promised to carry us to Switzerland this 
 summer ; if we go, it will be early in next month, 
 and then this visit must stand for both how-d'ye- 
 do and good-by !" 
 
 "The gods are against us!" said Laurence 
 half-laughing. " But we shall circumvent them 
 — you will not find us grown over with moss 
 when you come back." 
 
 " I hope not," rejoined the old lady ; and then 
 they talked on more lightly and pleasantly of 
 Laurence's travels and of the sons and daughters 
 who had been married from Bristowe since he 
 went away, until John Withers came in to take 
 his sister tiome, according to an arrangement 
 made between them before she set off in the 
 morning. 
 
 They walked back to the rectory by the moor 
 and the High-beck, which was coursing down 
 its rooky bed full and noisily, and when they 
 had crossed by the bridge — for the stepping- 
 stones were quite washed over by the swollen 
 stream — Rachel told her brother how there was 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 29 
 
 no present chance of a reconciliation between 
 Whinstane and the Hurtlemere House. 
 
 " I am very sorry to liear it," said lie, and 
 spoke no more until they reached the rectory. 
 By his face he was thinking about Katherine. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FOURTH. 
 
 TWO STRINGS TO HIS BOW. 
 
 It is good to be off with tlie old love 
 
 Before you are on with the new. — Old JBallad, 
 
 The sudden break-up of the frost set all the 
 dale free, and every body began rushing about 
 calling on every body else, and making the most 
 of the welcome sunshine. Amongst the earliest, 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage drove up to the rectory in 
 the chill dignity-mood which she had chosen to 
 adopt toward her goddaughter since her en- 
 gagement to Mr. Gilsland had been acknow- 
 ledged — she declared that she could not recon- 
 cile herself to it, and that the more she saw of 
 him, the less she liked him. Sheer "prejudice, 
 Rachel was convinced. She did not believe 
 Bittersweet was ever cordially glad to hear of 
 young folks marrying, but how was the world to 
 go on unless they did? She would have cared 
 less for her opinions, , however, had not John 
 also been so obviously of her mind. He had 
 quite wounded her feelings a little while back by 
 saying with an air of resigned weariness that a 
 man need not see much of his brother-in-law if 
 they did not suit. True 'enough, rejoined poor 
 Rachel, but she should not like her marriage to 
 detach her from her brother or any of her old 
 friends. Her course of true love, you perceive, 
 was not running quite smooth. 
 
 Bittersweet had certainly repented her of that 
 grand threat of altering her will. Said she 
 thereanent : " I respect the liberty of the sub- 
 ject, Dumpling, and would by no means restrain 
 a willful woman from being miserable ill her 
 own way ; therefore you will get what I intend- 
 ed you to have at my death, but not before. 
 And I am not going to die yet, remember that. 
 Sly family are all long-lived." Rachel replied 
 that she might live forever for any coveting 
 she felt for her legacy ; and then Bittersweet 
 protested : " Ay, but if Mr. Gilsland knew what 
 I have left you he would begrudge me every 
 breath I have to draw !" 
 
 Rachel grew most eloquently indignant. "Why 
 should you attribute such wicked selfishness to 
 a person of whom you can know so little ?" 
 cried she. " I do not discern in him this vulgar 
 craving for money, though I sometimes wish he 
 indulged less ambitious hopes of worldly ad- 
 vancement, A great position and wide popu- 
 larity are not essential to my scheme of happi- 
 ness ; I could be quite content never to raise 
 my eyes beyond Hurtledale ; but then I am 
 only a woman, and he is a man of spirit and 
 genius !" Bittersweet curled up her nose ex- 
 pressively and said he was nothing of the sort. 
 
 Rachel Withers' friends and acquaintance 
 did not fail of their duty toward her in the 
 way of advice and of warning ; but they entirely 
 misunderstood her temper if they hoped to de- 
 tach her from Mr. Gilsland by constant abuse 
 and sarcasm. It was always her propensity to 
 
 take the part of unlucky or unpopular people, 
 and her sympathy went invariably with the un- 
 successful person whom the rest of the world 
 combined to run down. Every word therefore 
 that was said against her lover only made her 
 the more determined to see with her own eyes 
 and judge with her own heart of the good that 
 was in him. 
 
 Amongst others, worthy Mrs. Anderside must 
 needs take her to task. "I have known you 
 ever since you were born, Rachel, and you never 
 thoroughly surprised me before," said she sol- 
 emnly. " How disappointed your dear mamma 
 would be if she were livipg now ! I always 
 took you for a steady-going, right-headed, prac- 
 tical little body, without a taint of sentimentality 
 about you, and they tell me you have positively 
 fallen in love with our curled Adonis of a cu- 
 rate ! I declared that I would not believe it 
 until I had it from your own lips. Now is it 
 true?" Rachel admitted that it was, and the 
 old lady, after indulging herself with a pro- 
 longed gaze at her conscious face, exclaimed in 
 a tone of comical vexation : " Won't Kitty be 
 grieved when she hearb it !" 
 
 "Why should Kitty be grieved?" Rachel 
 rather indiscreetly asked. 
 
 " For the same reason that every body else is 
 grieved — ^because there is no chance of your 
 being happy with him," was the reply. " My 
 dear child, what can you know of his dispo- 
 sition, his temper, his character ? Ton have 
 been too hasty by half in forming an engage- 
 ment ; it is barely six months since you first 
 met. Look at Kitty and excellent Mr. Crofts, 
 how patiently thet/ waited." 
 
 " They waited twenty years, I believe, but if 
 I am not married earlier than Kitty I will re- 
 main a spinster to the end of my daj's," retorted 
 Rachel. Kitty was, indeed, hardly a judicious 
 example for her mother ^ cite, and she became 
 sensible of the fact when the deed was done ; 
 but she continued her lecture notwithstanding. 
 
 "For three -and-twenty years did Mr. Crofts 
 remain in the same humble lodging over Jane 
 Nabb's millinery shop, and never a complaint 
 did he make' in all that time of any want or in- 
 attention. Mr. Gilsland succeeded him in the 
 same rooms, and before the week was out I had 
 been down twice to accommodate difificulties. 
 At the month's end he changed his quarters, 
 and changed them so much for the worse that 
 he had notice to quit before he had occupied his 
 apartments three days ; they say the woman of 
 the house rang all the bells for joy when he was 
 going out of it — very insolent of her if she did, 
 but I can quite believe it. Since then he has 
 moved four or five times, and I hear he is now 
 on the eve of another fiitting.- Each of the 
 womanfolk who has had to deal with him, pro- 
 claims him a selfish, thankless, inconsiderate 
 fidget. ' He'd be cheap at two guineas a week, 
 ma'am, and seven shillings is the money,' said 
 Jane Nabbs ; ' I don't know when I've been so 
 rejoiced to see any body's back as I was to see 
 Mr. Gilslaud's. Mr. Crpfts was worth a hundred 
 of him!'" 
 
 Rachel was not prepared to dispute that pro- 
 position with Mrs. Nabbs or with Mrs. Anderside 
 either, but she thought and said it was very 
 unkind and very wrong to collect and retail to 
 her all the paltry gossip that was circulated 
 
30 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 against Mr. Gilsland^; but she did not believe 
 one half of it — ^no, nor one tenth part of it 1 
 Warming up into fiery indignation as she pro- 
 ceeded, she said : " He has lived hitherto in 
 comparative luxury, and I see nothing wonder- 
 ful in his failing to be comfortable even in the 
 best of their poor little Brafferton lodgings — ^I 
 should be rather astonished if he were .! It is 
 ; easy enough to be self-denying and contented 
 in theory, but the practice of most of us would 
 give way if it were tried every day at dinner- 
 time with chops half scorched and half raw, and 
 potatoes to match them, either as hard as stones 
 or boiled to a mummy. It is very fine for peo- 
 ple to talk lightly of other folks' semi-starva- 
 tion, when they have got a good cook them- 
 selves." By which little oration Mistress Rachel 
 betrayed that her lover was not above worrying 
 her with his petty discomforts at home as well 
 as his lack of appreciation abroad ; and for a 
 naturally weak young woman it will be allowed 
 that she came out pretty strong in his defense. 
 
 If time did not fly in Hurtledale, it kept evei» 
 pace and was rarely heavy, rarely lagging. With 
 her domestic affairs, the school, and the poor 
 people, Rachel Withers had few leisure hours 
 on her hands that had not more claims than 
 enough to satisfy. Either Mr. Gilsland was at 
 the rectory or she must write to him ; and very 
 exacting he proved in that particular — or there 
 was a visit owing, or Mrs. Sara Grandage drop- 
 ped in for her spell of cotemporary social his- 
 tory, as she was pleased to call her gossip, or 
 something else, unforeseen, happened. She 
 could almost have found in her heart to envy 
 Laurence Warleigh and his wife the quiet lei- 
 sure of their lives, with nobody going near them, 
 and nothing to attend to but each other. 
 
 When spring was^illy come, with its fresh 
 beauty of field and Mrest, on the pony which 
 Laurence, according to his promise, had bought 
 for Helena's service, she rode to Braft'erton and 
 back to say her prayers in the Catholic chapel 
 twice or thrice a week ; then to and fro the hills, 
 and, as the days lengthened, they made further 
 excursions amongst the dales into other haunts 
 as secluded as their own, where generation after 
 generation had lived and died, seemingly with- 
 out ever a thought of forsaking their remote 
 homes for any busier world. Years hence, if 
 God spared them, their existence now would be 
 to look back upon like one long, sunshiny day. 
 
 By this time, Helena and Lucy were both 
 quite satisfied with the manner of their new life 
 in the dales. They had made themselves little 
 household interests; they gardened, they had 
 pets of fowls, Imd their interludes of talk about 
 Grandmamma Gwynne and dear old Everham 
 were becoming more and more rare, until, by 
 and by, they promised to lapse into the past and 
 to be almost forgotten in the way, of regret. 
 Laurence Warleigh bore the kind of life pretty 
 well. He trudged by his wife's pony far and 
 near in all their wanderings, for he was a famous 
 pedestrian; and at home he was forever at her 
 elbow, reading to her, admiring her bits of work, 
 and occasionally offering her a little willing but 
 awkward assistance. A very charming picture 
 of Darby and Joan in the heyday of love they 
 made. 
 
 One day whein Rachel Withers was up at the 
 Hurtlemere House, Helena took her into her 
 little oratory, which was a quaint room project- 
 ing over the great porch, with three narrow 
 arched windows looking three separate ways. 
 She had decorated it rather fantastically, as it 
 seemed to Protestant Rachel, with transparencies 
 of saints against the lights east and west, while, 
 reared up in front of the center one, was a cru- 
 cifix — the cross in ebony, the figure in ivory, 
 very finely carved. Every inch of wainscot bore 
 a picture, a garland, or some symbol of her faith. 
 Here, also, were her devotional books, and when 
 Laurence was not with her this was her favorite 
 retreat. She was a sincere, pious soul as ever 
 breathed. Once she told Rachel that she had 
 had thoughts of becoming a nun, and called it a 
 "blessed vocation," but perhaps she found it 
 a still more blessed vocation to be Laurence 
 Warleigh's wife. He did his utmost to make 
 up to her for the lack of all other friends and 
 affection, and, apparently, with full success. 
 Whatever her wicked little secret that she kept 
 so close, it was not fretting her now ; each time 
 that Rachel saw her she looked brighter and 
 happier than the last. 
 
 " I wonder whether I shall be as happy when 
 I am married !" thought Rachel, and followed 
 the speculation up with a sigh. Was that sigh 
 ominous of some doubt creeping in ? That she 
 had her troubles we have good reason to know. 
 It was about this time — early in June — ^that 
 she went over with John to pay a three days' 
 visit at Floyd's Seat — a visit which had been 
 promised and put off, and promised and put off 
 it would be hard to say how frequently since 
 their return to Hurtledale. The Grantleys were 
 hospitable people, and never of their own will 
 had their house empty. There was a dinner- 
 party the first evening, to which came Mr. Gils- 
 land in very high feather and his most lover-like 
 and amiable mood. Rachel was content that 
 night, for nobody jeered her or flouted him ; he 
 was 'not intimate with the Grantleys, and for 
 her sake they inclined to think him a pleasing 
 person. 
 
 On the following day there was the Annual 
 Archery Meeting held in the grounds, and to^- 
 sist at it came a considerable muster of compa- 
 ny from all round the neighborhood, which 
 made it the pleasantest, gayest entertainment 
 that Hurtledale had seen since last summer's 
 closing picnic at Prior's Bank. Rachel With- 
 ers never pretended to deny that she was fond 
 of a little cheerful society ;■ and as the curate 
 again appeared on the scene, and again in his 
 genial temper, she had the promise of a day of 
 bliss before her. But it was not destined to go 
 over without a little speck or two of bitterness. 
 The most talked-about and conspicuous per- 
 son at Floyd's Seat on this memorable occasion 
 was that Miss Briggs, who has been mentioned 
 once already, as having distinguished herself by 
 being taken faint in church at Kitty Anderside's 
 wedding. But she was very far from being 
 taken faint now ; for she had just fallen into a 
 surprising great fortune by the death of an ec- 
 centric old tinswoman, who, though she would 
 never see her as long as she was alive, had made 
 up for the neglect now by bequeathing to her all 
 her possessions — ^to the prejudice, it was said of a 
 couple of nephews, whom she had brought up 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 31 
 
 in the expectation of being her heirs. Now an 
 heiress is always interestifig, and though Miss 
 Briggs was rather old to bo still a young woman, 
 she had not given up irrevocably her pretensions 
 to youthfulness ; and her accession to fortune 
 did, no doubt, materially lessen the sum of her 
 years. Rumor varied as to the amount of her 
 inheritance ; some persons said it was five thou- 
 sand a year, others reduced it to two ; but let 
 the facts be what they might, the poor spinster 
 had received a mighty increase of wealth, and 
 betrayed, by every air and gesture, that she 
 felt herself to be a person of magnified import- 
 ance in the eyes of society. 
 
 Eachel Withers had heard of her great good 
 luck, and expected to see her flourishing in all 
 the gloss and crispness of new mourning ; but 
 .old habits are not got over in a day, and Miss 
 Briggs had apparently adapted to her own serv- 
 ice some of tiie rustiest relics in her deceased 
 kinswoman's wardrobe ; for she was wonderfully 
 equipped in an aged black lutestring, tight in the 
 sleeves, with epaulettes, and- a rigid economy 
 of breadth in the sidrt. Over it she wore a lit- 
 tle velvet pelerine, trimmed with bugles, and to 
 crown all, a chip bonnet of antediluvian shape, 
 embellished with a broad, drooping feather on 
 each side. Her unusual splendor gave rise to 
 much criticism amongst her numerous acquaint- 
 ance ; but she bore herself throughout the day 
 with the serene self-possession of a woman who 
 feels herself exceedingly well-dressed ; and so 
 she was well-dressed for Betsy Briggs, with six- 
 ty pounds a year, but for Miss Briggs, the fortu- 
 nate heiress, she was, perhaps, rather behind 
 the fashion — at least, people said so who were 
 lately from Paris. 
 
 She was always a plain woman, but she never 
 looked plainer than on this public occasion ; for 
 her affectations and minaiideries were carried 
 over the borders of the grotesque. It appeared 
 more than once as if she were striving to act up 
 to some comical conception she had formed of 
 what a rich woman ought to be. Not one word 
 did she utter without contortions of eyes, mouth 
 and peaked-up nose, which she elevated in the 
 air, as if snuffing admiration, while she stepped 
 to and fro the lawn amongst the company, view- 
 ing herself on either side with the complacency 
 and self-delight of a six-year old child in its holi- 
 day-clothes. Oh ! she felt grand ! 
 
 She was not a sweet-natured woman at heart, 
 and the unexpected rise in her fortunes seemed 
 to have brought out in full flavor two or three 
 latent qualities not commonly accounted pleas- 
 ant. " Yes, ma'am," and " No, sir," were her 
 humble formulas in past times, and to Mrs! 
 Sara. Grandage, who was rather arbitrary, but 
 who had done her a thousand substantial kind- 
 nesses when she needed them, she was then es- 
 pecially deferential ; but now to Rachel Withers' 
 mischievous amusement, she quite changed her 
 tone — soothed her, advised her, and referred to 
 the precautions necessary at her time of life, 
 though she knew as well as any body tfiat her 
 ancient patroness hated to hear her age or in- 
 firmities spoken of. 
 
 It was a queer scene for an onlooker. Bitter- 
 sweet's bright black eyes sparkled with ire ; She 
 always had a repugnance for Miss Briggs as a 
 fawner and toady, even while she pitied and as- 
 sisted her ; but now she was thoroughly disgust- 
 
 ed, and declared she was more odious with her 
 new fortune than ever she had been in her low 
 estate. 
 
 "But- there is one consolation," added she, 
 spitefully, addressing her goddaughter ; " she is 
 such a mean-spirited thing, she will never have 
 the heart to spend her money ; she will indulge 
 herself in the pleasures of accumulation — ^very 
 dear to many who have known poverty !" 
 
 Eachel had her sly little laugh at her god- 
 mamma, but her own turn with Miss Briggs was 
 coming by and by. That lady was one of Mr. 
 Grilsland's very few admirers in Brafferton, and 
 Bittersweet liked to tease Eachel by saying the 
 lean spinster had a secret tendresse for him ; 
 and he for her cups of comfortable bohea. Of 
 course, Eachel could afford to bear these jibes 
 good-humoredly — she knew the curate's real 
 opinion of old Miss Briggs. Nevertheless she 
 felt a spasm of very genuine and undignified 
 vexation when the heiress came up to her and 
 whispered iu her sharp, tittering, lackadaisical 
 way— 
 
 " He ! he ! Miss Rachel, so you and Mr. Gils- 
 land are to marry ! When ? When he jumps 
 into a fet rectory, and your ship comes home 
 with your fortune ? It will be another case of 
 Kitty Anderside and the gray curate, I expect — 
 twenty years' courtship and a parsonage in the 
 Potteries at last !" 
 
 Eachel wished the spinster could have heard , 
 a few of the curate's latest criticisms on her own 
 fascinations, then would she have been sweetly 
 avenged for this insolence ; but as her benevo- 
 lent aspirations were only made in her own 
 heart. Miss Briggs retired uninjured and trium- 
 phant. She did not like Eachel Withers, for 
 some reason best known to herself, and it was 
 an intense satisfaction to her to feel that she 
 had planted one thorn at least in that successful 
 young woman's bosom. 
 
 But in the course of the day Eachel came in 
 for her compensations. Other old friends con- 
 gratulated her, and said kind things to her ; and 
 though Mrs. Sara Grandage would not have been 
 Bittersweet had she not done her little best to 
 dash her goddaughter's contentment, she was 
 not so resolutely malicious as usual. She caught 
 Eachel once standing alone,, while Mr. Gilsland, 
 who had been her companion until a moment 
 before, was speaking aside with a stranger ; she 
 was smiling to herself at a pleasant thought, and 
 looking so superlatively silly that ,the opportuni- 
 ty for raillery was too good to be lost. 
 
 " Oh, you beatified goose !" cried the old lady, 
 making a comical caricature of her attitude and 
 expression. " Do let the natural woman come 
 out a little more. What is your lip curled up 
 to your nose for if you are to turn out senti- 
 mental ? I would never have stood godmother 
 for you if I could have believed you would !" 
 
 Here Mr. Gilsland, having done with his 
 friend, advanced to join Eachel, on which Bit- 
 tersweet withdrew herself, pursing up her mouth 
 and saying, " Now we are going to look niminy- 
 piininy againj" 
 
 He asked what were her charming remarks, 
 but did not press for an answer ; he knew very 
 well that, he was no favorite with the sarcastic 
 old lady at Prior's Bank, and distrusted her ac- 
 cordingly. 
 
 John Withers and his sister were remaining 
 
32 
 
 ANNIS WABLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 at Floyd's Seat over the following day, and 
 therefore they witnessed the dispersion of the 
 general company ; and it was not without a pang 
 of acute wrath, that Kaohel saw Miss Briggs of- 
 fer, and Mr. Gilsland accept, a seat in the hired 
 pony-chaise in which the heiress was returning 
 to Brafferton. Mrs. Sara Grandage looked on 
 rejoicing, and with a sudden inspiration of 
 wickedness, said to her suffering goddaughter — 
 " An engagement is not final. Dumpling — nothing 
 is final but a marriage ; what will you bet me 
 that your beautiful curate is not fitting a new 
 string to his bow ?" 
 
 If a reproachful glance could have killed. Bit- 
 tersweet had never stirred again from that hour ! 
 
 " What respect the world pays to money ! 
 What court old Miss Briggs receives since the 
 fame of her fortunes spread through the dales! 
 Yesterday when John and I drove into Braffer- 
 ton there were two carriages standing at her 
 door, and ours made the third — I would not 
 have called, but John said I must. When we 
 got into her stuffy little parlor, there we found 
 the Grantleys and Carltons, whom she was en- 
 tertaining with conversation in her grand new 
 manner, only droppmg now and then by acci- 
 dent into her old servile style. We had not 
 paid her a visit since she came to her kingdom, 
 and she receivfed us with the loftiest patronage ; 
 we were the last friends who had honored her, 
 she said. Oh, Bittersweet, how odious money 
 makes odious people !" This moral tag to her 
 story issued with a good deal of expletive force 
 from Mistress Rachel Withers' lips, and her god-' 
 mamma encouraged her to go on with the tale 
 of her visit to the heiress ; it was excellent fun 
 to the old lady to see her put out of temper. 
 Until lately she had been almost monotonously 
 sweet and soft ; but nature was asserting herself 
 again without the poor girl's precisely knowing 
 why. 
 
 " Well, we had not been there many minutes," 
 continued she, "when in came Mr. Gilsland, 
 bringing Miss Briggs a little pamphlet which it 
 appeared she had commissioned lum to procure 
 for her ; and she was so diffusive in her thanks 
 that he tried to stop her — but she would not be 
 stopped until she had had her say out. Then the 
 Grantleys and Carltons took leavq, and as soon 
 as they were gone, again did she rehearse her 
 fulsome — ' So very much indebted, so very kind 
 indeed of you, Mr. Gilsland,' as if he had walked 
 to London and back for her, until John's face 
 expanded into an irrepressible grin, to cover 
 which he begged to ask, if it were no secret, 
 what this precious pamphlet was about ? And 
 she began to say she was not sure she might tell, 
 with such an affectation of archness and mystery 
 as put Mr. Gilsland quite out of countenance. 
 I could see he was intensely provoked !" 
 
 Bittersweet laughed enjoyingly. 
 
 " I wish I had been there !" said she. 
 
 "And after all," proceeded Kachel, "the pa- 
 per turned out to be neither more nor less than 
 the prospectus of some inferior school where 
 the orphaned sons of clergymen are received at 
 a lower charge than other pupils, and that she 
 wainted the information to help her to dispose of 
 that brace of luckless lads whom her cousin's 
 caprice has left dependent on her tender mer- 
 
 cies. She squeezed my hand impressively as I 
 was coming away, and whispered in confidence, 
 ' You see, my dear, a single woman must seek 
 an adviser amongst her friends when her re- 
 sponsibilities are so great as mine.' ' Why 
 don't you go to Mr. Anderside, then ? ' said I, 
 and left her quite annoyed. Affected old thing ! 
 Mr. Gilsland took his hat to accompany us, but 
 on some pretense or other she managed to de- 
 tain him, and we saw him no more; for we 
 drove straight home after a visit to the rec- 
 tory. Twice or thrice on the Svay John broke 
 out into his merry, enjoying laugh, for which 
 there was no excuse that I could see ; and when 
 I made him tell me why he did it, he only asked 
 if I had no sense of humor, and said that scene 
 in Miss Briggs' parlor was the finest bit of com- 
 edy he had ever witnessed. Perhaps I might 
 have thought so too if any body but Mr. Gils- 
 land had taken the chief role in it ; as it was I 
 am afraid my temper got the better of me, for 
 I exclaimed passionately that Miss Briggs was a 
 detestable woman! which set John off again 
 into a perfect peal of laughter — and it was 
 ridiculous." 
 
 Thus far Mistress Kachel with unembarrassed 
 fluency ; and then she melted into a flood of 
 tears. Her godmamma looked on as she had 
 listened — with delightful composure; .and as 
 soon as the shower was over, said with perfect 
 confidence in the wisdom of the advice she was 
 offering, " Dumpling, if that man gives you the 
 chance, quarrel with him." 
 
 " But I don't want to quarrel with him," 
 sobbed Rachel, " and it is all her fault !" 
 
 " Then, my dear, he will quarrel with you. I 
 will bet you a thousand pounds to a penny that 
 your faithful swain has fitted a new string to his 
 bow." Bittersweet spoke with the calm assur- 
 ance of fate, and though, of course, Rachel did 
 not believe her, the words went down into her 
 heart and made it heavy. 
 
 The following day Mr. Gilsland was due at 
 the rectory, but he disappointed Rachel and did 
 nol come — it was the first time he had failed of 
 his appointment yet. When it grew so late that 
 she knew it was useless to go on expecting him, 
 she set off for a walk upon the moor alone. On 
 reaching the ridge of the fell that looked over 
 into Mirkdale, there she stumbled on Laurence 
 Warleigh and Helena, seated on a plaid amongst 
 the heather enjoying the splendid June sunset. 
 Helena was looking marvelously lovely, there 
 was the softest, saintliest expression in her eyes. 
 What they had been speaking of before Rachel 
 mterrupted them, she could not tell, but the 
 moment Laurence espied her he sprang up ex- 
 claiming, " Here is Rachel Withers, now let us 
 be gay ! Tell us the news in the dales, Rachel, 
 or how the world wags beyond them !" 
 
 There was a little effort in his manner, and 
 Rachel would gladly have excused herself, and 
 left them to thtir own company, but they would 
 not permit her to escape, and they wsiked as 
 far as the High-beck together. The stream was 
 rippling over the stones with a pleasant fullness 
 of sound, and somewhere down in Mirkdale 
 there was the ringing of church-bells which 
 chimed musically in with its melody. It was a 
 sweet summer landscape such as Rachel would 
 have enjoyed with the inmost fiber of her na- 
 ture, had not a strange feeUng of doubt and 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 33 
 
 depreasion kept thrusting itself like a cloud 
 betwixt her and its beauty. She carried the 
 haunting presentiment home with her, and asked 
 herself a hundred times during that dreary, 
 sleepless night-^could all the world be just in 
 lightly esteeming her lover, and she alone 
 wrong in taking him for a true man ? 
 
 Said Bittersweet with good-humored sarcasm, 
 "There is the wooing that is all butter and 
 honey, the wooing that is all sugar and spice, 
 and the wooing that is all scratch and claw, snap 
 and snarl — which is yours, Dumpling ? If you 
 grow thin and ugly over it, I will never forgive 
 you !" 
 
 " Am I growing thin and ugly over it ? I am 
 a good desd worried in my mind, and that is the 
 fact " — a great confession this for a girl like 
 Rachel Withers to make, especially to a woman 
 who had been against her all along. She made 
 it about a month after the archery gathering at 
 Floyd's Seat, since which her tender little affairs 
 had been going altogether wrong. She wished 
 she were a little happier. She could not per- 
 suade herself Into a belief that she either was 
 contented, or ought to be contented, while 
 things continued as they were. It was quite 
 impossible to guess what €ad lately come over 
 Mr. Gilsland; she never felt less bright or 
 cheerful than after a walk and talk with him ; 
 he wore and discouraged her mind with com- 
 pkunings and gloomy previsions as empty often 
 as they were jiseless. John Withers^had ceased 
 to intermeddle either one way or another ; he 
 saw his sister was worried, but she had made 
 her engagement with her eyes open, and , in de- 
 fiance' of his opinion, and she must bear the 
 brunt of discovering her mistake — an engage- 
 ment was a more serious business in his views 
 than in Bittersweet's — she would have broken a 
 dozen rather than not. How different this love- 
 making was to what poor Rachel fancied ! JSTo 
 pleasant, sunshiny hours of quiet converse now 
 their mutual strangeness was gone — nothing but 
 thorns, prickles, uneasiness ! 
 
 "If I knew how to satisfy him I would do 
 it — he knows I would, and yet he is always 
 finding fault with me," said she in pitiful, quer- 
 ulous accents, which were balm to her god- 
 mamma's ears. 
 
 Only the last time he was at the rectory he 
 had said to her with cutting coldness, "You 
 have no sympathy with me, Rachel ; you never 
 attempt, to realize my position. If I tell you 
 how Mr. Anderside leaves the burden of the 
 parish on my shoulders, you answer that he is 
 growing an old man — ^as if that had any thing 
 to do with it. A little condolence would please 
 me far better than your constant cheerfulness. 
 Tou do not feel how alien to all my tastes and 
 all my habits is the stagnation of provincial so- 
 ciety. I die in it — sometimes I am capable of 
 any rashness to deliver myself from it. Tou 
 suggest that I should resign my curacy here and 
 seek another elsewhere^ — ^that does not sound as 
 if you valued my company much, but I will let 
 it pass as well-meant, though I must remind 
 you that curacies with stipends of one hundred 
 and fifty pounds a year are not waiting to drop 
 into my mouth directly I open it. No, I see 
 nothing before me but years of this distasteful 
 C 
 
 drudgery ! It is sheer madness for a gentleman 
 to take orders unless he have large private 
 means or powerful patronage ; and I have 
 neither money nor friends at court." 
 
 Rachel could not answer him — his thoughts 
 were not her thoughts, nor his hopes her hopes : 
 she never could have imagined how widely they 
 differed unless she had pledged herself to share 
 them. She would have been very happy during 
 a long day of small things with affection to 
 shine on it, but she began to perceive with 
 shrinking reluctance that Mr. Gilsland did not 
 love her as a man must love the woman he 
 marries if she is to enjoy any measure of con- 
 tent — yet still she clung to him. 
 
 " Give him up — I would never be so poor- 
 spirited as to bind myself to a man who did not 
 care for me !" cried Bittersweet, contemptuous- 
 ly. " Besides, it is both foolish and wrong." 
 
 "You might as well say it is foolish and 
 wrong to have a pug-nose — it may be against 
 the laws of beauty, but it is not'against the laws 
 of nature. And it is my nature to go on loving 
 what I have once loved though it disappoint me 
 ever so," answered Rachel with a bitter earnest- 
 ness. 
 
 " So much the worse for you !" said her god- 
 mamma, and ceased from her reasoning. The 
 sagacious old lady knew that patience, time and 
 the hour would bring this troublesome affair to 
 the end she desired to see. 
 
 And in fact that end came very shortly. One 
 day early in August Mr. Gilsland walked over 
 to the rectory ; it was sultry weather, and he 
 arrived there very hot, tired and dusty ; very 
 much out of love with the world and with him- 
 self. Rachel met him less graoefuUy than usual ; 
 she also was heated and weary with a tedious 
 morning amongst the children in the school ; and 
 an uncomfortable doubt and dread of him was 
 in her mind. There was thunder in their moral 
 atmosphere, and a general tendency toward 
 storm. 
 
 They talked a little while on common things, 
 verging gradually toward personal interests, 
 Rachel becoming more and more conscious 
 every moment that the curate had something to 
 say which he had yet a difficulty in bringing out. 
 She did not help him with a single word — she had 
 quite enough to do. to keep guard over herself. 
 
 At last it came, awkwardly, blunderingly, but 
 still it came. Mr. Gilsland was not without a 
 sense of the proprieties, and he knew he was 
 doing a hazardous deed, but he did not stick at 
 doing it. He told Rachel that when he made 
 her an offer of marriage he was under the im- 
 pression that she possessed a considerable for- 
 tune, and he impUed that she had herself de- 
 ceived him. 
 
 This insinuation she passed by ; he knew he 
 was lying, and she knew that he knew it — ^but 
 to the first part of his statement she made an- 
 swer with a steady little face and more dignity 
 than was usual with her, — "No, Alfred, I have 
 only a thousand pounds, and I think I must have 
 told you so." She had not told him so, but he 
 had been aware of the fact some months ; John 
 had given him the information when he permit- 
 ted the engagement. "I think I must have 
 told you so," repeated Rachel, and then looking 
 straight into his eyes, she added, " but if you 
 repent of your promise / will not hold you to it." 
 
34 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 This was precisely what he wanted to bring 
 her to, but he was excessively angry when it was 
 achieved. He called her all the cold-hearted 
 things in the world, and finally went away in 
 a rage. But he never came to the rectory again, 
 and Rachel Withers' little love-story was ended. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIFTH. 
 
 IN THE WINTERLT WEATHEK. 
 
 Thk blank gray was not made to blast her hair. — Byron. 
 
 There was something again a little amiss with 
 Laurence Warleigh's wife. Her spirits that 
 wdre so even were becoming as uncertain as the 
 winds. She fretted about Laurence, and fancied 
 she saw often a look of tedium creeping over 
 his face; her tender heart was smitten with 
 many an aching fear lest the present existence 
 of sweet idleness might grow flat, stale, and bur- 
 densome to him. Then, quite forgetful of her- 
 self, she urged him to make a change, though 
 what change she could never suggest ; but he 
 always answered her that Hurtledale satisfied 
 him, and until she wearied of it there they 
 would temain. 
 
 By tacit consent, they never mentioned Whin- 
 stane or his sisters now, and in this instance 
 Laurence Warleigh's passive stubbornness of 
 endurance began strongly to manifest itself; for 
 though he resented the neglect of his family in 
 silence, he resented it with a very deep displeas- 
 ure. No doubt but that Helena brooded over 
 it too. She had some cruel moments of self- 
 torment from the thought that she it was who 
 had alienated Laurence from his own people, 
 and many a dread lest a time might come when 
 she should not be there to compensate him for 
 what he had lost. But was he not separated 
 from them almost as widely before he married 
 her ? though a door of reconciliation was then 
 open to him had he chosen to avail himself of 
 it. It was a pity that either of them should suf- 
 fer the matter to weigh on their hearts, however ; 
 for what was Sir William Warleigh that any one 
 should heed his displeasure ? 
 
 There is nothing in this world without alloy. 
 Fondly and faithfully as they loved each other, 
 there were thorns, and sharp ones, in their rose- 
 garden of Eden. 
 
 Visitors they had none, besides John Withers 
 and his sister. They were quite out of the 
 world. Laurence Warleigh's bringing up at 
 Whinstane had isolated him from companions 
 of his own age and standing, and his wandering 
 life before his marriage had helped still further 
 to keep him poor in friends near home. Neither 
 were his present circumstances such as to tempt 
 the gentlefolks of the dales to lay aside their 
 mossy dignity and make advances to the un- 
 known son of the notorious Sir William War- 
 leigh, even did not the distance of the Hurtle- 
 mere House from all their civilized dwellings 
 make a visit thither in the best of weather a 
 hard day's work. The Damer Warleighs, who 
 might have brought them forward, were gone 
 abroad, and they, therefore, lived entirely to 
 themselves ; and it was not to be marveled at if 
 Laurence did now and then crave some more 
 
 muscular mental diet than his fair young wife's 
 society could afford him. 
 
 As the summer and autumn passed over, and 
 November winds began to scatter the leaves in 
 the woods, Helena grew worse. Some uncon- 
 fessed source of trouble influenced her spirits 
 capriciously. She had long and apparently 
 causeless fits of weeping, and days when she 
 would sit still, pale and speechless, from morn- 
 ing to night. Merry little Doctor Beane who 
 attended her, made light of her freaks, but dur- 
 ing the last few weeks Laurence had several 
 times mooted anxiously the advisability of carry- 
 ing her away from the loneliness of Hurtledale ; 
 and he Would undoubtedly have done so had she 
 not now been herself averse to move. 
 
 It was one day about this time that she took 
 her courage in her hands, and begged Laurence 
 to let her write to his sisters — she wanted them 
 to forgiye her for taking him fro^ them ; to 
 think of her gently, though they were never to 
 meet, she pleaded : it would be a happiness to 
 her to know that they did not guiie hate and 
 despise/ her. Poor girls, tjiey would have re- 
 ceived her with open arms and open hearts had 
 the chance been allowed them ! He would not 
 at first, but a little more entreaty prevailed, and 
 he gave her reluctant leave to do as she wished, 
 though he forewarned her of ill-success. She 
 refused to \>e discouraged, however : she thought 
 she would have skill to move the hearts of two 
 women whose own lives were not very happy, 
 and she addressed them together. 
 
 It was a simple, touching little letter that She 
 wrote. Katherine's proud throat swelled as she 
 read it, and Grace cried aloud that she would set 
 off to Hurtlemere that very hour ; then their 
 father's coarse voice recalled them to themselves, 
 asking what they were sniveling about, and com- 
 manding them to hand him the letter. He 
 snarled and swore over it a good deal, then flung 
 it on the fire, and, with vindictive bitterness, 
 forbade them to answer it at their peril. Kath- 
 erine was haughtily silent, but Grace burst into 
 a passion of tears, and was hustled out of the 
 room by her sister to escape their father's rage. 
 Oliver discreetly held his peace, taking neither 
 part, but a day or two after, when Sir William 
 showed signs of relenting before his daughters' 
 persistent entreaties that he would allow them 
 to go over and see Laurence's wife, he spoke 
 strongly against it ; sneered their petition down, 
 and said it was a very mean expedient in his 
 brother to let Helena's pen plead for their res- 
 toration to favor. Lady Georgina took the same 
 self-interested view of it, and Sir William — 
 always most angry when he thought himself 
 cajoled — renewed his stern injunction to his 
 daughters against either writing or going to the 
 Hurtlemere House. And thus it came to pass 
 that poor Helena's pathetic appeal went unno- 
 ticed. 
 
 Each succeeding day after it was. sent, Lau- 
 rence or Mathew Dobie went down to the post as 
 soon as the letters were in to inquire if there had 
 come any reply. She too would go to the gate 
 to shorten her suspense in waiting for their re- 
 turn, and it was cruel to see the disappointed 
 yet hopeful air with which she met the empty- 
 handed messenger returning during the first 
 week. " Nothing yet — perhaps they are away, 
 and it may come to-morrow." But for many 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 35 
 
 to-morrows it did not come, and ag thej convic- 
 tion of her utter failure forced itself on her mind 
 she became more despondent and tearful than 
 ever. 
 
 Mistress Dobie reasoned with her solemnly, 
 for she perceived that it drove her master almost 
 mad when he saw his darling thus causelessly 
 distrust. " He loves you as his very life is bound 
 up in you," urged the worthy old woman; "an' 
 how can you heed any body's unchristian spite 
 when that's so ? I wouldn't, not I ! It behooves 
 you to cheer up and be merry for all sakes ; I 
 don't know what Mrs. Damer 'ud say,' an' she 
 could see that pitiful face !" 
 
 Then poor Helena strove with her weakness, 
 but as she mournfully said, she could not help 
 it. Dr. Beaue bade them be patient with her, 
 and prophesied that in due time all would be 
 right again and the little lady happier than ever ; 
 but his cunning eye had lately discerned that 
 she had a secret fear on her mind ; he could not 
 persuade it out of her, and he said to Tiimself 
 with misgiving — " The child has got it into her 
 head that she is going to die." 
 
 And that was just what Helena had got into 
 her head — foolish Lucy had told her weeping in 
 the spring that the White Hands had been seen 
 hovering over her from the very night Laurence 
 had brought her home, and as her hour of trial 
 drew near, she made up her mind that she rmtst 
 "die and leave him — die and leave him; and aU 
 her bitter tears and anguish betrayed how little 
 able she was yet to resign herself and go ! 
 
 The last time that Eachel Withers saw Helena 
 was in the ensuing January. She found her 
 fitfully gay ; Laurence had received a long letter 
 from Mrs. Damer Warleigh announcing their 
 speedy return to Bristowe, and this had enliven- 
 ed her. He went out for a walk, leaving his 
 wife and her friend together, and they had a 
 gossip over the traveler's news, during which 
 Helena smiled more genuinely than she had 
 smiled for months. But the brightness did not 
 last. When she passed from foreign adventures 
 to speak of Mrs. Damer Warleigh's influence at 
 Whinstane, her face clouded over again with a 
 weary depression.' " She is my last hope of a 
 reconciliation between Laurence and his family," 
 said she. " If any thing should happen to me he 
 will never forgive them — the breach will never 
 be healed. By any means and on any terms, I 
 yearn for it to be closed before my child is 
 born." 
 
 Mistress Dobie had occasion to enter the room 
 while Kaohel was there, and on Helena's remark- 
 ing that the lowering of the storm-clouds re- 
 minded her of the weather when Laurence 
 brought her home to the Hurtlemere House, 
 " What a long, long time ago !" she looked 
 round at the gentle creature and exclaimed : 
 " 'Deed but you'll find t' years '11 be short enew 
 by an' by ! Ag you grow auld like me you'll 
 hardlings care to count 'em, they'll flee so fast." 
 
 A convulsive shudder ran through Helena's 
 frame from head to foot, and with a smile more 
 touching than any tears, she said, " It was only 
 the White Hands over my head — I feel them 
 often now. Do you think they are blessing me 
 to a long life. Mistress Dobie, or do they hover 
 over me for a warning, ' that the blank gray 
 was not macfe to blast my hair ?' " 
 
 " White Hands and fash !" exclaimed the 
 dame with well-acted contempt but genuine 
 alarm ; " my dear lady, it is but an auld wife's 
 tale that you shouldn't give heed to — more 
 shame to me that tolled you ! Ignorant folk 
 take up wi' that sort o' logic, but it is not for us 
 as knows better. Pray, never let Master Lau- 
 rence hear you go on wi' that." 
 
 Helena glanced at Rachel half amused, but 
 when Mistress Dobie had gone out she said very 
 quietly and resignedly, " Don't caU me weak, 
 Kachel, but ever since I got to know how they 
 told a story in the dale that the White Hands 
 were seen over my head from the first night that 
 Laurence brought me here, I have felt sure I 
 shall not live. I kept it to myself and fretted 
 over it terribly once, but it does not weigh on 
 me so sadly now. God has given me peace, but 
 my heart breaks for Laurence ! We have been 
 very happy together — I am only a little fondling 
 thing, but oh, how he loves me ! It is almost 
 pain to think of it now ; I wish I might have 
 staid with him a little, Utile longer. And he 
 does not know — he does not know that I must 
 go!" 
 
 Rachel Withers could never afterward recall 
 ier words, and the look on her face, without the 
 tears starting to her eyes. She said whatever 
 she could think of to reassure and comfort her, 
 but to what purpose was it reasoning against 
 such a fixed imagination — a prevision so likely 
 to bring about its own fulfillment ? When Lau- 
 rence Warleigh returned from his walk, she 
 kissed Helena good-by and went away — kissed 
 her and said good-by for the last time ! Mis- 
 tress Dobie let her out at the front door, and 
 whispered earnestly as she did so, " Oh, Miss 
 Eachel, don't be long o' seeing my dear lady 
 again. She frets sorely after being friends wi' 
 them proud misses at Whinstane ; she'd fain 
 bespeak their kindness for th' lile bairn she 
 thinkg she'll ha' to leave as soon as it comes into 
 this cauld world ; and her heart does not misgie 
 her for naught, I know." 
 
 'So ; Helena's sweet face looked like one that 
 was never to grow old, and the Shadow of Death 
 was haunting the dim chambers of the Hurtle- 
 mere House nlreidy. 
 
 It was through a heavy snow-storm that Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh, two days after her return to 
 Bristowe, rode up to Hurtlemere, an urgent let- 
 ter from Laurence having reached her by a spe- 
 cial messenger at noon. It was night when she 
 arrived, and every thing wag dark except a sin- 
 gle thread of light stealing through a chink in 
 the closed shutters of an upper chamber. The 
 deep snow muffled the sound of the horse's 
 feet, and no one appeared to admit her until 
 after a second and lengthy summons. At last 
 Mistress Dobie presented herself at the door, 
 looking dull and bewildered, like a person sud- 
 denly awakened out of the leaden sleep of utter 
 exhaustion ; and as Mrs. Damer Warleigh step- 
 ped across the threshold, she said, with laconic 
 despair: "She's dead— it's aU ower, an' she's 
 deeHi, an' done wi' her troubles !" 
 
 The visitor asked for Laurence, and wag an- 
 swered : " He's out somewhere i' the storm ; 
 bite nor sup hasn't passed his lips sin' morning. 
 Oh ! Mrs. Damer, but we ha' had a time o' it !" 
 
 Mrs. Damer Warleigh walked through the 
 
ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 house into the kitchen, and stood before the 
 fire, the snow melting from her in tiny rills as 
 Magsie, stupefied with crying, relieved her from 
 some of her heaviest wraps. Mathew Dobie was 
 smoking his pipe in his chimney-corner with 
 his usual calm philosophy ; Lucy was not visi- 
 ble, and Mrs. Damer asked for her. 
 
 "She's getten charge o' t' babe, an' as it 
 keeps her fra fretting, that's ane bother out o' 
 hand," replied Mistress Dobie. Mathew now con- 
 siderately proposed to go with his lantern in 
 search of his master, and bring him in, but his 
 wife thought he had better let him be. "It 
 don't do to mell' wi' folk i' his frame o' mind, 
 they comes to best by thersels','' said she. " He 
 wer worse nor mad this morning — it wer awfu' 
 to see him. An' oh, the wicked, wicked words 
 he spoke ! I hope God A'mighty don't hearken 
 to men when they're out o' thersels ? She 
 were sensible to the last,, poor pretty cretur that 
 she was, an' good as pretty !"• Mrs. Damer in- 
 quired if the child was a boy or a girl. 
 
 " A girl, an' it's not amiss considering. No 
 fear but it '11 live. Doctor Beane says ; an' we 
 ha' sent for Mary Wray, as has just lost her own 
 baby, to come nurse it. Lucy has ta'en to it 
 amazing, an' I ha' shifted 'em quite out o' Mas^ 
 ter Laurence's way ; for oh ! Mrs. Damer, I 
 don't think he's safe. When she was gone, he 
 flung out into t' storm like ane possessed, an' 
 he has never come nigh hand t' door-stane since. 
 It's cruel to see her lyin' there, an' him raving 
 demented out up o' t' fell. There I see him 
 this afternoon crying — Lord, how he was cry- 
 ing ! Them at Whinstane's getten much to 
 answer for, indeed ha' they." 
 
 After some time Mistress Dobie led the way 
 to the silent chamber where Helena was lying 
 in her dreamless death-slumber — poor little lov- 
 ing, aching heart at rest forever ! Mrs Damer 
 could not refrain herself from weeping aloud as 
 she gazed at the marble face, and remembered 
 the happy young wife she had left in her earthly 
 Eden but a few months ago. 
 
 WhUe they were standing there the hall-door 
 opened and shut, and Mistress Dobie said in a 
 frightened undertone : 
 
 " That's Master Laurence's foot coming in wi' 
 Mathew — ^pray he don't break out again !" and 
 she would have closed the door, had not Mrs. 
 Damer said, "No, let him meet her there;" 
 and the next moment he came into the room, 
 drenched, wild, incoherent. 
 
 The kind old lady took his hand and said : 
 " Ah ! Laurence, I did not look for such a 
 greeting as this ! It is a bitter, bitter bereave- 
 ment, but God's will be done !" 
 
 " Was it God's will ? Nay, it was their devil- 
 ish pride and cruelty that killed her !" exclaim- 
 ed he hoarsely. "She could not bear it — it 
 broke her heart. They killed her,' I say, they 
 killed her ; hell's curse upon them all !" and 
 his voice rose to an awful cry. 
 
 " Hush, Laurie, hush, in this holy presence," 
 whispered Mrs. Damer. Her tone and manner 
 subdued his frenzy, but when she would have 
 had him quit the room with her, he stubbornly 
 refused, and staid all lught watching by the 
 unconscious clay. The last twelve hours had 
 done on him the work of half a lifetime. 
 
 As soon as the news reached Whinstane that 
 Laurence's wife had borne a living child and 
 
 was dead, Sir William Warleigh sent Oliver over 
 with leave for her to be laid in the vault at 
 Penslaven ; but Laurence refused to see his 
 brother, and returned for all answer that neither 
 her dust nor his should ever come to the place 
 of his kinsfolk. She was buried, therefore, in 
 Hurtledale churchyard just below the chanccl- 
 window. 
 
 While Helena lay dead in the house, John 
 Withers was sent for to baptize her child. The 
 name given to it was Annis. 
 
 As the winter went on Laurence Warleigh 
 settled down again in a certain fashion, if that 
 can be called settling in which every hour of a 
 man's life is marred by a tormented restlessness, 
 a feverish impatience, and anger against God, 
 against his kinsfolk, and against himself. His 
 kind nature was embittered, his generous temper 
 warped and soured. He went and cime about 
 his house in a dogged silence, dark, down-look- 
 ing, and miserable. He suffered the canker of 
 resentment to eat into his heart, and was as 
 deaf to all overtures from Whinstane as Whin- . 
 stane had been to his while Helena lived. Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh and the Squire spent them- 
 selves in urging him to leave Hurtlemere, with 
 its many sorrowful memories, even if he resum- 
 ed the wandering life he led before his mar- 
 riage ; but aU in vain. He expressed a determin- 
 ation never to remove from the house where 
 his darling and he lived through their brief 
 happiness ; and though not much weight could 
 be attached to a resolution entered into in a 
 season of vehement grief, the event proved that 
 he had as much tenacity of remembrance as 
 quickness of suffering. His old charm of man- 
 ner, his fire- and freedom, were quite gone, and 
 in their stead reigned a harsh sullenness, which 
 Mistress Dobie excused by pleading that he was 
 not at all times himself — that he was half mad, 
 in Act; and, indeed, his conduct was marked 
 in many instances with something stronger than 
 eccentricity. Mathew Dobie averred that there 
 was no little of Sir William's wild blood in 
 him, and that a dour man would he be if he 
 lived and let it get the better of his mother's 
 milk. 
 
 He testified no thought for his child, and if 
 it were brought of set purpose in his way he 
 never noticed it, greatly to the ire of its foster- 
 pnother, of Lucy, and of the other womankind 
 in the house. The little creature being named 
 Annis, and born on a Friday, was, according to 
 all old wives' prognostics, predestined to be 
 much under spiritual influences, and unlucky in 
 its temporal concerns ; but thanks to the care 
 and good nursing of Mary Wray, in its infancy 
 it grew and throve apace. 
 
 It was about midway in the month of March 
 that Katherine Warleigh did rather a venture- 
 some thing m defiance of her father's commands. 
 She rode over into Hurtledale, having left the 
 Tower alone by the connivance of a favorite 
 servant before the rest of the household were 
 astir, and arrived at the rectory just as John 
 Withers and his sister were sitting down to 
 breakfast. She had come with the determina- 
 tion of seeing Laurence and his child, and of 
 persuading him if possible to be reconciled with 
 them at home ; Sir William's wrath was risin" 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 37 
 
 again after a temporary lull, and Oliver was do- 
 ing his utmost to keep it warm ; now or never, 
 therefore, must be reunion. 
 
 The brUliant freshness of the morning had 
 tinged Katherine's cheeks with an exquisite 
 btoom, and made her look exceedingly hand- 
 some, but when she came to sit quiet and talk 
 troubles over, her countenance fell, and the 
 beauty dropped away from it. Her account of the 
 state of affairs at Whinstaue was not cheering ; 
 Sir William was as violent and tyrannical as 
 ever, and Oliver and Oliver's wife ruled the 
 household despotically. Katherine was by no 
 means inclined to think her sistor-iu-law's pres- 
 ence at the Tower an advantage. 
 
 Grace's correspondence with Arthur Hill had 
 been discovered about six months before, and 
 at Oliver's instigation peremptorily forbidden, 
 and her naturally weak health and spirits had 
 sunk, in consequence, lower than ever. OUver 
 carried all with a high hand, and appeared to 
 be feathering his own future nest luxuriously 
 out of the convertible wealth of the estate ; but 
 to his wife the monotony and dreariness of life 
 in the dales was a most irksome bondage. She 
 kept almost as much in her own rooms as did 
 Lady Foulis, and had brought no society what- 
 ever about the Tower. Katherine described 
 her as a highly accomplished, frigid woman, 
 very plain, but elegant and distinguished in air 
 and manner. She was the daughter of a spend- 
 thrift Irish earl, and had been educated abroad ; 
 she was full ten years older than Oliver, and 
 the fortune for which he had the*credit of hav- 
 ing married her, came from her settlement at 
 her first marriage with a great brewer ; in this 
 he had not been very far-sighted, however, for 
 at her death the whole of it would revert to 
 the family of her first husband. Her children 
 — she had two now — were kept in superlative 
 good order. "Jndeed," said Katherine, "they 
 are trained never to speak above their breath, 
 and as for crying — they dare not do it ! Even 
 the baby is subdued, and behaves as beautifully 
 as if it were made of wax and moved with 
 wires." 
 
 She had fifty questions to ask about Laurence 
 and his little daughter, but John and Rachel 
 could only teU her what they heard by common 
 report themselves. They never saw him now 
 except at a distance riding along the road ; he 
 had not been inside their doors nor they inside 
 his since the day of Helena's funeral. Mary 
 Wray lived up at the Hurtlemere House, and 
 little Annis was said to be "a mighty fine 
 bairn ;" but John, who baptized her, was no 
 judge of babies, and Rachel had not seen her. 
 They showed Katherine Helena's grave under 
 the chancel window ; there was no memorial 
 stone upon it — only a young cedar that Laurence 
 had planted with his own hands a few days 
 after she was buried. In reference to that let- 
 ter, the neglect of which had caused Helena 
 such bitter pain, Katherine said explicitly that 
 had- not Oliver interfered, Sir William would 
 have granted her request, and have permitted 
 them to come over ; he was in great hopes her 
 child would prove a boy, and intimated that 
 if it did, he would make its birth the occasion 
 of forgiving his son, and of doing what he called 
 "the right thing" by him. His rage and dis- 
 appointment were terrible when the last news 
 
 reached him, and there was such an angry di- 
 vision betwixt him and Oliver for some time 
 that there was every probability of the second 
 establishment at Whinstane being driven away. 
 But Oliver was conciliatory and plausible, and 
 had made himself so necessary to his father 
 that the breach was of no long continuance. 
 
 When Katherine had- rested at the rectory 
 about an hour, John Withers went up with her 
 over the moor to the Hurtlemere House ; but 
 Laurence was gone out on horseback no one 
 could tell her whither, and from the orders 
 given to Mathew Dobie before he started, he 
 was not looked for back untU nightfall. This 
 was grievously disappointing after the risk of 
 her father's anger that she had run ; but she 
 saw the child, and thought its appearance and 
 tendance all that could be desired. Mary Wray 
 was affectionately attached to her nursling. 
 
 This -vvas scarcely the opportunity for John 
 to advance his own cause, but nevertheless he 
 drew some encouragement from Katherine's 
 visit. Oliver had put a period to Arthur Hill's 
 correspondence with his sister Grace on the 
 score of inferior position, and the same plea 
 might be raised against himself; but Katherine 
 wonld be less easily turned aside than Grace 
 when her feelings were once engaged. On the 
 whole he gathered some hope from her having 
 betaken herself to the rectory, as to a place 
 where she should find sure friends ; and Rachel 
 threw her word into the balance with it, by 
 saying that their preference, though still un- 
 spoken, was mutual, and to an observer quite 
 evident. 
 
 Two days after Katherine's ride into Hurtle- 
 dale there came a rumor that Sir William War- 
 leigh was dead — rumor was right for once ; he 
 was dead, and Sir Laurence was come to his 
 kingdom ! 
 
 It would have been sheer hypocrisy to put 
 on faces of sorrow. Kester Greaves even came 
 to the rectory to ask if he was to ring the bells 
 for the new Squire. " Not until the old Squire 
 is buried," replied his master; and then the 
 man seemed to understand that such premature 
 public rejoicing would be indecent. "But," 
 muttered he, as he retired from the study door, 
 " that don't prevent folks fra' being glad all t' 
 same." ' 
 
 It did not — Sir William Warleigh's death was 
 a positive source of relief and congratulation to 
 many. There is always hope in the heir, and 
 Sir Laurence could scarcely fail to reign better 
 than his father had done. Whinstandale began 
 to look forward to happier days than it had 
 enjoyed for many years. It seemed doubtful 
 to the sagacious, however, whether he would 
 fulfill their expectations ; for his first exercise 
 of his new dignity was a refusal to attend at 
 his father's funeral — a measure which every 
 body reprobated with horror, and none more 
 loudly than his brother Oliver. 
 
 The old Squire's death had happened in this 
 wise. He was thrown from his horse when out 
 hunting,,, but no bones were broken, and except 
 from the shock, he did not appear at first to 
 have sustained any material injury. He was 
 alarmed for himself, however, and bade Oliver 
 summon his son Laurence. 
 
38 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 " Pooh, pooh," said Oliver, " let us see how 
 you go on." 
 
 The next day Sir William became more ur- 
 gent. " I will see Laurence ; I tell you it is all 
 over with me, and I must see him." OliTer 
 pacified his impatience by promising to send 
 for his brother on the morrow, but he did not 
 send; and on the third day Sir William was 
 dead. 
 
 When the funeral procession was formed and 
 ready to start, there happened a curious inci- 
 dent. Down from her Tower came Lady Foulis 
 draped in heaviest mourning, and took her 
 place as chief in it. It was whispered about 
 that she was Sir William's mother, and those 
 who had seen him in his coffin averred, that he 
 showed in his dead visage something of the old 
 Warleigh race that living he had never shown. 
 
 Then were the old stories revived to be a 
 nine days' wonder, and to fade back again into 
 fable-land, when the gossips' tongues were tired 
 of wagging. Colonel Warleigh's legend of his 
 finding of the child, which had gained universal 
 credence at the time he invented and circulated 
 it, was never disbelieved until fifty years were 
 gone and the object of it was in his grave. 
 
 " Well," said old Mr. Anderside, when he 
 heard the last bit that had been added to the 
 marvelous story ; " I never gave the Colonel 
 credit for so much ingenuity in lying. He told 
 me the tale with his own lips, and I took it to 
 be as true as gospel ; there must have been 
 something desperately bad in the facts when he 
 made that cloak for them. But there is no 
 profit that I know of to be got out of speculat- 
 ing on them at this time of day " 
 
 There was not, and besides the dales' world 
 in general had quite enough to do in speculating 
 about the heir — a much more interesting sub- 
 ject of talk than any dead Squire could possi- 
 bly be. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 CHAPTER THE SIXTH. 
 
 MARRIED FOR MONET. 
 
 Whereunto is money good ? 
 Who has it not wants hardihood, 
 Who has it has much trouble and care, 
 Who once has had it has despair. 
 
 I. 
 
 " I AM not surprised, and there is one com- 
 fort, Dumpling — you are not likely to break 
 your heart over it ;" was Mrs. Sara Grandage's 
 reply when she heard from Rachel Withers' 
 own lips that her engagement to Mr. Gilsland 
 was at an end ; then she bestowed on her one 
 of her rare kisses, and bade her never mind ! 
 As if she did — no, she was very, very, very 
 glad it was over ;. she felt nothing so strongly 
 just then as a sense of relief at her deliver- 
 ance. When the quarrel was new, indignation 
 bore her up ; then came a reaction of doubt 
 lest she had done wrong in her hast€; and 
 finally ensued the calm satisfaction of having 
 freed herself and him from a yoke which to 
 wear would have been a life-long misery to 
 both. 
 
 "You don't look the disappointed woman 
 either, Dumpling, that is another blessing," 
 went on her queer consoler. "Tour cheeks 
 will soon be apple-red and round again, which 
 
 is more than they have been for tliese two 
 months past. Now, child, give way ; let your- 
 self go, and help me to pull him to pieces. 
 Tou can see , him with the eyes of the flesh 
 now he has rubbed the glamor oif, aiid isn't he 
 provocative of sarcasm ? Don't look so de- 
 mure, I know you are feeling downright 
 wicked." Perhaps she was, but she refrained 
 herself; it would have been very unhandsome 
 behavior — and possibly even yet a little against 
 the grain — to chime in with her godmamma's 
 mocking tone. 
 
 " He will marry Miss Briggs before the year 
 is out, and won't he have a treat in his wife ?" 
 Bittersweet went on, derisively. "0 lucky 
 Miss Briggs ! blessed Mr. Gilsland ! Don't 
 be mortified, Dumpling, but I saw your charms ■ 
 grew pale in the curate's eyes the moment she 
 appeared in her coach of fortune. You have 
 shown a prompt and generous magnanimity in 
 giving him up that all your friends admire ; but 
 tell me truly, are you not jealous ?" 
 
 "Jealous — as if one could be jealous of 
 one's grandmother !" exclaimed Rachel with 
 sovereign contempt. 
 
 No, Rachel Withers was a sober little wo- 
 man, riot liable to the commotion of violent 
 passions. Perhaps it was not in her nature to 
 be acutely jealous of any body or any thing ; 
 those anguishes she had read of in romances 
 found no echo of affinity within her gentle bo- 
 som. A silent, long pain, a deep, secret morti- 
 fication she could exhaust in all their bitterness, 
 but she was not the person to protest that all 
 life was wasted, or to worry her neighbors be- 
 cause'the love on which she had set her heart 
 had come to such a, ridiculous end. On the 
 contrary, she became more assiduous than ever 
 in her visits amongst the poor, and never re- 
 laxed for a single day her attendance at the 
 school. Some persons may argue from this 
 sensible conduct that she never really loved 
 Mr. Gilsland at all ; if she did not she fancied 
 she did ; and it comes to precislTy the same 
 thing in the end, when there is no opportunity 
 given to prove it. 
 
 Now though he had used her ill, she did not 
 even yet think very ill of him ; and all her 
 godmamma's sarcastic predictions did not make 
 her believe that he would do so conspicuously 
 foolish and mercenary a deed aa a marriage 
 with Miss Briggs would be. Miss Briggs was, 
 without metaphor, old enough to be his moth- 
 er. Her temper was bad, her manners were 
 disagreeable, and her person was not only unat- 
 tractive, but obtrusively ugly ; good folks say 
 we should not call any of God's creatures ugly, 
 but ste was ugly with affectation, pretension, 
 and Ill-nature. Rachel knew- the curate was 
 afraid of being poor— which is a very different 
 thing from coveting great wealth ; but she re- 
 fused as long as facts would allow to credit that 
 he could fathom that abyss of absurdity and 
 greed into which a, man plunges when he sells 
 himself to a woman made of money, and of 
 nothing but money. 
 
 Events, however, were too strong for ter 
 faith. October was not out before an engage- 
 ment between the handsome curate and the 
 fortunate heiress was announced ; and Novem- 
 ber was not out before they had ratified it in 
 Brafferton Church in the presence of a large 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 39 
 
 and critical congregation. It was done. Rachel 
 could not speak a word for him any more. She 
 could have forgiven him any thing but flying to 
 the feet of MisS- Brigga 1 if he had won the 
 prettiest girl in the dale, she would have for- 
 given them both ; but she could riot forgive 
 him his cowardly meanness that had earned 
 him her contempt. She was made ashamed 
 that she had ever loved him, and it was a long 
 while before she could be in charity with her- 
 self again for having done it. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage, the irreclaimable, cu- 
 rious old gossip, actually went to the wedding, 
 and she told Rachel afterward that the bride 
 was got up to such a degree of perfection that 
 through her rich vail nobody would have guessed 
 her at more than thirty. 
 
 " Nay," said Rachel, shaking her head with a 
 doubtful smile, "no milliner could abolish her 
 ancient gait !" 
 
 "But she was padded and puffed and bustled 
 off into an elegant symmetry," continued Bit- 
 tersweet, spreading her own skirts abroad in 
 airy demonstration of flowing bridal raiment. 
 f " Leanness is much more manageable in the 
 hands of an artiste than over-redundancy of 
 flesh, and I assure you. Dumpling — and you 
 need not look as if you did not believe me — 
 that all the church admired her extremely. She 
 was a miracle of success : she was got up quite 
 regardless of expense : white satin, lace flounces, 
 and scarf, wreath of orange-blossoms and roses, 
 and a sweeping vail that covered her all over. 
 She tottered a little in walking up to the altar, 
 but that was only a proper display of nervous- 
 ness, which interested us all immensely, and 
 enhanced her maidenly charms." / 
 
 Here John Withers, who was present while 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage was giving his sister this 
 florid account, de'clared that if they were going 
 to quiz so abominably he should leave them to 
 themselves ; which he did accordingly, and as 
 soon as he was out of hearing. Bittersweet be- 
 gan to say, "Now, Dumpling, I am sure you are 
 dying to know how he looked, but I will not tell 
 you until you ask me the question formally." 
 
 " Well, then," said the quiet young woman, 
 " how did Mr. Gilsland bear himself through 
 the crisis of his fate ?" 
 
 " That was very coolly put ; Dumpling, I 
 don't think you have an atom of heart ! Well, 
 my dear, he looked very nice and as natty as a 
 dandy parson could. I can not tell you what 
 he wore, but his clothes were an admirable fit, 
 and his hair was in the glossiest curl ; his face 
 was rather blanched, it is true, but I dare say 
 that twice or thrice during the ceremony it 
 flashed across his mind how awfully he was 
 conimitting himself. I declare it was almost as 
 tragical as the sacrifice of Iphigenia done into a 
 modern version 1 There was plenty of compa- 
 ny, and what the congratulations lacked in sense 
 I hope they made up in sound. She wept, but 
 did not faint. Now, Curiosity, is there any 
 thing more you would like to hear?" 
 
 Of course. Curiosity would like to hear every 
 thing — all about the bride-visits, which were 
 just over too. To this, Bittersweet pretended 
 to demur. She did not make her call on either 
 of the appointed state-days, but took the happy 
 couple by surprise in the sweet confidence of 
 private life, as she phrased it ; and she did not 
 
 think it was quite fair to betray the secrets of 
 families. But her scruples soon vanished 
 before the irresistible enjoyment of telling a 
 funny story. 
 
 " You know. Dumpling, how hard it is to 
 teach an old dog new tricks," began she, sink- 
 ing her voice, " and you may suppose that after 
 all her years of pinching it would be hard to 
 teach Betsy Briggs a wise liberality. I found 
 her sitting in her bleak dining-room, furbishing 
 up an old bonnet for dark days, while the 
 wretched curate was reading aloud to her a 
 missionary report — she was always ffoody, you 
 know. And I assure you he looks already with- 
 in an ace of hanging himself." Rachel hoped 
 not, arid reminded Bittersweet that she liad a 
 trick of seeing things sometimes less as they 
 were than as she would like them to be. " I 
 expected you would contradict me, and, per- 
 haps, defend him," retorted the godmamma, 
 and then she went on with her story. 
 
 "They told me about their tour, during which 
 the frightful extravagance of the hotel bills quite 
 spoiled the bride's pleasure. ' But Mr. Gilsland 
 will do every thing so lavishly,' she explained, 
 shaking her head at him with fond reproach. 
 Theri they discussed the comparative cost of 
 living in the north or the south, and while he 
 was decidedly in favor of London, she said, 
 despotically, (and I wish you could have heard 
 her say it. Dumpling !) ' No, Alfred, dear, we 
 must keep the curacy until we have had tijne to 
 look round for something else. It would be 
 frivolous to throw away a hundred and fifty 
 pounds a year — quite a competence, quite a 
 competence if we had nothing else !' We were 
 discussing this topic from various points of view 
 when there came a single premonitory knock at 
 the door, followed immediately by the entrance 
 of the cook carrying a pasteboard, whereon 
 were two pie-dishes full of sliced apples. With 
 sulky stolidity, the woman said she had come 
 according to orders to have the sugar put 
 amongst the fruit. But I am much mistaken if 
 the twinkle in her dull eyes did not betray a 
 deep-laid kitchen plot for the exposure and 
 mortification of missis. Mrs. Gilsland carried 
 off the incident with a laugh and a domestic 
 truism, but the miserable curate grew scarlet, 
 and when she said to him, 'Alfred, dear, loill 
 you do it ? the sugar . is in the sideboard,' the 
 scene was killing. She has him in good order 
 already, for he rose, and produced the sugar, 
 and sprinkled it sparsely over the fruit, while 
 she all the time curbed his extravagance by cry- 
 ing, in a gradually ascending minor scale, 
 'Enough, enough, enough, my dear, I say, 
 enough /' That is what a man comes to who 
 marries for money — ^his rich wife makes him 
 put sugar into apple-pies. This pleasing addi- 
 tion to his duties appears to be all he has gain- 
 ed yet from his far-sight speculation. You are 
 avenged already. Dumpling, if that is any satis- 
 faction to you !" , 
 
 " I cannot say it is," murmured Rachel, aid 
 there were positively tears standing in her fool- 
 ish eyes. 
 
 " You silly little goose !" cried her godmam- 
 ma; "why don't yoii rejoice in his humiliation? 
 Any sensible woman would. And to think in 
 what comfort you would have lapped his soul ! 
 how you would have petted him, and cosseted 
 
40 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 him, and slaved after his every whim and fancy ! 
 I hope he likea his exchange, that is all — / 
 should not." 
 
 At the cheerful Christmas season Mrs. Sara 
 G-randage always made as many musters of her 
 friends as she could, and in pursuance of her 
 annual custom, she invited John Withers and 
 his sister to dine with her on New Tear's day. 
 Rachel did not ask the precise question, and 
 therefore there was no need for a precise an- 
 swer, but it was both implied and understood 
 that Mr. and Mrs. Gilsland were not invited for 
 the same evening. Kachel therefore went in 
 peace and serenity, looking very nice in white 
 muslin with a sprig of holly in her bright brown 
 hair ; but as she was engaged in conversation 
 with Mrs. Anderside, the two last guests, for 
 whom dinner waited, were ushered into the 
 drawing-room, and behold they were the curate 
 and his charming wife ! Bittersweet's malicious 
 enjoyment of her trick was beyond description ; 
 but the party was large, and happily for Rachel 
 she never came near enough to Mr. Gilsland to 
 make recognition necessary. She had not seen 
 him since that memorable day when they quar- 
 reled and parted. 
 
 Mrs. Gilsland was in full bridal splendor all 
 but the vail, her poor old arms and withered 
 neck contrasting sweetly with her shining white 
 satin drapery; it was a cold night, and she 
 looked miserably pinched, but she stoically re- 
 fused to be made comfortable with a shawl of 
 Bittersweet's, and wore her bride's airs and 
 graces with a dignity that was most comically 
 impressive. Her husband seemed to shrink a 
 good deal out of sight — liking his situation per- 
 haps as little as Rachel did hers — -and somebody 
 made the remark afterward that he was small- 
 er than he used to be. He had lost his ponfi- 
 dent manner, and his assurance that he was 
 pleasing somebody — was thoroughly ill at ease, 
 in fact. 
 
 It was a very flat evening to several of the 
 company, and John and Rachel both expressed 
 themselves glad when the party broke up ; but 
 the sprightly little hostess declared it went off 
 capitally, and to her no doubt it did ; for she 
 always found her sweetest amusement in the 
 cross-purposes of her friends and acquaintance. 
 
 Rachel Withers did not see Mr. Gilsland again 
 until one afternoon in the spring when she had 
 gone out with John for a walk on the moors. 
 They came suddenly upon him at a turn in the 
 path where avoidance was impossible, and they 
 all made a stand, and spoke like common ac- 
 quaintance. Rachel was looking as fresh as a 
 rose, and the meeting did not lower her color — 
 perhaps it was that caused Mr. Gilsland to say 
 it must be more healthy living high up in the 
 dale than down at Brafferton. 
 
 " We hope to leave the place before wmter 
 comes round again; for it does not suit my 
 wife at all," he added. 
 
 John regretted to hear she was not well. 
 
 "She is always ailing, always ailing ; but I 
 hope she will be better when I get her away 
 into the south," responded the curate, and lift- 
 ing his hat to Rachel with a little of his old 
 manner, went off nervously swinging his stick. 
 
 " After all," said John Withers, " one can not 
 
 help feeling some pity for a man who has 
 taken himself in so grievously as poor Gilsland !" 
 'So, Rachel could never think of him now 
 without being divided between laughing and 
 crying. She actually wished he were more in 
 the way of getting some of the good for which 
 he had bargained. He looked literally shabby 
 and poor when they met on the moor, and his 
 dress was by no means the most remarkable 
 falling off in his appearance. Instead of better- 
 ing his condition by a rich marriage he had de- 
 voted himself to a slow, lingering, miserable 
 martyrdom. He could not have much abstract 
 pleasure in reflecting that his wife's income 
 verged on three thousand a year when in their 
 present luxurious establishment they could bare- 
 ly expend three hundred. They had taken a 
 half-furnished house that had stood long unoccu- 
 pied, and its wants were excused on the plea 
 of its being only a temporary residence ; an in- 
 ferior cook and a very aged housemaid formed 
 the domestic staff, and the horse that was to 
 lighten the poor curate's labors had not been 
 found yet. The only indulgence Mrs. Gilsland 
 allowed herself was an extravagance of physic — 
 one that her husband could hardly be anxious 
 to share with her. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage delighted in giving an 
 imitation of her airs of invalidism. 
 
 " There she lies on her sofa all day with her 
 face made up into the most mevely look, while 
 that wretched curate waits hand and foot on her 
 caprices," said the vivacious old lady. " It 
 would touch the heart of a stone, Dumpling, to 
 see how thoroughly dejected, crushed and ef- 
 faced he is in his wife's house. Their marriage 
 settlements left him quite dependent on her 
 mercy and charity, and precious little of either 
 does she exercise, in his behoof She is so 
 odiously stingy and oppressive that if I were in 
 his shoes I would try a little bullying." 
 
 Even through the magnifying glasses of gos- 
 sip and scandal it was easy to see a long vista 
 of domestic misery in that ill-assorted house- 
 hold. They disagreed in public as well as In 
 private, and she invariably got the last word. 
 Mr. Gilsland had tried to deal plausibly with his 
 wife, and while she had the power of the purse 
 he was no match for her at all. Bittersweet 
 delighted to tell Rachel that Mrs. Gilsland al- 
 ways referred to her as " that girl," and said she 
 should never wish to see her again within her 
 doors ; as if Rachel were anxious to storm her 
 castle of harmony ! The reason alleged was 
 Rachel's satirical spirit, but poor body, if she 
 had shut out all who made fun of her, die would 
 have had to shut out every soul of her acquaint- 
 ance ! 
 
 There was little present likelihood of their 
 leaving Brafferton, though Mr. Anderside would 
 gladly have been rid of his unpopular curate. 
 Whether it was that Mrs. Gilsland really felt too 
 ill for exertion, or whether it was that she pre- 
 ferred established friends to new ones, it is hard 
 to say, but at all events she was exceedingly re- 
 luctant to change her quarters. Bittersweet de- 
 clared she was as strong now as in her Betsy 
 Briggs' days, and every body knew that Betsy 
 Briggs was the toughest woman in the parish. 
 She made nothing of walking in and out to 
 Prior's Bank three or four times a week. But 
 now, when she visited her friends, she hired the 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 41 
 
 chaise from the inn, and went in frouzy state, 
 which lavishness of expense convinced Rachel 
 that her ailments were not all fancy, as some 
 folks wickedly delighted to say. 
 
 " Who would he day after day on a sofa in a 
 dull room pretending to be ill ?" said she, de- 
 precating her godmamma's sarcasms. " For 
 my part I would rather dig, or delve, or follow 
 the plow, or break stones on the high road 
 than act such a tedious play for the am.usement 
 of the gossips !" 
 
 " You are a woman of sense, Dumpling, and 
 Betsy Briggs always was, and always will be, a 
 fantastic fool !" retorted Bittersweet ; and Racllel 
 was fain to drop her useless defense. 
 
 But a time of reverses was at hand ; the 
 heiress had enjoyed barely a year of golden 
 prosperity when fortune decreed that she must 
 return to poverty's hodden gray, carrying the 
 most wretched of men and curates down with 
 her in her humiliating descent. 
 
 " Swift retribution for a man who married 
 for money," said one. 
 
 " Mrs. Grilsland will have to find the use of 
 Betsy Briggs' feet again," said another. 
 
 Nobody had a word of sympathy at their serv- 
 ice or any feeling of pity. Vague rumors flew 
 about the dale for a few days, and then the 
 whole story came out. 
 
 It appeared that when Mrs. Gilsland's eccen- 
 tric cousin Dawson died, and her papers came 
 to be looked over for the will, the document 
 discovered, though in all respects regular, was 
 of very old date, and that her man of business 
 openly stated the fact of his having drawn up 
 another which had been duly executed in the 
 presence of his head clerk and himself only two 
 years before. This instrument was not forth- 
 coming, however, when wanted; suspicions 
 arose that the testatrix had destroyed it' in the 
 design of making a new one ; and this her law- 
 yer said she had twice consulted him upon, 
 without being able to decide as to its provi- 
 ions ; he was daily expecting her final instruc- 
 tions when she was taken ill, grew rapidly worse 
 and died. Her confidential servant also stated 
 that during the last night of her life she appear- 
 ed much distressed in her mind, but that she 
 got ease' when she had sent a message to Mr. 
 Saunderson, hep lawyer. 
 
 "If I am fit to see Saunderson to-morrow I 
 wiU," were her words; "but if not, tell him 
 that perhaps things could not be better settled 
 than they are ; and the will he made is in the 
 cabinet that my cousin John is to have." 
 
 Before morning the old lady was gone ; and 
 the recent wiU not being found where she said, 
 that by which Mrs. Gilsland became rich and 
 the two nephews were left quite unprovided for, 
 was held to be her true testament, and acted on 
 accordingly. 
 
 Thus far the tale flowed without mystery ; 
 but now it Went that the missing will had actu- 
 ally turned up in the identical cabinet where 
 Mrs. Dawson told her maid it would be found. 
 The cousin John to whom, as a family relic, it 
 was bequeathed, conveyed it to his house ; and 
 his wife declining to admit it as too ancient and 
 cumbrous amongst the modern furniture of her 
 best rooms, it ultimately found a refuge in their 
 boys' tool-shed, where it served conveniently 
 as a museum of curiosities. A little while ago 
 
 one of the tiny drawers in which birds'-eggs 
 were ranged in wool got fast, and the eldest 
 boy, in prizing it open, broke off a splinter of 
 wood, in the cavity beyond which he espied 
 something " glittering like gold." Immediately 
 the young carpenters went to work, and in a 
 few minutes they had discovered three narrow 
 slides, constructed in each division between the 
 center tier of drawers. They missed the secret 
 of the spring, but found that a piece of wood, 
 not much stronger than veneer, and folding up- 
 ward on a concealed hinge, was what had hid- 
 den the slides or trays before. In one of these 
 were some old-fashioned trinkets of no great 
 value, in the second was a miniature of Mr. Daw- 
 son, his watch and his spectacles, and in the 
 third was the missing will, and a paper of mem- 
 oranda which purported to be part of the draft 
 for that new will about which she had consulted 
 her lawyer. 
 
 This will Mr. Saunderson declared to be the 
 one he had drawn up. In it the name of Miss 
 Briggs did not occur at all, but amongst the 
 memoranda there was a sentence to the effect 
 that Betsy Briggs must have something — three 
 hundred pounds would be enough . Further the 
 story ran that a compromise had been offered to 
 the present possessors of the property and by 
 them ' indignantly rejected. Mr. Gilsland was 
 said to have pronounced the recently discover- 
 ed will an impudent forgery, and to have sworn 
 to fight out the battle to the last gasp. But 
 every one thought the refusal of terms the 
 height of folly, and decided their cause as lost 
 before it was opened. The will had been sub- 
 mitted to competent authorities, the lawyer who 
 made it took oath it was genuine, the opinion of 
 counsel had been heard on both sides and it was 
 against the Gilslands. Popularly speaking, they 
 had not a leg to stand on. 
 
 It was a most disastrous downfall ! The way 
 in which they had used Mrs. Dawson's nephews 
 was not to their credit ; they had sent them to 
 a cheap commercial school, though until their 
 aunt's death they had been brought up as gen- 
 tlemen, and destined to the church and the 
 army. Common decency forbade that they 
 should be turned altogether adrift on the world, 
 but for any sense of kinship that Mrs, Gilsland 
 had testified, they might have starved or gone to 
 the poor-house. She had not borne her pros- 
 perity with any grace, and when adversity came 
 she did not bear it with any resignation. As for 
 the curate, he was like some desperate animal 
 caught in a trap, and running aimlessly to and 
 fro in his agony to escape, when escape there 
 was none. 
 
 "Don't tell me," said Rachel Withers, shut- 
 ting her eyes with an expression of pain when 
 her godmamma insisted on giving her a lively 
 description of his sufferings ; " don't tell me — 
 I can not bear to hear it I I think he had quite 
 got his deserts before, without losing the money 
 for which he married his odious wife !" 
 
 But you see Rachel would have pitied any 
 thing fallen into calamity ; it was the way with 
 her. How much soever she might have disliked 
 them in their good-luck, when trouble came, her 
 own wrongs and their disagreeableness she could 
 remember no more. " Poor souls !" sighed she, 
 " what hard lines theirs will be now for both 
 their lives to come I" 
 
42 
 
 ANNIS WARLIJIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 One afternoon she walked over to Prior's 
 Bank, and on arriving there found the old Braf- 
 ferl^on chaise standing at the gate ; and suspect- 
 ing whs was with her godmamma, instead of at 
 once going in, she took a turn round the beauti- 
 ful wild-flower walk by the river, intending to 
 keep out of the way until the visitor was gone ; 
 but being seen from the window, a messenger 
 was sent to call her to the drawing-room at 
 once. 
 
 On entering she found there Bittersweet look- 
 ing her most ireful and indignant, while Mrs. 
 Gilsland sat in tears, fretting her gloveand hum- 
 bling herself in broken apologies. Rachel hated 
 to see any body undergoing mortification and 
 abasement, and in the impulse of the moment, 
 threw more warmth into her greeting of .the poor 
 soul than perhaps could appear to her genuine ; 
 for though she took the outstretched hand, and 
 made some sort of response she suspected in her 
 bitter heart that Kachel rejoiced in her miseries. 
 She only remained a few minutes longer, and as 
 soon as she was gone, Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 broke out in undissembled wrath. 
 
 "Tou will never guess. Dumpling, what that 
 woman has been here begging me to do ! She 
 wants me to back them with money in this most 
 unjust and abominable suit. ' No, Betty Gils- 
 land,' said I, 'I will not give you one farthing 
 for any such purpose. I will help you to get 
 away from Brafferton, but that is all the help 
 you need look for from me.' They can not in- 
 duce any respectable attorney to undertake their 
 cause, and how is it likely they should ? It is 
 as clear as the day that they have no right to 
 Mrs. Dawson's money, and every hour longer 
 they hold it they are robbing those boys. I al- 
 ways thought until lately that Mr. Gilsland had 
 a peculiarly shrewd eye to the main chance, but 
 I am convinced now that he is as short-sighted 
 as all over-clever people are. It is impossible 
 he can retain the property, and yet he is bent on 
 giving the rightful owners as much trouble as 
 he can. He knows perfectly well the will is no 
 forgery — she, the weak fool, with her own lips 
 admitted that, and afterward had the audacity 
 to entreat me to support them. No, I told her, 
 I had not lived in honor and honesty for sixty 
 years to turn fellow-swindler in my old age ! I 
 was too angry to spare her, I assure you, Dum- 
 pling." 
 
 Clearly so.. When Bittersweet was angry she 
 did not spare any body. 
 
 Of course, every sagacious person foresaw 
 where this miserable affair must eventually end. 
 When the Gilslands had recovered from their 
 first shock of dismay, horror, and rage, they 
 came to their senses, accepted the terms offered 
 by Mrs. Dawson's nephews and gave up the 
 property. Mrs. Gilsland received the three hun- 
 dred pounds which her cousin had intended her 
 to have, they left Brafferton, and retired some- 
 where into a doleful obscurity. 
 
 But such a man as Mr. Gilsland never retires 
 beyond the reach of temptation ; and he had 
 put himself so entirely out of the ordinary 
 grooves of prosperity that it was quite sure to 
 find him sooner or later, and to drag him deeper 
 and deeper into the sloughs of despond. 
 
 CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. 
 
 SIR LAUEENCE WAELEIGH. 
 
 La philosophie triomphe ais6ment des maux _pass6s et 
 des maux h venir ; mais les maux presents triomphent 
 
 d'elle.— ROCHEFOUCADLD. 
 
 I. 
 
 It was now full six months since Sir Williani 
 Warleigh died, and since, to the reprobation of 
 the whole neighborhood, Sir Laurence had re- 
 fused to appear at his father's funeral. He was 
 beginning to drop out of people's thoughts and 
 conversation now. At first the country hoped 
 and expected that he would emerge from his se- 
 clusion and assume his due position as master 
 of Penslaven and Whinstane ; but in this they 
 were disappointed. He never left Hurtledale 
 for a single day. They had therefore ceased- to 
 wonder over his preference for a hermit-life, and 
 had given up all hope of seeing the Warleighs 
 take their rightful place in society during the 
 present baronet's reign. It was a pity and much 
 to be regretted, many persons said, that Oliver 
 was not the elder brother ; he was sensible of 
 what rank and wealth owe to the world, and 
 would have regilded the tarnished name of War- 
 leigh splendidly. Lady Georgiana was very 
 strongly of that opinion. By dint of constant 
 harping on the theme, she almost succeeded at 
 last in convincing herself that her husband was ^ 
 an injured person, defrauded of his birthright, 
 and suffering the evils of poverty that a half- 
 crazy impostor might let ancestral halls become 
 howling wildernesses, and accumulate untold 
 sums of rents in the hands of his provincial 
 bankers. 
 
 Mr. Bond, the steward, was an honest, consci- 
 entious man, or he would have found his office 
 under Sir Laurence one of vast temptation and 
 opportunity ; for his master committed all to 
 his charge, and found apparently neither inter- 
 est nor enjoyment in his possessions. He had 
 made no change whatever in his manner of living, 
 which was as rough and plain as that of a sim- 
 ple yeoman farmer. From time to time various 
 rumors had flown abroad respecting his ways 
 and habits, all more or less derogatory to his 
 credit, and mortifying to those who wgre per- 
 sonally interested in his honor. He was said to 
 frequent low company and to drink deep, but 
 both these scandals were without foundation. 
 He was abstemious in Helena's lifetime, and 
 since her death, a more unsociable man, wheth- 
 er with equals or inferiors, could not have been 
 found throughout the length and breadth of the 
 dales. 
 
 Gossip said her say, and probably Sir Lau- 
 rence heard never a word of it. With his dogs 
 and his gun, his horse and his boat on the tarn, 
 his pipe, his newspaper and his books, he had 
 made himself quite independent of the world 
 with which he had quarreled. So rarely had 
 he seen his child that Mistress Dobie was ready 
 to lay a wager any day that he would not know 
 it if he met it in an unaccustomed place ; many 
 and many a time had Mary Wray and Lucy 
 pranked it out in its best, and waylaid him in 
 the hope that he would notice it ; but he never 
 did, and his manners were so surly and alarm- 
 ing to the women that they agreed at last it was 
 safest to keep it altogether out of 'his sight. 
 Through the intervention of Mrs. Damer War- 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 43 
 
 leigh a sort of reconciliation had been established 
 between him and his sisters, but Oliver he had pe- 
 remptorily refused to see ; though for the present 
 he permitted him to continue at the Tower. With 
 his sisters there and Lady Foulis, it was impos- 
 sible immediately to disband the household ; 
 but it was understood that at the end of the 
 year's mourning for their father a change must 
 be made. Lady Georgiana was in the practice 
 of declaring that they must then go and live 
 somewhere abroad for economy^ sake ; she might 
 more truly have said for pleasure's sake ; for 
 they would really be able to flourish with great 
 bravery on the fine spoils they had contrived to 
 glean during the later months of Sir William's 
 lifetime. Laui;ence not being there to interfere 
 or remonstrate, all the finest timber on both es- 
 tates had been ruthlessly swept down and turned 
 into money to satisfy Oliver's rapacity. 
 
 One day about the time of falling leaves, Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh, after a visit to the Hurtlemere 
 House, called on her way home at Prior's Bank, 
 where Kachel Withers happened to be spending 
 the afternoon with her godmamma. The excel- 
 lent old lady fell immediately to talking of Sir 
 Laurence, and said she was ajfraid he would turn 
 out nothing but a disappointment to her and the 
 Squire. She could not understand his persist- 
 ence in remaining in Hurtledale when the luxu- 
 ries and glories of Penslaven and Whinstane 
 were at his disposal, and his conduct at the time 
 of his father's death she freely characterized as 
 monstrous and unnatural. There ;l re some peo- 
 ple who can not change their mood as easily as 
 their gloves, and Sir Laurence was one' of them. 
 
 " He allowed me to overwhelni him with re- 
 proaches and good counsels without uttering a 
 word in his own defense," said the visitor. 
 "There he sat and there Jsat — ^he smoking like 
 a kiln, I lecturing until for lack of breath I could 
 lecture no longer. It is very provoking to see 
 him so given up to regret and indolence as he 
 iSj and nothing will stir him out of them seem- 
 ingly. The baby is a capital little creature, but 
 not a bit like Helena, and he does not seem to 
 care a straw for it, though he will not intrust it 
 to his sisters. By the by, Rachel, how is John ?" 
 
 This question sprang palpably out of some 
 thought of Katherine, and Eachel answered 
 that he was very well, on which Mrs. Damer 
 said, " I should like him to come over with you 
 to Bristowe for a few days next week if you can 
 spare the time ; Katie and Grace are both com- 
 ing, and now that all my own giris are married 
 and gone, the place is dull for young folks un- 
 less we can gather several together at once." 
 Rachel accepted the invitation on her own re- 
 sponsibility ; she was sure John both could and 
 would make leisure for that visit, though for 
 most people he was ever ready with an excuse. 
 And Rachel herself would be very glad to see 
 her friends again. 
 
 Bristowe was a pleasant house to stay at, and 
 two of its guests, at least, vastly enjoyed its so- 
 cial opportunities. Mrs. Damer Warleigh was 
 not properly a maneuverer, but John Withers 
 and Katherine had not been there two days be- 
 fore she had brought about a. thorough under- 
 standing between them. It was a.n engagement 
 at last. She was twenty-six and would not need 
 
 to ask any body's consent to being happy in her 
 own way and according to her own choice, even 
 had there been any likelihood of opposition 
 from her brothers, which there was not. Sir 
 Laurence declined to interest himself in his sis- 
 ters' affairs- altogether, and several times since 
 their father's death Lady Georgiana had pro- 
 claimed her opinion that his daughters would be 
 better off settled in homes of their own, though 
 ever so humble, than left to themselves at Whin- 
 stane Tower when she and Oliver deserted it. 
 There could be no two views on the subject. 
 Both the Squire and Mrs. Damer Warleigh pro- 
 fessed themselves gratified by Katherine's choice, 
 and to all appearance John and she would be a 
 very evenly-yoked couple. She was looking re- 
 markably handsome at Bristowe, and though to 
 Rachel's mind she was neither so tender nor so 
 attractive as Grace, she was much better suited 
 to John. 
 
 Whatever virtue Rachel lacked, she did not 
 lack patience in listening to lovers' rhapsodies, 
 and they all seemed with one consent to have 
 elected her Old Woman to hearken to their re- 
 spective experiences. She was astonished how 
 naturally she fell into the character. Could she 
 be on the verge of finding her vocation in the 
 world ? Was she really going to be that some- 
 body who, having no ruore particular rejoicings 
 or grievances of her own, was always to be 
 called on to sympathize in those of other peo- 
 ple ? It began to look rather like it. Bitter- 
 sweet used once to provoke her by saying that 
 she was cut out for an old maid, but she had 
 come to think so herself now ; and though she 
 would not be oue-and-twenty until December she 
 had quite made up her mind that the best part 
 of her life and adventures was over, and she 
 bore the belief very patiently. She was always 
 a quiet young woman. 
 
 Authur HUl was at this time in Syria, and his 
 correspondence with Grace Warleigh had never 
 been renewed. "She was looking sadly pined 
 and disconsolate at Bristowe, and spoke in a 
 plaintive voice that had tears in it perpetually. 
 One afternoon, wandering with Rachel through 
 the wood-walks, they saw John and Katherine a 
 little way in advance, but so completely absorb- 
 ed in each other that they heard no footsteps 
 behind them. The friends turned off, therefore, 
 into the fields, Grace saying, "Do not let us dis- 
 turb them ; I am ashamed to show my face where 
 happy people are," and her sickly smile and sigh 
 contrasted painfully with what she knew to be 
 the contented state of the inobservant lovers. 
 
 Presently, and of her own accord, she began 
 to speak of Authur Hill, and to tell Rachel how 
 roughly Oliver had behaved to her, and in what 
 a peremptory, assuming strain he had written to 
 Authur to forbid their correspondence. 
 
 " He never wrote to me after," she went on. 
 " I almost expected that he would set Oliver at 
 naught, but on some points he is very sensitive. 
 I was debarred from going to the rectory, so 
 that I had no chance of hearing of him or of 
 sending any word through his mother. I be- 
 lieve it is all over between us forever, and I 
 was very much attached to him. How do wo- 
 men console themselves for these separations ? 
 I hardly knew how Arthur was woven into all 
 my daily thoughts and future hopes until Oliver 
 sundered us. It is not possible that I should 
 
44 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 ever cease to love him, ever forget him," — and 
 so she talked on, pitying herself, and foreseeing 
 no mitigation in the void of her dull life, until all 
 at once she remembered that Kachel, too, had had 
 what is called a disappointment, when she mani- 
 fested some curiosity to Itnow how she had got 
 over it. 
 
 Kachel told her more easily than any one 
 would imagine, or than she could have imagined 
 herself beforehand. 
 
 "Ah, you are eo sensible !" said Grace, with 
 a faint inflection of disapproval in her tone. 
 
 " It was not a romantic episode to frgt over. 
 I could not indulge myself in a sentimental sor- 
 row for the man who married Miss Briggs," re- 
 plied Kachel, a little decidedly. 
 
 " But did you never feel quite downcast and 
 hopeless — ^as if there were nothing left in 'the 
 world worth living for ?" asked her companion, 
 her countenance expressing that to be quite her 
 own state of mind. 
 
 " To speak strict truth, I never did," was the , 
 answer. " I was rather lost "and vacant at first, i 
 and the time hung long on my hands — as time > 
 will when we have no central rallying point for; 
 our leisure thoughts-^but I was not mortallyf 
 wounded. I tried to get away from my feelings^! 
 and God and my work helped me. I never 
 gave up. Then John was so unfeignedly thank- 
 ful, and godmamma Grandage did nothing but! 
 congratulate me; and by and by I knew I had; 
 had what I ought to consider a lucky escape." ■ 
 
 "I dop.'t think I could ever have regarded it| 
 in that light," murmured Grace. ' 
 
 " Perhaps not : we are difierently constituted. 
 I turn every thing bright side out, and accept 
 cheerfully what I can not evade. Perhaps if all 
 had gone smoothly, and I had married Mr. Gils- 
 land, he might never have developed the traits 
 he has done ; but if he had, I should have been 
 miserable as his wife. He is timorous of ill- 
 fortune, and incapable of withstanding the 
 temptations of poverty and a humble position. 
 Straightforward honesty and plain dealing are 
 not in him. He was paving his way to Miss 
 Briggs' golden graces before our engagement 
 ceased, as his prompt marriage within three 
 months after betrayed. I should prefer good 
 temper and common-sense in domestic life 
 before many finer-sounding virtues, and it is in 
 those two qualities that Mr. Gilsland has shown 
 himself most of all deficient. Besides, like 
 many women, I abhor meanness and greed far 
 worse than many more obtrusive vices; and I 
 am really sorry that I have wasted the freshest 
 of my affections on an unworthy object. It is 
 just my best lost. I esteem you much happier 
 in your love than myself." 
 
 " I think so, too. Nothing would comfort me 
 for the baseness and treachery of any one to 
 whom I had attached myself." 
 
 " Contempt is a swift chiller of affection. So 
 long as one can go on believing in a man one 
 can go on loving him through the most adverse 
 circumstances ; but once creep in scorn and it is 
 all over 1" 
 
 "I have the deepest, sincerest respect for 
 Arthur Hill: I trust and pray it may never 
 change !" sighed Grace; but this time the sigh 
 was lighter, for she found consolation in com- 
 paring her own trial with her companion's — 
 hers that might end in ultimate happiness, while 
 Kachel's nothing could change. 
 
 To make the sense of relief permanent, 
 Kachel, who discerned her thoughts pretty cor- 
 rectly, offered a few pleasant predictions which 
 were quite as likely as not to come true. 
 Christmas would certainly see Arthur Hill home 
 again, and when he found how his friend had 
 prospered with Katherine, he might take heart 
 to renew his suit to her sister. Grace smiled 
 and said Kachel was very kind ; and the quiet 
 little woman felt that she had done somebody 
 good. 
 
 The following morning, Mrs. Damer Warleigh, 
 Katherine, and Rachel were seated in a pretty 
 room opening into the conservatory, all busy 
 with idle-work and chat, when they saw Sir 
 Laurence Warleigh crossing the lawn toward 
 the house, in company with the Squire and 
 John Witliers ; his riding-whip in his hand and 
 his country-made clothes white with the dust of 
 the roads. Katherine sprang np, her face ra- 
 diant with joyful surprise, and called Grace 
 from the library adjoining, for her first thought 
 was that her brother knew of their being at 
 Bristowe, and had come over on purpose to 
 see them. 
 
 But such was not the case. He had only 
 met them once before since Helena's death, and 
 he met them now with a quite natural reserve 
 and coldness — a mwe hopeless temper out of 
 which to educe good family-feeling than anger, 
 howsoever vehement. Grace looked even more 
 white and ill than usual, and Katherine's mo- 
 mentary exuberance fell as quickly as it had 
 risen. They exchanged a few sentences, but 
 only on general subjects, and parted again with' 
 the distant courtesy, and, on one side at least, 
 with the indifference of strangers. They were 
 strangers in heart. Mrs. Damer Warleigh was 
 grieved, but the sisters expressed nothing of 
 their feelings, though it was impossible not to 
 perceive how their brother's negligence wound- 
 ed and disappointed them. 
 
 John Withers had some conversation with 
 him which may be described as having had no 
 results. Sir Laurence said Katherine was inde- 
 pendent of him, and would, of course, please 
 herself; quite ignoring the circumstance that 
 when she was married their homes would be 
 almost within sight, of each other. But John 
 took his churlishness very philosophically: it 
 was enough for him that he had neither opposi- 
 tion nor delay to expect from the head of the 
 family. 
 
 Oliver and his Lady Georgiana were so well 
 satisfied with the engagement, that the reply 
 they sent in acknowledgment of the letter that 
 announced it, was accompanied by an invitation 
 to Whinstane Tower ; which, in the cultivation 
 of their soon-to-be family relations, both John 
 and his sister accepted. They went thither at 
 the end of October, when the few days of the 
 latter summer were reigning on the hills and in 
 the woods, and thus the place looked less deso- 
 late than as Kachel once saw it before in the 
 winterly Christmas weather. 
 
 The Oliver Warleighs showed themselves as 
 gracious toward their guests as it became them 
 to do toward accepted future connections, but 
 from the first Kachel could not bring herself to 
 like Lady Georgiana. She was a tall woman 
 stiff rather than stately, though well made, and 
 
THE ELDER GENERATION. 
 
 45 
 
 her face was exceedingly white — olay-white, 
 and deeply pitted with the small-pox. Her 
 eyes were p4e yellowish gray, and the brows 
 and lashes so light as to be scarcely perceptible 
 at a distance ; her hair was a dull towy flaxen, 
 dressed in the most ornate style its natural 
 frizzinesa would admit of, — ^altogether an ex- 
 ceedingly plain woman with a mean type of 
 face and commonplace features. The children, 
 fortunately for them, took after their father 
 rather than their mother; and Mortimer, the 
 eldest boy, was extremely pretty. Rachel made 
 quite a pet of him, but Eatherine and Grace 
 had such a dislike to their sister-in-law that 
 they could hardly help carrying a little of it on 
 to her children's account. 
 
 Lady Geor^ana was a, remarkable disciplin- 
 arian — even her ten months' old baby felt her 
 power and obeyed it. One day she offered the 
 tiny victim to Kachel's arms, but not liking the 
 face of a stranger, it naturally set up a small 
 pipe of a cry, when Lady Georgiana immedi- 
 ately withdrew with it to the next room ; after 
 a few minutes' absence she returned, the atom 
 sitting up on her arm with its feathers com- 
 posed, and again she offered it to Rachel's em- 
 brace, but agam baby gave way to an irrepressi- 
 ble wail. Rachel felt quite ashamed of herself, 
 and apologized, saying she was afraid there wag 
 something about her he did not like ; to which 
 Lady Georgiana replied in her hard voice " 
 no ! not at all, not at all ; but my children are 
 inclined to cry at the sight of strangers, and as 
 it is a trick I particularly dislike, I endeavor to 
 cure them of it at every oppaftunity ;" and a 
 second time she vanished behind the door. 
 When she reappeared baby went to Rachel 
 without a whimper, and was as good as gold. 
 For a mother. Lady Georgiana was a wonderful 
 woman, and did not err on the side of tender- 
 ness. 
 
 The first evening John Withers and his sister 
 were at Whinstane, Mr. and Mrs. HUl came to 
 dinner. The good old rector and his wife were 
 very kind to Grace and told her Arthur was 
 soon coming home. Her sad countenance cheer- 
 ed a little, but it was nothing to be compared to 
 Katherine's jubilant brightness. % Happiness was 
 a new state of behag to her, and she carried the 
 lustre of it in her beautiful face. She was aoft- 
 ,er in manner too, and her very voice had an- 
 other tone. 
 
 Whinstane was undeniably a pleasanter place 
 to stay at now than it had been during fhat first 
 memorable visit of Rachel Withers in Sir Wil- 
 liam Warleigh's time ; but it was provoking both 
 to her and to her brother to watch Oliver ex- 
 ercising his airs of mastership when they re- 
 membered who ought to be living and ruling 
 there. His sisters did not seem to have power 
 to say a word in furtherance of their own wish- 
 es ; Lady Georgiana had her carriage, but they 
 had no carriage, and now, no horses to ride. 
 Sir William only left each of his daughters five 
 thousand pounds at her own disposal, and three 
 hundred a year for life, charged on the estate ; 
 not fortunes commensurate withhis great wealth 
 by any means ; but Oliver had profited to the 
 extent of their loss. 
 
 The first night when Rachel went to bed, she 
 heard Lady Foulis, as usual, making the dark- 
 ness mournful with the drone, of her organ. It 
 was not so sad at this tune of year, when she 
 
 could set her. window open to listen; and this 
 she did, looking up at a sky where was no moon, 
 but which was bright with innumerable stars, 
 How was it that standing there, with the wind 
 on her brow, and the sound in her ears, there 
 came over her heart and her brain all that had 
 passed between then and now? All the sun- 
 bright hopes, and shadowy doubts, and dark 
 realizations of the doubts — all the little love- 
 passages, and vexed words, and mortified tears 
 that had put her out of the pale of youth, and 
 made of a gladsome girl, a serious and grave- 
 eyed woman. They came and went, and her 
 face was wet again, and the sob in her throat 
 again ; and she said her prayers and God com- 
 forted her, ; and the morrow came like any other 
 day, and nobody knew or cared that she had 
 seen ghosts last night. She was a reticent little 
 woman, and kept her troubled visitants from the 
 other world of memory to herself. 
 
 Lady Foulis sent for her once during her stay 
 at Whinstane, and from certain allusions she 
 made, Rachel understood that she knew of the 
 disappointments that had befallen her. There 
 was no special reference made to them, how- 
 ever, and the weird old lady seemed better 
 pleased to prattle on the theme of Katherine's 
 going to be married. " And Grace too, Orace 
 too" she added, with an emphatic gesture of 
 her head. She had become somewhat hard of 
 hearing, but she still fingered her organ as in- 
 cessantly as ever. If we think of it what a con- 
 solatiou it must have been to her during her 
 half-century of captivity ! Music would be the 
 last passion, the last sense to forsake her. 
 
 When she was told by what name Sir Lau- 
 rence's little daughter had been called, she tes- 
 tified extreme distress, wringing her withered 
 hands and crying : " Oh unwise, unwise ! There 
 was never an Annis Warleigh lived to be good 
 and happy yet. It was my name — it is under a 
 curse, under a curse !" 
 
 Katherine, in speaking of this to Rachel, re- 
 gretted that the name which was coupled with 
 disaster and dishonor to their house whenever 
 it had been borne by a daughter of it, should 
 have fallen to Laurence's child. But Rachel, 
 with the warning of Helena and the White 
 Hands strong in her recollection, said that if 
 these family traditions were not so mischievous 
 they would be simply ridiculoua. Impress an 
 imaginative mind with the idea that it is bom to 
 sorrow, and the prophecy is very likely to work 
 out its own fulfillment. Idle words often sink 
 deeper than the speakers mean they should. If 
 the first Annis Warleigh was faithless to her 
 husband, a poisoner, a witch, and every thing 
 else that is wicked, her descendants were aurely 
 not bound to take after her ! Lady Foulis had 
 undergone penance enough in her own person 
 to wear out any curse. 
 
 Katherine heard her say her say, and then re- 
 iterated with unconvinced pertinacity : 
 
 "All the same, I wish she were not called 
 Annis. She will be either very bad or very un- 
 lucky." 
 
 "Then," replied Rachel, "let us trust she 
 may be only unlucky !" 
 
 Early in December Arthur HiU returned to 
 England, and perhaps nobody was very greatly 
 surprised when it was announced that two wed- 
 
46 
 
 ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FOETUNBS. 
 
 dings instead of one would take place at Whin- 
 stane in the course of the ensuing spring. Grace 
 and he needed only to see each other to set their 
 troubles straight, and a Christmas morning letter 
 brought the good news to Hurtledale Eectory, 
 where no news could have been more welcome. 
 Rachel was cordially glad for her friend, and to 
 John Withers no brother-in-law could have been 
 so acceptable as Arthur Hill. 
 
 Now and then the thought of how she should 
 dispose of hereelf when her brother married had 
 intruded itself very sadly on Rachel's rest, but 
 she early made up her mind to one thing — she 
 would not go on living at the rectory. Married 
 folks were best left to themselves, and besides 
 she had no fancy for taking a secondary place 
 where she had been mistress. She liked to order 
 and manage about a house, and if she were to 
 remain, she should constantly be putting in her 
 oar where she ought not. It was nonsense of 
 John to talk about Katherine's wanting her to 
 teach her household and parish ways ; Katherine 
 must learn for hersejf as she had done. Perhaps 
 it would have grieVed her never to have had the 
 offer of a home with them, made to her, but 
 when they had done their affectionate duty, she 
 began to think in earnest of doing her wise one. 
 She was sure a way would be made clear by and 
 by, and meanwhile she looked round her in pa- 
 tience and hope. 
 
 Let her lot in life be what it might, Rachel 
 Withers would never be otherwise than what we 
 call a happy woman. It is worth a fortune to 
 have a cheerful temper and an easy adaptability 
 ' of character. She could thrive in any soil, and 
 it must have been a black cloud indeed through 
 which her eyes could not discern any portion 
 of the silver lining ! The secret of it was that 
 she could enjoy the present, and throw herself 
 heartily into little passing pleasures ; but she had 
 no great enthusiasms, and one step at a time in 
 life was enough for her. She was not given to 
 daily self-anatomy as practiced by heroines, but 
 she did her duty as far as she knew it, and be- 
 came in process of time calmness and patience 
 personified ; precisely what her mother had been 
 before her ill her later years. 
 
 While Rachel was considering of her^ future 
 lot, her godmamma Grandage was considering 
 of it too; and after mature deliberation she 
 made her the oifer of a permanent home at 
 Prior's Bank. 
 
 " While I live, live with me : when I am dead 
 you will find yourself suficiently provided for," 
 said the old lady very kindly. "I want compa- 
 ny, and I hate the idea of a hired companion ; 
 I was always in an agony lest Betsy Briggs 
 should get hold of me, until she came mto her 
 fortune and Mr. Gilsland married her ; but now 
 I feel comparatively safe. It seems to me that 
 you are thrown on the world. Dumpling, just 
 at the right moment to be picked up and adopt- 
 ed by me ; for I must have somebody soon, if I 
 don't have you. Go home and talk to John 
 about it." 
 
 So Rachel went home and talked to John 
 about it. As far as she individually was con- 
 cerned, she would rather go to Prior's Bank 
 than not, she said. Bittersweet was fond of 
 her, and they were as much used to each other's 
 oddities and quiddities as if they had lived to- 
 gether for years. Old as Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 
 was her mind was serene, and her wits as bright 
 as ever ; while as for her habits, the only risk 
 would be of, their proving too active for her 
 goddaughter. At Prior's Bank she should still 
 be in the midst of friends, within reach of the 
 schools and of some of her other work with 
 which Katherine's coming to the rectory need 
 not necessarily interfere. 
 
 John heard all and said little— Ae would not 
 have liked to hve with Bittersweet, if it were 
 only for her untiring vivacity of speech, but he 
 knew his sister's patience, and thought perhaps 
 she might be able to bear it. She was of a con- 
 versational turn herself. 
 
 Rachel and her godmamma had the matter 
 over several times again before any thing was 
 finally decided, but as they were the principal 
 persons concerned in the result, they deter- 
 mined at last to please themselves ; and agreed 
 that when John brought Katherine home to the 
 rectory his sister should move to Prior's Bank. 
 
 In the prospect of her new home and its du- 
 ties, Rachel could not help wishing 'that nature 
 had endowed her with a warmer and more dif- 
 fusive manner toward those she loved. ' Wheth- 
 er it was the violent check her aflfections had 
 received, or whether it was only her character- 
 istic reserve developing itself, she could not tell, 
 but certainly her cold shyness and formality 
 were growing upon her. When it would have 
 been appropriate to say something affectionate 
 and cordial more often than not she was tbngue- 
 tied. She conscientiously warned Bittersweet 
 of this, lest when they came to be always to- 
 gether, she shoi|}d be disappointed; but her 
 godmamma professed herself net exacting of 
 displays of tenderness, and comforted her not a 
 little by answering to her avowals, " You are 
 not so much cold as quiet. Dumpling, and I 
 know you will prove very satisfactory to me. 
 Demonstrative people's ways are pretty and 
 touching, but they may be a bore and grow fid- 
 gety in private life. One is safer with a calm 
 disposition in the long run, and permanence al- 
 ways pleased me better than vehemence." The 
 energetic old lady was, at all events, disposed 
 to make the best of her household companion, 
 and next after jT)hn, Rachel certainly loved her 
 now better than any body else in the world. 
 
 In March the rectory had a thorough turn-out 
 in preparation for the coming of its new mis- 
 tress ; and poor Rachel, with all her endeavors, 
 could not keep away the little cloud of dullness 
 which would creep over her now and then, as 
 she went to and fro the house, directing and su- 
 perintending the changes that had to be. And 
 John was so cheerful ! 
 
 " Well," said she, taking herself to task one 
 day, when she had been flatter than usual, "well, 
 if this goes on, I shall turn into a sour, cantan- 
 kerous old thing, resentful and envious of other 
 people's happiness, and that would be worse to 
 bear than all ! Going to Prior's Bank will be a 
 sort of new beginning- of life to me — not so 
 hopeful as the last, but I must begin it with a 
 good heart. When life looks level and blank 
 before one it is well to have won the belief that 
 God knows best. In saddened moments a 
 thought comes tempting me to fancy that I 
 could have arranged my own lot more satisfac- 
 torily, but I am utterly resolved to feel and say 
 that after all God must know best." 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 47 
 
 And Rachel's work went the better and her 
 heart was the lighter for her Christian philo- 
 sophy. 
 
 V. 
 
 The time flew very fast toward the end. 
 One, two, three days, and Eaohel Withers must 
 say good-by to the dear old rectory as home, and 
 go to make way for its new mistress. She had 
 a sort of leave-taking at the school and of her 
 poor folks, feeling all the while as if a good cry 
 would have eased her heart, but the tears refus- 
 ed to flow. They said that they should miss 
 her ; and she would like them to miss her a lit- 
 tle at first ; though in time Katherine was sure 
 to make up for her loss. She bade fair to be- 
 come an excellent clergyman's wife. 
 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh declined to attend at 
 the marriage of his sisters, and the ceremony 
 took ^laoe with the utmost privacy in Penalaven 
 Church ; only Mrs. Damer Warleigh and the 
 Squire being invited to be present. 
 
 The weddings over, John and Katherine set 
 out for a month's tour in Scotland, and Arthur 
 Hill and Grace departed to Devonshire, where 
 he had been presented to a small living, beauti- 
 fully situated on the coast. Rachel then went 
 home to Prior's Bank, and very shortly after- 
 ward the Oliver Warleighs discharged their es- 
 tablishment, and retired to live in Paris ; leaving 
 Whinstane Tower to Lady Foulis and the owls. 
 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh still remained faithful 
 to the old Hurtlemere House. 
 
 PART SEOOTTD. 
 
 SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIRST. 
 
 ANSIS AT HnRTL|MEKE. 
 
 Thb sound of tliy merry voice 
 Makes the old walls 
 Jubilant, and they rejoice 
 With the joy of thy young heart, 
 O'et; the light of whose gladness 
 No shadows of sadness 
 
 Prom the somber background of memory start. 
 Longfellow. 
 
 There was nothing about little Annis to re- 
 mind Sir Laurence Warleigh of the sweet wife 
 he had lost when she was born. She had 
 russet-brown elf locks, large, bluish-gray eyes 
 like himself, and a sturdy, willful, fearless tem- 
 per of her own as ever child was made with. 
 She enjoyed her liberty unchecked and un- 
 thwarted, and was perhaps encouraged to be 
 despotic and imperious more than was quite 
 good for her, because her small tyrannies were 
 an amusement to those who loved her. Nothing 
 the womenfolk liked better than to see her 
 drumming with tiny fist low down on the door 
 of the room where Sir Laurence sat, and shout- 
 ing to him to open and let her in. 
 
 There had been an important revolution 
 transacted at the Hurtlemere House soon after 
 Annis began to toddle alone, which was a source 
 of rejoicing to all concerned. One day, having 
 evaded Lucy's watchfulness with that demure 
 little spirit of mischief which was hpr strongest 
 baby trait, she strayed down to the edge of the 
 tarn, and there she was sitting in the sunshine 
 amongst the reeds, when Sir Laurence happened 
 to go thither to take out his boat. He picked 
 her up, much as he might have picked up a 
 terrier-pup, and Annis was as game. 
 
 She was used to see him from her nursery- 
 window, and Lucy had taught her to call him 
 Papa as she called a tree tree, and a horse 
 horse ; so when he lifted her to a level with his 
 face, she gazed ' at him undaunted, lisped his 
 name and poked out one of her wee fat hands 
 to clutch his beard. Sir Laurence shook her ; 
 she chuckled, kicked, and crowed, and finally 
 at his request, pouted two rosy buds of lips and 
 
 kissed him, until he ended by putting her into 
 the boat and rowing across the tarn with her ; 
 to the inexpressible anguish of Lucy by whom 
 her loss was discovered almost as soon as she 
 disappeared. Sir Laurence kept her out with 
 him until dusk, and a terrible weeping -and 
 wailing was going on round the borders of the 
 tarn when he was seen coming home with the 
 little gipsy in his arms, having left the boat on 
 the further side, of the water and walked back 
 through the woods. Lucy with a loud cry ■ 
 dashed fbrward and snatched her away, sobbing 
 with hysterical delight ; for she had almost be- 
 gun to think of the child as dead, and to picture 
 to herself the drowned looks and dear baby face 
 tangled amongst the bushes overhanging the 
 water which might suddenly confront her and 
 end her dreadful search. 
 
 Sir Laurence understood the case without 
 Mistress Dobie's half-glad, half-angered expla- 
 nationS, and the same evening he put an end to 
 Lucy's wretched anticipations of immediate dis- 
 missal for her negligence, by giving her a 
 sovereign, and bidding her mind the child more 
 carefully in future. Lucy in the fervor of her 
 penitence and gratitude transferred the coin to 
 the bag for the Catholic poor of Brafferton, and 
 she could never for years after speak of Annis's 
 "blessed preservation" without weeping like 
 Niobe. Mary Wray, who had been some time 
 returned to her husband's roof, but who loved 
 the little creature as if she were bone of her 
 bone and flesh of her flesh, talked of going 
 back to the Hurtlemere House to take charge 
 of her foster-babe herself; but her master re- 
 fused to spare her again, and instead she re- 
 moved with him into the small farm near the 
 Force, which Sir Laurence at this period grant- 
 ed them rent-free in acknowledgment of Mary's 
 office to his daughter. 
 
 Thus out of an imminent danger had come a \ 
 great good, and little Annis was no longer the 
 only neglected thing ^in her father's house. 
 From that day she was permitted to hang about 
 his steps like any other doggie ; he taught her 
 to run on messages, to fetch and carry his boots, 
 his slippers, and his big pot of tobacco, and to 
 
48 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 lie down on the rug and fall asleep amongst the 
 dogs when he wished her to be still. AnniS 
 soon learned to love him far better than her 
 nurses, fond as she was of them ; hers was a 
 warm heart that would cling faithfully to any- 
 one .who caressed her ; and her otherwise ne- 
 glected childhood wag certainly not unhappy. 
 
 Lucy said she was a tom-boy, but she thought 
 her a precious darling, and would have quar- 
 reled with any body who should have dared to 
 find a fault in her miracle of perfection. It 
 seemed never to occur to those who cared for 
 and indulged her that it was in any way neces- 
 sary to teach her the art of reading ; and though 
 from the lips of Mistress Dobie, who was a great 
 adept at recitation, she had learned a number 
 of quaint old ballads which Sir Laurence set 
 her to lisp at his knee in her clipped provincial 
 dialect, while he was smoking his pipes of win- 
 ter evenings, she did not at four years old so 
 much as know her letters. Lucy's own educa- 
 tion wag very imperfect, and did not compass 
 the pronunciation of long words without spell- 
 ing, which was probably the reason why her 
 views were so very lax. She brought the child 
 up just as she would have brought up a child 
 of her own, and being wholly trusted by Sir 
 Laurence, was rather jealous of any advice or 
 interference from without. She was undoubt- 
 edly a well-principled young woman, and her 
 constant affection cheered and warmed the 
 motherless bairn ; but kinsfolk and friends be- 
 gan to say that at four years old Sir Laurence 
 Warleigh's daughter should have other eom- 
 panioBfship and tendance than that of anfgno- 
 rant young Eomanist nurse, how good and kind 
 soever she might be. In some respects Anuis 
 was well done to, but in others there was much 
 room for improvement. Winter and summer 
 her clothing was rough and plain, and not 
 always either whole or cleanly; for the little 
 maiden ran as wild out of doors as any cot- 
 tager's child could do. One day her Aunt 
 Katherine going up to pay a rare visit at the 
 Hurtlemere House, saw the merry wee gipsy, 
 without hat and tanned berry-brown, perched 
 astride of a broad-backed cart-horse which 
 Mathew Dobie was leading down to water, and 
 shouting at the utmost pitch of her sound young 
 lungs such encouraging ejaculations to Tinker 
 as she had picked up from the farmer's frequent 
 use of them. 
 
 It was on this occasion that Katherine first 
 essayed a mild remonstrance with Sir Laurence, 
 but he appeared to think that there was time 
 enough yet to get his little wildling — who was 
 only a better sort of a pet dog to him — into 
 training, and would not be prevailed on to sub- 
 ject her to any stricter discipline than that she 
 now throve under. A truly disheartening ac- 
 count of her appearance and manners was then 
 sent to Grace, who thereupon joined in the ap- 
 peal, even offering to take the child into her 
 own charge ; for she had none of her own. 
 Katherine might have wished to assume the 
 responsibiUty too, but her husband would not 
 have permitted her to add to her cares, even 
 had her brother been willing to let Annis go to 
 her; and indeed, her hands were quite full 
 enough with her own active, irrepressible 
 boys — two in the house, neither of them yet 
 steady on his pins, were anxiety and trouble 
 enough for any reasonable woman. 
 
 By some means or other the rumor of changes 
 affecting her foster-babe came round to Mary 
 Wray's ears, and she esteemed it her bounden 
 duty to go first to Katherine and afterward to 
 Sir Laurence himself to inquire how much or 
 how little truth there was in what she had heard. 
 She also gave them the benefit of her opinion 
 on what influences were likely to affect ber dar- 
 ling's destiny for good or ill, and suggested that 
 if Annis must needs go from home to be made 
 a lady of, why should she not be sent to Oliver 
 "Warleigh's wife who was an experienced mother 
 herself, and who must know what belonged to 
 bairns, having three of her own ? 
 
 This was how Lady Georgiana came first to 
 be thought of as the most eligible guardian for 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh's daughter. Her own 
 children were patterns of proper behavior, and 
 though no love subsisted between her and her 
 sisters-in-law, they were both fain to agree that 
 there was 'sense and soundness in Mary Wray's 
 suggestion. 
 
 But however the rest of the family might - 
 cabal for the rescue of Annis from the ruinous 
 neglect and indulgence in the midst of wMoh 
 she was flourishing as luxuriantly as an Hi-weed 
 could. Sir Laurence himself had not the small- 
 est intention of parting with her ; and this com- 
 fortable assurance he gave her foster-mother 
 with his own hps. 
 
 " The bairn is but a bairn and can't be catch- 
 ing much that's amiss yet ;" said Mary ; but on 
 the other hand it was very justly pleaded that 
 refined habits are seed for early sowing, and 
 that Annis ought soon to be transferred to the 
 care of a gentlewoman if she was to grow up 
 into a little gentlewoman herself. The manner 
 of the change was the difSculty, and also how 
 to bring Sir Laurence to consent to any change* 
 at all ; but Katherine was convinced of the wis- 
 dom of it more effectually than ever, when she, 
 on the occasion of another visit to the Hurtle- 
 mere House, heard Lucy instructing her niece in 
 a Catholic child's prayers. Her Protestant feel- 
 ings took the alaim, and she wrote forthwith to 
 Lady Georgiana to sound her on the feasibility 
 of Mary Wray's idea. 
 
 Three or four days after the dispatch of this 
 letter, OUver Warleigh arrived at the rectory, 
 perhaps more to the surprise than the pleasure 
 of its inhabitants, but Ins welcome was quite 
 sufiSciently cordial to induce him to remain. 
 He and his wife had caught eagerly at the pos- 
 sible advantages which might accrue Jo them 
 from having the care of Sir Laurence's child ; 
 and primed with all manner of plausible argu- 
 ments in favor of the suggestion Katherine had 
 made to them, he came over in hot haste to 
 urge it on his brother in person. 
 
 It was on a dull March afternoon that Oliver 
 Warleigh first presented himself in his chai'acter 
 of ambassador at the Hurtlemere House. Sir 
 Laurence was not indoors, but Mistress Dobie 
 with a rather frozen welcome ushered him into 
 a room adjoining that which his brother habit- 
 ually occupied, and bade him wait. One leaf of 
 the folding-door which communicated with the 
 next room stood ajar, and looking through it, 
 Oliver perceived that Annis was there ; and he 
 remained for several minutes watching her at- 
 tentively, and listening to her monotonous 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 49 
 
 chanting of one of those ancient ballads which 
 were her only accomplishment. 
 
 Couched upon the hearth in the midst of a 
 group of sleeping dogs sat the child, shaggy as 
 any one of them, singing straight through the 
 tragical song of " The Bonny Earl of Murray." 
 At the close of the last verse, she laid her head 
 down on the broad side of one of the great 
 hounds, stretched her little arm up over its neck, 
 and appeared to be composing herself for a nap ; 
 but the creaking of a board under Oliver War- 
 leigh's stealthy foot, made her turn and look 
 round. When she saw a stranger she rose on 
 her knees, gazed straight at him and said quaint- 
 ly, " Who are you ? You are not of this house." 
 
 "I am your uncle Oliver, my little petkin," 
 replied ho, and held out his hand. 
 
 The propitiatory gesture was not responded 
 to. Annis got on her feet and staid regarding 
 him neither diffident nor afraid for some mo- 
 ments, as if she were considering his claims to 
 her favor, and deciding on them as extremely 
 trifling. " A bold little lass," thought he ; but 
 he made a second advance by asking if she 
 would like to come and sit on his knee. "No," 
 was the bhmt response ; and after watching the 
 intruder suspiciously for another minute or so, 
 she made a sudden rush past him and escaped 
 out of the room. " A wild little lass," thought 
 Oliver Warleigh again, and sat him down much 
 disconcerted in his brother's chair. 
 
 Though it was scarcely more than midway the 
 afternoon, the day was so overcast that already 
 it was growing gloomy indoors ; but he^flung 
 some logs out of the wood-basket upon the fire, 
 and as the pine knots kindled and blazed up the 
 dim twilight was suffused with a warm and 
 pleasant glow which penetrated into the remoter 
 parts of the large room. But the ruddy fire- 
 shine only brought out into greater prominence 
 its dreary, comfortless nakedness ; on the panel- 
 ed walls no picture, on the oaken floor no car- 
 pet, and the scant furniture of a rude and cum- 
 brous antiquity. It was not the east room 
 which was used when Helena was alive, but the 
 long-abandoned dining-hall, which in old times 
 re-echoed with mirth more loud than wise when 
 Moor Murray entertained his boon companions 
 after a hard day's sport. The aspect of Sir Lau- 
 rence's daily abode for these four years past, 
 re vealed to Oliver Warleigh more of his brother's 
 actual life than could have done the amplest 
 spoken details. Its atmosphere was one of a 
 thousand pipes ; guns, dog-whips, fishiug-taokle, 
 and other kindred articles ornamented every 
 corner and recess ; while several slovenly heaps 
 of books and magazines, strewn hither and thith- 
 er upon the floor, were indicative of Annis's 
 constructive skill in castle-building ; other toys 
 than these paper-bricks she had none. 
 
 As his eye took in each dull detail of this 
 gloomy scene, Oliver Warleigh marveled more 
 and more ; he lost patience in thinking of Lau- 
 rence. " Evpry pleasure of life within his reach, 
 and not the spirit to enjoy any thing !" solilo- 
 quized he. " There was never a woman trod 
 shoe-leather yet worthy of such sacrifices to her 
 memory! And that gipsy-bred little monkey 
 heiress to Penslaven and Whinstane — if I have 
 any discernment concerning natural attraction 
 and antipathy there will not be much love lost 
 between her and my Lady Georgiana when they 
 come together." 
 
 D 
 
 For two hours or more he waited in the 
 dreary, half-lighted room* for his brother's re- 
 turn, his only amusement being to grasp the 
 poker, strike the smoldering logs, and then 
 watch the routed myriads of sparks fly up the 
 wide chimney. At last the outer door opened. 
 Sir Laurence's heavy step crossed the hall ; and 
 sensible of a sudden and uncomfortable flush of 
 embarrassment, Oliver rose from his seat by the 
 hearth and listened. There was first the sound 
 of Mistress Dobie's voice announcing his own 
 arrival, followed by a few minutes of dead si- 
 lence, which seemed to the anxious visitor to 
 lengthen and lengthen themselves out as if they 
 would never end. He experienced some very 
 nervous fluctuations of courage while every in- 
 stant expecting his injured brother to confront 
 him ; but he looked outwardly self-possessed 
 enough when the door opened, and Sir Laurence, 
 entering, stood face to face with him for the 
 first time since they were boys together at Whin- 
 stane Tower. 
 
 They were quite strangers to each other's 
 appearance now, but they shook hands mechan- 
 ically, and Sir Laurence was the first to speak, 
 though what he said was as little like a fraternal 
 greeting as it well could be. " Over here on 
 business ?" he asked ; and Oliver answered with 
 strict truth, " Yes, on business of importance." 
 
 " Going on to Whinstane ?" ioquired Sir 
 Laurence again. 
 
 " No ; they have put me up at the rectory," 
 was the reply. 
 
 " It is \!lose upon dinner-time, will you re- 
 main an^ dine with me ?" was the next sugges- 
 tion, one to which Oliver readily acceded. 
 
 And that strange meeting was accomplished, 
 courteously and coldly as a meeting between 
 two strangers ! 
 
 Sir Laurence then immediately turned back 
 to the door which he had left open, and called 
 aloud for Annis, who came running as swiftly as 
 her little feet would carry her, but paused irre- 
 solute when she perceived who was still in pos- 
 session of the hearth. Her father put an end 
 to her indecision by taking her up in his arms 
 and carrying her to the fireside, but all the 
 while she kept the eyes of suspicious watchful- 
 ness on the unwelcome guest ; and Oliver War- 
 leigh did some violence to his feelings when, 
 by way of smoothing an avenue to conversation, 
 he remarked that she was a fine child. 
 
 " She is like my mother," answered Sir Lau- 
 rence, and sat down with her on his knee. 
 
 Oliver acguiesced, though in reality he could 
 not see the faintest shadow of resemblance — 
 that brown, elfish mite like their beautiful mo- 
 ther ! He grew quite sarcastic over the idea 
 inwardly ; thought paternal partiality might 
 claim some allowance, but when it reached 
 such a stage of blindness as that, it became 
 only pitiable and ludicrous. With certain per- 
 sons a little contempt for their company induces 
 a remarkable degree of ease and assurance, and' 
 when Oliver Warleigh discovered, this weakness- 
 in his brother to despise, he found hi» wits and 
 his tongue loosed, and began to talk fluently in 
 spite of the discouraging brevity of Sir Laii- 
 rence's replies. He gave has brother a sketch 
 of his own promising young family unasked, 
 
 "Our boys take after the Warleighs, and 
 fine, well-grown lads they are. Mortimer is 
 a vei7 fine lad for six years old," said he, " and 
 
50 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 his tutor tells us that he shows talent ; but these 
 are early days yet to judge of what he may turn 
 out. As much depends on temperament as on 
 capacity, and he has a lazy, pleasure-loving turn 
 such as is not commonly the making of success- 
 ful men. But he will hare to fight for himself — 
 both my boys will have to fight for themselves, 
 for I shall have nothing to give them ; so it is 
 lucky they are blessed with abundance of moth- 
 er-wit." 
 
 It did not appear that Oliver Warleigh was 
 deficient in paternal partiality any more than 
 Sir Laurence. He then went on to say that 
 Lady Georgiana and he were returning to Eng- 
 land permanently in the spring for their child- 
 ren's sake ; and expressing himself as entirely 
 in favor of public school education, asked his 
 brother what was his opinion about it. Sir 
 Laurence could not profess to have any opinion, 
 or to pronounce on the advantages or disadvan- 
 tages of a system of which he knew nothing. 
 Then Oliver pressed him with the inquiry, 
 whether he thought his own training at home 
 had been good, to which he unhesitatingly re- 
 plied : " No, as bad as bad could be." 
 
 " So it was," agreed Oliver ; and then he felt 
 his way cautiously on untried ground by saying 
 that if Sir Laurence had gone to Eton, or Har- 
 row, or Eugby, as a boy, he would scarcely be 
 burying himself alive in Hurtledale now ; and 
 concluded by asking if he never meditated 
 making any change in his manner of life. 
 
 To this his brother abruptly replied, " What 
 change should I make S" and Oliver suggested 
 that he should return to Whinstane or take 
 Penslaven into his own hands. Sir Laurence 
 answered that he liked the Hurtlemere House 
 better than either, and continued, half absently, 
 to stroke the rosily-flushed cheek of Annia, 
 which was next the fire, as if she were the per- 
 vading influence of his reverie, until Oliver, 
 with adventurous boldness, said : " And what, 
 must this poor little gipsy lose by being allowed 
 to grow up wild in such an out-of-the-way spot — 
 she who must inherit two of the finest estates in 
 the north, unless you alter your mind and marry 
 again." 
 
 Sir Laurence started as if he had been stung, 
 and exclaimed, harshly : 
 
 " Have you traveled all the way from Paris 
 to ask me that ? Tou might have spared your- 
 self the pains !" 
 
 And then he got up and strode out of the 
 room, taking the child with him. His suspicions 
 of the purport of his brother's undesired visit 
 were evidently aroused ; but Oliver did not al- 
 low himself to be discomposed ; he had won a 
 hearing, the object of his embassy had been 
 approached, and though, for the moment, he 
 found himself flung roughly back, he should 
 know how the better to approach it again at a 
 more auspicious moment. 
 
 Sir Laurence reappeared without Annis when 
 dinner was on the table, and Oliver, discreetly 
 avoiding all recurrence to personal topics, plung- 
 ed into the troubled sea of politics, foreign 
 and domestic, and at length succeeded in^en- 
 tangling his brother in an argument on the 
 respective merits of the rival statesmen of the 
 day, between whom party feeling ran high. 
 Dinner over, they drew their chairs to the 
 hearth, and Sir Laurence ordered Annis to be 
 
 sent in again. Oliver would have preferred her 
 absence ; and when she came, carrying in her 
 two hands, and propped against her breast, a 
 box of tobacco with a couple of pipes carefully 
 balanced on the top of it, he fancied _ hinissU 
 transferred to the parlor of some wayside mn, 
 with this small brown maiden to wait upon the 
 travelers. Sir Laurence asked him if he smok- 
 ed, and when he said, " No, Lady Georgiana 
 had broken him of the habit directly after their 
 marriage, and he had never attempted to resume 
 it smoe," his brother replied that Lady Georgi- 
 ana was unwise ; it was a moral sedative ; blue 
 devils, black devils and all other evil humors 
 vanished in a cloud of good tobacco-smoke. 
 
 Annis busied herself in filling her father's 
 pipe, using her little thumb for a stopper, and 
 having seen it alight and curling up in white 
 fragrant wreaths, she appeared to consider her 
 evening duty done, and diverted herself in va- 
 rious ways about the room. At last she settled 
 on her knees by one of the jambs of the chim- 
 ney-piece, and with a handful of tobacco, ab- 
 stracted from the box, proceeded to dress in 
 shaggy wigs all the grotesquely carved heads 
 within her reach that embellished it. Oliver 
 Warleigh could not keep his eyes from follow- 
 ing the restless movements of the child. He 
 watched her pat the lantern-jaws, and pinch the 
 high noses, and whisper in the great ears as if 
 the things were human, and stick twists of pa- 
 per in their yawning mouths, and bid them 
 smoke. She appeared to have invested each 
 figure with a name and certain character, and 
 to be enacting scenes in an irregular drama of 
 her own construction. One long-featured, down 
 drooping face, the topmost under the mantle- 
 shelf, she addressed as Bir Sumfit, and two 
 chubby little sons of Bacchus, crowned with 
 grape-clusters, as Ye Babes, The largest head 
 in the center of the jamb was thie Offre, and Ye 
 Babes were warned with much shaking of An- 
 nis's elfish locks, not to come within snap of his 
 great jaws. It struck Oliver Warleigh by and 
 by that the imaginative little mischief was in 
 some way or other connecting him with this 
 grinning visage of which it pleased her to feign 
 a shivering terror ; for her eye glanced toward 
 him twice or thrice, and then she committed an 
 inaudible secret to the keeping of Te Babes, 
 and wagged her head with an air of great sa- 
 gacity, as if desirous of Impressing them with 
 its profpund 'importance. He should never 
 forget the thing's antics as long as he lived, he 
 said to Katherine, when he described this quaint 
 scene. 
 
 There was no end to Annis's game until Lucy 
 came to carry her away to bed ; but first a bis- 
 cuit was given her, with which she fed her play- 
 fellows, and then was taken on Sir Laurence's 
 knee for a final interval of petting before goo3- 
 night. Oliver looked on with some impatience 
 while the two discoursed in their little language, 
 and was thankful when it was over ; and Annis, 
 having strained her father's head to her bosom 
 with all the force of her tiny arms, and exclaim- 
 ed, with passionate fondness, " I love you, papa ; 
 I do love you, papa," was handed over to Lucy. 
 But scarcely had the door closed upon them, 
 than Sir Laurence, as if repenting him of an 
 omission, laid down his pipe and followed ; and 
 the next moment Oliver heard the child's voice 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLINU. 
 
 51 
 
 as it receded up the stairs, crying, " Good Don- 
 ny, faster ; trot, Donny, trot 1" and, with a rather 
 mean curiosity, he peeped out and saw that his 
 brother was clumsily feigning himself u, horse, 
 and giving her a ride to bed. 
 
 Oliver laughed when he told this to his sister, 
 and it was not a kind laugh ; he thought Sir 
 Laurence a fool aud the child as spoiled a little 
 baggage as ever breathed. But Katherme spoke 
 up in their defense. 
 
 " I love Laurie for his tenderness," said she, 
 her mother-feeling kindling in her eyes. " I 
 think it is beautiful ; and she is a dear wee dar- 
 ling with all her savagery, and only wants system 
 and kindness to make her as docile as other 
 children. I am very fond of Annis, Oliver." 
 
 Oliver replied, of course, of course; she was 
 only over-indulged, that was all; but Lady 
 Georgiana was a tight hand, aud if ever she came 
 under her rein, she would very soon be broken 
 in. No doubt she would ! 
 
 When Sir Laurence- rejoined his brother, 
 Oliver dextrously contrived to turn the talk 
 once more toward the main object of his em- 
 bassy, and though Sir Laurence puffed a silent 
 cloud, and seemed little inclined to enter on the 
 conversation, he harangued about Lady Georgi- 
 ana's skill in the management of children, and 
 the paramount necessity of implanting good 
 early habits in the young in a way that would 
 have done credit to a commissioner of education. 
 Jfhence he diverged to the remoteness of Hur- 
 tledale from all means of instruction ; and at last, 
 with sudden earnestness he appealed to his 
 brother to know if he intended keeping his fine, 
 clever little daughter much longer without op- 
 portunities of ■ learning ; adding, that he had 
 heard from his sisters how she was not even 
 being taught to read. 
 
 Sir Laurence replied abruptly that he did not 
 think any change yet necessary. 
 
 " The child might be fourteen instead of four, 
 to hear you talk ! She will do very well as she 
 is for some tune to come. Katherine and Grace 
 have attacked me already, and I have desired 
 .them to give themselves no anxiety on my 
 daughter's account." 
 
 " Ton can never send her to school ; she 
 would break her heart under the tedium of for- 
 mal discipline," said Oliver, pressing the charge ; 
 " yet the longer she runs wild the more severe 
 wUl restraint be when it must come." 
 
 To this Sir Laurence answered that he had no 
 intention of exiling Annis from home. Then 
 Oliver suggested again that it would be by Ao 
 means easy to induce any lady capable of giving 
 her an education suited to her rank, to come 
 and live at the Hurtlemere House. Sir Laurence 
 responded that no Idea of bringing a stranger 
 thither had ever occurred to him ; but he now 
 saw that some scheme in which Annis was con- 
 cerned was laboring for delivery in Oliver's 
 breast, and he bade him impatiently speak out, 
 and not fence any longer with the question. 
 
 Then said Oliver, uncertain for the moment 
 whether he was most relieved or disconcerted 
 by the sudden challenge, 
 
 " Tou have conjectured rightly. The women 
 are more anxious for their little niece's welfare 
 than you suppose ; and amongst them they have 
 devised a plan which they declare excellent ; 
 this plan is that you should intrust Annis to 
 
 Lady Georgiana ; besides her two boy-cousins, 
 she would also have our little Clara, only a year 
 younger than herself, for a playmate, and every 
 body who has to do with children knows the ' 
 value of equal companionship." 
 
 Sir Laurence listened in an embarrassing 
 silence, his face betraying nothing of how he 
 was affected, and it was not until the proposi- 
 tion had had several minutes to sink into his 
 mind, that Oliver, perceiving he did not intend 
 to speak, ventured to ask, "Well, Laurence, 
 how does it strike you ?" 
 
 " I have never seen Lady Georgiana," was the 
 reply. 
 
 " But you could see her, either here or at 
 Bristowe," said Oliver. Again Sir Laurence 
 smoked on in mute meditation, and again his 
 brother was reduced to the expedient of asking 
 a direct question. " Will you meet her if she 
 comes over?" 
 
 "You must excuse me, Oliver — No," Tvas 
 the brief answer; and after a few minutes' 
 pause Sir Laurence put an end to the debate by 
 saying, " We will not talk of this matter any 
 more. Lady Georgiana I do not know, but you 
 made yourself my enemy ; and if my sisters had 
 behaved to Helena as they ought to have done 
 her child would have stood in need of none of 
 their kindnesses now. They mean well, perhaps, 
 but I am not disposed to hear their advice or to 
 be indebted to them for any help. H you have 
 come over specially with this object, I regret 
 that you should have taken so long a journey 
 for nothing — a letter would have answered the 
 purpose quite as well, and have been much less 
 costly in every way." 
 
 " r shall not regret it since it has given me 
 the chance of shaking hands with you again after 
 fourteen years, Laurence. We are friends now, 
 are we not ?" returned Oliver, plaintively. 
 
 "It was not my fault we were ever other- 
 wise," said Sir Laurence, affecting no enthusiasm 
 of gladness at their reunion. Oliver sighed, 
 and there was silence between them for some 
 minutes. The old clock in the hall striking 
 eleven broke it, and warned them that it was 
 time to separate. 
 
 " They keep early hours at the rectory, I must 
 be going," said Oliver, and rose with a show of 
 reluctance. 
 
 " I will walk with you down the hill," replied 
 Sir Laurence ; and the brothers turned out to- 
 gether into the cold starlit night. 
 
 At parting the elder suggested a hope of see- 
 ing Oliver again before he left Hurtledale, a 
 hope which Oliver gratefully encouraged. Sir 
 Laurence- was not so insensible to the elixir of 
 society as he imagined ; it was an unconfessed 
 pleasure to him to see his brother's face and 
 hear his voice once more, notwithstanding all 
 that was past and gone ; and at their next meet- 
 ing he invited him to transfer himself from the 
 rectory to the Hurtlemere House, which Oliver 
 did with a good deal of secret, wily exultation. 
 
 Nobody, of course, supposed that Oliver War- 
 leigh undertook his mission in behalf of Annis 
 from purely disinterested motives. His wife 
 had brought him a fortune, but by all accounts 
 she was a frightfully extravagant woman. Paris 
 was an expensive place of residence, they kept 
 
52 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 up a showy establishment, and their family 
 would now begin to increase in wants with each 
 advancing year, so that the temporary guard- 
 ianship of Sir Laurence's daughter with n, 
 handsome allowance would have been a very 
 acceptable adjunct to their other cares. Thus 
 far Oliver had gained nothing, but he had lost 
 nothing either; and to have re-established a 
 footing in his brother's house, closed against 
 him for so many years, was a desirable end 
 achieved. 
 
 He was witness to some rather curious inci- 
 dents behind the scenes at the Hurtlemere 
 House. The first morning when he descended 
 from his room, trim and stately, he foimd Sir 
 Laurence in a rough frieze coat of genuine 
 BrafCerton cut, just rising from his finished 
 breakfast. Annis also was there, done up with 
 a napkin under her chin, eating porridge and 
 milk with excellent appetite. She took the op- 
 portunity of the slight diversion caused by her 
 uncle Oliver's entrance to carry her nearly 
 empty platter to the cHimney-piece, and was 
 just in the act of putting a spoonful into the 
 Ogre's mouth, when Lucy appeared and pre- 
 vented the accomplishment of her hospitable 
 designs. Annis was not too well pleased at the 
 interference, though she allowed her dish and 
 spoon to Jbe' transferred to the center of the 
 table beyond her reach ; and the setting of her 
 lips and perverse little twist of her shoulders 
 betrayed the smoldering rebellion which broke 
 out into frank resistance, when Lucy ofi'erod a 
 hand to lead her from the room. Stubbornly 
 intrenching herself amongst the dogs upon the 
 hearth, she braved her mild monitress with a 
 naughty eye, and dared her audibly to touch 
 her. Lucy wisely did not attempt it, and after 
 a little ineffectual coaxing, she glided out of the 
 room as noiselessly as she had come in, leaving 
 Annis triumphant. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh was very disagreeably im- 
 pressed by Lucy's position at the Hurtlemere 
 House. He told Katherine that she had the 
 air of a person accustomed to consideration and 
 even deference. He professed to discern in her 
 craft and force of will, and the coolest self- 
 possession, all demurely vailed under a modest 
 simplicity of self-respect that was plausible and 
 well enough acted to deceive any body less 
 versed in the wicked wiles of human nature 
 than himself. Katherine laughed merrily at his 
 ridiculous suspicions. Worldly wisdom may 
 sometimes be a light to the eyes, but almost as 
 often it is a mere misleading Will-o'-the-wisp ; 
 and in this instance it had certainly tempted 
 Oliver Warleigh's discernment astray. Lucy 
 knew that she was pretty, and she had that natu- 
 ral love of limited power which is a trait in all 
 intelligent persons of her sex; but ♦she had no 
 more designs on Sir Laurence, which his brother 
 implied she had, than upon the man in the 
 moon. She had plighted her troth a couple of 
 years ago to the eldest son of Eobb, at Prior's 
 Mill, and it was to be a match as soon as he 
 could stock a farm and furnish a house to take 
 her to. But the vexatious idea Oliver had con- 
 ceived concerning her, tipped his tongue with 
 blackest gall of bitterness in speaking of his 
 brother ; he said to Katherine that Sir Laurence 
 appeared to him to have degenerated into an 
 absolute boor, and predicted that he might very 
 
 probably, if the progress of deterioration con- 
 tinued, end his long mourning for Helena by 
 the commission of the greatest of all possible 
 follies — that of marrying her maid ! A pleasant 
 cud for him to chew, this ; and his sister did 
 not succeed in convincing him how more than 
 absurd was his fancy. 
 
 Annis and he, by his own candid confession, 
 did not grow in each other's good graces ; 
 though the evenings passed not unpleasantly at 
 the Hurtlemere House. He became more anx- 
 ious for the success of his mission every day he 
 staid there ; his earnestness arising from a 
 desire to get Lucy away along with the child 
 Yet he steadily refrained himself from the topic 
 that was uppermost in his thoughts, and when 
 he and his brother were alone, laid himself out 
 to amuse, telling his, best society stories in his 
 best society manner, that he might not risk 
 losing all by over eagerness in pressing a dis- 
 tasteful subject. 
 
 Sir Laurence smoked his meditative pipes 
 and said little, but his brother's company ^as 
 becoming very pleasant to him. It was long 
 since he had entertained friend or kinsman at 
 his lonely fireside. At distant intervals appear- 
 ed his steward, Mr. Bond, and at still more dis- 
 tant, John Withers spent an evening with him, 
 and these were the only two guests Annis knew 
 as bearing her father company. 
 
 She liked to see Mr. Bond and John also ; for 
 the first brought her gingerbread, and the sec- 
 ond set her up to say a long ballad, and always' 
 commended her proficiency with, a pat on the 
 crown ; which, as Annis loved praise, was per- 
 haps as acceptable as the spice-cake. But the 
 new stranger who called himself uncle Ohver, 
 was by no means so welcome ; some instinct 
 deeper than reason warned her against his sur- 
 face cordiality, and she kept watch over him in a 
 spirit of distrustful defiance which she was too 
 young to dissimulate. 
 
 One evening she was Invited to display before 
 him her powers of recitation, but she left Sir 
 Sumfit and Ye Babes reluctantly, and when 
 perched on her father's knee for the triumphant 
 exhibition, with a precocity of malice, which 
 would express itself by parable rather than not 
 at all, she proceeded to chant the Ballad of The 
 Babes in the Wood, addressing the narrative 
 portions toward the dogs, and the denuncia- 
 tions of the cruel uncle toward her kinsman 
 with the oddest little naughty look sparkling in 
 her eyes that ever child wore; and when re- 
 quested to bid him proper good-night after- 
 ward, she turned suddenly, took a long stare 
 at him, shook her elf-locks and decamped. 
 Oliver Warleigh laughed, but there was neither 
 laugh nor love in his heart, and it was by no 
 means a benevolent aspiration when he wished 
 Lady Georgiana had her I But even Lady 
 Georgiana might meet her match. She was 
 equal to icing a baby's tears, but whether she 
 was equal to icmg the passionate blood of such 
 an one as Sir Laurence's little wildling was yet 
 to be tried. 
 
 On another occasion he witnessed an awful 
 instance of her waywardness and of her father's 
 indulgence which had a worse effect on his tem- 
 per than any defnonstration of dislike toward 
 himself that had preceded it. One evening he 
 proposed to his brother a ride to Bristowe for 
 
SIR LAUEENOE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 63 
 
 the next morning ; the weather being fine and 
 the roads good, why- should they not go ? Sir 
 Laurence did not say why not, but he demur- 
 red — could not Oliver go alone? Oliver replied 
 that of course he could, but a ride over the 
 moor was pleasauter in company than in soli- 
 tude; he did not urge the matter, however, 
 and at breakfast, he was in no way surprised to 
 hear his brother announce that he had changed 
 his mind and would go to Bristowe ; but he was 
 surprised and annoyed too when Sir Laurence 
 added that -Annis would accompany them in 
 fulfillment of an old promise to Mrs. Darner 
 Warleigh. 
 
 "Can the little monkey ride so far?" he 
 asked, darting a very sharp glance at the small 
 porridge-devourer -virho faced him. 
 
 She nodded her head and said, "Farther," 
 without the addition of an explanatory word. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh resigned himself. The elfish 
 mite seemed to have penetrated his feelings and 
 to be enjoying his vexation with imp-like mal- 
 ice.- Breakfast over, the horses were ordered, 
 and when Sir Laurence and his brother went out 
 they found Annis already mounted on her black 
 pony, a swift, sure-footed, handsome little beast, 
 docile to her hand and word as a well-trained 
 dog. She wag clad in a heather-colored habit 
 of rough Scotch cloth, and wore a boy's cap, 
 with a silver thistle in front, tied under her chin. 
 She was as fearless and as much at home on her 
 pony as amongst the dogs on the hearth, and 
 her uncle Oliver reluctantly admitted to himself 
 at last, that the little gipsy, in spite of her dark 
 locks and nut-brown skin, was a very beautiful 
 child. 
 
 Annis was a chatterbox ; her tongue wagged 
 fast, and for some distance she absorbed the 
 chief part of the talk ; but by and by when they 
 came to where the road turned across the open 
 moors, she would have cantered off by herself 
 had not her father, though he loosed the leading 
 rein, bidden her keep close by his side. He 
 looked down at her from time to time very 
 thoughtfully and very fondly as if he were turn- 
 ing over in his mind some design fraught with 
 pain to both. And so it presently appeared that 
 he was. Peremptorily as he had at first refused 
 to entertain the proposal made to him of intrust- 
 ing Annis to Lady Georgiana, it had since re- 
 curred to him as perhaps worth consideration ; 
 and he now introduced the subject himself by 
 saying to Oliver that he supposed he should have 
 to let his little gipsy leave him soon, though it 
 would be very hard lines for her, go when and 
 where she would. 
 
 Oliver had much ado to repress the thrill of 
 triumph that stirred in his heart at this unexpect- 
 ed symptom of yielding on his brother's part; 
 but he replied with an air of sympathy and en- 
 couragement that she was young enough yet to 
 be very easily molded to new manners. He 
 then led the conversation to Lady Georgiana, 
 pleasing particulars of whom he was fluent in 
 detailing. After some general remarks on the 
 advantages of living abroad, he went on to state 
 . his intentions with reference to a home in Eng- 
 land, and to expound all the beautiful plans for 
 the bringing-up of an heiress, with which his 
 clever wife had primed him beforehand. Sir 
 Laurence heard him patiently, and though he 
 said it would be much against the grain when- 
 
 ever he let her go, he acknowledged that it 
 might very probably be her best chance of good 
 training and good treatment ; and perhaps with 
 an ulterior view of insuring both, he made some 
 reference to the money part of the negotiation 
 which Oliver airily set aside as quite secondary ; 
 though any body who knew him must know that 
 it would be his chief consideration. 
 
 The affair had got into this promising cue, 
 while Annis, trotting demurely at her father's 
 side, heard every word ; a stormy resolution 
 gathered up in her dark little face as she listen- 
 ed, and at the climax, " she wheeled her pony 
 suddenly round, gave him a smart stroke with 
 her whip, and galloped back over the moor as 
 fast as it would carry her; believing that she 
 was immediately to be decoyed away and given 
 up to her wicked uncle ! Oliver Warleigh- was 
 for instant pursuit, but Sir Laurence lifted a 
 hasty hand and bade him hold back, crying 
 aloud, " Mind the quarry, my birdie," and then 
 Annis was seen to draw rein, to swerve into a 
 lower track, and so to continue her homeward 
 flight straight as an arrow from a bow. 
 
 "That danger's over, thank God!" said Sir 
 Laurence ; " Brownie will carry her now safe to 
 his stable-door. But you see what she is, Oli- 
 ver, and it can not be helped. I must ride after 
 her, but you go on to Bristowe." ■ 
 
 This, however, Oliver was secretly too much 
 provoked to do — besides he wished to see the 
 end of the sprite's adventure. 
 
 So far from being ashamed of her misconduct 
 or afraid of any consequences, Annis was sitting 
 in the sun on the steps outside the porch await- 
 ing her father and uncle ; and as soon as they 
 appeared she ran to the former and, clinging to 
 his hand, laughed and danced up and down with 
 high spirits as if she had performed some admi- 
 rable feat for which she expected to be praised. 
 But Sir' Laurence looked grave, and lifting her 
 up in his arms, asked if she did not know 
 she had been very naughty, on which she rub- 
 bed her soft little face against his, curled round 
 his neck, and with wily ca,regses refused to see 
 or to know any thing but that she was papa's 
 darling with whom he could not really be angry. 
 He kissed her before he set her down,' but he 
 attempted no further admonition, neither did 
 he' apologize to his brother for his being disap- 
 pointed of the ride to Bristowe ; and when Oliver 
 would have reverted to the momentous theme 
 which her flight had so inopportunely interrupt- 
 ed, he entreated him to let it drop. 
 
 "It will not do to send her away so young — 
 she is unmanageable except by Lucy," said he, 
 impatiently. " We may perhaps talk of it more 
 seriously when she has got another year over 
 her head. And even then there will be woeful 
 scenes to go through, for her love is strong and 
 her will ia strong, and her temper has never 
 known the curb." 
 
 So much the better reason, Oliver thought, 
 that it should learn to know it without any fur- 
 ther delay; but after Sir Laurence's decisive 
 words he felt that, for the present, it was ad- 
 visable to consider the negotiation at an end. 
 
 Though Oliver Warleigh had not succeeded 
 in the chief object of his mission, he could not 
 be saiid to have had' his journey for naught ; for 
 
54 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 while he was at the Hurtlemere House Sir Lau- 
 rence promised to undertake all the charges of 
 his eldest boy's education and future launch in 
 the world. Olirer had represented himself as 
 almost an object of charity, and told him that 
 but for Lady Georgiana's fortune they could 
 barely hare lived ; and that as the boys grew up 
 and went to Eton, they should have to practice 
 aseverity of economy that neither of them would 
 relish. His sister Katherine was very incredu- 
 lous of these statements ; for she knew that he 
 had carried away from Whinstane and Pensla- 
 ven, far more of spoils both before and after 
 his father's death than he had any right to, and 
 that if he was poor now, it could only be by 
 his own and his wife's fault. She did not know 
 whether most to admire Sir Laurence's generous 
 forgiveness of Oliver, or most to fear what 
 looked like a weak return of trust and confi- 
 dence in him ; Laurence had not a grain of false- 
 hood in his own nature, and, therefore could not 
 suspect his brother of persistent guile and double- 
 dealing. Oliver was a clever and specious man, 
 but true he was not ; and when she perceived 
 how much more he wanted Aimis as a prize for 
 his pocket than for the child's own good, for a 
 little moment she felt more bent on circum- 
 venting than on helping him. 
 
 In Sir Laurence's resentment against those 
 who had not acknowledged his poor young wife, 
 there was no taint of vindictiveness — though he 
 hardly forgave he could not condescend to per- 
 secute ; and when he found himself looked up 
 to as the wealthy head of the family, he did 
 with a free hand what was expected from him. 
 Ohver was astonished at his generosity, but he 
 was not touched ; his heart was not of that na- 
 ture which can be touched by magnanimity or 
 made grateful by benefits. 
 
 The brothers dined at the rectory together 
 one evening, and John Withers, who had not 
 seen them aide by side for nearly fifteen years, 
 was struck with the conspicuous difference be- 
 tween them ; far greater now than when they 
 were boys. The elder was the taller man by a 
 couple of inches, the better built and handsomer 
 in feature, but his gait was become heavy and 
 slouching, he carried his head down, and his 
 dress differed in no wise from that of the rudest 
 yeoman farmer in the dales — a stranger might 
 have supposed him to be one of them without 
 discrediting his discernment in any measure. 
 Oliver, on the contrary, who inherited the high- , 
 bred delicacy of his mother's face, and had lived 
 the life of gay society under the tutelage of a 
 wife, clever, fond and fashionable, was a mirror 
 of grace, polish and surface courtesy ; but he 
 was extremely disagreeable to some people not- 
 withstanding. His brothera-in-law disliked and 
 distrusted him, and old Mrs. Sara Grandage be- 
 stowed on him the epithet of serpentine ; to Ea-_ 
 chel Withers he was just the same velvet-gloved 
 Oliver with the claws as formerly ; so smooth 
 and sleek, but yet with a deadly spring in him 
 and a cruel, ruthless grip under his bland soft- 
 ness. 
 
 He fancied he had taken pretty Lucy's meas- 
 ure, but she had taken his with a much shrewd- 
 er accuracy, and had told Mary Wray that she 
 hoped Sir Laurence would never let Annia out 
 of his sight — " at least not in hu hands ;" which 
 insinuation had thrown Mary into fresh anxiety 
 
 about her foster-child. Prom the moment Oli- 
 ver Warleigh entered the Hurtlemere House^ 
 Lucy's spirit had revolted against him; for 
 treacherous as his conduct toward his brother 
 had been, the popular voice had magnified it, 
 and with many his name was a by-word for cun- 
 ning and cruelty. She watched and saw the 
 observation he spent on Annis ; and the weight 
 he attached to her words and ways ; and when 
 she felt that he doubted Aer, her doubt of him 
 redoubled ; for why should he cast an evil eye 
 on her unless because she was the child's most 
 active guardian ? 
 
 However, relief to all those who feared and 
 suspected him was at hand. Having no further 
 temptation to remain in the monotonous seclu- 
 sion of Hurtledale, Oliver Warleigh betook 
 himself home again to his Lady Georgiana in 
 Paris. Sir Laurence said to Katherine, " He 
 was in haste to begone;" and she detected a 
 strong undercurrent of disappointment in the 
 way he spoke. Oliver was cat-witted ; he could 
 see and seize an immediate advantage ; but he 
 was not apt at reading the subtler sentiments of 
 any heart less self-absorbed than his own, or he 
 might hive guessed that his hurried departure 
 as soon as he had gained all he was likely to 
 gain, would leave a harsh impression on his broth- 
 er's mind. It did so. A good and generous feel- 
 ing had been blighted in Sir Laurence, but the 
 natural warmth still lingered amongst the em- 
 bers of his life, which, drawn together by a ten- 
 der and faithful hand, might still have kindled 
 again into heat and flame. His sister Kather- 
 ine perceived a sensible change in him during 
 the week Oliver staid at the Hurtlemere House ; 
 he had yielded to a belief that for some little , 
 love of him, some real though late repentance, 
 Oliver had sought him in his solitude ; but his 
 prompt flight when he had made -the utmost 
 profit out of his brother's generous mood, had 
 quite despoiled him of that pleasing imagina- 
 tion. For a little while after, Sir Laurence 
 seemed sterner and less contented than before 
 his visit. 
 
 One day Annis went down to spend the morn- 
 ing at the rectory with her cousins Dicky and 
 Andrew, whom she tumbled about like nine-pinS 
 on their nursery-floor, and being asked if she 
 was not sorry to bid her uncle Oliver good-by, 
 answered without reserve, "No, she was very 
 glad." 
 
 " But he is going to send you some toys all 
 the way from Paris," urged Aunt Katherine ih 
 reference to a promise of his. 
 
 " I don't want any, and he shall not come 
 back here. He is ugly — I don't like him ; he 
 wants to take me away from papa, but I won't 
 go !" answered the child, emphasizing her reso- 
 lution by casting down on the floor one of 
 Dicky's doll's tea-cups, which was broken in its 
 fall ; but she had no repentance for the disaster 
 in that fiery moment. 
 
 The Uttle gipsy had comprehended all the 
 length and breadth of the family plots so far as 
 she was personally concerned, and further talk 
 with her ehcited no modification of her first ex- 
 pressions of antipathy. She was particularly 
 strong on the point of her uncle Oliver's ugli- X 
 ness ; and to a child's instinctive discernment, 
 notwithstanding his handsome features, he might 
 be ugly ; for there was no kindness in his heart, 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 S5 
 
 and no pretense of it in his manner, and his 
 countenance was often darkling and bad. 
 
 A general feeling of distrust- was thus all Oli- 
 ver Warleigh left behind him as the result of 
 his first embassy to the Hurtlemere House ; and 
 he went away not altogether unconsoioui of it. 
 
 CHAPTER THE SECOND. 
 
 OLITEB WAKLEIGh'S SECOND EMBASSY. 
 
 One may smile, and smile, and be a rillain. 
 
 SHA.ESPEARE. 
 
 I. 
 
 One afternoon early in the month of April 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel Withers were 
 driving leisurely up the lane by the Force Farm 
 when they saw Lucy waiting in the garden and 
 Annis swinging on the gate. 
 
 " How do you do, Annis, and how is papa ?" 
 cried Bittersweet, nodding out of the window at 
 the child. Annis only stared and went on 
 swinging, but the sound of carriage-wheels 
 brought Mary Wray into the porch, cloaked and 
 boimeted as if for a walk. She made a gesture 
 which caused Clip to pull up his horses, and 
 running down into the road, apologized for the 
 liberty she took in stopping them ; but said she 
 was going to the Hurtlemere House to nurse 
 Sir Laurence ; he was ill, he had got a fever, and 
 wanted somebody handy to look after him. 
 
 " I thought may be, Mrs. Withers didn't know ; 
 happen you'll call an' tell her on your way back," 
 added she. 
 
 They promised to do so, "and then Mary, 
 snatching Annis from her dizzy elevation, took 
 her by the hand and set off in haste up the pas- 
 tures ; while Lucy, at a sign from Rachel, de- 
 layed a moment to give them a little further ex- 
 planation. 
 
 Sir Laurence, she said, had been ailing for 
 more than a fortnight past ; he had caught a 
 cold which he -could not shake off, but he had 
 refused to have Dr. Beane sent for until this 
 morning, when his suffermgs had increased so 
 much as to make medical advice imperatively 
 necessary. The doctor did not foresee danger, 
 but he said Sir Laurence ought to have been in 
 his bed a week ago ; and would not promise 
 him a good deliverance without quiet and cau- 
 tion now. He advised that Mary Wray, whose 
 skill as a sick nurse was of the highest repute 
 in the dale, should be sent for ; so Lucy had 
 brought Annis out for a walk, and summoned 
 her straightway. 
 
 " We need not alarm Katherine," said Mrs. 
 Sara Grandage, as the carriage drove on. " We 
 will just tell her Sir Laurence is not well, and 
 that Beane has seen him — a strong man like him 
 can not ri.sk much from a feverish cold." 
 
 This was Bittersweet's way ; being as tough 
 as bend-leather herself, she never believed any 
 body else could ail much. 
 
 But when they stopped at the rectory to de- 
 liver Mary's message, they found that the ill- 
 news had flown fast enough to get there before 
 them, and that both, John and Katherine were 
 gone up to the Hurtlemere House themselves. 
 
 "Annis was as gay as a lark, so it can not be 
 very serious," then said the old lady; "and 
 even if Sir Laurence has a good bout of fever 
 it may be all the better for him eventually ; it 
 
 will purge away old melancholies, and make a 
 new man of him. I would not pull a long face 
 yet. Dumpling, if I were you." 
 
 Dumpling did not know she was pulling a 
 long face, but she was thinking it would be a 
 woeful day for Sir Laurence's little wildling if 
 any thing happened to him. She had never 
 given her adhesion to the scheme her sister- 
 in-law had conceived of sending Annis to be 
 brought up by Ladj Georgiana. She knew them 
 both, and felt sure Annis would not take kindly 
 to the polishing processes by which her little 
 cousins were made such perfect specimens of 
 obedience and propriety. It seemed almost 
 ■wicked, all the conspiring to take her away 
 from her father whom she worshiped, for the 
 sake of handing her over to the formal charities 
 of that freezing wife of Oliver's. What a mar- 
 tyrdom of clipping and training the hapless little 
 * mortal would have to undergo before her civili- 
 zation was accomplished ! What matter if she 
 did say a few Catholic prayers and hymns, and 
 recite a few rude ballads in a provincial dialect; 
 she had better grow up heathen or savage than 
 dwindle and die under the icy manipulations of 
 Lady Georgiana ! 
 
 All this Rachel thought, and all this she said 
 to her godmamma, who was much inclined to 
 take her view of part of the facts ; but who be- 
 lieved that Katherine's anxiety to remove An- 
 nis from the Hurtlemere House was greatly 
 augmented by her desire to see Sir Laurence 
 make a change in his method of living. The one 
 alteration she hoped might lead to the other. 
 
 In this Rachel acquiesced ; she knew well how 
 both his sisters mourned his alienation from so- 
 ciety and from themselves. The outward court- 
 esies of kinship were observed between them, 
 but Sir Laurence had never forgiven their ne- 
 glect of Helena's letter and of herself. On his 
 unjust persistence in blaming them, they never 
 commented ; they thought now, indeed, that if 
 they had dared their father's wrath and disobey- 
 ed his commands it would have been right ; but 
 as for poor Helena, she was not made to grow 
 old ! They might have rejoiced her brief life 
 with their kindness, and have crowned her early 
 departing with one longed for, inexpressible 
 comfort ; but her death came from the hands 
 of God and none other ; and not all the love in 
 the world could have staid it for a single day. 
 
 Little Annis, much against her will, was trans- 
 ferred to the nursery at the rectory during her 
 father's illness, and immediately the news of it 
 reached Paris, Oliver Warleigh hastened back 
 to the Hurtlemere House. 
 
 Sir Laurence had a hard and sharp 'Struggle 
 for his life, and when the crisis was over, a long 
 languor succeeded to the fierce trouble of his 
 delirium. Oliver watched him with a haggard 
 anxiety, and as soon as Dr. Beane pronounced 
 his brother saved, he seemed almost like to give 
 up and die in his stead ! John and Katherine 
 advised his speedy departure to Hastings, where 
 Lady Georgiana had just established herself in 
 lodgings with her children ; and when the worst 
 was past, he followed their advice. It was time 
 he went ; unless his nervous excitability got 
 some rest soon, he would be laid up hunself ; 
 and he felt it. 
 
56 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 He 'looked half worn out, and Bittersweet 
 maliciously said, — 
 
 " He is going to be ill of Sir Laurence's get- 
 ting better !" 
 
 Other people besides Bittersweet thought he 
 was disappointed at the issue, but of course they 
 spoke low when they spoke so ; except Rachel 
 Withers, who replied to her godmamma's sar- 
 casm, " God forgive me if I wrong him, but I 
 do believe he is the only person akin to Sir 
 Laurence who does not rejoice in his safety !" 
 
 After a month's stay at the rectory, Annis 
 went home again, and a most sensible relief to 
 her aunt Katherine her departure was ; for the 
 charge of her during this time of trouble had 
 been as onerous as the charge of a freshly-caught 
 wild animal. She was constantly on the watch 
 to circumvent Lucy, and run away home to her 
 father. She was quiet enough now that she was 
 back with him, and would sit in his room by the 
 hour together as still as a mouse, without either 
 speaking or moying ; only resting her cheek 
 against his lean hand as it hung down over the 
 bed-side, and caressing it with her wee soft 
 palms. 
 
 "Make the most of your time, loving little 
 Annis : it will not be for very long now," he 
 said to her one day. 
 
 " I am going to stay with you always, papa," 
 was her reply ; so he left her in her blissful de- 
 lusion. 
 
 But the decree had gone forth ; the verdict 
 that pronounced Sir Laurence rescued from his 
 imminent peril, pronounced their separation ; — 
 as soon as he could travel he would be allowed 
 neither rest nor peace until he went away — so 
 decided Bristowe, so also Katherine and John. 
 Dr. Beane would not guarantee him another 
 year of life without a thorough change of hab- 
 its, and against that sentence even his own ob- 
 stinacy could not stand firm. Annis seemed to 
 be the only impediment, and every body was ut- 
 terly resolved that she should not stand in his 
 way. Oliver said little — perhaps he was not just 
 then capable of saying much ; but when he went 
 to Hastings, he knew that so far as Annis was 
 concerned, the day was his own ; for his bro- 
 ther's extremity had brought round his oppor- 
 tunity. 
 
 The child was not warned of what awaited her, 
 but gentle measures were adopted to wean her 
 from some of her wildest indocilities. Lucy 
 adopted toward her the most tenderly protect- 
 ive airs ; for she and Mistress Dobie had a quar- 
 rel on the subject of Annis's behavior. 
 
 Said Mistress Dobie : 
 
 " She's a lile lady, an' must ha' a lady's bring- 
 ing up. Miss Katherine and Miss Grace, when 
 they was her age, was twice aa forward an' high 
 learned, an''boo' an' courtesy they did aa pretty as ; 
 my lady herself; but Miss Annis an't got no 
 manners at all, an' you pettles her ower much 
 by half" 
 
 Then Lucy protested : 
 
 " She don't want no manners ; she is a deal 
 better without if they'd make her as proud and 
 hard-hearted as her aunts !" for Lucy had not 
 forgotten one slight passed on her dear, dead 
 mistress. 
 
 Every body was agreed that when Annis went, 
 Lucy must go with her — to break her fall as it 
 were ; and though Robb's son at the mill said 
 
 he should " be wanting her at the back-end," 
 he was told that he must have patience a little 
 longer. But he had got the promise of the TJp- 
 gyll Farm which the present tenant was leaving 
 at Lady-day ; the summer would see the house 
 duly renovated and made ready for its pretty 
 mistress, and after harvest he declared he would 
 brook no longer delay. Therefore if Lucy went 
 away with her darling at all, it must be soon. 
 
 The main change was generally regarded as 
 settled, but the nearer it came to be made, the 
 more uneasy grew Mary Wray as to whether it 
 would be quite safe for her foster-child to go to 
 her uncle Oliver's house. Lucy liad infected 
 Mary with her own distrust of him, and as her 
 difficulty and distress about it were too deli- 
 cately personal to be laid before the rector's 
 wife, she brought them down to Rachel With- 
 ers and unfolded them before her. 
 
 She began by saying that Lucy was " rather 
 a chancy body for taking likes and dislikes; 
 she was full of her megrims, and did Miss Ra- 
 chel think there was aught in them ?" — a ques- 
 tion much easier to ask than to answer. 
 
 " Lucy says she can't abide him — nayther art 
 nor part of him," proceeded she, recapitulating 
 the young woman's precise expressions. " She 
 don't hke his slant eyes, nor his voice that he 
 always drops as if he was afraid of the hearing 
 of his own words, nor yet his way of turning 
 about, an' peeping, an' listening. He's deep an' 
 he's sharp too. I once thought liim a fair- 
 spoken gentleman enough, but nor me now 
 nayther. Miss Rachel, I shouldn't wish to come 
 under his grindstone. I saw him while master 
 lay ill, an' it wasn't his good wishes nor Ms 
 prayers that mended him. Show me a pattern 
 o' the stuff an' I'll tell you what t' piece is. 
 Talk o' Sir Laurence being a hard man ; he'd 
 stand up front to his enemy, but Oliver, he'd 
 stab his i' the back, an' lick th' knife after for 
 th' sweetness o' revenge !" 
 
 Mary Wray used strong words when she 
 warmed to her subject, but the strongest found 
 an echo in Rachel Withers' heart ; though she 
 did not dare add the weight of her own feeling 
 against Oliver Warleigh to the doubts Mary en- 
 tertained. She afterward spoke to her god- 
 mamma about what had passed, but Bittersweet 
 gave another testimony. " I do not believe 
 that Oliver Warleigh's passions will ever carry 
 him over the borders of the most respectable 
 vices," said she. " He is quietly lavish, grasp- 
 ing and self-seeking in practice, but his moral 
 theories are of the beat. He is a plausible, 
 skillful, cautious person, and I dare say he will 
 live all his days in success and end them in 
 peace and honor — unless, indeed, the devil as- 
 sail him with some very strong and safe temp- 
 tation." 
 
 Rachel in the face of this opinion would have 
 been, ashamed to confess her own suspicions, 
 but her mind misgave her sorely in secret that 
 1 the choice of a new home for Annis was about 
 the worst that could have been made. But the 
 responsibility was none of hers ; her voice was 
 never heard in the matter from first to last. 
 
 About the middle of May the first step to- 
 ward the ultimate change was made by Sir 
 Laurence going over with Annis to Bristowe, 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 67 
 
 where Oliver Warleigh and Lady Georgiana 
 were to meet them in the course of a few days. 
 Annis was in blissful ignorance of what was 
 preparing for her, and played round her father 
 and Lucy as merrily as at home. Eaohel With- 
 ers had gone to Bristowe as Katherine's depu- 
 ty, she being detained at the rectory by her 
 own urgent private affairs ; and the quiet, kind 
 boul was as thankful for the respite to Annis as 
 if she herself were on the point of being con- 
 signed to Lady Georgiana's guardianship. It 
 is impossible to say that Annis was a good little 
 girl as good little girls are commonly estimated, 
 but she was very loving and very lovable ; as 
 truthful as the light, and so brave by nature 
 that nothing daunted her. Every body at Bris- 
 towe took to her amazingly. 
 
 Arthur Hill and Grace were there' — Grace 
 rather invalidish, as she always was, and now 
 seeming more so because she showed herself 
 aggrieved that Annis was not to be intrusted to 
 her. But Mrs. Damer Warleigh and the com- 
 mon-sense of the family generally, had been 
 against her undertaking so weighty a charge 
 from the very first ; Lady Georgiana, with her 
 robust health and successful practical manage- 
 ment of her own children, appeared to every 
 one except Rachel, Lucy and Mary Wray, much 
 better suited to it. 
 
 There had been a tender leaving-taking be- 
 tween Mary and her foster-child before Annis 
 set off; and so, for that matter, had there been 
 between Annis and her pony, the dogs, Mathew 
 and Mistress Dobie, and even Sir Sumflt, Ye 
 Babes and the Ogre ; but this was the little 
 gipsy's first going away from home, and though 
 sKe'was allowed to believe that she should re- 
 turn within a week, it was still a mighty serious 
 occasion. 
 
 Lucy had leave of absence from Hurtledale 
 for three mouths, at the end of which term of 
 probation it was hoped that Annis would be 
 sufficiently settled and at home with her cousins 
 to dispense with her services. Lady Georgiana 
 strongly objected at first to her going with the 
 child at all, as likely to do more harm than 
 good ; but Sir Laurence made such a point of 
 it that she was compelled to yield her opinion 
 to his. Lucy also had a decided feeling on the 
 matter, and even expressed herself as exceed- 
 ingly jealous of what might arise out of an ar- 
 rangement which she had from the beginning 
 thought wrong. But whatever any body thought, 
 the chief persons concerned were not warned, 
 and were not suspicious of any, possible mis- 
 chief ; and those who feared, and those who 
 doubted of results, could now but keep such 
 fears and such doubts to themselves, and hope 
 for the best. 
 
 Sir Laurence was gaining strength, but the 
 gray pallor of recent illness still showed in his 
 face, and it was quite touching to see Annis 
 with her brown and rosy visage pressed up 
 against his, that he might catch some of her 
 color, as she said. They were almost constant- 
 ly together, and Squire Damer Warleigh* often 
 made a third with them, being all the more wel- 
 come probably when he brought two or three 
 dogs in his train. The willful little gipsy dis- 
 dained the mild amusements of the morning 
 room, and always made haste to escape from 
 the blandishments of the womenkind, to the 
 
 society of any creature out of doors. Annis 
 was much more partial at this date to the other 
 sex than to her own. Toward her aunt Grace 
 she betrayed a manifest disfavor by reason of 
 her having indiscreetly proposed a daily reading 
 lesson ; she was now supposed to have conquer- 
 ed the alphabet, but she passed a by no means 
 triumphant examination when Rachel Withers 
 tried her with the big letters on the top of a 
 reel of thread. Still she had a wonderful mem- 
 ory for any thin'g learned by rote, and >■ very 
 brief spell of training and teaching would 
 bring her up to the level of the most " high 
 learned " children of her age. She was strong 
 and hardy as a little mountain pony at this pe- 
 riod, and tumbled down and picked herself up 
 again with many a bruise and graze, but never 
 a thought of tears. 
 
 " You need not be anxious for her, she will 
 take a great deal of killing," said Mrs. Damer 
 Warleigh, when Grace expressed some doubt as 
 to how she would bear the total change and 
 separation. 
 
 A great deal of killing ! well, even that was 
 a sort of comfort to reflect on in case Lady 
 Georgiana should prove n martinet. Every 
 body would naturally have felt more uncer- 
 tainty as to the issue of the experiment had 
 Annis been a frail, delicate sprite, instead of 
 the tough little wildling she was. 
 
 A few days longer of her happy unconscious- 
 ness went by ; then the Oliver Warleighs ar- 
 rived, bringing their eldest boy with them, and 
 a change came suddenly over the spirit of her 
 dream. Oh ! the resentful countenance she 
 showed to all around her ; what deep gloom in 
 her eyes, what resolute indignation on her set 
 lips ! The intensity of her wrath was hardly 
 childlike ; so helpless, yet so strong was it that 
 it seemed more like the amazed rage of some 
 entrapped animal. In vain Mortimer coaxed 
 her to play with him — she would not stir from 
 her father's side. When he was out of doors, 
 there was she, hanging to his hand ; when he 
 was indoors, there sat she on the floor embrac- 
 ing his leg, and defying every one of them with 
 her slow, dark glances. 
 
 Lady Georgiana was serene and amiable ; 
 nothing disturbed her cold placidity. Said 
 Grace to her one day half crying, " It will 
 never do ; the child will break her heart !" To 
 which her sister-in-law replied, laughing at her 
 serious air, "Nonsense! things of that age 
 have not found out yet that they have any 
 hearts to break. Away from her father she 
 will forget him in a month !" 
 
 Rachel Withers was present, and lier quiet 
 spirit rose at this. "Forget her father in a 
 month — no, that will she not !" cried she. "I 
 would back Gipsy's remembrance of those she 
 loves to outlast some of ours by many and 
 many a day !" Lady Georgiana gave Rachel 
 after this quite a shivering feel; it might be 
 prejudice, but whetlier from prejudice or a 
 well-grounded reason, she could not endure 
 her. 
 
 Oliver was quite at home in the situation — 
 plausible, kind, considerate, and anxious to put 
 every body else at ease. His eldest boy, Mor- 
 timer, was really a clever, well-behaved little 
 fellow, perfectly obedient, and yet not cowed ; 
 he loved his stony-bosomed Spartan mother, 
 
58 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 watched her eye, forestalled her commands, 
 and seemed to let his very thoughts move only 
 under her authority. It would need many, 
 many weary efforts of coercion to trim Annis 
 into this perfection of order and discipline. 
 
 One night after she was gone to bed Sir Lau- 
 rence and Rachel Withers had a little talk to- 
 gether about her. He said, " You are the only 
 woman who was kind to Helena except Mrs. 
 Darner Warleigh ; and you are the only woman 
 her child takes to." 
 
 Rachel replied that Annis was more familiar 
 with her face — that was all. 
 
 " I wish from my_heart she were to be famil- 
 iar with no other," rejoined he; and then he 
 got up and walked away looking perplexed and 
 gloomy. Presently he came back and began 
 to ask if Rachel approved of Lady Georgiana. 
 What could she say ? She told him she thought 
 her very successful in the management of child- 
 ren. 
 
 " Yes," muttered he ; " but Annis manifests 
 more repugnance to her than to any of them — it 
 is just the soared shyness of the filly to the rough 
 rider who is to break her in." 
 
 Here Oliver interrupted them and challenged 
 his brother to a game at chess. 
 
 It was not Rachel only who had conceived an 
 aversion for Lady Georgiana when domesticated 
 with her in the same house. Mrs. Darner War- 
 leigh's kind heart yearned with pity over the 
 child jis the time for her departure drew near ; 
 and her change of mood testified to her fear ajid 
 loathing of her future guardians. 
 *" I wish I had never meddled in the matter," 
 she said to Grace soon after Oliver and his wife 
 . arrived ; " and the Squire does not half approve 
 of it either. 'Tis a pity Kate could not take 
 her — but then Kate has her hands full, and Lau- 
 rence perhaps would not have consented." 
 
 " Kate could not manage her, and the diffi- 
 culty of keeping her from running away to the 
 Hurtlemere House would have made their Hves 
 together a continual fight," replied Grace ; " but 
 she might have been suffered to come to me. 
 Arthur was not unwilling, and I could have found 
 her playmates enough. She would have made 
 up to me for having no children of my own. I 
 shall always think they might have trusted her 
 to me." 
 
 Annis was not distinctly apprised or her des- 
 tiny until the evening before she was parted 
 from her father. On that last night Sir Lau- 
 rence himself told her that in the morning she 
 must go away with her aunt Georgiana and her 
 cousin Mortimer, and that to please papa she 
 must not cry but bo a good little darling. 
 
 She never quite believed it until that moment ; 
 for she looked up at him with a dumb, imploring 
 gaze, stretched her hand to his face, then hid 
 her eyes against his breast and never spoke. 
 She was making her mute resignation of his love. 
 Only Rachel Withers was present besides them- 
 selves ; and she had not expected .this, neither 
 had Sir Laurence. Tears and violence they 
 were prepared for, but not this silent agony. 
 For ever so long a pin might have been heard 
 to drop in the room. Sir Laurence sat with his 
 face bent down over the loving little head, — a 
 most pitiful tenderness in the whole attitude of 
 
 him. By and by he got up and carried her into 
 the quiet garden, all lovely with the freshness of 
 spring, and walked about with her in his arms 
 until dusk ; then Rachel lost sight of them for a 
 little while, and about nine o'clock he came into 
 the drawing-room alone. Rachel went to peep 
 at her before going to her own room, and found 
 her fast asleep with Lucy sitting by her pillow 
 softly sobbing — she said it was a shame, a cruel 
 shame, so it was, to take the poor little .bairn 
 from her father, and she wished they might not 
 all live to repent it ! 
 
 The next morning before any body had moved 
 from the breakfast-table. Sir Laurence's horse 
 and Annis's pony passed the window — he was 
 going to ride with her one stage on her journey, 
 'fhe rest of the travehng party were to follow 
 in the carriage -half an hour later. 
 
 And that was the last glimpse any of them at 
 Bristowe had of the dear, pretty gipsy, perched 
 on her beloved Brownie, and gazing round from 
 face to face with dark, dry eyes : thmrs were not 
 dry. 
 
 " It is like the grief of a woman !" sobbed 
 Grace as they rode away, the Squire walking 
 down the avenue beside Annis, and endeavoring 
 to make the scene more cheerful with buoyant, 
 loud-voiced talk. Rachel ran up to the gallery 
 window, and watched, along the road untU they 
 were out of sight, but neither turned or looked 
 back for a moment. 
 
 Mrs. Damer Warleigh expected Sir Laurence 
 would return to Bristowe, but he did not ; and 
 when the servants came back with the carriage 
 after depositing Lucy and the Oliver Warleighs 
 at the railway-station, they brought a message to 
 the effect that Sir Laurence had gone straight 
 away to the Hurtlemere House after seeing his 
 little daughter off. 
 
 " Did she fret ?" Rachel asked of old James, 
 the coachman. He couldn't say she did fret — 
 not to be seen. She was u, good plucked one, 
 that was what she was ! 
 
 The women would rather have heard of a 
 storm of passionate tears than of that quiet, in- 
 ward bleeding, so unnatural in a child — but they 
 repeated to each other for consolation old James's 
 testimony to her courage. She was a good 
 plucked one, that was what she was ; and she 
 would take a great deal of killing. 
 
 CHAPTER THE THIRD. 
 
 A RUMOR, AND WHAT CAME OP IT. 
 
 How oft the Bight of means to do ill deeds 
 Makes ill deeds done. — Shakspbaee. 
 
 I. 
 Rachel Withers returned to Hurtledale two 
 days after Annis was taken away from Bristowe, 
 to find the rectory ,in serene possession of a 
 new baby. It was a girl this time, and Rachel 
 stood godmother, giving it her own plain name, 
 which was presently exchanged for the ridicu- 
 lous one of Sacharissa Tulip, a name which 
 stuck by the injured child until she was quite a 
 young woman. In this stage of her existence, 
 she was certainly kissed as if she were the 
 essence of sweetness, except by Dicky and mer- 
 ry Andrew, who protested that there was no 
 fun in girls, and would have liked to barter her 
 in her long-elothes for another boy. 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLINa. 
 
 59 
 
 Rachel was pleased with her acquisition. She 
 did not go into insane ecstasies over it, but she 
 liked it iu a highly proper, sufficient, feminine 
 manner — quite as much as could reasonably be 
 expected from a woman of four-and-tweuty, cut 
 out by nature, as Mrs. Sara Grandage averred, 
 for an old maid. Since she went to live at 
 Prior's Bank, she had gradually become a little 
 stouter, squarer, and more quietly formal in her 
 manners ; and when she tried to nurse Kather- 
 ine's tiny petkin, she was found not to have the 
 knack of handling a baby. It made a point of 
 doubling up the moment it was put into her 
 arms, and its precious little head was not 
 screwed on quite tight enough to satisfy her of 
 its security— only one turn more would have 
 done it. She never had any real enjoyment of 
 the comical creature until It was about ten 
 months old, when it took air-baths on a thick 
 blanket on the nursery-floor ; but this was not 
 yet, and, meanwhile, Katherine, hurt in her 
 mother's feelings by Rachel's incapability, told 
 her it was a shame to see her so stupid and 
 helpless with a baby. 
 
 "I can't help it," retorted Rachel ; " it would 
 not do if we were all alike. You are becoming 
 so very wife and very mother that you have not 
 a thought to spare for any thing beyond the 
 four walls of home, and John is growing ridic- 
 ulously fat from being taken so much care of," 
 and Katherine was growing of amazingly com- 
 fortable proportions too, though she fancied 
 herself quite thin ! It was a very happy, easy 
 household at the rectory, and though Rachel 
 and, Katherine tiffed a little now and then over 
 Sacharissa Tulip, they were excellent friends in 
 the main. 
 
 " Stay tea; Mr. Pemberton is coming," whis- 
 pered Katherine on this occasion. " There is 
 no affinity between godpapas and godmammas 
 amongst Protestants, you know, and John likes 
 him so much." 
 
 Mr. Pemberton was John's curate : a gentle- 
 man with some private means, middle-aged, and 
 a good scholar, but high-shouldered, plain-fea- 
 tured, and rather absent. He had stood god- 
 father with Rachel and Grace for Sacharissa 
 Tulip; and had betrayed what Katherine con- 
 sidered a very promising inclination toward 
 Rachel's society. But Rachel did not encour- 
 age him. 
 
 " It is no use trying to make a match for me, 
 Kate, I am cut out for an old maid," was her 
 reply to her sister-in-law's invitation ; on which 
 Katherine said she was a foolish, provoking, 
 obstinate woman, and let her go her own quiet, 
 reserved way, which was not the way to win her 
 Mr. Pemberton's shy affectiona 
 
 Indeed,* he married about a year after this 
 Miss Fanny Grantley, who was a good girl but 
 not diffident, and both John and Katherine felt 
 that it was quite Rachel's own fault. They gave 
 her up thenceforward to her godmamma's un- 
 mitigated rule, agreeing that perhaps she was 
 contented at Prior's Bank, and, if she were, it 
 was useless endeavoring to better a lot that 
 satisfied her. But this is advancing matters. 
 
 When Rachel came home from Bristowe, she 
 found Mrs. Sara Grandage in a mood of vexa- 
 tion over a letter from Mr. Gilsland, which had 
 reached her by post the morning before. After 
 the Gilslands left Brafferton she had helped them 
 twice or thrice with money, until, at length. 
 
 they had fixed themselves on her as pensioners ; 
 and very troublesome, exacting pensioners they 
 proved. She accompanied each xcmittance witjh 
 a warning that it was to be the last, but the 
 next humble petition found her as ready to un- 
 draw her purse-strings as ever. This time their 
 plea was that they had met with a very poorly- 
 paid curacy in Wiltshire, and were desirous of 
 entrapping some private pupils of either sex 
 " deprived of parental care," as their advertise- 
 ment set forth. 
 
 " Unhappy private pupils !" ej^ulated Bitter- 
 sweet, offering the letter for Rachel's perusal. 
 " I hope, Dumpling, you return grateful thanks 
 on your stubborn little knees every day of your 
 life for having been preserved from that man ? 
 Tou ought to bless Betsy Briggs as the greatest 
 benefactress woman ever had !" 
 
 No ; Rachel did not look on the matter en- 
 tirely in that light. 
 
 " Mr. Gilsland is not so bad as his wife," was 
 her perverse reply. " He would not write beg- 
 ging letters unless she made him — she dictated 
 this precious epistle." 
 
 " Oh, oh !" laughed her godmamma, and then 
 vindictively rejoined, " I stung my forefinger 
 with a brier this morning and can not hold a 
 pen ; therefore you must answer the ' precious 
 epistle ' for me, and decline compliance with its 
 request." 
 
 " No, that will I not — not If it goes unanswer- 
 ed until doomsday," Rachel with decision as- 
 sured her. 
 
 " Then you will be the cause of my wasting 
 money on their worthlessness — you will be the 
 cause of wretched orphans being made more 
 wretched still ; for I shall inclose them a hand- 
 some check instead' of writing if you refuse to 
 do it." 
 
 Rachel did refuse, and Bittersweet did inclose 
 them a handsome check. John Withers gave 
 her some strong advice on the subject, happen- 
 ing to drop iu at the moment ; but she put it - 
 away for future use instead of at once applying 
 it to the case, and she had the provoking ma- 
 lice to say to her goddaughter when she ha(i 
 done it : 
 
 " It is all for your sake. Dumpling ! As long 
 as I live I shall periodically pick these interest- 
 ing folks out of the mire, and when I am gone 
 the Christian duty will devolve upon you." 
 
 Rachel was annoyed at her way of putting 
 the case, and warmly repelled the idea that she 
 could under any circumstances come forward 
 as their helper ; but Bittersweet only raised her 
 eyebrows incredulously and bade her give over 
 protesting. 
 
 " My dear little Dumpling, it is of no use 
 talking to me — / know you. You would give 
 that man three fourths of your, last sixpence, 
 and he would take it. You have_ an utter con- 
 tempt for him, but for old love's sake— now 
 don't get into a passion— /<)»■ old love's sake, I 
 repeat it, you would not see him down without 
 longing to give him a lift — and lucky it is "for 
 some men that some women are made of your 
 disposition. Don't talk to me about his not de- 
 serving it — if we charitable worldly folks only 
 helped those who deserve it, want and wicked- 
 ness would soon be starved off the face of the 
 earth together. Dumpling, you are more than 
 ever a goose !" 
 Perhaps so, but Bittersweet" could put forth 
 
60 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 her cackle of nonsense too. Kachel wished in 
 her heart that Mr. Gilsland were comfortably 
 transported to some place where she should 
 never hear of him again. Her temper was not 
 prone to revenge, and therefore it was always 
 more or less of a pain to her to hear of liis 
 troubles ; and his permanent extrication from 
 them would have been welcomed by her. It 
 was disagreeable to revert to her old follies and 
 mortifications, now that she had done with them ; 
 but if any body supposed that a sentimental halo 
 surrounded Mr. Gilsland in her memory still, 
 because she had once been such an ineffable 
 simpleton as to love him, any body was much 
 mistalsen. There were moments when she felt 
 an almost intolerable sense of shame for her past 
 absurdities — how handsome she had thought 
 him, how eloquent, how superior in every way 
 to her honest, plodding, duty-loving brother 
 John — that man who wrote maudlin begging- 
 letters, and loathed the wife he had married for 
 her money ! 
 
 It was only by degrees that Rachel had come 
 to a true sense of the greatness of her deliver- 
 ance. Betsy Briggs was harsh and grasping and 
 ill-natured, but he had a base, crawling, creeping 
 soul ; a man with a grain of self-respect could 
 never have written as he did to Bittersweet. 
 He had made his cowardly cast for fortune and 
 had lost all, present and future too ; poverty is 
 a vast temptation, that Rachel could allow, but 
 she said to herself with a vehemence of disgust, 
 that had she been in his place, she would have 
 Iain down to starve and die rather than degrade 
 herself as he had done ! She was sick of the 
 thought of him, and wished his name might 
 never sound in lier ears more ; but her devout 
 aspiration was not to be realized. 
 
 Aa Grace ana Arthur Hill traveled south- 
 ward again to their Devonshire rectory, they 
 •turned out of their road to go for a single day to 
 Hastings, where Aunis was now at home witli 
 the Oliver Warleighs. Grace's account of her 
 written in full detail to Katherine was not either 
 particularly cheering or very much the reverse. 
 The apartments occupied by the Oliver War- 
 leighs were pleasantly situated, sh'E said, and 
 the children had no stint of air and space ; but 
 she thought Annis looking pale; though this 
 Lady Georgiana assured her was only the effect 
 of the sunburn Wearing off. She exhibited the 
 child to her aunt equipped for a walk on the sands 
 in a holland blouse, a bonnet and a blue ugly ; 
 her elfish locks had been clipped, and she looked 
 admirably groomed, but the friisk and frolic or 
 her nature were in a phase of permanent sup- 
 pression. Lucy, who was herself well and con- 
 ■ tented, said her little charge was settling better' 
 than she expected, though she n^ver dared lose 
 sight of her for a single moment, lest she should 
 try to run away — which did not look much like 
 settling, thought Grace. 
 
 Lady Georgiana was so strict and methodical 
 that a breach of her rules was hardly possible, 
 but she was not actively unkind ; and if children 
 could thrive and be happy without any warmth 
 of love her system would be a most prosperous 
 one — but they can not any more than flowers 
 can thrive without sunshine. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh apparently exercised no in- 
 
 fluence in his wife's domain. He found Hastings 
 hot and dull, and longed for Paris, whither Sir 
 Laurence was gone. What further course his 
 travels would take was not known either there 
 or in Hurtledale ; but it was not anticipated that 
 he would stay long amongst cities and civiliza- 
 tion unless his change of health had induced also 
 a thorough change of mind and mood. He had 
 some idea of going to South America when he 
 left home, but Katherine opined that he would 
 not take himself very far away anywhere until 
 he had full assurance that his little wildling was 
 happy with her kinsfolks. 
 
 Neither did he. Annis had been at Hastings 
 about a month when one afternoon while she' 
 was down on the sands with Lucy, her cousins 
 and Salter their nurse. Sir Laurence was seen 
 coming along toward them. Aimis had dug a 
 hole for the water to flow into which she caUed 
 Hurtlemere, and was busy piling up the house a 
 little way from it, working with fiery energy, 
 unlike the other children, who lay basking in 
 the sun, when Lucy cried out, "Look there. 
 Miss Annis, who is this ?" pointing at the same 
 time to the swiftly advancing figure. 
 
 "Papa, papa!" cried Annis, and flung down 
 her spade and rushed to meet him like the wind. 
 The nurses saw her taken up and fondly 
 hugged, then carried down to the water's edge, 
 and for an hour, while the tide was flowing in, 
 there Sir Laurence paced with her in his arms, 
 eagerly talking both, as if all the time before 
 them were too short for the utterance of their 
 mutual love. Presently he took off the child's 
 sunshade, and her prim little bonnet, and rufled 
 up her short locks into some likeness of theii; 
 former tangledom ; then set her down, withdrew 
 a pace or two to look at her, and laughing aloud, 
 snatched her up again, making quite merry over 
 her funny appearance, aa Lucy interpreted his 
 gestures. 
 
 At last he brought her back to her nurse, 
 saying ,^at "Now he must go !" 
 
 " Where are you going, papa ?" asked the 
 piping voice and wistful eye. 
 
 He told her to look far away over the sea in 
 the west and said, " There." She did not un- 
 derstand. He explained that he was going 
 across the water in a big ship, and that as soon 
 as he reached the land beyond he would send 
 her a large letter written by himself to tell her 
 all about his voyage, which Lucy must read to 
 her. 
 
 " And I will write a large letter to you, papa," 
 was the fond answer — poor little darling, still 
 entatigled in pothooks and hangers ! Then there 
 was a long, silent kiss and he left her, quite 
 patient and submissive ; that lesson slie had 
 learned perfectly already. 
 
 By this glimpse of his pretty gipsy at her play, 
 Sir Laurence had satisfied himself that her body, 
 at least, was not pining; Lucy's affectionate 
 care had softened the worst asperities of the 
 change, and he quitted her with a mind at ease. 
 A few days afterward he sailed from Southamp- 
 ton in the design of a two years' adventure in 
 South America. The effort of leaving Hurtle- 
 mere had more than repaid its pain ; his fever, 
 as Bittersweet premised, had routed out old 
 melancholies, and reviving strength had driven 
 them away ; his brother Oliver and all who saw 
 him at Hastings, reported that he looked as hale 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 61 
 
 and as cheerful as ever he did in his life. New 
 air Iiad given him new courage, and it was nbt 
 without a lioen sense of present enjoyment that 
 he found himself once more on the sea, and on 
 the way to a renewal of the free, wild existence 
 in which he had been so well content before the 
 short, beautiful dream of his life with Heleiia 
 came and ended it. 
 
 in. 
 
 That summer seemed to Rachel Withers more 
 long-drawn out than any previous summer since 
 she came to Prior's Bank. Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 did not make an annual practice of changing her 
 ( quarters, and her goddaughter felt the want of 
 variety ; but variety was not what she was like- 
 ly to have, for the older Bittersweet grew, the 
 less she appeared to care for it. 
 
 One day in the latter summer, Katherinetook 
 her for a drive to Whinstane over the purple 
 moors. Their purpose was to see Lady Foulis, 
 and neither could perceive that she was any the 
 worse for her last four or five years' wear. She 
 was rather deafer perhaps, and her memory 
 played her false sometimes ; otherwise she wa.? 
 pretty much the same as when Katherine and 
 Grace were married from the Tower. The vis- 
 itors told her about Sir Laurence being gone 
 on his travels again, and about Annis being 
 left under the care of Oliver Warleigh and 
 Lady Georgiana ; to which last item of informa- 
 tion she made one of her grotesque replies. 
 
 " Send a wood-pigeon to be nurse-tended by 
 a goshawk ! What if it pyke out its eyes, 
 you wise folk,, you wary folk!" and then she 
 wandered off to other topics more personal to 
 herself, and recurred to the child no more. 
 
 These duty visits Katherine had paid to Lady 
 Foulis twice annually' since her marriage, but 
 the weird old woman grew each time apparently 
 more indifferent to them. How long life will 
 linger and last in some human frames when 
 worn utterly threadbare of joy, love, hope, in- 
 terest ! Lady Foulis was a miracle of passive 
 endurance ; it could not be said now that she 
 suffered, but it would have seemed even less 
 irksome to suffer than to vegetate in the trance 
 of feeling that enthralled her. 
 
 " Why do you not go out into the sun now 
 and then ?" Katherine asked her. " The place 
 is so overgrown and deserted now, that nobody 
 would disturb you ?" 
 
 Lady Foulis turned her face to the shining 
 sky visible through the open window, and after 
 gazing at it vacantly for a few minutes, said, 
 " I have lost the use of my limbs," though they 
 had seen her walk across the room not five 
 minutes before. 
 
 Katherine told Rachel afterward that this 
 was her invariable reply whenever, after Sir 
 William's death, she was invited to take the air. 
 " I have lost the use of my limbs." Whether 
 she really fancied so, or whether she merely 
 used the words in a figurative sense as express- 
 ing her determination never again to cross the 
 threshold of her refuge, no one could tell. She 
 did not appear uncheerful by any means, though 
 she sawher visitors come without pleasure, and 
 go without regret. Some day she would just 
 lay her gray head down and die, and noWdy 
 would miss her ; she would only be one ghost 
 the less haunting Whinstane Tower. 
 
 Toward the end of August Lucy returned to 
 
 Hurtledale, and a fortnight later she took up 
 her abode as mistress at the farm on which 
 young Robb had entered at Lady-Day. She 
 looked frfesh and blooming from her seaside so- 
 journ. Duriiig her absence she had been at 
 Everham, and had visited many former friends ; 
 but old Mrs. Gwynne, Helena's grandmother, 
 was dead, and strangers were in possession of 
 the house, where the violets grew in such sweet 
 profusion under the breakfast-room window. 
 Lucy's account of Annis. was fair on the whole, 
 and tallied with what Lady Georgiana wrote to 
 Katherine. The child was no lover of litera- 
 ture, and after three months of steady teaching, 
 she could not read words of four letters yet ; 
 but she grew and played, no one better. She 
 was moody at first, but her dullness and ill-tem- 
 per wore off by degrees. 
 
 " It is a life that is like a strait-waistcoat to 
 her after running wild at Hurtlemere ; but it 
 don't vex her now as much as it did," Lucy 
 told Rachel Withers. " She is downright ob- 
 stinate, that is what she is ; if she takes a no- 
 tion into her head, I defy any body either t"o 
 scold or to coax it out of her again. She's 
 very provoking, and she can't abide Lady Geor- 
 giana. Some people would spite her fbr it, 
 but Lady Georgiana doesn't — she's always the 
 same, and Miss Annis might just as well beat 
 her head against a stone wall as think to put 
 Iter past her patience. She is served just like 
 her cousins ; there is no difference made among 
 'em nor allowed. I can't say but they all be- 
 have very well to her — only Mr. Oliver he 
 don't notice her much, and she runs out of his 
 way whenever she sees him coming ; for she's a 
 queer suspicious little thing to them she takes 
 against, and him she hated from first sight." 
 
 " And whom in the household does she love 
 best ?" Rachel inquired. 
 
 " I thmk it's Mactavish, an ugly Scotch dog 
 that belongs to Master Mortimer," replied Lucy. 
 " They are both odd in their tempera and might 
 be something akin, as Salter says. It is the 
 creature most like being at home to her, and 
 that is the reason." Ra6hel asked further if 
 Salter was kindly disposed toward her addition- 
 al ^charge. "Salter is well paid, and has no 
 reason to object to any thing," was the answer. 
 " Before I came away, she got an under-nurse 
 to help her, a girl I can speak for, a cousin 
 of my own who lived at Everham. Salter's 
 tongue's a bit rough at times, but she means 
 nothing amiss. Miss Annis will take no harm 
 from her." 
 
 " And how did she bear the parting from you, 
 Lucy ?" was the next interrogatory. 
 
 Lucy looked touched with a too-late com- 
 punction as she said: "Well, Miss Rachel, I 
 was that coward of seeing her fret that I never 
 told her, and wouldn't have her told. She'd 
 miss me in the morning, and Salter would drfess 
 her instead, and so it would break on her that 
 I was gone. She is grown used to them all 
 now, and maybe she wouldn't feel it so much 
 as I was afraid she might — children have not 
 such long memories as old folks. But I 
 wish, now, I'd kissed the pretty darling good- 
 by !" 
 
 IV. 
 
 For several months after his departure from 
 England news of Sir Laurence Warleigh came 
 
62 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 with strict regularity both to Hastings and to 
 Hurtledale ; but the November mails brought 
 no letters to either, and there was a failure also 
 in Mr. Bond's intelligence. Katherine was 
 greatly disquieted, and carried her uneasiness 
 to Rachel at Prior's Bank — what could Lau- 
 rence's silence mean ? 
 
 " I should imagine that it might easily be ex- 
 plained on the supposition that he has got be- 
 iyond the regions of posts," said Mrs. Sara Grand- 
 age, who was in a sarcastic mood. " Most 
 likely he is hunting alligators or bears on the 
 top of the Skihi mountains — depend upon it 
 he is in some mischief, but quite safe. Com- 
 mend me' to the women of this generation for 
 worrying themselves about shadows and fan- 
 cies. " 
 
 The early December mails brought no letters 
 again, and Mr. Bond being inconvenienced by 
 his master's silence, came over to the rectory to 
 consult Katherine about it ; but she could only 
 suggest Bittersweet's explanation or else the 
 tediousness of writing letters. 
 
 " It must be very tiresome for a traveler to 
 keep up a flow of domestic intelhgence when he 
 has betaken himself for a season to the ways 
 and customs of savage life," she said ; but though 
 she mid it, it neither relieved her own mind nor 
 satisfied the steward's. 
 
 Waiting for news is weariful work, but when 
 ill-news comes most of us would fain barter the 
 pang of it for the aching expectancy that has 
 culminated in the worst tidings that could have 
 been brought us. 
 
 On the fifteenth of December there came to 
 the rectory a letter from Oliver Warleigh, con- 
 taining the intelligence that Sir Laurence was 
 dead. He had started one day in company with 
 another English gentleman, whose name was 
 Carew, and attended by' several natives, on an 
 expedition into the forests, which was to last a 
 week. They were in n. very wild part. of the 
 country, and had to carry their provisions, tent, 
 and other necessaries with them. Four, days 
 beyond the stated time for their absence had 
 elapsed, when Mr. Carew reappeared alone at 
 the missionary station whence they had started, 
 wounded, and almost worn out with hungei" and 
 fatigue. His story was that on the last day of 
 their journey, when they were preparing for a 
 return to the station, they were set upon by a 
 party of savages, that their guide and servants 
 fled, and that both Sir Laurence and himself 
 were shot down. His wound, however, was 
 trifling, and he made his escape after lying 
 close for a few hours in the brushwood ; btit 
 of Sir Laurence he had seen nothing from 
 the moment he fell, and he believed him to be 
 dead. 
 
 This account, written by Mr. Carew himself 
 from the Catholic missionary station where he 
 then lay ill, was inclosed in Oliver Warleigh's 
 letter to John Withers and Katherine. It came 
 upon them with the shock of a terrible and un- 
 expected disaster — call it but a i-umor, as Mr. 
 Bond did, still it seemed to have a foundation 
 in truth ! Oliver believed it so fully that he had 
 ordered Annis and all his household to be put 
 into mourning forthwith ; Katherine refused to 
 do this yet — so long as there was uncertainty 
 she determined to think there was hope. Mr. 
 Carew did not say he had seen Sir Laurence 
 
 dead, but only that he believedhim. dead ; it was 
 a slender stay but she clung to it, and presently 
 received some additional strength from an ir- 
 regular source. 
 
 As soon as Mistress Dobie heard the fatal 
 rumor, she went down to the rectory to see 
 Katherine, protesting by all her superstitions 
 that she did not believe the story one bit. 
 
 " If he'd been to die this year shouldn't we 
 ha' seen th' White Hands hovermg aboon him? 
 , They'd not fail o' th' sign, an' him the head o' 
 ' the family too." Katherine murmured some- 
 thing in acquiescence. " Don't tell me o' Sir 
 Laurence being dead, he's no more dead than I , 
 am!" the dame went on, emboldened by an 
 encouragement that perhaps she did not expect ; 
 " if he'd been to die wouldn't he ha' gone off 
 in the fever ? but I knew he'd pull through and 
 be stronger than ever. 'Cause why ? the White 
 Hands never appeared ! He'd getteu a new 
 lease o' life when he set off to them foreign . 
 parts, an' last words he spoke to me afore start- 
 ing was that he felt more like himself again 
 than he'd done for years." 
 
 When Mary Wray heard the tale she imme- 
 diately, cried, " Send for the bairn — I pray you, 
 send for the bairn ?" 
 
 But who was to send for her ? Her uncle 
 Oliver was her natural guardian if her father 
 were, indeed, dead ; and he had left her in his 
 care, out of which nobody could take her. Then 
 Lucy went to Katherine with tears on her pretty 
 bridal face, saying, " Oh, Sir Laurence was the 
 best master ever servant had, and the tenderest 
 father to Miss Aimis. They'll bring her home 
 to Hurtlemere now, won't they ? They'll nevCT 
 leave her in Mr. Oliver's hands ?" 
 - These open evidences of distrust only served 
 to intensify Katherine's anxieties, and her broth- 
 er Oliver's unannounced arrival at the rectory 
 two days after his letter complicated them still 
 further. He was in a very nervous, excited 
 state both of mind and body ; physically he was 
 not strong, and great agitations soon threw him 
 altogether off his balance. Under these circum- 
 stances he was any thing but an acceptable guest 
 amongst people already suffering and distressed. 
 His object in his prompt descent on Hurtledale 
 was to see the steward. 
 
 Mr. Bond was a cool and resolute man ; he 
 obeyed Oliver Warleigh's summons but he obey- 
 ed it leisurely, and behaved throughout the in- 
 terview with great circumspection. He was 
 determined to keep a tight hand over the pow- 
 ers that had been left with him, and said with 
 entire respect but no doubtful decision, " Until 
 'I receive more positive information of Sir Lau- 
 rence's death, than any that has come to us yet, 
 Mr. Oliver, I shall continue to act as under his 
 orders." . 
 
 Oliver was exceedingly angry ; he put on high 
 and mighty airs ; said the steward was presump- 
 tuous, though he was only faithful, and even 
 went so far as to throw imputations on his mo- 
 tives. But Mr. Bond was too strong in his con- 
 scious integrity to be moved by any thing of 
 this sort, and though during the course of the 
 ne^few days Oliver visited Pfenslaven, Whin- 
 staft and Hurtlemere, in Annis's interest, as 
 he said, but really with the'overseeing eye of a 
 greedy master-expectant, he gained nothing by 
 it — people did not even give him the title ; a 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 63 
 
 trifling discourtesy, but one that stung him to 
 the quick. 
 
 Much gossip flew about the dales during the 
 old Christmas season when neighbors were cir- 
 culating from house to house to make it merry. 
 But at the rectory there was a cloud and at 
 Prior's Bank too. One night when they were 
 alone, Mrs. Sara Grandage and her goddaugljter 
 fell to talking all the circumstances of Sir Lau- 
 rence's rumored death over ; and Rachel, at 
 length, appealed to the sagacious old lady to tell 
 her candidly what she thought of them. Bitter- 
 sweet wrinkled her brows and demurred to the 
 comprehensive question — she had a reputation 
 for wisdom which she was not inclined to pledge 
 rashly in a ease of such great moment. 
 
 " There is an air of probability about the story 
 — an air of great probability," said she in her 
 musing way, " but' I should not be at all aston- 
 ished to hear at any Jjour that Sir Laurence had 
 turned up again, quite safe and sound. If I 
 were "in Oliver Warleigh's shoes, I should not 
 make haste to kick them off and get into my 
 brother's on the strength of the information we 
 have at present. Bond is quite justified in 
 keeping hold of every thing until he hears more. 
 I wish, for my part, he had hold of Sir Lau- 
 rence's daughter too !" 
 
 Further than this Bittersweet would not utter ; 
 but Eachel interpreted her oracle's words to 
 mean as low a state of belief as her own and 
 Katherine's. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh went over to Bristowe before 
 returning home, and there he found the house- 
 hold had not been put into mourning any more 
 than that at the rectory. He expressed violent 
 displeasure, and Mrs. Damer Warleigh, in speak- 
 ing to Katherine afterward, s^id his behavior 
 was an exhibition most odious and painful to 
 witness. No one had better reason to know 
 this than Katherine herself. He lost his temper 
 with every body who dared to suggest a doubt 
 of his brother's death, and declared they were 
 all fools together. The shock of joy, some peo- 
 ple said, had been almost too much for his 
 reason ; and they were astonished that Lady 
 Georgiana, who was better versed than most 
 women in the art of taking things coolly, had 
 not warned him against the ill-appearance his 
 exuberance would have in the eyes of a censo- 
 rious world. It was an exceeding relief to all 
 at the rectory when, after a week of worry and 
 wretchedness, he took his way southward once 
 more. 
 
 By the next ship that sailed for the port whith- 
 er Sir Laurence had gone just six months before, 
 Mr. Bond's eldest son, a shrewd young lawyer's 
 clerk of five-and-twenty, set out with* plenary 
 powers to investigate, on behalf of Katherine 
 and John, the report that had been sent home 
 of his Jeath. Oliver denounced the measure as 
 quite needless, and Grace Hill, who had taken 
 the sad story on the darkest side, hoped from it 
 no good results. But until this was done, Mr. 
 Bond refused to yield up one iota of his mas- 
 ter's property or his own authority into other 
 hands, and Katherine equally refused to put on 
 black for her brother. 
 
 It seemed like disaster upon disaster ! Three 
 days after Oliver Warleigh went back to Has- 
 
 tings, there came to Katherine a, letter from 
 Lady Georgiana apprising her that the scarlet 
 fever in its worst form had broken out in her 
 nursery. The nursemaid, Lucy's cousin, was 
 the first to sicken, then Mortimer, and now lit- 
 tle Annis. The two other children had been 
 sent out of the way as soon as the disease de- 
 clared itself. 
 
 Katherine instantly became impatient to go to 
 the assistance and comfort of her sister-in-law ; 
 but this Dr. Beane expressly forbade for the 
 sake of her own darlings. "Then Rachel With- 
 ers proposed to make the journey, but neither 
 would her godmamma allow her to encounter 
 the risk. " What good could you do ?" she 
 asked, when Rachel became very urgent. " You 
 are not used to children, still less to sick child- 
 ren and would be far more of a trouble than of a 
 help if you did go." Lucy Robb would have 
 Undertaken the mission, but her husband re- 
 fused to hear of it, and as for poor Mary 
 Wray, she had never been out of the dales in 
 her life. There was nothing for it but to wait 
 the turn of events. 
 
 Each morning's post was watched for anxious- 
 ly. The next letter — rather long delayed — was 
 from Oliver : he said Mortimer had the fever the 
 most violently — Annis the least so. He made 
 some mysterious allusion to further intelligence 
 from abroad, substantiating the report of his 
 brother's death, but entered into no particulars 
 on the score of Kate's unwillingness to be con- 
 vinced of an event so deplorable. One thing 
 was evident to all — Oliver himself credited it, 
 and Lady Georgiana also fully credited it ; they 
 were as firmly persuaded in their own minds that 
 Sir Laurence was dead as they were of their own 
 existence in the body. Bittersweet made a re- 
 mark that startled Rachel as she was recounting 
 to her the contents of this letter. 
 
 " Whether Sir Laurence be dead or not, the 
 belief of it has taken dangerous root in Oliver's 
 mind," she said, and their eyes met. 
 
 Rachel felt her color come and go, and her' 
 pulse quicken. What did her godmamma mean , 
 to insinuate ? She did not idare ask her, and 
 her own thoughts were too dark to be told. 
 Whence came her suspicions and her fears ? 
 She did not go in search of them. Were they 
 sent to her for warnings ? she asked in the air. 
 
 The day after this letter of Oliver's was re- 
 ceived at the rectory, Lucy carried one thither 
 which she had just had from Salter, the respect- 
 able nurse who was her fellow-servant at Has- 
 tings. She was no longer with Lady Georgiana's 
 children, but with a family in London. She had 
 heard of her former charge's illness, and now 
 wrote to Lucy about it, telling her that she 
 had been discharged from her situation at the 
 time news came of Sir Laurence Warleigh's 
 death, on the plea that she exercised favoritism 
 in the nursery to the prejudice of Annis. 
 "But," said she, in her 'letter, "so far was I 
 from slighting her that I stood up for her many 
 a time and oft. For after you was gone, Lucy, 
 she had sharp work of it with her book and 
 Lady Georgiana, and fretted her little heart so 
 that it quite pitied one to see her. She was 
 dull, and I don't think a day went over her 
 head that she was not either stood in the corner 
 with her face to the wall, or else shut up in the 
 dark closet; and that she could not bear, her 
 
64 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 spirit was BO high. I spoke my mind about it, 
 and Lady Georgiana gave me ray discharge, and 
 a month's wage without any warning. She got 
 Mrs. Lupton, who was her maid in her first hus- 
 band's time, to come temporary while she 
 found somebody in my place. If she is there 
 now, the children will not be tended badly, for 
 she is a clever nurse, though I always thought 
 her a spiteful, proud thing. But I wish you 
 was there, or else me, on account of poor Miss 
 Annis. She ought to be put in Chancery, to 
 be took care of if her papa is dead — it would 
 be safer. One has heard tell of strange things, 
 but I say naught." 
 
 Thctagh Salter said naught she said quite 
 enough to increase every body's distress on the 
 child's account; her letter was detained and 
 shown to Mr. Bond. " I'll just go over to Has- 
 tings and see how things are," suggested he ; 
 and he started by that night's mail, reaching his 
 destination by the middle of the next day. 
 
 But he was too late. He was met at the door 
 with the intelligence that Annis was dead. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh was in the act of inditing a 
 letter to Katherine with the pitiful tidings when 
 the steward was ushered into his presence. He 
 looked desperately nervous and ill ; said he 
 could not live through such a period of anxiety 
 agam ; wished a thousand times he had never 
 undertaken the care of his brother's child ; and 
 then Lady Georgiana entered, grave and stately, 
 and relieved him from the strain of conversa- 
 tion. 
 
 Her husband left the room, and she bore the 
 brunt of all the questions Mr. Bond chose to put 
 to her, replying to them with an air of candid 
 precision. Annis had struggled against the fe- 
 ver successfully at first : they had better hopes 
 for her than for Mortimer ; but all at once she 
 sank, and never rallying again, died about ten 
 o'clock the night before. 
 
 Mr. Bond saw Mortimer.;— a wan little skeleton 
 in his bed, for he was recovering ; but he did 
 not see Annis. He was one of those persons 
 who shrink from beholding the dead. For a 
 moment he thought he miMi, he ought — that no 
 one would be satisfied in Hurtledale unless he 
 did ; but Lady Georgiana made no suggestion 
 of the propriety of his doing so, and he was 
 thankful to escape the necessity. 
 
 The following day he Visited Lady Georgiana 
 again, and arranged with her that the corpse 
 should be carried to Hurtledale for interment. 
 "Annis must be laid beside her mother; if Sir 
 Laurence were at home, I am sure that is what 
 he would wish," said he. And Oliver Warleigh 
 after some demur acceded to it. 
 
 At the same time as the steward was making 
 these last arrangements' at Hastings, his letter 
 and Oliver's containing the bitter news were be- 
 ing read at the rectory with many teat's and 
 useless regrets. Before the day was done the 
 intelligence had flown through the dale, and the 
 hazardous tongues of all the gossips were un- 
 loosed. 
 
 " Has the bairn had fair play. Miss Rachel ?" 
 asked Mary "Wray, putting into words the doubt 
 that had visited unbidden many minds besides 
 hers. " Has the bairn had fair play, think ya ?" 
 
 Bittersweet stared into the fire and said noth- 
 
 ing; but there was a world of silent meaning m 
 her face. Rachel only shook her head, and re- 
 marked that it was a very fatal fever. Lucy 
 Robb just cried and reiterated that it could not • 
 be true — she would not believe it ; but realizing 
 it by degrees, she sobbed, " Oh ! if I'd been 
 there she'd never have died ! She was like dear 
 Misg Helena — she broke her heart amongst 
 strangers ; it was that killed her more than th« 
 fever." 
 
 The rector, the tenants, and all the persons 
 in Sir Laurence Warleigh's employment met the * 
 coffin when it arrived at Brafferton in charge of 
 Oliver and Mr. Bond. Hearse and mourning- 
 coaches were in readiness, and the funeral pro- 
 ceeded through six miles of stormy weather 
 over the moor straight to Hurtledale church- 
 yard. Here were assembled in the wind and the 
 sleet, Katherine and her children, Rachel, Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh and the Squire, Mary Wray, 
 and Lucy Robb, and all the cottage and farmer- 
 folk from far and near. It was a scene long 
 remembered in the dale. 
 
 The impression the child's death had created 
 was very painful. She was neglected — she did 
 not get fair play — she was wanted out of the 
 world — this and much more to a similar effect 
 went floating about amongst the gossips. OUver 
 Warleigh looked wretchedly iU, and after resting 
 a single night at the rectory, he went home 
 again. Katherine and he could not talk the 
 calamity over together — indeed she scarcely saw 
 him. Mrs. Sara Grandage spared Rachel for a 
 week to be with her sister-in-law, and her pres- 
 ence was a great comfort. Grace Hill wrote in 
 a mood of sorrowful reproach, " If the poor, 
 darling had come to me, this would not have 
 happened — we have no fever here." And every 
 body who had lent a voice in favor of sending 
 Annis to Lady Georgiana now felt a load of 
 self-rebuke, which it was not easy to reason 
 away with the reflection that they had acted for 
 the best. 
 
 When Rachel returned to Prior's Bank the 
 first thing Bittersweet said was, "See here, 
 Rachel," and offered her the supplement of The 
 IKmes, pointing to the notice in the obituary of 
 Annis's death, followed immediately by that of 
 Sir Laurence, which in reluctant deference to 
 Katherine's wishes, Oliver had hitherto refrained 
 from publishing. " Cheerful, is it not ?" added 
 the old lady dryly. "TA« Times flies all the 
 world over ; and he may see it alive and well 
 in the body ! What a shock for him about his 
 little wildling ! Of this, Rachel, I am persuaded 
 ^had there not come to England this story of 
 her father's death, Annis would be above ground 
 this day." 
 
 And Rachel in her secret heart thought so 
 too ; but it was an awful assertion to make, and 
 it would have been a still more awful assertion 
 to prove. 
 
 People now began to ask who was to hinder 
 Oliver Warleigh from entering on the enjoyment 
 of his brother's wealth and title ? Annis was 
 out of the way — out of the way ! An expressive 
 phrase — How often had he wished her out of the 
 way before Heaven took her? asked many a 
 cynical tongue. Rumors and fears of change 
 began to harass tenants and servants. Sir Lau- 
 rence had been a generous landlord and an easy 
 master, while every body's experience of Oliver 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 65 
 
 predicted the reverse. The Dobies looked for 
 notice to qviit the Hurtlemere House, and Mary 
 Wray and her husband expected that they would 
 either have to leave the Force Farm or to pay 
 their rent dues like other tenants ; for Sir Lau- 
 rence had given them no bond to secure them 
 in its free occupancy, and word of mouth testi- 
 mony was not Ukely to go far with such a stick- 
 ler for his rights as Oliver. 
 
 His rights ! Every soul in Whinstandale de- 
 ^voutly prayed that he might never establish 
 any rights over them, and waited as anxiously 
 for young Mr. Bond's report of Sir Laurence as 
 did any amongst his kinsfolk, at the rectory or 
 elsewhere. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 CHAPTER THE FOURTH. 
 
 UNDER COTEE OF NIGHT. 
 
 I WOULD not have such a heart in my bosom 
 For the t^gnity of the wholt body. 
 
 Shakspeake. 
 
 "We must now return to the day when Mr. 
 Carew's letter with the tidings of Sir Laurence's 
 death reached Oliver Warleigh at Hastings. 
 That night he shut himself in his study alone — 
 no, in company with his evil thoughts, which 
 kept muttering over and over in his heart with 
 a deafening persistence, " Laurence is dead — 
 Laurence is dead ; and there is only that little 
 brown brat of his Catholic wife's between me 
 and Whinstandale. I wish she were in heaven !" 
 A devouter prayer than that never fathomed 
 hell. 
 
 By and by he brought out an old plan of the 
 Penslaven and Whinstane estates, which he- had 
 drawn when he was living at the Tower in Sir 
 William's lifetime ; he gloated over it, reckoned 
 up the rentals and devised how he would raise 
 them when they became his. 
 
 To him in this mood came Lady Georgiana ; 
 saw what he was doing, saw into his mind, and 
 said, cold and scornful, " What is the profit of 
 it, Oliver ? Yours is the barren title, all else is 
 the child's." 
 
 Then his secret thought took words and 
 clothed itself. "Who knows?" said he. "I 
 wish she were in heaven !" Lady Georgiana 
 glanced round alarmed and bade him hush ! 
 And for the next five minutes they stood facing 
 each other, but silent ; and fearful as two con- 
 spirators in whose mind a bad plot is germinat- 
 ing. 
 
 The next morning Salter gave Lady Georgiana 
 a pretext for dischar^g her; she took her 
 wages, packed up her belongings, and departed 
 the same evening. She was no sooner out of 
 the house than Mrs. Lnpton entered it ; a fair, 
 sleek, well-favored woman about forty years of 
 age — ^precisely the sort of woman to look at, 
 whom mothers would feel confidence in placing 
 about their children. She had Lady Georgi- 
 ana's entire confidence. On the second day 
 from the arrival of the letter Oliver Warleigh 
 made a journey to Hurtledale, and returned in a 
 week to find every thing precisely as he left it. 
 He was not satisfied ; he was very much excited 
 — ^he did not like Mrs. Lupton, and wished she 
 were out of the house. Nevertheless Mrs. Lup- 
 ton staid. ' 
 
 E 
 
 " It is not safe to make opportunities, Oliver, 
 we must wait for them," whispered Lady Geor- 
 giana. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh betook himself to Eastbourne 
 for quiet, but was recalled the following day by 
 the news that the Uttle nurse and Mortimer were 
 ill. He loved his children and hastened home — 
 perhaps a judgment was at hand and not a for- 
 tune ! The next night as he sat brooding in his 
 study over that plan of the estate his wife came 
 to him again. "Lupton thinks Annis also is 
 sickening for the fever," said she, peevishly. 
 
 " Let her sicken — I wish she were in heaven !" 
 hissed Oliver, a grin of white-hot eagerness con- 
 vulsing his face. 
 
 Lady Georgiana seated herself in front of her 
 husband, and wh'fen he repeated his aspirations 
 she said, " Amen," sarcastically, but warned him 
 to be cautious and speak low. 
 
 " Are you in jest or in earnest ? — it is almost 
 too good news to be true," said he, trembling 
 all over. 
 
 " In earnest — ^her symptoms are precisely the 
 same as Mortimer's but more acute ; shall we 
 write and tell them in Hurtledale ? We mwsi." 
 Oliver admitted the necessity. 
 
 A noise at the door disturbed them ; but it 
 was only Lupton, and she came in. " What do 
 you think of Miss Annis, Lupton?" her master 
 asked as she entered, and shut the door behind 
 her. 
 
 " I think she is going to be very ill, sir." 
 
 "Do you, indeed ?" ■ 
 
 " Not a doubt of it, sir. It will go harder 
 with her than with Master Mortimer." 
 
 " The fever will have its natural course," this 
 with an acquiescent sigh. 
 
 " It will, sir." Then turning to Lady Georgi- 
 ana she said, " Would your ladyship be pleased 
 to call in =•■ physician for Miss Annis ? Under 
 the circumstances perhaps it would be well — 
 not that I presume to advise; but Dr. Frith 
 might see her. I can recommend him from ex- 
 perience in children's oa^es." 
 
 "Why, the feUow's an arrant quack !" inter- 
 posed Oliver Warleigh hastily. 
 
 Mrs. Lupton gave him a glance of superlative 
 contempt, but Lady Georgiana answered her as 
 if he had never spoken. 
 
 "Yes, Lupton, send for Dr. Frith. I am 
 quite satisfied with Mr. Blunt for Mortimer 
 and little Jane, but I agree with you that under 
 the circumstances, a physician must attend Miss 
 Annis." 
 
 A singular expression crossed Mrs. Lupton's 
 smooth features, but courtesying in silent re- 
 spect, she modestly vailed her eyes before her 
 master's uneasy, inquiring scrutiny, and went 
 out. 
 
 For a few minutes after they were left alone, 
 Oliver Warleigh* and his wife maintained a dead 
 silence. It' was a peculiarly still night out of 
 doors ; the wind was stm and the sea was still ; 
 there was no sound to break the hush in the 
 room except the rustle and tinkle of the fire in 
 the grate which was dying down amongst white 
 wood embers. Lady Georgiana was a woman 
 who had a vein of irony in the dull metal of h^r 
 composition. She ended the dismal quiet by 
 saying with a slow sneer, "One might think 
 that somebody was helping OS, Oliver." 
 
 " Are you sure of that woman ? " he asked 
 
66 
 
 ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 suspiciously, passing by his wife's uncanny 
 jest. 
 
 " She is an excellent nurse ; we may safely 
 leave the children to her," was the ambiguous 
 reply. 
 
 "But what is this Dr. Frith for? a low 
 fellow — ^I do not exactly see what it means." 
 
 " Dr. Frith is to attend Annia instead of Mr. 
 Blunt. Perhaps it is not necessary that you 
 should exactly see." 
 
 The conversation dropped for that night. The 
 next and the next after that went over, and there 
 was no more allusion to the desperate wishes 
 primed to produced their guilty fruit. No one 
 had come from Hurtledale and the — well, — the 
 cUvU had it all his own way with them at Has- 
 tings. 
 
 On the fifth night from Annis's sickening Lady 
 Georgiana stood in a light closet adjoining the 
 room where the child lay burning and tossing 
 and moaning in the height of her fever. 
 
 " How will she wear through the crisis ?" 
 asked she presently of the nurse — her own child 
 had weathered it bravely, and was on the turn 
 to recover. 
 
 "I don't think she will get through it, my 
 lady — she need not," was Lupton's answer, 
 given with a sidelong look at her mistress's pale 
 face. Lady Georgiana sighed, but she went to 
 her husband exultant. 
 
 Oliver was in a qualmish mood. 
 
 " I — I will not have any thing that is not safe" 
 stuttered he with the very guilt of murder in 
 his face. His wife looked at him long and steadi- 
 ily. " I mean it," he added ; on which she went 
 away from him without a word, and spoke again 
 with Mrs. Lupton. 
 
 "If she stood between me and money, she 
 should not live," said the nurse ; and she mut- 
 tered somethii% more to herself about men being 
 cowards, and never knowing their own miuds. 
 
 But Annis passed through the crisis safely, 
 and opened her wan eyes on the faces round 
 her bed again with a clear recollection of each. 
 
 One night something more than a week after 
 this, the child lay white and weary on her bed 
 of pain — longing for Lucy, longing for Salter, 
 mightUy afraid in her heart of that broad-faced 
 woman who had replaced the latter. The night- 
 light had burnt low and flung grotesque, flitter- 
 ing shadows on the walls, as the flame rose and 
 fell in the socket. Annis was dismally wide 
 awake, and pathetically miserable. She had 
 been a long while alone — ever since six o'clock 
 when Lupton gave her tea, and now she heard 
 it striking eight by the time-piece in the hall. 
 She had said " Gentle Jesus," three times over, 
 and was thinking of beginning again when the 
 nurse entered, fully equipped for out-of-doors, 
 and bade her peremptorily get up. Annis did 
 not at first quite understand her ; she was very 
 wan and weak from her fever, and had never 
 been dressed yet; but when she saw Mrs. Lup- 
 ton taking from a drawer her bonnet and frock 
 and underclothing, she sat up and watched ; and 
 at a second command slipped out upon the 
 floor. 
 
 She neither whimpered nor questioned ; every 
 morsel of flesh upon her bones quiveringly ac- 
 knowledged her dread of this sleek, soft-voiced 
 woman. She detested her aunt Georgiana, but 
 
 she did not fear her as she feared this nurse, 
 who yet had done nothing but take care of her. 
 As Lupton's hands moved swiftly to and fro in 
 clothing her, she trembled from head to foot, 
 and she was literally palsied with agony, when, 
 after having tied a thick woolen vail over her 
 face so that she could neither see nor be seen, 
 the nurse took her up- in her arms, and looking 
 out first to note if the stairs were clear, de- 
 scended to the hall where the house-door was. 
 opened for her and reolosed without a sound. , , , 
 
 It was a very cold and blusterous night, and 
 they met the wind fulhin front, which perhaps 
 helped to preserve Annis's consciousness ; but 
 Mrs. Lupton presently struck down a narrow 
 side-street where the height of the houses shel- 
 tered them. She walked to the end of it, then 
 turned on her steps and turned again some 
 dozen times or more as if waiting for other per- 
 sons. Those she expected came up as the clock 
 in a house close by struck nine — a man and a 
 woman to whom she spoke angrily. 
 
 " You are later than I expected — ^I have been 
 here twenty minutes. The train goes in half an 
 hour and the boat from London-bridge at six. 
 You have no time to lose now, for you must be 
 off to-night. Which of you will carry her ? She 
 is a light weight enough." 
 
 " Give her to me," said the woman ; and An- 
 nis found herself transferred to a stranger who 
 held her by no means so firmly as Lupton. A 
 great terror was upon her ; she would have cried 
 aloud, but her voice died strangled in her throat. 
 
 There was no more conversation ; the nurse 
 walked briskly away, her "good-night" sound- 
 ing a long way off to the child's half-stunned 
 senses ; and then the woman who carried her, 
 turned with her companion in an opposite di- 
 rection, swiftly and silently. On coming to a 
 wider thoroughfare, they called a cab from a 
 stand, and got into it, bidding the driver take 
 them to the station, and adding some remark 
 about their luggage having gone on before. 
 They did not look like persons who would be 
 embarrassed with much luggage, but the man 
 had a carpe^bag in his hand. If any of the 
 quiet Hurtledale folk could hate peered into 
 the cab and seen the faces of Annis's new guard- 
 ians, they would have recognized in spite of 
 all their soiled weeds of poverty and decay, 
 their brilliant old acquaintances Mr. and Mrs. 
 Gilsland ! 
 
 The next day, while Annis was being carried 
 across the Channel and forVarded to some safe 
 concealment in Paris, Mr. Bond made his ap- 
 pearance at Hastings. Nothing, as Lady Georgi- 
 ana and Lupton agreed, could have fallen out 
 more conveniently — a few hours earlier would 
 have spoiled their plot. Even if he had desired 
 to see the child they were ready with a sufficient 
 plea against it; but he did not — his nervous 
 aversion to the sight of death helped them even 
 there. 
 
 Who is it makes opportunities for those who 
 want to do bad deeds ? They are never far to 
 seek, and help to profit by them never seems 
 lacking either. Lady Georgiana sardonically J ■; 
 acknowledged that somebody had aided them, 
 and vexed her husband by her expressions of 
 ironical gratitude. He did not relish his wife's 
 grim humor. He was too much of a coward ; 
 he feared man, God, and the devil, but man the 
 most ; for though he had the cunning to devise 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 67 
 
 wickedness, and the greed to covet the Dead- 
 Sea fruit of crime, he found no stomach for it 
 when it was plucked. He sat at the feast like a 
 panicstrioken wretch with a sword dangling 
 above his head, and suspecting poison in every 
 dish. Having planned this abduction of Annis 
 and connived at the doing of it, fear came upon 
 him horribly. Not a double of his guilt, not a 
 twist, but his own wilineas could have followed 
 it out and detected it in any other sinner. He 
 went through the drama of her funeral like a 
 man in a trance, and when he got safely back 
 to Lady Georgiana, he shut himself up for sev- 
 ■eral days, the most abject, despicable victim 
 that ever fell before temptation, and then grov- 
 eled before the dread of being found out. 
 
 To Mrs. Lupton, whose nerves were of steel, 
 he was a very curious study, but she said to her 
 mistress, doubtfully, — 
 
 " He ought not to have been in it — no secret 
 is safe with him. We may get into trouble yet." 
 
 "Leave him to me," responded Lady Georgi- 
 ana. " When the funeral was over the worst 
 danger was over. He will come to himself by 
 and by, and be firmer than you anticipate. But 
 we must keep excitement away from him. Those 
 people we have used need not trouble us in per- 
 son ; if we find the means you will manage them. 
 It was a hard bargain they drove with is, but 
 you did your best." 
 
 " Consider the stake and the risk. But it is 
 done and it shall be done. I never put my hand 
 to a thing yet that I did not make an end. By 
 this time they are all safe in Paris ; and there 
 may they stay !, It would make it surer for all 
 of us if one of them never came back. 
 
 The next day but one after her abduction, 
 Annis woke up in the cold early morning to 
 find herself in a large room, bare except for a 
 lumber of boxes and disused furniture piled 
 against the walls — an utterly naked, foul and 
 comfortless garret in an old house of the Luxem- 
 bourg quarter in Paris. Her bed was a chaff 
 mattress laid on a wooden frame, too large for 
 it by half its breadth ; and her covering was so 
 insufficient that twenty times during the past 
 night she had roused up shivering, then dropped 
 uneasily to sleep again. 
 
 There were two windows in the room, both 
 heavily barred and crusted with dirt, and the 
 house was surrounded on every side by other 
 high houses similar to itself. Annis rose and 
 looked out for a few minutes in the pale dawn, 
 then cowered back to her bed, and lay wakeful 
 and fretful for a long while before any body 
 came near her. 
 
 It was past ten o'clock when Mrs. Gilsland 
 appeared, bringing her coffee and a hunch of 
 bread; after eating part of which she was again 
 left to herself. About noon the sun struck 
 against the darkened windows and gave her 
 courage to get up and feebly put on some of her 
 clothing. Then, with her little frock drawn 
 hood-fashion over her head, she crouched in 
 the window seat, pressed her face to the glass, 
 and peering up at the frosty sky — the only fa- 
 miliar thjng her eyes could see — she cried for 
 " Papa, oh, dear papa !" until she was sick and 
 weary with crying. 
 
 The frock she wore was black. They had 
 
 told her papa was dead when it was first put on, 
 and she was never more to look for his return, 
 but she had not realized it then, and when the 
 fever smote her it went dean out of her mind. 
 His name was oftenest on her lips in her deli- 
 rium, and he was the only person upon whose 
 help she called now. She had some vague 
 sense of his being near her, but it did not com- 
 fort her much. Her mind was half wandering, 
 and she was soon cold and hungry again. But 
 hungry or not, no second meal came to her 
 until night was drawing in. Then Mrs. Gils- 
 land brought her bread and coffee again, after 
 which she was put into her wretched bed, and 
 the key of the room door turned upon her as 
 her jailer went out. 
 
 If to solitude and darkness had been added 
 the terrors they have for some children, Annis 
 must have lost her wits : but she was not old 
 enough, perhaps, to feel them. She said "Gen- 
 tle Jesus," and then, mercifully, fell asleep. 
 
 Weeks and months went over her head in 
 this secret place. When Mrs. Gilsland was in a 
 worse temper than usual she beat her, but Annis 
 had not for this querulous, red-nosed woman 
 the agony of terror she had experienced when 
 in the hands of Mrs. Lupton. Mrs. Gilsland 
 cried almost as much and as often as herself; ' 
 especially she cried when the taU shabby man 
 who was her master, got into a rage and threat- 
 ened and cursed, as he always did when he 
 came to look at Annis in her captivity. Neither 
 of them was allowed to go out. Once only did 
 Annis feel the sun and fresh air, and that was 
 by stealth when the trees in the Luxembourg 
 gardens were beginning to bud. Mrs. Gilsland 
 took her abroad on this occasion, but the walk 
 was never repeated. 
 
 After that her guardians quarreled over her 
 more than ever, but she had ceased to heed 
 them much. By this time cold, neglect, and 
 semi-starvation had done their cruel work on 
 her ; dulled her mind, enfeebled her body ; 
 made of her a poor, forlorn, haggard little waif 
 that nobody could have recognized as Sir Lau- 
 rence Warleigh's bonnie wildling. She had 
 forgotten her long ballads, she had forgotten 
 her own name and answered to that of Alice ; 
 she had forgotten every thing but " Gentle 
 Jesus," and dear papa ; and sometunes her head 
 ached so that it felt as if they were drifting and 
 fading out of it too. And when the April sun- 
 shine made its way into her hideous garret, the 
 pitiful face it shone on was merry little g;psy's 
 no longer, but a specter of poverty such as 
 haunts the frozen streets of cities and makes 
 unaccustomed strangers start at sight of child- 
 hood so little childlike, so little human ! 
 
 The primroses were just coming into bloom 
 at Prior's Bank, when one morning as Eachel 
 Withers was taking a turn round the wild-flower 
 walk after breakfast, she saw her brother John 
 crossing the lawn and' waving above his head 
 what in form and substance appeared to be a 
 letter. She ran to meet him. 
 
 " From Sir Laurence !" cried he, and the next 
 moment he was telling her all how and about it, 
 but in such a confused joy and hurry that it was 
 some time before her understanding could get 
 at the real facts of the case. She never in her 
 
ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 life before remembered to have seen John so 
 carried away by any feeling of delight as he was 
 then; if men wept when they were glad as 
 women do he would certainly have broken down. 
 
 At last Kaohel got the letter into her own 
 hands to read, and then she found from its date 
 that it had been penned just seven weeks later 
 than the writer's supposed death, and while he 
 was still a prisoner, gaunt, weak and suffering 
 from a gunshot wound which had nearly cost 
 him a limb. Mr. Carew's story had been true 
 as far as it went, but it did not go far enough. 
 Sir Laurence had been badly wounded and 
 abandoned by all his companions, but when the 
 marauding party of savages were gone with 
 their spoils, one of the guides crept back to the 
 place where he saw his master fall, and found 
 him still alive. They made their way to the 
 haunts of civilization through as many difficul- 
 ties and privations as Mr. Carew himself had 
 done, but at the time of his writing Sir Laurence 
 was so far on the road toward recovery that he 
 hoped soon to be able to travel again. For a 
 fuller view of the scene of his adventures than 
 he could give her in the compass of a letter, he 
 referred Katherine to Humboldt's journey on 
 the Orinoco. He had not at this date seen 
 young Mr. Bond, nor heard of his little wild- 
 Img's loss, and the letter was full of tender allu- 
 sions to her which brought the tears into Rachel's 
 eyes as she read them. By this time the little 
 grave beside Helena's was green, and Dicky 
 and merry Andrew hushed their voices when 
 they approached the spot where they were told 
 cousin Annis was lying. 
 
 Hurtledale and Whinstandale rang their loud- 
 est chimes when the news came that Sir Lau- 
 rence was alive and well, and in joy of it almost 
 forgot the pitiful spectacle of his darling's 
 funeral winding through the Christmas storm 
 over the moor. , But her foster-mother stUl 
 kept her memory dear, and whenever she had 
 the opportunity of a gossip with Mistress Dobie 
 dilated on her first text of " had the bairn fair 
 play ?" And Mistress Dobie would respond that 
 she could not make it out at all — the White 
 Hands had never blessed her before she went 
 away ; so that between love and mystery the 
 little gipsy's story was likely to live amongst 
 the Chronicles Of Hurtledale until time and the 
 hour brought round their revenges, and set her 
 once more in her rightful place. 
 
 V. 
 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh's letter was received 
 at the rectory on a Thursday morning, and the 
 next day it was laid on his brother Oliver's 
 breakfast-table at Hastings, inclosed in one 
 from John Withers. 
 
 "A doable letter from Hurtledale," said Oli- 
 ver, and broke the seal. At sight of the con- 
 tents a bitter oath broke from his white lips, 
 and Lady Georgiana understood the whole case 
 in a moment. 
 
 " Be still, Oliver," said she, and fixed her 
 eyes on him with steady, controlling power. 
 
 " It was your doing ; I would never have al- 
 lowed it but for you and that cursed Lupton," 
 stuttered he. 
 
 " You are a coward, Oliver; but even a cow- 
 ard can keep counsel from fear, and that is 
 what you must do," said his wife, with firm. 
 
 cold scorn. He cowered under her eyes, but in 
 his desperation he defied her. 
 
 "No, I shall teU Laurence ; I shall teU him," 
 gasped he; "I was never afraid of Laurence. 
 He has come to life again — who the devil 
 would have thought it? Oh! what a fool I 
 have been to let you women get me into this 
 scrape I I always said you were in too great 
 haste ; they did not believe in Hurtledale that 
 he' was dead. What have you done with the 
 child? Tell me— I will know." To this out- 
 break Lady Georgiana opposed only a con- 
 temptuous silence. He spoke again. "She 
 shall be restored to him — we will get out of the 
 way and send her to Kate. Then he shall be 
 told." 
 
 Lady Georgiana was compelled to decide upon • 
 her course on the spur of the moment. She 
 had no scruples about deceiving her husband, 
 since he was bent on her ruin and his own ; and 
 with a quiet, unmoved countenance she replied, 
 " She can not be restored to him ; for she is 
 dead." Oliver glared at his wife, but it never 
 occurred to him to doubt her word — indeed, 
 why should she lie to Mm? 
 
 " Dead — how did she die ? Was it murder ?" 
 he asked under his breath. 
 
 " No, it was not murder, but it would look 
 like it if it came out — she died of a relapse of 
 the fever as soon as they reached Paris. But 
 all you have to know is that she died here — by 
 the visitation of God, in the common course of 
 nature, or what you will. Do not pry into par- 
 ticulars — you know more already than you can 
 bear. Nothing can be undone that is done ; 
 you can not give her back to Laurence, there- 
 fore why drag down your children and me and 
 yourself to perdition by a dozen idle words ? 
 Any poltroon can hold his tongue." 
 
 His paroxysm over, Oliver Warleigh agreed 
 that silence was the safest policy. " But we 
 will get out of the way before Laurence comes 
 home," suggested he, still trembling and sore 
 afraid. His personal security was now his first 
 thought; profit from what had been done he 
 was incapable of enjoying ; indeed, there was 
 no profit. Since Sir Laurence was alive and 
 Annis dead, even the thousand a. year his 
 brother was to give him with her was gone. 
 
 "We will go back and live in Paris," said 
 Lady Georgiana. 
 
 " But iJiey are there," muttered he, meaning 
 the Gilslands. His wife said they need not re- 
 main if they were, but she believed they had 
 left. In fact, she knew nothing of their where- 
 abouts at all ; she trusted details to Lupton, 
 who was more apt at managing them than her- 
 self She had almost succeeded in persuading 
 herself that the child was lost sight of forever. 
 But if Oliver objected to Paiis, they would try 
 Brussels. 
 
 They tried Brussels accordingly, but did not 
 like it, and early in April they had established 
 themselves in Paris. The Gilslands had re- 
 ceived warning through Lupton by this time 
 that they must either keep close quarters or 
 change them ; for it had been found necessary 
 to hoodwink Oliver Warleigh into a belief that 
 the child actually was dead. But during that 
 single walk which Annis took with Mrs. Gilsland 
 by stealth when the trees were budding in the 
 Luxembourg Gardens, she, saw her uncle and 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 knew him. He caught a glimpse of her too, 
 and told hia wife afterward that he had met 
 either the chUfl or her ghost ; but she laughed 
 him out of the idea. 
 
 After that Annis was kept a strict prisoner, 
 and Mr. Gilsland and his wife had serious dif- 
 ferences of opinion about her. They knew 
 then that Sir Laurence Warleigh was alive and 
 well again, and Mrs. Gilsland was for revealing 
 all the plot to him, and throwing themselves on 
 his mercy for the consequences. She loathed 
 her task of jailer ; she was herself as much a 
 captive and more wretched than the child ; the 
 days when she lived in the odor of respectability 
 and poverty were paradise by comparison with 
 her present life ; and she would have done and 
 endured almost any thing to escape from it. 
 
 Nature had not planned Betsy Briggs on the 
 criminal mold ; but she had fallen into hands 
 where she was helpless. The money gone, Mr. 
 Gilsland was master and she the tool. He was 
 well clothed and fed now, and looked like a 
 clergyman out on a holiday, seen in the streets 
 alone. Far-sighted enough to know that any 
 exposure of the part he had taken in the ab- 
 duction of Annis must sink him forever, he de- 
 termined to abide by the results of what he 
 had done for the present. As a last desperate 
 step they could but tell all — and it would never 
 be too late. So long as Oliver Warleigh and 
 his wife were true to their side of the bargain, 
 he would be true to his; and meanwhile Sir 
 Laurence's little wildling was Alice Gilsland — 
 his niece, the orphan daughter of a dissipated 
 brother of his own who had died of drinking, 
 vice and destitution in Paris. A tale easy to 
 tell, a drama easy to sustain, if they could only 
 keep her out of sight of friendly faces until 
 lapse of time had , obliterated them from her 
 memory, and changed hey also beyond risk of 
 recognition. 
 
 Mr. Gilsland's will prevailed over his wife's, 
 and she gradually resigned herself to the adop- 
 tion of her part in the play. The sharp pinch 
 of necessity was withdrawn, and they were in a 
 position again to appear in society — ^that is, in 
 a society where they were not known; and 
 after Lupton had seen the child by stealth, and 
 pronounced her sufficiently, altered to answer 
 the purpose of the plot, they received per- 
 mission to return to England, and push their 
 fortunes if they could. With money in his 
 pocket, a good appearance and a fluent tongue, 
 there was little doubt but that Mr. Gilsland 
 would be able to do it in a fashion. He had 
 given up dreaming of honor and reputation 
 now, and had only to make shift how to live. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIFTH. 
 
 IN PABIS. 
 
 Infected minds 
 To their deaf pillows will discbarge their secrets. 
 
 It was just four years since Rachel Withers 
 began to make her home at Prior's Bank ; four 
 years that had beep spent in that serene mo- 
 notony of ease which is sure, sooner or later, to 
 conduce to apathy of spirits and stagnation of 
 mind ; and one morning Bittersweet addressed 
 
 her with the uncomplimentary remirk that she 
 was afraid that she was growing stupid. She 
 answered that there really was nothing to talk 
 about — all their subjects were worn threadbare, 
 from the troubles of the Warleighs to the catas- 
 trophe of the last new novel. 
 
 " You are right — there is nothing," respond- 
 ed her godmamma, who was feeling particularly 
 well and vivacious at the moment. " It is a 
 great ■ shame that we should settle down into 
 dormice at our time of life-^I am only sixty- 
 six, and you are less than half my age. Ra- 
 chel, we'll go to Paris, and see a bit of the 
 world !" 
 
 Rachel's first impulse was to remonstrate, 
 dearly as she would have enjoyed it. Was 
 Bittersweet equal to it? 
 
 "Equal to itl don't be insiuuative; I am 
 equal to any thing. I have not been there for 
 twenty years, and it has all been ground new 
 again since my day. r knew it, my dear, half 
 a century ago, when the Revolution reigned 
 and Terror was king !" 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage settled it, and she and 
 Rachel set out in May, backed by the advice 
 and good wishes of all their friends, taking 
 with them Clip, the invaluable, and Hanson the 
 maid ; but no sooner had they reached Amiens 
 than they were laid fast by the heels. Bitter- 
 sweet having contrived to fulfill all her god- 
 daughter's worst anticipations by falling ill of 
 the fatigues of the journey. 
 
 To be laid up at home is not altogether mis- 
 erable ; the house is kept still, every body goes 
 softly, every body is at the invalid's service, and 
 there are kind inquirers from without, whose 
 coming breaks the dreary length of day; but 
 to be laid up at an inn is very different. Still 
 Bittersweet was a model for sick folks. They 
 had been at Amiens just one week, and she 
 had never left her bed for an hour, yet she had 
 never lost her spirits for an hour either. 
 
 " It is nothing — I am not ill," she persisted. 
 " I am like the babies, and shall sleep myself 
 sound again ; and I won't have any of your ri- 
 diculous French doctors brought near me !" 
 
 None of those in her train dared do other- 
 wise than look cheerful and seem to enjoy them- 
 selves ; but they were often anxious out of her 
 sight. Clip went round the town watching and 
 wondering over the process by which the streets 
 were paved with asphalte, big bubbling caldrons 
 of which were standing about in every thorough- 
 fare; and though he had no conversational 
 French worth mentioning, he still contrived to 
 enter into one-sided arguments, from which he 
 always came off triumphant, with any workman 
 who could be prevailed on to listen to him. 
 Hanson took refuge in the infinite tucks of 
 a new petticoat, and as her mistress peremp- 
 torily forbade them to be dull, Rachel aiid she 
 relieved each other in her room by turns, and 
 brought her detailed accounts of their out-door 
 wanderings. 
 
 Amiens Is a pleasant old town, and the wea- 
 ther was so cool, clear and sunny, that it was 
 looking its very best. Rachel discovered seve- 
 rable agreeable walks, but her main attraction 
 was always the cathedral. One morning she 
 breakfasted very early, for there was a confirm- 
 ation, and she wished to see it ; but when she 
 got there, the nave was half filled with the 
 
70 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 children who had already come in ; the girls all 
 in white, with bouquetg, wreaths of flowers, and 
 long vails covering them from head to foot ; the 
 boys, little miniature men, in small, high-shoul- 
 dered coats and hats, and carrying nosegays like 
 their sisters. 
 
 Eachel was easily pleased, and she thought it 
 a pretty sight to watch the country cur& from 
 the surrounding villages appear leading their 
 primitive flocks ; though poor-looking, thin, 
 anxious-visaged men some of them were. She 
 made friends with an old countrywoman, who 
 was delighted to show her which detachment 
 was her pays, and to point out her cure — evi- 
 dently a much revered and beloved person. 
 He was a lean, elderly man, in a very rusty 
 bombazine cassock, and with a weather, work- 
 worn face. She liked, too, to see the Sisters 
 of Charity arrive in charge of the poor schools ; 
 it looked kind and comfortable. 
 
 The service was lengthy, and it was only about 
 half over, when, as Rachel was standing near 
 the great door, there entered an English clergy- 
 man, whom she instantly recognized as Mr. 
 Gilsland, though he was changed much- for the 
 worse since he left Hurtledale. He circulat- 
 ed about amongst the throng for a quarter of 
 an hour with leisurely curiosity, and Rachel 
 was very far indeed from desiring to attract his 
 attention, when, in peering about in his old, 
 short-sighted way, he at length caught her eye, 
 started visibly, and turned clay-white in the 
 face. Why should the man change color be- 
 cause of her ? she thought, and stifSy inclined 
 her head as he made a sudden move toward 
 the spot where she was stationed. She feared 
 he was coming to speak to her, but instead he 
 veered round, rushed to the door, and disap- 
 peared. Rachel was not sorry to be avoided — 
 though why avoided so abruptly she did not 
 know; judging by externals, Mr. Gilsland's 
 circumstances were more prosperous than when 
 they last heard of him at Prior's Bank. When 
 she got back to the inn. Bittersweet received 
 her with the agreeable intelligence that her 
 friends the Gilslands were there. 
 
 " &anson saw them drive up in the omnibus," 
 said she ; " and they have a wretched little 
 girl in black with them — one of the misera- 
 ble private pupils they have contrived to pick 
 up most hkely. Don't you pity her, Rachel ?" 
 Rachel replied in a general way that her Unes 
 had certainly not fallen in pleasant places ; as 
 the lines of children deprived of parental care 
 but very rarely do. 
 
 Hanson, who was a woman of an inquiring 
 turn of mind, esteemed it a part of her duty to 
 gather up all sorts of little crumbs of gossip for 
 the refection of her mistress, especially now 
 that she was unable to forage for herself ; and 
 the same afternoon she was in a position to say 
 that she had seen Mrs. Gilsland, who looked in 
 very poor health, and also that she had found 
 out who the child in black was ; namely, a 
 niece of Mr. Gilsland's, whom they were car- 
 rying home, her father being recently dead, 
 and she having no mother. " And, poor lit- 
 tle soul, it would may be be a mercy for her, 
 if she were dead too," added the maid pathe- 
 tically. 
 
 Rachel did not remember hearing that Mr. 
 Gilsland had any married brother or sister, or 
 
 any brother or sister at all, but she knew that 
 gossip intelligence is not particular to a shade 
 or two of relationship ; and she»said that it was 
 a sign of his growth in charity if he had adopt- 
 ed the poor little orphan into his care. Rar 
 chel never could persuade herself to think the 
 worst of any body — she always liked to find 
 one white spot in the darkest disposition. 
 
 The next morning, before any of Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage's party were astir, the Gilslands left 
 Amiens, and very much surprised she was that 
 her old friend Betsy Briggs had made no effort 
 to see her. 
 
 " You don't mean to say that the woman has 
 gone without paying her respects to me when 
 shejknew I was in the hotel ?" cried she, in im- 
 disguised astonishment, as Hanson brought in 
 the news with her breakfast; " I don't under- 
 stand it. Their affairs must be looking up in 
 the world, Rachel, depend upon it. That pru- 
 dent Betsy should be within reach of her best 
 milch-cow, and not apply for a draught of the 
 refreshing fluid is amazing ! I feel as if some- 
 body had made me a present. I debated in my 
 own mind last night before I fell asleep how 
 much I could spare her, and now I am all the 
 richer by what she has not begged. G-one, is 
 she ? I am heartily glad of it ! I shall take 
 my dry toast and tea with the better appetite. 
 I feel stronger and livelier this morning than I 
 have done since we left Prior's Bank, and I have 
 saved at least ten pounds." 
 
 This news seemed to Rachel and her servants 
 much pleasanter and more to the purpose than 
 any coming or going of the Gilslands, and as 
 the day went on Bittersweet's report of her 
 health received confirmation. She got up" at 
 noon, went out at four o'clock, and the next 
 morning gave orders for an immediate move on 
 Paris, saying that if she fell ill again, her fol- 
 lowers could amuse themselves there without 
 minding her. 
 
 Poor little Annis had missed a very near 
 chance of a rescue, and the Gilslands had had a 
 very narrow escape from discovery ; so narrow 
 that Mrs. Gilsland hardly recovered from the 
 nervous shock of it sufSciently to travel out 
 of the risk. But her husband had no mercy 
 on her weakness ; he foresaw that if she once 
 got a glimpse of Bittersweet's face, reviving 
 her former days of peace and respectability, the 
 whole dangerous secret would be out, and his 
 prospects in life dashed down for good and all. 
 And therefore he made her go. 
 
 II. 
 
 The vivacity of Paris agreed with Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage. When she had been there a wei 
 she was quite agreeably settled in private apart- 
 ments close to the Champs Elys^es. Opposite 
 her windows she had a prospect of a very charm- 
 ing garden, gay with flowers, and with acacia 
 trees all sweetness and bloom leaning over the 
 high wall. Many of her old friends rallied round 
 her ; foremost amongst them a witty cosmopol- 
 itan lady, all sparkle and naughtiness, who was 
 English-bom, but whose tongue invariably glid- 
 ed off into French when her unreined spirits 
 ran away with her discretion of speech ; then 
 there was an ancient, very poor Legitimist com- 
 tesse, very, very old, possessed of an artist son, 
 also old. The mother spoke of the Bourbons as 
 
SIR LAUHENOE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 71 
 
 courtiers spoke when Louis Fourteenth was 
 king, of the Orleans as Hburgeois, and of the 
 Bonapartes with execration, mockery, and con- 
 tempt, vociferous aud shrill. In listening to 
 her talk, which was rapid and picturesque, Ra- 
 chel felt as if the world had rolled back fifty, 
 Bixty, seyenty years, carrying her with it, and 
 stranding her amongst the ghosts of the ancien 
 regime. 
 
 The Oliver TVarleighs were in Paris now, 
 living in an apartment in the Rue du Colys^e, 
 not ten minutes' walk from Mrs, Sara Grand- 
 age's, and settled as Lady Georgiana hoped, for 
 a permanency. One day Oliver Warleigh met 
 Clip in his peregrinations, and being informed 
 where his mistress was staying, took his wife to 
 call ; and Rachel observed the moment they 
 were ushered into the saloon that neither of 
 them wore a speck of mourning for poor little 
 Annis, though it was not yet six months since 
 they lost her. 
 
 Bittersweet was generally delighted to see 
 company, let it come how and when it would 
 and in whatever shape, but she did not manifest 
 any warmth of welcome toward them. They 
 either did not or would not see her formal airs, 
 however ; but laid themselves out to be partic- 
 ularly amusing and courteous. Lady Georgiana 
 looked quite herself; proud, calm, and fashion- 
 able, but Oliver was dreadfully altered ; Rachel 
 afterward remarked that she could not have 
 supposed such a transformation possible ; he 
 was' evidently in bad health, and his prompt 
 displacement from the state and title to which 
 he had too hastily raised himself on the rumor 
 of his brother's death had disagreed with him 
 in every way. If Rachel had known what the 
 man had suffered, she would not have wondered 
 at what he looked. 
 
 Lady Georgiana presently asked when and by 
 what route they had reached Paris, and on Ra- 
 chel's replying that they had come by Boulogne 
 and Amiens, at which latter place they had been 
 delayed ten days, she gave a quick glance at 
 her husband which Bittersweet intercepted. It 
 perplexed the old lady so much by its expres- 
 sion of menace that for a moment she was lost 
 to every thing but bewildered conjectures as to 
 its meaning; and she only woke up again to 
 hear Rachel referring to the Gilslands and their 
 convoy, and to see Lady Georgiana spring from 
 her chair, and rush toward Oliver exclaiming, 
 " Oh ! Oliver, you are going to be ill again — 
 you must resume your drops !" 
 
 " Tes, yes, it is the closeness of the room ; 
 when I get out into the air I shall be better," 
 gasped he feebly; and refusing any stimulant 
 he immediately left the house ; both Bittersweet 
 and Rachel feeling panic-struck at his sudden 
 seizure. 
 
 Lady Georgiana determined never to commit 
 the indiscretion of telling her husband any thing 
 again; she had thought to set some of his 
 anxieties at rest by assuring him a few days be- 
 fore that the Gilslands had ret,urued to England, 
 and now there were more lies for her to invent 
 in explaining away the child in black who had 
 been seen in their company. But success at- 
 tended her more than she hoped for ; he accept- 
 ed her assertions and execrated his own dan- 
 gerous weakness ; and an hour after, his wife 
 returned to Mrs. Sara Grandage's apartments 
 as serene and charming as ever to apologize and 
 
 explain. She said that Oliver had been subject 
 lately to these attacks of faintness, which he 
 ascribed to incipient disease of the heart ; but 
 this she believed to be nothing more than the 
 fancy of a man a little hypped, and hoped that 
 Paris with its cheerful scenes and society would 
 soon restore him to his normal stat? of health. 
 
 Bittersweet hoped so too, and said it was not 
 to be marveled at that he should find himself 
 shaken by what he had lately gone through; 
 and calling with Rachel to inquire the next day 
 he was found -ready to converse on any and 
 every subject. But he did not now look half 
 the man he was fourteen or fifteen months ago, 
 when he went to Hurtledale on that mission 
 which resulted in the transference of Annis to 
 his wife's care. His face was hollow and gray 
 about the eyes, with a livid under-tiut that came 
 out strongly in moments of disturbance. He 
 had lost his nerve with his health, and was 
 quite subdued to his wife's authority; and so 
 altogether worn and depressed that Rachel in 
 her universal charity could almost have found 
 in her heart to be sorry for this velvet-gloved 
 Oliver whose claws had been clipped so close. 
 
 One evening, a few days only after this meet- 
 ing Mrs. Sara Grandage and her goddaughter 
 were invited to dine with the ancient comtesse 
 and her son, who lived up in that quarter of 
 Paris where the Gilslands had hidden them- 
 selves with Annis. After dinner the amusement 
 was to look through folios of sketches, one' 
 amongst whioli literally startled Rachel from its 
 likeness to Sir Laurence's little wildling. Had 
 she not believed that the poor darling was lying 
 safe in her grave by her mother's, she could 
 have been certain it was taken from her very 
 self; and Bittersweet was not much less struck 
 by the resemblance. 
 
 It represented a child in a black frock, crouch- 
 ing up in the recess of a barred window, and 
 watching the scud of the clouds over the sky. 
 Its right hand clutched one of the bars in the 
 apparent act of shakiug it, and its mouth was 
 set in just the same painful, resentful fashion as 
 Annis had familiarized every body with at Bris- 
 towe during the few days before she was parted 
 from her father. 
 
 Perceiving how his guests were struck by the 
 sketch, the artist would conduct them into his 
 atelier to show them how it had been taken. 
 Cornerwise from the main part of the house 
 there extended a wing in which, so near that 
 long arms might have shaken hands across, 
 there were two windows grated like that in 
 the picture. One jalousie being now open, they 
 could see into the room, which was a gloomy, 
 disfurnished garret, used apparently for nothing 
 but the reception of lumber. In that window, 
 rain or fair, the day in and the day out, he told 
 them, the little solitary child used to sit with 
 her thin face pressed against the panes, or when 
 they were open for air, against the bars, like a 
 caged bird. He could not tell precisely how 
 long she was there, but it was very cold weather 
 when he first noticed her, aud she was accus- 
 tomed to raise her frock hood-fashion over her 
 head to keep herself warm, as he had represent- 
 ed her. He tried to engage her to converse 
 with him, but she was persistently dumb, though 
 shp never retreated as if afraid when he opened 
 his window to acopst her. 
 
 When the guests were taking leave at night, 
 
72 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 the artist presented this sketch to Rachel, who 
 said that had it been more like the merry little 
 gipsy when she quitted Hurtlemere, ste would 
 have sent it to Sir Laurence ; but such a pitiful 
 shadow of her as this would be worse than 
 none. She treasured it herself, however, and at 
 the first opportunity showed it to Lady Georgi- 
 ana, who could not perceive the likeness at all, 
 and said it was a thorough tawny, sallow, French 
 child ; but Mortimer, peeping over it with boy- 
 ish inquisitiveness, cried out, " That is cousin 
 Annis ! Where is she, mamaia ? Who shut 
 her up in that prison ?" His mamma replied 
 that cousin Annis was gone home, and was 
 quite safe and happy, and he must ask no more 
 questions ; which he, trained to an implicit obe- 
 dience, did not, except with iiis eyes, and they 
 looked still full of inquiry. 
 
 Lady Georgiana told Rachel afterward in 
 whispered explanation of Mortimer's remarks, 
 that she did not allow her children's minds to 
 be overshadowed by any thoughts of gloom, 
 and that when Annis died her little companions 
 were only told that she was gone home ; and she 
 begged that the drawing might be put out of 
 sight lest her husband should come in and see 
 it, adding that the very thought of the child 
 agitated him dangerously in his then weak con- 
 dition. Rachel instantly complied, but Mor- 
 timer, who was an intelligent boy, by-and-by 
 came asking her stealthily, "Do you know where 
 cousin Annis is ?" She reminded him of the 
 answer he had just received from his mamma, 
 and by way of diverting his mind from the ques- 
 tion, said she hoped he had loved her, and been 
 kind to her while she was with him. 
 
 " No," he replied, with the frank truth that 
 seeks no expedient disguises, " we did not love 
 her very much. She was always crying for Lucy, 
 and then mamma locked her up in the dark 
 closet." 
 
 "Ah," thought Rachel, "my mind did not 
 misgive me for naught ! I will pry no more 
 into the secrets of the poor little darling's last 
 days of martyrdom." 
 
 In July, Mrs. Sara Grandage moved out of 
 Paris heat and dust to St. Cloud. The acacias 
 were then in all their beauty in the park, and 
 Rachel Withers thought it delightful walking 
 through the long, straight, green avenues in the 
 cool of the day. The Oliver Warleigha had gone 
 thither also for a month, and the two families 
 were naturally thrown much together. Kathe- 
 rine, in writing to Rachel, since she had been 
 informed of Oliver's state of health, had en- 
 treated her not to suffer any prejudice to linger 
 in her mind against him ; and she had striven 
 her best to oast it out, though only with partial 
 success, 
 
 One evening, being in the park alone, she met 
 him, also alone, and wearing the most lost, 
 haggard look on his face that she had ever seen 
 on the face of any living man. She had heard 
 that an impression of peculiar anxiety always 
 marks the countenance of persons afSicted with 
 disease of the heart, and his conjecture respect- 
 ing himself had every external sign of truth. 
 He joined Rachel, and they walked for some 
 time together, conversing of this, that, and the 
 other — quite matters of general interest. It 
 
 was always her care to avoid speaking before 
 him of little Annis, remembering Lady Georgi- 
 ana' s warning of what an exciting topic it was 
 to him ; but he now introduced it himself, in 
 spite of her attempted evasiofis,' and- talked 
 about the child in a nervous, disjointed manner 
 for a long time ; beginning from the day when 
 they first received her in charge from her fath- 
 er, and then touching on various episodes during 
 their residence at Hastings, which convinced 
 Rachel that Annis could never have been happy 
 or resigned in her changed lot. When he men- 
 tioned the breaking out of the fever, his agitation 
 became excessive ; and, at the risk of appearing 
 rude or indifferent, Rachel checked him, saying, 
 that as the poor little thing was dead and buried, 
 and no regrets could bring her to life again, 
 perhaps they had better relinquish the painful 
 task of talking about her. 
 
 " True," gasped he, standing still for a mo- 
 ment, with a catching of his breath ; " she is 
 dead and buried, and none of us can bring her 
 to life again !" If Rachel had been as anxious 
 to make him talk as she was to make him silent, 
 she must have heard all the facts that night. 
 But he looked so livid and ill that she was 
 thankful to see Lady Georgiana approaching 
 with Mortimer to meet them. She offered hep 
 arm for her husband to lean • on, and glanced 
 Bcrutinizingly at Rachel, who whispered that it 
 was not her fault, he woidd talk of Annis ; an 
 explanation which apparently satisfied her. 
 
 AU this seemed very strange to Rachel when 
 she came to reflect upon it. Though, probably, 
 the Oliver Warleighs had to reproach themselves 
 with neglect or harshness toward the child, 
 their feeling now — his especially — appeared^ ex- 
 aggerated. They who loved her could speak of 
 her with the calm of tender regret ; while those 
 to whom she had been a burden found in her 
 very name a source of painful agitation. When 
 she suggested this to her godmamma. Bitter- 
 sweet shook her head, and replied, in a cautious 
 tone, " Speak low, Rachel ; in this ease, I am 
 sure the least said will be the soonest mended. 
 All is not right about Annis's death; of that, 
 the oftener I see them the more am I convinced. 
 To me. Lady Georgiana's carefulness is even 
 more significant than Oliver's unqMet remorse. 
 There are strange secrets in families, and the 
 blacker our thoughts here, the deeper let us 
 bury them. I oouJd tell you many a startling 
 story, my dear, that is as true as gospel, which 
 would not bear and will never see the light of 
 day for innocent living men's and women's sake," 
 and thereupon both fell into a silence heavy with 
 fearful meaning. 
 
 The day after this private warning of Bitter- 
 sweet's, Lady Georgiana invited Rachel to join 
 her in a drive to Paris, where she wished to give 
 Mortimer a treat at Ronconi's, to celebrate his 
 birthday. As they were returning to St. Cloud 
 afterward, the little boy being seated on the box 
 by the coachman, and out of hearing, she gave 
 her companion a full and circumstantial history 
 of Annis's sickness and death. Rachel did not 
 invite her confidence, but she was not sorry to 
 hear what she had to say. 
 
 Lady Georgiana began by tellmg her that after 
 Lucy's departure from Hastings, Salter domin- 
 eered over ail the children, but especially over 
 Annis, and acquked a mischievous habit of hold- 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 73 
 
 ing each up as a pattern and model to the rest 
 just according to the caprice of the moment.' 
 She was a hot-tempered person, and on two oc- 
 casions a hasty blow followed up her hasty words 
 while her practice of admonishing one offender 
 to profit by the superior example of the child 
 who, at the moment, happened to be in favor, 
 set the little folks at variance amongst them- 
 selves, and made the nursery a scene of perpetual 
 dissension. This all sounded plausible and pro- 
 bable enough, little as it tallied with Lucy's 
 character of her fellow-servant, or Salter's own 
 account of her discharge. 
 
 When Lady Georgiana came to speak of the 
 child's behavior under her rule she admitted 
 that the gipsy-thing never did take root amongst 
 her children, and perhaps never could have done 
 so. She bore up pretty well as long as Lucy 
 was there to control her, but when she was gone 
 she' became more untractable and unsociable 
 than ever. 
 
 " She was what I call « wild-tempered crea- 
 ture," said Lady Georgiana. " If she could not 
 have those near her she loved she would have 
 nobody. She refused to accommodate herself 
 to necessary changes, and had a tenacity of 
 memory and of purpose that were wonderful in 
 any thing so young. If she had recovered from 
 the fever I must have rid myself of the care of 
 her. It was too onerous — too trying. You 
 can itot imagine how she resented and resisted 
 all my efforts to teach her ; she learned nothing 
 from me, and showed no capacity for learning. 
 She was the most difficult child I ever had to do 
 with, and I consider myself a born instructress — 
 witness my success with my own children." 
 
 And so the conversation diverged to Morti- 
 mer, and his little brother and sister, who were 
 certainly trained to a perfection of manners and 
 obedience beautiful to behold. Rachel was not 
 sure, however, whether it might not turn out 
 that there was a fundamental error in Lady 
 Georgiana's theory ; and whether in binding her 
 children with such a network of orders and re- 
 strictions she was not giving them rules instead 
 of principles. 
 
 She detailed the foregoing conversation to 
 Bittersweet that evening, and the shrewd old 
 lady replied, "Lady Georgiana explains too 
 much, but she will never explain away the dark 
 impression that has been made on every body's 
 mind. The child's death occurred at an unfor- 
 tunate crisis for those who were interested in it. 
 All the world has thought and all the world will 
 continue to think what Mary Wray put into 
 plain words — had the child faif play ? If she 
 had not, the guilty are punished already enough 
 to satisfy any revenge — look at Oliver's coun- 
 tenance ; he is a haunted man. And look at 
 Lady Gebrgiana — she is a prisoner at large. 
 Don't be any more curious, Rachel ; if you are 
 wise; you will let the matter rest. Nothing but 
 wretchedness to innocent persons could come 
 out of searching into its secrets now. I tell you 
 again as I have told you before — there are 
 mysteries best left uncleared and doubts best 
 left unverified." 
 
 CHAPTER THE SIXTH. 
 
 A LITTLE WAIF AND STRAY. 
 
 Tub darkest hour comes before the dawn. 
 
 Her Paris visit was drawing to an end, Sep- 
 tember was nearly over, and Rachel Withers 
 was beginning to contemplate a return to Prior's 
 Bank with satisfaction, when Mrs. Sara Grand- 
 age received a pressing invitation to spend a 
 few weeks with ner cousins, the Misses Ferrand, 
 two maiden ladies residing at Claymire, a retired 
 sea-side village on the Devonshire coast, not 
 more than twenty miles from Linton, where lived 
 Arthur and Grace Hill. The invitation included 
 Rachel and Hanson, but not Clip, and as his 
 mistress always felt at a loss without her facto- 
 tum, she was at first anxious to decline it. 
 
 " I can not stay in that house," she said pet- 
 tishly. " Every body is so overwise and over- 
 good, and Delia, unless she be very much 
 changed, would almost talk a spider to death — 
 yet the worthy kind souls will be grieved if I 
 refuse to go." She reflected a moment or two, 
 wrinkling her brows and looking very discon- 
 solate, but at last a bright idea struck "her, and 
 she exclaimed, " I'll tell you what we will do, 
 Rachel ; we will write and say we are too large 
 a party to be received at Brookfall, but that if 
 they can find nice lodgings for us in the village 
 we will go and stay a month. Claymire is a 
 very pretty spot even in October, and the sea 
 air will freshen us all up after our stay in this 
 dusty blazing Paris." 
 
 Her proposal was duly transmitted to the 
 cousins, and was by them well received. They 
 engaged a cottage for her about half a mile 
 from Brookfall, and thither she took her journey 
 with Rachel and her servants at the beginning 
 of the following week. Claymire was a truly 
 charming village, though its name alone was 
 almost enough to give a stranger a prejudice 
 against it. It lay in a little hollow girt with 
 hills, the cliffs forming a beautiful bay. The 
 leaves were just at the change when they are 
 loveliest and fullest of variety, and there were 
 flowers enough still left in the garden at Brook- 
 fall to make of it a perfect rustical paradise. 
 
 Rachel Withers made up her mind that if she 
 did not live in Hurtledale she should like to live 
 at Claymire, in the cottage that had been taken 
 for their lodging. It was a pretty little thatch- 
 ed nook, clustered over with roses and clematis, 
 woodbine and ivy, even to the darkening of its 
 tiny lattices. Clip by-and-by dared to insinuate 
 the propriety of extensive pruning, but his mis- 
 tress warned him that it would be at his peril if 
 he touched a twig — let them be smothered in 
 pioturesqueness, it was only for a month ! The 
 village consisted of a few fishermen's and labor- 
 er's cottages, and three houses of a better sort 
 where a few visitors who preferred seclusion to 
 gayety took up their summer abode. The church 
 stood about midway between the rectory and 
 Brookfall — they could just see its spire through 
 the trees from their windows. It was not a gem 
 of architecture, but it was neat and well kept. 
 
 The rector was Dr. Ferrand, brother to the 
 ladies at Brookfall ; he was a widower with one 
 son, a fine youth of about fifteen, who soon in- 
 sinuated himself very deeply into the good 
 
74 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGITS FORTUNES. 
 
 graces of Mrs. Sara Grandage, perhaps by rea- 
 son of those questionable virtues which caused 
 his aunts Delia and Flora to shake their heads 
 seriously and distrustfully when they alluded to 
 his future career. Fain would they that he ran 
 quietly along that well-worn groove which leads 
 into the church, but his present determination 
 was to become a traveler and an adventurer, and 
 nothing besides. His father made no attempt 
 to thwart his inclinations, but only insisted on 
 his having patience to receive the education of 
 a gentleman first ; and this he* appeared to be 
 getting combined with the accomplishments of 
 rough-rider, sailor,' sportsman and pedestrian ; 
 for he cultivated the muscular part of his Christ- 
 ianity with the heartiest diligence. Bittersweet 
 delighted in him, though she said she did not 
 see'why he should be so big and tawny — neith- 
 er his father nor his mother was above the mid- 
 dle size. However, such as he was, there he 
 was, nearly six foot now, and promising to grow 
 into a young giant before he had done; he 
 dwarfed every body who stood near his long, 
 leggy, awkward frame. 
 
 Dr. Ferrand was a very grave, silent, scholarly 
 gentleman ; silent, said his son, because he was 
 so over-talked by his sisters in his youth that 
 he had never been able to recover it. He, Sin- 
 clair, was not likely to suffer in the same way, 
 for he was most irre^rent of their little foibles, 
 though he was fond of them too. And they 
 were very good, though their powers of speech 
 were truly bewildering ; as for Miss Delia, she 
 began at every opportunity, like a stream with 
 a fresh on it, and long ere she had done, her 
 listeners felt as if their wits were all being 
 washed away on a tepid flood of vagueness. 
 
 She dearly loved to preach private sermon- 
 ettes, and when once her eyes were closed to 
 the face of her auditor, nothing could stop her. 
 And her way of going to work was not quite 
 fair either. She always assumed to open with 
 that her victim was in utter spiritual darkness 
 and ignorance, which was apt to put even a self- 
 possessed person at a disadvantage. Rachel 
 "Withers one day caught herself with meek 
 hands folded in her lap, hearkening and assent- 
 ing to the most elementary and self-evident 
 propositions as if they were then dawning on her 
 understanding for the first time ; and this de- 
 mure air of respectful interest, though quite 
 unintentional, encouraged Miss Delia's pet pro- 
 pensity until Rachel feU to nodding at her for 
 sheer drowsiness. 
 
 At last, either by an instinctive effort to es- 
 cape from further homiletic discourse, or as an 
 intimation that she had possibly heard some 
 similar observations before, Rachel murmured 
 that her father had been a clergyman, and her 
 only brother was also in the church, which 
 brought Miss Delia to a momentary check — 
 she was glad to hear of her young friend's priv- 
 ileges ; probably cousin Sara had mentioned her 
 connections in her letters, but if so the particu- 
 lars had slipt her memory. Great talkers rarely 
 are good listeners, which perhaps accounts for 
 their bad memories. 
 
 Miss Flora was a shade or two less loquacious 
 than her younger sister ; and they were both 
 pretty old ladies — that is, they were about fifty, 
 but had elderly ways and white hair, though 
 they had a faded rose of complexion still left, 
 
 and nice fair skins. Their dress was all soft and 
 neutral-tinted, without rustles or wrinkles, and 
 put on in a fashion that was theirs and nobody's 
 besides ; nothing scrimped or poor about it, but 
 so far modified from the prevailing style as at 
 once to intimate that they belonged to a world 
 apiirt from that which follows the lead of Paris. 
 Their house of Brookfall was as delightful in 
 its way as Prior's Bank. It was very appropri- 
 ately fitted up in cottage style, and had odd, un- 
 expected nooks and corners, with shelves of 
 dainty china and oriental gimcracks without 
 number. And there were growing flowers in 
 stands everywhere, which gave it the perfumy 
 atmosphere of a conservatory. But after Rachel 
 had heard the excellent ladies engage in con- 
 versation, she understood why her godmamma 
 chose rather to stay in lodgings than to place 
 herself quite at their mercy in their own house. 
 
 ' Immediately after their arrival at Claymire, 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and her goddaughter spent 
 a long day at Brookfall, where they met at din- 
 ner nearly every body who constituted its inti- 
 mate society. There were Mr. and Mrs. Wallis 
 from the rectory at Enowle — he what Bitter- 
 sweet called " a faith-sans-works man," she pious- 
 frivolous; Mr. More, a bachelor of uncertain 
 age, wealthy,,neat-looking — rather too bland and 
 precise in mannerj but Miss Delia Ferrand's mod- 
 el of a charmingly good young man ; Mr. Clarke, 
 the Claymire curate, and his sister, both quiet, 
 pleasant people ; Captain Hartford, a red-faced, 
 jovial naval officer ; Mr. Wilson, the surgeon of 
 the district, and Dr. Ferrand and his son Sm- 
 clair ; and to obviate the fatal mistake of thir- 
 teen at tablCj a quaint little spinster of great 
 vivacity was procured at the eleventh hour in 
 the village. Her name was Miss Crispe, and 
 she might be any thing short of a hundred 
 years old. 
 
 And they heard of somebody else. " Posi- 
 tively," said Rachel to her godmamma, "the 
 Gilslands would be justified in believing that 
 we are hunting them about." It appeared that 
 they had arrived at Welsbeck Vicarage a couple 
 of months before to take the duty for the cler- 
 gyman of the parish, who had obtained a year's 
 leave of absence from his cure on account of 
 ill-health. They had two boy pupils, and a little 
 niece living with them. The neighborhood had 
 called upon them, and though Mrs. Gilsland was 
 not J)opular, and people marveled what could 
 have made her handsome husband marry her, 
 he was well thought of, especially in the pulpit. 
 He had preached a charity sermon at Claymire 
 soon after his arrival, and' had delighted every i 
 body but the doctor with his fine flow of elo- 
 quent language; the doctor had a masculine 
 preference for matter over manner, and made 
 a private resolution that he should not be in 
 haste to invite that high-flown, sentimental 
 preacher to occupy his pulpit again. But many 
 ladies. Miss Delia Ferrand amongst them, pro- 
 fessed admiration of his flowery style. 
 
 Considering the marked manner in which the 
 Gilslands had avoided them at Amiens, Bitter- 
 sweet and Kachel were both agreed that there 
 was no necessity to visit them here; and as 
 'Welsbeck was four miles from Claymire across 
 the downs it was devoutly hoped that no un- 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 75 
 
 lucky accident might throw them together. 
 They had been invited to dine at Brookfall the 
 same day as themselves, but had declined on 
 the plea of Mrs. Gilsland's having caught cold. 
 Any knowledge Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel 
 had of their previous circumstances, they thought 
 it only just and wise to keep to themselves. 
 
 "Perhaps they are trying to redeem them- 
 selves," said Eachel; "let us not spoil their 
 chance." 
 
 This season of the year had its drawbacks 
 even at Ciaymire ; after a few days of pleasant 
 autumnal weather there ensued a week of wind 
 and rain, and nothing to do, which made Eachel 
 long to be comfortably settled at Prior's Bank 
 again, with her books and work around her ; 
 but they were pledged to stay here a month, 
 and even had they been free to escape at once. 
 Bittersweet could not have traveled in such cold 
 and boisterous weather. 
 
 Toward the end of this week it was that there 
 occurred a remarkable incident which gave rise 
 to a world of talk in that quiet neighborhood, 
 and summarily abolished the Gilslands' chance 
 of peace and prosperity in that part of the 
 country. 
 
 Sinclair Ferraud had been out on one of his 
 adventurous expeditions over the downs, and 
 was returning at dusk when he was overtaken 
 by a tremendous storm. The fog then gath- 
 ered so thickly on the hills that he lost his way, 
 and went wandering about until long past night- 
 fall, uncertain where he was, and a [raid almost 
 to move, lest he should find himself suddenly at 
 the bottom of a deserted quarry or of one of 
 the.soarped eliflfs that characterize the Ciaymire 
 downs. For some time he took shelter under 
 the lee of a cart-shed, and when the mist lifted 
 a little, he began to move cautiously on in a de- 
 scending line, trusting to come soon on some 
 familiar object that would put bim on the way 
 to the rectory. But as if ho were on enchanted 
 ground, he could apparently make no progress ; 
 for he preseiitly found himself back at the old 
 cart-shed, or eke approaching another precisely 
 . similar. 
 
 As he drew near, he heard a sound which he 
 at first supposed to be the moan of a dog ; he 
 whistled, but nothing appeared, and the sound 
 ceased. He then went round to the other side 
 -of the buUding, whence he saw start up out of 
 the wet and mire, tio animal but a child which 
 immediately ran off down the hill. He cried out 
 to it to stop, but it still fled on, and believing it 
 to be some little village girl, lost in the storm 
 like himself, and now fearfully escaping from 
 him as from a new terror, he started in pursuit, 
 and captured the fugitive very soon ; but so far 
 was she from being grateful to her protector 
 that she struck at him vehemently, and strug- 
 gled with the desperation of a wild animal to 
 get loose again. The lad wisely held her fast, 
 and when her fright or passion had exhausted 
 itself, he asked her where she came from, and 
 if he might carry her home. To this she sobbed 
 that he could not — it was beyond the hills ever 
 so far away, but she should know it when she 
 got there ; and then she strove to wrest herself 
 free again both with frantic efforts and touching 
 entreaties. 
 
 Young Perrand had no idea how to calm or 
 comfort her except by kissing, which universally 
 
 understood language of kindness met with par- 
 tial success ; for she at length consented to al- 
 low him to grasp her hand and steer her gently 
 down hill ; and soon after, the storm blowing 
 over and the mist with it, he was able to discern 
 certain landmarks, by which in about half an 
 hour's time he reached his aunt's house at Brook- 
 fall. But here again, as soon as the child found 
 herself returning to regions of civilization, she 
 renewed her struggles to escape, and she was 
 at last presented before the benevolent old ladies 
 beating with all her little might against her de- 
 termined captor. 
 
 He carried her into the kitchen, and set her 
 down in the midst of a group of wondering wo- 
 mankind, announcing that she was lost on the 
 downs, and they had better take care of her un- 
 til the morning, when they might perhaps find 
 out to whom she belonged ; and Miss Flora's old 
 dog Floss getting up and amiably licking her 
 face, either frightened or soothed her so much 
 that she ceased her crying and was quiet. 
 
 " It would have touched a heart of stone to 
 look at her, I assure you it would," said Miss 
 Delia Ferrand with the tears in her eyes as she 
 recounted all this to Mrs. Sara Grandage and 
 Eachel. " A poor, sickly, pitiful little face, all 
 eyes and mouth, gazing round at us strangers as 
 if we were hunters and she at bay. She had no 
 covering on her neck or on her head, and only 
 a pair of miserable ankle-strap shoes, broken at 
 the sides, on her feet ; and she was wet to the 
 skin — and what was worse than all, when we 
 came to undress her and put her into a warm 
 bath to make her comfortable before bed, we 
 found her little body marked with stripes new 
 and old — we did indeed ! Monster that could 
 use a chUd so I When Dolly our kitchen-maid 
 saw it she fell to crying and kissing the wheals, 
 and the poor thing stared as if she did not know 
 what tenderness meant. It was almost too much 
 for dear Flora when she asked for something to 
 eat, and ate it, oh, so hungrily ! She must have 
 been starved as well as beaten, and oh ! she had 
 been beaten cruelly !" 
 
 Miss Delia said further that they had teased 
 her with no. questions, but when she seemed fit 
 for it, she was carried to Dolly's bed, where she 
 presently fell fast asleep quite exhausted and 
 worn out. AU the excellent household were 
 painfully shocked beforehand, however, by her 
 incapacity to say her prayers ; they tried her to 
 no purpose with a few of the most familiar that 
 children use, and after fumbling in her memory 
 as it were, she at length began to recite a little 
 Catholic hymn, "Gentle Jesus," but broke 
 down at the second line with sobs and tears ; 
 and so they laid her in bed, and the good pious 
 old ladies breathed a special prayer for her in- 
 stead. 
 
 The next morning Sinclair Ferrand was up at 
 Brookfall very early to inquire after his little 
 waif, whom he found sharing the kitchen hearth- 
 stone with Floss in the hight of friendship and 
 good-fellowship. She had been washed and 
 brushed and fed with bread and milk, and 
 would have looked comfortable enough but for 
 a trick she had of pressing her hand on her 
 brow and murmuring : " Such a pain here, such 
 a bad pain here !" Sinclair tried to coax some 
 intelligence out of her to guide him in his 
 search for her family ; but she was either too 
 
76 
 
 ANNIS WAELEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 languid or too stupid to answer, and Dolly 
 would have her let alone, predicting that she 
 was going to be laid up. And so unfortunately 
 she was. Out in the night rain so long she had 
 caught cold, and being feeble, starved, ill-used 
 and wretched besides, the result was a kind of 
 low fever. And there she was at Brookfall, 
 poor little mortal, aching and moaning, while 
 Miss Delia Ferrand was relating her piteous 
 story to Bittersweet and Rachel. 
 
 As they were listening, a shrewd suspicion 
 gradually crept into the mind of each, and nei- 
 ther was surprised when, as the result of Sin- 
 clair's inquiries, his capture was discovered to 
 be Mr. Gilsland's niece, or, as the reader who 
 is behind the scenes knows. Sir Laurence War- 
 leigh's little wildling ! 
 
 III. 
 
 A fortnight went over, and the poor child at 
 Brookfall still continued desperately ill — wasted 
 to a skeleton she was ; and through all her pain 
 and weakness, she lay moaning, incessantly 
 moaning, for "Papa, papa!" 
 
 Mrs. Gilsland had only been allowed to see 
 her once; for when she was introduced into 
 the room the sick creature manifested such a 
 terror and repugnance at her presence, that, in 
 her delirium, she sprang out of bed and tried 
 to creep under it. Her affectionate kinswoman 
 wept " canting, crocodile tears," said Dolly, 
 and deplored her naughtiness, exhibiting a bite 
 in the thick part of her hand, inflicted by the 
 child's teeth the afternoon before she ran away, 
 and declaring that from the first hour of taking 
 her under her protection she had been as indo- 
 cile and untraotable as a wild animal out of the 
 woods. , 
 
 Miss Flora suggested that if she had tried the 
 magical power of kindness instead of blows she 
 might have succeeded better. Mrs. Gilsland 
 promptly denied the blows ; but Miss Delia as 
 promptly contradicted her denial, and referred 
 her to Mr. WUson, who was attending the 
 child, if she desired to hear her treatment of it 
 accurately characterized. The two kind old 
 ladies could not find terms in their own vocab- 
 ulary strong enough to express their disgust, 
 and Sinclair Ferrand, with the fervent indigna- 
 tion of youth, expressed a desire to walk into 
 Mr. Gilsland, and to send his odious wife to the 
 treadmill. 
 
 Some sort of negotiation had been begun 
 with a view of the child's being left altogether 
 under the care of the ladies of Brookfsdl, but 
 thus far Mr. Gilsland had refused to give her 
 up ; though as every body thought he might, 
 after what had happened, have been thankful to 
 get her a good home away from his wife, who, 
 of course, bore the heavier share of popular ex- 
 ecration. It had been found impossible to keep 
 the affair quiet, and such an outcry against them 
 had spread through the country that they would 
 certainly be obliged to leave Welsbeck. In 
 view of this necessity. Miss Delia Ferrand's 
 heart became strongly set on retaining the 
 child. 
 
 " She has always been wanting something to 
 try her educational theories upon ever since I 
 have known her," said Bittersweet. "Years 
 ago; if she could have set up a baby of her 
 ovm without bother or impropriety she would 
 
 have done it; the experiment of adopting one 
 is critical, and rarely satisfactory in its_ results. 
 But now this little" wsuf has drifted into her 
 lap, it is my belief she will keep it, and defy 
 the Gilslands tooth and nail. A determined 
 body is Delia when her mind is made up, gen- 
 tle, drowsy, loquacious as she seems when she 
 has nothing particular in view." 
 
 Rachel Withers had discovered, even through 
 the kind soul's floods of tepid talk, that she was 
 both importunate and persistent ; but she wish- 
 ed her success in this instance. The hapless 
 little orphan would find herself in clover at 
 Brookfall; and bringing her up wisely and 
 plainly was sure to issue there in plenty of pet- 
 ting and indulgence to the top of her bent. 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage also entered so far into 
 her cousin's good intentions as to promise to 
 exert her personal influence in bringing about 
 the desired result. The Gilslands were not 
 aware of her being at Claymire, and she deter- 
 mined one day to astonish them by a descent 
 on Welsbeck unannounced, so that they should 
 have no chance of evasion. She insisted on 
 Rachel's accompanying her, much against her 
 inclination; and Miss Delia Ferrand having also 
 volunteered herself one of the invading party, 
 the trio drove over to Welsbeck in the Brook- 
 fall brougham, wrought up variously into ex- 
 cited mood, and ready at all points for the 
 stormy encounter fhey had to anticipate. 
 
 Welsbeck Vicarage stood upon the high road, 
 and was a bald, dark house in front, but the 
 drawing-room into which the visitors were ush- 
 ered looked on the garden, which was large, 
 shady and pleasant, though just now neglected. 
 The place bore no other agn of its present ten- 
 ants save this neglect, seeing they were only 
 installed in it temporarily during the owner's 
 absence abroad ; and after the formal dispatch 
 of their names through the little servant, most 
 punctiliously recited and impressed on her rus- 
 tic mind by Miss Delia, they had to sit in silence 
 and observation for a considerable time. The 
 importance of the occasion was on Miss Delia's 
 mind most responsibly; and Rachel was too 
 uneasy in the situation to talk, but Bittersweet 
 enjoyed it rather than otherwise, and presently 
 gave her humor play. 
 
 " I daresay Mrs. Gilsland is beautifying ; she 
 was always too slovenly to be presentable at a 
 moment's notice," whispered she ; then, " Ra- 
 chel, how do you feel?" Rachel replied that 
 she felt in no way particular ; on which, to en- 
 hance the dramatic interest of the occasion, the 
 old lady embraced this critical moment to say to 
 her cousin, "Mr. Gilsland was Rachel's first love, 
 Delia ; and he quarreled with her for his wife's 
 sweet sake — but she was not his wife then. 
 Was he not a man of discernment ?" 
 
 " Don't romance, Sara ; I won't believe it !" 
 cried Miss Delia, and just then the door opened 
 with a suddenness so remarkable that every 
 body felt sure Mrs. Gilsland, who now entered, 
 must have been near enough to overhear this 
 inconvenient effusion of Bittersweet's malice 
 and mischief. 
 
 She appeared with her head and neck swath- 
 ed up in flannel, her sharp features sharper, and 
 her watery eyes more weepy than ever. She was 
 suffering visibly from a very severe influenza, 
 and seemed so weak and depressed as to be at 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 11 
 
 first hardly able to speak. The interview opeif- 
 ed with general greetings and remarks between 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and herself, and the Tisit 
 seemed to run a risk of dwindling away into one 
 of mere courtesy when Miss Delia Ferrand broke 
 peremptorily into the conversation. 
 
 " Cousin Sara, postpone these trivial things. 
 to matters more serious," said she, in a tone 
 which quelled irrelevance at once and convinced 
 Kachel, if she had any doubts remaining, that 
 this was the woman to come, to see, and to con- 
 quer if it were in the power of feminine deter- 
 mination to do it. Mrs. Gilsland started, dress- 
 ed herself feebly up in her chair, and began to 
 fidget nervously with the gilt handle of the card- 
 basket as Miss Delia went on with her challenge, 
 slightly incoherent in style, but quite clear in 
 meaning. "About that cruelly ill-used child, 
 laid up ill at Brookfall, and my sister most like- 
 ly sitting by her bed, if not Sinclair and Floss to 
 amuse her as well ; what are you going to do ?" 
 
 "I can do nothing without Mr. Grildland; you 
 had better talk to him, but he is in the village 
 now," was the fretful reply. " I begin to wish 
 we had never seen the child ; she is no end of 
 trouble. From first to last it has been a most 
 unlucky' business for us — such terrible anxiety, 
 worry and care ; it will get my life at last, I 
 know it will. As I am continually saying, No 
 money could pay us for the burden." 
 
 " Paid for it, are you ? Then the more shame 
 for you, Betsy, that you beat and starved the 
 poor thing !" interposed Bittersweet. 
 
 " We did not starve her or beat her," returned 
 Mrs. Gilsland, doggedly. " If she says we did 
 she is a wicked story-teller ; but she is the worst 
 child T ever met with, and could not speak truth 
 if she tried ! She sulked at her meals, refused 
 her food daily, and flung herself about in her 
 passions until she was bruised all black and 
 blue." 
 
 " How came she to bite you ? you must have 
 been engaged in a pretty close struggle then," 
 observed Miss Delia. 
 
 Mrs. Gilsland began to cry, and Bittersweet 
 proceeded to address her in a voice of solemn 
 appeal. 
 
 " Now, Betsy, listen to reason. Tou are no 
 fool, but, on the contrary, a very shrewd and 
 long-headed women. It is of no use inventing 
 fictions and excuses to divert us. Tou are in a 
 difficulty, a very damaging difficulty, which all 
 the little world of hereabouts is discussing > 
 angrily. Tou can not remain at Welsbeck after 
 what has been made public ; and in leaving you 
 would be as well rid of the child as she would 
 be well rid of you. My good cousins at Brook- 
 fall are willing to keep her, since Providence 
 has mercifully delivered her into their hands, 
 and such an opportunity of freeing yourself of 
 an onerous charge is not likely to recur. If you 
 will give her up, what are the terms ? will you 
 keep her penny-fee and let the child go, or will 
 you give up the child and her pay too ?" 
 
 Instead of answering, the poor creature look- 
 ed mute and terrified, and foUowing the direc- 
 tion of her seared eyes the visitors saw her hus- 
 band standing in the open doorway of an adjoin- 
 ing room, from which he had entered noiseless- 
 ly, giving each one a disagreeable shock of sur- 
 prise. 
 
 " "What is all this, Betsy, and who are these 
 people who come here to talk of my giving up 
 
 my brother's daughter ?" exclaimed he, staring 
 at his frightened wife as he advanced into the 
 midst of the party with an air of awful dignity. 
 
 " These poople," said Bittersweet in her most 
 sarcastic tone, "are your old acquaintances, 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and Miss Rachel "Withers 
 from Hurtledale, and your new acquaintance 
 Miss Delia Ferrand from Claymire." 
 
 It was Mr. Gilsland's turn now to be taken 
 aback ; evidently he had not recognized the 
 visitors at the first glance ; he had observed 
 nothing beyond the fact of his wife's being seat- 
 ed in committee with three ladies, one of whom 
 was addressing her in "a severe and pointed 
 strain; for he halted, lost his color and self- 
 possession, and begging Mrs. Sara Grandage's 
 pardon in stammering terms, sat down, looking 
 not much less helpless and amazed than his 
 wife. Miss Delia gave him no time to recover, 
 but at once discharged over him the batteries of 
 her fluency — reproaches, adjurations, entreaties 
 enough to take away any body's breath but hers. 
 By the time she was thoroughly run down, how- 
 ever, he was almost his own man again, though 
 by the flickering unsteadiness of his eye and his 
 hesitation of manner it was plain that she had 
 awakened in him, if not a wholesome sense of 
 shame, at least a sense of ignominious disgrace. 
 Still he reared up his head with an air of inso- 
 lent defiance when he spoke again as if, come 
 what would, he was prepared to brave it out. 
 
 " Have you seen the object of this benevolent 
 lady's exaggerated sympathies ?" asked he, turn- 
 ing to Mrs. Sara Grandage, and for all his at- 
 tempted bravado listening for her answer with 
 an almost sickness of anxiety ; the certainty 
 present to his mind that if she or Rachel With- 
 ers had seen or did see her, all his plots' and 
 prospects and respectability were blown to the 
 winds. 
 
 " No," replied Bittersweet ; "I have not seen 
 her, neither do I desire to see her. She is not 
 able to bear the intrusion of strange faces round 
 her pillow. We do not wish to frighten out of 
 her emaciated frame the little life there is left 
 in it, or to gloat over the misery, cruelty and 
 neglect can inflict upon a child. She is in good 
 hands now, and you wUl do wisely to leave her 
 there." 
 
 "Indeed you will!" added Miss Delia with 
 great fervor. " Tou may relieve yourselves of 
 a burden, and bestow on us a boon at the same 
 time, for which we shall truly thank you. No- 
 body has seen her yet and nobody shall see her, 
 poor little lost darling, until she is strong and 
 well again. Mr. Wilson says it is not safe to 
 irritate her nerves or her brain at all now, and 
 we must shut every body out. It was God 
 guided her like a tiny frozen bird to our door, 
 and it would go to our hearts to cast her forth 
 again. Tou will not drag her from her refuge, 
 Mr. Gilsland ; you will intrust her to our care — 
 care which will never be felt by us as a tax !" 
 Eagerness in the pursuit of her wishes made 
 Miss Delia coherent and almost eloquent ; but 
 Mr. Gilsland got up, shook his head, walked to 
 the window, came back again, and protested 
 that it was impossible ; against his most sacred 
 feelings, against his undertaldng to his brother 
 on his death-bed — ^he could not do it, he could 
 not, and yet all the while there was yielding and 
 capitulation in his manner. 
 
 Rachel Withers, silent herself and taking no 
 
78 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 part in the discussion, had the more leisure to 
 observe, and it appeared to her that he would 
 hare been most sincerely relieved to be free of 
 the child, but that some powerful secret con- 
 sideration induced him to retain it — perhaps the 
 money, for he was evidently but ill off. His 
 wife watched him intently, her lean hands 
 clasped, her dull eyes fixed in a very pathos of 
 supplication. 
 
 " Ton had better, Alfred," murmured she, but 
 she never spoke again after the glance he gave 
 her in reply. 
 
 The treaty did not advance much farther than 
 this. The utmost Mr. Gilsland would pledge 
 himself to was not to' remove his niece from 
 Brookfall until she was quite recovered from 
 her sickness, unless he should have to go away 
 from Welsbeok before — ^then, he said, of course, 
 he could not leave her behind. 
 
 As they drove home Miss Delia, in talking the 
 business over, was greatly inclined to interpret 
 Mr. Gilsland's protestations as Rachel did, but 
 Bittersweet's shrewd observation took them 
 both by surprise when she said ; " The man has 
 somebody to consult besides his wife — if the 
 decision lay only between those two it would 
 immediately resolve itself into a question of 
 pounds, shillings and pence." 
 
 A few days after this embarrassing interview, 
 as Mrs. Sara Grandage and her goddaughter 
 were sitting at luncheon, there arrived a lad 
 with a note from Mrs. Gilsland which Rachel 
 was bidden to read. On opening it and seeing 
 the few irregular pencil lines of which it con- 
 sisted, she remarked aloud that she thought it 
 must have been written in haste and secrecy, 
 and undoubtedly so it was. Mrs. Gilsland en- 
 treated her old patroness to go to her imme- 
 diately, saying that she believed her hours were 
 numbered, and that she wished before she died 
 to speak to her on a subject that lay very heavi- 
 ly on her mind. " I must see you alone," she 
 wrote, " and if you arrive between three and 
 four o'clock we shall not be interrupted." 
 
 There was a very violent thunder-rain falling 
 at the time ; Claymire boasted but one carriage 
 to let out at hire, and this had to be sent for 
 from'the inn ; then the horse that drew it was 
 to be fetched some distance from its work in 
 the fields, which delay made them so late that 
 it was past four o'clock when they left the cot- 
 tage; Rachel going for company to her god- 
 mamma on the drive. 
 
 As they entered the long village street, Mrs. 
 Sara Grandage espied Mr. Gilsland crossing the 
 road to the rectory ; he turned his head, glanced 
 sharply at the carriage, and looked very hag- 
 gard when he recognized its occupants. They 
 reached the door at the same moment, and he 
 presented himself at the carriage window direct- 
 ly it stopped, when Bittersweet, without hinting 
 at the summons she had received, immediately 
 said : " I have heard that your poor wife is 
 worse, Mr. Gilsland, and for old sake's sake I 
 should like to see her once more if I can be of 
 any use." 
 
 " No body can be of any use," said he ; and 
 the thought struck Rachel that she was already 
 gone, but in the next breath he explained that 
 she was only weak and wandering, so that if any 
 
 chance of recovery was left her it lay in perfect 
 rest. 
 
 " Still, as I am here, go and ask if she would 
 like me to come up," urged Mrs. Sara Grandage. 
 
 " Better not," replied he ; " much better not. 
 She has been very low since last night and has 
 not recognized any of us." 
 
 Now Bittersweet saw that this could not be 
 strictly true ; for if the poor woman had been 
 in a state of unconsciousness, how could she 
 have written that message to her ? In spite of 
 his advice, therefore, she made a movement to 
 leave the carriage, and he opened the door for 
 her to get out. "You may stay where you are, 
 Rachel," said she, and then turned and entered 
 the house, determined at all events, to compass 
 a sight of Mrs. Gilsland in whatever state she 
 might be. It seemed a very long ten minutes 
 to Rachel before she returned ; and when she 
 did appear she looked exceedingly grave and 
 troubled. Mr. Gilsland was with her, and they 
 did not exchange a single word as he put her 
 back into the carriage which immediately drove 
 away. Rachel presently asked how Mrs. Gils- 
 land was. 
 
 " All but gone," Bittersweet answered her. 
 " Whatever condition she might be in earlier in 
 the day she is speechless now, but I think she 
 knew me. Her eyes rested on my face and she 
 ceased her groaning, but only for an instant. I 
 wish I could guess what she wanted to tell me. 
 Rachel, I loathe him worse than ever — ^hard un- 
 feeling wretch ! I feel sure that poor soul 
 quakes in her dying bed when he is standing by. 
 He would go in to prepare her, as he said — I 
 wonder whether she would have spoken to me 
 had I seen her without his preparing." 
 
 The next morning in very good time. Miss 
 Delia Ferrand went down to the cottage to com- 
 municate the inteEigenoe that Mrs. Gilsland was 
 dead — she had died the night before at eleven 
 o'clock, never having rallied for a moment. It 
 seemed sudden and was a "great shock both to 
 Bittersweet and Rachel ; enough to make them 
 vow never to speak or to think hardly of any 
 body again. But a few days ago, they had felt 
 that she was- abhorrent to them, and already she 
 was beyond their repentance, their considera- 
 tion, their forgiveness. Which of the two — ^her- 
 self or her husband — was most to blame about 
 the hapless child was not material now ; on the 
 dead dispraise lies very lightly ! 
 
 They had not told the poor little waif who was 
 still lying so ill at Brookfall, that her aunt was 
 dead. Miss Delia said, neither did they intend 
 doing so until she was up and about, of which 
 there was no present prospect. " She is full of 
 freaks and fancies, which we can not reconcile at 
 all with the account given of her by Mr. and Mrs. 
 Gilsland," continued the kind so*il ; " and yet 
 she does not talk as if she were light-headed. 
 Mr. Wilson says we can not exercise too much 
 caution with her, and nobody enters her room 
 now except dear Flora and Dolly — even / keep 
 out. If it please God to make her well again, 
 then my turn will come. She persistS'in calling 
 for her papa, and in affirming that he is not 
 dead — now we all know he is dead, because she 
 is in mourning for him. The little frock she 
 had on when Sinclair brought her to Brookfall 
 is tucked half-way up with crape. It is difficult 
 dealing with such an idea — ^what would you do 
 
SIR LAURENCE'S LITTLE WILDLING. 
 
 79 
 
 about it, cousin Sara ? Would you take no no- 
 tice and let the delusion wear out ; or would 
 you reason with her on the naughtiness of main- 
 taining it in defiance of her uncle and poor 
 aunt — but she is gone now." 
 
 " I should certainly not chafe the young 
 thing's feelings by insisting on her believing 
 any thing grievous," replied Bittersweet. " Let 
 her speak of her papa as being alive if it com- 
 forts her ; as she recovers her strength and finds 
 herself in the midst of people who are good to 
 her, she will realize the truth with less pain." 
 The old lady then asked Miss Delia if she were 
 already busy laying her plans and developing 
 her theories for the education of her prot6g6e. 
 
 " I am not sure that she is mine yet," said the 
 worthy kind creature, coloring with beneficent 
 pleasure at the prospect the question opened 
 out before her. " I am sure of nothing — Mr. 
 Gilsland has giveil me no undertaking that she 
 will be left with us ; but I entertain more hopes 
 of his yielding since he has lost his poor wfle ; 
 for what can a solitary man do with a little girl 
 like her on his hands ? I intend to see him 
 again as soon as the funeral is over, and to urge 
 him to a decision. My brother does not disap- 
 prove the scheme, and dear Flora quite enters 
 into it. I shall thoroughly enjoy having a child 
 to bring up ; something I can call my own and 
 manage just as I like. Of course we should 
 train her judiciously, and make her capable of 
 helping herself, but also we should consider it a 
 duty to provide for her — if she married, for in- 
 stance ; or outlived us, remaining single, which 
 in the common order of nature might be looked 
 for. We were speaking last evening of music, 
 and though we are disinclined to whatever sa- 
 vors of worldliness or frivolity, still, if she have 
 talent we should let her learn music, and sing- 
 ing also if her voice be sweet, not otherwise — 
 Flora had a very sweet voice when she was 
 young ; I hear no singing like hers nowadays. 
 The child's accent is rather provincial in speak- 
 ing, as if she had had a Scotch nurse about her, 
 and some of her sayings are very quaint ; for 
 instance. Floss begged for a bit of her mutton 
 yesterday, and she gave him a mouthful off her 
 fork, telling him he was ' like the Lord Mayor's 
 fool, and knew what was good for him !' Dolly 
 laughed heartily S,t the oddity of the comparison, 
 for Floss does make a god of his inside. She 
 can not read, though she is past five years old, 
 but, as Flora and I both think, we had much 
 better begin on no foundation than on a bad 
 one ; and I am sure we shall find her education 
 a delightful task." 
 
 " I wish it may not turn out harder than you 
 expect," said Bittersweet, smiling over Miss 
 Delia's enthusiasm. " These young folks have 
 ways and wills of their own bred in them, and 
 are not to be trained as easily as lapdogs." 
 
 " The great secret is management from the 
 outset," replied Miss Delia with an air of expe- 
 rience and sagacity; "begin as you intend to 
 go on ; be firm in kindness, but above all, be 
 firm. ' Train up a child in the way he should 
 go, and when he is old he will never depart 
 from it ' — ^there are counsel and encouragement 
 both." 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage retired from the debate. 
 Miss Delia evidently had a heart fuU of good 
 iiitentions, and a head quite empty of the knowl- 
 
 edge which comes of laboring to carry good in- 
 tentions out; but like other knowledge worth 
 having, she would only get it at the price of ex- 
 perience. It was well that she should start with 
 a profound faith in the ultimate success of her 
 undertaking, for she was sure, let the child be- 
 come ever so docile and intelligent, to meet 
 with some shocks and disappointments in car- 
 rying it on ; but the little waif was assuredly for- 
 tunate in having been cast into such kind and 
 conscientious hands. 
 
 Doubts of Mr. Gilsland's decision were ex- 
 pressed, but few were really felt. " Supposing 
 there were some person in the background who 
 would have a right to claim' her in the event of 
 his desiring to relinquish his charge," Bitter- 
 sweet argued, " not many kinsfolk would strive 
 with each other for the guardianship of a por- 
 tionless orphan, or dispute the responsibility of 
 adopting her when you are ready to take the 
 sole charge, Delia." Miss Delia was glad to 
 think so until the affair was settled. 
 
 Mr. Gilsland played his part to admiration in 
 the final interview that he had with Miss Delia 
 Ferrand and Mrs. Sara Grandage, but both the 
 ladies trusted that he did not suppose he was 
 really taking them in. He looked rather thin 
 and out . of health, and an air of melancholy 
 suited him; at all events, he wore it steadily 
 throughout the meeting, and spoke of his wife 
 in terms that would have been touching to any 
 person not aware of the facts. He was leaving 
 Welsbeck forthwith, and he was prepared to 
 yield up his niece on what to every body seemed 
 easy conditions. He stated distinctly that no 
 one had right or power to interfere in the dispo- 
 sal of her except himself: for to the best of his 
 knowledge and belief she had no blood relations 
 besides. Her mother who was dead was an 
 only child, and her father, " a dissolute repro- 
 bate, though he said it," was his own only 
 brother. 
 
 He prevaricated slightly in his answers to the 
 questions Mrs. Sara Grandage put to him in ref- 
 erence to the money his wife had implied was 
 paid for her maintenance ; saying at first that 
 his wife was mistaken, and then admitting that 
 there were a few hundreds — but here Miss Delia 
 Interposed with an assurance that he was wel- 
 come to keep them for his own necessities, as 
 she would have nothing whatever to do with 
 money ; the child must be wholly and solely de- 
 pendent on herself. 
 
 This matter was soon arranged and passed 
 over, and then they went on to consider future 
 terms of correspondence ; and here a hitch 
 seemed likely to occur ; but it was finally 
 smoothed away by Mr. Gilsland's agreeing to 
 abstain from all personal interference between 
 his niece and her protectress, on condition of 
 being kept informed of her well-being twice 
 during the year. Considering how very little 
 feeling he had testified for her before, he was 
 very exact in making his rights understood now. 
 If she had been his own daughter, and he had 
 had a strong natural affection for her, he could 
 not have been more anxiously scrupulous than 
 he was. 
 
 " You must mind what yo{i are about, Delia, 
 or he will make the child an instrument for 
 
80 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 screwing money out of you by and by," said Bit- 
 tersweet, in accents of warning when the last 
 details were arranged and he was gone. " If he 
 ever attempts it, don't parley, but hand him 
 over to the doctor or your . old lawyer, Napper, 
 at once. 
 
 " I will, I win ; but don't make me feel un- 
 sure of my prize so soon," repUed Miss Delia. 
 " Tou can not imagine how my heart rejoices 
 over the thought that we are to keep her. I 
 wish she may be well enough for you to have 
 one peep at her before you go away. She is be- 
 ginning to do nicely now." 
 
 They hoped so too, but the veriest trifle in- 
 terfered to disappoint them. On what small 
 hinges turn the great courses of hfe ! On the 
 last day of their stay at Claymire, Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage and her goddaughter walked up to 
 Brookfall expressly to see and admire Miss De- 
 lia's treasure, but when they arrived Dolly re- 
 ported of her as being in a beautiful sleep — and 
 sleep was salvation to her now ; and when Ra- 
 chel suggested that it would perhaps be only the 
 better opportunity. Miss Flora cautiously ob- 
 jected on the score that the door creaked so it 
 could not be opened wide enough to enter with- 
 out waking her ; Brookfall Cottage was very 
 old, and all the doors creaked and the floors too. 
 
 Thus was lost the last chance of discovering 
 the cruel treachery which had brought Sir Lau- 
 rence TVarleigh's little wildling into the hands 
 of these good Samaritans. It was a kind Prov- 
 idence perhaps that left her there. 
 
 On the journey home to Prior's Bank, Ra- 
 chel Withers caught cold, and on her arrival 
 she was laid up with an attack of inflammation 
 on the lungs. She had never been ill in her life 
 before, and made but a very bad patient; thanks 
 to God and a good constitution, however, she 
 won safely through, though some delicacy and 
 susceptibility were left behind. Dr. Beane would 
 have had her seek a warmer climate for the win- 
 ter, and her godmamma would have gladly as- 
 sented, but she rebelled against the proposal 
 and prevailed ; it sounded so very invaUdish, and 
 besides she wished to be near John and Kather- 
 ine and the bairns. 
 
 All was well in that household : John stout- 
 ening fast into rectorial dignity, and Katherine 
 keeping steady matronly pace with him ; while 
 the children, as their nurse declared, were the 
 most rautorian trio ever she was plagued with. 
 Health and good spirits were cheap amongst the 
 boys, and Sacharissa Tulip was just beginning to 
 toddle ; but being naturally fat, and much over- 
 weighted with sash behind, she came down_/?Mmp 
 at every other step ; she fell soft though, which 
 was a comfort, and took her jolts in very good 
 part, only chuckling and staring with big, amaz- 
 ed blue eyes, at each recurrence of the bump, 
 as if it were quite a novel catastrophe. 
 
 When Rachel began to go out again it was 
 December ; the sky was gray with mists, the 
 woods and gardens were all blown and winterly 
 desolate. 
 
 " What changes in Hurtledale since last year 
 at this time !" thought she, the first Sunday she 
 weut to church after her recovery. The little 
 grave by Helena's was green, and Annis's name 
 was there on a new memorial stone below her 
 mother's. During his brief reign Oliver Warleigh 
 had had the cedar which his brother planted on 
 his wife's grave cut down, much against John's 
 and Katherine's wishes, and the stone placed 
 against the wall instead. And there Rachel, un- 
 suspicious of how near she had been to a discov- 
 ery of the fraud, read the lie it afiSrmed before 
 the world. 
 
 Young Mr. Bond had returned to England a 
 month or two before, but Sir Laurence, to ev- 
 ery body's relief, had been prevailed on to ad- 
 here to his original intentions, and continue his 
 travels. In a letter to Katherine which Rachel 
 read, he spoke in a tone half pathetic, half sar- 
 castic, of Oliver's disappointment, and seemed 
 in no way inclined to resent the temporary usurp- 
 ation of his name and estate. 
 
 Of his daughter he said very little, and that 
 little blamed no one but himself — he ought not 
 to have left her. And so in Hurtledale it was 
 all over — all the distress, and mourning, and ex- 
 pectation, and save in his heart, Helena and her 
 baby were as if they had never been ! 
 
 PAET THIED. 
 AMONGST GOOD SAMAEITANS. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIRST. 
 
 AT CLATMIEE. 
 
 Blessed are the merciful. 
 
 Annis, or Alice as she was now called, and 
 as we must also call her, so long as she remains 
 Miss Delia Ferrand's treasure, did not make a 
 public appearance downstairs until Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage and her goddaughter had been gone 
 home to Hurtledale a month. It was then 
 very cold weather, and she was such a fragile 
 mite to behold that the cautious old ladies 
 would not hear of her putting her little head 
 out of doors, though she gazed wistfully from 
 the windows during many an hour in the day, 
 
 and longed to feel her feet on the green grass 
 once more. Her recollections had come back 
 to her but very imperfectly, and Mr. Wilson 
 warned Miss Delia against any attempts to stim- 
 ulate her mind for perhaps years to come ; 
 good food, kind usage, and much play were all ' 
 she was fit to profit by now. The lesson-books 
 that had been bought in readiness for a begin- -i 
 ning were therefore laid on the shelf; a cargo 
 of toys was obtained in their stead, and Alice 
 found herself established in a state of perma- 
 nent holiday. 
 
 It must be allowed that at this season she af- 
 fected the kitchen' and Dolly's society in prefer- 
 ence to any other at Brookfall, which gave Miss 
 Delia her first acute distress on her protegk's ac- 
 count. That Alice should love Dolly who had 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 81 
 
 nursed her like a mother was quite right and 
 proper, but she must learn to love lier more ; so 
 the kind old lady would set the child in her lap 
 day by day, and tell her stories of children who 
 were i'emarkable for early piety and genius, but 
 who all came to premature endings ; in the 
 hope of winning her heart and her interest 
 through these pretty parables. Alice listened 
 always with wide-eyed composure ; but one day 
 when she had attended in spirit the touching 
 scene of a little angel-girl's death, she said, — 
 
 " I don't want to be good, auntie Dee." 
 
 " My petkin does not want to be good I " 
 echoed the old lady, greatly surprised and 
 shocked. 
 
 " No. Good children all die — ^I like to stay 
 and play with Sinclair better." 
 
 " Tou darling, and you shall stay and play 
 with Sinclair!" cried the illogical instructress, 
 and kissed her with enthusiasm. 
 
 That playing with Sinclair was Alice's prime 
 enjoyment. He made great fun of her, called 
 her quaint little Goth, and teased her and tossed 
 her and worried her continually, and perhaps 
 she pulled his tawny locks oftener and harder 
 than was pleasant in return, but they were firm 
 friends and allies notwithstanding. To him she 
 confided her hopes of seeing her dear papa 
 again, which the aunts gently but firmly dis- 
 couraged ; to him she recited such scraps of 
 her ballads as survived the general wreck in 
 her memory ; and to him she fled for comfort 
 and refuge when her wild temper got the bet- 
 ter of her, and her benefactresses were in dis- 
 pleasure. 
 
 Alice was not a reformed character yet — she 
 had not changed her nature with her name; 
 she was as little patient and as much willful as 
 in her first estate; and Miss Delia found her 
 self-imposed task by no means one of unmiti- 
 gated joy. Sinclair was the child's aider and 
 abettor in many a naughtiness; for with the 
 mischief inherent in boys, he delighted to set 
 her upon pranks that aggrieved and astonished 
 his sober aunts ; and when Miss Delia took him 
 to task he would toss back his shaggy mane and 
 reply : 
 
 " She was the captive of my bow and spear — 
 that is, of my kisses. I found her, aunt Dee, 
 and I have a right to at least half of her." 
 
 He had half of her love at all events, and 
 more than half; not tl;ie whole bench of bishops 
 could have convinced Alice that any thing was 
 wrong Sinclair bade her to do. During his 
 long absences at Rugby she was much more 
 amenable to discipline as enacted at Brookfall 
 than when he was at home. On one occasion, 
 fully aware of his aunt's prejudices against dogs 
 indoors, he gave her a tangled clew of a puppy 
 to carry home, bidding her tell auntie Dee it 
 was quit§ a, drawing-room dog, and then, per- 
 haps, she would be allowed to keep it. Alice 
 was in the highest glee over her acquisition, 
 and presented herself before her benefactresses' 
 astonished spectacles with the little animal bun- 
 dled up m..her frock, and only its face out. 
 
 ■' My joy, what have you got there ?" cried 
 Miss Delia, staring very hard at the black pug 
 and bright eyes. 
 
 " A drawing-room dog ! " responded Alice, 
 " look ! " and plumped down on the rug with 
 the puppy in her lap. 
 
 " There are no drawing-room dogs, petkin," 
 said the old lady, shaking her head seriously. 
 " Carry it away, darling, to the place ^ou 
 brought it from." 
 
 " Sinclair gave it me to keep, and I mil keep 
 it," replied Alice, eyeing Miss Delia with un- 
 winking firmness. 
 
 " No, no, sweeting ; auntie Dee can not allow 
 her treasure to have drawing-room dogs," was 
 the answer, very gently spoken. " Dogs belong 
 to out-of-doors, except old Floss, and he is put 
 up with in the kitchen. Now, I know my 
 chick is going to be good and do what I bid 
 her." 
 
 Miss Delia was rather.premature in her assur- 
 ance ; Alice was by no means going to be good, 
 if that included dispensing with the puppy. 
 She cuddled it up in her arms and left the 
 room, and a minute or two after Miss Flora, 
 who never took part if she could help it in the 
 little disputes that occurred between her sister 
 and their joj-ofe^ee, said, " I think, Delia, if you 
 look out you will find she is carrying the dog 
 up-stairs." 
 
 So she was ; and the dog and she kept the 
 room which had been appropriated as her 
 nursery, against the aunts, against the cook, 
 and against Dolly for several hours. The doc- 
 tor happened to drop in while the argument 
 was going on through the key-hole, and he was 
 invited to plead with her, but declined on the 
 pretense that he should be defeated; she had 
 looked herself in, and there was no getting at 
 her except by parley, to which she turned a 
 deaf ear, or else by breaking open the door. 
 When Sinclair heard from his father of this 
 great game going on up at Brookfall, he went 
 off in haste to take his share ; which came in 
 the shape of a long remonstrance from his 
 aunts. Finally, however, he was prevailed on 
 to coax Alice out, and extract the puppy from 
 her strict embrace ; and this he did by promis- 
 ing to bring it up to pay her a visit whenever he 
 had time. And then with a little excusable tri- 
 umph he wagged his head at aunt Delia and 
 said, "Tou see none of you can manage her 
 but me." None of them could manage her at 
 any rate with the same ease and absence of 
 struggle. 
 
 This incident of the puppy may be taken as 
 an example of the sort of life Alice led the 
 ladies at Brookfall. She loved them with all 
 her heart, but as Dolly slyly and irreverently 
 expressed it, she soon had the length of their 
 foot, and knew how to caress and wheedle them 
 into letting her have Eer own way in almost 
 every thing. They were by nature indulgent, 
 and where they gave an inch the child took an 
 ell, while her coaxing, affectionate ways covered 
 her encroachments. In this manner passed 
 over her head two or three years. She learned 
 to read, and as soon as she had done that, she 
 became a devourer of books ; though they were 
 for the most part but dull books on which she 
 could lay her little hands. At eight years old 
 she was set to learn music, under the tuition of 
 Miss Clarke, the curate's sister, who gradually 
 took upon herself all the systematic instruction 
 Alice at that time received. She was not a 
 very docile pupil, even to Miss Clarke, and if 
 
83 
 
 ANNTS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 she set her face against learning any particular 
 lesson, the end was that she did not learn it. 
 
 Miss Delia and Miss Flora allowed no one but 
 themselves to impart to their darling religious 
 instruction, and though their talk must often 
 have been most bewildering to the little sensi- 
 tive heart and brain, still Alice could not but 
 gain a life-long good with their practical Christ- 
 ian example before her eyes every day. An 
 ounce of example is worth a pound of precept 
 whether exhibited before old or young. 
 
 The greatest tiial to both her benefactresses 
 was the tenacity with which she clung to those 
 ideas about her father which, accepting Mr. 
 Gilsland's narrative of her parentage, they were 
 bound to regard as delusions. As she grew 
 older they grew stronger, and any reasoning 
 against them only threw her into a mood of 
 gloomy grief which never went oif until she 
 had slept a night upon it. When they talked 
 to her of heaven and of the good things of 
 God, they would try to lead her to think of her 
 dear father and mother as being there with 
 Him ; but one day after they had been more 
 earnest with her than usual, and she had ap- 
 peared, as they fancied, rather softened and 
 responsive, they heard her murmur to herself, 
 "All the same, papa is not dead!" Thence- 
 forward they desisted from their attempts, and 
 determined to maintain an unbroken silence on 
 the subject; and Mr. Wilson advised them to 
 take no notice of 'her vagaries, promising them 
 that she would grow out of her moods and her 
 delusions together in the course of time. 
 
 Hitherto there had come no interference from 
 without to disturb their possession of their 
 treasure. Mr. Gilsland kept to his conditions, 
 and had not been seen at Brookfall since he 
 relinquished his guardianship of his niece. He 
 was now serving a church in London, and was 
 creeping into popularity of a certain kind by 
 slow measures. His letters of inquiry came 
 with undeviating regularity, and Miss Delia 
 Ferrand answered them with the same exact- 
 ness ; keeping him fully informed as to the 
 child's progress in her education. Alice, was 
 always made to listen to his letters, which were 
 expressed in the most kind and kinsmanlike 
 terms; but the invariable result was an out- 
 burst of temper. One Christmas when she had 
 achieved a legible round-hand of her own, an 
 attempt was even made to persuade her to 
 answer a pretty little epistle he had addressed 
 to her ; but she turned obstinate on the spot, 
 utterly refusing compliance, declaring that he 
 was not her uncle — ^he was nothing to her, and 
 she liated his very name! These wild W/Ords 
 were passed by as ravings that it was very 
 wrong for her to utter ; but no second effort 
 was made to induce her to correspond with Mr. 
 Gilsland. 
 
 From the first day of her going out at Brook- 
 fall, Alice had betrayed her passion for riding, 
 but until she was ten years old she never at- 
 tained to any fuller gratification of it than a 
 trot round tlie paddock on Sinclair's horse when 
 he came back from a ride. The young man 
 was gone to college by this date, and was carry- 
 ing off prizes for scholarship and honors for 
 his achievements in physical sports, until his 
 name was becoming quite a glory to Claymire. 
 It was he who proposed that Alice should have 
 
 a pony, and go out with him when he was at 
 home for the long vacation; and MisS Delia 
 entered into his wishes so far as to promise that 
 she should have a pony if she did not fly into a 
 pet over Mr. Gilsland's next letter, or moon 
 about once for a whole week, dreaming that her 
 father was alive. 
 
 Sinclair thought kindly to warn her of the 
 conditions annexed to the attainment of this 
 much coveted indulgence, but Alice, with indig- 
 nant tears in her eyes, and crimson in her face, 
 cried, " Sinclair, how dare you tempt me ? If 
 I were never to see a pony again, if I were 
 never to see you again, I would not say I think 
 papa is dead ; for he is not ; and Mr. Gilsland 
 is a wicked bad man to pretend that I belong 
 to him !" 
 
 Sinclair felt a little ashamed and confused at 
 this undaunted rebuke from the fearless child, 
 and he did not mention it to his aunt at the 
 time ; but on her telling him a few days after 
 how Alice had failed at the test, he said, " Aunt 
 Delia, I think she ought to have the pony for 
 holding on to her idea. She evidently thinks 
 she should be guilty of falsity did she profess 
 to abandon it ; I gave her notice of what you 
 had made contingent on her being good in your 
 fashion, and she asked me how I dared tempt 
 her. My father thinks she should have the 
 pony too." 
 
 So Miss Delia being no argumentive moral 
 philosopher, but only a tender-hearted old lady 
 longing to grant her darling an indulgence, 
 caused the pony to be bought, and in its new 
 equipments, to be presented before Alice one 
 morning as a surprise. And to witness her 
 ecstasy was a treat ! 
 
 "Brownie, Brownie!" cried she, exultant, 
 and kissed the white star on its forehead, and 
 capered round it at her wits' end for joy. 
 Sinclair suggested Stella as a more appropriate 
 name, but she reiterated, " No, no. Brownie !" 
 so Brownie was thenceforward the name of it. 
 
 During the next two years there was a very 
 marked intellectual advance in Alice ; she 
 proved a really quick child, and not only quick, 
 but also capable of earnest application when 
 her subject suited her. But it could not be 
 said that in the matter of docility and temper 
 she made equal progress. Perhaps Miss Delia 
 was at once too strict and too easy ; or, to 
 speak without paradox, too fidgety in her rule. 
 Alice was averse to formalities ; there was much 
 monotony at Brookfall when Sinclair was away ; 
 she had no companions of her own age, and the 
 literature supplied to her as amusing might 
 have been more correctly classed under the im- 
 proving and wearying. She felt a great love 
 and gratitude toward her benefactresses, but 
 she rebelled against them often ; and then en- 
 sued fits of grievous rfemorse which they were 
 fain to kiss away with tender assurances that 
 they knew she tried to be good, though she did 
 not always succeed. This was not very whole- 
 some disciplme ; her feelings were too often on 
 the stretch between her own temper, the soft- 
 ness their loving lectures excited, and the self- 
 reproachful moods that followed. 
 
 "She has fine and delicate instincts — she is 
 brave to the core and truthful as the light," said 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 83 
 
 •tfiss Delia to a married woman of her acquaint- 
 ance who had seyeral daughters of her own. 
 "I am never afraid of her doing any thing 
 really wrong, but she is becoming a source of 
 great anxiety to us. She is at once too childlike 
 and too womanlike. I wish I knew what was 
 the best thing to do with her." 
 
 " I should send her to school," was the prompt 
 advice ; " one girl in a household of grown peo- 
 ple is too much considered and worried after 
 ever to turn out a thoroughly healthy character." 
 Miss Delia entertained a prejudice against 
 schools, and was not sure Alice would bear to 
 be sent from home at all, until Mrs. Sara Grand- 
 age, to whom also she had partially revealed 
 her distresses, told her of a Miss Cornwell, a 
 friend of Rachel Withers, who lived in the 
 neighborhood of London and took only six pu- 
 pils, whom, with the assistance of masters, she 
 educated entirely herself. It was the midsum- 
 mer-holiday time then, and as neither of her 
 benefactresses could have been easy in conscience 
 to send Alice to a perfect stranger. Miss Corn- 
 well was invited to spend her vacation at Brook- 
 fall to be made acquaintance with. 
 
 Alice was not apprised of her quality or the 
 cause of her coming, but she fortunately took a 
 liking to Miss Cornwell's sensible countenance 
 and straightforward manners ; so that though 
 she made a v'ery grievous face when she found 
 herself about to be exiled from home and the 
 presence of her aunts, they encountered no an- 
 gry opposition. Mr. Gilsland was apprised of 
 the intended change, but he did not gainsay it ; 
 only remarking that with Miss Cornwell's per- 
 mission it would be gratifying if he were* now 
 and then allowed to visit his niece. 
 
 Some of her quaint sayings were all Alice was 
 admonished by Miss Cornwell to leave behmd 
 her when she went to schoBl ; it was strange 
 how those odd phrases of Mary Wray's and 
 Mistress Dobie's had stack in her memory when 
 so much else had faded away from it. Within 
 five minutes her future instructress heard a 
 couple of them — ^Floss being the subject thereof. 
 Miss Delia was grieving over him as not relishing 
 his dinner, which she feared was a sign of his 
 being unwell, whereupon Alice remarked, " He'd 
 be worse if he ailed aught." And on his depos- 
 iting himself cosily on Miss Cornwell's muslin 
 gown as she sat on the turf, she added, " FIqss, 
 thou's as brazen as a milner's horse that stops 
 at every body's door !" 
 
 " Alice, darling !" said Miss Flora remonstra- 
 tive, when she saw Miss Cornwell's rather sur- 
 prised amusement ; for the child gave not only 
 the spirit of the words, but the accent too. Al- 
 ice darling only laughed, however — perhaps she 
 had said her sayings with so much gusto for the 
 perverse purpose of shocking governess-propri- 
 ety, and if so she achieved a perfect success. 
 
 And thus at twelve years old Alice went to 
 school. " She was the sunshine of Brookfall," 
 said Sinclair when he next came home and found 
 her gone. " I don't know how you could bear 
 to part with her." 
 
 " My dear boy, we could bear worse things 
 than parting if we believed it to be for her 
 good," replied his aunt Delia, but there were 
 tears in her kind eyes as she spoke ; for the cot- 
 tage had been a very dead-alive place. indeed 
 since its bit of youth and brightness was taken 
 away. 
 
 For the next three years Alice remained un- 
 der Miss Cornwell's care, nothing happening 
 during that period of greater importance than 
 the return of the holidays, when its Sunshine 
 went joyously home to Brookfall, sometimes ac- 
 companied iff Miss Cornwell, and always by her 
 favorite friend, Jane Grantham, whose mother 
 was dead and whose father was in India. 
 
 In Hurtledale there had been no changes 
 either, and no new suspicions bred. Every body 
 had grown nearly ten years older since the day 
 poor little ^psy's pantomime funeral came ov6r 
 the wintry moors, but otherwise things had gone ' 
 on pretty much in the old routine in the various 
 households of our friends and acquaintance. 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh had been in England 
 twice or thrice in the interval ; and when he 
 went down into the north he always made his 
 home at the Hurtlemere House. His brother 
 Oliver and Lady Georgiana had lived chiefly 
 abroad, Oliver during several years having been 
 placed under restraint with a physician at Tours, 
 while his wife lived at Bonn for the sake of her 
 children's education. He was better now ; Sir 
 Laurence had seen him, and objected to his be- 
 ing kept any longer in his semi-captivity ; and 
 early in the year of the Great Exhibition of 
 eighteen hundred and fifty-one they returned 
 permanently to England. 
 
 Lady Georgiana had undergone her trials and 
 persecutions too ; but they were borne in a 
 dead silence. She had been kept fully informed 
 of all that had befallen Annis, and had acqui- 
 esced in each change that had been made for 
 her advantage. When she thought of the stol- 
 en child now, she looked at her own beautiful 
 Mortimer, and schemed in her heart secretly, 
 how some day her wrong-doing might be un- 
 done, or a compromise made with Heaven about 
 it by marrying the two ; but such compromise 
 was yet in the far future, and meanwhile her 
 pains and penalties multiplied upon her, and her 
 three tools became her tyrants — ^tyrants such as 
 only greedy, guilty, conscienceless men and wo- 
 men can be over another in their power. 
 
 CHAPTER THE SECOND. 
 
 ATTER TEN YEARS. 
 
 Ten years are past, life is no more 
 The fairy land that once 1 knew ; 
 Pleasures have proved but falling stars, 
 And many a sweetest spell untrue. — ^L. E. L. 
 
 It was the twenty-second of April. Mrs. 
 Sara Grandage was profoundly intent on her 
 Times for a long while that morning, and when 
 she laid it down at last and took ofl* her specta- 
 cles, she gave vent to a genuine sigh, which 
 caused Rachel Withers to look up in much 
 amazement; for a sound of this nature did not 
 escape the old lady more than once in a twelve- 
 month. On raising her head Rachel found her 
 godmamma contemplating her with a comical, 
 lachrymose expression to match the sigh', and 
 on her asking what was the matter, she replied 
 in the most irrelevant way, " Dumpling, you are 
 still a young woman — still a 'young woman, you 
 know." 
 
84 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 " Comparatiyely," rejoined Rachel, marveling 
 what Bittersweet would discover next — reviving 
 that ugly old name too, which had been abolish- 
 ed by common consent ages ago ! 
 
 " Comparatively, of course. Tou are not a 
 girl, but your powers of enjoyment are as keen 
 and quick as ever." 
 
 "Oh, yes ! I am ready for any little pleasure that 
 comes opportunely in my way." Here a pause, 
 then Bittersweet again, " Dumpling, it begins to 
 occur to me that I have perhaps been rather 
 selfish about you, and that some day you may 
 reproach my memory for it." (What can have 
 put that nonsense into her head ? thought Ra- 
 chel.) " It is pretty here ; Prior's Bank is very 
 pleasant, but this is a dull life we lead for a 
 woman who is still young." (Rather late in the 
 day to find that out, thought Rachel again, but 
 she only said she did not often feel it so.) " An 
 occasional variety does us all good. You en- 
 joyed our Paris excursion amazingly, I remem- 
 ber." 
 
 "Yes; tha.t is nine, no, ten years ago." 
 
 "Ten years, is it? How short they seem! 
 Ten years! And we went to Claymire after- 
 ward, did we not ? That was at the time poor 
 Betsy Briggs died. I recollect it all now !" And 
 then she again took up her newspaper, and was 
 absorbed for another half hour, at the end of 
 which she threw it from her, exclaiming with a 
 gasp, "No, it is impossible to picture it, quite 
 impossible ! Rachel, do come and talk ; you 
 are scribbling letters forever !" 
 
 Down immediately went Rachel's pen, and 
 " What is the text ?" said she, ensconciijg her- 
 self in her favorite easy-chair, with a bit of idle- 
 work in her fingers, ready for one of those in- 
 terminable talks with which Bittersweet now 
 wore out half the day. 
 
 "This great exhibition — should you not like 
 to go to it?" was the answer, and in an instant 
 she was wide awake. 
 
 " Like to go ? Of course, I should like to 
 go ! John and Katherine are going, and the 
 Hills, and all the rest of the world !" She 
 would have added, "Let us go, too," but she 
 remembered her godmamma's seventy-six years, 
 and refrained herself. But the old lady, who 
 was as vivacious and not tiuch less active than 
 formerly, said it for her without demur. 
 
 "Let us go, Rachel — we will go !" cried she ; 
 and from that moment it was decided. They 
 did not discuss the matter, they settled it. Han- 
 son and Clip would accompany them, and take 
 all trouble and care off their hands. Rachel felt 
 as jubilant as a child setting off to sea for the 
 first time — a very healthful frame of mind to be 
 in at the advanced date when her godmamma 
 good-naturedly spoke of her as still a young 
 woman. 
 
 "As we are going, let us go to the opening!" 
 was the next proposal. " It will be a fine spec- 
 tacle, and I always liketi a crowd." When Bit- 
 tersweet undertook any thing, she did not un- 
 dertake it by halves. "And we will stay a 
 month or six weeks in town, and see every thing 
 there is to be seen." It was very far from Ra- 
 chel's mind to gainsay any thing so charmingly 
 desirable. " And we shall meet every body we 
 know. Even cousin Delia has discovered that 
 it is her pious duty to go, since the object is the 
 furtherance of peace and good-will amongst 
 
 men ; and Flora and the doctor will be there, 
 of course ; and Sinclair, and probably that little 
 girl who has gone to school to your friend, 
 Mary Cornwell. You will be glad to see Mary 
 Cornwell again, Rachel." 
 
 " Of course I shall. She is the only one of 
 my peculiar set who remains unmarried like my- 
 self except Carrie Martin." 
 
 " And can you fancy this magnified glass-house 
 roofing in two elms as big as any about here, 
 as easily as our conservatory roofs in a couple 
 of camelias ? And the jewels. Dumpling, and 
 the laces, and the china ! I always had a passion 
 for lace and curious china ;" and so she went 
 on, exciting her own and her goddaughter's an- 
 ticipations to the utmost over this famous gath- 
 ering of wonders of the world. 
 
 The same afternoon, full of impatience to 
 spread her report, Rachel went up to the recto- 
 ry to communicate with Katherine about the 
 journey to town, stating her godmamma's queer 
 preamble and all ; when to her utter astonish- 
 ment, her sister-in-law fully acquiesced in Bit- 
 tersweet's self-accusation ; if she could have an- 
 ticipated such a tirade as followed Rachel would 
 certainly never have told her. 
 
 " So she has been selfish, very selfish !" cried 
 Katherine. "John and I have often thought 
 so, and regretted that we ever allowed you to 
 live at Prior's Bank. It is nobody else who 
 has prevwited your marrying and settling in 
 life, as it is every woman's duty to do — yes, 
 Rachel, every woman's dvfy /" . 
 
 Katherine was so serious and impressive that 
 Racljcl could not help laughing as she protested, 
 and truly, that nobody had ever made her an 
 ofier but Mr. Gilsland — and who could say it 
 was her fault she had not married him ? 
 
 " Of course, no one ever made you an offer — 
 how should they when you gave yourself airs of 
 being a hundred years old? But you might 
 have had that excellent James Pemberton, who 
 was all your imagination fancied that other 
 man whose name it sets my teeth on edge to 
 hear ! Yet there he is now, flaring away at 
 some proprietary chapel in London as a fashion- 
 able preacher, and several of the papers speak 
 well of him ! Defend me from such a shepherd ; 
 he quite destroyed your life and chance of hap- 
 piness !" 
 
 " Don't be sentimental, Kate ; I am blithe and 
 blooming yet ! And I never cared a straw for 
 your James Pemberton." 
 
 " You did, Rachel, you can not deceive me, 
 you did J but you just echoed to yourself Bitter- 
 sweet's mischievous old prediction that you were 
 cut out for an old maid, and you would not give 
 way to it. If you had given way to it it would 
 have come, and you might have been now as 
 happy, independent and well off as I am with 
 dear John." 
 
 " It is silly to talk to you ! You married wo- 
 men who have married to your liking feel youi^ 
 selves at the very top of creation. Now, I 
 would not be worried with your three tearing 
 Turks of children — no, not if they could be 
 mine tomorrow !" 
 
 " That is just spite, envy, and jealousy, Mis- 
 tress Rachel, ^ite, envy, &ud jealousy, every bit 
 of it!" criei Kate with serene defiance, and ac- 
 tually in her own mind convinced of the truth 
 of what she said. 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 85 
 
 Rachel asked her if she would like her to go 
 and get married now — being still a young -wo- 
 man; but to this her sister-in-law answered, 
 No, she was much too old, and had let all her 
 chances slip long ago; adding, with a quaint 
 mischief on her face, that one maiden aunt in 
 the family was desirable — even if it were only 
 to tuck Sacharissa Tulip's petticoats. Kachel 
 took the hint, as she had taken many another 
 in her little goddaughter's behalf, and left the 
 rectory with a bundle of fine muslins under her 
 arm. - She was a capital needlewoman, and the 
 child outgrew her clothes very fast. 
 
 Rachel was not in the mood just then to ad- 
 mit it to Katherine, but she knew Bittersweet' s 
 prophecy had tended to settle her vocation. 
 She had learned to think there was nothing 
 lovable about her after her trouble, which gave 
 her a shy, cold, restrained manner. She was 
 constantly cheerful ; but after all cheerfulness 
 is but a bright coldness, and satisfies no one 
 without a happy vein of passion and sentiment 
 below it. She knew in her secret heart that 
 Katherine with her three rantorians and beloved 
 John was better off than herself or than Bitter- 
 sweet with all her wealth and personal popu- 
 larity. The old-fashioned idea of woman's hap- 
 piness, she thought, was best ; though when she 
 had leisure to reflect and observe, she found 
 much might be said on the other side of the 
 question too. 
 
 Calling at the cottage of the present curate 
 on her way back to Prior's Bank, she asked 
 his merry little cricket of a wife if she were 
 to be treated to the great show in London. , 
 
 " Oh, dear no. Miss Withers, neither of us. 
 We have six good reasons for staying at home !" 
 replied she, pointing to her young fry — each one 
 a step below the other, and the eldest not yet 
 ten years old. Rachel agreed with her — six 
 unanswerable reasons they were ; looking at their 
 frayed shoes and often renovated httle garments 
 she said Xo herself: 
 
 " Mrs. Barton is doubtless a proud and happy 
 woman ; but my pussy's boots never wear out, 
 and at this moment I rejoice in my freedom 
 from her numerous family cares !" 
 
 Rachel Withers had never staid in London 
 before, and it could hardly be said with truth 
 that she enjoyed it now. It was too noisy and 
 too bustling. Mrs. Sara Grandage never went 
 out on foot, but she thought Rachel ought to 
 take advantage of her opportunities ; and she 
 was therefore sent abroad with Clip, who thir- 
 ty, forty, fifty years ago, knew the town well. 
 He had not forgotten it yet, though the changes 
 were many and great. He found Rachel's 
 company a vast anxiety, especially when there 
 streets to be crossed — which there always 
 were. 
 
 When he said, "Now, miss, we must get 
 across here," Rachel made a rush -^ the dismayed 
 countrywoman at every point, looking neither 
 to the right nor to the left, nor anywhere but 
 at the distant pavement where she would_ be, 
 and executing the most venturesome evolutions 
 in her swift transit, as if instead gf being wing- 
 ed by fear, she were the bravest of the brave. 
 Then up panted Clip, growling : " You shouldn't 
 run, miss ; it's the worst thing you can do is to 
 
 run !" But she could not help it. Oooasipnally 
 she yielded to the expedient of taking hold of 
 his arm as a safeguard, but she had not the pro- 
 per degree of confidence in masculine protection, 
 for she invariably found herself alone when she 
 reached the flags, without at all knowing how 
 she lost him. 
 
 Clip conducted her one day north, another 
 south, then east, then west, from their lodgings 
 in Harley Street, showing her the various quar- ■ 
 ters and the tribes thereof. They were in the 
 city one afternoon toward four o'clock, and 
 at a very wide space with fine public build- 
 ings round it, the Exchange, the Bank, and 
 others, where the chaos of carriages, the rush of 
 feet, and the confusion of tongues were aw- 
 ful. Clip said, in his most provokingly calm 
 manner : " Now, miss, we have to get across 
 here." 
 
 " No, Clip, not unless you can change me into 
 a bird of the air," was her response ; " clearly 
 we must wait !" 
 
 " You may wait," rejoined he, with serene 
 contempt, and prepared to start. 
 
 " Show me where I must aim for !" asked 
 Rachel, wildly ; "oh I they may take London 
 who like for me ! I shall never wish to find 
 myself here again !" 
 
 Clip pointed over the heaving sea to the 
 farthest corner of all, and was instantly washed 
 away by an advancing wave of clerks. She 
 made the plunge desperately, with her eyes 
 shut for any thing she could remember after- 
 ward, and reached the appointed place in 
 safety, then looked back on the perils of the 
 passage with secret wonder and admiration of 
 herself. 
 
 No disappointment befell either Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage or her goddaughter ; they saw what 
 they came to see, and met those friends they 
 hoped to meet. The excellent cousins from 
 Claymire arrived in town a few days after them- 
 selves, but when Rachel and her godmamma 
 called at theit lodgings they were out ; and the 
 first encounter between them took place quite 
 by accident in the exhibition rooms of the Royal 
 Academy. 
 
 There was the worthy doctor with a sister on 
 each arm, viewing many of the pictures with 
 spectacles of disapproval, and there was the 
 towering Sinclair taking charge of the little girl 
 whom he found on the misty downs nearly ten 
 years ago, and whom his aunts had now quite 
 adopted as a child of their own. Rachel With- 
 ers was rather curious to see her, remembering 
 her relationship to Mr. Gilsland, and the singu- 
 lar events attending her change of protectors ; 
 but her close cottagerbonnet did not aSbrd 
 much opportunity for finding out what she was 
 like. She was a tall shp of a girl, of about 
 fifteen years old, with very handsome eyes, but 
 dressed so quaintly, in conformity with her ben- 
 efactresses' pious prejudices, that neither her 
 face nor her figure was set off to the best ad- 
 vantage. 
 
 Sinclair Ferrand and she seemed to be im- 
 mense friends and allies ; and Rachel overheard 
 a debate betwixt them and Miss Delia which 
 amused her vastly ; it seemed so characteristic 
 on both sides. The zealous, benevolent lady 
 had found out by this time that feminine plants 
 taken in hand to prune and train ever so early 
 
86 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 have still a willful way of growing left inherent 
 in their nature. 
 
 " Auntie Dee," began the child, in the true 
 tone of eoax-wheedle ; " Auntie Dee, may I 
 go with Sinclair to see the Ride on Thursday ?" 
 
 " The Ride —what, in the Park f" said Miss 
 Delia, gazing up in her face with reproachful 
 surprise. 
 
 " Yes ; I like it almost better than any thing. 
 It is my grandest holiday treat." 
 
 " But, Alice, my love, you have forgotten — 
 you were to go to Exeter Hall to hear the dear 
 bishop speak, with the doctor, your Aunt Flora, 
 and myself. Do you recollect that so it was 
 settled ?" 
 
 To this Alice answered nothing, but she made 
 a little mou, expressive of utter indifference to 
 bishops, and had they not been in a public place, 
 from the look of her, she would have accompa- 
 nied the mou with a touzling embrace of her 
 auntie's bonnet ; and if she had done so it could 
 hardly have been left more queer and original 
 in cut than it was. Miss Delia pretended not to 
 notice this pantomime, and turned her eyes re- 
 solutely on a lady painted in yellow drapery, 
 who extensively hid, without adorning, the wall 
 opposite their seat in the middle room, and kept 
 them fixed there until Sinclair, having been tel- 
 egraphed to by his young friend, came to her 
 assistance, and addressed his amiable aunt with 
 serene composure, like a person sure of success 
 who yet condescends to forms of conciliation and 
 entreaty. 
 
 " You don't care about going to Astley's, do 
 you,. Aunt Delia ?" was his insidious opening 
 question. 
 
 " Astley's, Sinclair, what is that ? Oh, the 
 circus. No, of course, I shall not go ; only one 
 remove from a theatre I " 
 
 " Then I might as well take Alice to the morn- 
 ing performance to-morrow, and reserve the 
 Ride for Thursday, when you all go to the Hul- 
 laballoo Islands." 
 
 " Sinclair, don't be irreverent ! You know 
 we disapprove of such exhibitions, and why will 
 you teach the child to rebel ?" 
 
 " But she must see It ; Astley's is quite a 
 place to be seen by people from the country. I 
 wish you would go too. I daresay even Quak- 
 ers go there — horses can not be wicked, you 
 know." 
 
 " It is not the horses themselves I object to, 
 but the temptations they lead people into — 
 standing on their hind-legs, poor ill-uaed things, 
 and jumping through hoops. I saw it once 
 myself under a tent that blew down, and only 
 once, but there was no real improvement in it, 
 and the pistols firing off quite frightened me — 
 accidents happen so soon. Never mind Ast- 
 ley's, Alice, you shall go the Waxworks instead." 
 Here Alice's countenance became as expressive 
 against waxworks as it had previously been 
 against bishops. 
 
 " Oh, well, she'll see plenty of wicked folks 
 there, all paint and spangle, — I don't envy her !" 
 muttered her advocate, sarcastically. " The 
 distinguished criminals in the Chamber of Hor- 
 rors are nice acquaintances for a girl, and if you 
 tell her their histories, no doubt it will have a 
 fine moral influence on her character." 
 
 " What do you mean, Sinclair ? I dislike 
 satire." 
 
 " I mean that horses are afar pleasanter sigh( 
 than those grinning masks you want to show 
 her — enough to give her bad dreams for a month. 
 And I am sure she would rather not see them. 
 It would do you good to go through a penal 
 course of fashionable dissipation yourself, aunt 
 Delia: theatres, concerts, balls, smart gowns, 
 fine caps and all — make you feel wiser and more 
 charitable ever after. It is only because you 
 don't Icnow that you are so dead set against all 
 amusements except such as are not amusing !" 
 
 " Sinclair, you do very wrong to say so. I 
 never put my foot inside a theatre and I trust I 
 never shall." 
 
 During the foregoing colloquy Alice had stood 
 mute as a mouse, but at this point she interpos- 
 ed with a sly, inimitable assurance, and said : 
 " Then, auntie Dee, I may go to the Ride on 
 Thursday instead of to the Bishop, if ifis to be 
 dear, delightful Astley's to-morrow ?" 
 
 Miss Delia waved her head despondently and 
 murmured, " Naughty, persistent child !" and 
 again became absorbed in her contemplation of 
 the lady in yellow. This appeared by the young 
 folks to be understood as granting tacit consent, 
 for Alice gave Sinclair a jubilant glance, and 
 then went off with her hand tucked under the 
 young man's arm to inspect the pictures in the 
 farthest room, to which they had not yet paid 
 their compliments. 
 
 Miss Delia and Rachel being left to themselves 
 had a brief spell of moralizing over the difficul- 
 ties and responsibilities attending the bringing 
 up of children, which was suddenly ended by 
 thet irrelevant old lady uttering aloud the sen- 
 timent which had been fermenting in her mind 
 ever since she sat down on the red bench, 
 
 " Well," said she, " I should not like to be 
 hung up at full length in a, public place like 
 this ! ' Mrs. Jones of Langpudgwyllam,' and 
 no doubt many truly interesting pictures turned 
 out to give her space enough, i'our good land- 
 scapes I have calculated by some in her vicinity 
 would be required to cover her ample skirts, 
 and a fifth her head and bust. You remember 
 the portrait of my dear mother which hangs in 
 the doctor's drawing-room at the rectory, Rach- 
 el — the lady in the scarlet bodice. It was painted 
 in the year after her marriage by Mr. Gains- 
 borough, who is dead long since ; but compare 
 that sweet, tender, womanly figure with this 
 obtrusive piece. I greatly admire a good por- 
 trait, but this is offensive ; and more from the 
 artist's flagrant bad taste than from any fault in 
 his subject. He has contrived to give a modest 
 woman a meretricious air — if I were her husband 
 I should burn the picture. Suppose we change 
 our seat and look at something pleasanter." 
 
 They changed their seat accordingly, and 
 being joined by the doctor. Miss Flora, Mrs. 
 Sara Grandage and a lady who had just claimed 
 to renew her acqufuntance with the last, they 
 talked over the pictures that had most struck 
 them, apd found out that they took very differ- 
 ent views of art. The strange lady, who was a 
 disciple of the extreme new school, went off into 
 a high-flown rhapsody that amazed and puzzled 
 Rachel. She could not help speculating how 
 much of it was claptrap and how much sheer 
 windy nonsense ; ideas ripen slowly in the 
 country, and tongues move in old-fashioned, 
 plam phrases, but the quiet daleswoman imagin- 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 87 
 
 ed this flowery glibness that sounded so clever 
 to the uninitiated might with a little careful 
 practice be found very easy of imitation. How- 
 ever, when she had given six negative answers 
 in reply to six questions whether she had seen 
 six masterpieces in six different foreign galleries, 
 her mind was oppressed with the knowledge of 
 the art critic, and she took refuge in a stern 
 contemplation of a bit of sunny landscape below 
 the line and just opposite her. She would have 
 been more perplexed than ever could she have 
 known that this lady had not seen the six mas- 
 terpieces any more than herself, and knew as 
 little of any art, except the art of fluent conver- 
 sation, as did she. 
 
 From the Royal Academy Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 and Rachel went home with the Ferrands to 
 their lodgings to dine, as it had been settled 
 when they met, lest the opportunity should not 
 recur again so conveniently; for as they all 
 wished to visit such places of public entertain- 
 ment as chimed with their respective tastes, and 
 these tastes differed materially, private engage- 
 ments would be apt to interfere. Rachel hoped 
 thus to have the chance of studying more close- 
 ly Miss Delia Ferrand's protegee, but Alice's 
 holiday hours expired at flve o'clock, and instead 
 of going home with her aunts she was sent 
 straight back to school under Sinclair's convoy. 
 
 Sinclair Ferraud had done with college now 
 and taken his degree — fourth wrangler — and 
 from the heedless lad of flfteen whom Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage had fallen in love with ten years ago 
 at Claymire, he had sprung up into a very fine- 
 looking though dawny -headed young man of five- 
 and-twenty; remarkable for personal prowess 
 no less than for scholarly ability. His father 
 was a pleasant gentleman of the learned ancient 
 school which is fast going out with shorts and 
 shoe-buckles ; and in many of his best traits his 
 son was like him. The aunts were exceedingly 
 proud of his university honors, and where his 
 gayety of temper trespassed on their gravity of 
 principle or prejudice they were always ready 
 to excuse him on the plea of exuberant youthful 
 spirits. 
 
 Rachel Withers did not know when she had 
 met with a more kindly and pleasant family 
 party than were these out-of-the-world folks 
 from Claymire. They fell to talking over old 
 times, and Miss Delia commended herself as 
 having only been in London once in her life 
 before ; very different to cousin Sara who always 
 spent the season in town so long as her father 
 and her husband lived — yes, and for several 
 independent years after they were dead ! But 
 then cousin Sara's father was in parliament, and 
 wealthy, and worldly, and her husband was 
 given up to every kind of dissipation and frivol- 
 . ity fashionable in fashionable society ; for her 
 part, Miss Delia did not know how cousin Sara 
 had borne it so long ; and the late hours had 
 begun to tell on her health before she could 
 make up her mind to withdraw from the vortex. 
 Bittersweet listened to the solemn rehearsal of 
 her ancient gayeties, and only smiled good- 
 humoredly ; reviving a few old anecdotes of 
 society which the doctor capped from his experi- 
 ence witji others quite as amusing. The doctor 
 had lived with a clerical generation that loved 
 its cakes and ale as well as common men. He 
 and his cousin Sara were of minds somewhat 
 
 akin, and enjoyed each other's little stories, whis- 
 pered aside lest they should shock the demure 
 spirits of his reverend sisters, like two people 
 who understood each other. 
 
 Very precise and punctilious the reverend 
 sisters were, and some people might think, per- 
 haps, righteous overmuch; but if they were 
 narrow in theory, they were strict in practice, 
 and there was no asperity in their tempers to 
 set a cruel edge to their judgments of those who 
 did not agree with their views. Theywere 
 never caught compounding for their own sins by 
 condemning other people's ; and were so gen- 
 uinely honest and sincere in word and deed that 
 they invited from every body an implicit confi- 
 dence and reliance. 
 
 Miss Delia naturally enjoyed expatiating on 
 the subject which was most of all important to 
 her amongst her earthly cares. Alice was up- 
 permost in her thoughts, waking and sleeping, 
 and she engaged the not reluctant Rachel' to 
 listen to her that night, giving her pretty full 
 details of how her educational experiment had 
 turned out. 
 
 "I have not had every thing quite as I could 
 have wished, but if the child has been a great 
 care^ she has been a great blessing too," said 
 she with a smile and a sigh of heartfelt satis- 
 faction. " We had not the mother-feeling 
 which is the surest key to child-nature, but we 
 did our best, and we trust that the results may 
 prove we did not do much amiss. She loves us, 
 and feels that we love her dearly, and that has 
 been the great secret. We are exceedingly 
 pleased with the effect of Miss Cornwell's 
 training upon her ; she is very apt in the con- 
 trolling and managing of young folks, and, to 
 confess the truth, our dear girl has a strong 
 will of her own which requires a firm hand on 
 the reins." 
 
 Miss Flora gave additional significance to this 
 revelation by waving her head slowly and add- 
 ing, " A very strong will indeed for a girl ,-" at 
 which emphasis the doctor laughed and said, 
 " It was often a battle of the wills, and nine 
 times in ten Alice had the best of it." 
 
 Miss Delia did not apparently relish this allu' 
 sion ; for she made haste to change tlie conver- 
 sation after remarking with a decision that no- 
 body attempted to gainsay : " But the child is 
 a good child at heart ; and in her way through 
 thi? world of temptation, she had better be 
 over-resolute than over-pliable. Such marked 
 strength of character is not given her for no 
 purpose ; and though so far as we can judge at 
 present, her life may run on calmly and safely 
 enough, perhaps the All-Wise foresees that she 
 will one day stand in need of aU her steadfast- 
 
 A rainy day in London was no opportunity 
 for making up arrears of letters or of any thing 
 else. One morning Rachel Withers awoke to 
 hear a rattle and patter against the windows, at 
 which she felt quite thankful and rejoiced, say- 
 ing to herself, " Now to-day at last we shall be 
 quiet — we can not possibly go anywhere to- 
 day." But at breakfast her godmamma dis- 
 pelled her idle hope by observing, "The rain 
 will cool the air ; so, Rachel, we will go to the 
 Exhibition again. It was rather too much for 
 
88 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 me the last time, witli the sun and the dust and 
 the drive there. We will order Clip to have a 
 carriage at the door by twelve o'clock." 
 
 And to the Great Exhibition they went ac- 
 cordingly; but, as it happened, they saw on 
 this occasion much more of kinsfolk and friends, 
 than they did of the glories of the show. John 
 ' Withers and Katherine had just arrived in 
 town, and the first group Kaohel espied on en- 
 tering consisted of her brother and his wife. 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh, Lady Georgiana and 
 her husband, and their son Mortimer, now a 
 beautiful, well-grown youth of seventeen. 
 
 Sir Laurence looked at all points the traveller 
 and adventurer he was — bearded, bronzed, stal- 
 wart and unconventional. His brother Oliver 
 was leaning on his arm, and seemed to have 
 much need of its support. He was a confirmed 
 hypochondriac now, always expecting something 
 of a distressing nature to happen. It was very 
 painful and pitiable to be with him for long to- 
 gether, and her friends wondered how Lady 
 Georgiana endured it ; but Lady Georgiana ap- 
 peared to endure it with a very resigned and 
 commendable pa,tience. She was never absent 
 from his side either at home or abroad, into 
 company they did not go, and very rarely to 
 any place of public amusement. It was not 
 without much persuasion and urging that Sir 
 Laurence had prevailed on his brother to come 
 out with him and be enlivened by the spectacle 
 of the Exhibition on this occasion. 
 
 Unlike many persons given up to melan- 
 choly, Oliver Warleigh was not irritable ; his 
 air of sufferance and his submission to Lady 
 Georgiana were perfectly touching. A man 
 who had something on his mind — that was the 
 impression he gave to strangers, and to those 
 also who, like Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel 
 Withers, had not seen him for several years. 
 He walked with a stick, slowly, his head bent 
 forward, his eyes usually turned toward the 
 ground, but lifted now and then with a quick, 
 apprehensive scrutiny to the faces of those 
 speaking around him. Thus were they on this 
 day once raised to Rachel's face, shocking and 
 startling her by their wild expression. 
 
 She was speaking to Lady Georgiana of Mary 
 Cornwell, and recommending her school as a 
 suitable place for her daughter Clara, who, she 
 had been telling Rachel, did not prosper under 
 a governess without companions to stir her 
 emulation. Rachel mentioned Alice Gilsland 
 as being there, and said how thoroughly satis- 
 fied were her aunts with her improvement and 
 progress. Lady Georgiana did not, however, 
 encourage the suggestion, but replied rather 
 abruptly that she did not approve of schools 
 for girls ; whereon it was explained to her that 
 Mary Cornwell's establishment could not pro- 
 perly be called a school, seeing that she only 
 took six pupils, and, with the assistance of 
 masters, educated them entirely herself. 
 
 It was at the name of Alice that Oliver War- 
 leigh eagerly advanced bis head, staring at 
 Rachel, and asking, " Who, who are you talk- 
 ing about — Annia what ?" He constantly re- 
 peated the first words of his sentences like that 
 peremptory "Who, who?" 
 
 " No one you know, Oliver — Ali^ie is a very 
 common name ; your ears deceived you," in- 
 terposed his wife. "In this instance it only 
 
 belongs to a littje niece of Mrs. Sara Grandage, 
 Rachel's godmamma." As Rachel saw that she 
 did not wish him to talk-^for talking always 
 excited him — she did not correct Lady Georgi- 
 ana's misstatement, but let it pass as immate- 
 rial, and Oliver soon relapsed into his usual 
 condition of half-drowsy quiescence. 
 
 The similarity in sound to the well-remem- 
 bered name of Sir Laurence's lost daughter had 
 struck on that jarred chord in his memory 
 which gave way when his life was all unhinged 
 by the disappointment of his hasty and greedy 
 ambition, awakening in him a sort of galvanic 
 interest, but it did not last long ; liis wife's 
 voice was sufficient to quell it. They seemed to 
 Rachel more peculiar in their ways than ever. 
 She loathed Oliver once, and now she could 
 only feel com])assion for him as he sat by her 
 half alive ; noticing nothing of the beautiful 
 objects gathered around them, and less than 
 nothing of the incessant crowd passing to and 
 fro. 
 
 They were left together to rest for a time, 
 Oliver Warleigh, Lady Georgiana, and herself, 
 on a seat near the crystal fountain, and while 
 they were talldng, Rachel espied the tall head 
 of Sinclair Ferrand above the crowd, and a 
 minute or two afterward he approached quite 
 near, Alice Gilsland's straw poke bonnet rising 
 nearly to his shoulder, and turning hither and 
 thither in genuine girlish curiosity and excite- 
 ment. Alice perceived Rachel and nodded, 
 then advanced quickly with Sinclair and asked 
 if by any chance she had seen the doctor — they 
 had lost him in the crowd; Rachel said she 
 had not, and the next moment the young folks 
 were gone. 
 
 " How frightfully that girl is dressed," re- 
 marked Lady Georgiana in her hard voice — ^her 
 voice and her visage both had grown harder 
 and colder than they even used to be. Rachel 
 was just on the point of explaining to her that 
 the girl was Alice Gilsland of whom she had 
 been speaking a few minutes before, when 
 Lady Georgiana' s attention was called away 
 from her to her husband, who, with a deathly 
 pallor on his face, was struggling to rise. 
 
 "Be still, Oliver," said his wife in a low, 
 stern tone, and he was quiet in an instant, but 
 staring and wild as if he had seen a ghost. " Tou 
 are tired and want to go," she added more gen- 
 tly as if she were addressing a chUd that needed 
 soothing. " Have a little patience until Lau- 
 rence comes back or John Withers to help you 
 through the crowd, and then we will leave." 
 They had to wait full half an hour, however, 
 before either appeared, and during that interval 
 his faintness increased so much that when his 
 brother arrived he had to be placed in a Bath- 
 chair and wheeled out of the building to the 
 carriage, being quite unable to support hunself. 
 He was a sad, forlorn object, and Sir Laurence 
 was as tender as a woman over him in his bro- 
 ken-down condition. Every remembrance of 
 former wrong seemed to have passed out of 
 mind between them. 
 
 They had not been gone many minutes when 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage joined her goddaughter 
 with John Withers, he having piloted her 
 through the sculpture court with great diffi- 
 culty. Katherine was there still with her ne- 
 phew Mortimer, but Bittersweet had seen enough 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 80 
 
 for one day, and would only rest half an hour 
 while John pioneered his sister through the 
 crush from which she had just emerged. Re- 
 turning to her afterward, Rachel again fell in 
 with Sinclair Ferrand and Alice Gilsland, when 
 Alice proclaimed with decision that she liked 
 the " Amazon" better than any thing else there 
 was to be seen, and she was going to look at it 
 a^ain for the last time before leaving. She then 
 nodded and went gayly off on Sinclair's arm, 
 looking as proud and happy as a queen. 
 
 " She reminds me of somebody I have seen 
 somewhere, but I can not think who it is," said 
 Rachel as she passed on with John. "But I 
 wonder what end Miss Delia Ferrand proposes 
 to gain by disguising her in that checked ging- 
 ham gown and poke bonnet half a yard deep — 
 she seems a simple child enough." 
 
 John Withers made some inarticulate re- 
 sponse—he had not noticed Miss Alice Gilsland. 
 
 While they were in London Mrs. Sara Gran- 
 dage graciously spared her goddaughter for a 
 couple of day*" that she might spend them with 
 her old friend Miss CornweU. Rachel found the 
 time very pleasant and greatly enjoyed it, most 
 of all perhaps because it reminded her of the 
 season when she was young herself Miss Corn- 
 weU loved her vocation of teaching and had 
 been very prosperous in it. Rachel regretted 
 not having succeeded in doing her a good turn 
 with Lady-Georgiana, for she felt sure little 
 indolent Miss Clara would have reaped many 
 advantages under Mary's care which she could 
 not have at home"; and Mary had a, vacancy 
 just now. Her pupils were only five in num- 
 ber, and Alice Gilsland was the youngest but 
 one. 
 
 The first evening of her visit, Rachel was 
 invited into the school-room to hear the " sub- 
 jects " read, and she accepted the proffered en- 
 tertainment with glee, remembering what a 
 favorite exercise of hers were these same " sub- 
 jects " in the blissful salad days when she spelt 
 beautiful with a big B and thought it more im- 
 pressive. 
 
 The girls were a pleasing group enough, and 
 this was a, high moment in which to contem- 
 plate them. Being accommodated with ^ low 
 chair by a window opening on the bright gar- 
 den, Rachel looked out and listened and criti- 
 cised quite at her ease, and felt like fifteen 
 again, minus the secret torture of waiting to 
 hear her own lucubration read. Girls — even 
 school-girls — have their little ambitions,, and 
 these subjects were here as they had formerly 
 been with Mary CornweU, Carrie Martin and 
 herself, the intellectual test that conferred on 
 each her position in her class. The eldest of 
 the party might be eighteen, the youngest four 
 years less, but the face amongst them all that 
 most attracted Rachel's attention was that of 
 Alice, who was sitting in the highest place at the 
 long desk, opposite the teacher's chair; and the 
 table whereon lay the five copy-books contain- 
 ing the subjects. 
 
 She had a bit of work before her, but her 
 hands were idle, and her sensitive lips utterly 
 refused to obey the restraining power which 
 acted triumphantly enough on / eyes and brow. 
 She was in a keen and increasing state of ex- 
 
 citement, consequent, Rachel opined, on the 
 probability of forfeiting her proud position to 
 her neighbor ; a girl of a good countenance, on 
 whose firm mouth, and smooth, large forehead 
 sat the confidence of a certain amount of proved 
 power. Rachel conjectured, and rightly, that 
 she had long been head of the class, used to 
 reign and rule, and that to Alice the dignity was 
 new and inexpressibly precious ; but that the 
 rivalry between them was as generous as it was ( 
 open. While Alice was visibly ' expectant and 
 thrilling through every nerve, Jane Grantham was 
 outwardly calm, and* drew her steady needle in 
 and out as regularly as the beat of her'pulse. ' 
 Rachel could not forbear a smile when the title 
 of the Subjects was read by Mary CornweU ; it 
 was taken from the list in Robello's Italian 
 Grammar, and they had written it themselves 
 going on for a score of years ago. Oh ! the 
 high-flown magniloquence of somebody's effu- 
 sion ! Rachel could not have written so finely 
 now if she had been paid a hundred guineas the 
 page. " The Four Seasons invited to dine with 
 Time dispute which is the most valuable to 
 mankind," that was the beautiful name of it. 
 
 The first to be read was that of Ellen Her- 
 bert, who ranked as lowest in the class, and the 
 only criticism vouchsafed to it was a slow shake 
 of the head full of considerate reproof; but the 
 dear chUd had evidently no more imagination 
 than a turnip, and was quite unmoved. The 
 next was Janet Scott's — commented on as very 
 careless, and so it was. The third was Kate 
 Frazer's, mildly encouraged as an improvement 
 on her last ; and these being disposed of, the 
 teacher and pupils straightened themselves into 
 attitudes of critical attention, and the compo- 
 sition of Jane Grantham was very distinctly 
 enunciated, every eye on the reader except tliat 
 of the writer. It was a clever composition for 
 a girl of eighteen ; she had a good grip of her 
 ideas and expressed them clearly — from begin- 
 ning to, end it was even, accurate, not over re- 
 dundant — honest work and her best. When 
 finished it was laid down without a word, and 
 the last was taken in hand. 
 
 "Now, Alice, for yours; let us see if you 
 have maintained your place," said Miss Corn- 
 weU cheerfully. Rachel thought she should not 
 have spoken then ; but dear Mary, excellent 
 and conscientious as she was, was never sympa- 
 thetic. She had no conception of any pain 
 biting at poor Jane Grantham's heart while her 
 fate was hanging in the balance so near to be 
 decided. Now Rachel's tenderness — and she 
 could not help it — flowed always to those who 
 strove but did not win — who strained for the 
 prizes and carried off the blanks. 
 
 Alice Gilsland's face could keep no secret of 
 emotion, and as Miss CornweU read her theme 
 with spirit, she betrayed ' palpably her longing, 
 eager hope of success. Watching her in her 
 growing excitement, Rachel began slowly to 
 perceive that her face was a very lovely one 
 both in feature, in coloring, and in expression. 
 Young eyes are generally beautiful, and hers 
 were peculiarly innocent, limpid and soft, dark 
 in shadow, in the light a deep bluish gray, with 
 black lashes and brows nearly level above them ; 
 her skin was creamy-tinted and exquisitely glos- 
 sy and pure, looking perhaps fairer than it waa 
 because the rich cable roUs of her hair were a 
 
90 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 dark russet- tinged brown. The changes that 
 passed over her countenance during the twenty 
 minutes that her subject took to read, were note- 
 worthy as studies of temper and character, and 
 when Miss Cornwell closed the copy-book with 
 the significant, conclusive remark that, " They 
 must stand as they were," the sunshine that 
 poured all over it was marvelous for its expres- 
 sion of delight without triumph, and of gladness 
 that has not yet realized how it is founded on 
 another's pain and disappointment. 
 
 Miss Cornwell's decision was undeniably just. 
 A pretty fanciful piece Alice had made of her 
 theme, with only one blunder in the shape of 
 a mixed metaphor, beginning in a ship, and 
 ending in a star ; but this flaw notwithstanding, 
 it was far more striking and original than Jane 
 Grantham's careful composition. Jane herself 
 looked up from her needle, nodded at Alice, and 
 said, "Yes," in immediate and frank acquies- 
 cence with the verdict. A generous tempered 
 girl, thought Rachel; but young folks are most- 
 ly generous. 
 
 The reading of the subjects over, and the fiat 
 pronounced, the girls dispersed themselves into 
 the garden, Alice Gilsland and Jane Grantham 
 pairing off together. Rachel wondered what they 
 talked about. She remembered suffering a simi- 
 lar defeat in her own person, and what a terror 
 she had felt lest she should have her pangs mis- 
 interpreted into spite, vexation or envy — not 
 that Carrie Martin could ever have so interpreted 
 them, but other girls.. When she heard people 
 dilate on the miseries of human life, her ima- 
 gination always went back first to the trials of 
 quite early days ; and she thought they had been 
 as bad to bear as any, if not worse. One has 
 not begun to understand the theory of compen- 
 sations then, and the present object, be it bright 
 or sad, fills the sky to the horizon. Grown older 
 we stand higher, and perceive that all things 
 have a limit ; even the most exquisite anguish 
 is intermittent, and the most exquisite joy is 
 underlaid with a sense of passing away. 
 
 Late in the evening the young folks all re- 
 assembled at tea, and Rachel found herself placed 
 directly opposite to Alice, who was at Miss 
 Cornwell's left hand. She looked brilliant and 
 happy, and talked more than any body for a lit- 
 tle while, when she ceased suddenly, and a few 
 moments after, her teacher said, touching her 
 hand at the same time to recall her to herself, 
 " My dear child, I wish you would not fix your 
 eyes on people in that vague way — you are 
 enough to stare Miss Withers out of counte- 
 nance." Rachel was not observing her at the 
 moment, but hearing this admonition she loolied 
 up just in time to intercept the dreamy gaze as 
 it was fading from Alice's eyes. She gave her 
 head an impatient shake, drew a long breath ; 
 and as Miss Cornwell added in a lower tone, "It 
 is rude, my dear; you should not forget your- 
 self," she applied herself to munching bread and 
 butter like the healthy, hearty school-girl she 
 was ; but Rachel did not again hear her pleasant 
 voice chimimg above others with a silvery ring 
 in the conversation round the tea-table. 
 
 Miss Cornwell, who knew her friend's old 
 trials, and why she might feel a special interest 
 in Alice Gilsland, told her afterward that the 
 child had given her plenty of trouble to man- 
 age, and that it was still mighty hard work to 
 teach her any thing she did not wish to leam. 
 
 Miss Delia Ferrand had not found her darling 
 experiment of bringing up a child so easy as she 
 had anticipated. For Alice, in addition to lier 
 strong will, had a passionate conscience, and 
 many an hour's willful naughtiness was followed 
 up by morbid anguishes of self-reproach before, 
 by the advice of sounder judgments than their 
 own, the ladies of Brookfall were prevailed o i 
 to transfer their capricious protegee to the cars 
 of Miss Cornwell. Under her Alice had im- 
 proved in docility ; for Mary had discretion, and 
 evaded coming to open issue with her on points 
 where her temper was determined. An appeal to 
 her affections was the surest way to move her — 
 against a threat she would obstinately and utter- 
 ly revolt. She was very loving where she set 
 her heart, and of a genuine, canine fidelity ; but 
 her antipathies were equally strong. 
 
 To Sinclair Ferrand she was devoted ; when 
 she was quite a little thing, and nobody else 
 could control her, he with a caress and a few 
 words of petting could make her as good as 
 gold ; and the same influence he exercised over 
 her stiU. But to the sound of her uncle Gils- 
 land's name she had the keenest aversion ; and 
 when he claimed to see her, as he did now peri- 
 odically, it was only from a knowledge that Miss 
 Cornwell's eye was on her behavior, that she 
 could prevail on herself to speak to him with the 
 ordinary forms of courtesy ; and the ruffling ef- 
 fect of his visits was visible in her temper for a 
 week after. 
 
 Mr. Gilsland was now, as Katherine had told 
 Rachel, the fashionable preacher of a fashion- 
 able congregation in London, and to this Miss 
 Cornwell added the information that he was re- 
 cently married to a member of it — a wealthy 
 widow of mature experience and good position. 
 Thus he had at last achieved the objects of his 
 darling ambition. He was popular, he was no- 
 torious, and he was rich ; but his reputation for 
 ^anctity of life and purity of doctrine did not 
 stand high in the esteem of the respectable and 
 the orthodox ; and his tradesmen spoke of him 
 querulously as the worst paymaster on their 
 books. He lived at a great rate in an exclusive 
 quarter of the town, and cut such a figure in a 
 certain pseudo-pious clique, that many people 
 went to see and hear him from curiosity, as they 
 would have gone to see and hear any other 
 mountebank. Mrs. Sara Grandage took a car- 
 riage and went, Hanson accompanying her ; for 
 Rachel refused to do it on the plea that good 
 words out of the mouth of such a preacher al- 
 ways did her harm,' and that she could not have 
 listened to him with any proper Sunday feelings. 
 Many persons, more acute than Rachel, said the 
 fashionable preacher was like his famous pro- 
 totype, Mr. Sterne, in his discourses; others again 
 thought he had fatally missed his vocation when 
 he betook himself to the pulpit instead of to the 
 stage. He was altogether an exceptional cha- 
 racter, an anomaly amongst his order, who gird- 
 ed at liim very often and very sternly ; perhaps 
 he would have left it had he been able ; he was 
 reported to have said once that his gown was 
 no better than a domino, and that his bands kept 
 him strangling en permanence. 
 
 Her attempted avoidance of Mr. Gilsland not- 
 withstanding, Rachel Withers fell in with him a 
 few days after leaving Miss Cornwell's, under 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 91 
 
 very unexpected circumstances. Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage desired to pay her respects to Lady 
 Geoigiana Warleigh before leaving town, and 
 she carried her goddaughter with her on the 
 occasion. When they were ushered into the 
 drawing-room, there was Mr. Gilsland, sitting 
 in confidential tails, which their entrance ab- 
 ruptly checked in mid-flow. He wore an in- 
 definably insolent air under the sentimental 
 saintliness which it seemed his present cue to 
 assume, and it needed no special acuteness to 
 detect that the interview between them was far 
 from being agreeable to Lady Georgiana. Two 
 red and angry patches stained her cheeks, and 
 her light eyes were glittering with a passionate 
 expression of vexation which she coul4 not at 
 once dissemble. 
 
 She received her visitors with some demon- 
 stration, and was about to perform the ceremony 
 of introduction between them and Mr. Gilsland, 
 when Bittersweet saved her the trouble by 
 challenging him herself, and congratulating him 
 on his social and public successes in her pecu- 
 liar vein of half earnest irony; he did indeed 
 look as handsome and thriving as good health, 
 good living, and a good tailor could make him, 
 and that was very well — picturesquely clerical. 
 But the mask was off his face for Kachel alto- 
 gether now ; and she could only draw an un- 
 comfortable parallel between his present appear- 
 ance, and his appearance on the last occasion 
 when she had seen him ; which was at the door 
 of Welsbeck rectory just before his first wife 
 died. 
 
 Every detail of this scene and of others at the 
 same period sprang up vividly before her mind's 
 eye, and betrayed her into some awkwardness 
 and confusion of manner; but Mr. Gilsland 
 never lost his countenance for an instant ; he en- 
 gaged in a conversation with Bittersweet as airily 
 and gracefully as if he had taken her in to din- 
 ner the night before in the height of good-fellow- 
 ship and friendship. With visible effort Lady 
 Georgiana joined in it, and Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 made a rather long-drawn-out visit, hoping that 
 he would take his leave first ; but he did not — 
 he outstaid them ; and they did not see Oliver 
 Warleigh either; it was one of his bad days. 
 Lady Georgiana said, and excused his not ap- 
 pearing to bid them good-by, 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel both observed 
 that Mr. Gilsland had established himself in the 
 Oliver Warleighs' house on terms of familiar 
 intimacy ; but what could be the link between 
 two people so dissimilar as Lady Georgiana and 
 he they were at a loss to conjecture. He was 
 not the sort of person whom she could person- 
 ally approve or admire, and she was by no means 
 of that gushing devotional turn of mind which 
 is apt to betake itself to the feet of fashionable 
 preachers. She was a very shrewd woman for 
 detecting shams, yet here .was she seen on the 
 closest terms of acquaintance with the most con- 
 spicuous Tartuffe of the day. 
 
 As they were going away Bittersweet, who 
 was not usually observant of details, could not 
 help remarking to her goddaughter on the ap- 
 pearance of poverty which every thing sur- 
 rounding the Oliver Warleighs wore. Their 
 lodgings were inconvenient for situation, and 
 they were also ill-furnished and ill-served ; but 
 they continued in them on the plea that the po- 
 
 sition was healthy, quiet, and out of the way. 
 Out of the way it certainly was ; for the driver 
 of the hired brougham which carried them there 
 took half an hour or more in seeking the house. 
 
 Kachel Withers enjoyed as much diversity in 
 her visit to London as she was capable of en- 
 joying. She saw all the regular sights, — thea- 
 ters, operas, picture-galleries, exhibitions, and 
 museums ; but hers was not a mind that would 
 bear many new ideas at a time. She saw by 
 glimpses some of its laborious gayety too, and 
 thanked her stars that she was not bound to 
 slave in that mill. She had found many a coun- 
 try dinner-party amongst friends and neighbors 
 quite as lively and entertaining as a crowded 
 " at home " in Bayswater. When she was young 
 she would have walked barefoot, or with un- 
 boiled peas in her shoes a considerable distance 
 to behold the writers of her favorite books; 
 perhaps her curiosity was a little cooled down 
 now, but still when her godmamma announced 
 that she had received a card from her ancient 
 friend, Mrs. Conolly, for one of her aesthetic teas, 
 she felt exceedingly glad, and enjoyed some of 
 the sweetest pleasures of anticipation in looking 
 forward to the evening. 
 
 And it was amusing, though nobody looked 
 much amused. Standing about in close rooms 
 is uneasy work for those new to it; Kachel found 
 it so. She had no precise expectations as to 
 what she should see and hear, but she still, in 
 her ignorant, countrified imagination, did fancy 
 it would be something decidedly worth remem- 
 bering. None of the great gods were present, 
 but there were several good artists, several mi- 
 nor authors, and one important little critic who 
 was a pink of neatness. Also, there were for- 
 eigners of many nations, and learned ladies not 
 a few. Amongst others there was Mrs. Lipsome, 
 whose books for children were Rachel's early de- 
 light, ample and gracious, with sweet words on 
 her tongue, and a jewel on her forehead ; there 
 was a French poetess of unpoetical proportions, ■ 
 and a young lady novelist, slender, graceful, and 
 gushing. Then she heard the exquisite drawl 
 of a very fine gentleman telling two fine ladies 
 how he had " harnessed the donkey before the 
 horse," but what came of the arrangement was 
 lost to her ; then she heard the critic speak to 
 a friend and probable coadjutor on some forth- 
 coming " slaughter of the innocents," which 
 she interpreted to mean, cutting up of the mi- 
 nor poets. And a very white hand presented 
 her with a cup of tea, and the person to whom 
 the hand belonged was that light of the pulpit 
 and drawing-room saint, Mr. Gilsland. She was 
 better pleased to see her old friend and school- 
 fellow Carrie Martin, who dropped in for a. few 
 minutes after the opera, quizzed Kachel on her 
 innocent bewilderment in the novel scene, 
 yawned and went her way home to bed. 
 
 After that, Kachel was not sorry to go too ; 
 she saw how entertaining the , entertainment 
 might be to those who understood the mystery 
 of it, which she did not ; but Bittersweet, re- 
 marking afterward that these gatherings at Mrs. 
 Conolly's were not nearly so good as twenty or 
 thirty years ago, she excused herself for finding 
 it rather dull, and thought perhaps she had rea- 
 son for the opinion. 
 
 The next day she betook herself to visit Car- 
 rie Martin, one of the very few remaining to 
 
92 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 her of the band of enthusiastic friends with 
 whom she corresponded at the date of her re- 
 turn to Hurtledale with John, now nearly seven- 
 teen years ago. They exchanged letters and 
 kept up their intimacy still. Carrie Martin had 
 settled herself in London, and was leading a life 
 quite to her own taste — free and laborious in 
 the direction that suited her. It was always 
 predicted amongst her young companions that 
 she would turn out something odd, and here 
 was she now a genuine specimen of the literary 
 working-woman — writing to order on such un- 
 interesting subjects as strikes, pawnbroking, ear- 
 ly closing, and sanitary reform, and .doing it 
 well too — so well that her articles were one and 
 all credited to a masculine hand. Bachel felt 
 no awe of her wisdom, but was very fond of 
 Carrie on the principle of opposites agreeing ; 
 for no two persons could have been more dis- 
 similar. 
 
 JBittersweet, who now saw her goddaughter's 
 quaint friend for the first time, was half-disposed 
 to be angry with her for keeping Carrie's vir- 
 tues all these years to herself; the vivacious old 
 lady was charmed with the younger one, and 
 they would sit and talk together about the world 
 and its ways in a satirical strain that was enough 
 to make quiet folks' hair bristle. They were 
 like flint and steel striking out sparks, and firing 
 the tinder of all manner of flimsy fashions and 
 prejudices. 
 
 The result of the acquaintance was an invita- 
 tion to Carrie to visit Prior's Bank in the au- 
 tumn ; in the mean while, Mrs. Sara Grandage 
 and Rachel were going down to Claymire for a 
 month while Alice was at Brookfall for her holi- 
 days, and before Sinclair Ferrand set oft' for his 
 year's tour in Egypt and Syria. The opportu- 
 nity of being at Claymire while these two were 
 at home was thought by the excellent aunts 
 quite inducement enough to bring their cousin 
 Sara down into Devonshire ; and when she was 
 tired of town, thither she turned her steps with 
 Rachel, Clip, and Hanson in attendance, and 
 took possession of the same lodgings as she had 
 occupied on the occasion of her previous visit 
 ten years before. 
 
 CHAPTER THE THIRD. 
 
 THE SUNSHINE 0¥ BROOKFALL. 
 
 A CREATURE Qot too bright or good 
 
 Por human nature's daily food ; 
 
 For transient sorrow's simple wiles, 
 
 Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles, 
 
 Wordsworth. 
 
 There were few places prettier or more thor- 
 oughly English in home character than the cot- 
 tage at Brookfall when summer was in its prime. 
 In winter it was too much alone and looked des- 
 olate under the shadow of the down, but on a 
 June morning it was like a picture out of ro- 
 mance-land with its wealth of flowers and fan- 
 tastic overgrowth on thatched gable and rustic 
 verandah. The brook ran down with diminished 
 force at this time of year, but the miniature 
 cascade was so lovely amongst the fresh ferns 
 and airy silver birches that Rachel Withers stood 
 watching its foamy gambols for ever so long, 
 and thinking how the waters come down at Lo- 
 
 dore ; all waters are akin and have family fea- 
 tures of resemblance, for this little Fall was as 
 merry and frolicksome in its play as was ever its 
 big brother of the North. 
 
 Miss Delia Ferrand espied her from the draw- 
 ing-room window, and appearing in the garden, 
 joined her where she' loitered. The elder lady 
 was looking admirably cheerful, and annoimced 
 even before they had shaken hands or gone 
 through any of the preliminaries of meeting, 
 that their dear girl was coming home on the 
 morrow — the best of news this at Brookfall, 
 for it was never so pleasant as when its Sunshine 
 was there. They then walked up to the house 
 together, exchanging chat until they came to 
 the plot where Miss Flora was busy amongst her 
 flowers. She raised herself stiffly erect to re- 
 peat her sister's tidings, and for the next ten 
 minutes the two old ladies talked rapidly one 
 against the other, the beginning, the middle, 
 and the end of their excited discourse being 
 the virtues, the charms, and the manifold ac- 
 complishments of their darling. They had ap- 
 parently forgotten the fact that Rachel had seen 
 her in town ; but it was very amusing to hear 
 them trying to be judicious in their affectionate , 
 enthusiasm, each softly qualifying the other's 
 praises until between them Alice came out a 
 bundle of sheer contradictions and inconsisten- 
 cies. 
 
 " She has the sweetest temper in the world," 
 said Miss Flora, which eulogy Miss Deha imme- 
 . diately moderated by adding, " but warm, Flo' — 
 on occasion even very warm !" 
 
 "So much the better," was the response, "I 
 do not like your tepid, negative characters that 
 never flashed out." Then : " She is certainly 
 pretty — I am not one of those who profess to 
 make no account of beauty, because it is only 
 skin deep ; and as for her figure, it is grace it- 
 self." 
 
 " Rather angular, Flo', rather angular as yet !" 
 interposed Miss Delia, viewing her own comely 
 contours with an air of connoisseurship. 
 
 " What of that ? She has the framework 
 of an elegant symmetry, and will be all the 
 handsomer by and by for being pointed now — 
 what do you expect at fifteen ? Not that she 
 should be rounded into full beauty, surely ?" 
 
 " Her voice is delicious, her music is excel- 
 lent, her French accent is beyond reproach, her 
 letters are the most amusing that were ever 
 read;" and so on and so on did the benevo- 
 lent ladies dilate, growing fervent over their 
 subject, and magnifying willful, madcap Alice 
 into a very paragon before they let it drop. 
 
 They were in the hight of this happy glo- 
 •j-ification when Sinclair Ferrand appeared, tramp- 
 ling his heedless way over the velvet lawn in 
 his hobnails. 
 
 " Sinclair, Sinclair, can you not keep to the 
 gravel walks?" cried his aunt Flora with hands 
 uplifted in pathetic remonstrance. " You leave 
 hoof-marks all over the turf" The young man 
 paused, then made three great bounds which 
 landed him in the midst of them, brown, breath- 
 less, and laughing. "You tiresome boy, how 
 often must I tell you the same thing! Now . 
 then, what brings you here at this time of 
 day ?" 
 
 " Nothing particular. The doctor is gone over 
 to a meeting at Knowle, so I have come to see 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 93 
 
 how 70U are getting on — and I want to know 
 if Alice's pony is all right — is it up in the sta- 
 ble ?" Misa Delia answered that it was, and 
 he disappeared. 
 
 A few minutes afterward they saw him lead- 
 ing the high;;spirited animal into the paddock, 
 where he gave it a canter in preparation for its 
 young mistress's service. Miss Delia watched 
 his maneuvers with a countenance expressive 
 of mingled admiration and distress, slowly shak- 
 ing her head from time to time, and saying at 
 last with a long-drawn sigh : "It is indeed a 
 pity ! " Miss Flora guessed what she was think- 
 ing of, and suddenly applying herself with great 
 vigor to an imaginary weed in a bed of ver- 
 benas, exclaimed: " It is trying — but, dear 
 sister, we may not choose our crosses — they 
 are sent." 
 
 " I know that," replied Miss Delia, " but still 
 I can not help feeling it very grievous that he 
 should be so determined on hiding his talent in 
 the earth. When he can do any thing in the 
 way of headwork that he wills to do, is it not 
 cruelly unjust to himself to let his powers lie 
 waste? I once dreamed he was going to be 
 made archdeacon, and what is there to hinder 
 him from attaining to that dignity, or even a 
 higher, if he would only bethink himself and 
 listen to reason?" 
 
 But Sinclair Ferrand was not one of those 
 pliable characters who wsKlisten to reason if it 
 go against the bias of their nature. He was not 
 planned for a bookworm, and a bookworm he 
 would never become, notwithstanding bis fath- 
 er's example and his own university successes. 
 It was to the intense mortification and disap- 
 pointment of his worthy aunts that he still ad- 
 hered to his refusal to enter the church, where 
 they thought a young man was most safe from 
 the dangers and temptations of this wicked 
 world ; ^though Miss Delia innocently betrayed 
 that she had still an eye to the pomps and prizes 
 therein to be won. If the doctor shared their 
 regret, he kept it to himself. The young man 
 was independent of work and fortune, and might 
 well gratify his desire for a traveler's life. Al- 
 ready he had walked half over Scotland, Ire- 
 land, Wales, and our own romantic north 
 and south-western counties ; he had been in 
 Spain and Italy, and was going to the East next 
 month. His leading-strings were loosed for good 
 now, and could never be put on again by the 
 most pious and persistent of old ladies ; he was 
 five and twenty, master of himself, and of a 
 sufficient income from his mother's fortune, be- 
 sides a liberal allowance from his father. Brook- 
 fall and Prior's Bank must both ultimately be- 
 come his own, and meanwhile he was free as a 
 bird on the wing ; coming and going as he list- 
 ed — but generally as Alice came and went. He 
 was a tawny, powerful young giant to look at, 
 built to grapple with strange perils by forest and 
 wilderness, but the fact that he had high men- 
 tal powers besides only made his resolution to 
 run away from the ambitious chances of civilized 
 life the greater grief to the proud and affection- 
 ate aunts. The men of their family had all been 
 scholars. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage, for her part, sympathized 
 in his election. A life of adventure must be 
 delightful. ^ One imagines poetry in that ; while 
 the successful careers of the great wiseacres at 
 
 home, come they to ever such fame and dignity, 
 are built up chiefly of prose, prose, prose ! The 
 most envied and powerful of them all must la- 
 bor as hard as a galley-slave chained to his oar, 
 and feel perhaps sometimes as little love for 
 their labor. 
 
 A day or two after Alice came home to Brook- 
 fall for her holidays, Rachel Withers walked up 
 thither to tea by invitation ; her godmamma 
 preferred remaining alone ^- Miss Delia had 
 been with her, talking all the morning. Just 
 as they were sitting down to table, in dropped 
 quite unexpectedly Mr. Wallis, from Knowle, 
 and joined the feminine group, not entirely to 
 the satisfaction of the younger members of it ; 
 for he was one of those men who, wherever he 
 went, left ruflied sensations, gloom, and dis- 
 couragement behind him. He was Alice's pe- 
 culiar aversion, for she always thought he ag- 
 gravated Sinclair's delinquencies, and. vexed his 
 aunts on his account more than every other 
 person and circumstance added together. He 
 began in his usual way by inquiring what were 
 the young man's plans for his next wild-goose 
 cha^e. 
 
 " Nothing is changed of them since we saw 
 you last — he leaves England again next month," 
 replied Miss Delia tragically. 
 
 "It has struck me lately that his view? are 
 unsettled," said Mr. Wallis lugubriously. " Is 
 he getting any ideas of Rome into his head ? 
 He is full of the pride of his secular knowledge, 
 and if he does not go over to Popery, mark my 
 words, he will go over to nothing — he will go 
 over to nothing — which so many young men 
 are doing." 
 
 " No need to fear either the one or the other," 
 replied Miss Flora with spirit. " His feelings 
 are genuine and his judgment is sound. He wUl 
 not easUy be beguiled or misled. I have faith 
 in Sinclair's principles, his sense, and his train- 
 ing." 
 
 " They are just blind guides — blind guides, 
 my friend, nothing better ! If he felt himself 
 weak, ignorant, uncultured, dull, I should have 
 ten times more reliance on his stability. It is 
 your fine minds that most often go astray." 
 
 " There I believe you," murmured Miss Delia 
 sorrowfully ; " there indeed I believe you." It 
 is marvelous in what nonsense people will ac- 
 quiesce if it be only advanced with the voice of 
 authority. 
 
 When Mr. Wallis was gone. Miss Delia pro- 
 ceeded to expatiate on some of his texts, with a 
 considerable amount of self-contradiction ; for 
 it was patent to all the world that she was as 
 proud as possible of her nephew's university 
 honors, though at this moment she professed 
 to regard them as his most dangerous snare. 
 
 " If he had failed when he went up for his 
 degree, perhaps the humiliation might have been 
 for his good," said she sadly ; " failure is good 
 for all of us, but especially it might have been 
 good for him ! " 
 
 " Oh, auntie Dee, how can you say so, when 
 it would have made him ashamed and unhap- 
 py?" cried Alice, uplifting the voice of keen 
 remonstrance. " And it would have grieved 
 you too, and disappointed the doctor. You 
 would have accused him of idleness then — but 
 
94 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 he worked hard and deserved what he won. 
 He is fifty times nicer and wiser as he is than 
 if he were made into a copy of that Mr. Wallis !" 
 
 "You are speaking fpolishly, Alice. _ Nobody 
 wishes to see Sinclair other than he is except 
 better ; and even you, silly child, will not dare 
 to say he is without need of improvement. 
 ' Learning puffeth up.' " 
 
 " But he is not puffed up ! he is quite as sim- 
 ple as ever he was. Little wits are puffed up, 
 but nothing could make our Sinclair so small as 
 to be conceited. Keally wise men, are never 
 conceited." 
 
 " I did not say they were ; but Sinclair is not 
 a really wise man. He is out of boyhood cer- 
 tainly, but in character, experience, and knowl- 
 edge of the serious responsibilities of life he is 
 almost as much a baby as yourself." 
 
 " Would you like his hair to turn gray in a 
 single night, aunt Delia? Tou have told me 
 often we go on learning every hour we live." 
 
 " So we do. Sunshine, so we do,"' interposed 
 Miss Flora. " We must give Sinclair time ; if 
 he be wayward and too firmly set on hia own 
 will now, a few years may alter him. We would 
 rather have kept him safe amongst ua, and have 
 seen him following soberly in his father's steps, 
 but with the eagerness of youth for variety he 
 is bent on spending what we think an unprofit- 
 able life. We deplore his taste, but none of us 
 would be justified in demanding from him a 
 complete sacrifice of it. Perhaps when he is 
 older, and we are quite old, he may return home 
 and settle peaceably." 
 
 " What I feel most is that he should throw 
 himself away," said Mies Delia, returning to the 
 charge. " If he had been wooden-spoon or 
 whatever they call the last man on the list, he 
 could have ridden and rowed over the world 
 just as well as a wrangler. It is like so much 
 labor lost. When he was a little boy in ankle- 
 straps I set my heart on his taking orders and 
 doing his Father's work in the vineyard ; when 
 he went to Kugby my thoughts went with him, 
 and to Cambridge also, though by that time he 
 had begun to manifest his strangely restless 
 propensities. Still I hoped even against hope, 
 and made it the theme of many prayers until 
 the dear doctor, in announcing to us his son's 
 degree, warned us that we must give up looking 
 to see him ever a minister of the Gospel. No 
 one can imagine what my disappointment has 
 been and is ; for besides ■ being his aunt, I am 
 also his godmother, and it seems as if I had 
 failed in the performance of my duty toward 
 him." 
 
 " Failure is good for all of ua," murmured 
 Alice, mischievously applying Miss Delia's words 
 to her own case, and feeling the moment she 
 had done so that she had done naughtily. In a 
 spasm of tender remorse she began immediately 
 to caress and kiss the worthy old lady, protested 
 that she did not mean it, that she wished Sin- 
 clair could travel to please himself and at the 
 same time stay at home to please them ; and 
 then by way of getting quite clear of the subject, 
 she diverged unexpectedly to the very objec- 
 tionable lilac tint of her auntie's cap-ribbonS, 
 pronouncing it ugly, washed-out, and with no 
 sense in it. Miss Delia accepted the a/mende 
 very affectionately, and then suggested a chap- 
 ter from a tedious spiritual biography to close 
 
 the discussion, which it did most effectually, for 
 at the first word, Alice evaporated, whether by 
 door or window nobody was alert enough to 
 notice, leaving her aunts and Kachel Withers to 
 enjoy the improving work by themselves. 
 
 As Rachel was going home an hour later, she 
 met Alice walking back to Brookfall under the 
 convoy of the doctor and his son, a wreath of 
 black briony twined round her hat and a gigan- 
 tic fern-spray in her hand. She looked very 
 bonnie, very fantastic, and in very high spirits, 
 and had apparently quite forgotten all the serious 
 part of the evening. When she forsook her 
 aunt's society, she had betaken herself to the 
 rectory in quest of more cheerful company than 
 theirs, made heavier by the Reverend Joseph 
 Woolley's story ; for when they met Rachel the 
 doctor asked her if the biography had been 
 shelved for the night, and Alice with a naughty 
 sparkle in her eyes, added, — 
 
 " If it is not I shall stay out in the shrubbery ; 
 it is too dull and affected to be borne." 
 
 " Tut, tut, little Miss Critic ! " cried the doc- 
 tor. " Speak reverently of reverend persons. 
 Joseph WooUey was no doubt a valuable man 
 in his way." 
 
 " But I don't like his way ; there is too much 
 whine in it," retorted she. " It reads as if the 
 person who wrote it was crying all the time ; 
 and he takes such trouble to prove that this is a 
 wicked, miserable world, when he had really a 
 great share of good luck in it, and met with kind 
 friends wherever he went. If he had been one 
 of the poor starved curates with ten children he 
 might have bemoaned himself, but his living at 
 Swineford was very fat. Do you know, I 1)^ 
 lieve he was too well off from the beginning to 
 the end of his life ever to be quite aware of it." 
 
 " What fern is this, you minute cynic ? Ex- 
 ercise your young wits on the vegetable king- 
 dor* awhile longer, before you begin to give 
 out your views on human nature," said the doc- 
 tor. " What do you know about it ?" 
 
 " No more than what I learn from the spiritual 
 biographers," replied she. " We are going 
 through a regular course of them, so I shall be 
 wonderfully wise by-and-by." 
 
 " My dear Sunshine, you will always be some- 
 thing of a goose," the doctor rejoined ; and so 
 they shook hands with Rachel and parted, Alice 
 still catching the last word and saying, that goose 
 though she might be, not one pen-feather of 
 hers should ever fall into the fingers of religious 
 biographers. 
 
 In this little colloquy Alice betrayed one of 
 her perversities which was almost more than all 
 the rest distressing to the excellent ladies at 
 Brookfall. They had brought her up as far as 
 they were able on an exclusive diet of good 
 books — ^no stories, legendary lore, fairy-tales or 
 secular poetry had been allowed to her at 
 home ; Mary Cornwell gave a wider range- 
 Scott and Shakspeare were found on her study 
 shelves and not forbidden ; and the consequen- 
 ces were now appearing in Alice's disgust at the 
 colorless, prosy literature which was chiefly pa^ 
 ronized at Brookfall. She was an imaginative 
 girl, her mind was growing, and on the spare 
 and meager food then afforded to it, it would 
 not grow straight; Miss Delia during these 
 present holidays was systematically doing her 
 endeavors to nip all the child's flowers of fancy 
 
 ■-!'. 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 95 
 
 in the bud, and the result was a breaking forth 
 in a much worse direction — sarcasm was bloom- 
 ing on the pretty lips of fifteen in a very un- 
 usual fashion, surprising, hurting and shocking 
 her friends continually ; for nature will out in 
 one shape or another, tread its strength down 
 as resolutely as we will. It is a blessing to wo- 
 men to be possessed of fair intellectual culture, 
 and with a little unprejudiced direction Alice 
 would have acquired it well and wisely ; as it 
 was, she got it by hook and by crook, and in 
 spite of hindrances, but not without many a 
 serious difficulty with her aunts. 
 
 One evening again .soon after this, Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage and her goddaughter having spent 
 the day at Brookfall, Rachel ended it by going 
 up into the glen wood with Miss Delia and Al- 
 ice — Alice being in one of her freakish moods; 
 when she was pleasantly disposed to make be- 
 lieve all manner of nonsense, and to ruffle her 
 aunt's sobriety most teasingly. But let her be 
 ever so worrying, it was almost impossible to be 
 cross with her. Miss Delia looked exceedingly 
 solemn before they set out, and shook her head 
 disapprovingly whenever Alice glanced at her, 
 which the provoking puss did very often, and 
 in her most provoking way ; and when they 
 had got deep into the wood, and the excellent 
 old lady was half-way through some good dis- 
 course of no particular tendency, she auda- 
 ciously proposed that they should have a fairy 
 hunt ! 
 
 "It is broad daylight yet, and they have all 
 ^ot fernseed and walk invisible; but don't be 
 discoataged, auntie Dee," cried she, with a de- 
 mure air of seriousness, " only follow where I 
 lead, and we are sure to come on some traces 
 of them." And then she marshaled her elders 
 through a tangledom of ferns and bushes, turn- 
 ing her little crazy pate every now and then to 
 admonish them of matters concerning their 
 safety. " Take care where you step," cried 
 she, with warning gesture ; " there, in that 
 gray lichen cup lurka a sparkish fellow, who 
 would fain trip you up ignominiously upon this 
 hidden stone, wrought over with exquisite fret- 
 work of moss. Do not snatch heedlessly at 
 any floating sprays, or the willful elves that 
 cluster in every blossom may punish your te- 
 merity with a thorn in your palm ; but espe- 
 cially take heed to your eyes, for that wicked 
 bramble with the hooked spines likes nothing 
 better than to dash himself in the faces of cu- 
 rious explorers, and cause them to turn back, 
 lest they should discover the secret clue that 
 leads to fairy queen's bower." 
 
 "What a chatterbox it is!" ejaculated Miss 
 Delia. " I wish bramble would catch you /" 
 
 "No chance of it,"- retorted Alice. "He 
 piques himself mightily on his fidelity, and 
 guards the approaches . to the labyrinth with 
 jealous care, but if we go warily and creep 
 low we shall outwit him yet; strong, and 
 tough, and well-armed as he fancies himself." 
 And here, being heedless of where she went, 
 she almost fell over the bared root of a tree, 
 recovering herself with some difficulty, just in 
 time to avoid stumbling against Sinclair Fer- 
 rand, who was returning from Knowle through 
 the glen wood. The sun was now goings down, 
 
 so they joined him and all went on their way 
 home together — the two young ones in ad- 
 vance, and rejoicing apparently in each other's 
 company. 
 
 Miss Delia had betrayed by an unusual silence 
 ever since she started out for the walk that she 
 had a heavy burden on her mind, and as soon 
 as Alice and her nephew were beyond ear- 
 shot, she opened it to Rachel with a woeful 
 gravity. 
 
 "Sunshine's nonsense is longer than her 
 tongue — far longer," said she, in a voice that 
 almost faltered. " Flora and I have often 
 speculated what she does with a pen in her 
 hand so often, and now we have found out — 
 she C(mi'po&es^'''' 
 
 Rachel received the painful intelligence with 
 becoming seriousness. " She composes /" echoed 
 the quiet body, at a loss for other words ade- 
 quate to the occasion, and thinking all the 
 while that her friend Mary Cornwell was to 
 blame for giving encouragement to this per- 
 nicious tendency. 
 
 "Yes;" and Miss Delia waved her head 
 dolorously. 
 
 "Poetry?" then suggested Rachel in the 
 tone of an anxious inquirer. 
 
 "No, worse — they get over poetry,'' was the 
 answer. "If you will not mind the wasted 
 time I should like you to read it. The dis- 
 covery has been almost too much for dear 
 Flora. She thinks, and so do I, that if the 
 child can break out into such fantastic rig- 
 maroles after the careful bringing up she has 
 had here, there is a very bad prospect before 
 her if the day should ever come when she 
 must turn her talents to something profitable." 
 And here the distressed old lady drew from her 
 pocket a tiny manuscript roll, which Rachel 
 weighed in her hand as one way of testing its 
 merits, and finding it very light, she said reas- 
 suringly that, at all events, there was not much 
 of it. 
 
 " Not much of it," repeated Miss Delia 
 grievously ; " there had not need be much ! 
 Fays, and elves, and sprites, and all sorts of 
 nonsense ! Where she has got her ideas from 
 it is quite impossible to guess. Neither Flora 
 nor I can charge it upon our consciences that 
 we ever put a fairy-tale into her hands in her 
 life. We disapprove of works of fiction and 
 imagination so strongly, that' I could find in my 
 heart to iVish there had never been one writ- 
 ten ! I must write to Miss Cornwell to desire 
 her to exercise a much stricter supervision over 
 the child's leisure reading than she has done ; 
 for I am sure she has had hold of books she 
 ought not — who knows but they may have been 
 novels ? " 
 
 Rachel, who was very far from sharing this 
 prejudice, tried to insinuate that when young 
 folks show a decided hankering after that kind 
 of mental refreshment it would perhaps be wise 
 to gratify them with a judicious selection ; but 
 Miss Delia only sighed and shook her head 
 again, being too deeply depressed to argue the 
 question at all just then. Rachel therefore car- 
 ried home Alice's little fantasia and read it for 
 her godmamma's amusement. They both laugh- 
 ed over it heartily, and Bittersweet fully appre- 
 ciated her cousin Delia's horror when she dis- 
 covered her protegee's leisure trifling. The 
 
96 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 damsel, at school or elsewhere, had clearly en- 
 joyed her readings of Shakspeare, Spenser, and 
 others ; for she had stolen the names of some 
 of the fairies of old, and set them to their mid- 
 summer sports with new ones of their kin to 
 whom she herself had stood godmother, giving 
 them all manner of fantastical titles. 
 
 But though it was a high transgression of 
 their rules, it was impossible to avoid thinking 
 that the excellent old ladies at Brookfall treated 
 Alice's fanciful escapade with much more se- 
 riousness than it deserved. The sparkling little 
 person received a solemn lecture one morning 
 shortly after she was found out in the presence 
 of Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel Withers, 
 which they were bound to acknowledge had no 
 more eifect on her than was — to be expected. 
 She looked droll, and heaved big, weariful sighs, 
 and beat impatiently on the floor with her foot, 
 and was all over one quiver of fun and vivacity 
 when they began ; but the good aunts were too 
 deeply wounded in their pet prejudices to allow 
 her to triumph over them in her usual despotic 
 fashion. _ 
 
 " We wish you to lay it to heart, dear Alice, 
 that no profit can ever come out of such idle- 
 ness as this," said Miss Delia, tapping the edge 
 of the table with the tiny manuscript roll, and 
 then using it to rub her dear old nose, on which 
 a fly had perched for a moment. " Reflect on 
 the value of time — once wasted, we can never 
 redeem it. What does the busy bee in the 
 hymn teach you ? And then think of the ne- 
 cessity there is that you should be solid." 
 
 Here Alice seemed very much depressed, and 
 deliberately pricked her forefinger with a brier 
 till it bled. " What mischief is the child after 
 now?" interposed Miss Flora, detecting her in 
 the act. " Solid, indeed, expect her to be 
 solid ! Ask foam to be solid ! She is much 
 more like one of her own whimsical sprites. 
 By the by, Alice, have you gone on with the 
 biography of the Reverend Joseph Woolley, as 
 I desired you to do ?" 
 
 Alice hesitated, her lips twittered, then broke 
 into an irrepressible smile as she said, Tes, 
 she had. 
 
 " And have you tried the profitable exercise 
 I suggested — ^have you epitomized any portion 
 of it?" To this also Alice answered, "Yes." 
 " Let me see it, m^ pet, bring it here at once ; 
 now I shall begin to have some hope for you!" 
 Miss Flora spoke in a cheerful tone, and Miss 
 Delia's countenance brightened while the cul- 
 prit went to fetch the fruits of her obedience. 
 
 She was absent several minutes, and when 
 she reappeared the struggle of pretty audacious- 
 ness and terror in her face was most amusing. 
 She dai'ted a queer glance at Bittersweet, vrtiose 
 sympathy she saw she had enlisted, and then, 
 standing demurely ,in front of Miss Flora's ta- 
 ble, presented her offering. Miss Flora imme- 
 diately rubbed her spectacles and put them on, 
 and with a pleased expression began to peruse 
 the written page. At first she looked puzzled, 
 then startled, and finally she dropped the paper 
 as if it burnt her fingers, exclaiming with tears 
 in her voice, " Oh ! you wicked puss, how did 
 you dare ?" 
 
 " What has she done ?" gasped Miss Delia. 
 . " She has put it into blank verse. Read it 
 sister dear !" and Miss Delia read : 
 
 This ia the story, trae and long.and prosy, 
 Of a good man who lately lived and died. 
 Barren it is of incident or wit, 
 And dull as death proverbial. 
 Once he was wicked, moderately so, 
 Never outraging crisp proprieties 
 With rampant vice ; hut wicked as are all, 
 " A miserable sinner " in the common sense. 
 He had the noblest mind, the purest heart. 
 That e'er embellished Christian character. 
 His countenance was intellectual, full of grace. 
 Humble, benignant, gentle, kind, and grave. 
 His virtue strict, but sweetly amiable ! 
 High-bred and courteous, and a scholar he. 
 Who leant to skeptics when he was a youth. 
 But in maturer years embraced the truth. 
 
 " Stop, Delia, stop, I can not bear any more 
 of it !" cried Miss Flora, shuddering and press- 
 ing her hands over her ears. 
 
 Miss Delia laid the awful document aside with 
 a groan, and poor Alice stood before them, 
 looking the very picture of convicted, rebellious 
 naughtiness ; once she stretched forth her hand 
 to repossess herself of her delectable exercise, 
 but she only got her knuckles rapped with the 
 paper-knife as Miss Flora laid an embargo on it 
 and said, " No, Alice ; not until after the doc- 
 tor has seen it." 
 
 " And this you think a suitable preparation 
 for your future life, do you, Alice ?" asked Miss 
 Delia, softening into Christian pity for what 
 began to look almost like a case of unimprova- 
 ble wickedness. 
 
 "I am sure I don't know," said the child, at 
 her wits' end. 
 
 " What can you be made into with such 
 wrong views and feelings?" urged Miss Flora. 
 
 " I will not be made into a governess," mur- 
 mured Alice. 
 
 "But there is nothing else that a lady can 
 be." 
 
 " Then I will not be a lady !" and wearing 
 an air of desperate defiance the culprit rushed 
 out of the room. 
 
 A few moments of grieving silence ensued, 
 which Miss Flora broke by saying despondently, 
 " What u to become" of her ?" 
 
 " It is to be hoped some good man will marry 
 her." sighed Miss Delia. 
 
 " And a nice handful he will get !" responded 
 her sister with plaintive irony. 
 
 And so on, and so on, they prosed until, if 
 their two listeners had not known dear little 
 Sunshine, they might have supposed her planned 
 by nature to fall into all manner of mischief. 
 The old ladies drooped now and then into these 
 moods of discouragement about her. In their 
 systematic judiciousness the J: had ever kept it 
 before Alice's eyes that a time mighi come when 
 she would have to depend upon and provide for 
 herself; and to this end they had given her 
 what they considered to be a wise education ; 
 but no one could look at the beautiful, willful 
 girl now Without seeing that she had been far 
 too much petted and indulged ever to bear 
 the ordeal of being thrust forth on the world 
 on her own resources. No one was ever less 
 fitted for it. 
 
 Dr. Ferrand's verdict on Sunshine's iniquity 
 when he became apprised of it was not over 
 severe. He said she must not make any more 
 parodies of religious biographies — that was all; 
 and advised that she should not be permitted to 
 read that style of literature until she was better 
 able to appreciate it. Decidedly the wicked lit- 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 97 
 
 tie monkey gained by her wickednesa ; and Sin- 
 clair privately reported to Bittersweet that his 
 father had wished she were a boy, when he 
 would have taken herin hand himself and made 
 something clever out of her. Such leniency of 
 judgment Miss Delia regarded as extremely mis- 
 chievous ; and some disagreeable daily task to 
 do being one unalterable article of her code for 
 moral training, Alice was set now every morn- 
 ing to pucker a seam for an hour, which per- 
 haps she detested more than . the WooUey 
 ordeal. 
 
 It was impossible for Rachel Withers not to 
 sympathize in the fractious creature's feelings, 
 and not to endeavor to ameliorate them during 
 a brief visit she paid with her godmamma to 
 Brookfall, by reading aloud something pleasant 
 while Alice sewed. Sintram delighted her, but 
 Miss Delia happening to overhear a little mys- 
 tical bit, remarked that she did not like its 
 tone, and begged Rachel to entertain the child 
 with a few pages of Proverbial Philosophy in- 
 stead. But the penitential hour was nearly up 
 when she spoke, so Rachel just finished the 
 chapter of Sintram, and' then deposited it in 
 her work-basket. Alice's hand was immediately 
 stretched forth to take possession of the little 
 paper-covered book, but at the same time she 
 said : " Aunt Delia, I must read this tale to the 
 end ; I shall never rest till I do." 
 
 " You know our wishes, Alice, but it seems 
 you do not care to please us," was the calmly 
 reproachful answer. 
 
 "Yes, I do wish to please you; but dear, 
 dear auntie, don't make it so hard !" pleaded 
 Alice, by no means relinquishing her designs 
 on the book. 
 
 "You intend to have your own way." 
 
 " I can not read good books forever ! They 
 make me feel wicked and satirical Yes, they 
 do, aunt Delia, very." 
 
 " That ,is because of your own evil, corrupt, 
 unregenerate nature, poor child I" 
 
 " I am not evil — I am not corrupt I But what 
 is there in Mr. WooUey, or Mr. Nully, or Mr. 
 Tully, to amuse or instruct me ?" 
 
 " I do not know who Mr. Nully and Mr. Tully 
 are, Alice ; but from Mr. WooUey you might 
 gain lessons of patience and sobriety that you 
 greatly need. You are in a very sad way if you 
 do not feel the profound sinfulness of your own 
 poor heart, and your want of help from above 
 to cleanse and sanctify it." 
 
 Poor Alice was now in for a sermonette and 
 she got it. Miss Delia closed her eyes, bated 
 her breath, and prosed on for a long quarter of 
 an hour ; the ohild'going»through each phase of 
 impatience, weariness, sullenness, and dejection 
 which being preached at in this fashion invaria- 
 bly produces. At last Miss Delia made an end, 
 when AUoe laid down the book but said, with 
 quiet resolution, " I would rather defy you than 
 deceive you, aunt Delia, and I mean to read the 
 story through." 
 
 Even Rachel was startled at this frank dis- 
 obedience, and laid her band on her property to 
 remove it, but Miss Delia, making a virtue of 
 necessity, said, " Let her have it — if you do not, 
 Sinclair will. But in future, dear Miss Withers, 
 bring no such books in her way. Was I not 
 justified in saying that they are so great a temp- 
 tation to the young that I could find in my heart 
 G 
 
 to wish no work of imagination had ever been 
 written." 
 
 "No, Delia, you are not justified in saying 
 any thing of the kind," interposed Sara Grand- 
 age, who had witnessed the scene with gradually' 
 rising displeasure. " Neither are you justified 
 in driving AUce to revolt by laying on her re- 
 strictions that her nature will not bear. You 
 might deal so with a stock or a stone, but not 
 with one of her mould." 
 
 Fortunately Alice had quitted the room, for 
 Miss Delia was too much astonished at this 
 abrupt interference with her authority and dog- 
 mas to have her faculties ready at call for a 
 reply. She sat dumb and did not recover from 
 the shock of the rebuke for the whole day after. 
 She had a great respect for her cousin Sara's 
 common-sense and practical wisdom, and it was 
 noticed that two or three old novels, written in 
 the form of letters, soon afterward made their 
 appearance in the drawing-room. Bittersweet 
 caught the first glimpse of them, recognized 
 there Miss Clarissa Harlowe, Miss Byron, and 
 other friends of her youth, and counseled their 
 immediate retirement into private life again. 
 
 " We don't lock our girls up in this genera- 
 tion, my dear, but we keep their thoughts as 
 pure as may be," said she. " Richardson might 
 be very moral reading for our mothers, but I 
 call him a sickly writer. Alice would ■ find him 
 dull too — steer clear of novels before Miss Aus- 
 ten and Scott ; if you would like me to make 
 you out a list of amusing wholesomes, I will do 
 it." 
 
 Miss Delia replied grievously that there was 
 no need to trouble her — Sinclair would only be 
 too glad to supply Alice if she was to be aUowed 
 to fill her head with bubbles ; and the task was 
 delegated to Sinclair accordingly. After this 
 Alice might be seen any hour of the day when 
 she was not riding, walkmg, or eating, with her 
 nose buried in a book of romance or poetry ; 
 and their, effect was soon perceptible in a sweet- 
 ening of her temper and a softening of her pro- 
 pensity to sarcasm. She found the people In 
 Miss Austen's books much more like those she 
 knew than the lay figures in the religious biog- 
 raphies, and was therefore not tempted to quiz 
 them as pretending to be better than human 
 nature. But her general taste was for some- 
 thing with a higher strain of poetry in it than 
 Miss Austen could reach ; for at fifteen the 
 world is full of promise which has all the bloom 
 on it yet, and the chime of sweet verses makes 
 pleasanter music at that time of life than the 
 shrewdest prose. 
 
 But apart from her taste for light reading, 
 Alice had other weaknesses to correct. She was 
 very ingenious in the art of provoking — that 
 her most cordial admirers were forced to admit. 
 
 Throughout the previous winter and spring 
 all the world round about Knowle had bfeeu 
 dUigently embroidering screens, pen-wipers, and , 
 other odds and ends, for the restoration of the 
 tower of the church; or rather for the bazaar 
 which was to be held in aid of the fund for that 
 purpose. Rachel Withers had been asked to 
 contribute, and Alice had been made reluctantly 
 to furnish her quota since she came home ; and 
 the spoils having now been aU sent in to Miss 
 
98 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 Delia Ferrand, aa vice-president of the fancy- 
 fair, were duly Isud out in the study for the mu- 
 tual inspection of the workers before being 
 finally dispatched to Knowle, where the bazaar 
 was to be held. 
 
 The morning after they were so arranged, the 
 good aunts went in to admire their neighbors' 
 ' beautiful handiwork, and having incautiously, 
 left Alice behind on retiring, she could not re- 
 frain her fingers from mischief. Sinclair Fer- 
 rand arrived most inopportunely to aid her, and 
 what did she do but dress him up into what she 
 called a Bazaar Trophy — that is, she pinned him 
 all over with cushions, anti-macassars, screens, 
 and other wool ware, and then ushered him into 
 the drawing-room where the aunts were sitting 
 in the solemn state of a morning call from little 
 Mr. More. Neither of the delinquents knew 
 that he was there, and they both looked rather 
 silly and abashed ; for Mr. More was the prime 
 mover of the Fancy Fair, as he was, indeed, of 
 all public matters in the neighborhood ; and 
 being a person of rather touchy feelings he was 
 not likely to see his last great effort made fun 
 of without betraying his annoyance. Having 
 entered, however, Sinclair scorned to retreat, 
 and stood like a string-jack, his arms outstretch- 
 ed and dangling with frippery, a tasseled cush- 
 ion on his tawny head, and Ms back covered 
 with banner-screens in poppies and roses. 
 
 " Alice !" cried Miss Delia, in a voice of acute 
 reproach. 
 
 " How do you do, Miss Alice ?" said the visi- 
 tor, rising with tender formality to shake hands. 
 
 "Very well, thank you,'' answered Alice, 
 demure as six years old ; and then giving her 
 head a pretty confused • toss, she backed into a 
 recess of one of the windows, whither her trophy 
 followed her, and recklessly sat down on a most 
 elaborate piece by Miss Orispe that garnished 
 his coat. 
 
 Mr. More looked very red and embarrassed ; 
 there was no joke in the affair to him — nothing 
 but, a deUberate insult planned and executed 
 wholly and solely by " that red-haired young 
 fellow," as he designated Sinclair Ferrand ; for 
 whom, nobody could guess why, he had a man- 
 ifest repugnance. Sinclair perversely recovered 
 his countenance the moment he saw how vexed 
 the punctilious visitor was, and appealed to him 
 with serene audacity to say whether he did not 
 think perambulating trophies such as himself 
 would not be a novel and .attractive feature at 
 the bazaar. 
 
 " There ought to be two of us, and we might 
 take the money at the door," suggested he. " I 
 would wear the cushions, screens, and heavy 
 goods, and you might be decked out in the light 
 gear of kettle-holders, mats, pen-wipers, and 
 slippers." 
 
 "Are you aware of the serious ulterior object 
 of this benevolent sale, young sir ?" demanded 
 Mr. More in a tone of pique. 
 
 " Yes, we are going to rebuild the tower of 
 Knowle Church.'" 
 
 '■ And you think that afit subject for mockery 
 and ridicule? I am sorry for you." 
 
 " I am afraid Alice is most to blame," inter- 
 posed Miss Flora. " Go away, Sinclair, and take 
 off the things before they are spoilt." 
 
 Her nephew was gracefully retiring in obedi- 
 ence to orders when Miss Delia looking after 
 
 him, forgot for a moment his enormities in ad- 
 miration of the display on his broad shoulders. 
 
 " Oh, dear ! how very effective those poppies 
 are. Stand still, Sinclair — yes, they are very 
 effective, very handsome indeed ; don't you 
 think so, Flora ? Perhaps a little more floss silk 
 would have improved them,, but it is hard to 
 say. Now what price should you affix to that 
 piece, Mr. More — ^five guineas ?" 
 
 " Not less than five guineas certainly," re- 
 plied he, stiffly regarding the trophy through 
 his glasses. 
 
 " Turn round, Sinclair, let aunt Flora look at 
 her famous cushion," said Alice, her courage 
 beginning tg revive ; but Miss Flora, conscious 
 of the visitor's cold disapproval of the spectacle 
 cried out, " No, no ;" she had seen her own 
 cushion often enough, and they were to go 
 away. 
 
 As the pair vanished both the old ladies 
 smiled, but Mr. More sighed audibly. 
 
 " Children will be children," said Miss Flora 
 with gentle consideration. 
 
 " Yes, we can not expect to put old heads on 
 young shoulders," added Miss Delia, " though 
 perhaps since Sinclair has taken his degree and 
 come out a high wrangler, Sunshine should learn 
 to treat him with more respect ; but he encour- 
 ages her, and that is the truth." 
 
 Perhaps it was : at all events he did not look 
 an unwilling victim. 
 
 That was Alice's last prank at home for some 
 time to come, however. A few days afterward 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel left Claymire, 
 and carried her with them as far as London, 
 when she was again safely deposited in Miss 
 Cornwell's care. Sinclair Ferrand remained 
 little more than a week behind them, and then 
 pruned his wings for a long flight in the East. 
 After he was gone the people at Brookfall and 
 the rectory led a very quiet life, and would often 
 have been thankful for a visit from him, or for 
 a capricious gleam of their Sunshine. When 
 they were absent no smgle fault they had was 
 remembered — nothing but their youth, their 
 brightness, and their gay company. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FOURTH. 
 
 BACHEI. WITHERS MAKES A THIKD START IN LIFE. 
 
 Take her for all in all we shall not look upon her 
 like again. 
 
 I. 
 
 When Mrs. Sara Grandage and Rachel Withers 
 went home to Prior's Bank the harvest was just 
 beginning, and the moprs were in bloom. This 
 was Carrie Martin's leisure season, and she was 
 glad to make her holiday with them. She staid 
 a month, enjoying long rides, idleness, pleasant 
 company, good books and an excellent table as 
 a person living habitually in dull London lodg- 
 ings can not help enjoying the delights of coun- 
 try life. When she left, the leaves were at the 
 change, and the cold dark days of winter were 
 advancing. But at Prior's Bank a gloomier 
 home-cloud attended their drawing on than any 
 outside. 
 
 Bittersweet fell ill, and about midway in No- 
 vember took to her room, and soon after to her 
 bed. It began by and by to dawn on Rachel's 
 
 -\ > 
 
AMONGST GOOD SAMARITANS. 
 
 mind that she would never quit it again. She 
 did not suffer pain, but she lost her strength and 
 was quite feeble, though even, then her spirits did 
 not fail her. Dr. Beane gave it as his opinion 
 that she would linger a long while. T^he slow 
 winter wore through, spring budded, summer 
 bloomed, and autumn faded again, and she still 
 lived. Rachel's was a weary vigil, but she kept 
 it with devotion. Miss Delia Ferrand and Sin- 
 clair came down into Hurtledale to see their 
 kinswoman soon after the young man's return 
 from the East, but Bittersweet was glad to Icnow 
 them gone again. Prior's Bank was dull with 
 its mistress bed-ridden. 
 
 A second Christmas went over, and another 
 new year began similar to the last. 
 
 One night in January Bachel sat thinking by 
 the firelight while her godmamma lay wakeful, 
 watching her between the curtains. Presently 
 she was bidden to read the Address of Nature 
 in one of Montaigne's Essays — " Que philoso- 
 pher o'est apprendre d mourir," a great favorite 
 of the old lady's, which Eaohel had read so often 
 that she knew it by heart. When it was ended 
 they had a grave tolk which Bittersweet began. 
 Bachel would have checked her and cheered her, 
 but she refused to be silenced. " My dear child," 
 said she, " how little you profit by philosophy. 
 I am going my way satisfied — I have not made 
 out many things clearly, but enough to live by 
 and die by. I am growing tired after traveling 
 these seventy-eight years, and am not sorry to be 
 within sight of rest. But now I want to know 
 what you will do when I am gone ?" 
 
 Rachel sat on the e dge of the bed, her hand 
 lying on her godmamma's white, withered fin- 
 gers'. She did not immediately answer, and 
 Bittersweet, looking wistfully in her face, asked 
 again, " What shall you do, Dumpling, when I 
 am gone ?" 
 
 Then Rachel told her she had no plans for 
 herself — absolutely none. She fancied her old 
 friend felt relieved ; she was silent for a minute 
 or two, and then she went on. " I should not 
 have liked to hear you had ; nobody likes their 
 death to be made a nucleus for new plans, but 
 mine can not be far off now, my feet are so cold ; 
 and therefore I want to give you a bit of advice, 
 my dear. Have a home of your own. Living 
 about amongst your kinsfolk might be pleasant 
 for a time^bttt not for a permanence. As far 
 as means go, you will be comfortably indepen- 
 dent, and a woman has more consideration in 
 the world and greater liberty who possesses a 
 home of her own, than one who spends her 
 time and her money from house to house as 
 it hanger-on amongst friends." 
 
 True enough no doubt, Rachel allowed ; but 
 she could not play at deciding, and she hoped 
 even against hope that the need for decision 
 might still be far distant. Her godmamma went 
 on again, " There is, in fact, no one who has a 
 claim upon you, and I have been thinking if 
 that pretty little cottage at Claymire where we 
 lodged were your own, you might spend your 
 winters and springs there ; it is warmer than 
 Hurtledale, and would suit you better. You are 
 not so strong as you used to be — I often hear 
 you coughing in the night." 
 
 Rachel let her scheme, and devise, and settle, 
 seeing that it satisfied her ; but the idea of liv- 
 mg at Claymire chiefly did not approve itself to 
 
 her — it was too far from Katherine, John and 
 the children. She did not say so, however, and 
 Bittersweet taking her silence for agreement, 
 gave a hint to her lawyer ; and when she next 
 heard of it the' little cottage was hers. " I trust 
 it may be a long while before I need to take 
 possession," said she. 
 
 Toward the end of the month fell Rachel's 
 birth-day, and nobody remembered it or wished 
 her many happy returns ! These anniversaries 
 seemed to come round very fast now that she 
 was past the confines of middle-age ; ' and she was 
 sometimes almost ashamed of herself for feeling 
 so young at heart when there was a suspicious 
 line tracing itself between her eyebrows, and 
 her hair was all mingled with gray. But she 
 was a comely woman at eight-and-thirty as Bit- 
 tersweet predicted of her at eighteen ; bright 
 and cheerful when there was no present distress, 
 and overflowing with ready kindness to all in 
 need of it. 
 
 What a strangely level, easy life she had led 
 since she was twenty, and what a flat stretched 
 out before her in the future ! It had been like 
 gliding along a groove at a very safe, slow pace, 
 while others whom she knew — Carrie Martin, 
 for instance — had encountered such awful ups 
 and downs, and expected jerks and collisions. 
 Where Rachel had one event to recollect, Car- 
 rie had a score ; and Carrie would by no means 
 have changed fates with her she knew ; she would 
 have been dulled to death in Rachel's monotony 
 of comfort, and Rachel would just as surely 
 have been beaten to death in Carrie's incessant 
 conflicts with a perverse fortune. ' 
 
 We do not acknowledge it early, perhaps, but 
 when we get well on our life's journey, we most 
 of us begin to see that we have been led by the 
 road for which we were best shod. Rachel had 
 murmured often at her own dull, smooth course 
 in secret, but in the face of coming change and 
 sorrow, she felt that God had dealt with her well 
 and wisely in not letting her fare over rough 
 and dangerous places too frequently. She had 
 not the strength, the nerve, or the fortitude for 
 a very troublesome life, and in mercy she had 
 been spared its temptations. 
 
 When March came, it was vain for Rachel to 
 strive any longer to shut her eyes against the 
 truth. Dear old Bittersweet was dwining away 
 fast. Never a day passed now that she did not 
 refer to the time when she should be gone, and 
 her god-daughter would be ' alone. Still her 
 good spirits survived, which was more than could 
 be said for Rachel's. There was one consolation, 
 even for her, however — Bittersweet did not suf- 
 fer either in body or in mind. She was prostrate 
 with weakness, but she was composed. Even 
 Miss Delia Ferrand, who came down to Prior's 
 Bank again at this season, stood silent before 
 her silence. Her cousin Sara never could and 
 never did talk out her feelings whether of affec- 
 tion or of religion ; yet she had always made her 
 friends feel full reliance on the steadfastness>of 
 her love, and she had impressed Rachel, who was 
 with her in her best moments, with a belief that 
 she was a good Christian if an unobtrusive one. 
 No power of art could have transformed het into 
 the similitude of her excellent cousins at Brook- 
 fall. They had been very differently brought 
 
100 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 up, and had all their lives beheld the world 
 through different mediums and from a different 
 point of view. They thought her an irreligious 
 woman ; she thought them righteous overmuch 
 — even trenching a little now and them on cant 
 and hypocrisy. What a blessing it is that we 
 are none of us each other's final judges ! 
 
 Bittersweet clung to her old books of philoso- 
 phy to the end, but she heard her Bible read 
 too — some people fancied she never opened it ; 
 she left them in their delusion ; but Eachel 
 knew better. 
 
 "It is the soundest philosophy of all, my 
 dear, and stick to it," said the old lady toward 
 the last — "I stuck to it when it was no more 
 clear to me than High Dutch, but light has 
 glimmered out since — enough to see by. Good 
 people are not very different at bottom, only 
 they fight so over their dogmas that they seem 
 really to hate each other for the love of God. 
 Never mind religious ideas. Dumpling, and don't 
 worry yourself with so-called good books ; they 
 reason all round the compass if you read enough 
 of them, and if you do not you only get the 
 views of a party. I do not think myself there 
 are any parties where I am going. Do your 
 best and trust God, my dear ; there is nothing 
 else for it ; I hope I have not done you harm — 
 Delia thinks me a scoffing old woman; but that 
 was my rule, and it has answered — I have no 
 reason to accuse it of failing me — ^none. I had 
 some sharp trials in my youth and it alone 
 withheld me from being a discontented, utterly 
 miserable, perhaps wicked woman." She took 
 breath a little while, and on Kachel'fl hinting 
 that long as they had lived together she knew 
 very little of her life, her godmamma went on : 
 " There is not very much to know. I was mar- 
 ried at sixteen to a man older than my father, 
 and if I were to say I was married in payment 
 of one of my father's debts of honor, I should 
 probably be as near the truth as ever we can 
 get in such transactions. He was excellent 
 company, my husband, to every body but his 
 wife ; I was too young and simple to amuse 
 him long, and I was only on the verge of be- 
 coming wise enough for the duty when he died. 
 He was very charitable and serious in his later 
 years, and the world always gave him a good 
 word in every one of his phases. In his early 
 and middle life he was a great rake ; but he re- 
 formed when he grew weary of sinning and 
 turned saint, proposing me to himself as a de- 
 votee — but I thought his last estate worse than 
 his first. I used to try to provoke him by show- 
 ing my lack of faith in the genuineness of his 
 conversion, and he bore with me very philo- 
 
 sophically. Cousin Delia would say he had got 
 a changed heart— I don't know ; it always gave 
 me an uncomfortable feeling to see him trying 
 to circumvent his old master — Rachel, am I 
 growing profane? Ah, my dear, I was much 
 worse at twenty — heaven forgive me ! Draw 
 the curtains— now I'll go to sleep." 
 
 Her last words and to the last characteristic. 
 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage had not misled her god- 
 daughter as to the provision made for her in her 
 will. Besides the cottage at Claymire, she had 
 bequeathed to her absolutely five thousand 
 pounds, and charged upon the Prior's Bank 
 property was an annuity of two hundred a year 
 for her life. 
 
 Rachel missed her dear old friend, and mourn- 
 ed for her sincerely. They had lived together 
 fifteen years. She staid at Prior's Bank until 
 the end of March, and oh ! how still the house 
 seemed of nights with the east wind blowing, 
 and the spring rain coming down drip, drip, 
 drip upon the gravel ! She could not realize it 
 at first, this life of hers quite alone, but she 
 knew by experience that she should wear to it 
 by and by. The days slipped over her one by one 
 as beads are slipped down a string ; the trees 
 budded, the days lengthened, the birds were 
 heard in the woods, and all nature was reviving. 
 
 Dear old Bittersweet ! what capital company 
 she used to be ! Sometimes Rachel could have 
 fancied she heard her voice speaking out of her 
 familiar place in the twilight, and saying, 
 " Rachel, come and talk," but when she looked 
 round the chair was empty, and its occupant 
 passed away to her quiet lying in the beautiful 
 churchyard on the slope of the fell. 
 
 When she left Prior's Bank finally, Rachel 
 staid a fortnight with her brother John and his 
 family ; then she went to London to Carrie 
 Martin for a few days, and at last to Claymire, 
 where she arrived about the middle of April. 
 Clip and Hanson went with her, and a niece of 
 Hanson's as cook, and they formed her house- 
 hold when she made her tMrd new start in life. 
 
 " I hope, please God, it may be the last !" 
 said she as she laid her head down on her pillow 
 for the first time under a roof of her own. " I 
 hope, please God, it may be the last." 
 
 Probably it would. She had passed the date 
 when changes are likely to occur, and she was 
 secure of fortune. There was nothing apparent 
 before her but to make herself contented, to do 
 good, and to grow old ; and happily for herself 
 Rachel Withers was one of those women who 
 can grow old gracefully. 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 101 
 
 PAET FOURTH. 
 
 SEEKING. 
 
 CHAPTER THE HKST. 
 Alice's lovers. 
 AuLD Robin Q-ray cam a-courting to me. — Scotch Song. 
 I. 
 Rachel Withers had lived too long with 
 Mrs. Sara Grandage to alter her ways when she 
 went to Claymire, but she was hardly likely to 
 escape the well-meaning endeavors of the worthy 
 ladies at Brookfall to convert her to their own 
 when she was left unsupported within reach of 
 their powers of persuasion. She enjoyed mean- 
 dering through a long, slow evening with them 
 when they would let her alone, but sometimes 
 they were persistently prosy. It is really mar- 
 velous how little good people shrink from the 
 responsibility of giving advice. Does it never 
 dawn' on their kind hearts that a love of au- 
 thority lurks uu«ler their desire to make every 
 body wise and happy in their own peculiar 
 fashion? Rachel had given up being young, 
 but they were nearly double her age, and a 
 sentiment of respect tied her tongue, else could 
 she often have refuted their arguments and de- 
 fended her own cause sturdily. If she had done 
 so the probability is that they would have 
 thought her self-opinionated. 
 
 One evening she was tempted so far as to say 
 that she had not forgotten her Church Cate- 
 chism, but was trying to do her duty in that 
 state of life to which it had pleased God to call 
 her — that state being one of competence and 
 quiet ease; but Miss Delia shook her head, 
 disapproving of her^ rather obtrusively, and 
 Mias Flora forthwith cited a long list of charita- 
 ble labors that she might do but did not. In 
 vain Rachel pleaded that she had not. the neces- 
 sary qualifications, that no impulse moved her 
 to undertake such and such task-work, for 
 which she believed herself to have a natural in- 
 aptitude ; and, as a last word, that if Providence 
 had meant her to be a toiler as well as a spin- 
 ster, He would probably have directed her incli- 
 nations to some practical object, and not have 
 left her to choose capriciously what she would 
 or would not do amongst unappointed things. 
 She did not dare mention what, nevertheless, 
 she suspected to be true — that iif she made a 
 little more fuss and talk over her proceedings 
 they would bear ai*- equal comparison with the 
 Martha-like deeds of her neighbors; and still 
 less did she dare to insinuate that Miss Delia's 
 efforts to direct her spiritually, and guide her 
 actions, appeared at her age in the guise of un- 
 welcome and quite needless interference. But 
 Miss Delia lived to do good ; she made it her 
 profession, and followed it up with relentless 
 assiduity. What a pity it is that there are such 
 multitudes of perverse people in this wicked 
 world who don't want to be done good to, and 
 who resent the attempt as an impertinence! 
 Rachel Withers had experienced no inward call 
 to engage in the service, and disliked being 
 practiced on as a patient ; it was, indeed, worthy 
 of remark hovir much wickeder she felt after 
 
 Miss Delia's charges; and it is possible that 
 a long course of them might have even made 
 her irreverent with her tongue, after the exam- 
 ple of Bittersweet. Fortunately for her, there- 
 fore, deliverance came soon, ere mischief was 
 done. At Midsummer, Alice Gilsland finally left 
 school and came home to Brookfall, "a finished 
 gentlewoman," in Miss Cornwell's phrase, and 
 after that event the excellent aunts had their 
 hands full with her, and Rachel was left in com- 
 parative peace. She enjoyed the release from 
 constant suggestion and dictation more than it 
 is in the power of words to express. 
 
 On the very afternoon of Alice's arrival, as 
 Rachel was returning from a wood ramble, she 
 met her with Sinclair Ferrand riding up toward 
 the downs for a delightful gallop already. She 
 was grown during the two years that had elapsed 
 since Rachel had last seen her, and was im- 
 proved, if that were possible. Her face had 
 done more than kept its promise of loveliness ; 
 she looked bright, fresh and sweet as a rose, 
 but she carried her wild little head in the air 
 still, and seemed as far from any serious, woman- 
 ly thoughts as ever. Her blitheness of spirit, 
 and joyous appreciation of a life that much love 
 made very happy, gave her a rare grace and 
 charm of manner ; her gayety was a perpetual 
 protest against gloom, and her beaming ex- 
 pression seemed only the natural efluence of the 
 generous temper that had worthily won her her 
 pretty pet name of Sunshine. 
 
 It was pleasant to watch how the elderly peo- 
 ple cherished her and enjoyed even her Uttle 
 willfuhiesses ; and it was easy to see, by and by, 
 who was the leading spirit at Brookfall on every- 
 day occasions ; indeed. Mistress Alice adopted 
 no measures to mask her little despotisms, 
 which it must be allowed sat upon her not un- 
 becomingly. 
 
 When the two young folks rode forward and 
 lefther, Rachel turned and went on her home- 
 ward course musing and meditative. Of whom 
 was it that Alice so strongly reminded her — was 
 it of some real person or some picture that she 
 had seen ? The idea haunted and eluded her 
 for several days, and then it came upon her like 
 a flash that the bewildering likeness she saw was 
 to the portrait of a lady which hung over the 
 chimney-piece in the dining-hall at the old 
 Woodlands Manor Farm between Claymire and 
 Knowle. 
 
 To assure herself that this was no mere fanci- 
 ful crotchet she set off the next morning to look 
 at the portrait again ; there it still was, framed 
 in the panel, — a spot of sunlight where all else 
 was gloom, antiquity and decay. By the dress, 
 it dated two centuries back at the least ; and 
 the farmer's dame told Rachel that if her memory 
 served her rightly it was the picture of a Lady 
 Eleanour Seymor — a Roman Catholic lady, as shfe 
 supposed from the cross on her bodice. She 
 had heard that Woodlands belonged to the Sey- 
 mors up to her father's time, when they had 
 sold it to Earl Rashleigh, 'who had converted it 
 into a farmstead. 
 
102 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 There were several Seymor monuments in 
 Claymire Church, and one of them, bearing the 
 figures of a knight and a lady lying side by side 
 in a recess of the chancel, with three children 
 at their feet, was the monument of this very 
 Eady Eleanour and her husband. Sir Reginald 
 Seymor. They appeared from their sculptured 
 effigies to have been quite in years when they 
 died, but the portrait was that of a face in the 
 dewy velvet bloom of May, with two eyes softly 
 shining, blue and frank as heaven, two lips 
 pouting like a rose-bud at the blush ; a chin 
 sweetly curved, a throat round and smooth as 
 marble, flowing tresses of ashen-shadowed gold ; 
 a form slender yet stately — half maiden-simple, 
 half proud princess, self-oonsoious, loving and 
 lovely. 
 
 It was Alice, but with a difference. In Alice 
 there was more warmth of coloring, more 
 nature, more passion; but as Rachel stood 
 gazing up at the portrait, it seemed to mock 
 her with little traits that -peeped out here and 
 there, from the arch of the lip, the nostril, the 
 line of the level brow, so like and yet unlike 
 the Sunshine of Brookfall ! - 
 
 Rachel was not, as a rule, genealogically 
 curious, but she now said to herself she would 
 try to trace out this Lady Eleanour Seymor, and 
 get to know if there existed any remote kinship 
 between her family and the Grilslands. She 
 therefore in this intent inquired about for a 
 County History amongst her acquaintance, until 
 one day Alice herself brought down to the cot- 
 tage a very ancient and moth-eaten tome which 
 Dr. Ferrand had borrowed for her from an anti- 
 quarian in Exeter. They sat down together 
 and began to turn it over, looking at its engrav- 
 ings, drawn in the queerest perspective, and 
 its family trees, some now dead altogether, some 
 divindled down to a single stem, until they came 
 on that of which Rachel was in search. There 
 they were^-a chapter full of Seymors, knights 
 and baronets, with their marriages and inter- 
 marriages, and their descendants, lineal and 
 collateral, down to the middle of the eighteenth 
 century. In the seventeenth occurred the Sir 
 Reginald whose monument was in Claymire 
 Church ; and who married in the year sixteen - 
 hundred and fifty-three Eleanour Gwyrvne, 
 youngest daughter of Rupert Grwynne, Esquire, 
 of AJversham in the county of Surrey — 
 "Gwynne," murmured Rachel to herself; 
 " Gwynne," that was the name of poor Helena ; 
 and I do think that portrait has a look of her 
 too." 
 
 She let the leaf lie, and fell into a reverie. 
 She saw nothing yet; but unconsciously the 
 first stone was laid in her mind for the slow 
 building up of a discovery ; but it was left un- 
 shaped — a bit of material in the rough though 
 by no means waste. Alice had tired of the 
 musty old volume before this, and sat sunning 
 herself by the open window until Rachel came 
 out of her reverie, and told her why she had 
 wanted it. Alice had never seen the portrait 
 that was like herself; but she would go and 
 see it. 
 
 " It is strange, and you are not to laugh at 
 me if I tell you, Rachel," said she a little con- 
 fusedly ; " but the first time you came to Miss 
 Comwell's — that night you were in the school- 
 room and heard the subjects read — I recollect 
 
 telling Janey Grantham that I was sure I had 
 known you somewhere else. They said it was 
 impossible, and when I looked at you afterward 
 I could not see it. Aunt Delia is always telling 
 me my imagination runs away with my judg- 
 ment, and perhaps it does ; for I often fancy 
 very odd things." 
 
 Rachel did not laugh at her young compan- 
 ion, but neither did she ask her what these 
 " odd things " were ; for she knew that Alice's 
 benefactresses wished her to be reminded as 
 little as possible of the early portions of her 
 life ; but though they avoided talking of that 
 gloomy past, no one imagined that she had 
 wholly forgotten it. Rachel had never yet 
 heard her allude to Mr. Gilsland in any way, 
 but wandering up over the downs with her one 
 evening, she stopped by a certain stile, and 
 pointing to a thatched shed which stood a little 
 higher up, partially sheltered by the hedge, 
 she said, " It was there that Sinclair found me, 
 Rachel — have you ever seen the spot before ? 
 If I were to die for Sinclair, I don't think it 
 would be enough !" Rachel smiled up in the 
 bright face glowing with enthusiasm. " If I 
 were to die for him it would be nothing /" she 
 repeated, and walked on quickly with glancing 
 eyes and a sob in her throat. 
 
 This sort of thing was not much in placid 
 Rachel's way; she did not quite comprehend 
 Alice's caprices of feeling, and thought perhaps 
 silence was the best way of meeting them ; she 
 held her peace, therefore, until an opportunity 
 occurred of setting off on the tack of wild-flower 
 talk, which she sustained singly until Alice's 
 spirit went down, and she was tame enough to 
 join in it. 
 
 " Why does Mr. More always suggest to me a 
 cheese-colored tom-cat ? He does, especially 
 viewed from behind," said that dreadfully viva- 
 cious little Miss Crispe.to Rachel Withers. 
 
 It was on the occasion of a tea-drinking in the 
 rectory gardens with the first syllabub of the 
 season, when Mr. More appeared in sedulous 
 attendance on Miss Delia Ferrand and her Sun- 
 shine. He kept as close to the pair as their 
 shadow, though perhaps nobody but the watch- 
 ful wee spmster had observed it. Rachel smiled 
 at her remark, and looked too, but was unable 
 to see the feline resemblance she mentioned. 
 She saw something more important, however. 
 
 " He must be courting one of them — which 
 can it be ?" said wicked Miss Crispe again ; 
 "just notice his ambling gait, and his purring 
 countenance. He is pervaded with love from 
 top to toe !" Rachel was rather amazed and 
 rather shocked; but really Miss Crispe had 
 reason in what she said. The little man looked 
 altogether in glory. 
 
 Miss Delia and her Sunshine appeared equally 
 unconscious of any thing conspicuous in his 
 assiduities ; they were accustomed to have him 
 dangling after them, and he had quietly appro- 
 priated to himself many little privileges in con- 
 sequence. He was a favorite at Brookfall, as 
 well with Alice as with the aunts ; and Alice, 
 who had the frolic audacity of a child at times, 
 when she was possessed by the spirit of fun and 
 mischief, paid his formality smaU respect. But 
 he was not aggrieved by her vagaries — quite 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 103 
 
 the reverse indeed ; she might do any thing, and 
 whatever she did was beautiful in his eyes. He 
 talked of her to Rachel Withers that very after- 
 noon, giving his sentiments full play. 
 
 " She has a sweet, pure, ardent nature that 
 refreshes the feelings like a song," said he, in 
 that mystical metaphorical jargon of lofty talk- 
 ing to whicfi plain people like Rachel non-un- 
 derstandingly assent, trying to look sympathetic, 
 but falling very far short in the matter of reply. 
 He went on, " I have known her, Miss Withers, 
 from the fortunate hour when a careful Provi- 
 dence guided her lost footsteps to the threshold 
 of those dear ladies at Brookfall." (No acknowl- 
 edgment of Sinclair Ferrand as the instrument 
 of Providence.) " I have seen her grow in 
 beauty, and in a better grace than beauty, year 
 by year since until now, ' standing with reluctant 
 feet where the brook and river meet, womanhood 
 and childhood sweet,' I see her like a fair flower 
 in the morn's dewy sunshine, expanding into a 
 character of wondrous lovelinesj^^d perfec- 
 tion !" y^ 
 
 But the phrases are notJiHTg without the tone 
 and gestures c ^thej itttgman ! Rachel wished 
 Alice could have"^eard him ; did he ever address 
 her in that florid style, and if. so, how did she 
 answer him? Perhaps in her fairy fantasia 
 manner. They had been friends from very early 
 date, and he brought her little gifts and pretti- 
 nesses still, as he "used to bring her toys and 
 playbooks when she was a child, and she ac- 
 cepted them with as frank a pleasure, appearing 
 to regard the donor with an almost filial benev- 
 olence. He was a kind-hearted, benevolent 
 little man in reality, but clogged outside with a 
 frieze of affectations : aflectations that had been 
 worn so long and so systematically that at last 
 they had become a second nature of confirmed 
 habits. Mjss Crispe insisted that he had begun 
 originally to form himself on some romantic 
 ideal in a novel, and that this was the queer re- 
 sult. 
 
 Since the first visit Rachel Withers had paid 
 to Claymire with her godmamma the village had 
 increased somewhat ; a row of detached houses 
 had been built fronting the sea, which were a 
 favorite resort of invalids in search of seclusion 
 and quiet. The Oliver Warleighs had found 
 their way down from town to one of them, in- 
 tending to remain throughout the summer ; and 
 as Rachel was not aware of their coming it was 
 a great surprise to her to see them appear in the 
 rectory gardens amongst the doctor's other 
 guests. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh looked much the same as he 
 did two years ago, and though Lady Georgiana 
 assured Rachel he was much stronger than then, 
 he -had one of his nervous fainting attacks while 
 walking on the terrace in front of the rectory 
 and had to be led into the doctor's study to re- 
 cover. Lady Georgiana had grown inured to 
 his condition, for she did not betray any alarm, 
 and simply begged every body to stand back 
 from him. Alice in her kind eagerness to be of 
 use ran for a glass of wine, but when she ap- 
 proached with it. Lady Georgiana impatiently 
 pushed her aside, spilling the sherry down the 
 child's pretty new muslin dress. Alice stared 
 with astonishment, and for a moment, Rachel 
 who was by, feared from her change of color 
 that pettishness was going to get the better of 
 
 politeness ; but she needed no second hint to 
 get out of the way ; she disappeared and never 
 came back again ; and when Rachel sought and 
 found her, she was walking under the rookery 
 elms behind the house, all trembling and in a 
 state of the greatest excitement. 
 
 " Who is that lady with the pale face pitted 
 with the small-pox?" she asked hastily. "I 
 have seen her before — those cruel eyes of hers 
 make me shudder." 
 
 Rachel told her Lady Georgiana was a strang- 
 er at Claymire, and she must be mistaken about 
 having seen her before ; then she explained the 
 connection between her own family and the 
 Warleighs, but Alice was not satisfifed, though 
 she refused to go back into the garden to verify 
 or to disperse her impression. No, she affirmed, 
 she knew those cold, leaden gray eyes too well 
 to wish to come under their ken again, and she 
 should stay where she was. 
 
 " I know her, I tell you," she reiterated pas- 
 sionately when Rachel smiled over her persis- 
 tence, and then added in a lower tone, "and 
 she knows me too." Rachel judged it expedient 
 to let the subject drop ; she had heard Miss 
 Doha say that it was worse than breath wasted 
 to attempt to reason away any crotchet that had 
 once gained possession of Alice's mind. The 
 best and briefest plan was to let it alone to die 
 out of itself. 
 
 The day after this incident at the rectory, 
 Alice came down betimes to Rachel to persuade 
 her out upon the rocks Where she wished to go 
 in search of anemones and other quaint marine 
 creatures to furnish forth a very handsome glass 
 which the doctor had presented to her. The 
 aunts never descended below the cliffs, and Sin- 
 clair being engaged, she was of course far too 
 impatient to await his leisure. 
 
 " If you are too busy to come I will ask Miss 
 Crispe,""'said she, looking in through the open 
 window at Rachel placidly enjoying her news- 
 paper and her breakfast. " I know she would 
 like to go, only I ain afraid that she might fall 
 into one of the deep pools and be taken over- 
 head; she is such a wee old woman!" Rachel 
 consented to accompany her if she could vrait 
 ten minutes, which she did, perching on me 
 window-sill, and singing to herself like the 
 blithe bird she was. 
 
 It was delightful on the shore in the morning, 
 but Rachel did not often summon courage to 
 turn out so early as this. Alice directed her 
 steps straight to the low rocks where the tide 
 was down, talking fluently from Mr. Gosse's 
 book, and doing her best to indoctrinate her 
 companion with the interesting subject that 
 pervaded her own thoughts. Then they set dil- 
 igently to work, but it is not certain that their 
 search would have been successful had not Mor- 
 timer Warleigh come wandering that way, and 
 stopped to watch what they were doing. Rach- 
 el did not at once recognize him ; for he had 
 grown manly in appearance since they last met, 
 but he soon challenged her, and asked if he 
 might be permitted to join in the hunt. She 
 thsmkfuUy acquiesced ; for not being possessed 
 by the same enthusiasm for every thing new that 
 inspires young folks like Alice, she did not find 
 it either a very easy or a very agreeable busi- 
 ness ; she was indeed getting very wet and un- 
 comfortable about the feet, and even when she 
 
104 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 did see a fantastical thing like a flower stioliing 
 on a reels: which Sunshine ecstatically pronounc- 
 ed lovely, she had a shrinking disinclination to 
 touch it ; so that the help she rendered was 
 very trifling. But Mortimer Warleigh under- 
 stood how to capture the creatures so that they 
 hardly knew it ; he chipped them off with a bit 
 of their native stone under them, and foui^d 
 many comicalities — one like a scarlet jockey's 
 cap that was only an anemone reversed, with 
 which Alice was charmed to enrich her collec- 
 tion. 
 
 It never occurred to Eaohel that she was 
 either doing or permitting any thing but what 
 was strictly regular and discreet. The two 
 young people made acquaintance readily enough ; 
 for Alice had a pleasant, frank, cheerful manner 
 with her, and Mortimer Warleigh seemed bent 
 on being equally useful and agreeable. He told 
 Rachel that his father and mother were some- 
 where on the beach, and when she saw them in 
 the distance, she made an excuse to leave the 
 slippery rocks that she might go and speak to 
 them. Alice then went farther away, saying 
 she had not yet gathered half spoils enough, 
 and Mortimer followed her ; Eaehel had not for- 
 gotten her remarks of yesterday upon Lady 
 Georgiana, and aware that she would evade a 
 second meeting if possible, promised by and by 
 to come back to the rooks ; Alice said very well, 
 and bade her not hurry herself, as she meant to 
 stay an hour or two longer. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh looked more himself that 
 morning; more composed and self-possessed 
 than usual, and he shook hands with Rachel as 
 if to see her pleased him. " I find this air agree 
 with me, it agrees with me," murmured he in the 
 weak uncertain voice which seemed now to have 
 become habitual with him. " It was my wife's 
 suggestion that we should come here. The 
 scenery ia very rich and luxuriant ; 'there is 
 nothing like England for greenness ; I always 
 tell my friends so ; there is no Verdure out of 
 England, no turf," and so on he maundered, long 
 after Lady Georgiana in her distinct harsh tones 
 had begun to give Rachel an outline of their 
 present arrangements and the reasons for them. 
 How is it that people who are plotting under- 
 hand work are generally so ready to explain 
 their visible doings about which no one is in 
 doubt ? 
 
 " Clara is at school in Paris, and Roderick is 
 at Bonn ; only Mortimer is here with us, and 
 he finds it dull, poor boy, " said she. " But he 
 is such an exceeding comfort to his father and 
 myself that we can not bear him away from us. 
 He haa n fine disposition, has Mortimer — a 
 beautiful generous disposition." She looked 
 toward him as she spoke with as much tender- 
 ness as her atony face was capable of express- 
 ing ; and then after a moment's pause asked 
 who could be the young lady upon whom he 
 seemed to be dancing attendance. Rachel told 
 her it was Alice Gilsland, the child whom the 
 Misses Ferraiid had adopted, and reminded her 
 of the ill-drSssed girl whom she had seen and 
 commented upon at the Exhibition two years 
 since. She remembered the trivial incident per- 
 fectly. 
 
 " She was a rather ungainly, awkward crea- 
 ture then, was she not ?" said she, pursuing Sun- 
 shine's light figure with a critical eye. " I should 
 no,t have known her again. She brought some 
 
 wine for Oliver yesterday when he was taken il 
 at the rectory, but I did not recognize her.' 
 (Lady Georgiana had recognized her on the in- 
 stant.) " Now that I observe her I do ; but 
 still there is something peculiar about her attire 
 which would make her very remarkable had she 
 not natural grace enough to counteract the ab- 
 surd effect of her straight petticoafe and little 
 jacket. It is a mistake in your pious people to 
 rely so much on the outward advertisement of 
 their clothing to prove them not of this wicked 
 world ;~ for, after all, nobody of sense believes 
 in a sanctified poke bonnet or a limp drab gown. " 
 
 Lady Georgiana did not often indulge herself 
 in sarcastic speeches, and perhaps this slipped 
 out unawares ; for she made haste to add that 
 the ladies at Brookfall were most excellent, 
 worthy people — indeed, their treatment of Alice 
 proved them to be of the salt of the earth, and 
 she trusted they would do her the honor of call- 
 ing upon her. She then asked several questions 
 about Sinclair Ferrand, saying that she saw no 
 young men about except the doctor's son. 
 " And Mortimer would be the better for a com- 
 panion, therefore I hope they will make acquaint- 
 ance,"! continued she. " He was out boating 
 when he ought to have been at the rectory with 
 us, or they would have met there. He will not 
 like to be thrown quite on his own resources for 
 amusement while we are down here." 
 
 Oliver Warleigh had fallen into a drowse 
 during the last few minutes, but now waking up 
 suddenly, he wanted to go home ; Lady Georgi- 
 ana succeeded in pacifying his impatience a little 
 longer while she held Rachel in conversation, 
 but perceiving presently that he grew restless 
 and excited at the delay, she recalled the donkey 
 chaise boy, who had been sent to employ him- 
 self out of ear-shot, and they took their slow 
 way up the zigzag in the cliffs to their lodgings. 
 
 Rachel remained where she was, seated on a 
 boulder within the shadow of the rocks ; for 
 there were yet no signs of Alice being ready to 
 abandon her entrancing occupation ; and while 
 dreamily listening with eyes shut and senses 
 only half awake to the soft sough of the waves 
 on the shore, she was startled by Sinclair Fer- 
 rand's voice asking close by, 
 
 " Miss Withers, who is that with Alice on the 
 reef?" 
 
 She jumped up, made abruptly aware of some 
 neglect, and hastened to explain Mortimer War- 
 leigh's intimacy with herself, while Sinclair 
 stood shading his eyes under his broad hand arid 
 looking out at the two figures, which moved to 
 and fro together, or bent down, or compared 
 notes on their discoveries, or gazed idly sea- 
 wards into the great calm and sultry hush of the 
 noonday. 
 
 " I'll go to them," said the young man, and 
 started off with rapid strides, never heeding 
 when Rachel called after him that as he was 
 there to take care of Alice and convoy her 
 home, she should go away ; for she had already 
 been three hours on the beach, and was very 
 tired. She waited to see him join Alice, and to 
 witness the pantomime of introduction between 
 the young men, and then strolled leisurely up 
 the cliffs by herself; not sorry to effect her 
 escape, and not in the least disquieted as to the 
 acquaintance between Alice and, Mortimer that 
 had been begun under her auspices. 
 
 The little incidents of the morning were past 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 loa 
 
 and almost forgotten, she had dined and was 
 cosing with a delightful new hovel in her sofa 
 corner, when she saw the ladies from Brookfall 
 toddling round by the most circuitous path to 
 her door, making their remarks on her careless- 
 ly ordered borders as they advanced. From 
 their gray dresses, white shawls, and huge leg- 
 horn bonnets in which they were habited, she 
 perceived that they had been engaging in the 
 arduous duty of a first call of ceremony ; which 
 call, she immediately conjectured, had been 
 made on Lady Georgiana Warleigh, and she 
 was right. There was a degree of stiffness in 
 the manner of both the sisters as they entered 
 which impressed her at once with the fact that 
 she had, however innocently, offended them ; 
 and when they were satisfactorily seated, she 
 waited to hear how before introducing any indif- 
 ferent topic of conversation. 
 
 Miss Delia was not the person to beat long 
 about the bush when her mind was made up to 
 speak, and fixing on Rachel two eyes of mild 
 reproach, she said : 
 
 " Oh, Kaohel, we are so grieved that you 
 should '■have made that gay young Mr. Warleigh 
 and our dear girl known to each other. Flora 
 and I had decided not to call on his mamma, lest 
 such an unsuitable intimacy should arise, and 
 now our anxious precautions are all undone by 
 your want of discretion. We have felt obliged 
 to pay to Lady Georgiana the compliment we 
 did not intend to pay ; and as we feared before- 
 hand, she is not a person wtiose intimacy we can 
 desire to cultivate. She used formerly to be 
 quite given up to the world, and at heart she is 
 so still." 
 
 " I would not quite assert that, dear sister," 
 interposed Miss Mora more tenderly ; " if she 
 has not to bear what weans a woman from van- 
 ity, who can be called afflicted ?" 
 
 " That is not the question," said Miss Delia in 
 her peremptory tone, " Rachel ought to have 
 been wiser than to lead Alice into the society of 
 that very fascinating young man. I am not 
 aware that she is either more susceptible or more 
 silly than other girls, but site Is vacant and Ite is 
 idle, and foolish love springs up fast in idleness. 
 She was too tired to accompany us on the call 
 we have just been making and I was glad of it." 
 
 Rachel was so much taken aback by the sud- 
 den view of the responsibilities she had incur- 
 red, that she never thought of defending her- 
 self ; but only said she believed Mortimer War- 
 leigh to be not merely harmless but poatively 
 good, adding as a mental reservation that Miss 
 Delia jumped very quickly to absurd conclusions 
 when her fancy was once set on the alert. 
 
 " Good, Rachel — ^well, he may be good ; far 
 be it from me to say that he is not," returned 
 the old lady In a tone that implied a thousand 
 doubts. "He has the most beautiful face for a 
 man I ever saw, but he fell asleep at church last 
 Sunday morning, and he never came to the even- 
 ing service at all." 
 
 ^Rachel did not feel this quite so conclusive 
 as Miss Delia — ^in fact, she had seen 7ier nod at 
 sermon too, and nobody could have dreamed of 
 denying that she was a woman of almost vener- 
 able goodness. 
 
 " You see, dear Rachel, Alice is a solemn care 
 on our mindSjf ' said Miss Flora, who, of the two 
 sisters, had by far the larger share of practical 
 
 wisdom, " If she were our own child the anx- 
 iety might be less, but the love could not be 
 greater. We not only try to promote her hap- 
 piness but we also strive to keep her out of the 
 way of unhappiness. One need not be a witch 
 to see that she will take her life very much in 
 earnest, there is so much passion in her nature ; 
 and though it is the fashion nowadays to talk 
 of love as if it were a mere breath on a mirror, 
 I should think it is pretty much what it always 
 was." 
 
 " Dear Flora, pause ! You are growing senti- 
 mental, and what is the use of that ?" broke in 
 Miss Delia tartly. "Rachel knows as well as 
 we do, that there is no greater misfortune for a 
 girl than that she should set her affections on an 
 unworthy object, I can not teU you by what 
 magic it was that the moment I saw that young 
 man with his beautiful countenance and joyous 
 air I said to myself, ' We must keep our dear 
 girl out of your way !' and now, here is Rachel, 
 with her inconceivable carelessness, quietly cir- 
 cumventing us !" 
 
 Rachel ought to have felt profoundly penitent, 
 seeing the old ladies' genuine distress, but she 
 did not ; she could scarcely forbear a smile, and 
 some mischievous spirit prompted her to sug- 
 gest that perhaps there was a, fate in it, 
 
 " Fate, nonsense ! who talks of fate ?" ejacu- 
 lated Miss Delia pettishly. "Everybody who 
 has the care of young folks must indulge some 
 hopes and expectations in their behalf, ahd ours 
 for Alice have ever been that a worthy staid man, 
 with plenty of ballast and a round dozen of 
 years older than herself, might win her affections 
 and marry her. That would be her most de- 
 sirable /ai«." 
 
 To this Rachel answered not a word, but her 
 face became expressive of keenest amazement 
 and dismay when she caught this glimpse of 
 Sunshine's foreshadowed future ; and Miss Delia, 
 who read her sentiments distinctly, wagged her 
 head and exclaimed, " You may look astonished, 
 Rachel, at our prosaic notions, for you are in- 
 grained with romance ; but let me assure you 
 that some of the happiest marriages we know 
 were no better than compromises with what you 
 are pleased to call fate, and some of the mis- 
 erablest failures began in the realization of 
 youth's fantastical desires." 
 
 Rachel drew a long breath and attempted no 
 reply beyond a remark that her observation had 
 not led her to the same conclusion as Miss Delia, 
 but to one precisely the reverse of it. 
 
 Lady Georgiana Warleigh was not proud of 
 her son Mortimer altogether without reason ; 
 neither were the ladies of Brookfall without 
 grounds for their fears. He was clever, but not 
 in the common way, and superlatively handsome, 
 though not in the muscular Christianity man- 
 ner ; never, indeed, was there a stronger con- 
 trast between two young men than between him 
 and Sinclair Ferrand, He drew in water-colors 
 charmingly ; he played and sang, no amateur 
 better ; he quoted recondite wisdom and popular 
 poetry with the same graceful facility; and 
 when he lent himself to conversation, it was 
 with such an earnest, sincere pleasantness that 
 every body was immediately impressed in his 
 favor by the personal interest that he appeared 
 
406 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 to feel in them. He was thoroughly amiable, 
 and like many persons of that temper, thorough- 
 ly indolent. But even his- indolence was at- 
 tractive. Busy people looked at him and allow- 
 ed that labor, painstaking and trouble could not 
 be sent into the world to harass such as him ; 
 Utopia should be his abode, or if not Utopia, 
 then the brave good fortune laid out for him as 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh's Keir. He seemed quite 
 suited to his destiny, and if, with that advantage 
 and so many others to boot, he found himself 
 much flattered and made of iu the world, of 
 course, neither he nor any one had a right to be 
 astonished. He was never astonished, but took 
 maternal incense and all other as naturally as 
 the flowers take dew. 
 
 One afternoon he spoke to Rachel Withers of 
 his uncle Laurence, saying he was in Greece. 
 "And I ought to have been with him," added 
 he ; " but he makes such a toil of his pleasures 
 that I can not follow his fortunes. At Midsum- 
 mer I like to dwell in some sleepy hollow like 
 this where there is no suggestion of the duty of 
 getting up to work. My spirit sings with "the 
 lotus-eaters, ' There is no joy but calm !' " And 
 he appeared as if he felt it in every fibre of his 
 languid frame. He had gone down to Rachel 
 with a message from his mother, and finding 
 her in the garden, tying up her carnations, had 
 cast himself on the lawn and there lay, basking 
 in the sunshine, the very type of luxurious lazi- 
 ness, when Sinclair Ferrand and Alice, riding 
 by, stopt at the gate. 
 
 If there was one place more than another in 
 which Alice looked beautiful it was on horse- 
 back, and never in her life, perhaps, had she 
 looked lovelier than she did now. The aunts 
 had committed the amazing mistake of warning 
 her against Mortimer Warleigh, and a soft, self 
 conscious expression blushed all over her face as 
 she answered his greeting with a shy pride that 
 had never been observable in her before. 
 
 Sinclair was rather crisp in his manner ; he 
 just nodded to Mortimer, and then cried out, 
 " Miss Withers, you are wanted at Brookfall — 
 can you go up to tea this afternoon? Aunt 
 Delia has difficulties on her mind about the 
 school treat, and you and Miss Crispe are re- 
 quired to consult." Rachel asked if the mor- 
 row would do as well ;■ for she had just promised 
 her company to Lady Georgiana Warleigh, and 
 was to return with Mortimer; his father had 
 had a very bad day, and she was prevented in 
 consequence from leaving the house. 
 
 " It will do quite as well," said Alice ; " but 
 come early, for there are twenty things to settle 
 besides that, because of our soon going abroad. 
 Good-by!" And so the two rode on — silent 
 until they were out of sight of Mortimer War- 
 leigh watching them down the lane. 
 
 He stood there long after they were gone, and 
 Rachel proceeded with her work amongst her 
 flowers, snipping here, binding there, weeding 
 elsewhere, until he either grew weary of waiting 
 or of his own thoughts ; for he said, 
 
 " Miss Withers, I respect your perseverance, 
 but it fatigues me to watch you. When, are 
 you coming with me to my mother ?" 
 
 She replied that she would go at once ; that 
 is, as soon as she had made a little necessary 
 change in her dress, and then she left him, 
 chanting dreamily to himself — 
 
 " Death is the end of life ; ah, why 
 Should life all labor be ? 
 Let US alone. Time driveth onward fast, 
 And in a Jittle while our lips are dumb. 
 Let ua alone. What is it that will last?" 
 
 A melancholy tone this for one so young, Ra- 
 chel thought ; but for all his beauty and his joy- 
 ous air he did .somehow impress her with an in- 
 definable moumfulness. When she returned to 
 the garden he was gone — vanished utterly — so 
 she left a message with Hanson in case he should 
 come back and set off alone to the house on the 
 cliff where the Oliver Warleighs were lodg- 
 ing. Lady Georgiana was glad to see her — she 
 would have been glad to see any body, for Clay- 
 mire was stagnation itself to her ; but where, 
 she asked, was Mortimer ? Rachel told her how 
 he had disappeared, on which she exclaimed, 
 
 " Ah, I thought he had something new run- 
 ning in his mind — it is that beautiful nymph at 
 Brookfall I" Here was confirmation of Miss 
 Delia's fears! 
 
 "Well !" cried Rachel recklessly, without 
 thinking to whom she spoke, "if he has, it can 
 not be helped — ^it is the way of all flesh !" 
 
 Lady Georgiana looked at her with visible, 
 smiling surprise, but she dropped the subject, 
 and then they fell to talking of things in gen- 
 eral, until Oliver who had been taking his siesta 
 in the room adjoining gave the signal that he 
 was awake by knocking on the floor with his 
 stick. Mortimer soon after presented himself, 
 and they all went to tea, after which they sat out 
 under the verandah, and talked at intervals, 
 and watched the sea. How feelings change! 
 Instead of her ancient antipathy Rachel felt only 
 a sort of pitiful friendliness toward Oliver War- 
 leigh and Lady Georgiana now ; and a remorse 
 for the wrong she had done in her secret 
 thoughts to two people who had suffered so 
 long and so severely. 
 
 Mortimer was very gentle to his father ; in- 
 deed it was not in him to be less than kind to 
 any living thing ; his fault lay rather in too sen- 
 sitive and feminine a tenderness. 
 
 " He should have been my daughter," whis- 
 pered Lady Georgiana to Rachel aside ; " my 
 daughter instead of Clara ; for poor Clara, though 
 a good girl, is unfortunately plain." 
 
 Rachel could only remember her as the 
 naughty baby who had refused to kiss her, and 
 who was so mysteriously managed by her moth- 
 er into being submissive. 
 
 When she left, Mortimer walked home with 
 her, and though he was in a gay mood all the 
 way until they reached the gate, it was perhaps 
 rather significant that his last words should be, 
 " She is going abroad, your young friend — ^is she 
 going for long?" Rachel said it was uncertain; i n 
 she had not heard it much talked of yet, then 
 good night, and he departed. 
 
 The dear old anxious ladies at Brookfall made 
 Mortimer Warleigh's personal acquaintance the 
 next day in a manner much more ludicrous than 
 agreeable. Rachel Withers had gone up in the 
 afternoon according to her promise, expecting 
 to see Miss Crispe only ; but on her arrival she 
 found the feminine conclave sitting at business 
 in great formality with Mr. More presiding — 
 there was nothing, however private and domes- 
 tic, in the parish that that little man did not 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 107 
 
 contrive to have his hands in it ! This was a 
 debate on the school feast — where and how it 
 was to be held ; and on what day.' Miss Crispe 
 was present, trim, tiny and mischievous as usual, 
 too evidently conspiring with Alice to coax a 
 little fun out of the tedious proceedings which 
 lasted until tea brought them to a welcome 
 end. 
 
 In token of its being rather a festive occasion, 
 and also because it was very warm out of doors 
 and Alice wished it, the table had been spread 
 under the beautiful' brown beech-tree above the 
 waterfall, and there they were, lazily luxuriating 
 on strawlaerries and cream and other delectable 
 things, intermingled with social chat, when they 
 heard a rustle and a rush, a scramble and a 
 crackling of broken branches, and almost before 
 they had time to look up to the steep, rocky 
 bank whence proceeded the mysterious commo- 
 tion, down into the midst of them rolled Morti- 
 mer Warleigh, — his coat torn and grasping in 
 his hand an ineffectual branch which had snapped 
 from some tree when he caught at it to arrest his 
 descent. 
 
 Miss Flora sprang up much alarmed calling 
 vaguely for assistance, but Miss Delia who rec- 
 ognized the intruder in spite of dilapidations 
 exclaimed, "Young gentleman, I beg to say 
 that these grounds are private, but if you are 
 injured it is no matter," she did not mean the 
 injury was no matter, but the privacy of the 
 grounds. 
 
 Mortimer rose looking painfully confused, and 
 lifted his hand to his head from which his hat 
 was missing. 
 
 " I am not hurt," said he, and then his eyes 
 fell on AUce who stood a pace or two off; those 
 sensitive lips of hers all a-quiver, but whether 
 with laughter or sympathy was not very apparent. 
 
 " Oh, you must be hurt after that crash — 
 don't tell me you are not !" cried Miss Delia 
 again, and the poor young man now pleaded 
 guUty by turning very white and threatening to 
 faint. 
 
 "Water!" whispered Alice, an<l offered a 
 glass to his lips, of which, however, he was no 
 longer in a condition to avail himself, for the 
 next moment he became unconscious. 
 
 <" Here is a pretty dilemma !" muttered little 
 Miss Crispe. " It is my belief he did it on pur- 
 pose ; " and just then appeared in sight Dr. 
 Perrand and his son, crossing the lawn to join 
 the agitated party. 
 
 All this while Mr. More had remained seated, 
 stately and sulky behind the urn, regarding the 
 unlucky Mortimer as a personal affront to him- 
 self and awkwardly thinking his thoughts aloud 
 as his custom was when greatly perturbed. 
 
 " Hum," grumbled he in the inner voice 
 which served him on these occasions, " Hum ; 
 this is worse than that red-haired young fellow. 
 Ribs or collar-bone broken, of course, or shoul- 
 der dislocated, and he will be laid up here for a 
 month — then they will be for adopting him too. 
 Very dangerous, hum !" But things were not 
 quite so bad as that ; there were no fractures 
 discoverable, and after lying in the air and being 
 ministered to as tenderly as a lady, the young 
 man presently opened his fine eyes on the sun- 
 yyyyy, burnt visage of Sinclair Ferrand, and asked 
 where he was. 
 
 " You are all right," was Sinclair's answer. 
 
 " Here is my father who is more than half a sur- 
 geon, and he says you will do directly." 
 
 " It is a great mercy it was no worse ; it gave 
 us a dreadful fright in the midst of tea," remark- 
 ed Miss Delia. 
 
 " He could not help it," whispered her sister 
 considerately; and then the uninvited guest, 
 being propped against the bank in the shade, 
 was by and by persuaded to eat some strawber- 
 ries which Alice prepared for him with her own 
 pinky fingers, and mingled with sugar and cream 
 just as she would have liked them herself; but 
 he could not plume himself on the graceful at- 
 tention, for she afterward did the same thing for 
 the doctor and even for Sinclair. 
 
 The party now contained too many discordant 
 elements to amalgamate as it had done before. 
 Mr. More was precisely the man to be one 
 amongst a circle of ladies ; therri he shone much 
 more brilliantly than amongst his own sex or. in 
 even a mixed assemblage. He had a little polite- 
 ness at every woman's service and was as civil 
 to those who were plain and elderly as to those 
 who'were young and handsome ; but with the 
 doctor, Sinclair, and the splendid young stran- 
 ger to dispense their conversation amongst them 
 as well as himself, he appeared under the same 
 disadvantage as the sun does during a total 
 eclipse. 
 
 If Miss Delia Ferrand was severe on conspic- 
 uous beauty and good luck, misfortune was a 
 key that opened her kind heart at once ; several 
 times were her eyes caught resting compassion- 
 ately on the pathetic figure of poor Mortimer, 
 reclining against the green bank ; his rich chest- 
 nut hair hanging over his forehead, and a touch- 
 ing pallor still on his face. 
 
 " I never saw any thing so lovely ; he looks 
 like a bit of porcelain," whispered Miss Crispe. 
 Mr. More Overheard her and sneered ; " And he 
 seems almost as brittle." 
 
 It was not often that Mr. More was ill-natured, 
 but at this moment his globular eyes behind his 
 spectacles were feline in their spiteful glitter. 
 It was a comical scene altogether ; Sinclair Fer- 
 rand leisurely consumed his strawberries, ap- 
 pearing to notice nothing, but in reality taking 
 in every thing. He had a very fine countenance, 
 that young man, though undiscerning persons 
 called him ugly. 
 
 Alice sat beside the doctor who, when he had 
 seen that nothing was seriously amiss with the 
 stranger, had settled himself to his tea in a busi- 
 ness-like way, wholly undisturbed and uninter- 
 ested by the little drama that was being enacted 
 around him ; he was going up to the cottagers 
 in the Glenwood afterward, and did not loiter 
 over it, but rose as soon as he had finished, and 
 patting his favorite on the crown, said, — 
 
 " Get your hat, Sunshine, and come with me," 
 which she did immediately and with an air of 
 satisfaction. " I will leave you here, Sinclair, to 
 give an arm to Mr. Mortimer Warleigh down 
 the hill," added he, and Sinclair, nodding as- 
 sent, went on eating strawberries. 
 
 Mortimer put in a word of disclaimer as to 
 his needing assistance, but no one listened, and > 
 as soon as the doctor and his pretty companion 
 ■had disappeared through the shrubbery wicket, 
 he lifted himself up from the ground with a 
 rather ungraceful stiffness, and proposed to go. 
 
 " I trust you do not feel very much the worse 
 
108 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 for your terrible fall, but do let us send you 
 home in the brougham," cried Miss Delia, taking 
 his limp white hand, for she was now quite 
 melted and sympathetic. 
 
 " Oh, yes, it shall be ordered at once ! Why 
 did we not think of it before?" added Miss 
 Flora also with tender feeling. 
 
 But Mortimer declined the carriage — he 
 would not alarm his mother for the world, (" so 
 kindly thoughtful of him," murmured Miss Delia, 
 verging on afifectionate admiration,) and he also 
 declined the offer of Sinclair's stalwart arm. 
 
 " But pray allow some one to go with you, or 
 the brougham would be ready in five minutes," 
 urged Miss Flora. 
 
 " I thank you, but it is quite unnecessary," 
 replied Mortimer with a wan smile. 
 
 Sinclair did not press the services that had 
 been once rejected, but with calm Indifference 
 went on clearing each dish of fruit, while Mr. 
 More sat primly measuring his thumbs, staring 
 through his spectacles, and muttering, " What 
 nonsense it was to make such a fuss over that 
 young puppy !" 
 
 Miss Deha, however, put on a sad countenance 
 and persisted in her expressions of sympathy. 
 
 " I trust you may reach home without any 
 return of faintness, but I do not feel it at all 
 safe to let you go alone," said she, then, catch- 
 ing a sight of Rachel Withers, a bright idea 
 struck her, and she exclaimed, " Oh, here is 
 Rachel Withers ! she must pass aloftg the cliff 
 to reach home ; I am sure she will not mind 
 leaving us a little earlier than usual, and she will 
 be nice company for you." 
 
 Of course Rachel did not mind leaving a little 
 earlier, and as Mortimer did not object to her, 
 they set off together. No doubt but either Mr. 
 More or Sinclair informed Alice when she re- 
 turned how the luckless young gentleman had 
 been sent home under feminine esport. 
 
 When they had gone a short way, Rachel 
 asked her companion how he came to be wan- 
 dering in the plantation above Brookfall, and he 
 confessed plainly that it was in the hope of 
 getting a glimpse of Alice. He walked very 
 slowly, and she fancied with pain, but this he 
 denied, saying it was only a little stiffness that 
 would wear off by the morrow. 
 
 Poor Mortimer! that this accident should 
 have happened to him, so sensitive as he was to 
 ridicule ! There was a quaint vanity about him 
 too, and he spoke now and then as if he had 
 proved more by his own experience than it was 
 possible at his years he could have done ; for he 
 (vas not yet twenty. But like other thoughtful 
 young folks, he took wisdom at second hand, and 
 culled it where he could with a flavor of bitter- 
 ness and sarcasm. What they evolve out of 
 actual suffering is commonly much more mellow. 
 Rachel could hardly forbear a smile when this 
 beautiful youth with such a brilliant lot before 
 him wound up a dissertation on the joys and 
 cares of humanity with a passage from Burton 
 which was surely never meant to be quoted 
 Apropos of a roll down a bank. " For a pint 
 of honey thou shalt find a gallon of gall, for a 
 dram of pleasure a pound of pain, for an inch 
 of mirth an ell of moan, as ivy doth an oak 
 these miseries encompass our life." 
 
 On the following morning quite early. Miss 
 
 Delia Ferrand was down at the Oliver War- 
 leighs' lodgings, calling on Lady Georgiana and 
 inquiring how Mortimer was after his awkward 
 accident ; her compunctious visitings would not 
 let her rest until she had done this duty of 
 neighborly kindness, she told Rachel Withers 
 to whose cottage she proceeded when her busi- 
 ness elsewhere was accomplished. 
 
 " I do not like Lady Georgiana— no, there is 
 something covert about her;" then said she, 
 making an unconscious grimace as if she had 
 semething disagreeable in her mouth; "but 
 Mortimer is an amiable character, though with 
 no more sense of serious things than a Hot- 
 tentot." 
 
 Rachel asked after Miss Flora and Alice. 
 
 " Oh, Flora is very well, but Alice is in one 
 of her moods ; she always is when there comes 
 a letter from Mr. Gilsland," was the grievous 
 reply. " And this morning there arrived some- 
 thing more than a letter : both Flora and I say 
 that as he judged fit to keep the bits of trum- 
 pery back so long he had better never have sent 
 them. The parcel was addressed to Alice also-^ 
 which the letters never si^ — so that we had no 
 opportunity of exercising our discretion about 
 giving its contents to her. These were a minia- 
 ture of her mother, some hair and a few trin- 
 kets — a brooch, a locket and two rings that she 
 wore. Of course the child would have been 
 adamant had she not felt upset, though she can 
 have no recollection of her. Sinclair is off to a 
 cricket match at Welsbeck, and there is no one 
 to stir her up — if you are not busy, Rachel, will 
 you come back and spend the day with us ?" 
 
 Rachel consented without demur, and in a 
 few minutes they were on their way. They 
 walked up through the wood to escape the 
 sultry glare on the cliffs, and on coming out by 
 the waterfall there they found Alice sitting 
 under the trees, her hat lying by her on the 
 grass, her book flung aside and her hands clasp- 
 ing her knees in an attitude of weary abandon- 
 ment. She was in no soft mood just then, but 
 in a mood of hard revolt ; her face set, pale and ' 
 lowering, her eyes clouded but tearless. Rachel 
 expected to find her full of sentimental sorrow, 
 giving way to tender imaginations of her lost 
 mother; weeping, pitiful, in need of gentlest 
 comfort. She rose when they appeared and 
 came forward to receive Rachel, saying when 
 Miss Delia told her that she had come to spend 
 the day that she was glad of it, and then offer-, 
 ing to take the visitor to her room to put off 
 her bonnet. 
 
 " Yes, do, my darling ; luncheon must be on 
 the table ;" responded Miss Delia caressingly; ^ 
 and in her usual affectionate fashion, Jjioe 
 slipped her hand under Rachel's arm, and led 
 her away to the house and up-stairs. 
 
 The mementoes, said to be of her mother, 
 which had come from Mr. Gilsland that morn- 
 ing, lay strewn on the toilet-table ; the cotton 
 wool, paper and string with which they had 
 been packed amongst them ; all in disorder, no 
 arrangement or loving care — just as they had 
 been taken up and cast down with as little in- 
 terest as if they were new bought toys of lacker- 
 ware from the bazaar in the village. 
 
 Rachel glanced at them but said not a word. 
 The miniature was a poor washy thing on ivory^ 
 looking faded and qiiaint in its out-of-date dress 
 — the dress, however, and a queer reflection it 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 109 
 
 was too, being of the identical fashion in which 
 Rachel remembered herself best when she was 
 young. The face had not a line of resemblance 
 to Alice. It was feeble in feature and queru- 
 lous in expression ; in what expression it had 
 that is. But it had been the work of an infe- 
 rior artist who had stamped all his own faults 
 and weaknesses upon his work. The trinkets 
 were no more valuable than the miniature — an 
 enameled locket, a brooch set with garnets, a 
 ring of the same stones, two pins linked toge- 
 ther by a slender chain, and a few things of 
 even smaller account. In the locket was some 
 hair of a light color, and lying apart by itself 
 was a long brown tress, as soft and glossy as if 
 . it had only been severed yesterday. 
 
 Alice sat down on a chair at the corner of the 
 table to wait for Rachel until she was ready, and 
 her fingers began wandering from one of the 
 relics to another, but with no fond, lingering 
 tenderness of touch. Rachel did not like to see 
 her action — there was something in it of repul- 
 sion and contempt. Once she took up the 
 miniature, held it a moment in the palm of her 
 hand, then with a sigh turned it face down- 
 ward on the table. When they quitted the 
 room, she left all lying as it was, open to any 
 inquisitive servant's eye, if such there were at 
 Brookfall. 
 
 The aunts took a swift, silent survey of their 
 protegee's countenance when she joined them 
 with Rachel at the luncheon table, but no refer- 
 ' ence was made to the event of the day. They 
 talked about the arrangements for the foreign 
 tour which was to be undertaken by the two old 
 ladies and Alice in August, under the care of 
 the doctor and his son; about the chance of 
 sunshine on the morrow, when the rector was 
 to give his annual hay-making feast to the 
 young and old, rich and poor of his flock ; about 
 any thing and every thing, indeed, but what was 
 uppermost in all their thoughts. Alice took no 
 part in the conversation ; she had not spoken 
 to Rachel up-staars and she did not speak now ; 
 in fact, the chief characteristic of her mood was 
 that she was dumb — dumb as the provoking 
 young lady of Parma in the Book of Ifpnsense. 
 
 Luncheon over, however, they all returned to 
 the pretty, picturesque drawing-room, and then 
 Alice whispered an invitation to Rachel to come 
 out with her on the downs. Rachel consented 
 gladly, and they set off, warned by Miss Delia 
 that dinner was at five, to make a long evening 
 afterward for a stroll in the glen-wood. Alice 
 seemed no more talkatively disposed now than 
 she was before ; but Rachel let her alone, and 
 they climbed the steep swelling breast of Ash- 
 down without exchanging a syllable. Once on 
 the high level, a delicious breeze from the sea 
 met them in face, and onward they went for a 
 good mile to a little hollow in the shoulder of 
 the hill, whence there was a magnificent pros- 
 pect of land and water. 
 
 "Here let us stay," said Alice. "To look 
 over this scene always quietens me when nothing 
 else will." And so she seated herself on the 
 short herbage, leant her back against a higher 
 ledge, and intimated that Rachel was to place 
 herself beside her. This she did, and there for 
 ever so long they remained, coolly shadowed 
 from the afternoon heat by the ragged thorns 
 that grew in the hollow, and fanned by the soft 
 
 south breeze blowing over new-mown fields of 
 grass, broad patches of beans in blossom, and 
 sweet honeysuckle hedges irt the valley. 
 
 By and by Alice began to overflow. 
 
 " Rachel, what sort of a country do you love 
 best ? When I am in a district of hills I always 
 want to be at the topmost point, to look abroad 
 for the home where I lived with papa. In 
 ascending any new hight, my heart beats, oh ! 
 so heavily ! I think I shall see it near below — 
 I am sure I should know it if I ever did. Last 
 summer we were in Wales, and we never went 
 out amongst the mountains but I expected at 
 some turn of them to come upon it. They say 
 I can not remember, that I have dreamt it, that 
 It is a delusion ; but it is real, I know it is real ! 
 I mount up here to think about it, and keep it 
 in my mind a clear image." 
 
 Rachel asked if this view they had before 
 them was any thing like it. She said. No, it wa.9 
 not so soft ; it was more like the dark Scotch 
 glens that Sinclair had brought back in hia 
 sketch-book from the Highlands ; and then she 
 tried to paint it in words, but though the picture 
 in her imagination might be distinct enough, 
 she did iiot succeed in transferring it to her 
 listener. 
 
 " Sometimes I am afraid to say what I feel," 
 she went on after a prolonged silence. " I am 
 afraid of being laughed at or of grieving them. 
 Have you ever heard or read of such a thing as 
 the whole of a life being foreseen in a vision ? 
 I think I must so have foreseen mine, for nothing 
 that happens strikes me as a surprise. When 
 Mr. Mortimer Warleigh came to us on the rocks 
 that morning, and talked to me, he was not 
 strange. I felt only as if I had been warned 
 that some day he would appear, and there he 
 was." 
 
 Rachel smiled now, and put her own inter- 
 pretation on this mysterious intimation and its 
 fulfillment ; and Alice, detecting her amuse- 
 ment, exclaimed, in a tone of annoyance, "You 
 are going to mock at me like every body else." 
 
 No, she was not, Rachel earnestly assured 
 her ; she was very far indeed from mocking 
 at what seemed so serious to her. But Alice 
 kept silence for the next five minutes, watching 
 through half-closed eyes the bees drowsily hum- 
 ming in the wild thyme, and toying in her 
 heart with some thought that was not altogether 
 sad. 
 
 Presently she spoke again. 
 
 "If they could tell me where that happy 
 home of mine with papa was, I should be so much 
 more contented, but nobody can. They say he 
 was not a good man ; that he went wandering 
 hither and thither, never staying in any place 
 long ; and that they all lost sight of him for 
 many years. That is hU story ; you know whom 
 I mean. But I do not believe it. It came in 
 the letter to-day ; for I had asked to know aU 
 there was to be known about i my father ; and 
 he tells me that, and sends those things which 
 he says were my mother's — well, they muy be, 
 but / do not believe that mtker." 
 
 Rachel was very much dismayed ; she could 
 not answer her at all. Alice enunciated these 
 extraordinary sentiments with a perfect calm- 
 ness and assurance ; but apparently she did not 
 expect her companion to reply ; for she con- 
 tinued after a moment's pause, " I dare 'not say 
 
110 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 this to aunt Delia or aunt Flora ; it would dis- 
 tress them so bitterly; but I must say it to 
 some one — ^let me talk to yon" Eachel had no 
 wish to check her and she did talk ; she talked 
 out of the dreamy imaginations of her heart 
 such a chapter of fancies as her sober-minded 
 hearer would never have expected to find any- 
 where save in the pages of a romance. She 
 seemed to suppose herself some sort of lost 
 princess ; but " alas !" thought Rachel, " these 
 are not the days of fairy-tale transformations, 
 and there is no probability of your ever turning 
 out to be other than a poor little Cinderella 
 rescued by the ladies at Brookfall from quite 
 commonplace neglect and destitution !" She 
 did not tell her so, however, — why should she 
 not dream her dream ? 
 
 They went home again only just in time for 
 dinner, and Rachel had the satisfaction of car- 
 rying Alice back with her in a much more 
 pleasant and cheerful temper than that in which 
 she set out. Some one had been busy in their 
 absence, and had cleared away the relics, and 
 left all neat and in order. The trinkets had 
 disappeared out of sight, but the miniature was 
 hanging over the mantlepiece,ou a naU that had 
 been newly driven into the wall for it, just be- 
 low a fine engraving of the Madonna della Sedia 
 which had been a Christmas gift from the doc- 
 tor to his favorite Sunshine. Alice caught sight 
 of it the moment she entered the room, and 
 uttering a, vexed exclamation, went straight 
 to the hearth, and was on the point of raising 
 her hand to remove it when Rachel said depre- 
 catingly, 
 
 " Let it be, Alice, let it be !" but she turned 
 on her with passion-darkened eyes and demand- 
 ed, " Why should it hang there to fret me every 
 day of my life ? I will not let it be — I shall 
 hide it out of my sight." 
 
 Rachel did not attempt to gainsay her any 
 further, and she actually took the miniature 
 down, wrenched the nail from the wall with her 
 tender fingers, then opened a drawer into 
 which she was accustomed to throw odds and 
 ends of ribbons and other useless things, and 
 laid it upon its face in the midst of that trashy 
 confusion. Rachel's soft heart was shocked at 
 what seemed so like utter want of feeling; 
 though exaggerated sensibility disgusted her, 
 she liked to see natural tenderness have its 
 way. But Alice had a plea — she evidently did 
 not believe the poor little faded picture to be 
 her mother's portrait, and as such she would 
 neither accept nor honor it. 
 
 By the time dinner was over and dessert on 
 the table, she was almost herself again ; not so 
 ready to chatter, perhaps, but quite ready to 
 take her share in the general talk. The aunts 
 were gratified and caressing with her, plymg her 
 with kind words and the fairest fruits like some 
 capricious pet bird that they could not indulge 
 or fondle enough. When the old ladies retired 
 to the drawing-room afterward to enjoy their 
 usual forty winks, she betook herself to the gar- 
 den to look out for Sinclair and the doctor, who 
 generally wandered up from the rectory at this 
 hour of the summer evenings, between dinner 
 and tea, for a gossip or a leisurely stroll in the 
 glenwood. They came by and by, and then 
 Rachel, who had had enough of walking, took 
 her leave and went home, while Alice and the 
 
 rest sauntered into the wood ; Sinclair listening 
 to Sunshine's version of the morning's distress, 
 and the doctor listening to his sister's, with much i 
 the same feeling toward Mr. Gilsland as Miss 
 Delia had expressed to Rachel in the morning. 
 Since he had seen fit to keep the poor relics 
 back until now, he would have done both more 
 wisely and more kindly had he kept them back 
 altogether. 
 
 As the reader possibly suspects, it was a de- 
 vice suggested to Mr. Gilsland by Lady Georgi- 
 ana Warleigh in the intention of affirming all 
 previous particulars that had been ^ven to 
 Alice and her benefactresses concerning her 
 parentage. It failed of its object with Alice 
 utterly, but the unsuspicious aunts received it 
 in implicit good faith. 
 
 There can not be a much prettier, pleasanter. , 
 scene in the world than a, large gathering jof 
 children making holiday ; and such a scene was 
 that in the glebe meadow where the doctor's 
 hay was down, and the sun was shining resplend- 
 ently. The little ones mustered in great force 
 about three o'clock, marshaled by the infant 
 class mistress, and by Alice who was a clever 
 manager amongst the very tinies ; and about 
 half an hour later the main body of thg school 
 marched in under the master. First'"a hymn 
 was sung and then the grand rout of' tea and 
 cake began. Most of the children saved their 
 dinner on these famous occasions, and came to 
 the feast voracious as young lions ; it was great 
 fiin to see how enjoyingly they ate ; their eyes 
 enlarging and their cheeks swelling visibly dur- 
 ing the process. 
 
 About midway the entertainment the grandees 
 began to arrive, and quiet as was Claymire at 
 ordinary times, the assemblage in the doctor's 
 garden overlooking the meadow at these cele- 
 brations was gay enough and fashionable enough 
 to be an immense attraction to the rustic gaze. 
 Amongst other strangers appeared two Miss 
 Clutterbuoks, newly come from town, who wore 
 such amplitude of petticoat that in passing- be- 
 tween the ranks of infants to distribute cake, 
 they literally swept the wee-est over ; fortunate- 
 ly they were seated on the hay, and so they fell 
 soft; had they been perched on benches, the 
 result must have been disastrous. 
 
 "Did you ever see any thing more out of 
 character at a hay-making school feast ?" cri<(# 
 Miss Clarke, the curate's sister, who sinned as 
 little in expanse of skirt as did the ladies at 
 Brookfall, while Miss Crispe who was as lank as 
 if she had been drawn through a ring, malicious- 
 ly wished she were their fairy godmother, that 
 she might change them into a couple of mush- 
 rooms, which they were not much unlike below, 
 being disproportionately short and stout. 
 
 Alice was in exquisite beauty ; yesterday's 
 cloud had passed over ; she looked particularly 
 happy; and every body who observed her, com- 
 plimented the aunts on her coming out so lovely. 
 She had her little pride of appearance like the 
 rest of her sex, and as the kind old ladies did 
 not allow of sacrifices to tyrannical fashion for 
 her any more than for themselves, she had com- 
 promised the difSculty by prevailing on them to 
 supply her summer wardrobe with delicately 
 tinted muslin raiment instead of with the soil 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 Ill 
 
 falling, neutral gray and drab materials in which 
 their taate ordinarily disported itself. 
 
 " This has plenty of stand-off of its own, you 
 know ;" whispered she to Eaohel, with laughing, 
 blushing confidence, when she congratulated her 
 on her airy flow of pink and white drapery. 
 " And it is such a very baby pattern that even 
 Aunt Delia could not say it was too modish." 
 
 Modish, indeed ! It was extremely elegant, 
 and of the most dainty, crisp, filmy texture ; 
 nothing girls are so prettily girlish in as fresh 
 muslins. Stiff silk is for dowagers, and for 
 maidens whose bloom has gone off. In their 
 yielding, affectionate disposition toward Alice, 
 her excellent benefactresses were giving in at 
 last to some of the minor pomps and vanities of 
 the world ; and they were all the more lovable 
 for the weakness. 
 
 Lady Georgiana Warleigh, who appeared in 
 the rectory garden with her son alone, conned 
 AMpe over as narrowly as the damsel's shyness 
 of her presence permitted. " She might be 
 made into any thing," was her flattering criticism 
 addressed to the delighted Miss Delia. " She 
 might be made into any thing, though still I do 
 not see how she could be more charming than 
 she is. The consciousness of being loved gives 
 her a sweet ease and grace that are as rare as 
 they are precious ; so few girls are natural in 
 this generation, and when they assume natural- 
 ness it becomes the worst style of affectation, 
 and they are coarse or hoydenish— /««< is the 
 right term I think." Lady Georgiana's word 
 carried weight in matters of taste, though she 
 was condemned as of the world, worldly. 
 
 Sinclair Ferrand was busy all the afternoon 
 setting the big boys to their games, starting the 
 races and so forth. Alice also was kept pretty 
 well employed, Mr. More supporting her with 
 fussy energy. She made him trot ! She sent 
 him hither and thither on messages to the mis- 
 tress, to the tea-brewers, the cake-cutters, the 
 aunts ; and he went rejoicing, and never failed 
 to reiterate at each new command with the 
 cheerfulest satisfaction ; " Make me useful, 
 Miss Alice, pray make me useful 1" as if she 
 needed any urging ! 
 
 Mortimer Warleigh watched him with an 
 amused smile on his face, but he did not offer 
 to lighten his labors or to wait on Sunshine's 
 behests himself, not he ! There he lay, indo- 
 lently reclining in the shade with a sweet verbena 
 in easy reach which his fingers were continually 
 furling through for the sake of the delicious 
 perfume. Miss Orispe, who had a habit of at- 
 taching a sobriquet to persons whom she did 
 not reverence, designated him " Ornamental 
 CMna," and privately entreated Sinclair Ferrand 
 to move the cricket players to the further end 
 of the meadow, lest an accidental ball should 
 fly his way and do him a mischief. Kachel 
 Withers reproved the wicked little woman, tell- 
 ing her it was wrong to laugh at his airs of lan- 
 guor ; he was not very strong, and she was to 
 ' recollect his recent catastrophe at BrookfaJl. She 
 had rarely observed, Rachel said, that people 
 capable of active exertion give themselves up 
 to voluntary laziness : pleasure-loving, sensitive 
 temperaments like his shrink from work as they 
 would shrink from pain — it is pain to them in 
 fact. Miss Crispe listened demurely, and replied 
 that Rachel was the most good-natured creature 
 
 she knew ; but in revenge for the little lecture, 
 Rachel was thenceforward styled by her a " buf- 
 fer" in the sense of being something soft to pre- 
 vent hard words coming into collision with 
 tender folks' feelings. 
 
 When the feast was over and the company 
 dispersing, Alice came to Rachel with a basket 
 of cake and strawberries which she was gomg to 
 carry to a little boy in the village who was an in- 
 valid and could not share in the other children's 
 holiday. They therefore walked down the hill 
 in company, until just at the turn of the lane 
 leading to the cliffs, they met Lady Georgiana 
 Warleigh and her husband in his donkey-chair 
 coming up. They stopped, and Rachel stopped, 
 of course, but Alice walked forward without 
 even bowing, 
 
 " Why_doe^ she avoid me ?" said Lady Geor- 
 giana, gazing after her with a vexed expression ; 
 then without waiting for a reply, she asked if 
 the feast had wound up triumphantly, if Morti- 
 mer had left before Rachel came away, if they 
 were likely to meet him on the hill : and then 
 they parted again, and Rachel pursued Alice, 
 but did not overtake her until she was within a 
 hundred yards of the cottage whither she was 
 gomg. 
 
 " Why did you not wait for me, and why did 
 you not acknowledge Lady Georgiana ?" she ask- 
 ed, on coming up with her. ^ 
 
 " I do not wish to know her," was the curt 
 reply. 
 
 Rachel ventured on a gentle remonstrance, 
 trying to make her see that it was neither right 
 nor amiable to allow her fanciful antipathies to 
 intefere with common courtesy. But she spoke 
 to no purpose ; Alice let her say her say with- 
 out answering a word, and without being in the 
 least persuaded, as might be seen from the firm, 
 stern compression of her beautiful lips. Her 
 face was like a mirror for reflecting every mood 
 of her mind ; she could not have played the hyp- 
 ocrite even if she had tried ; but her vagaries 
 were at times very disconcerting to her friends. 
 
 During the five or six weeks next ensuing 
 Rachel Withers felt herself standing by, the one 
 disinterested spectator before a most complica- 
 ted game at cross-purposes. The drift of some 
 of the players was evident enough, but that of 
 others was profoundly enigmatical. Mr. More 
 had a stealthy eye on the Sunshine of Brookfall, 
 and Miss Delia secretly encouraged him ; Sin- 
 clair regarded Alice as his own by right estab- 
 lished, and she loved him with a strong, endur- 
 ing love which habit had made a second nature 
 to her ; Mortimer Warleigh looked and perhaps 
 longed, but he saw the nymph seldom, and 
 whether Lady Georgiana wished in sober earnest 
 to promote an attachment between her son and 
 Alice puzzled several persons besides Rachel. 
 
 One morning toward the end of July, Sinclair 
 Ferrand stopped at Rachel's gate to wish her 
 good-by. "The foreign tour was now finally 
 settled, and she expected each day to hear the 
 announcement of her friends starting. Sinclair 
 brought the news. 
 
 "I am going to town to-morrow, and my fa- 
 ther will follow with Alice and my aunts in a 
 week's time ; he can not get away any earlier," 
 said the young man, and meditatively flicked a 
 
112 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 fly from his horse's ear. "Tes, Miss Withers, 
 I am off to-morrow ;" and here he drew a long 
 breath as if endeaToring to heave some weight 
 off his mind. 
 
 " Is it not an occasion of rejoicing ? I wish I 
 were in your traveling shoes !" cried Rachel. 
 
 " Why not set off on a journey then ? Tou 
 have nobody but yourself to please. By the by, 
 I want to ask you to look after Alice this week. 
 My aunts never take long walks, and she will be 
 left pretty much to her own devices. She does 
 not like riding with the groom after her, and 
 she must not ride alone." 
 
 Kachel promised to be her companion any day 
 and every day in a walk, but she could not un- 
 dertake to ride with her. Sinclair was satisfied, 
 and said that would do — he would tell her to' 
 meet Rachel in the wood each day at eleven 
 o'clock, if it was neither wet nor too sultry. That 
 was settled ; they had even shaken hands and 
 exchanged mutual good wishes, but still he did 
 not go. He had something on his mind to say 
 that was not easy to bring out. Rachel guessed 
 what it might be, and gave him an opening by 
 asking if he had seen much of Morthner War- 
 leigh lately. 
 
 " No ; in the first place I have not had time, 
 and in the second he does not suit me," was the 
 prompt answer. "He told me he had some 
 thoughts of going abroad, and asked our route ; 
 but we had not quite decided on it then ; indeed, 
 I can not say, that we have quite decided on it 
 now ; arrangements are so often changed at the 
 last moment. You will be here, I suppose, when 
 w£ come back ?" 
 
 " That depends upon how long you stay away." 
 
 " Until the end of October, the doctor says ; 
 but I plead ioi a winter in Italy for Alice, and 
 a return home next spring ;" and so he lifted 
 his hat and rode away, all the more lightly be- 
 cause he had secured Sunshine from solitary 
 rambles that might be encroached on, and inti- 
 mated to Rachel not to further Mortimer War- 
 leigh's possible pursuit by giving him any in- 
 formation as to their traveling plans. 
 
 He had not been out of sight many minutes 
 when Mr. More came trotting up the lane. 
 
 " How d'ye do, Miss Withers, how d'ye do? 
 .Busy as a bee amongst your flowers this morn- 
 ing !" cried he ; " any commands for Brookfall? 
 I am on my way thither now." 
 
 Rachel thanked him and said, no, and off Ae 
 went. 
 
 He wag very often on his way to Brookfall 
 now, and he looked as fussy and jubilant as if 
 he had agreeable business and met a cordial wel- 
 come there. Rachel wished him any thing but 
 good speed; and would have warned Sinclair 
 had she dared, that in his anxiety to stave off 
 Mortimer Warleigh, he was overlooking the 
 much more imminent danger of Mr. More with 
 Aunt Delia to back him. 
 
 The next morning she was preparing for her 
 promised walk with Alice when Miss Delia on 
 her way from the school dropped in to say it 
 was such a pity the dear child should lose the 
 last of her rides that Mr. More had kindly offer- 
 ed to escort her as Sinclair was in tBe habit of 
 doing. Perhaps Rachel's face became rather 
 quizzically expressive on hfearing this, for Miss 
 Delia colored and asked : "What now? Why 
 do you look so significant ?" 
 
 Rachel might well look significant, and the 
 old lady felt she had betrayed her match-making 
 plot to one person who looked on it with shrewd 
 disapproval. Neither Dr. Ferrand nor his son 
 had been taken into her counsels yet, and not 
 until recently her sister Flora. The beautiful 
 scheme was her own conception entirely, and 
 Mr. More had entered into it with inexpressibl 
 satisfaction. But it had been kept very quiet 
 and nobody besides themselves knew of it, un- 
 less it were the all-observing and all-suspecting 
 Miss Crispe. Miss Delia now therefore invited 
 Rachel to walk home with her to luncheon that 
 she might have the opportunity of talking her 
 over to her own views. Miss Flora was out in 
 the village on errands of charity, and as she did 
 not come in while Rachel was up at Brookfall, 
 she heard no personal expression of her opin- 
 ions, but she imagined they must be widely at 
 variance with her sister's ; for as she listened to 
 Miss Delia she grew more and more surprised 
 at what might be called the worldlitiess of her 
 views on matrimony. 
 
 " Let me assure you, Rachel, that Mr. More 
 is one of the most eligible men of our aoqu^nt- 
 ance ;" said she, with some majesty in answer to 
 a rather disparaging remark of hers. "His 
 means are large and his family is ancient. He 
 will make Alice a liberal settlement though she 
 has no fortune, and we feel most happy — that 
 is, / do — in getting her provided for so well and 
 so early. It is a sign of great generosity that 
 he is anxious to marry a girl in her peculiar 
 position." 
 
 Rachel could not see it — there could be no 
 special generosity she thought in an elderly man 
 desiring to appropriate to himself a beautiful 
 wife of seventeen, and she ventured to say as 
 much; adding that he was old enough to be 
 Alice's father. • 
 
 " You have taken an aversion to him, Rachel, 
 that is what you have done," returned the old 
 lady, peevishly. "And I can not at all guess what 
 you find to dislike. To me he appears truly 
 admirable and uriexceptionable in every way. 
 His principles are fixed, his temper is amiable, 
 and his disposition is Christian — he has the root 
 of the matter and that is worth all besides. I 
 can not tell you to how many of the societies he 
 gives annual subscriptions. Perhaps he is a little 
 too old according to popular notions, but I have 
 considered his superior age an advantage rather 
 than otherwise. She is such a thoughtless thing 
 and he has ballast enough for both ; if we al- 
 lowed her freedom of choice and rejection in 
 this important matter, it would never be ended ; 
 she is too young really to know her own mind." 
 
 " I should think that the best reason in the 
 world for leaving her time to find it out," Siud 
 Rachel. 
 
 " It was not so when Flora and I were young. 
 , If a girl received an eligible offer, her parents 
 accepted it, and she was married without any 
 nonsense,' ' was the conclusive reply. Here Alice, 
 poor, unconscious darling, returned from her 
 ride, came into the room singing and swin^ng 
 her hat by the ribbons, when Miss Delia imme- 
 diately asked, "Sunshine, don't you like Mr. 
 More?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, very much. He is a dear little 
 man," said she, with the most perfect indiffer- 
 ence ; and flashed out of the window again, while 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 118 
 
 her aunt darted at Eachel a glance of triumph- 
 ant satisfaction. 
 
 "I am no more convinced than ever," ex- 
 claimed she. "No, not a whit more convinced — 
 quite the reverse, indeed 1" 
 
 "Admit that you are rather romantic in your 
 views of life," returned Miss Delia, with a pro- 
 voking air of superior wisdom. " The ' dear little 
 man' is stealing his way quietly- into Alice's 
 affections, and if she is nqf, drawn aside into 
 dangerous society, we shall soon have her looli- 
 iug up to him with reverence and admiration, 
 and, by degrees, assimilating all her tastes and 
 sentiments to his — a most desirable result ; for 
 her freakishuess is often a source of heavy dis- 
 quietude to dear Flora and myself I lie awake 
 many hours in the night thinking of her, poor 
 darling." 
 
 " If her freakishness is bad for you, what will 
 it be for him ?" murmured Eachel. " It will be 
 like yoking a skittish filly with a sober, fagged 
 old carriage horse, and then setting them off 
 down hill with no drag on." 
 
 "Pray do not rush into such violent similes, 
 my dear ! If the coach is upset, you will not be 
 in it ! Let them once come to an understanding 
 and they will pull very nicely together. Mr. 
 More is always ready to make allowance for her 
 youth and high spirits. I think she likes him 
 quite well enougMalready, and a good girl ought 
 never to show Her feelings until the declared 
 preference of a lover courts her to do so. And 
 you know when she is married she will be safe — 
 no one can take her out of the hands of a hus- 
 band. Twice since she has left school, Mr. Gils- 
 land has hinted at the propriety of her paying a 
 lengthened visit to him and his wife in London. 
 We have never told her, for the possibihty of 
 such a thing would set her almost beside herself; 
 and, fortunately, this promised tour abroad puts 
 it off for the present. But the dread of it hangs 
 over us, and if I seem rather urgent and hasty 
 about getting her settled, you need not be sur- 
 prised any longer. It would not seem like losing 
 the dear child to have her no further off than 
 Welsbeek. And even you, Rachel, must admit 
 that she will be happier with Mr. More than she 
 would be abandoned to her uncle again. I do 
 not like his recent letters at all." 
 
 " I am not quite sure, of that — a marriage is 
 irremediable, but a visit, however unpleasant, 
 comes to an end," said Eachel. " If I were you, 
 I should consult the doctor and Sinclair." 
 
 "But neither the doctor nor Sinclair could 
 keep her here if Mr. Gilsland were determined to 
 have her back. She would be a prize in his sort 
 of society, with her beauty and talent, and I 
 would risk any thing rather than expose her to 
 its contamination. She would be a fortunate 
 girl in many points to win Mr. More — look at his 
 pretty place at Welsbeek, his nice establish- 
 ment — we go nowhere where things are in more 
 exquisite order. Then consider his good family 
 connections," and so Miss Delia went on, mouth- 
 ing over two or three titled names of his kins- 
 folk as if they were likely to bring Eachel round 
 to her views of the question. 
 
 Money weighed with her too ; she dilated with 
 genuine satisfaction on the worldly advantages 
 of the match, and while gratified that Mr. More 
 should be of her own set, and a truly pious per- 
 son, she was far from insensible to the pomps and 
 H 
 
 vanities and material good things he was anxious 
 to share with Alice. Mr. Gilsland's intimation 
 of his claim on his niece's company was a pow- 
 erful incentive too, but Miss Delia's fears had 
 exaggerated the danger. Alice could not be 
 starved or beaten with impunity now, even were 
 there any motive for it, which there was not ; 
 and, of the two evils, a visit to London would 
 certainly be the least. Eachel therefore repeated 
 her opinion as to the propriety of consulting the 
 doctor and his son : and reflected comfortably 
 on the absent Sinclair's behalf, that Alice was 
 not the girl to be hustled into any thing against 
 her will, much less then into a distasteful mar- 
 riage. 
 
 " Well, my dear, say no more," sighed Miss 
 Delia finally ; " the charge of children is a great 
 care ; you do not know what it is or you would 
 feel a little more 'sympathy in my endeavors to 
 do the best for Alice. Let this be between our- 
 selves. There is no mischief past undoing done 
 yet ; and in three or four dsys we shall be gone 
 abroad out of every body's way. I trust you to 
 keep my counsel on this matter, Eachel, since 
 you have surprised it so prematurely ; and though 
 I admit you may feel an interest in our darling 
 as all who know her do, stiU remember that it is 
 no business of yours in any way. Do not think 
 me rude, my dear, but you are rather apt to in- 
 terfere now and then where it would be wiser 
 did you refrain. It is a little failing which per- 
 haps you are not aware of, but which will grow 
 upon you if you do not watch yourself very 
 carefuUy. Now, my dear, kiss me ; we are the 
 best of friends, though we have differences of 
 opinion. Cousin Sara always said you were a 
 good girl." 
 
 Eachel retired leaviag Miss Delia in possession 
 of the field. Perhaps it was not a very lively 
 victory for the old lady, but she was so confident 
 of her wisdom and good intentions that she re- 
 mained fully resolved stiU to encourage Mr. More. 
 One certainty Eachel had acquired from the de- 
 bate — she had learnt that the ladies at Brookfall 
 had no inkling of their nephew's pretensions to 
 Alice. They had lived too long and too inti- 
 mately together for their friends to suspect them 
 of being in love. Only Mr. More was wider 
 awake. Personal interest had sharpened his 
 faculties, and he saw and understood quite 
 enough to make his sentimenis toward that " red- 
 haired young fellow" any thing but benevolent 
 He had set his heart on Alice, and he was pre- 
 pared to be jealous of whoever threatened to im- 
 pede his success — of Sinclair or of Mortimer 
 Warleigh — he could not stay to discriminate; 
 both were dangerous, suspected persons while 
 she was free ; and the idea of Sinclair traveling 
 abroad in her party was gall and wormwood to 
 him. As the day of their departure approached 
 his fears and misery increased until he looked as 
 jaundiced as he felt. To let her go without a 
 word was impossible, but the risk of that word ! 
 Would it be better to speak or to write ? But 
 if he wrote she might show his letter to Sinclair 
 — oh, worry, worry, worry, and how that red- 
 haired young fellow would laugh ! He grew 
 desperate as he thought of it ! He almost wished 
 once or twice he had never fallen in love, and 
 what would be the end of it ? 
 
 The end of it for the present was an exten- 
 sion of his torture. The day before that fixed 
 
114 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 for the starting abroad, Dr. Ferrand was laid 
 fast witli the gout ; and when Mr. Wilson saw 
 him he gave it as his opinion that he would not 
 be fit to travel for some weeks to come. 
 
 CHAPTER THE SECOND. 
 
 MR. MORE RECEIVES HIS QUIETUS. 
 
 Trust her not — she is fooling thee. — ^Longfellow. 
 I. 
 
 Doctor Feerand's hereditary enemy, the 
 gout, could hardly have chosen a more inconve- 
 nient season than the present for paying him a 
 visit — inconvenient, that is, for every body but 
 Mr. More. To him the fates seemed singularly 
 propitious. It deferred the tOur abroad, in the 
 first place ; Sinclair returned from town to see 
 what prospect of a start there was, and finding 
 his father's attack was likely to be more tedious 
 than dangerous, he joined some college friends 
 in a yachting cruise to the Channel Islands for 
 a month ; and the foreign trip was delayed till 
 September. 
 
 But what proved a hindrance to the traveler's 
 plans, proved a furtherance to the impetuous 
 Mr. More's. His feelings became quite too 
 much for him, while he was seeing Alice and 
 riding with her every day ; and in a fatal mo- 
 ment he asked the question, and was answered 
 with a very animated "No !" But he was not 
 diiscouraged — far from it. Women should not 
 be taken at their first word, he said, for their 
 second thoughts were always best ! 
 
 The effect of his proposal on Alice was very 
 queer ; she was so indignant ! " Quite on her 
 high horse !" cried Miss Delia. " Nobody must 
 speak to her about it." 
 
 But for all nobody must speak to her about 
 it, a very strong pressure was put on her at 
 home, and she was very often indeed spoken to 
 about it One afternoon Rachel Withers caught 
 her on the down alone; and though Alice 
 laughed through her tears at the irresistibly 
 ludicrous fancies conjured up by her lover's 
 wooing, it vexed and wearied her more than 
 enough to listen to her aunt Delia's reasonings 
 and exhortations. They would have provoked 
 a saint not of her own persuasion. 
 
 " Ah, my child 1" she would say in her soft 
 cooing voice which ought to have melted a 
 heart of stone, but which somehow had the effect 
 of hardening Alice's more. " Ah, my child, 
 you do not know what life is, or how thankful 
 you might some day come to be for the protec- 
 tion of such a one as Mr. More. He loves you, 
 Alice, and there is an adage, ' Better be an old 
 man's darling than a young man's slave !' And, 
 ah I how true it is !" And here she would 
 pause, mournfully wave her head, take a long 
 breath and go on again monotonously ; " Think 
 how happy it would make us to keep you in our 
 neighborhood, how comfortable you would be, 
 how many opportunities of doing good you 
 would find in your new sphere. Dear Alice, we 
 shall force you to nothing, but you are, indeed 
 you are setting a stubborn face against what 
 seems a very enviable lot — a lot which hundreds 
 of girls would gladly welcome !" 
 
 Alice for the most part sate dumbly hearing. 
 
 unconvinced and angry; but one day when 
 Rachel was present she opened her mouth in a 
 very unexpected retort. " Aunt Delia, though 
 you are fond of Mr. More, he would be no so- 
 ciety, help or comfort to me either in prosperity 
 or adversity; and I have a great many just 
 causes to show why we may not lawfully be 
 joined together." 
 
 "Tou profane, naughty puss! you are ac- 
 tually quoting the marriage service !" exclaim- 
 ed Miss Delia, shocked and horrified beyond 
 words to utter her feelings. Alice neither 
 excused nor defended herself but said simply ; 
 "Yes, she had been reading it" Miss Delia 
 heaved a profound sigh and murmured ; " Alice, 
 you are turning out a sore disappointment ! I 
 have set my heart on you too much, and now I 
 am punished." 
 
 It was cruel to harass the poor girl's feelings 
 with words like these — implying an accusation 
 of cold ingratitude ; for what could she answer 
 to such a charge? Her face paled, she com- 
 pressed her lips and just held her peace. The 
 doctor was laid up in his room, so that she had 
 not him to fly to, and Sinclair was out of reach. 
 Rachel Withers was the only person near who 
 knew enough to take her part, unless it were her 
 aunt Flora ; and aunt Flora was almost over- 
 borne by her sister's pertinacity. She was not 
 in grief about her persecution, which was well 
 for her; she did not mope, or show any self- 
 distrust, or signs of giving in ; and if Mr. More 
 had possessed only a common share of discern- 
 ment he might have found out that instead of 
 gaining any thing by pushing his proposal he 
 was really making her hate him. 
 
 Miss Delia bade her state some of the many 
 just causes she referred to as impediments to 
 her union with Mr. More. 
 
 " He is fifty-seven and. I am seventeen — " 
 began she. 
 
 " How do you know Mr. More is fifty-seven?" 
 interrupted Miss Delia. " 1 do not think he can 
 possibly be so old." 
 
 " Tou may see it in the register ;" was the 
 quiet reply ; " he was born here and baptized 
 by the name of Joseph Cornelius. I do not 
 like the name and I do not like him either — he 
 is utterly disagreeable to me." 
 
 " It is not a month since you said in this very 
 room, before Rachel Withers too, that he was a 
 dear little man and you liked him very much ! 
 How can you be so fickle and inconsistent ?" 
 • "A great many changes may take place in a 
 month ;" answered Alice* " Whatever I did 
 then I can not endure him now,." and gathering 
 up her work she left the room with a bright red 
 flush on either cheek — always a significant sign 
 that her patience was ebbing out and a stronger 
 phase of rebellious temper getting the mastery 
 of hex- 
 
 While Mr. More's tender affairs were in this 
 unpromising position invitations were issued 
 from Abbotsdene, a beautiful old country house 
 belon^ng to Earl Rashleigh about ten miles 
 from Brookfall, for a great archery meeting 
 and luncheon in the grounds. The excellent 
 old ladies were at first decidedly for refusing it, 
 but Alice looked plaintive and that led to its 
 being taken into further consideration. Whether 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 115 
 
 archery is a Christian sport or not — that was 
 the question ; and the arguments thereupon led, 
 as such arguments invariably do, to something 
 very like profanity. After much vain talk, 
 however, it was decreed that to draw the bow 
 is an act in itself innocent, that to draw the bow 
 in society is likely to promote good fellowship 
 amongst neighbors, and that fellowship amongst 
 neighbors is a very good thing in its way ; there- 
 fore Miss Delia whose was the first and last dis- 
 sentient voice, reluctantly consented to let Alice 
 go, and go herself to take care of her. Miss 
 Flora then thought she also should enjoy the 
 drive, and the fourth seat in the brougham was 
 offered to Rachel Withers who gladly accepted 
 it ; for there was a chance Grace Hill might be 
 present and she had not seen her now for two or 
 three years. 
 
 Archery is the prettiest outdoor sport we have 
 left .us in which ladies can take part. Perhaps 
 it may be adapted to purposes of fliritation, as 
 cautious Miss Delia suggested ; but so also is a 
 missionary meeting in a village barn, or church 
 decorating at Christmas-tide, or any other mixed 
 assgrnblage when young men and women are 
 flirtaSSasi^ disposed. At Abbotsdene the com- 
 pany cams' from far and near, and as the day 
 was brilliantly fine, the scene on the long slop- 
 ing lawn before the house was very charming 
 and pictorial, but it was a most pictorial place. 
 The mansion was ancient — a fine broken line 
 of building with depths of shadow between its 
 masses of masonry that the sunshine never 
 fathomed; windows stone-muUioned and pro- 
 jecting ; and the porch with a crown of ivy 
 centuries old. 
 
 Mortimer Warleigh was present, not as an 
 assistant in the games but as a leisurely onlook- 
 er. He abjured active exercise and seemed to 
 consider his whole duty lay in looking beautiful 
 — a duty which he performed to every body's 
 admiration. Rachel Withers found him in com- 
 pany with the Hills ; Grace looking stronger 
 and fresher than formerly, and her husband 
 with quite the dignitary air in his archdeacon's 
 hat. 
 
 While the shooting was going forward Grace 
 and Rachel had a quiet chat apart on family 
 matters ; Mortimer lying on the grass near the 
 shady nook where they had esconced them- 
 selves, but too intent on Alice to heed any body 
 else. 
 
 Alice to her great chagrin had been claimed 
 as his partner by Mr. More, who, to her certain 
 knowledge, had never practiced at a target until 
 the day before ; but in Sinclair's absence she 
 was obliged to put up with him, for she had no 
 other friend in the gathering who took part in 
 the sport. 
 
 When they had talked over Katherine and 
 her children, Arthur's promotion and clerical 
 jealousies in his neighborhood, Grace began to 
 watch her nephew and to say half fondly, half 
 contemptuously, 
 
 " Look at that lazy boy ; he puts Arthur quite 
 out of patience when he comes to stay with us. 
 He does nothing all day but lie in the sun, dream- 
 ing and drowsing as he is doing now, and Georg- 
 iana writes me word that he has fallen in love 
 again !" Rachel could not help echoing that 
 agam with some surprise. « " Oh, yes ; it is for 
 the third or fourth time," was the reply. "I 
 
 thought him very much in earnest last year with 
 a pretty, modest girl, his tutor's daughter, but 
 it was out of sight out of mind in a month ; and 
 now I do not believe he can put his whole 
 strength into either doing or loving any thing." 
 Rachel could form a' tolerably accurate guess, 
 but nevertheless she asked who was the present 
 whim of his fancy. Grace replied that she must 
 know her, for she was a girl at Claymire, the 
 adopted daughter of two pious eccentric ladies 
 who lived there. Of course, in this description 
 she recognized Alice and pointed her oijt stand- 
 ing just opposite to them. Alice had her bow 
 raised in the act to shoot ; her arrow flew from 
 the string and struck the target in the red ; then 
 she stepped back a pace or two, turning as she 
 did so toward the spot where Rachel and Grace 
 sat. 
 
 " She is very lovely," was Grace's verdict ; 
 then lowering her voice she whispered : " Lady 
 Georgiaua is not so ambitious for her favorite 
 son as might have been expected ; for she says 
 if Mortimer has set his heart on this girl he shall 
 have her." 
 
 " There go always two words to strike that sort 
 of bargain," responded Rachel, smiling. 
 
 " Mortimer wins more love than he gives. 
 Pew girls with disengaged affections could resist 
 him, and she, I am told, was only a .poor clergy- 
 man's niece." Rachel said she was the niece 
 of Mr. Gilsland whose name was well known in 
 certain circles. "Indeed!" cried Grace, "I 
 did not hear that, and I should think it no de- 
 sirable connection. Arthur dishkes the man 
 exceedingly. Your old lover has got up in the 
 world but not by a very straight ladder. But 
 who is that dapper little gentleman who attends 
 on the young lady with such a punctilious cour- 
 tesy now?" 
 
 " An old friend of her aunts," replied Rachel, 
 but faithfully kept Mr. More's sentimental secret 
 though Grrace would have enjoyed it. 
 
 " An old beau of her own," rejoined she and 
 laughed. "An old beau with pretensions, 
 Rachel, or I am very much mistaken." 
 
 After this Grace began to speak of her broth- 
 er Oliver and his wife. 
 
 " They are always straitened for money, and 
 Arthur and I can not make out how it is," said 
 she. " Lady Georgiana is not the selfish person 
 to stint for the sake of keeping a private purse ; 
 and it is wonderful how she, with her former 
 lavish habits, can reconcile herself to their pres- 
 ent penurious living. Poor OUver is lucky in 
 his wife if in nothing else. He is very trying, 
 but she is most beautifully patient. I nevei 
 thought there was so much good in her till his 
 illness called it forth. They have no old debts, 
 for those Laurence paid long ago ; and Mortimer 
 has no private extravagances ; but still they ap- 
 pear and spend as if they had less than a fourth 
 of their nominal income." 
 
 Rachel could give no clue whatever to the 
 understanding of the mystery; and only said 
 her godmamma Grandage and she had observed . 
 the same evidences of narrow means about them 
 when they saw them in London during the year 
 of the Great Exhibition. 
 
 " It has been so ever since they went to live 
 in Paris before Oliver's first attack, and it puz- 
 zles all of us. We can not ask Lady Georgiana 
 for an explanation, for she never complains and 
 
116 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 never bega ; and ahe ia not eaay to talk to when 
 ahe choosea to be close about any matter." , 
 At this moment some friends of Grace Hill 
 who were strangers to Rachel approached their 
 pleasant retreat and there was no more oppor- 
 tunity for conyersation until the day's sports 
 were ended. But Rachel had plenty given her 
 whereon to meditate. Lady Georgiana'a words 
 were disquieting. "If he has set his heart on 
 thia girl he shall have her." Perhapa she would 
 acquiesce in thia alliance to avert the chance of 
 his ausceptibility plunging him into a lower. 
 But in Rachel's estimation Sunshine was far too 
 good for him ; he was not worth her worth ; 
 and it would have grieved her just then to think 
 it possible he might win her. Rachel's kind 
 sympathies and good wishes were, in fact, all 
 with Sinclair Perrand. But love is often un- 
 equal and for any thing ahe knew Alice's fancy 
 might be caught in the handsome young fow- 
 ler's net already. There were symptoms that 
 showed not unlike it. He spoke to her often 
 at Abbotsdene, and her manner in replying was 
 always more or less conscious. To be sure, her 
 aunt Delia had an eye upon her, and Mr. More 
 had another and a very jealous one, so that per- 
 haps ahe was confused by their watchfulness as 
 much as from any other cauae; but it would 
 have been as well — perhapa better — had no 
 warning been addreaaed to her about him, 
 though that mischief, if mischief it were, was 
 done beyond retrieval. Rachel fancied she liked 
 to talk about him, and she certainly betrayed a 
 shy inquisitiveness to know any thing that Ra- 
 chel could or would tell her of his life and con- 
 versation ; and Rachel, being on her guard and 
 prejudiced, made this very little. She wished 
 Sinclair Perrand were at home again to look 
 after his Sunshine before he lost her ! 
 
 The day after the archery meeting at Ab- 
 botsdene Alice was down at Rachel Withers' 
 cottage soon after two o'clock begging for her 
 company in a walk, and as there was rather more 
 wind than waa pleaaant on the downs they went 
 through the newly-mown meadows and growing 
 corn to the Woodlands Manor Parm, and loitered 
 some hours away in the quaint sheltered garden. 
 Rachel trusted the aunts would not blame her, — 
 for indeed it was no doing of hers and she would 
 much rather it had never happened — but while 
 they were resting on the soft cushiony slope of 
 turf by the brook, each with an idle pencil and 
 leaf of sketch-book in her hands, there appeared 
 coming down the ancient steps from the house 
 Mortimer Wjirleigh and the farnyBr's wife who 
 was doing the honors of the place to him accord- 
 ing to her custom with strangers. He espied 
 and recognized them at a glance, spoke a few 
 words of dismissal to the good woman — ^proba- 
 bly explaining himself as their friend — ^for ahe 
 nodded cheerfully, looked toward them, nodded 
 again, and then vanished into the hall while he 
 walked down the green alley to the spot where 
 Rachel and her companion were resting. 
 
 Alice said nothing, but her fingers became in 
 an instant diligent with her pencil at a minute 
 bit of outlining from a crag in the chinks of 
 which grew tufts of hard fern, glosay and fresh 
 with the constant moisture. It was Rachel's 
 instinct and habit to be good-natured to every 
 
 body ; neither to man, woman, nor child could 
 she give a rebuff, unless she received an imme- 
 diate provocation. She knew some people who 
 could and would have looked the intruder out of 
 their company in five minutes, but ahe had not 
 that chilling knack ; and in less time than it has 
 taken to record it, Mortimer was seated near 
 Alice, also on the turf, had possessed himself of 
 her sketch-book and pencil, j,nd was finishing 
 her tiny vignette with the swift, sharp, effective 
 touches of a master. Rachel would have liked 
 to know whether his coming was accidental, or ' 
 whether he had seen and followed them ; how- 
 ever, there he was and there he remained — vis- 
 ibly contented himself, and not taking away 
 visibly from Alice's contentment. ^ 
 
 It was a' sleepy afternoon in that inclosed 
 spot, though there was breeze enough in the 
 open fields; the bees were humming in the 
 honey flower that clothed the wild grown hedges 
 beyond the brook and in the thousand luscious 
 blossoms of the garden. Rachel fell away into 
 a reverie and they talked, the two young ones. 
 She heard their voices sounding far ofi' and un- 
 real aa in a dream, uneasily, lazily feeling that 
 she ought to end this — that she ought either to 
 go away with Alice or to get rid of Mortimer ; 
 but she did neither. Alice and she had come 
 there to spend the afternoon, and without some 
 clumsy excuse for going, how were they to go ? 
 And if they went would not he go too ? " Per- 
 haps," thought she with an inward sigh, " there 
 is a fate in it," and that resigned her to her dif- 
 ficulties. 
 
 The hours might be silver-winged to them for 
 aught ahe knew, but to her they were weighted 
 with lead. It waa three o'clock when Mortimer 
 came down into the garden ; at six o'clock the 
 shadows began to creep into the pleached alleys 
 and the drowsy-sounding bees to fly homeward 
 to their hives ranged und6r the warm house 
 wall, but still he was there ; silent for long in- 
 tervals, and then quoting some sweet line while 
 his ready pencil was busy on the fair pages of 
 Alice's sketch-book. The crisp sound of rending 
 paper made Rachel presently look up, and she 
 found him tearing out a leaf. 
 
 " Let me see your drawing," said she, and 
 held out her hand bending forward to take it 
 from his. 
 
 Alice was gazing at the sketch with the rosiest 
 smile. 
 " I may keep it ?" Mortimer said to her. 
 " If you wish it. I did not know what you 
 were doing." 
 
 After a moment's hesitation he passed the leaf 
 to Rachel, smiling as he did so and peering ex- 
 pressively out of his eyes as if he would have 
 asked what she thought. She thought it was a 
 lovely face he had outlined rising Naiad-like 
 from the brook, that it had a lovely glimpse of 
 Alice in it, that it was somehow a pity he had 
 ever found her there, that the sooner they part- 
 ed the better — a dreamy, confused, self-reproach- 
 ing, self-defending tangle of thinkings which 
 she could not disentangle ; only she had a duU, 
 sorrowful impregaion left on her mind that what 
 waa done was done amiaa — ^had been more wise- 
 ly never done at all. Mortimer was quick and 
 sensitive ; perhaps in her face he read more 
 clearly what she was feeling than she could have 
 expressed it ; for he how prepared to leave them, 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 IIT 
 
 putting up his treasure with a very tender care. 
 Alice watched him, smiling. 
 
 " Good by — this has been a beautiful hour," 
 said he, and threw a glance i-ound about the 
 place. "And what a sky will that bo to-night 
 when the sun sets," pointing to the windy gleams 
 and clouds blown between the openings of the 
 trees in the west. And with that he went away, 
 and they sat down again, neither of them prone 
 to talk much ; both of them busy in their hearts 
 and perhaps not quite easy. Soon they were 
 obliged to follow, and his figure was before them 
 in the distance all the way until he came to the 
 sudden dip of the hill where it seemed to go 
 down to the sea ; and then they lost him. 
 
 " You will tell your aunt Delia who has been 
 with us. Sunshine," Eachel said, keeping fast 
 her hand for a moment at parting. Alice look- 
 ed at her frankly, and said, " Tes," then went 
 away with a smile on her lips. 
 
 It happened from a variety of little hindrances 
 that Rachel Withers did not see Alice again 
 after this for nearly a fortnight ; but one morn- 
 ing early she presented herself at the cottage, 
 looking so literally over-brimming with a species 
 of dolorous fun that it was evident her affairs 
 were come to a crisis. Rachel had watched Mr. 
 More ride by daily on his road to Brookfall, and 
 the moment Alice entered her thoughts jumped 
 at once to the conclusion she desired to see ; 
 what then was her astonishment and mortifica- 
 tion when the damsel announced in half a dozen 
 words that she had promised to cofisider of the 
 little man. 
 
 " To consider of him — actually promised to 
 consider of him ! Oh, Alice, do you know what 
 you are doing ?" cried Eachel, with a positive 
 sinking at her heart. 
 
 " Yes ; I saw there was going to be no peace 
 until I did". It was tease, worry, fret, all day 
 long, and now I hope I shall be rid of the sub- 
 ject for a little while," responded she, pulling 
 off her hat and throwing it down impatiently. 
 •'And besides, it will check aunt Delia's fidgeti- 
 ness about somebody else," and here she paused, 
 hesitated and grew scarlet. Rachel thought 
 could Miss Delia have used somebody else as a 
 lever to urge Alice into this folly of follies by 
 way of strongest denial ? 
 
 For some minutes both were silent, Rachel 
 watching Alice in inexpressible dismay while 
 she took up her iBcissors and began to shape 
 and clip with considerable care what turned out 
 when finished to be a pair of paper spectacles, 
 which she deliberately fitted on to her own fea- 
 tures. " Now," said she, when she had adjust- 
 ed them, "I am going to show you what he 
 looks like." 
 
 Eachel interrupted her with all the solemnity 
 at her command, exclaiming : 
 
 "No, Alice, no ! If you are going to marry 
 Mr. More it is quite time you gave up making 
 fun. of him." 
 
 She did not appear to see it from that point 
 of view at all ; for daintily setting the paper 
 rims on her naughty little nose, she replied, 
 
 " But I must ; you are my only chance. If 
 I don't find a safety-valve in you I shall break 
 out again at home, and then I don't know what 
 will become of me. Yo#must not tell — the 
 
 more cross you are the better you will represent 
 me ;" and then the very wicked, circumventing 
 puss, in spite of Rachel's half-averted and wholly 
 disapproving eyes, sat on the edge of her chair, 
 turned in her toes, measured her thumbs, stared 
 at her pathetically and pumped up such a sigh ! 
 " That is it exactly— I have read two or_ three 
 love-stories, and the courting was not a bit like 
 it. I am quite disappointed," and here she 
 stared and sighed again with the most provoking 
 comicality. 
 
 "You ought to be ashamed of yourself, 
 Alice," murmured Rachel. 
 
 " But I am not. Oh ! what a Deddy Doldrum 
 he is !" cried she, in a sudden but intense freak 
 of exasperation, jumping up and walking to the 
 window. "I wish Sinclair were here to put an 
 end to him — ^he would." 
 
 " You must never marry Mr. More with such 
 feelings as these, Alice ; it would be wicked," 
 said Rachel earnestly. 
 
 " I don't intend !" was her confidential answer. 
 "But aunt Delia teased so, and would accuse 
 me of growing into a liking for somebody else — 
 as if I could when Sinclair is there ! and to pre- 
 vent her, I just agreed to consider of Mr. More — 
 only ioconsider of him, you know, Rachel ; and 
 now I shall try to tire him out. Oh ! his blue 
 spectacles, and the squeak-leather in his Ijoots ! 
 I never coulij be fond of any body who had 
 squeafe-leather in his boots, could you ?" 
 
 Rachel would not have laughed had it been, 
 in primmest human nature to resist the tempta- 
 tion ; but the child, though behaving abominably, 
 looked so droll in her paper rims and wicked 
 humor, that her better principles were over- 
 come ; and when she was able to set her coun- 
 tenance for serious remonstrance Alice crumpled 
 her up with a hasty embrace and said, she need 
 not begin to scold, for she was not going to 
 listen ; she had been driven into her naughti- 
 ness, and Rachel might go and lecture those 
 whose fault it was instead. 
 
 Rachel only succeeded in making her hear 
 that she was using poor Mr. More very ill, to 
 which she retorted, 
 
 " And is not poor Mr. More using me very 
 ill ? He must know I find him dull company. 
 When first he asked me to marry him did I not 
 say ' No,' as plain as tongue could speak ? 
 Have I not told him since I should be dead with 
 moods in a month ; that I wished he would ask 
 aunt Delia instead ; that I did not like him half 
 so well as I used to do, and for aU that he would 
 persist in teasing my life out. He is far more 
 to blame than I am. And he gets into such 
 tantrums, Rachel ! However, I have done with 
 him now I am considering, he is forbidden to 
 come to Brookfall for one whole week that the 
 staid equilibrium of my thoughts may not be 
 disturbed, and it feels like the beginning of hol- 
 idays. Don't look grave — they made me do it. 
 As I said to aunt Dee, — if I marry him, I shall* 
 be obliged to bear with him then, but I won'i 
 bear with him now." 
 
 " You admit the possibility of your marrying 
 him ultimately then." 
 
 " No, I do not ! I would throw myself over 
 the cliffs first," was the answer in a tone that 
 rang as if she meant it. 
 
 " I trust you will do neither the one nor the 
 other," replied Rachel coolly, "but you should 
 
118 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 have persisted in holding on to your first ' No,' 
 and the matter would have taken its inevitable 
 turn soon." 
 
 "Ton are not comfortable this morning — 
 nobody is comfortable. I thinli I shall go away. 
 When I said I would consider, I warned them I 
 did not mean to change my mind ; "but if you 
 had two people worrying at you all day long to 
 do something you hated you would be glad of 
 a little respite too ! Sinclair, dear Sinclair, is 
 all the real refuge I have, and he is away !" 
 
 Lool^ing up in her excited face, Rachel saw 
 the tears shining through the impromptu spec- 
 tacles, and for the Ufe of her she could not for- 
 bear a smile. It vexed Alice, for she snatched 
 them off, and flung them on the table, exclaim- 
 ing pettishly, " Tou are very unkind ! There — 
 I will leave you those as a memento of this day 
 when I am so happy and you can laiigli at me !" 
 And then with a stormy change of mood she 
 burst into a passion of sobbing and crying, and 
 declared that it was horrid of aunt Delia to urge 
 her to marry that most tiresome and disagree- 
 able of mousy men ; but she would not, no she 
 would not, and oh ! what would she not give if 
 only dear Sinclair were at home ! 
 
 When the fit had spent itself Kachel proposed 
 a walk by way of settling her perturbed spirits. 
 " Not further than the rectory gardens then," 
 Alice stipulated; and to the rectory gardens 
 they betook themselves and walked about- under 
 the trees for a long while talking over her per- 
 secutions and difficulties. Rachel feared once 
 she was preparing for tears again ; but catching 
 a glimpse of the doctor's head at the study 
 window, she changed her intentions, and stop- 
 ping suddenly short in the footpath, exclaimed 
 that she would go and talk to him — there he 
 was, down-stairs again for the first time ! Her 
 countenance brightened at the inspiration ; and 
 bidding Rachel wait until she came back away 
 she flew to her safest and most judicious coun- 
 selor. Rachel staid and staid on until she was 
 weary, but finding that Alice did not return as 
 her two o'clock dinner-hour drew on, she de- 
 parted, hoping that the long interview would 
 have the good result of giving Mr. More his 
 quietus. 
 
 And it had. The doctor was alarmed, vexed, 
 indignant — ^he knew his son's hopes if no one 
 else did. He thought Mr. More's pretensions 
 outrageous ; and after the poor little man had 
 been talked to by his spiritual pastor and mas- 
 ter he very sadly and reluctantly withdrew them. 
 The aunts also were talked to and acquiesced in 
 their brother's judgment ; Miss Flora with visi- 
 ble relief; Miss Delia with a still continuing 
 protest that she knew what was best for Alice 
 and that the. match she had tried to make for 
 her was a good match. 
 
 V. 
 
 The doctor being out of his room again and 
 his old enemy put to flight, the preparations for 
 the tour abroad, which it was now arranged 
 should last through the winter, were resumed. 
 The evening before they set off Rachel spent 
 at Brookfall. Miss Delia was thouroughly out 
 of sorts, and not unnaturally ; for she was very 
 much disappointed and mortified at the totsil 
 overthrow her plans had undergone. 
 
 " I should like to see the Griselda spirit pre- 
 
 vailing a little more amongst women nowadays, 
 but it seems almost extinct," observed she, with 
 a profound sigh aimed at Alice, who was leisure- 
 ly gathering together the pretty things on the 
 drawing-room table preparatory to their depart- 
 ure from home. 
 
 Alice paused with a slender pearl book-cutter 
 in her hand, and tapping her lips with it as if 
 admonishing them not to bubble over in any 
 naughtiness, said, " Griselda was Griselda for a 
 lord whom she loved," and went on piling up 
 the nicknacks with a very careful patience. 
 
 " Pshaw !" snapt Miss Delia. " She was Gri- 
 selda because it was her duty to be Griselda, if 
 you use her name as synonymous with the vir- 
 tue she exemplifies. I wish you would cultivate 
 a plainer manner of speaking, for we are not po- 
 etical people at our time of life, and'can not al- 
 ways understand you !" Alice took her aimt's 
 pshaw ! and rebuff very Idndly ; she was quite 
 happy and at ease again ; for on the morrow 
 they were to start on their journey, and she 
 should see Sinclair. But Miss Delia was indu- 
 bitably cross for several days. 
 
 Whether that other person alluded to by Sun- 
 shine in her complaint to Rachel was mentioned 
 in her plea to the doctor neithey the aunts nor 
 Rachel ever knew. They met no more for the 
 present after that beautiful hour in the garden 
 at Woodlands, and Alice went away as blithe as 
 a bee, with never a care on her heart so far as 
 her friends could tell. And Mortimer appeared 
 perfectly contented too. Rachel saw him in the 
 cliff-lane sketching the morning after Alice left 
 Brookfall. They talked awhile together, but he 
 did not mention her, and looked as drowsily at 
 his ease as a chUd who has never heard the name 
 of Love. Rachel did not understand it; she 
 had almost feared the existence of a mutual pre- 
 ference, notwithstanding Sunshine's disclaimers 
 when speaking of her aunt Delia's persecutions ; 
 but she was not sorry for her mistake. Nothing 
 she would sooner suffer in vain than empty fears 
 — ^nothing she would sooner see blown off in 
 harmless vapor of idle fancy than the clouds 
 that seemed to threaten the happiness of those 
 she loved. 
 
 But Lady Georgiana, foiled, as she believed,' 
 by her son's negligence alone, in a matter that 
 was fast becoming almost equivalent with her 
 to life and death, saw the Brooltfall party go with 
 deepest vexation and disappointment. She had 
 come to Claymire, braving risks which her first 
 meeting with Alice showed tq^be very imminent, 
 in the design of undoing in part the great, the 
 terrible wrong she had done. What her life 
 had been and was with the perpetual terror of 
 discovery hanging over her, words can not utter. 
 Her base instruments were become her tyrants ; 
 penury and scant living were the least tortures 
 tbeir rapacity caused her to endure. She was 
 trying to outwit them now, and it was a desper- 
 ate attempt — she must gain all, or lose all ; and 
 in her new scheme she worked alone, aware that 
 a suspicion would be ruin. She had set her 
 heart on Mortimer's marrying Alice; and her 
 knowledge of his susceptibility had seemed at 
 first to make the matter easy ; she was sure that 
 had he entered into her wishes he might have 
 won her, so high was her opinion of his endear- 
 ing qualities. But here was her difSculty — she 
 could not tell him ifhat her wishes were ; she 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 119 
 
 could only guide him to desire the girl himself ; 
 and after she had given him an intimation that 
 he would meet with no opposition from her, dis- 
 cretion and caution both bade her desist, and 
 give the charm time to work itself. 
 
 When Alice was gone, however, she could 
 not refrain from asking him how he had sped. 
 
 " I have sped none at all," was his reply. 
 "She is beyond my reach; I might look and 
 long forever, hut those grapes would not drop 
 for me. Besides, mother, she loves Sinclair and 
 he her.'' 
 
 Lady Georgiana was sarcastic both at her son's 
 expense and at Sinclair's — she was sure Sin- 
 clair's rivalry would soon fall effaced before him 
 if he put his heart into his efforts. 
 
 "I could love her," then added the young 
 man, musmgly. " It is a lovely face !" 
 
 She said no more, but she inwardly resolved 
 that when Alice returned from abroad she should 
 be compelled to go to Mr. Gilsland's house, 
 where Mortimer could have opportunities of see- 
 ing her every day. " If I wanted to keep them 
 apart they would rush together to defy me," 
 thought she ; " now I would fain they did, both 
 are indifferent. If they were married, the world 
 might come to an end to-morrow !" 
 
 By the world's coming to an end she meant that 
 the secret crime which was such a yoke about her 
 own and her wretched husband's neck might 
 be found out and she would hardly heed it ! 
 But she wanted to save to her favorite son all 
 she had sinned for. Once secure of Alice for 
 him, she thought she would venture all and tell 
 Sir Laurence. By day and by night she brood- 
 ed over it. Three persons living beside heraelf 
 were in the secret — Mr. Gilsland, Nurse Lupton, 
 and Dr. Frith. If any one of them got an ink- 
 ling of her designs, they would make haste and 
 be beforehand with her in a revelation of the 
 crime. Guilt always distrusts its tools. Alice 
 had seen recognition in her eyes, and this was a 
 danger, but not so great a danger as the other. 
 She did not know how suspicion had hovered 
 from the first over the little grave in Hurtledale 
 churchyard, or she would have known that her 
 risks lay on every hand manifold and full of life ; 
 ready to spring a mine under her feet at any hour, 
 went she to work on her new scheme ever so 
 cautiously. Fate is deeper, more wily, more 
 treacherous and more unerring than the strong- 
 est sinner; in its hands Lady Georgiana was 
 mere half-burnt tow ; certain sooner or later to 
 be broken asunder and cast abroad on the whirl- 
 wind she had sown. 
 
 CHAPTEE THE THIRD. 
 
 SUSPICION BUDS AGAIN. 
 
 Foul deeds will rise though all the world o'erwhelm them. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 It is true enough that one half of the world 
 does not know how the other half lives. Carrie 
 Martin's existence was a queer, practical com- 
 mentary on the threadbare text, of woman's 
 rights and woman's wrongs. If she had been 
 a man ever so, she could not have been happier, 
 freer or more independent of the world and its 
 conventional ways than she was. The cheerful 
 isolation of her habits would not have suited 
 
 her friend Rachel Withers, but then Rachel had 
 never had the same hardships to knead her out 
 of the common mold of her sex. Here was 
 Carrie in her bachelor-looking lodgings, alone 
 for the most part ; in the morning spinning her 
 various webs ; then to the reading-room of the 
 British Museum in the exercise of her vocation; 
 afterward to dine in some pleasant company, 
 for she was a person of many friends ; and often 
 of an evening on foot to the opera, where she 
 doffed her bonnet, sat in a stall, forgot the 
 work-a-day world in a revelry of music, and 
 walked home again without a doubt or a fear. 
 Women are very different creatures hedged 
 round with petting, care, and tender watchful- 
 ness, to what they become when set by fortune 
 to stand alone, and help and keep and support 
 themselves. 
 
 Carrie Martin had her lodgings now in the 
 same house as the Oliver Warleighs, and the 
 owner of it was Mrs. Lupton. It was the house 
 where Rachel had seen the Oliver Warleighs 
 during the year of the Exhibition, but Csfrrie 
 had not been in it long. Their rooms were 
 taken by the term, and always kept in readiness 
 for them. They had the whole of the first floor, 
 and Carrie was over them ; her apartments be- 
 ing at the back of the house for quietness sake, 
 and also for the broad glimpse of blue sky and 
 green gardens she could get up there, better 
 than below. It was a dreary neighborhood, 
 but she was satisfied with it ; and here Ra- 
 chel Withers visited her during the spring af- 
 ter her friends the Ferrands went abroad with 
 Alice. 
 
 When Rachel heard the landlady's name it 
 did not occur to her as familiar, but when she 
 saw the woman, she thought she possessed the 
 most sleeky evil countenance she had ever be- 
 held ; and so she told Carrie, adding that if she 
 lived in her house she should be afraid some 
 night she should be murdered in her bed. Car- 
 rie only laughed, and said she had never yet 
 been worth murdering. 
 
 " But you are right in your antipathy to her 
 face," she continued, " she is a suspicious char- 
 acter, and on that account she interests me. 
 Also she is an admirable cook ; she is very clean, 
 and does not meddle with books or papers ; she 
 takes less toll off my coffee, sugar and wine than 
 any landlady who ever experimentalized on my 
 liberality before, and I give as little trouble as 
 a single gentleman ; so that, in fact, we are on 
 excellent terms together. I have two Ideas 
 concerning her, and am now on the watch to 
 prove which is the true one ; she is either a 
 member of the female detective police, or 
 else she is herself a criminal not yet found out. 
 
 " I would not stay here ; I would go to some 
 respectable commonplace body without a mys- 
 tery," said Rachel seriously. 
 
 "Not at all — why should I? I am safe, 
 being on my guard, but safest as having noth- 
 ing for her to covet. Besides, she amuses me. 
 She has had her adventures, and delights to 
 expatiate on them. I feel it expedient some- 
 times to check her indiscretions of speech lest 
 she should afterward repent of her confidence, 
 and become afraid of me ; which, from her 
 eye, might be dangerous. When she brings 
 up our coffee after dinner I will set her go- 
 ing." 
 
120 
 
 ANNIS WARLBiaH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 Rachel begged Carrie not to set her going for 
 her, as she would greatly prefer dispensing with 
 her society ; but Carrie liked her own way, and 
 when Mrs. Lupton appeared with the fragrant 
 beverage, she detained her on one pretense or 
 another until the restraint of Rachel's presence 
 as a stranger wore off, and she followed her 
 lodger's dexterous lead toward the ever self-in- 
 teresting topic of her own remarkable sayings 
 and doings. She appeared like a woman with 
 a perfect digestion ; her features were large and 
 handsome, her skin healthy and blooming, but 
 her long eyes were half closed and sly, and her 
 mouth was stretched into a perpetual smirk, 
 which became a grin when she was recounting 
 an unpleasant story — and sooth to say, most of 
 her stories were unpleasant. One very neces- 
 sary caution she practiced even while indulging 
 her loquacity — she never mentioned names, 
 either of persons or of places. 
 
 " There are queer things in families, oh ! very 
 queer things !" cried she once, shaking her head 
 and peering through her drooped eyelids as if 
 she saw, and in imagination enjoyed, a long 
 vista of calamities, the bringing about of which 
 lay in her own immediate power. " If every 
 body had their own, there would be a deal of 
 upsetting of them that are high and of lifting 
 up of them that are low. Yes, as I say, if every 
 body only had their own !" 
 
 " A nurse has perhaps more opportunity of 
 making acquaintance with private skeletons 
 than any body," suggested Carrie, drawing her 
 on. 
 
 " Ton are right, ma'am. Somebody mtai be 
 trusted, that is it. I never met the man or 
 woman yet who could keep a bad secret to them- 
 selves, and not go mad or die under it. I was 
 reading a word or two in a paper that was lying 
 here on your table yesterday, that went to prove 
 how doctors were not likely to know much of 
 the romance of life ; bless the man that wrote 
 it, thought I, it was never an old doctor that 
 told you thM ! Why, doctors are confessors to 
 us Protestants, and next to them come the law- 
 yers ; and perha^ps nurses and waiting-women are 
 not far behind, only they're told of necessity 
 often while things are in the acting ; and the 
 doctors only hear the tale when the deed's done 
 and past undoing, and misery begins to set in 
 and break down the health. Now I knew a 
 doctor once — and if I had any guilt on my 
 conscience it is not Mm I would send for when 
 I was dying — who could not keep a quiet 
 tongue in his teeth, he didn't know what was 
 harmless gossip he might amuse his patients 
 with, and what was real tragedy that he had 
 learnt as good as under seal of confession. It 
 was about a pretty young widow with two boys, 
 who came to live in a country place where I 
 was then in a very good service. My mistress 
 was for calling on her, but first she must know 
 a little of her belongings, and slie asked our 
 doctor, who was attending on the stranger, what 
 he knew. He hummed and he hawed, and for 
 that time he kept safe counsel ; the lady was 
 desirous of living secluded, he said ; she was 
 not well off, and she had her two sons to bring 
 up ; but she was a lady — oh ! yes, quite a lady 
 of manners and education. So my mistress, 
 who was oldish, and rich, and fond of some- 
 body new, called on her, and they were getting 
 
 quite to be friends. " The widow had had her 
 troubles, but being of a pious spirit she was 
 slowly grieving down, as I heard my mistress 
 say, when her doctor must needs blab how the 
 poor young creature had told him in her very 
 great agony when she first came to the town, 
 that the father of her children, her own husband 
 that she'd once loved, had been hanged — hang- 
 ed in Ireland something like a month before, 
 and that for murder done in a drunken brawl. 
 She had come away from all that knew her to 
 hide their shame, and brought her sons where 
 they might live to grow up and never hear of 
 it. And what does her doctor do but tell my 
 mistress, and she told me, and soon it was every 
 body's secret. Then folks looked curious, or 
 shy, or pitiful of the poor creature, and so she 
 took her children and went away somewhere 
 else — God knows where, but I never saw her 
 after. And thinks I to myself, what mischief 
 and misery more than there is, would there be 
 in the world if nobody had any more discretion 
 than our old doctor !" 
 
 Here Mrs. Lupton paused to take breath and 
 apparently to angle in the dark depths of her 
 memory for some other grotesque anecdote. She 
 was not long in drawing one to the surface. 
 " And speaking of persons coming wrongfully 
 by what they hold, and nurses knowing of their 
 private skeletons," said she ; " I remember once 
 hearing of a nurse who took a temporary place 
 with a very great lady who had charge of a 
 child amongst her own that stood between her 
 and money. Her husband hated the child, but 
 he was one of them men that stop short, not for 
 want of wQl but for want of courage, and the 
 deed would never have been done but for his 
 wife ; and she got rid of her out of the country, 
 making believe that she was dead who is alive 
 this day. And that nurse knew it, she did, and 
 some other folks suspected all was not right, but 
 there was no stir made, and hasn't been yet, no, 
 nor ever will be ! But if that great lady could 
 undo her doing now, oh ! but she would ; for 
 things fell out so after, that she had no profit of 
 it ; not so much as to pay for keeping it dark. 
 That nurse has told me she's seen her raging 
 like a player on the stage. If she could make 
 it compromise with God about it, that it should 
 never be found out, but the wrong righted in 
 some quiet, safe way, I do think she would be 
 content to die the moment it was done ! But 
 there are them in it will hinder her. I've had 
 a sort of pity for that lady ever since I heard it, 
 for she is very high and proud in her ways and 
 
 in her family. Ay, and I could tell you " 
 
 what more Mrs. Lupton could have told them 
 was lost for the present ; for the street-door bell 
 rang and she left the room. 
 
 " Mrs. Lupton is herself the nurse who assist- 
 ed in that last little tragedy or I am very much 
 mistaken," remarked Carrie Martin. " She has 
 told me the tale before but with variations. 
 People should not meddle with lying unless they 
 have excellent memories." 
 
 Rachel was shocked and she began to ask her 
 friend how she could endure to remain under 
 such a woman's roof ; but Carrie replied with a 
 careless laugh that there was something every- 
 where to dislike, and that she preferred a mys- 
 tery combined with exquisite cleanliness to other 
 evils she had met with in London lodgings. 
 
SEEKING. ' 
 
 121 
 
 She wag never anywhere so comfortable before. 
 "Besides," added she; "I have not fathomed 
 her character yet, and how can you expect me 
 to leave my sport — it is all in the exercise of my 
 vocation. Mrs. Lupton has her religious observ- 
 ances like the best of us, and who am I that I 
 should say she is worse than her neighbors ? It 
 will not do to go about the world condemning 
 people because they happen to have an unpleas- 
 ant grin or a furtive look in their eyes. Your 
 friends the Oliver Warleighs treat her with 
 great confidence, and she uses me honestly 
 enough." 
 
 " I don't care ; I would not lodge in her 
 house if I were you," persisted Rachel. 
 
 " Of course not — ^neither should I if I were 
 as timid and ingrained with proprieties as you ; 
 but I am not. I have some acquaintances so 
 eccentric you would think them ready for Bed- 
 lam. Come, dear old sober-aides, don't look so 
 solemnly disapproving, but put on a black silk 
 mantle over your black silk dress, and a bonnet 
 that will not care for crushing, and let us go out 
 and hear some music." 
 
 Eaohel did not feel as if this were quite -pro- 
 per either, but to Carrie Martin it was a mere 
 matter of custom ; so she did as she was bidden, 
 and they went to the Lyceum and heard Bosio, 
 Mario and Ronconi in the Barber of Seville ; 
 and Rachel after all enjoyed it as much as if she 
 had gone in full dress and under masculine es- 
 cort. Carrie took a very practical view of wo- 
 man's rights — especially of woman's right to 
 enjoy herself, when she has achieved indepen- 
 dence or had it thrust upon her. And not a 
 sensible person of her acquaintance had ever 
 thought she did other than wisely or esteemed 
 her a groat the leas for having courage to be 
 happy in her own way. 
 
 Rachel Withers had been only two days in 
 town with her friend when the Oliver War- 
 leighs arrived to take possession of their apart- 
 ments in Mrs. Lupton's house. They had been 
 spending the winter af Brighton and were going 
 down to Hurtledale in a week or ten days. 
 Rachel's presence seemed at first any thing but 
 acceptable to Lady Georgiaua — every thing that 
 was unexpected was toher suspicious, she asked 
 many questions about Carrie Martin, her condi- 
 tion and pursuits, but appeared satisfied with 
 the answers given, and wound up her interro- 
 gation by saying she knew Mrs. Lupton's lodg- 
 ings were popular ; for she was a -Vfery careful, 
 attentive person. 
 
 " We have the highest confidence in her skill 
 and kindness," she went on : " there is nobody 
 , Oliver likes to have about him so well as Mrs. 
 Lupton when he has his worst attacks ; and I 
 greatly fear there is one lying in wait for him 
 now. She was my nurse at that distressing 
 time when Sir Laurence's poor little daughter 
 died." 
 
 " Your nurse was she ?" said Rachel, vague- 
 ly ; and the few trivial sounding words set her 
 musing. Lady Georgiana asked her what she 
 was thinking of. " Nothing— I was not think- 
 ing — only Mrs. Lupton has a disagreeable face." 
 
 Lady Georgiana laughed at this and said 
 Rachel was fanciful — the nurse was a very 
 worthy creature, and the subject was permitted 
 to drop. 
 
 On the following day Oliver Warleigh was 
 taken ill as his wife had foreseen would be the 
 case; his usual medical attendant, one Doctor 
 Frith, was sent for and the whole house was 
 disorganized. Something very grave leemed to 
 be impending. Before the four-and-twenty 
 hours were over Lady Georgiana looked terribly 
 worn and haggard. She sought Rachel With- 
 ers' society, and made her the recipient of her 
 trials and troubles. 
 
 " It is very wearing this frequent illness of 
 Oliver's ; I never know when I have him safe," 
 said she pathetically. "I often think it would 
 be best for us to settle permanently abroad ; 
 constant change is necessary to keep him in 
 spirits, and that is more easUy attainable there 
 than here. You are going for a little tour with 
 your friend Miss Martin, are you not ? Shall 
 you see them in Hurtledale first ?" 
 
 Rachel thought not ; she proposed paying a 
 visit to the rectory later in the year — in August 
 or September. 
 
 " That is the pleasantest time on the moors," 
 said Lady Georgiana. " I disUke the Hurtlemere 
 House myself, but Oliver has a strange hanker- 
 ing after it, as persons afflicted as he is often 
 have for the places and people that, when in 
 health and vigor they sought most to avoid. 
 Mortimer is a dear good son to us ; but for his 
 promise to accompany us, I should hardly have 
 courage to go. Once there, it will be for the 
 whole long summer I am afraid. But we must 
 spare my boy for one little holiday." 
 
 Mortimer was, inde?d, a kindly, gentle, tender- 
 hearted fellow ; there was something about him 
 that it was impossible to help loving. At the first 
 private opportunity, he asked Rachel how and 
 where were all her Brookfall friends. She told, 
 him they were all well, and that they had just 
 returned to Paris after wintering in Italy. She 
 was not sure whither they were going next — 
 whether to Switzerland or Germany. It was 
 too early in the spring yet for Switzerland, Mor- 
 timer replied, but he wished he were on the 
 wing thither ; then added that it would be im- 
 possible for him to leave his mother while she 
 was in so much anxiety about his father. 
 
 He looked anxious too, and when Rachel in- 
 quired if the present attack were serious, he 
 said, " Yes, very serious, and I do not think 
 my father will ever be himself again until he has 
 very different people about him. Mrs. Lupton 
 may be a good nurse but she is distractingly 
 watchful — Mr. Gilsland is not here or he would 
 certainly have followed in Dr. Frith's wake. He 
 has been obhged to betake himself to some hid- 
 ing place abroad to secure himself from his 
 creditors, and it is lucky for us he has. Then, 
 as for Dr. Frith, I do not believe in him at all — 
 I think he as often brings on the paroxysms as 
 he alleviates them. He is a quackish little up- 
 start with a German degree, but my mother is 
 ready to swear by his skill. He can have no 
 regular practice, for go where we may, he is al- 
 ways within hail. My mother is slavishly defer- 
 ential to him, as women are to the physician 
 who they fancy holds in his hands the power of 
 life and death ; but if I had a voice in the mat- 
 ter he would be immediately deposed in favor of 
 some man of reputation ; for that he is perfectly 
 helpless in such a difficult and complicated case 
 as my father's, I have long been assured." 
 
 Rachel hereupon became rather curious to see 
 
122 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 this Dr. Frith, and to know who and what he 
 was that Lady Georgiana should persist in trust- 
 ing him when no one could perceive any bene- 
 ficial results from liis attendance on her husband. 
 She had slightly sprained her wrist a few days 
 before leaving home, and domestic remedies had 
 failed to reduce the swelling, so she made this 
 an excuse for having him sent in to her the next 
 time he came to the hous^; though Carrie 
 mockingly said she could prescribe for her quite 
 as well, and she should be glad of the fee. 
 
 When he came he proved to be a mean- 
 visaged, pompous, shabbry person, as unlike a 
 family physician as possible. His surgical 
 knowledge was trifling, but he used tremendously 
 long words to make a show of more, though it 
 needed but small discernment to set him down 
 as a very ignorant and disreputable member of 
 the profession he had usurped. Seen casually, 
 he appeared an elderly man, but when Rachel 
 came to talk with him over her maimed limb, 
 she perceived that he could not be above forty, 
 and that his grizzled hair was neither more nor 
 less than a wig, and that -his green spectacles 
 were certainly worn either for purposes of dis- 
 guise or for show of respectability, rather than 
 for any use they could be of to the lynx-like 
 eyes that glittered behind them. 
 
 Carrie) Martin sat in her idle-time chair, criti- 
 cally considering him throughout the consulta- 
 tion, and when he was gone she exclaimed, 
 " Rachel, that man is not only quack but rogue ! 
 Where can your friends have picked him up ? I 
 would not let him prescribe for a sick dog of 
 mine." Rachel said • she did not know. 
 " Humph !" returned Carrie, " I should say his 
 practice has been chiefly colonial, and probably 
 carried on at his country's expense. I never 
 saw more legibly knavish characters on any face 
 than on your family physician's, my dear." 
 
 The same day an opportunity occurred of in- 
 troducing Dr. Frith's name before Lady Georgi- 
 ana, when she spoke at once highly in his favor. 
 There was no one in whom she felt so much 
 confidence, she said, no one. Mortimer wished 
 to have a second opinion on his father's ease, 
 but she could not insult Dr. Frith by showing 
 such a distrust of his skill. He was, she added, 
 the physician who had been called in at Hast- 
 ings when Annis and Mortimer lay ill of the 
 scarlet fever. For her own child she might have 
 been satisfied with Mr. Blunt, the surgeon who 
 attended her children on ordinary occasions, but 
 for Sir Laurence's little daughter she had judged 
 it expedient to have other advice. Rachel list- 
 ened amazed — how could Frith have ever hood- 
 winked Lady Georgiana into the belief that he 
 was a capable person ? she thought. No wonder 
 the child died, with Lupton for her nurse and 
 that ignorant man for her doctor — and in spite 
 of herself Rachel's mind reverted to the old sus- 
 picions that had circulated round the event, and 
 which Bittersweet had warned her against seek- 
 ing to verify. 
 
 As soon as Oliver Warleigh was fit to travel 
 he went down to Hurtledale with his wife and 
 son, and Dr. Frith also in attendance. It was 
 the doctor's first appearance at the Hu^lemere 
 House, and it gave rise to much excitement 
 there. Mistress Dobie told Mary Wray amongst 
 
 other things that he had terribly violent scenes 
 with his patient, and that Lady Georgiana seem- 
 ed almost afraid of her life between them. 
 
 About a week after their arrival in the north, 
 one morning immediately after breakfast, Lady 
 Georgiana presented herself at the rectory to 
 seek an interview with John Withers, for the 
 purpose of soliciting him to lend her a sum ,of 
 money which it was any thing but convenient 
 for him at the moment to spare. She begged 
 him on no account to apprise Sir Laurence of 
 her necessities, and vaguely intimated that it was 
 Mortimer who had brought them upon her. 
 John contrived to oblige her, but both he and 
 his wife were greatly perplexed by the excuse 
 she made for her request. 
 
 " Mortimer extravagant — ^I will never believe 
 it !" cried Katherine. " Give him leisure, sun- 
 shine, a pencil and a book, and he has enough 
 to satisfy all his desires. Talking to me only 
 yesterday in his indolent, earnest fashion he 
 wished he were his father's younger son that he 
 might live obscurely at ease instead of having to 
 prepare for the responsibilities of wealth." 
 
 John replied: " But why should Lady Geor- 
 giana blame her son if the blame lies justly else- 
 where ?" 
 
 To this Katherine said she did not know, but 
 that she was certain Mortimer was not the drain 
 that kept his father and mother always poor ; 
 and while his defense was still hot in her mind 
 an opportunity occurred of asking the young 
 man himself how it was that they were constant- 
 ly straitened. 
 
 " I can not tell — ^where the money goes is as 
 much a mystery to me as it is to you, aunt 
 Kate," was his prompt answer. " I never dream 
 of interfering, but I conjecture that Frith is a 
 great tax. It is costly Tfrork to carry a doctor 
 about with you, is it not ?" 
 
 Katherine believed so. She had never yet 
 seen Dr. Frith ; Lady Georgiana did not venture 
 to introduce him at the rectory ; but John had 
 seen him and drawn certain inferences from his 
 presence at the Hurtlemere House. When La- 
 dy Georgiana came down for that money, she 
 looked like' a. woman with a great dread upon 
 her ; he felt that she did not breathe freely un- 
 der the doctor's incubus, though she professed 
 to repose an entire confidence in him. She told 
 John of her desire to live abroad, mentioning 
 that Frith expressly forbade another removal 
 for his patient. She said also that a nurse was 
 then on her way down from town by his orders, 
 and that tfie dreary probability was that they 
 should remain in the dale through the summer. 
 Her brother-in-law could only condole with her, 
 deplore Oliver's unhappy condition and wish for 
 her any change she desired. 
 
 The same evening the nurse arrived and 
 proved to be Mrs. Lupton. The inferior woman- 
 folk at the Hurtlemere House received her with 
 marked disfavor, and the gossips whispered 
 more shrewdly than ever. 
 
 "Mark my words — there's mischief brew- 
 ing," said Mistress Dobie to another of her cro- 
 nies. " Such a proud woman as Lady Georgiana 
 does not go down on her knees to the like of 
 that Doctor Frith for no small cause. There's 
 a riddle 'uU be unriddled afore long as will as- 
 tonish some folks more than they reckon on. I 
 can't abide this nurse as is just come ; Oliver 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 123 
 
 wants no nursing, none he ; he wantg letting 
 alone ; it is liker a jailer she ia than a nurse. 
 Bury a secret deep as you will but it'll come up 
 greftn above ground sune or syne." 
 
 It was just at this time that Katherine drove 
 over one brilliant spring daytoWhinstane Tow- 
 er to pay a duty visit to Lady Foulis. She took 
 Saeharissa Tulip with her for company on the 
 drive, and left her to amuse herself in the wil- 
 derness gardens while she mounted to the re- 
 cluse's turret. Lady Foulis had now been bed- 
 ridden for a year or more, but life was strong 
 in her yet, and her mind retained such a fixed 
 hold of certain ideas that it seemed as if it would 
 never let them go. 
 
 From the first news of it she had refused to 
 believe that poor little Annia was dead at Hast- 
 ings, and had commonly made inquiries after 
 her when Katherine paid her periodical visits ; 
 and though each time the same explanation and 
 reminder of the child's death was given in reply 
 to her questions, on the next occasion she re- 
 peated them as if she had never heard the story ; 
 and thus she did now. 
 
 " How is Sir Laurence's daughter, Kate, and 
 where is she ?" she asked abruptly in the midst 
 of another subject. 
 
 Katherine tried gravely to recall to her mem- 
 ory how she had been repeatedly assured that 
 the child was dead ; but she retorted with acrid 
 distinctness, — ' 
 
 " I know I have been repeatedly assured that 
 she is dead, but that does not make it any the 
 more true. Why do you go on believing in 
 lies? Ask Lady Georgiana about her — she 
 ought to be able to tell you. I had a dream of 
 her last night — she is very beautiful and good 
 though she is my namesake. When she comes 
 home, bid Laurence bring her here to me." 
 
 Saeharissa Tulip found her mother very silent 
 as they were driving home again. Katherine 
 was thinking. The singular persistence of Lady 
 Foulis in this delusion of little gipsy's being alive 
 haunted her whether she would or no. Could 
 there lurk a great crime under the wretchedness 
 of Oliver and his wife ? Many a moment of 
 bewildering doubt and conjecture had gone over 
 her as over others ; could the words of that 
 weird woman have been all along the clue to a 
 dangerous fact which no one would accept from 
 her? 
 
 That evening being alone with John she told 
 him what had passed at Whinstane Tower, and 
 he no longer slighted Lady Foulis's assertion. 
 Katherine looked at him pale and awe-stricken. 
 " Are you thinking she may be alive, John ?" 
 she asked in an almost inaudible whisper. 
 
 " The gossips are beginning to say so, Kate ; 
 suspicion is budding again, and there are many 
 watchful eyes and ears about the Hurtlemere 
 House," was his answer. " And there is food 
 enough for them in all conscience. ' 
 
 " If she be alive, where is she ? she^must be 
 almost a woman now," Katherine said. 
 
 "God knows — we do not. We are on the 
 eve of a discovery and we can but wait," replied 
 John. "Moral certainties are vain in such a 
 case, but there is a mighty power in secrets to 
 reveal themselves if we give them time. If 
 there be any iniquitous fraud about the child's 
 alleged death it is fast growing now out into 
 the daylight." 
 
 " Oh, John, I pray it may be all a dream !" 
 cried his wife infinitely distressed. 
 
 " I am afraid, my Katie, that it will prove a 
 black and shameful truth. Patience and silence." 
 
 No fear that she would talk except to him I 
 And thus suspicion reared again its darkling 
 front and for every wnisper of its tongue rose a 
 fear and an agony in the breasts of the guilty. 
 Lady Georgiana walked about as much as ever, 
 and greeted the cottagers with her old dignified 
 grace, but she saw that one and another eyed 
 her askance, and that the day of her reckoning 
 with heaven was at hand. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FOURTH. 
 
 IN RHINELAHD. 
 
 A WORK divine, 
 A blending of all beauties ; streams, and dells, 
 
 Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, cornfield, mountain, vine. 
 
 Lord Byron. 
 
 Cakrie Martin loved the town, Rachel With- 
 ers loved the country ; Carrie loved the stir of 
 the market-place, Rachel the solitude of hills 
 and rivers, therefore it was a bargain before the 
 friends started on their holiday tour that if Ra- 
 chel staid peaceably in Paris three weeks with 
 her friend, her friend should afterward spend 
 three weeks with her in any district of fine scen- 
 ery she selected. Rachel chose the Rliine val- 
 ley, and thitherward they traveled early in June, 
 stopping a night at Strasbourg and then going 
 forward to Heidelberg the next day. Rachel 
 was delighted with the Neckar Scenery and pro- 
 posed remaining there a while. " Just as you 
 like," said Carrie, " one hill of vine-sticks is the 
 same as another to me." And they subsided for 
 a week into an inn close by the bridge ; a cleanly, 
 well-served, old-fashioned place where they were 
 made comfortable in a homely way at very mod- 
 erate charges. 
 
 On the further side of the river and about 
 three hundred yards above the bridge, there 
 was a walled-in orchard with a little garden- 
 house abutting on the road, which had the pret- 
 tiest garlanded window and balcony imaginable. 
 A Virginian creeper twined its thousands of 
 tendrilly sprays up the rustic pillars and waved 
 from the roof in the most frolic and luxuriant 
 of festoons. It was a picture of itself even 
 now while the foliage was all one mass of vivid 
 greenness, but when the finger of autumnal frost 
 touched leaf by leaf into the wondrous crimson 
 that is its dying array, it must have presented 
 such an exquisite bit of form and color as a 
 painter might delight to carry away for a me- 
 morial of the lovely valley. 
 
 Its beauty aad picturesqueness caught Ra- 
 chel's fancy on the evening ef their arrival 
 when they strolled down -by the river in the 
 twilight for half an hour, before writing their 
 home dispatches to give notice of their where- 
 abouts. It was solitary when they passed it 
 first, but in returning they saw that it was oc- 
 cupied by a young man and a girl whose heads 
 were drawn together in whispering intimacy 
 and confidence. Carrie, who had as quick an 
 eye fou a germ of romance as for any other 
 mystery, immediately suggested " lovers," and 
 the wreathed balcony was forthwith flowered 
 
124 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 over with her fantastic speculations concerning 
 the pair. Rachel, believing Carrie very possibly 
 correct in her surmises, dipped her hat as they 
 went by and forbore to look up. Having in- 
 vested it with so tender an interest, the next 
 evening they looked out /rom their window to 
 see if the pair were there again, watching the 
 sunset and the moonrise, and speaking low as 
 the fashion of lovers is. The/ were, but with 
 them was a lady whom Carrie set down at once 
 as elderly and English, for she wore a bonnet 
 that was never constructed save by a provincial 
 milliner of her own country with a sedate, 
 gray-haired single gentlewoman in prospect. 
 Rachel took these particulars on hearsay ; she 
 was not long enough sighted to discover them 
 for herself ; but her curiosity to know who the 
 strangers were was excited, and the following 
 day the discovery was made to her very great 
 satisfaction. 
 
 They were loitering inn-wards weary and 
 thirsty after a long day's wandering on the 
 wooded hills, when just as they were approach- 
 ing the garden-house of the wall, out came their 
 two young lovers upon the balcony. To glance 
 up was irresistible ; to recognize Sinclair Fer- 
 rand and Ahee was the affair of a moment, and 
 their exclamations of welcome and astonish- 
 ment were simultaneous with Rachel's own. 
 
 " You here, Rachel Withers !" cried Alice, 
 leaning down toward her in eager greeting. 
 " Oh ! what a godsend you will be to aunt 
 Delia — somebody new to explode to ! Come in, 
 do come in ! Sinclair has gone down to open 
 the garden-door !" And there he was already, 
 standing with it wide and looking by several 
 degrees browner and cheerier than he did when 
 he left England in charge of the traveling party 
 eight months before. 
 
 It was impossible to resist the temptation of 
 familiar faces so far away from home ; therefore 
 tired, dusty, faint, as they were, in they went ; 
 through the orchard, across a little lawn strewn 
 with plots of beautiful flowers, and up a shallow 
 flight of stone steps into "■ pretty room where 
 sat Dr. Ferrand with a book. Miss Flora with 
 her knitting, and Miss Delia with her basket of 
 busy idlenesses, precisely as they might be found 
 sitting any three hundred nights in the year in 
 their own houses at Claymire. 
 
 " Eh, what, Rachel Withers dropped from 
 the clouds !" cried the doctor, who was the first 
 to realize her as a fact ; and then the two old 
 ladies clasped their hands, kissed her, rejoiced 
 over her, and asked more questions in a breath 
 than she could have answered by morning. As 
 soon as a pause ensued, Carrie Martin was made 
 known to them ; then they were told where the 
 two friends were staying ; and as no entreaties 
 moved the aunts to release either until the morn- 
 ing, Alice convoyed them up-stairs for a refresh- 
 ing, and half an hour after they were all assem- 
 bled at a banquet made as English as possible 
 with excellent strong tea, up-heaped dishes of 
 fragrant Alpine strawberries and delicious bread 
 and butter. 
 
 Of course then there was great effusion of 
 chat; and Carrie, by reason of her non-acquaint- 
 anoesfiip till now being almost useless for con- 
 versational purposes, had leisure to make mental 
 notes on all the party and especially on her 
 charming young lovers. Not much serenity 
 
 was to be expected from Miss Delia after the 
 sudden break-up of their family circle, and she 
 made haste to put her guests to the use for 
 which Sunshine had so simply said they w^ld 
 serve. Her tongue went incessantly in praise, 
 in blame, in depreciation, or in pious horror of 
 the strange and wonderful things they had wit- 
 nessed in their travels. They had been in 
 Heidelberg since the middle of May, thankful 
 to escape out of "heathenish Paris," whence 
 they came last by way of Strasbourg, stopping 
 two nights at the Maison Rouge to rest. This 
 news made an opening amongst generally in- 
 teresting topics, of which Carrie, who abhorred 
 silence, boldly availed herself, striking in with 
 an opinion that the cathedral of that ancient 
 fortified town was the finest of all the Gothic 
 churches she had yet seen ; an opinion which 
 caused both the old ladies to wave the head of 
 most earnest dissent. 
 
 " I could not give my thoughts to the edifice," 
 sighed Miss Flora ; " for there on his knees was 
 a laboring man, saying his prayers to a recum- 
 bent image, and kissing, yes, positively hissing, 
 the senseless hands and feet and breast in 
 adoration I" 
 
 "And I observed thai, stone though it be, it 
 is worn with the repetition of that act of wor- 
 ship," added Miss Delia shuddering. " Oh ! it 
 is melancholy to reflect on such utter darkness 
 ind absence of gospel light ! I have not en- 
 joyed one happy Sunday since we left Claymire, 
 but certainly that at poor Strasbourg was the 
 worst." 
 
 Sinclair Perrand rather wickedly suggested 
 that perhaps that might be because there was 
 something wrong about aunt Delia herself — " a 
 lack of sympathy for instance" — but Carrie 
 Martin subsided into silence before the Protest- 
 ant demonstration ; and knowing her taste and 
 her temper, Rachel had reason to be glad she 
 refrained from proclaiming herself something 
 dreadfully heterodox on the spot, for the per- 
 verse pleasure of mystifying her new acquaint- 
 ance. The doctor good-humoredly attempted 
 to discuss the building with her on architectural 
 rather than doctrinal grounds, but Carrie felt 
 she had fallen into dangerous society, where her 
 independence would not be appreciated or re- 
 spected ; and she kept such discreet watch over 
 her words as deprived them of all their usual 
 flavor and piquancy. She had been shuf&ed 
 about the world through many reverses, and 
 had seen most civilized varieties of men, 
 women, and books, and the result of her ex- 
 periences had been to make bigotry — or what 
 she supposed to be such — her favorite aversion. 
 
 "We spent Christmas in Rome, and a truly 
 penitential season it was to me," said Miss Delia 
 by and by. "The young ones arranged the 
 tour, and we have patiently followed our lead- 
 ers, though I know we might often economize 
 distanc^and be less frequently on the road." 
 
 Rachel inquired if Sinclair had been with 
 them all the time. 
 
 "Oh, no, not one half of it!" cried Alice. 
 " He leaves us planted somewhere and goes off 
 on independent expeditions with only a knapsack 
 and a walking-stick." Sunshine looked as if she 
 too would like to be off on independent expedi- 
 tions with only a knapsack and a walking-stick ; 
 especially when Sinclair observed a minute or two 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 125 
 
 after that he thought he ahould be away to Heil- 
 bronn on the morrow. And the following morn- 
 ing, he having started before six o'clock on a 
 tramp up the valley as he had said, Alice brought 
 her sunshine to the inn where Kaohel and her 
 friend were staying, and spent a lazy day with 
 them out on the hills fern-gathering and wild- 
 flower hunting. 
 
 Alice was in her lightest, gayest mood that 
 morning. Blithe as a bee or heedless as a but- 
 terfly. She was -rery fluent of speech also, and 
 had a thousand little adventures of her travels 
 to tell ; and Carrie having incautiously availed 
 herself of her firm right arm to help herself up 
 an abrupt steep, was not suffered to relinquish it 
 again, but was obliged to be dependent for the 
 rest of the ramble. Eachel could perceive that 
 her old friend was amused by this peremptory 
 assistance, and that she was endeavoring to draw 
 Ahce out several times. But draw her out as 
 she would, there was never word or sentence 
 ' elicited that could produce so much as a momen- 
 tary regret. Even when Alice's sense of fun 
 beguiled her into some arch comment on the 
 aunts, she immediately qualified or effaced it by 
 an affectionate ejaculation. She should be quite 
 sorry to go home, she said, though Claymire 
 was pretty in its way — ^in fact, like every body 
 else of her age and temper, she reveled in change 
 and excitement. 
 
 " It is delightful to travel about," cried she, in 
 a glow of enthusiasm. "I always feel as if 
 something new and wonderful were going to 
 happen — ^it does not, but there is the expectation. 
 The world has lovely bits in it ! The marvel to 
 me is that while our time in it is so short, we 
 content ourselves with seeing the little we do. 
 Auntie Dee protests daily against the weariness 
 of packing up and moving on, and in the most 
 beautiful scenes bears herself with obtrusive re- 
 signation — ^no, I ought not to say that ; for she 
 is very patient, really, and it is hard to look 
 gratified when we are expected to enjoy what we 
 don't care about. But I never watch Sinclair 
 setting out as he did to-day, with his knapsack 
 strapped on his back, and his stick in his hand, 
 that I do not think how much more delightful it 
 must be to be a man than a woman, and long to 
 throw my girlishness by and be off too." 
 
 " And you would be off too, did not the pro- 
 prieties and Auntie Dee forbid," said Carrie, 
 laughing. 
 
 Once during that day when they were lying 
 down to rest in the shade, Alice with her hat off, 
 her russet brown hair blown about and her 
 cheeks richly flushed, her likeness to the old 
 portrait at Woodlands was 'marvelous. She was 
 very beautiful and growing lovelier every day ; 
 there was a grace and a charm of animation 
 about her that are most rare ; but her fascination 
 would not have been half so great had there 
 been no latent power, no passion underlying the 
 sparkling airiness of her sunny-day moods. 
 
 "I Uke your young friend very 'well in her 
 beaming moments, but I shall not be satisfied 
 unless I see her in a storm," said Carrie when 
 Alice had left them and gone home. 
 
 " Most likely she will giye you the opportunity 
 if we meet often," was Eachel's quiet reply. 
 " She is never long the same." 
 
 Nor was she. If inquiry had been made of 
 Miss Ddia she would have borne testimony to 
 her capriciousness with great unction. 
 
 On their first Sunday at Heidelberg, directly 
 after breakfast, Carrie and Eachel went up to 
 the castle, and while seated on the terrace they 
 saw Sinclair Perrand and Alice walking together 
 alone ; their parents and guardians not having 
 chosen to surmount the difficulties of the steps 
 and the hill before going to the English service 
 as they had had courage -to do. 
 
 "Look at them," said Carrie, " they are un- 
 conscious of every body but themselves and each 
 other. Ah ! now they have espied us, and are 
 coming this way. Turn your head straight, 
 Eachel, and don't see them ; perhaps, then, they 
 will fancy themselves unobserved." 
 
 Eachel did as she was bidden and stared reso- 
 lutely into the air; but there was no double- 
 dealing about AUce or Sinclair, and in a few 
 moments they arrived and in the most disinter- 
 ested manner, if they were lovers, gave the friends 
 the pleasure of their company as long as they 
 remained on the terrace. 
 
 In the evening Eachel and Carrie joined the 
 doctor's party by request, and sat aU in the 
 pretty garden-house together, with the window 
 open looking on the river. The doctor read 
 them a sermon there, and after it was over they 
 were free to talk and to stroll about the orchard. 
 Alice' had dug up in the woods and on the hills 
 a basket of beautiful ferns, which she was pro- 
 posing to carry away with her on their furthei* 
 travels : " Until," said Smclair, " they all die at 
 the top, when she wUl throw the roots away, as she 
 has done a score of times before," and foreseeing 
 but a short life for them under any circumstances, 
 he broke off several of the longest fronds, and 
 put them with a bit of scarlet geranium for a 
 drooping ornament in Alice's hair. Miss Flora 
 said, "It was not right on a Sunday," but be- 
 yond that no remark was made, except by Car- 
 rie, who telegraphed Eachel a significantly tri- 
 umphant glance, and afterward declared that 
 none were so blind as those who would not see — 
 herself implied ; for Eachel had not quite agreed 
 with her friend that the two were what she said. 
 
 " If they love and marry it will be a perfect 
 little idyll, but they have been companions ever 
 since Alice was a baby child of five or six years 
 old, and I am not sure they are more than friends 
 now," said she, humoring Carrie's fancy, but 
 still retaining her own private doubts. 
 
 That Sinclair bad set his heart on Sunshine 
 she firmly bdieved; but an incident of that 
 Sunday evening gave her reason to think Sun- 
 shine's vagrant dreams floated far away from 
 him. She mentioned Mortimer Warleigh's name 
 in common incidental talk, and a soft, tell-tale 
 rose blushed all over her face in a moment. 
 Alice was a mystery to her about Mortimer ; she 
 had seemed attracted by him in one sense and in 
 another quite indifferent. All Eachel's aspira- 
 tions were for Sinclair — that brave, constant, 
 single-hearted lover whose love was not of one 
 sudden spring's growth but of many years. It 
 did not seem that the aunts had found out his 
 secret yet or that he had told it. Nor did the 
 doctor make any sign. Alice and he went their 
 own way, companions as much as ever, and were 
 still "the children" in the elder folk's eyes. 
 
 The next morning Eachel had a letter from 
 Hurtledale, some part of the contents of which 
 she read aloud to Miss DeUa Ferrand, who al- 
 
126 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 ways liked to hear pleasing news of her friends' 
 friends. Mortimer Warleigh had come abroad 
 to meet his uncle Sir Laurence, with whom he 
 had spent a fortnight in the Tyrol, and they were 
 now both at Munich, entranced among works of 
 art. A little while after she had read these pas- 
 sages from the letter, Kachel saw Alice diligently 
 studying her traveling map, and she suspected 
 it was for the purpose of coaxing Munich into 
 the way home; but when Kachel looked oyer 
 her shoulder she quietly folded it up, and met 
 her questioning eyes with a perfectly frank in- 
 genuousness. Alice had a true reticence; a 
 power of keeping her thoughts, hopes, fears, 
 feelings to herself, be they where they might ; 
 and her gesture conveyed to Rachel an unmis- 
 takable intimation that this girl, childlike as she 
 was, had depths of character which were not 
 idly and curiously to be pryed into. 
 
 That evening she parted with Carrie and her- 
 self on her way with her aunts and the rest to 
 Frankfort. The good-by was only for a little 
 while, however, as they were sure to meet again 
 somewhere in their passage down the Ehine. 
 And they did meet again at St. Goar. Rachel 
 and her traveling companion had come down 
 from Bingen in the broad shining afternoon, and 
 as they walked from the landing-place to the 
 l^Lily," they heard a familiar voice exclaim, 
 "Here they are," and looking up saw Sinclair 
 Ferrand in the balcony over the iim-door, and 
 Alice just rushing out at the window to verify 
 his report with her own bright eyes. 
 
 "So glad to see you again !" cried she, nod- 
 ding her head as they stood below.; "we came 
 from Rudesheim this morning." 
 
 And then they marched up-stairs and found 
 the doctor and the worthy aunts, and were all 
 extremely delighted to meet once more, though 
 it was scarcely a week since had they parted at 
 Heidelberg. There was an interchange of gossip 
 and adventures for half an hour, then a rest ; 
 and in the cool of the evening a leisurely stroll 
 by the river with an English tea in the Ferrands' 
 apartments afterward. Miss Delia was, as usual, 
 highly conversational; all the more cheerfully 
 so, perhaps, because she began to see a term to 
 her toilsome pleasure — ^whioh she peremptorily 
 insisted on every body understanding had not 
 been a pleasure at al^ but rather a prolonged 
 penance. 
 
 " We are drawing nearer home I hope every 
 day," said she, late in tie evening, when drow- 
 siness was stealing visibly over her. " Oh ! yes, 
 I hope so ! And truly, truly thankful shall I be 
 when I set foot on English soil once more. I 
 tell the children they will never prevail on me to 
 come abroad again ; I have had enough of sight- 
 seeing to last me my lifetime, aud it is a matter 
 of sincere congratulation to me that there are 
 no museums, picture-galleries or fine churches 
 to be visited on this part of the Rhine ; for I am 
 heartily weary of them. I can put up with the 
 natural beauties, but I do not intend to fatigue 
 myself by making one more excursion until I 
 walk down from Brookfall to the school at Clay- 
 raire ; and, therefore, Sunshine, you need not 
 think to beguile me by putting on your coaxing 
 airs." 
 
 " I am almost of your mind, sister," added 
 Miss Flora in her gentler way ; " we can not keep 
 pace with young folks now." 
 
 The doctor glanced up at them over his spec- 
 tacles and newspaper, and suggested prayers, 
 . wine and water, and bed — a suggestion that was 
 taken in perfectly good part and acted on by 
 both the old ladies ; while Alice, whose room 
 was next to Rachel's and Carrie's, came to talk 
 off a little of her superfluous spirits with them 
 before committing herself to rest. All through 
 the evening she had looked a picture of light- 
 heartedness ; she was not tired, bless her, the 
 world was far too new to her for that, and be- 
 sides something had happened. This something 
 was that they had seen Mr. Mortimer Warleigh 
 in the morning — only for a moment when the 
 boat stopped at Bacharach, and not to speak to, 
 but they had exchanged a recognition from the 
 distance, all of them. Alice now communicated 
 this bit of intelligence to Rachel, who thought 
 it rather significant that the incident had not 
 been referred to by any of the party below, 
 though, of course, her interest in him was very 
 well known to all of them. 
 
 Rachel had had another letter from Hurtle- 
 dale that day, giving an alarming account of 
 Oliver Warleigh's state of health, and this she 
 now told Alice, expressing some surprise that 
 Mortimer was not hurrying home — supposing 
 always that the bad news had reached him. 
 " Oh, I should think it has not, or he would 
 never delay," replied Alice. "I am sure he 
 would never delay ; for he has a good heart." 
 This was the first word Rachel had ever heard 
 her utter in Ms favor or otherwise. " He has a 
 good heart," said she, and so kissed Rachel and 
 went away quickly, forgetting Carrie, who was 
 listening by the open window to the Echo Ser- 
 enade. 
 
 " Oh, the little barbarian !" cried she, when 
 she became aware of the neglect. " So she is 
 gone. Has she been quarreling with her tawny 
 lover ? he looked more or less thundery all the 
 evening." 
 
 Rachel had fancied so too, but she had laid 
 the gloom to the rencounter with Mortimer 
 Warleigh, and the probability of his turning up 
 at St. Goar on the morrow, rather than to any 
 fault of Sunshine's. 
 
 The next morning when Rachel and her com- 
 panion went down into the long room to break- 
 fast, there at the top of the table by the open 
 window sat Mortimer Warleigh, himself as fresh 
 as the morning, oontSng his letters, a sheaf of 
 which lay on a plate before him. The sound of 
 their entrance caused him to lift his head, when 
 he immediately sprang up and shook hands with 
 Rachel, expressing the pleasure and surprise 
 that a chance meeting elicits from most persons, 
 not that there was very much cJianee about it, 
 however ; for he had learned from his mother 
 that Rachel and the Ferrand party were all to 
 and fro somewhere in Rhineland. Greetings ex- 
 changed, Rachel made haste to ask him the la- 
 test news from the Hurtlemere House. 
 
 " This letter that I was reading when you came 
 in is from my mother," was his reply, and he 
 turned the document in his hand, glancing down 
 the page as he spoke. After a moment's pause 
 he went on, " My father has taken a sudden turn 
 toward recovery, and she begs me not to hurry 
 home, and to intercept Sir Laurence if I can; 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 127 
 
 but I do not know where he is just now, for it 
 is a week since we partedj^perhaps her own 
 letters may reach him somewhere or else aunt 
 Kate's. I had news from her two days ago at 
 Heidelberg that moderated my anxiety a little, 
 and she wishes me not to cut short my holiday, 
 but I shall make my way home very soon never- 
 theless." 
 
 "Then you have lately come from Heidel- 
 berg ?" said Rachel. A delicate color suffused 
 his face as he answered, yes — it was a nice old 
 town. Naturally he was asked if he had staid 
 there long. Only one night, he replied, and the 
 ingenuous blush deepened. Mortimer was no 
 actor ! If' he had been inquired of why he was 
 here now, he would probably have said because 
 his mother had sent him. 
 
 Breakfast being now brought in, they seated 
 themselves in a. group and prolonged the meal 
 with travelers' tsdk. Mortimer glanced up hur- 
 riedly each time the door opened to see who en- 
 tered ; and good-natured Rachel, knowing well 
 for whom he watched, amiably took occasion to 
 observe by and by that though their friends the 
 Ferrands were at the inn — as perhaps he was 
 aware — they did not come into the public room 
 of a morning, but breakfasted in their own 
 apartments. Just at that moment, as if for the 
 purpose of contradicting her, appeared the doc- 
 tor, followed by Sinclair and there was a renew- 
 al of civilities. 
 
 " I see you have tasted the freshness of the 
 morning," said the doctor. 
 
 " Yes ; I came down by the earliest boat from 
 Bacharach," replied Mortimer. 
 "Sinclair was not disposed to conversation; 
 but his father added cheerfully that if Mortimer 
 Warleigh were remaining at the " Lily," he 
 hoped they should have the pleasure of seeing 
 him again during the day ; he then took a news- 
 paper and two letters from the post-box, and 
 . left the room, when his son, as if suddenly smit- 
 ten with the propriety of being more courteous, 
 invited Mortimer to join him by and by in a walk 
 up the beautiful so-called Swiss Valley across the 
 river. The proposal was accepted with the great- 
 est apparent satisfaction, and that being agreed 
 on, Sinclair followed his father, leaving the other 
 three to continue their interrupted chat. It 
 struck Rachel Withers at once that her friend 
 Sinclair had meaning in his maneuver ; and so it 
 presently turned out. She had heard no talk of 
 any excursion up the Swiss Valley on the pre- 
 vious evening, and when she paid her morning 
 respects with Carrie to Miss Flora and Miss Delia 
 she found that the arrangement included neither 
 the doctor nor his sisters, nor even Sunshine. 
 Palpably, therefore, Sinclair's object was to carry 
 Hbrtimer Warleigh out of Alice's way — a deep 
 design, perhaps, if she had not been bent on 
 circumventing it, but as the event proved, in 
 this instance, shallow exceedingly. 
 
 Mortimer was with the Ferrands' fai^ily party, 
 quite at home and happy, when Rachel and 
 ' Carrie went in ; his hands being at the moment 
 occupied in holding a skein of white lambswool 
 which Miss Delia was busy winding. The doc- 
 tor had his newspaper, Miss Flora her Bible, and 
 Sinclair his Murray; whila' Alice with the slight- 
 est gathering of cloud on her brow was asking 
 in a voidfe'of reproachful remonstrance, "Why 
 may I not go up the Swiss Valley with them, 
 auntie Dee?" - 
 
 " Because, my love, you did rather too much 
 the last time you went on an expedition with- 
 out M, and were quite ill after it," answered 
 Miss Delia with prompt decision. 
 
 " I was tire^' to start then, but I am not tired 
 now — may I go ?" persisted the willful damsel in 
 a more urgent tone. 
 
 " Your aunt Delia said no, Sunshine," inter- 
 posed the doctor; and there the discussion 
 would probably have been at an end had not 
 Mortimer put on a comically pathetic face and 
 pleaded for her, " We could carry her between 
 us if her legs fell short ;" that expression of legs 
 falling short being Alice's old excuse for not 
 going further, than she wished when she was a 
 baby-thing. 
 
 Every body laughed but Sinclair and Alice 
 herself, who immediately asked, " Who told you 
 that saying of mine ?" 
 
 " No one — is it a saying of yours ? So it is- 
 of my sister Clara's too," replied he, " She 
 uses it still when she fancies herself over-driven ; 
 in that we are both indolent alike." 
 
 The skein of lambswool was now reeled off, 
 and the holder was at liberty to depart. Sin- 
 clair made the first move. 
 
 " Come," said he, " the morning is getting 
 on ; we had better start." Mortimer glanced 
 round to the spot where a minute before Alice 
 had been standing, but she had disappeared; 
 so without more loitering or ado the two young 
 men went off together. 
 
 When Sunshine vanished it was only out upon 
 the balcony, where she ensconced herself to 
 watch the boat that would carry Sinclair and 
 Mortimer across the river. Miss Delia being in 
 some displeasure with her for her persistence 
 obtrusively refrained frqm noticing her; but 
 Carrie Martin, whose beguiling tones would 
 sometimes almost melt the hardness out of a 
 flint, addressed herself to the task of comforter; 
 but not, as it proved, with her usual success. 
 Alice fretted and fumed under her taming — or 
 teasing — artifices, and finally escaped them, on 
 pretense of writing a letter, which she left un- 
 finished that she might mend a glove, in its turn 
 dropped that she might seek the doctor who had 
 quitted the room soon after his son ; and thus it 
 came to pass that they all lost sight of her for 
 several hours ; that they sought her in the house 
 and round the house and could find her nowhere. 
 When they saw her next it was positively with 
 Sinclair -and Mortimer, coming up from the 
 landing-place for the boats; and her guilty, 
 half-defiant expression of countenance betrayed 
 in a moment that the willful young thing had 
 had her own way in. spite of her aunts and the 
 
 "'Ite^ have you been all this while, Alice ? 
 we have felt quite uneasy about you," Miss 
 Delia said suspiciously as she appeared. 
 
 " It is all right, aunt Delia — she has been with 
 us," replied Sinclair, in a tone meant to cut dis- 
 cussion short. 
 
 " We espied her wandering disconsolate by 
 the river and turned back for her," added Mor- 
 timer. "We hope to be forgiven our disobe- 
 dience this time ; she is not over-fatigued, as 
 you may see." 
 
 No, she did not look over-fatigued, nor yet, 
 though she had had her walk up the valley, did 
 she look perfectly happy after it. Miss Delia 
 would have felt herself neglecting a duty had 
 
128 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 she not deliyered herself of a rebuke or two, 
 and this, being really vexed, she did with so 
 much coldness, that poor Alice never spoke 
 once during dinner and ate like a mere sparrow, 
 grieving her aunts more and more. And when 
 evening came she had what Mi^ Delia called 
 one of her moods. 
 
 The women folk had returned to the saloon 
 after dinner, leaving the three gentlemen to 
 their conversation and pipes below, when Alice 
 went out into the balcony by herself and there 
 remained, silent and solitary. Miss Flora sug- 
 gested that she should be let alone, whispering 
 that the low fit would have its time ; and then 
 they fell to talking of other things and almost 
 forgot her until the Echo Serenade drew them 
 out into the twilight to listen. She had gather- 
 ed herself up into a corner of the balcony and 
 took no notice of any of them until Eachel, 
 thinking to rouse her, put an arm round her 
 shoulders, and made some indifferent remark 
 on the soft beauty of the evening. Alice was 
 leaning her face downward, and suddenly by 
 the falling of a scalding drop on her hand which 
 rested before her on the balustrade, Eachel 
 found out that she was crying — and tears from 
 Alice were a most rare and singular effusion. 
 
 "Don't, don't," she sobbed, and turned so 
 determinedly away from any attempt at conso- 
 lation that Rachel judged it expedient to foUow 
 Miss Flora's advice, and let her alone in her 
 mood. Soon after she left her retreat, and kiss- 
 ing her aunts told them she was going to bed. 
 Uo remonstrance was raised; only Miss Flora 
 said, " Tes, my darling ; you have over-exert- 
 ed yourself to-day, and a long sleep will do you 
 good," but as soon as she disappeared the ten- 
 der-hearted old lady added with a sigh : " I 
 should not be surprised if that child cried 
 through half the night." 
 
 " What began it ? Did any body speak to 
 her beside myself? She never frets for my 
 scoldings," said Miss Delia visibly aggrieved. 
 " What can it be that brings on these extraor- 
 dinary paroxysms of distress ?" 
 
 "It is of no use to speculate,'' responded 
 Miss Flora. " It is a mystery of nature, but I 
 did hope they were over and done with now. 
 Mr. Wilson used to assure us she would grow 
 out of her delusions, but they are more fixed 
 than ever!" 
 
 " She is an interesting study," here observed 
 Carrie Martin, " there is a very strange look in 
 her eyes at certain moments." 
 
 " What do you mean, my dear ? We have 
 seen nothing peculiar in them unless it be their 
 beauty," said Miss Flora with an animation 
 bordering on affront. ^^^^ 
 
 Carrie made haste to explain. ^/f^^ 
 
 " They are beautiful eyes," answered she ; 
 " very beautiful — dreamy and loving one mo-^ 
 inent and all caprice' and sparkle the next. 
 But the expression I mean never struck me so 
 forcibly in any face as it does now and then in 
 hers — it is the puzzled, painful, faraway, sekMng 
 gaze of some one striving vainly to rememher." 
 " She is full of faucigs, poor pet ; full of un- 
 accountable fancies," said Miss Flora sympathe- 
 tically ; "but we always entreat that they may 
 not be commented on to herself We attach 
 as little importance to them as possible our- 
 selves ; for we find they vanish soonest when 
 
 not reasoned upon. She will be hdrself again 
 to-morrow." -f 
 
 This closed the fionyersation ; for the doctor 
 and Sinclair appearing, they inquired for Ahce, 
 and being told that she was gone tired to bed, 
 prayers were read, and the rest followed her 
 example. Carrie Martin, with her knowledge 
 of psychology and her habits of shrewd observa- 
 tion, had, however, laid her hand upon a fact. 
 There was a chord in Sunshine's memory that 
 had begun, after long silence, to vibrate anew, 
 as she felt darkly along it to discover by what 
 it hung. Unconsciously even to herself, it hung 
 by Mortimer Warleigh, and a chance word from 
 him would set it painfully thrilling. As her 
 heart grew and ripened, the thought of her fa- 
 ther in the core of it became more real and liv- 
 ing to her than ever ; and she ^d no one — no 
 one to whom she m^htnitter it ! Even Sinclair, 
 dear Sinclair, who loved the very ground she 
 walked on, and set a value even on her shoe- 
 tie, rallied her over that, and tried to laugh her 
 out of it as a delusion. For all her seeming joy 
 and happiness there was often a heavy ground- 
 swell of sorrow and unsatisfied yearning below, 
 the sunny flow of the deep waters ; and not- 
 withstanding all discouragements both from 
 within and from* without, her faith never waver- 
 ed. She held her peace, but when she appear- 
 ed most to have forgotten, perhaps then she 
 remembered the best. 
 
 The next day she was very quiet and silent 
 after her mood of passionate gloom ; she looked 
 tired, restless, uneasy ; but it was safest to leave 
 her to herself, those said who knew her best ; 
 if she spoke at all it would be to Sinclair, and 
 of her own accord ; but for the present she 
 seemed intent on nothing so much as on the 
 avoidance of every body — Sinclair not excepted. 
 Miss Deha had a conversation with Rachel Wi- 
 thers about her protigee during that morning's 
 walk, which interested her exceedingly. She 
 had never before heard any particulars of the 
 poor child's recovery from that illness, brought 
 on by cruelty, cold, and exposure which ensued 
 on her adoption into the household at Brook- 
 fall ; for it was not a subject that her benefac- 
 tresses were fond of reviving. Indeed Miss 
 Delia now confessed that it had been their en- 
 deavor from the first to obliterate all traces of 
 a painful past from the child's memory. She 
 was discouraged from speaking of the period 
 before she escaped from Welsbeck, or of any 
 former recollections at all ; and as a very young 
 memory is not tenacious of names, or of any 
 thing but what may be styled picture-events, 
 most of what had befallen her before she was 
 put into the charge.of Mr. Gilsland and his wife 
 was undoubtedly lost. But one fixed idea. Miss 
 Delia acknowledged, she had retained for years ; 
 indeed, she was sure that in her secret heart 
 she had not relinquished it even yet ; and this 
 was that her father, for whom she was in mourn- 
 ing when Sinclair foimd her on the down and 
 brought her to Brookfall, was not dead. 
 
 " It was for her obstinate persistence in this 
 denial that Mrs. Gilsland had beaten her," Miss 
 Deha said, as she told her tale. " It is a long 
 while ago, and many things begin to slip my 
 memory ; but my strong impression is that the 
 poor little innocent was ill-used for asserting 
 that her dear papa was alive, in spite of all Mr. 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 129 
 
 Gilsland's solemn asauranoes to the contrary. 
 Sunshine's ways were no doubt very provoking, 
 but it was not a very sagacious means they 
 adopted to drive out her belief; for it ended by 
 stamping it on her heart Indelibly. Years after 
 when Flora and I were speaking" to her of God 
 and the future life, reminding her of her dear 
 father and mother gone before her»to heaven, 
 we were deeply grieved to hear her murmuring 
 to herself, " All the same, papa is not dead ;" 
 though she never openly braved us with the as- 
 sertion as she did the Gilslands. When she 
 has her moods now it is that idea, I am per- 
 suaded, that is at the foundation of them ; and 
 most distressing it is ; (pr such a strong and stea- 
 dy delusion amounts almost to monomania ; 
 and for all we can see, it increases upon •'her." 
 
 " It never occurred to you, cTid it, Miss Delia, 
 that Alice might have right and reason for what 
 she believed ?" said Rachel, on the inspiration 
 of the moment. Miss Delia looked at her as if 
 she thought she too might have taken leaVe of 
 her senses. 
 
 " My dear Rachel, I did not expect to hear 
 ■^uch an absurd question from you," was her 
 reply. " Of course it never did. How should 
 it ? I do not read romances to pervert my 
 judgment of facts. I take all things for what 
 they are." 
 
 Rachel held her peace ; and felt almost asham- 
 ed of her suggestion. 
 
 The next day there Vfas arranged an explor- 
 ing party over the hills beyond the Castle, in- 
 cluding every body but Miss Delia, who kept to 
 her w'ord of going on no more excursions, and 
 was apparently quite satisfied to be left in the 
 company of her Isnitting, her miscellaneous 
 work-basket, and her good book. The party 
 was provided with a baggage donkey to carry 
 the luncheon, and with two supernumeraries for 
 any body to mount who might fall tired by 
 the way. — ^Miss Flora and Carrie Martin im- 
 plied; but even they started on foot like the 
 rest. 
 
 In the golden prime of the morning they set 
 out. It was the beginning of one of those days 
 when old folks feel young again, and young ones 
 ought to doubt whether there be any pain, grief, 
 misery, wickedness in a world so fair. The 
 gossamer sparkled on the low bushes, and the 
 dew in the shady nooks about them, while^er- 
 head the sky shone, one calm, cloudless e^mse 
 of blue. And withal there was a stir in the air 
 as of innumerable wings — wings of zephyrs 
 that cooled deliciously the rosy cheek of Mid- 
 summer, which but for their gentle fanning must 
 have blazed in a sultry languor of blushes ere 
 noon. 
 
 Alice was not quite sunshiny, but 
 clearer weather with her than it had be: 
 two days past. She quietly possessed hei 
 Sinclair's arm, aifd Mortimer Warleigh 
 them, with or without a welcome. Thei 
 doctor lent his sister his aid in mounting 
 hill, whUe Carrie and Rachel strolled after ; the 
 donkeys bringing up the rear. 
 
 " You may think what you like, Rachel," sud- 
 denly began her companion as they followed 
 some twenty paces behind Alice and her two 
 friends ; "but that child and Sinclair Ferrand 
 I ■ 
 
 are profoundly and inseparably attached to each 
 other. Look how unconsciously she applies to 
 him, now she has come to herself again, as if 
 she had gotten to her rest. You fancy she has 
 a budding tenderness for that beautiful young 
 Warleigh, and there is a strain of caprice in her 
 manner that might mislead him too, but it does 
 not mean love. I should be angry with her if 
 she could prefer him to her tawny Hon — he is a 
 noble fellow." 
 
 " Well," replied Rachel, long since unsettled 
 in her opinions by Carrie's persistence ; " I 
 wish you may be right. Sinclair has served 
 for her these twelve years, and there is no 
 question as to which would love her most con- 
 stantly." 
 
 " Nor which is best worth loving. He has a 
 poetical, gentle character, that Mortimer, but 
 he has no courage, no fortitude to boast of. He 
 dreams of his wishes, — for they are too weak 
 to be called desires, and too indistinct to be 
 called hopes, — and in a little while they fade out 
 before him like roseate reflections of clouds in 
 water. Let him be ever so rich — ^and I by no 
 means despise rank and wealth — it would not 
 be a white day for Alice if she won him. What 
 is it that haunts her imagination and makes her 
 always of such an uncertain and divided mind, 
 Rachel ?" 
 
 The question came upon Rachel too imexpeot- 
 edly to be fenced off with skill ; Alice's delu- 
 sions were not explained by her benefactresses 
 to indifferent persons, and Rachel knew that 
 they preferred them to be as little known as 
 possible ; so she hesita^d, stammered and end- 
 ed by evading the inquiry with a pretense that 
 she did not know what Carrie meant. Carrie 
 saw through her feeble fiction and immediately 
 added : " Oh, never mind ; I had no right to 
 ask. But it is so much my habit to observe 
 that I can not for the life of me help seeing how, ' 
 beyond and above all daily pleasures and pains, 
 the child has some vision that holds her in- a ca- 
 pricious bondage. Her heart is half its time 
 pondering over a mystery, dim and hard to in- 
 temret. She has a secret hope and expectancy ; 
 ^M^ often when no one is watching her, and she 
 seems idly dreaming in the sun or reveling in 
 the sweet air, she is looking and straining out to 
 catch this film of fancy — or it may be of fact — 
 which floats always just beyond her reach." 
 
 "It never occurred to me that you were a 
 witch before, Carrie !" exclaimed Rachel laugh- 
 ing, but surprised at her penetration. 
 
 "Witch, nonsense!" repeated Carrie. "I 
 can add this and that together. I have heard 
 the story of her adoption at Brookfallr from 
 Mary Cornwell, and it is my opinion and always 
 was that she is no more akin tQ^Mr.- Gilsland 
 than you are. Mary thought so too. You see, 
 "achel, I am not afraid of speaking out." 
 
 Pray, don't spealrtut to any body else !" 
 ■ Rachel. " It would do far more harm than 
 ; if you will have it, — that is Alice's own 
 Ision. But no one regards it besides. Do 
 discreet, Carrie, and hold your peace here." 
 " So be it; let us talk of something else," re- 
 joined her companion ; and sheering off from 
 personal matters altogether, she began to speak 
 of a new German novel she was reading. But 
 what she had said before sank into Rachel's 
 
 mma. 
 
130 
 
 ANNIS "WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 They were walking along a winding road be- 
 twixt open fields that waved luxuriant with corn ; 
 the flower wag off the wheat, the ears were full, 
 and the sun had given them the first pale tinge 
 that a few weeks would enrich to a deep golden 
 brown. It was a wide expanse, with hills of 
 dun violet hue in the distance : a lovely scene 
 at any season, but at this the loveliest. On the 
 right the fields were fringed with wood growing 
 up a steep ; and as they went farther, the road 
 bending toward it, they looked down upon a 
 sweet curve of a narrow secluded valley. Bound 
 and round whirled a great mill-wheel in the 
 dazzling sunlight below, the diamond spray fly- 
 ing from it in showers, and the whirr, whirr, 
 floating up to where they stood with a softened, 
 pastoral rhythm. 
 
 " If we could get down into that valley !" 
 suggested Mortimer Warleigh, smitten by its 
 peaceful charm. 
 
 That did not seem impossible. Indeed, twice 
 since they set out on their wanderings they had 
 observed cart-roads across the fields to the wood, 
 which no doubt led down into the glen if follow- 
 ed far enough ; so they went on and on ; some- 
 times leaning away from it as the road lent, then 
 wending back to it again, until they reached a 
 farm and a green meadow dotted with trees — 
 the advance-guard of a thick copse that extended 
 before them with the highway running through 
 it. Oh ! the cool shadow and pleasantness of 
 it when they struck in under the dense foliage ; 
 and the donkeys being tethered with enough 
 grazing freedom, they^l sat down in a group 
 to rest. 
 
 " City life for those who like it, but give me 
 liberty and sylvan delights !" exclaimed Morti- 
 mer Warleigh, and stretched himself at ease 
 under a spreadmg tree. 
 
 Opposite to him was Alice leaning against a 
 mossy hillock, her hat in her lap, and her waved 
 brown hair uncovered. Rachel could not help 
 watching her and meditating on Carrie Martin's 
 strange suggestions. She was not talkatively 
 inclined, and to judge from the perplexed gravr 
 ity of her face, before they had been seated;<five 
 minutes she was sunk in a deep reverie ! her 
 mind going step by step through some slow pro- 
 cess of thought. This mood was better than her 
 passionate one, but it was not quite the most 
 suitable mood in which to go a-gipsying. 
 
 " Wake up, Alice," cried the doctor once in 
 his stirring tones, but though her eyes did lift 
 themselves vaguely for a moment they were 
 immediately down on the grass again and vailed 
 in mute meditation. Miss Flora intimated that 
 she was not to be teased, and for the next half- 
 hour she might have been asleep for any sign of 
 wakefulness she showed; though the doctor, 
 Mortimer, Carrie and the rest got into an ani- 
 mated talk about pastojal poets and poets 
 general, which at another time would have h 
 silvered with her liveliest prattle ; for Sunsh 
 had a very pretty taste in poetry and in all wi 
 of imagination and fancy. 
 
 When they struck their tents to journey ol 
 Miss Flora and Carrie after a few modest ex- 
 cuses, availed themselves of the donkeys that 
 had followed in their train with a view to their 
 falling tired by- the way ; and Alice slid her hand 
 under Rachel's arm, whispering her to come on 
 in advance, which she submissively did, al' 
 
 dlg^- 
 
 witting of the entertainment preparing for her. 
 When they had gained about a couple of hundred 
 yards before the rest of the party Alice said 
 without the slightest circumlocution, 
 
 " Don't talk to me, Rachel, I want to think" 
 "' You have hurried me out of breath, so that 
 I could not talk if I would," rejoined Rachel, 
 shortly. Alice thereupon gave her a little rally- 
 ing shake to restore her and slackened her pace, 
 falling presently into such a lazy lounge that all 
 the party were enabled to repass them. 
 
 "Don't be left behind," said the doctor, ad- 
 monishing them as he went by last with Carrie 
 Martin and his son. Rachel bade him not be 
 anxious, promising to k^ep them in sight, but 
 inly wishing Alice's vagaries were less obnoxious 
 to remark. She had not a word for her as they 
 loitered on; her mouth shut, her brow knit. 
 With her alpenstock which she carried rather un- 
 necessarily here, she apparently marked off the 
 different stages of her reflections, striking it on 
 the ground now and then with sudden emphasis. 
 Once or twice she sighed, threw back her head, 
 and inhaled a long breath like a person thorough- _ 
 ly wearied, bewildered, and perplexed. Their" 
 Rachel ventured to ask her what she was think- 
 ing about, but she was only bidden to be quiet 
 for reply ; and this went on for a mile or more, 
 when they saw Sinclair waiting in the distance 
 to be their guide through the wood into the 
 valley ; the rest having already disappeared 
 down a rough, narrow track which would just 
 allow the donkeys to pass and that hardly. It 
 was a very stony road, needing all their caution 
 and occasionally Sinclair's assistance, so that 
 by and by Alice was shaken out of her silent fit 
 and reduced to the proper use of her tongue. 
 The first laugh she indulged in broke the spell 
 completely ; and at length, when down by the 
 pathway came tinkling the merry little brook of 
 the valley, her sunshine burst out, and she be- 
 gan to sing with all her heart in her voice some' 
 stanzas of Tennyson's beautiful song, — 
 
 1- 
 I come from haunts of coot and hern, 
 
 I make a sudden sally, 
 And sparkle out among the fern. 
 
 To bicker down a valley. 
 
 I chatter over stony ways 
 In little sharps and trebles, 
 
 I bubble into eddying bays, 
 I babble on the pebbles. 
 
 I murmur under moon and stars 
 
 In brambly wildernesses ; 
 I linger by my shingly bars, 
 
 I loiter round my cresses. 
 
 4. 
 And in and out I curve and flow. 
 
 To join the brimming river. 
 For men may come and men may go, 
 
 But I go on for ever. 
 
 10 was herself again an8 more blithe and 
 lie than she had been since the first evening 
 J St. Goar. She seemed just to have flung the 
 cloud behind her by an effort of will ; she was 
 strong and sound-hearted enough to cast off 
 gloom when it would not come clear ; and how- 
 ever perversely fate might turn and twist her 
 fortunes, she would still have a fortune left in a 
 healthy, happy nature. Sinclair now staid 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 131 
 
 with her and Rachel, and they hastened or ling- 
 ered just as it pleased them. By and by Alice 
 linked her hand in his arm, and so they went on 
 until they emerged into the farm-yard of one of 
 th« mills. Crossing this, and a little intervening 
 meadow, they came out into the road that ran 
 through the glen, and saw their party traveling 
 leisurely forward in front. Before they could 
 overtake them a halt was called ; Miss Flora and 
 Carrie dismounted, and with Mortimer's assist- 
 ance passed the brook on stepping-stones to 
 take refuge on a charming little knoll at the edge 
 of the copse, which crept all the way up the hill 
 on that side of the valley. And here luncheon 
 was spread. 
 
 The moment Alice and her companions re- 
 joined the others. Miss Flora saw that her Sun- 
 shine was her brightest self again, and calling 
 the dear child to sit beside her she made pre- 
 tense of fastening her collar, smoothing her 
 hair, and by other unobtrusively tender demon- 
 strations intimated to her capricious darling the 
 .s.itisfaction she felt in the change. Her gloom 
 being gone, she became the pleasantness of the 
 afternoon to every body. It was marvelous what 
 a difference her altered mood made in the gen- 
 eral effect of the day's enjoyment. If she had 
 been grave to the end, most of the party would 
 h^ve gone back to their inn feeling that they 
 had had but a dull time of it. 
 
 Luncheon was gone through with lazy enjoy- 
 ment ; then Mortimer Warleigh brought out his 
 wandering sketch-book, and would draw all his 
 friends in their attitudes of ease ; but the most 
 picturesque part of the group turned out to be 
 the donkey-boys, regaling on the fragments of 
 the feast, with their donkeys picketed beside 
 them. Next the doctor told an adventure of 
 his travels in Germany when he made the grand 
 tour as a young man, and traveling was not so 
 easy as it is nowadays ; and finally Alice and Car- 
 rte sang a duet — such sweet singing as astonished 
 the miller and his men, and brought them out 
 into the blazing sun to listen. They let the time 
 slip by now as idly as it would, for they were 
 within two miles of their inn ; and without a 
 single adverse incident to mar the pleasure of 
 the day, they reached it at dusk, to find Miss 
 Delia waiting with a heavy German tea in prep- 
 aration, and the fairies helping her at her knit- 
 ting, for her needles were still briskly click, 
 clicking, though it was impossible she could see. 
 
 On the following day there was a second sep- 
 aration amongst the travelers. Mortimer War- 
 leigh went down to Bonn to stay with his broth- 
 er Roderick ; Dr. Ferrand and his party pro- 
 ceeded to Coblentz; and Rachel and Carrie 
 Martin remained on at St. Goar, awaiting the 
 arrival of expected letters. But there 
 general understanding that they should aV 
 again at Remagen in three or four days if 
 ing unforeseen occtlrred to prevent it. 
 
 The Ferrands were the first to arrive tl 
 and as they walked up from the landing-pli 
 a thoroughly happy-looldng group of pleasant 
 English gentlefolks — a solitary man who was 
 sitting, with no other company than his pipe in 
 the garden of the inn overlooking the river 
 watched tljem with the lazy sort of interest that 
 a Briton abroad commonly feels in his lellow- 
 
 country people. The season was not fully begun 
 and the rush of Rhine tourists had not yet set 
 in, so that this family party had a peculiar 
 attraction. Sir Laurence Warleigh — for he it 
 was — had had his inn to himself for a day and a 
 night, but these travelers were clearly making 
 for its hospitable shelter, as he saw from the 
 man in attendance on their baggage. As they 
 passed below the garden trellis he endeavored 
 to interpret their relationship ; the father and 
 son were easy to label, but neither of the aunts 
 looked at all like mamma, and the stately, 
 bright-visaged girl, whose russet brown hair 
 had escaped from its net and the shelter of her 
 hat, and was streaming down her back in luxu- 
 riant negligence, was evidently not of their kith 
 and kin. 
 
 Miss Delia was marching on independently in 
 front — there was briskness in the old lady's 
 step yet, notwithstanding her sixty years ; Miss 
 Flora had possession of the doctor's arm, and 
 Alice and Sinclair were bringing up the rear ; 
 he with a plaid flung over his shoulder and she 
 with another. The solitary observant man heard 
 her voice speaking as she went by, and some- 
 thing in the tone of it and in her air reminded 
 him- indefinably of his lost Helena. He stood 
 up and leant forward to look after her as she 
 vanished round the comer of the house to where 
 was the entrance, and then fell intoa long dream 
 of his darling and his poor little wildling as the 
 smoke of his pipe curled up in the blue summer 
 air. 
 
 He had found a letter at Mayence yesterday 
 arresting his hurried journey homeward on his 
 brother Oliver's account, and his previous plan 
 of travel having been broken by the hasty sum- 
 mons that had brought him thus far on his way 
 to England, he had come on to Remagen, which 
 he had liked on a former occasion when he staid 
 there during his earliest wanderings of all, 
 while Sir William Warleigh was still livmg and 
 he was an exile from home and friends. Hardly 
 more an exile than he was now, however, for 
 his life was for the most part lonely. He was 
 staying at the drowsy little village speculatiijg 
 on the chance of being rejoined by Mortimer, 
 who had gone away from him in some haste 
 while they were at Munich. His nephew and 
 he had unfortunately few tastes or pursuits in 
 common, and Mortimer had no notion of exert- 
 ing himself to cultivate such as pleased his 
 uncle. When he became weary Sir Laurence 
 let him go without remonstrance or complaint, 
 though the lad's company was pleasant to him. 
 He had tried to attach Mortimer to himself by 
 every act of generous kindness, but had failed — 
 failed,that is, for all practical purposes. Theo- 
 retically the young man loved, admired, respect- 
 ed Sir Laurence, but he could not live with him 
 ir longer than a week at a time without feeling 
 strain on his powers of exertion intolerable, 
 lat evening Sir Laurence had the great 
 of the inn quite to himself; the new 
 irs did not enter it, but esconced themselves 
 little salon adjoining, where was a piano, 
 on which in the twilight Alice played some soft, 
 low, reverie music. He went out into the bal- 
 cony for his smoke and listened till it ceased ; 
 and when the dark was falling out came the 
 young man of the party and the sunny-faoed 
 girl, with him, and stood not far off whispering 
 
132 
 
 ANNIS WAELBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 together. Sir Laurence said to liimself as Came 
 Martin had said on a former similar occasion, 
 " Lovers," and carried his pipe away to a bench 
 in the garden. But all that night and till long 
 past the midnight, thoughts of Helena and Annis 
 haunted him as they had not done for years ; 
 and on the morrow, to get away from melan- 
 choly, he took the first boat on to Cologne, and 
 the strange fate that had brought him within 
 reach of his wildling for a few hours drifted 
 them asunder again as far as ever. 
 
 The same afternoon Rachel Withers and her 
 traveling companion arrived at Remagen to find 
 that all their friends were just gone out for a 
 drive ; but in a couple of hours' time they re- 
 turned, refreshed and unfatigued by what Miss 
 Delia announced as the most charming little 
 outing she had enjoyed since they had entered 
 the Rhineland. It had been a long, straight 
 drive by the river. 
 
 But Rachel Withers was tired and out of 
 sorts. Carrie Martin had been speculating all 
 round the mystery of Alice's delusions as they 
 came down the river from St. Goar, and an in- 
 explicable weight and oppression had descended 
 on Rachel's mind in consequence. She felt a 
 vague presentiment that something was going 
 to happen. She tried to think there must be 
 thunder in the air and said so, but her manner 
 was nervous and absent.' 
 
 " You are not looking your best, Rachel ; 
 what ails you ?" were Miss Delia's observant 
 words as they exchanged greetings, warning her 
 to put off whatever traces of perplexing thought 
 overshadowed her countenance. The ready and 
 in this instance genuine plea of a slight head- 
 ache checked further remarks, and the old lady 
 having prescribed a cup of strong tea and the 
 amusement of light gossip after it, hustled Ra^ 
 chel before her into the little salon. Here Sun- 
 shine came to her blithe as a bird, asking if she 
 had nothing to say to her, and protesting that 
 she had not so much as given her a kiss or wish- 
 ed her good-day. These omissions were speedily 
 rectified, but the charge was just — Rachel had 
 Alice so much in her mind that she had over- 
 looked her actual presence. 
 
 "And you have had bad news — you are wor- 
 ried," then said Alice, holding Rachel's face be- 
 tween her two soft hands, and peering at her 
 with a kindly scrutiny. 
 
 " I have had no news good, bad or indiffer- 
 ent," was the answer. " I ought to have had a 
 letter from John or from Katherine this morn- 
 ing, but there was no letter at all." 
 
 " Let Rachel alone, Alice ; i^ nobody to be 
 allowed a mood but yourself ?" cried Miss Delia. 
 " Come, my dear, and have a cup of tea — the 
 best remedy in the world for a headache. 
 Open the window, Sinclair, and let us enjoy as 
 much as we can of the river breezes. TI 
 evening is very sultry." 
 
 And then they gathered round the tab] 
 group of perfectly commonplace people,; 
 talked over their cups the commonplace tal 
 holiday-travelers, till the urn had ceasei 
 hiss, and the OTtening sunshine faded into pur- 
 ple reflections on the hills beyond the river; till 
 the moon rose silvering the long ripples, and 
 the last steamboat dropped a single passenger 
 and went by on its way to Cologne. 
 
 This one passenger turned out to be Mortimer 
 
 Warleigh. When Miss Delia and Miss Flora 
 resigned themselves into easy chairs after tea 
 and the doctor imitated their laudible example, 
 Alice and Carrie had begun to sing duets ; then 
 Sinclair, whose base was magnificent, joined 
 them in a glee, until the music brought a furtive 
 group of listeners out upon the. balcony and 
 under it in the road — ^Mortimer amongst them. 
 He took the privilege of a friend abroad, and 
 looking in at the open window he asked how 
 every body did and if he might join them ; and 
 permission being granted, as a matter of course, 
 he entered the salon and was one with them for 
 the rest of the evening. He had been there 
 but a few miniltes when there came a knock at 
 the door and the landlord presented himself 
 with the official volume in which all persona 
 resting a night at an inn must inscribe their 
 names. Before writing his own, Mortimer 
 glanced up the page at those already there, and 
 notified his discovery of his uncle's by exclaim- 
 ing, "Oh! Rachel Withers, Sir Laurence was 
 here last night — did you see him ?" 
 
 " No ; we only arrived at Remagen this after- 
 noon," was Rachel's reply. 
 
 Mortimer then questioned the landlord as to 
 Sir Laurence's coming and going, and bemg 
 told that his destination was Cologne, he wrote 
 a few hues for which a messenger was to be 
 found swifter than the post, who would seek 
 him at the most likely hotels and give him the 
 letter, unless he had gone on his way and was 
 already out of reach. 
 
 It was a pity and very singular. Miss Delia 
 observed, condoling with the young man, that 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh should have passed his 
 nephew on his homeward road without meeting, 
 when a, meeting would have been so pleasant. 
 She had often been struck, she said, by the 
 strange, hair's-breadth disappointments that 
 people encounter in this world ; doubtless there 
 was a providential design in them, though to 
 the weak in faith they seemed so useless and 
 contradictory. She went on in her moral strain 
 a long while, nobody listening very attentively 
 to her platitudes except Rachel, who always 
 lent her ears good-naturedly to a neglected 
 speaker ; but how much more would the good 
 old lady have marveled at the inscrutable com- 
 plexity of human affairs could she have known 
 who had been within sight and speech of Alice 
 last night, and had gone on his unconscious 
 way this morning ! 
 
 When Mortimer Warleigh joined the party 
 the music had given place to conversation, and 
 on lights being brought in presently, Rachel 
 noticed that Alice shrunk into the shade and 
 bent her face low over a book. '" Just then Miss 
 Flora gently terminated her sister's sermonette 
 by saying, 
 
 '' I think you once told us, Rachel, that Sir 
 -enoe Warleigh married a Miss Gwynne, did 
 ' ot ? I knew a Mrs. Gwynne slightly some 
 ago." 
 
 es, she was a young Roman Catholic lady, 
 orphan ; she lived with her grandmother at 
 » place called Everham in Surrey, before her 
 marriage," replied Rachel. 
 
 When Miss Flora asked her simple question 
 Alice started, and now intense listening was ex- 
 pressed in every line of her face. 
 
 "Ah, then she must have been" Helena — 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 133 
 
 our old friend's grandchild !" cried Miss Delia. 
 " Mrs. Gwynne was one of the Talboys of Dor- 
 setshire — she was a strong Papist, but a good 
 woman in her way." 
 
 "Sir Laurence's young wife was called He- 
 lena ; she was a beautiful creature — I knew and 
 loTed her dearly," said Rachel. 
 
 " And her father would be James Gwynne — 
 he was in the Navy," went on Mias Delia. " He 
 was the last of the Surrey branch; there are 
 two or three Gwynnea left in Dorsetshire, but 
 the family is dwindling out." And this in- 
 formation the genealogical old lady followed up 
 with a long prose on the antiquity and dignity 
 of the race which had twice intermarried with 
 the Ferrands. 
 
 " Sir Laurence's wife was not kindly received 
 amongst his friends ; indeed, I believe they 
 never acknowledged her at all," interposed 
 Mortimer. " Qld Mrs. Damer Warleigh of 
 Bristowe stood her friend, but the rest neglect- 
 ed her. It was a cruel shame ; why should a 
 man not marry to please himself? However, 
 she died very soon, and then they were sorry. 
 My uncle Laurence loves her memory to this 
 day. They had one child, a little girl, whom I 
 can just remember ; a passionate, wild little 
 creature, who was sent to my mother to be 
 taken care of. "We both had the scarlet fever 
 together at Hastings, and she died." 
 
 At this instant Rachel Withers happened to 
 look toward Alice, who was watching the speak- 
 er with intent wide-open eyes ; her - lips dumb 
 but breathless and apart, as if her heart were 
 panting m an agony of vehement, suppressed 
 emotion. Carrie Martin also was observing 
 Her ; observing her with the keen scrutiny of a 
 person bent on following a secret into its re- 
 motest ramifications for the pure love of a ro- 
 mantic mystery. 
 
 " Family disunion is very much to be de- 
 plored," said Miss Delia; "but it is not often 
 repented of until repentance is too late." 
 
 " Nearly eleven o'clock, AUce !" here cried 
 the doctor, nipping his sister's fresh preachment 
 in the bud. "All out, eleven o'clock, I de- 
 clare !" appealing to his watch. " Time for 
 early birds to be gone to roost when there is a 
 long flight before them in the morning." 
 
 "Time for all of us," said Miss Flora ; " I had 
 no idea it was so late." And ten minutes after 
 good-nights were said and all had dispersed to 
 their several apartments. 
 
 On the stairs Alice kissed Rachel, who could 
 not but feel how cold was her face and how 
 tremulous Ker hps. The poor excited girl would 
 fain have continued with her the subject that 
 had been cut short below, but Rachel was weary, 
 she did not know what was impending, and she 
 lOnged for peace and seclusion in her own room. 
 She left Alice at her door, therefore, and wis^,,,, 
 ing her happy dreams with a feigned careffig|^' 
 ness, passed forward and left her standing 'Out- 
 side with a wistful disappointment in herj eyes 
 as she watched her disappear. Rachel was ajjgry 
 with herself for her coldness, and leisurely tln^ 
 dressing she had time to think the matter over 
 and to reflect on the probable complexion of 
 tliose happy dreams she had wished the child ; 
 and tingling with self-reproach she at length de- 
 termined to go to her, though with what inten- 
 tion she had no distinct idea. 
 
 Not receiving any answer to her first cautious 
 knock, she turned the handle of the door ; it 
 yielded and she went in, calling softly, " Alice, 
 Alice, where are you ?" for she did not see her, 
 her candle being out, and only the moonlight 
 shining into the room. She was not in bed nor 
 made ready for it; she was kneeling on the 
 floor near the window, weeping convulsively, 
 and when Rachel put her arm round her to lift 
 her up, her whole frame was quivering and 
 shaken by the violence of her sobs. " Alice, 
 darling, what is it? what ails you ?" she asked 
 entreatingly. But AUce would give her no an- 
 swer then except, "Let me be — leave me; I 
 want to be by myself," though she grew calmer 
 by and by when she found Rachel persisted in 
 not leaving her until she was safe on her pillow. 
 That achieved she would have made haste to be 
 gone, but Alice would not then suffer her to 
 escape so easily. 
 
 " Rachel, you know what troubles me, I see 
 you do," said she, with earnest lips. " Don't 
 tell me like all the rest of the world that I am 
 under delusions — they are not delusions. They 
 are more real and more precious to me than all 
 on earth beside, except one thing and that is 
 dear Sinclair's love." 
 
 " I will not tell you they are delusions, Alice, 
 for I begin to think there must be something in 
 them," responded Rachel. 
 
 " You do! Oh, bless you, Rachel, for those 
 good words !" and AUce gave her an energetic 
 embrace, and fell to weeping in an ecstasy. 
 Poor Rachel, sober by nature, and long set by 
 habit in calm, quiet ways, was terribly puzzled 
 and perplexed by the outbursts of more passion- 
 ate characters. She could only sit by watching 
 and wondering and wishing they were over, as 
 she did now, until Alice with a sigh as drawn up 
 from the very depths of her soul, sobbed out, 
 " I can be patient now — 1 only wish it were 
 Sinclair who believed instead of you. May I 
 tell him what you have said ? * From you it will 
 come like words of truth and soberness — me he 
 laughs at even how. Oh, Rachel, how you have 
 gladdened my heart !" 
 
 " Darling, what have I done ?" asked Rachel, 
 half frightened at the effect of her unconsidered 
 words. "I can not help you — perhaps I am 
 only one goose the more for saying what I have 
 said. If there be any thing secret it wUl come 
 out in the end. Let ine say good-night, now ; 
 if you want any more talk about it, stay till to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " But I may tell Sinclair ; I must — I always 
 do," urged Alice, still detaining her. 
 
 " Very well, and he wiU laugh at me 'too, no 
 doubt — ^perhaps, even, he will be displeased. I 
 can not help it if he be, it has been creeping 
 into my mind for some time past that your de- 
 lusions are not all frost-work of fancy. Some 
 of them may be unreal, but I honestly beUeve 
 there is a truth at the root of them." Rachel 
 made this profession of her faith with a sort of 
 reckless determination, and having made it she 
 •(Would not have hesitated about, repeating it, had 
 the occasion offered, either to the aunts or to 
 Mr. Gilsland himself! Alice kissed her again 
 with crazy enthusiasm, overwhelmed her with 
 expressions of gratitude, and would hardly let 
 her go. Rachel was the first person who had 
 given her a gleam of hope and encouragement. 
 
134 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 and it was with a lieart full almost to agony 
 that she lay down at last, sobbing, " Oh ! papa, 
 dear papa, I shall see you again, though the 
 time be ever so long !" 
 
 The traces of Alice's passionate emotion were 
 left on her face the next morning, and the ex- 
 cursion that had been planned for the day was 
 deferred by common consent until the morrow. 
 
 " She has had one of her most violent moods 
 last night ; I see it in her eyes, but she looks 
 exalted nevertheless ; what can she have taken 
 into her head now, I wonder ?" murmured Miss 
 Delia in distressed anxiety. 
 
 The speculation troubled Sinclair too ; he saw 
 she had wept a flood, and that now she was 
 singing in her heart rejoicings over some mys- 
 terious source of gladhess. By and by, after 
 luncheon, he invited her to come out into the 
 air, and they wandered away alone by the river 
 beyond Fiirstenburg, not talking much on the 
 way until they came to a group of walnut-trees 
 in a shady little hollow, where she suggested 
 that they might rest. 
 
 " Tou are very tired, Sunshine," said he, as 
 she dropped with a weary sigh on the soft warm 
 turf; "lean against my arm — so; you will 
 never weep yourself into stone like Niobe, but 
 you will melt away from me like a cloud if you 
 let these wild fancies fret you every day in this 
 fashion." 
 
 " You are not to call them wild fancies any , 
 longer, Sinclair, if you love me," was her quick 
 reply. " I know you love me, and I bid you 
 try to believe them too." Sinclair looked as if 
 he had the best will in the world to perform her 
 behests, but could not for sheer perplexity. 
 He kept a grave face, however, and did not 
 smile as his wont was on similar occasions. " I 
 have something to tell you," she went on with 
 confiding earnestness ; " but first tell me whe- 
 ther you think Rachel Withers is a shrewd, 
 sensible woman or not ?" 
 
 " Yes, I think she is a plain, honest little 
 body ; but what has Rachel Withers to do with 
 us?" 
 
 " She thinks there must be something real in 
 what you call my delusions," was the triumph- 
 ant response. 
 
 Sinclair was certainly taken by surprise. 
 
 "Does she? On what* grounds ?" he asked, 
 deliberating. 
 
 Alice was not prepared with grounds. 
 
 " She thinks so because she does," was all she 
 found to reply, but she uttered it as if it were 
 incontrovertible evidence. 
 
 Sinclair smiled now in spite of his endeavors. 
 
 " You are laughing at me !" then said Alice 
 pettishly, and withdrew herself from his arm to 
 rest against the tree instead. If his moral sup- 
 port failed her, neither would she have that 
 other. 
 
 " Alice !" said he, reproach in eyes and voice ; 
 30 she came back and told him he was not kindpii, 
 
 " What would you have me do ? Hunt this 
 delusion of yours through cloud-land as you are 
 doing ? I wish you would let us live at peace 
 on common earth instead !" said he, half in jest, 
 half in vexed earnest. 
 
 " No, Sinclair, it troubles my life, it troubles 
 my love for you. Now, when if ever I am to 
 
 be happy, I ought to be the happiest, it cro.sses 
 every hope. If it were but a shadow it would 
 fade, but it strengthens against the brightness. 
 The thought of papa aches in my heart the bit- 
 terest when I am near you. It never leaves 
 me now ; I hide it, but it is always there. He 
 is somewhere in the world by himself alone, and 
 I am here with you." 
 
 Smclair looked into the pathetic supplication 
 of her lovely eyes, and said, 
 
 "Bid me do any thing and I will do it — give 
 me any clue and it shall go hard, but I will run 
 it to the end. Must I seek Mr. Gilsland and 
 try to discover if he hag been playing us all 
 false ! But why should he— where is the profit 
 to him if he be ?" 
 
 " That I can not tell, but he is a bad, treach- 
 erous man ; and if any one knows where papa 
 is he must know. Oh ! Sinclair, don't watch 
 me so doubtfully ! Ara I a fool, am I an idiot, 
 that I should dream dreams like these that harass 
 me night and day ? It would be wicked and 
 faithless if I folded my hands and tried to sleep^ 
 them away, and I can not, I can not ! There is 
 much gone out of my memory, but enough re- 
 mains to assure me that it is truth and not 
 fancy that they grow out of; and things, many 
 things that were dim awhile ago are becoming 
 clearer now." 
 
 Sinclair, if not moved to a full acceptance of 
 her belief, was at all events moved to some- 
 thing ; for he said, 
 
 " Tell me again, Alice, and as explicitly as 
 you can, whatever yon recollect before you 
 came to Brookfall." 
 
 "It will be for the hundredth time," replied 
 she pathetically ; nevertheless she began to re- 
 cite again all those obscure recollections with 
 which she had once before amazed Rachel 
 Withers when they were on the Claymire downs 
 together. They were such scenes as might paint 
 themselves picture-like on a child's memory, 
 and become worn and half obliterated by lapse 
 of time. She had a confused vision with much 
 terror in it of what Sinclair could only explain 
 as the sword-dance which is danced by the 
 plough-lads in the Northern counties about Yule- 
 tide. Then she described a room that was very 
 pretty, where she never touched any thing, and 
 which she never entered but with her father ; 
 and another room with dogs on the hearth and 
 a high carved mantle-piece. She had a slight 
 idea of the few days at Bristowe, and of the 
 last good-by on the sea-shore at Hastings ; and 
 after that there was nothing but darkness until 
 the episode of the prison life in Paris. Thus 
 far there was nothing inconsistent with Mr. Gils- 
 land's account of her parentagS given to the 
 aunts ; and of this Sinclair gently reminded her ; 
 he had heard of it all before, many, many times 
 with the same result. 
 
 "But listen to me further," she said arresting 
 him"^ " Is any thing we have seen, or felt, or 
 done, ever forgotten ? I believe it is not. It 
 hide? itself from us, perhaps for long years, 
 but some day the light flashes into the dark cor- 
 ner, and there it lurks. Sometimes it seems as 
 if my memory were playing at hide and seek 
 with me — but it never can agsdn conceal that 
 dreadful place where I first saw Mr. Gilsland. 
 Papa was not there and never had been. He 
 kissed me good-by for the last time on the sea- 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 135 
 
 shore. This prison had dark, damp blue walls 
 and gratings to the windows, and there was a 
 gray rat ran in and out of a hole in the skirting- 
 board ; I gave it bits of my bread and it grew al- 
 most tame. I should know that horrible place 
 now if I could see it again. I was always cold 
 and hungry there, and when I cried in my mis- 
 ery they beat me. Then I used to try and say 
 'Gentle Jesus' — Sinclair, I could cry now to 
 think of myself doing that, as If I were some 
 other little wretched child. ' Gentle Jesus' was 
 the little hymn I used to say for prayers at home 
 with papa ; I forgot it for years and years after 
 I came to Brookfall, but one day you remember 
 when I was reading a book at the rectory I 
 found it quoted as a Catholic child's hymn, and 
 all in a moment I knew it. I used to say ' Gen- 
 tle Jesus,' but in the book where I met with it 
 again it was printed ' Holy Jesus.' I am not 
 a little child any longer, but every night I say 
 it before going to sleep — it is the only clear, 
 complete thing left me of the days when I was 
 happy with papa except his face — and I should 
 know him, Sinclair, if I met him in a desert or 
 on the top of one of the pyramids of Egypt." 
 
 Sinolair suggested that he must have grown 
 older and have changed somewhat since they 
 parted, 
 
 " He can not have grown so old but that / 
 shall know him," was her fervent answer, and 
 then she fell silent. 
 
 Sinclair sat musing and silent too. Of names 
 of persons or places she could not recall one ; 
 evidently names, mere sounds, did not live in 
 her mind like sights — things beheld with the- 
 bodily eyes. When she first saw Lady Geor- 
 giana Warleigh at Claymire she had insisted 
 upon it to Rachel Withers and to Sinclair also 
 that a mutual recognition had passed like a flash 
 between them ; but she could ai6t afterward 
 connect her with any distinct portion of her 
 recollections. Sinclair meditated on this. Of 
 all the faces he had ever seen, easy to be remem- 
 bered, perhaps Lady Georgiana Warleigh's was 
 one of the easiest. Pallid and deeply pitted 
 with the small-pox as it was, it could hardly have 
 changed by a single line since those dreadful scars 
 of disease were imprinted upon it. Her counte- 
 nance was one of those which, met but once and 
 in a throng of strangers, could never again be for- 
 gotten ; a harsh, powerful visage it was, mask-like 
 in its unchangeability ; with gray green eyes 
 shallow as a reflection on polished steel ; with 
 a strong jaw and teeth sharp and glittering in a 
 narrow thin-lipped mouths-cruelty and remorse- 
 less determination its most marked characteris- 
 tic. Her lithe, serpentine grace of form and 
 manner would only be a repellent force the 
 more coupled with her marred face ; and fear, 
 abhorrence, and dread had been from the moment 
 of their meeting Alice's only feelings toward 
 her. 
 
 Sinolair revolved these circumstances over 
 and over in his mind until he caught himself 
 saying like Rachel that there might be some- 
 thing in Alice's delusions ; he forebore to tell 
 her so yet, however, and only promised that if 
 she would try to be brave and cheerful until 
 they reached home again, then he would set to 
 work on Mr. Gilsland with such evidence as she 
 had given him, and do his best to discover what 
 was hidden, if any thing. 
 
 " It is no use implying a doubt, Sinclair, you 
 will never shake my faith," replied she smiling. 
 " I am very, very happy, but those old stories al- 
 ways give me a heart-ache !" and she pressed a 
 hand hard against her bosom as she spoke. 
 . "My darling, you shall keep your faith for 
 me !" said Sinclair, touched by the pathetic ges- 
 ture. " You must have suffered when you were 
 little. You made early acquaintance ^th hard- 
 ship, but let' rny love compensate you for that 
 past. Live in the present, Alice, don't look al- 
 ways far back or far forward when you should 
 be bright now." 
 
 And then they went to their home again, Alice 
 conscious of more strength in her hopes than 
 ever, and loving Sinclair and all the world better 
 for the assurance. Throughout the evening she 
 was quiet and meditative, and had Rachel With- 
 ers been anxious to speak of what had passed 
 between them the night before, she must have 
 taken the initiative, for which she had neither 
 the courage nor inclination. She expected Sin- 
 clair to say something in reference to it, and for 
 this she had not long to wait. After tea the 
 young man called her out into the balcony and 
 repeated all that Alice had told him. 
 
 " For my part," then said he, " I am well con- 
 tented with things as they are; but since she 
 can not rest and you have given your support to 
 her belief, something must be done. I have 
 promised her that if she will be good until we 
 go home I will take Mr. Gilsland in hand myself, 
 and do my utmost to discover if there be any 
 trickery in his dealing with my aunts about her. 
 Meanwhile let the matter rest quietly among 
 ourselves — they have been worried about it 
 enough already; and I would rather not see 
 them unnecessarily fretted now." 
 
 Rachel was thankful to acquiesce in this ar- 
 rangement of the difficulty ; during the day she 
 had been a good deal disquieted by her rash ad- 
 mission of the night before ; but she now per- 
 ceived that Sinclair's incredulity also had been 
 shaken. When Alice whispered at her good- 
 night that he was going to try to find out, she 
 understood that he had forbidden her to refrain 
 from talking over her hopes. And this he had 
 done. For the present his own faith in them 
 was so slight that he wished them to gain no 
 new strength from being dwelt on in conversa- 
 tion ; and Alice, stilled by his promise and her 
 own implicit reliance on it followed his wise 
 counsel without a murmur. 
 
 On the following morning when Rachel With- 
 ers and Carrie Martin went down to the little 
 salon to pay their compliments to their friends 
 they found Miss Delia occupying it alone ; all 
 the others having set off already on an excursion 
 to the Blue Lake, Mortimer Warleigh accom- 
 panying them. The old lady was at her work 
 and said she should be glad of their society ; so 
 they staid and bore her company, she, as usual, 
 leading and absorbing the conversation. 
 - Miss Delia's irresistible propensity to do every 
 body good has been mentioned before, and those 
 who understand the powerful nature of this pro- 
 pensity will also understand how it must have 
 been urging her in the direction of Carrie Martui 
 ever since that singular and misguided person 
 came within her reach. A more unpromising 
 
136 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 subject for her benevolent practices she would 
 have had to go far to find ; Carrie had long since 
 made up her mind to live her life in her own 
 fashion, and according to her own tastes, and was 
 not likely to put herself in bonds to any — ^the 
 best meaning woman in the world. 
 
 But worthy Miss Delia was troubled with no 
 doubts. She felt her good intentions burning in 
 her heart, and she sat down systematically to 
 her task, throwing in her little attacks wherever 
 she saw that Carrie was weakest. Rachel looked 
 on, not altogether unamused, while Carrie, un- 
 aware of Miss Deha's designs, received her mild 
 attempts without resistance. She rather hked 
 women of the Ferrands' order. "They are 
 genuinely good and- true," said she, "though 
 more worldly-wise than they appear on the sur- 
 face. It is they who can afford to have amiable 
 crotchets and to perform charitable eccentricities. 
 Providence takes care of them, they are clothed 
 like the lihes of the field; they open their 
 mouths and they are filled. Good. Set them 
 to a day's work for a day's bread, and they would 
 sleep hungry. Fortune does for us better than 
 we can do for ourselves." 
 
 Thus when Miss Delia talked in her hazy fluent 
 style on spiritual matters, Carrie composed her 
 countenance, and was patient and non-under- 
 standing. She would not have hurt the kind 
 soul's feelings for the world ; she hoped that 
 every Christian sect had salvation in the midst 
 of its errors of doctrine and system, and would 
 never have ventured on the responsibility of dis- 
 turbing any body's faith for the sake of bringing 
 them over to her own little private views. Car- 
 rie had been -brought up herself among the 
 straitest sect of the EvangeUcal party, and 
 had broken away from their narrowness of rule 
 since she came to maturity ; but for old sake's 
 sake, when she heard Miss Delia prose hke cer- 
 tain ancient, dear kinswomen of her own who 
 once bored her to extinction, she listened and 
 was eminently respectful. 
 
 But when the adventurous old lady forsook 
 Things Unseen and aspired in her innocence to 
 reform Carrie's mode of life and to abolish her 
 frivolous writings, then Carrie pricked up her 
 ears and rallied to the defense, demanding sar- 
 castically if Miss Delia had duly considered be- 
 fore she administered her dose of advice what 
 would be the result suppose it were taken ? No, 
 Miss Delia said, she had not. 
 
 " The result would be the abandonment of all 
 my means of living," answered Carrie. " Now 
 it is a fixed idea of mine that nobody for pre- 
 judice's sake should interfere with another per- 
 son's lawful gains who is not prepared to in- 
 demnify him for his losses. If you wUl settle 
 two or three hundred a year on me for fife. Miss 
 Delia, it may be worth my while to take into 
 consideration what you have got to say ; if you 
 can not do this, you must not meddle with my 
 way of earning the money, which is not wrong 
 of itself, but only against the grain of certain- 
 venerable prejudices which you entertain." The 
 serene audacity of this speech took Miss Delia 
 quite aback ; she had not a word to offer in re- 
 ply, and, as might be expected, she let Carrie 
 and her idle works alone for the future. 
 
 The travelers, Mortimer Warleigh excepted, 
 remained three days longer at Remagen — three 
 quiet drowsy days that passed very pleasantly to 
 
 all of them. The piano beguiled the lazy hours 
 that they could not spend out of doors. Alice 
 did not attempt ambitious songs, but her voice 
 was delicious. She appeared to feel ,great en- 
 joyment in her gift too ; and her aunt Flora 
 told Rachel that whenever she was mentally out 
 of tune at home, she always took refuge in her 
 piano, and the aira she played then would be a 
 sure key to her mood. Going by this criterion, 
 she was in a dreamy reverie now, mingled of 
 hope, joy and sadness; and her face in its ab- 
 stracted calm betrayed a mind resting and wait- 
 ing among many perplexing thoughts. 
 
 The weather was hot, with short sharp show- 
 ers at intervals to cool the air. One night there 
 was a thunder-storm that eclipsed the sunset, but 
 the atmospheric effects upon the hills were grand, 
 and grand too was the sonorous aerial chorus that 
 reverberated among them. For fairer times 
 there was the charming walk by the river toward 
 Fiirstenburg under rich fern-draped cliffs that 
 were lovely in their moist luxuriance of fern and 
 flower ; and on a lofty hill above the town was 
 an exquisite church but recently rebuilt. For 
 situation it was enchanting, and within and 
 without for rich unity and completeness of de- 
 sign it was admirable. There was a monastery 
 close by which looked bare and poverty-stricken, 
 enough, and Miss Delia had her eyes shocked or 
 dehghted — it is uncertain which — ^by the specta- 
 cle of an exceedingly comely young monk in 
 brown robes, with his cowl hanging down his 
 back and his breviary under his arm, rushing 
 across from the church to the house. She 
 screwed up her eyes and gasped and looked very 
 much horrified in the face, but she extracted so 
 much pathetic disquisition from the incident af- 
 terward that it was generally believed that she 
 would on no account have missed it. She had 
 seen a monK^he told them at the inn, and he 
 was very much like that handsome wife of the 
 wheelwright's at Claymire — she was not laugh- 
 ing, poor fellow, he really was. 
 
 She last evening went by cheerfully. ■ The 
 elders were homesick and glad to see the end 
 of their travels near at hand ; and Alice had 
 her private reasons to be glad too. Miss Delia, 
 with a little comfortable air of mystery, whis- 
 pered once to Rachel that she should perhaps 
 have something to tell her when they met again 
 at home, but for the present she would give her 
 no hint of it. Rachel teased, and said why did 
 Miss Delia indulge herself and tantalize her by 
 intimating that there was a happy secret on the 
 way, unless she meant to explain herself fur- 
 ther ? but the old lady only laughed, saying she 
 knew Rachel's spirit of inquisitiveness, and she 
 must just wait her time for relief. But Rachel 
 was not much worried ; she had a tolerably ac- 
 curate guess as to what Miss Delia's grand se- 
 cret must be. 
 
 And on the morrow the travelers separated, 
 and went each party their separate way ; the 
 Ferrands home by Verviers, Paris, and Rouen, 
 Rachel Withers and Carrie Martin by the route 
 through Belgium. 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 137 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIFTH. 
 
 A LOST LINK. 
 
 The unjust man shall not live out half his days. 
 
 " OsTEND ig a horrid place, Rachel," observed 
 Carrie Martin, as she sat with her friend in their 
 room at Brussels. 
 
 "Yes; I have always heard so — but what 
 have we to do with Ostend ?" said Rachel in re- 
 ply. 
 
 " It has a magnificent marine-parade, and is 
 the fashionable watering-place for all North 
 Germany." Rachel looked up to see if her 
 companion were reading from the guide-book ; 
 but no, she was lying back in her chair quite at 
 ease. 
 
 " Do you want to go there, Carrie ?" 
 
 " Tes — if you have no objection ; just for 
 two or three days of sea breezes before return- 
 ing to London. I shall not get out of it again 
 until next year at this time probably. You 
 are sure you will not very much dislike it, Ra- 
 chel r 
 
 Rachel was sure she should not dislike it 
 at all ; the sea was always welcome and pleas- 
 ant to her; and the following morning they 
 found themselves at Ostend, comfortably estab- 
 lished within three minutes' walk of the Pa- 
 rade. 
 
 It was very wild weather — more like Novem- 
 ber than July — ^but they made their way to the 
 pier in the afternoon, notwithstanding, to watch 
 the English boat beat into harbor ; and though 
 they could hardly keep their feet, there they 
 staid for a couple of hours, making believe 
 to enjoy the bluster for their health's sake. 
 It was a fine sight to watch the massive gray- 
 green waves rolling in and breaking against the 
 sea-wall, whUe the wind rent off their foam- 
 crests, and spumed them in showers of spray 
 through the air. They were thoroughly drench- 
 ed and chilled before they conld resign them- 
 selves to the idea of a quiet evening at their inn, 
 but at length even Carrie, who had an almost 
 crazy liking for a stormy sky, suggested that 
 perhaps they had had enough of it ; and as she 
 began to sMver and. turn blue Rachel agreed 
 with her. 
 
 They therefore set their faces once more to- 
 ward a refuge, and while steering their difficult 
 way along the Parade, dotted with adventurous 
 sight-seers like themselves, Rachel observed, 
 staggering along before them, a figure which 
 she was sure she knew ; and on approaching 
 nearer she -recognized Mr. Gilsland. He had 
 stopped about a dozen paces in front of them, 
 being seized with a violent paroxysm of cough- 
 ing, and was supporting himself by one of the 
 benches that stood along under the wall. His 
 lean, colorless hand clutching the back, struck 
 Rachel first, and an irresistible impulse of pity 
 caused her to pause and say, before she thought 
 what She was doing-; " Oh [ Mr. Gilsland, you 
 are very ill ; this is no day for you to be out 
 of doors !" 
 
 He started and stared at her with painful, 
 pallid eyes, while Carrie whispered, " There is 
 death in the man's face, Rachel ?" 
 
 Rachel hoped he did not overhear the incau- 
 tious words, though it could matter little 
 
 whether he did or not ; he must have known 
 the truth before, and the next moment he said 
 as much : " I am so ill that there can be but 
 one end to it, and the sooner it is over the 
 better." 
 
 Rachel felt inexpressibly shocked and distress- 
 ed ; she stood silent and motionless, the tears 
 in her eyes, unwilling to go on, yet bewildered 
 what else to do, until Carrie helped her out of 
 her strait. Carrie had no special sympathy 
 with prosperous sinners, but show her any one 
 ill or forsaken, though they might have been 
 ever so bad and notorious, and she was full of 
 service and active pity. She would have«stop- 
 ped to succor a friendless dog in the streets. 
 She now inquired of Mr. Gilsland if his wife 
 were at Ostend with him, and being told that 
 she was not, she asked further if they could be 
 of any assistance to him in any way. He said 
 he should like to talk to Rachel on the morrow 
 or the day after if she would see him. Rachel 
 observed that he called her by her name ; she 
 was, indeed, the last straw of human sympathy 
 he found to cling to in his drowning misery. 
 Her mind at once rushed to the thought of Alice, 
 and she said she would see him — not on the 
 morrow, which was Sunday, but on the follow- 
 ing morning. Poor, guilty, forlorn wretch ! 
 there was no longer need for alarm, and no 
 longer leisure for temporizing ; Death would 
 soon absolve him from all his perils, and take 
 away the chance of purging ' his burdened con- 
 science by confession. 
 
 All this while the wind was blowing about 
 them like a hurricane ; it seemed wonderful 
 how his broken emaciated frame could bear up 
 against it, but when Carrie suggested that they 
 must move on to some shelter, he crawled by 
 them into the town, and they left him at a cab- 
 aret near the ramparts, and not far from their 
 own inn. When he was gone up to the wretch- 
 ed room which was the only habitation left him, 
 Rachel, looking behind, saw the woman of the 
 house at the door, and leaving Carrie for a mo- 
 ment, she returned, asked a few questions, then 
 put into her hand what would purchase decent 
 care and nurture for him as long as his ebbing 
 life seemed likely to last. Bittersweet was right.' 
 She could not see this man she had once loved, 
 sick and in misery, and pass him by on the other 
 side. An exceeding pitifulness swelled in her 
 heart as she remembered his life, begun with 
 almost arrogant hopes, and ending in such 
 shameful wreck. When she overtook her friend 
 again there were great tears brimming her eyes 
 and rolling down her cheeks. Carrie knew that 
 it would not comfort her to call him all the 
 scamps and scoundrels in creation, nor yet to 
 deliver a homily on the natural issue and con- 
 clusion of his life, therefore she held her peace 
 and contented herself with pulling down Rachel's 
 vail over her face. 
 
 The next day was the F4te-dieu and the be- 
 ginning of the Kermesse. The wind was still 
 very high and the grand street procession of 
 priests and people with their sacred images and 
 banners had a hard struggle against it. The 
 friends went out on the Parade, however, and 
 in passing the cabaret where Mr. Gilsland lodged 
 they saw his white face leaning toward the glass 
 and looking after the throng. The following 
 morning the town was in a tumult with the fair,- 
 
138 
 
 ANNTS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 and the weather blew so loud and shrill that 
 Carrie Martin openly regretted having come to 
 Ostend at all. It was a noisy little den where 
 Mr. Gilsland was hiding ; all that day and the 
 next Rachel did not venture to approach it, for 
 it overflowed with soldiers and country-folks 
 celebrating the Kermesse with heavy libations 
 of beer, apd songs that echoed down the street 
 tumultuously. She wished anxiously that he 
 could have been removed to quieter quarters, 
 but nobody was found willing to take in a sick 
 man to nurse at the season when all the North 
 was sending its tribes to Ostend for their annual 
 sea-dip. 
 
 Ou the Wednesday there was calm round the 
 little tavern, and she went to the door, where 
 the woman met her with the news that Mr. Gils- 
 land was writing anil had forbidden any one to 
 disturb him. Rachel had not courage to be 
 urgent — she, in her heart, shrank from the spec- 
 tacle of his ruin ; but she imagined there was a 
 duty for her to do ; something for her to hear ; 
 and later in the day she returned and renewed 
 her application to see him. She was too late. 
 He was gone. The woman of the house told 
 her that on going up to his room with his dinner 
 about noon, she found him leaning back in his 
 chair dead; a number of sealed letters on the 
 table before him ; the pen with which he had 
 written them in his fingers still. Rachel went 
 away without a word. 
 
 It had been a rapid bre^k-up of the constitu- 
 tion with Mr. Gilsland. He had come over to 
 Ostend shortly before Christmas to evade his 
 debts, and had been attacked almost immediately 
 with severe inflammation of the lungs. Poor 
 living and neglect completed the mischief this 
 had begun ; symptoms of consumption declared 
 themselves ; he had not the means to seek a 
 more genial climate, nor perhaps the inclination. 
 His wife had refused to come to him, or to af- 
 ford him any maintenance out of her fortune, 
 which at their marriage had been settled securely 
 on herself; and thus he had been kept for 
 months hovering on the brink of destitution; 
 saved only from the last extremity by the scant 
 wages of his guilt, sent to him at irregular inter- 
 vals through Dr. Frith. 
 
 When Rachel returned to their inn after a 
 very brief absence, Carrie saw at a glance that 
 all was over. There was a touch of the grotesque- 
 pathetic in her passion of grief. Carrie did not 
 off'er her conventional phrases of comfort. She 
 sat in her chair regarding her, letting her tears 
 have their way, and considering within herself 
 how curiously and wonderfully wonien's hearts 
 of the good sort are made. Here was a man — 
 a very vermin amongst men — dead, and a wo- 
 man weeping for him as for a lost love and saint 
 on earth ! When there came a lull„ Carrie did 
 not allude to his meannesses, his frauds, his 
 hypocrisies, or bid Rachel remember how little 
 worthy he was of her tears ; on the contrary, 
 she tried to say of him any good she could re- 
 collect ever to have heard any, body else say, 
 and the calm was effectual. 
 
 " He had no courage, that was where he fail- 
 ed first ; and the first step wrong set him so far 
 wrong altogether that he could never get right 
 again," said Rachel when she gained a tolerable 
 command over her voice. " People who are 
 not tempted in the same way should not judge 
 
 him. I was very fond of him once — I don't 
 think a day has gone over my head since I was 
 a girl that I have not thought of him more or 
 less. I never oared for any body else as I did 
 for him, never — I suppose you will say I am a 
 fool." 
 
 " Not at all — ^I never call love wasted^ If it 
 does nothing else it keeps one's own heart 
 warm," replied Carrie, adding as a private men- 
 tal reservation, " Commend me to these quiet 
 women for long memories." By and by she ob- 
 served aloud thp,t this event would hinder the 
 inquiries about Alice. " Moral certainties are 
 very well as far as they go, and I am morally 
 certain slje is no niece of Mr. Gilsland's ; but it 
 would have facilitated measures if he had said 
 so. What will Sinclair Ferrand do now, I won- 
 der !" 
 
 "I had forgotten all that!" sighed Rachel. 
 Of course she had — she was dreaming of Hurt- 
 ledale and sunshine and old times and the things 
 that might have been and never were ; culmin- 
 ating in that rigid figure dead in the chair which 
 she had not seen but vividly imagined, and the 
 authorities taking possession of Ms papers and 
 speculating over the English priest dying neg- 
 lected in a low, miserable tavern. 
 
 Presently Carrie suggested that they should 
 pack up their chattels, order their bill, and leave 
 Ostend by that night's boat ; but Rachel's keen, 
 remonstrant No, apprised her that she meant to 
 stay and see Mr. Gilsland buried. She did stay, 
 and in the wind and rain stood by while he was 
 laid in his dishonored, alien grave — ^the only 
 mourner, if she could be called a mourner, who 
 followed him with a regret or a tear to that 
 bourne. His life of mean ambitions, shifts, 
 compromises, was ended, and the moral of it may 
 be briefiy summed up in that pithy sentence, that 
 " to be weak is to be wicked." 
 
 The same night Carrie and her companion 
 crossed over to Dover in wild stormy weather, 
 and by the next Rachel was quiet and safe at 
 home again in her cottage at Claymire after that' 
 bad, sorrowful dream. 
 
 It was inexpressibly pleasant and soothing to 
 Rachel to be still again after the continual move- 
 ment of the last six weeks and the wearing ex- 
 citement of the final days at Ostend. The Fer- 
 rands were at home and Brookfall was at its 
 brightest again ; sunshine without and sunshine 
 within, and Miss Flora and Miss Delia in the very 
 best of good humors. They "saw Rachel for a 
 few minutes the morning after her return, but 
 finding her visibly fatigued and needing rest, 
 they would not stay then, and made no oppor- 
 tunity of telling her their happy little mystery, 
 but she had a very shrewd guess what it was. 
 She believed Sinclair had made his lover's pro- 
 fession of faith to Alice, that Alice had respond- 
 ed to it, and that the good aunts were inclined 
 to rejoice. And she was right. 
 
 Rachel had been at home full a week before 
 she felt herself equal to returning the visits of 
 her friends and acquaintance ; but one morning 
 at the end of that time she roused herself, and 
 made an effort to walk up to Brookfall. It was 
 that hour of the day when the pretty place wore 
 its most picturesque aspect; when the lights 
 were the strongest and the shadows the deepest 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 139 
 
 in the narrovf ravine down which poured the 
 slender cascade that gave it its name. Insensibly 
 the familiar beauty, the pure air, the balmy 
 breeze cheered her; her thoughts got away 
 from that blank grave at Ostend, and she saw 
 that the sky was blue, and the sun shining, and 
 pleasant life in the world for all its shadow. 
 
 She arrived at the cottage at a most inoppor- 
 tune season, as she perceived directly she was 
 ushered into the drawing-room, but retreat was 
 then too late, and she was compelled to see and 
 hear the contest between Miss Delia and her 
 protegee which was going on in the presence of 
 Miss Flora and Dr. Ferrand. Miss Delia was 
 flurried and heated exceedingly, and as soon as 
 her greetings with Kaohel were over she broke 
 forth into explanations. 
 
 " Rachel, we have heard this day that poor 
 Mr. Gilsland — Alice's only relative as you know, 
 is dead ; and would you believe that the naughty 
 puss absolutely refuses to put on mourning for 
 him ? I think I never in my life before heard 
 of such shocking perversity." This sudden an- 
 nouncement of what Eachel knew so well already 
 nearly upset her ; she had made no mention to 
 any one of the event that had detained her at 
 Ostend. She was a bad feigner ; but she said. 
 Yes, she had heard of Mr. Gilsland' s death ; and 
 then, while the doctor retreated to what was 
 called the Prospect Window and lost himself as 
 much as possible in the view to avoid hearing 
 his sister's repetitionary arguments, she nerv- 
 ously took a seat opposite the delinquent and 
 listened. 
 
 Alice was sitting on the ottoman arrayed in a 
 bright blue muslin dress, with her Leghorn hat 
 on her lap, and in the crown of it a heap of 
 flowers which she had gathered into it as into a 
 basket. She had her stubborn face on, but for 
 all that a smile was lurking about her lips, and 
 when she glanced across at Eachel there was iio 
 mistaking her expression of willful defiance. 
 Any one less in mourning mood could not well 
 be imagined. 
 
 " It is in The Times — ^he died |it Ostend more 
 than a week ago, and now his widow has sent a 
 card ;" Miss Delia proceeded in an excited tone. 
 " It is not that we admire him, though many 
 did, or that Alice could be expected to love him, 
 but I have no idea of kinship being thrust aside 
 as, not of any account. There is a certain respect 
 ' that must and ought to be paid to ties of 
 blood. I would not have her go into deep, 
 crape — that is not called for — neither need she 
 give up her hat in the garden, but I shall insist 
 on her wearing a black dress." 
 
 "I hate black!" ejaculated Sunshine. "I 
 wore black when I was a miserable, friendless, 
 beaten little girl, and I will never wear black 
 again so long as I am happy; never, never, 
 never ! and I am happy now." 
 
 " Hush, darling, hush !" interposed Miss Flora 
 mildly; "you must not speak in that way. 
 Death is a very serious consideration, and it will 
 come to you some day, though you be ever so 
 happy." 
 
 Alice took up a spray of ivy-geranium and a 
 crimson rose, and proceeded to dress her hat 
 therewith; then she emptied the rest of her 
 garden spoils beside her on the ottoman, and 
 leisurely arranged them into a posy for her band. 
 It seemed as if she were bent on making herself 
 
 as gay and festive as possible. Miss Delia ob- 
 served her with hightened color and reproach- 
 ful eyes. " Alice, what possesses you ?" said 
 she, solemnly. " You are heartless, you are wick- 
 ed just now. You rejoice that Mr. Gilsland is 
 dead — you are thinking he can never molest 
 you again 1" 
 
 " He can never molest me again !" echoed 
 Alice, growing grave all at once. " He can nev- 
 er molest me again ! That is good news — why 
 should I pretend to grieve at hearing it ? You 
 used to say to me once — afraid yourself — that 
 he could claim me if he would, and take me. 
 away from you. I have not forgotten it. But 
 now his power is at an end, and I am glad — 
 yes, I am very glad !" And she crowned her- 
 self with her garlanded hat in token thereof, 
 looking from one to the other of her audience 
 with pei-feot composure and assurance. 
 
 " He did not persecute you much after you 
 came to Brookfall, Alice ; you might aiford to 
 forgive him now" murmured Miss Flora. " Your 
 fate would, perhaps, have been worse had he 
 not taken charge of you when your father died." 
 
 Rachel looked up at Alice as these quiet words 
 were spoken, and saw a great wave of emotion 
 pass over her face. She was silent tiU her heart 
 settled into a calm again, and then she said in a 
 low but most determined tone that gathered 
 force as she went on, " I never believed that 
 my iather was dead, aunt Flora, and I do not 
 believe it yet. Jf Mr. Gilsland has told the truth 
 about me, I will forgive him ; if not, I shall 
 loathe his memory even more than I loathed his 
 name. He took me away when I was wretched- 
 ly ill and unhappy, but it was not from my father 
 he tgok me. It was from amongst cruel strang- 
 ers who were worse to me than he was. It is 
 not all cltear to me now, but it comes by glimp- 
 ses ; and some day it will come like lightning, 
 and I shall see dear papa again. I shall, aunt 
 Delia, I tell you I shall ; I have said so to Sin- 
 clair a thousand times, and it is true !" 
 
 Miss Delia breathed a profound sigh ; these 
 were Alice's old assertions that were too mad to 
 be answered; she had heard similar speeches 
 often before with as little heed as she heard 
 them now. She passed them over as calmly as 
 if they had never been uttered, and took up 
 again the first bone of contention. " Miss Edge 
 will come this afternoon to try you on, Alice, 
 and I desire that you will not go out of the way. 
 You must have a paramatta for common wear, 
 and nice silk with crape trimmings for better 
 occasions." 
 
 " It is of no use causing them to be made, 
 auntie Dee, for I will never put them on," was 
 the firm reply. "Mr. Gilsland was no more 
 akin to me than I am akin to the man in the 
 moon." Perhaps a stronger illustration of the 
 argument could not have been offered, and it 
 exasperated Miss Delia to the utmost. She bade 
 Alice leave the room, and without a moment's 
 hesitation Alice left it accordingly — ^perhaps not 
 sorry to be dismissed. 
 
 The doctor came away from the Prospect 
 Window as Alice quitted the room, and Miss 
 Delia immediately asked, appealing to him, 
 " What do you think of mourning apparel, bro- 
 ther? Is it right or respectful to neglect it?" 
 
 The doctor thought in a general way that it 
 might be worn or let alone according to each 
 
140 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 person's private feelings or prejudices. His son 
 had communicated to liim Alice's wishes and 
 Ms own pledge to make the researches she de- 
 sired ; and this, combined with her own assever- 
 ations, which he had just heard, were not with- 
 out influence on his mind. He, too, began to 
 think there might be something in Sunshine's 
 vagaries. 
 
 " I do not like these modem ways and innova- 
 tions," was Miss Delia's reply to his opinion. 
 "When we were young the wearing of black 
 was graduated most strictly according to the de- 
 grees of relationship, and we even put it on for 
 friends. I do not know how we should have 
 been regarded had we dared to infringe on so 
 proper and universal a custom." 
 
 " But we never thought it pleasant wear, 
 Delia dear," observed Miss Flora. " In hot and 
 dusty weather like this it was especially disagree- 
 able. I always disUked it myself. ' 
 
 " Yes, I remember you did ; and the smell of 
 black woolen dye is very stuffy," Miss Delia 
 admitted. " But if we ought to do a thing for 
 respect's sake we ought, and there is an end of 
 it. One piece of affectation only would I abol- 
 ish, and that is the widow's cap. It was all very 
 well when women cut off their hair as a sign of 
 sorrow and bereavement, then it was necessary 
 to wear a covering over the head ; but now 
 when you see the rich braids and'puffe and plaits 
 through the transparent tarlatane, why, it is a 
 mere frivolity to put it on." 
 
 The doctor smiled, and the wicked little, 
 tongue of a listener at the open window, till now 
 unobserved, startled them all by saying: " But, 
 auntie Dee, it is very becoming. Young Lady 
 Monke looks very pretty in hers, and every body 
 says she is ever S0)happy since old Sir Koger 
 died who was so dreadful to her — worse than 
 Mrs. Pendarves' Gromro. Would you like to 
 hear a bit of news I have just had from Miss 
 Crispe at the gate !" 
 
 " What is it ?" asked Miss Delia, forgetting her 
 displeasure in the frank interest she took in her 
 neighbors' affairs. But just-at that instant ap- 
 peared in the distance Sinclair coming up to the 
 house, and Sunshine flashed away to meet him 
 without replying. Then Miss Flora, mildly rais- 
 ing her eyes to look after her, said what Ra- 
 chel's hopes and expectations had already antici- 
 pated. 
 
 " I do not know, dear Kachel, that we need 
 keep it a secret from you or from any body now 
 that those two are engaged. We are all very 
 glad, and trust it may turn out for the best, 
 'fhey are dear children both." 
 
 "Of course, it will turn out for the beat, 
 though Alice is so perverse," added Miss Delia 
 briskly. " Sinclair was always very fond of her 
 and does not care for her caprices ; but I expect 
 he will find his hands full when he gets her to 
 manage quite by himself. Now, Rachel, you were 
 aggrieved; on a former occasion with Sunshine's 
 bit of love-story ; how do you like this one ?" 
 
 " It is quite right and proper in every way — 
 it could not be prettier or pleasanter," was the 
 ready answer. 
 
 The young folks here presented themselves 
 at the window, and Sinclair intimated that they 
 were going for a gallop on the Downs. No ob- 
 jection being raised, Alice disappeared to don 
 habit and hat, and presently the two were seen 
 
 to ride through the gate and take the bridle- 
 path up the fields. Miss Delia's remark as they 
 vanished was : " I hope Alice will be back be- 
 fore Miss Edge arrives. I do not like the poor 
 dress-maker to be kept waiting and losing her 
 valuable time." 
 
 Very persistent was Miss Delia in things both 
 great and small, but in this matter of putting on 
 mourning for Mr. Gilsland she was likely to find 
 her Sunshine more than a match for her. 
 
 When Sinclair and Alice gained the high level 
 of the down they turned off toward Welsbeck, 
 where they had a delicious mile or two of 
 springy turf before them. Alice had fought 
 her little fight with aunt Delia and felt confident 
 of ultimate victory, but the cause of the first 
 shot was now to be reflected on with all its re- 
 moter and more serious consequences. She 
 had told Sinclair in the garden the moment they 
 met that Mr. Gilsland was dead, and they now 
 reverted to the same theme ; Sinclair introduc- 
 ing it by saying that if Mr. Gilsland were dead 
 there was an end of any appeal through him. 
 
 " Yes ; we must try another tack," respond- 
 ed Alice with composed assurance. Her com- 
 panion looked at her set face, perceived that the 
 moment was not one when she would bear rail- 
 lery, and asked what other tack she proposed 
 to try. 
 
 " Lady Georgiana Warleigh," said she with 
 prompt decision. 
 
 " Alice, it is impossible ! She — a perfect 
 stranger I" exclaimed Sinclair. " My dear child, 
 show me any thing with a shadow of reason in it, 
 and I will do your bidding to the utmost, but 
 don't send me round the world tilting at wind- 
 mills. She would set me down for a fool 
 absolute." 
 
 "She would look wicked and guilty, and per- 
 haps she would give up — ^I do not know. She 
 could lie down a world of weaker people, but 
 me she can never hoodwink again. She knew 
 me that day of «the strawberry party in the rec- 
 tory gardens when her husband fainted ; she 
 thrust me aside, and then I knew her too — and 
 she saw I knew her. I can not bring her dis- 
 tinctly into any, of my recollections, but she 
 lurks somehow behind them all." 
 
 " 1 wish you were rather less enigmatical, Al- 
 ice," said Sinclair, and there was just the faint- 
 .eat inflection of sarcasm in his voice. He had 
 tried this tone on Sunshine's delusions before 
 and found it irritating — he found it dangerous 
 now. 
 
 She gave one glance at his face and detected 
 the slight curl of the lip that matched the tone 
 of his voice, and the fire flashed from her heart 
 to her eyes like the blood-crimson to her cheek, 
 and giving her spirited horse a passionate stroke 
 it burst into a gallop and was away like the 
 wind. Sinclair had just time to smile at her 
 beautiful anger, to be vexed at the smile, at him- 
 self, when he perceived that in her reckless im- 
 petuosity, she had given her horse the rein and 
 had lost all mastery over it. By good luck there 
 was a long breathing stretch of turf before her 
 with a gradual descent to a gate entering on 
 Welsbeck-lane, and if she could guide it in the 
 least there might be no risk of harm to her ; if 
 not, — if it swerved right or left there was noth- 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 141 
 
 ing but certain destruction in the sheer steeps 
 of the down. Bide fast after her he dared not, 
 but there was one nearer and more abrupt des- 
 cent into the road by which ho might perhaps 
 make a circuit, meet and stop her if that gate, 
 generally open, should chance to be open now. 
 To think and to do were simultaneous, and 
 tearing away at a break-neck gallop he came into 
 the lane at a lower point ; then turned, listen- 
 ing with a sickness of dreadful anxiety for the 
 frantic race he expected to hear coming down 
 tiie stony way. 
 
 No sound — what might not hare happened ? 
 He reached the gate ; there was the horse 
 standing, flecked with foam and trembling in 
 every limb, but there also was Alice, safe and 
 sound on his back, stroking his neck and ca- 
 ressing him, but saying imperially : " Now, 
 my beauty, you have had one gallop to please 
 yourself you must have another to please me." 
 
 " I think you have both had enough," said 
 Sinclair, speaking in a forced voice — Oh ! God, 
 how thankful he was. 
 
 "We are not of your opinion," answered 
 Alice, and rode gently up the hill again. The 
 summit reached, she cried, " Now !" used her 
 whip sharply, and was away just the same as be- 
 fore. 
 
 Sinclair felt very angry — men always do when 
 they see women needlessly endangering them- 
 selves, and he followed at a trot until she, hav- 
 ing taken her revenge on her masterly favorite, 
 turn back at a walking pace to meet him. " You 
 may not be afraid, Alice, but I am," said he, 
 and his tone sounded deeply displeased. 
 
 Sunshine made him no answer, but rode close 
 at his side in silence, looking straight and stead- 
 ily before her, until they both rode back into 
 the stable-yard at Brookfall. She could mount 
 and dismount perfectly well without assistance, 
 but she had discovered of late that Sinclair liked 
 to help her — to give her a hand up, or to lift 
 her down ; so she always staid for his assist- 
 ance. She did now. He had been wondering 
 whether she would, and feeling a thousand vex- 
 ations for having vexed her first, and scolded 
 her after ; had he hesitated a second she would 
 have sUpped off and escaped, and it might have 
 been a quarrel ; but he did not, and as he lifted 
 her from her saddle she looked at him shyly, 
 their eyes met, and they were quite happy" 
 * again. 
 
 Alice never cared to argue herself in the right 
 with any one she loved ; if hers were the fault, 
 she liked by and by to be kissed and forgiven ; 
 if the fault were any one else's, when her little 
 temper was off, she kissed and forgave — ^weak 
 perhaps, but wjse, and the short way to keep 
 friends. Sinclair preferred it to the long moods 
 of dignity with which some ladies are said to 
 indulge their lovers ; and he felt all the more 
 exalted when he had been the victim of a brief 
 caprice. Perhaps he was in the wrong to start 
 with in this instance — nothing love detests like 
 sarcasm — but Alice did not deem it necessary 
 to make him feel it ; on the contrary, shfe ask- 
 ed in the garden after dinner — for he and the 
 Doctor dined at Brookfall that day — if he were 
 really angry with her. Sinclair made a suitable 
 response, and that matter was finally settled. 
 
 But, perhaps, after all,' hers was the wiliest 
 way of winning ; for certainly Sinclair felt in a 
 
 better frame for encountering the task imposed 
 on him than he had done before ; and when 
 Ahoe revived her fretful subject, and brought 
 Lady Georgiana Warleigh up again, he only said, 
 " But how am I to get at her, and what am I 
 to say when I do ?" 
 
 " Nothing. Listen to me — a sudden inspira- 
 tion has come into my head. Lady Georgiana 
 "Warleigh is at the Hurtlemere House now, and 
 that is near Prior's Bank, is it not ? Well, I 
 want to go to Prior's Bank." 
 
 " That is practicable enough, at all events. 
 The house is kept in order just as Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage left it, and if you can move my aunts 
 again so soon, I shall be proud to take you all 
 down there. You could not wait until next 
 spring, Alice ?" 
 
 No, Alice could not wait until next spring ; 
 she knew what he meant — they were to be 
 married next spring ; but she could not wait 
 until then. " Go to Prior's Bank for the moor- 
 ehooting instead of Scotland," said she. Sin- 
 clair said he had intended doing so. " Then it 
 is easy to invite us," she rejoined. 
 
 "Easier than to get the invitation accepted; 
 however, I will make it. But I should like to 
 have some inkling of what you propose doing 
 when you are there?" 
 
 " I can not tell you — I do not know. I feel 
 drawn thither — as I dwell on the thought, I feel 
 strongly drawn thither. Oh ! dear Sinclair, do 
 bear with me ; do be patient with me." 
 
 " I will be patient as Job, pretty sweeting, 
 go on." 
 
 " You can not help laughing at me. You think 
 , me silly !" 
 
 " No, I think you my own wise, bonnie " 
 
 " It is you who are silly now !" 
 \ " At any rate we will go to Prior's Bank. 
 Aunt Delia is coming this way, and she seems 
 in a lively vein ; let us take advantage of it to 
 win her promise. She will be the worst to 
 manage, I know." 
 
 The appeal was made on the spur of the mo- 
 ment, to be received with ejaculations of " Non- 
 sense I Ridiculous! What would he ask next ?" 
 But having gained a hearing, he put the thing 
 in quite a reasonable light, and succeeded so 
 far as to prevail on Miss Flora and the Doctor 
 to say they would consider of it. Miss Delia 
 continued obdarate. She never listened to so 
 preposterous a demand in her life : she supposed 
 it was a crazy vagary of Sunshine's, which Sin- 
 clair would gratify at every body else's ex- 
 pense ; but they would not get her to go flit- 
 ting about the country like a Will-o'-the-wisp, 
 just when they had come home from abroad too. 
 Pshaw !" 
 
 They let her alone then, but returning to the 
 charge again and yet again, they at length, 
 through their importunity, wearied her into a 
 reluctant consent. And when Sinclair started 
 off to Hurtledale at the beginning of August, 
 it was quite an understood thing that the Doe- 
 tor, the aunts, and Alice, should very shortly 
 follow. Rachel Withers also was preparing at 
 the same season to wing her flight northward, 
 and Alice announced to her sober-minded en- 
 eouraging friend the charming arrangement that 
 would bring them together at pleasant old Pri- 
 or's Bank. 
 
 " You are off the day after to-morrow, and 
 
142 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 we go next week, Kachel. The bloom is on 
 the heather, and I shall see Sinclair's moors for 
 the first time in their royal purple. Aunt Flora 
 wishes you to come to Prior's Bank for the first 
 part of our visit. It was your home once, and 
 you must know every inch of ground about 
 the place. We shall need a guide, for even 
 Sinclair is not at home in his own house yet. 
 Is it so very pretty ? Is it as pretty as Brook- 
 fall?" This speech of Alice's was made to 
 Rachel on the day after Sinclair Ferrand left 
 her. 
 
 " It is quite as pretty, but in a different way," 
 Rachel replied. " It is larger, and though there 
 is no sea, the views are grander and more ex- 
 tensive ; on a clear day you can see miles and 
 miles of hill and dale, and the broad bright 
 river like a silver ribbon winding through the 
 midst. From the drawing-room bay window 
 there is an exquisite peep of Hurtle Force, of 
 the ruins in the water-meadows, and of the 
 great old ash trees that are the pride of Prior'? 
 Bank. They call it the gem of the dale. Sun- 
 shine, and I am sure you will love it, though 
 you will have bleaker winters and shorter sum- 
 mers there than we have at Claymire." 
 
 Rachel's last few words brought a rosy smile 
 to Alice's face, a happy conscious softness 
 into her eyes. They were in the garden at 
 Woodland's, seated on the turf by the edge of 
 the brook in the selfsame spot where just a year 
 ago Mortimer Warleigh had spent with them 
 what he called a " beautiful hour." 
 
 " Aunt Delia considers herself very ill-used in 
 being obliged to travel again so soon, but we 
 could never go to Prior's Bank and leave her 
 behind," presently said Alice. " She has never 
 been there since she was young, and she can not 
 give me any account of it ; but aunt Flora re- 
 members it distinctly." She was now crouch- 
 ing against Rachel's' knees, her face averted and 
 her ungloved hand plucking idly at the blades 
 of grass ; a shy attitude that forewarned her 
 companion of a confidence coming, or of some 
 inquiry having regard to her mysterious fancies. 
 It came. " Rachel, who lives in Hurtledale be- 
 side your brother's family — what people of con- 
 dition, I mean ?" 
 
 " There is the old Hurtlemere House — that 
 belongs to Sir Laurence Warleigh ; and Floyd's 
 seat — that belongs to the Grantleys; and then, 
 except Prior's Bank, there is, no. gentleman's 
 place beside until you get down to Brafferton." 
 
 " What sort of place is the Hurtlemere House, 
 Rachel ?" 
 
 " It is an ancient, stone-built mansion stand- 
 ing high on the side of the fell, with a great 
 pine wood at the back of it. The situation is 
 very wild and lonely ; you would think it most 
 desolate, accustomed to the luxuriance here- 
 abouts." 
 
 " But is it desolate in summer ? It can not 
 surely be desolate in summer — no hilly country 
 is," 
 
 " It is pleasanter then certainly. The views 
 from it at any rate are glorious, especially at 
 this time when the moors are purple, and in 
 spring when the trees are coming out and the 
 foliage is fresh and various and all the gorse 
 ablaze with golden blossom. But taking it the 
 whole year round it is a comfortless spot." 
 
 " Whv does Sir Laurence Warleigh live in it 
 then ?" " 
 
 " Because he prefers it for old sake's sake. 
 But he is rarely there more than a month at a 
 time ; he spends his life chiefly in wandering 
 about, and has done so ever since he lost his 
 little daughter." 
 
 "Did his little daughter die at the Hurtlemere 
 House ?" 
 
 " No, his wife died there, but Annis died at 
 Hastings, where he had left her living with Lady 
 Georgiana Warleigh." 
 
 " Annis — that is a singular name ; but it 
 sounds to me as if I had heard it before — Annw. 
 Rachel, I have a great anxiety to see that Hur- 
 tlemere House ; I believe I shall know it. Mr. 
 Mortimer Warleigh described the interior to me 
 at Remagen." 
 
 " Did he ? then I am sure he would do it bet- 
 ter than I, for he knows it better. He has 
 lived there with his father and mother at inter- 
 vals a good deal during the last two or three 
 years. When you visit it mind and choose a sun- 
 shiny day, for then the tarn looks beautiful with 
 the birches drooping over it ; but on a gloomy 
 day it is as black as ink." 
 
 Alice said she would, then fell into a reverie 
 in which Rachel was not sorry to leave her un- 
 disturbed. Since Mr. Gilsland's death some 
 very strange lights had begun to move to and 
 fro over the troubled waters of her thoughts. 
 Thus far she beheld nothing but shapeless sus- 
 picions and wreck of old doubts drifting hither 
 and thither ; but there was an awed sense upon 
 her as of waiting till something greater should 
 reveal itself, until the sea should cast up its 
 dead, long hidden under the commotion of its 
 waves. 
 
 The day after this conversation at Woodlands 
 Sunshine had a letter from Sinclair, — the first 
 lover's letter he had had the opportunity of 
 writing to her. Rachel Withers might not have 
 heard of the beautiful event perhap."!, but that 
 having a communication to make to Miss Flora 
 before setting off on her journey north, she 
 walked up to Brookfall, and in a secluded nook 
 of the plantation there she found Alice, reading 
 the precious document for perhaps the twentieth 
 time. She did not hear Rachel's approach, 
 neither did Rachel espy her until she came full 
 upon her where she sat on the mossy roots of a 
 spreadmg beech ; t'len she sprang up blushing 
 like the mornmg, and exclaiming : " Oh, Rachel, 
 how you startled me ! I was reading my letter 
 from Sinclair — you will see him before I shall !" 
 ' " Tes," responded Rachel and waited, natu- 
 rally supposing the remark was a prelude to 
 some message or commission; but no, it was 
 simply a little thought outspoken by accident, 
 implying a gentle envy of the great privilege — 
 Rachel would see Sinclair before she did. As 
 nothing came of the pause but a low blissful 
 si^, Rachel grew aware of her mistake, and 
 proceeded to speak of the lovely weather and 
 other convenient general topics ; the only topics 
 Sunshine's mind could embrace at such a mo- 
 ment. She slipped her hand under Rachel's 
 arm and sauntered dreamily along beside her, 
 answering with monosyllables and inarticulate 
 murmurs until they both fell into a sociable 
 silence, and so reached the wicket into the 
 Brookfall gardens. Here Alice endowed her 
 companion with a kiss, and then fled to a cle- 
 
SEEKING. 
 
 143 
 
 matis-buried bower to con her dear letter again, 
 while Rachel went up to the house to talk prose 
 to the aunts. 
 
 She found Mias Delia in a state of lofty, ob- 
 trusive resignation. " You set off to-morrow, 
 Rachel, do you ? I can not understand all this 
 racing and chasing about the country ! We are 
 oS again next weels, and Sinclair departed the 
 day before yesterday almost without warning. I 
 think every body is gone crazy, but if I am to be 
 driven to Prior's Bank the moment I am peace- 
 ably settled at home again, all I can say is that 
 somebody else may take the trouble of it ; for I 
 will not put a finger to a single box," proclaim- 
 - ed the old lady, and then arranged herself with 
 great demonstration of case and comfort in her 
 iavorite easy chair. 
 
 " There is no need that you should, dear 
 Delia; Hawkins will attend to every thing," 
 said her sister soothingly. 
 
 " Hawkins is quite sufiSciently occupied with 
 Alice. I told the indolent puss only this morning 
 that she ought to have been born to a great for- 
 tune ; for she will soon want a maid all to herself.' ' 
 
 " And Sinclair wUl gladly afford her one, I 
 have no doubt." 
 
 " Humph !" murmured Miss Delia disapprov- 
 ingly, for this was quite a different view from 
 that she meant to offer. 
 
 But Miss Flora insisted on regarding every 
 thing from the bright side just now. " There 
 was a letter for Sunshine- from him this morn- 
 ing, the dear fellow, and .it was pretty to see 
 her delight. iFirst she kissed it, then she crush- 
 ed it against her frock, then she tossed it up 
 into the air and caught it as it eame down, 
 laughing and blushing " 
 
 •' And looking a perfect goose," added Miss 
 Delia with an abortive attempt to be grim. 
 " I really never knew how silly girls could be 
 until I made Sunshine's acquaintance ; nothing 
 would ever astonish me again that I might hear 
 of them. It is lucky Sinclair does not care for 
 a quiet life ; I would not be in his shoes for a 
 very pretty penny !" 
 
 " Oh, Delia dear, the child is quite natural ; 
 she is happy and she can not help showing it," 
 pleaded Miss Flora. " I congratulate myself 
 more and more every hour that Sinclair and 
 she are so strongly attached to each other ; I do 
 not expect we shall have any more of her moods 
 now. He will make up to her for every body 
 else, you will see." 
 
 " I don'^t wish him to make up to her for us 
 after all our trouble and anxiety — but that is the 
 way of the world; parents and silly people 
 bring up children and somebody else steps in 
 and has all the pleasure of them ! Alice is a 
 dear girl, and that I never seek to deny, but 
 she is very, very willful and obstinate. Only 
 think of those two black dresses, Rachel " 
 
 "Perhaps you need not tell Rachel that, 
 Delia ; it was naughty," interposed Miss Flora 
 with hasty deprecation." 
 
 "I sAaZZ— neither Rachel nor anyone else 
 would ever believe it without ; my dear," she 
 went on turning away determinedly from her 
 sister; "the two mourning dresses for Mr. 
 GUsIand that you heard us differing about the 
 other day, came home from Miss Edge last 
 night, and were laid out on Alice's bed with 
 their belongings all in order for Hawkins to try 
 if they fitted ; and when Alice saw them she 
 
 flew into one of her tantrums and quite terrified 
 our maid. Hawkins ran away out of sight of 
 her violence, and when she ventured back where 
 do you think those dresses were ?" Rachel did 
 not dare hazard a guess. "I'll tell you, my 
 dear," proceeded the old lady wagging her 
 head ; " yes, and I shall tell Sinclair too when 
 we see him ; they were in her bath, my dear, 
 over head and ears in her great bath, as I may 
 say, and the black dye all ranning out of the 
 paramatta ! When.Hawkins began to cry shame, 
 as was quite natural, Alice serenely bade her, 
 ' Take away that trash ;' and when I tried to re- 
 monstrate and show her what wicked, wanton 
 waste of good clotlies it was, she just said, pout- 
 ing her pretty face at me — she deserved to have 
 her ears boxed, she did ! ' Kiss me, auntie 
 Dee, and don't be cross. I told you I would 
 not wear them.' Now, I don't think you would 
 find a parallel to that amongst all the girls of 
 your acquaintance, Rachel Withers. I don't 
 know her match." 
 
 " And I suppose there was nothing left for 
 you to do but kiss her," replied Rachel, with 
 difficulty keeping her countenance. 
 
 " Well, no, there was not. Now that she has 
 Sinclair always to fly to it is no use battling with 
 her, for he takes her part against us always. 
 He will never cure her of her caprices and will- 
 fulness either. I am sure he will not." 
 
 " He always seems to enjoy them more or 
 less ; and if he can not tame her nobody can. 
 Time may do it ; I trust trouble will not ; for 
 she had her share, poor darling, when she was 
 little," said Miss Flora tenderly. 
 
 " Mr. More would have managed her — he 
 would have made of her a solid, estimable char- 
 acter. Yes, I maintain it." 
 
 " Dear Delia ! She would have managed him 
 out of his senses and into a lunatic asylum in a 
 month ! Recollect what frenzies she got into at 
 the very idea of marrying him. I think you must 
 have been a little mad yourself ever to fancy 
 such a match as that could possibly succeed !" 
 
 " Mad, not at all mad ! It would have done 
 very well. I do not wish things otherwise than 
 they are now ; but there are many far more un- 
 likely marriages than that would have been 
 made up in the world, which nevertheless turn 
 out very happily. You are as romantic as a girl 
 of sixteen still, Sister Flo' I" 
 
 Sister Flo' took the imputation very meekly. 
 She had been blithe and tender in her youth, 
 and had had her own little love story in her da.y, 
 but Miss Delia was always a fussy, practical body, 
 superior to vanities, and prone to managing peo- 
 ple, and setting the world to rights in her own 
 way ; which was occasionally an over-persistent, 
 irritating way, better adapted to machinery of 
 wood and iron, than to beings of flesh and blood 
 and human passions. 
 
 Alice's deiinquenoies disposed of, the journey 
 to Hurtledale was reverted to, and Rachel was 
 begged to make her arrangements at the rectory, 
 so that she might spend a few days with her 
 friends at Prior's Bank when they first arrived 
 there. Sinclair would have seen her to give 
 the invitation himself, but he had been so much 
 engaged at the last that he could find no spare 
 moment, and had left the message with his aunts 
 instead. Rachel gave a conditional promise, 
 and then they parted, not to meet again until 
 they mjt in her old home. 
 
Ui 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 PAET FIFTH. 
 
 FOUND. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FIRST. 
 
 LADY GEOEGIANA's AQONT. 
 
 Leavb her to heaven, 
 And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge 
 To prick and sting her. Shakspbare. 
 
 On arriving at the rectory Rachel Withers to 
 her great pleasure and surprise found Arthur 
 Hill and Grace staying there, and the two boys 
 both at home for their holidays. Altogether 
 they were a houseful. Rachel was put into her 
 own old room, and it was much such an evening 
 as that when her brother John and she came 
 back nearly twenty years ago to make it their 
 home. The open window showed her the same 
 prospect as it did then — the purple moors, the 
 corn-fields ripening to the harvest, the full sum- 
 mer foliage, the silvery rush of the Force ; but 
 whatchanges within and what changes amongst 
 all she loved ! It is always rather pathetic to 
 see one's faded face and grizzled hair reflected 
 in the little mirror that once showed us a bloom- 
 ing and sprightly youth. Rachel had never 
 seriously thought, how much she was altered 
 until that evening when she was dressing before 
 hers, and then it Struck her quite grotesquely. 
 " Gracious," murmured she, " how ancient I 
 begin to look!" And she did begin to look 
 ancient. One or two recent events had left 
 their marks on her face. 
 
 This old room of hers was so sunny that Kath- 
 erine had chosen it for a nursery when Dicky 
 was born, but now that the babies were grown 
 up into big children it had been re-converted 
 into a sleeping room, and all the former furni- 
 ture was reinstated in its former place. " We 
 call it our odd-ioom now, but I knew you would 
 feel most at home in it," said Katherine as she 
 ushered her in at the familiar, low door. " You 
 see, John has not enlarged the house, as he used 
 to threaten, and he never will now ; for I like 
 it best as it is." She looked quite young and 
 gay and as handsome as ever — her two immense 
 boys might have been her brothers instead of 
 her sons. ' 
 
 All at the dear old rectory seemed so cheer- 
 ful and buoyant that Rachel felt herself in an 
 atmosphere of as pure content and of as full 
 happiness as this world ever gives. They as- 
 sembled round the dinner-table, children and 
 all, on that first evening, as blithe and pleasant 
 a family party as could be found in the length 
 and the breadth of the land. Arthur Hill had 
 no native gloom in him and his wife had caught 
 some of his gayety : she was as lightsome again 
 as she used to be and far more given to lively 
 conversation ; while John Withers and Kather- 
 ine were a pattern pair of married lovers whom 
 all their kinsfolk and friends admired. If the 
 sisters had passed a forlorn childhood and lonely 
 youth the lack of happiness had been made up 
 to them with interest since. Lady Foulis was a 
 true prophetess when she told them they were 
 having their worst days at Whinstane, and bade 
 them look forward to the coming of happier 
 
 times elsewhere. And her hints to Rachel had 
 been justified too — touching the unsureness of 
 the future. Poor Rachel, poor sober Rachel! 
 who had been so gladsome in her heart during 
 that dreary visit to the Tower, and was now the 
 loneliest and dullest of them all ! So the wheel 
 of fortune whirls us round, sometimes sunny- 
 side up, sometimes down in the dust and the 
 dark — and we must even take the rough with 
 the smooth, the shade with the shine, and make 
 ourselves philosophical and contented I 
 
 But notwithstanding the merry talk and mer- 
 rier laughter there was a skeleton rattling its 
 bones in the background that night, and many 
 ears at the rectory were awake to its ominous 
 jingle. Rumor was no longer whispering in 
 Hurtledale, but crying aloud, open-mouthed and 
 insolent. The last people to hear her voice are 
 always those most concerned in what she says. 
 Lady Georgiana Warleigh had heard nothing, 
 but she suspected every thing, and this family 
 gathering at the rectory — which was, in fact, 
 purely accidental — she suspected most of all 
 What did it mean ? Why were they all come 
 together just at this season ? 
 
 On the morning succeeding Rachel Withers' 
 arrival, Lady Georgiana came down to the 
 rectory betimes accompanied by Mortimer to 
 pay her a visit. She looked very haggard and 
 restless, but she met Rachel with her cordial 
 airy manner, complimented her on her healthful 
 face, congratulated her on her pleasant tour 
 abroad, and hoped she would experience the 
 beneficial effects of it through the winter; 
 talking fast and fluently, and scarcely allowing 
 Rachel to edge in a word. When this had gone 
 on for some time, she made an excuse for dis- 
 patching Mortimer to join his cousins out of 
 doors, and they were left to themselves In the 
 drawing-room. Rachel experienced an inde- 
 finable sense of uneasiness when thus left alone 
 with Lady Georgiana ; she perceived that some- 
 thing more than ordinary was in her mind ; she 
 was a subtle, secret woman, and her visage was 
 a very mask for hiding emotion, but while they 
 were talking she several times pressed her 
 handkerchief to her mouth and held it there, 
 and her glance was expressive of the keenest 
 nervous alarm. She gave Rachel the idea that 
 she was in a state of violently suppressed agita- 
 tion and dread ; and also that she was consciou? 
 some great thing depended on lier exercising 
 self-control. She was dressed with her usual 
 scrupulous simplicity and grace, and all her 
 voluntary gestures were those of a perfectly as- 
 sumed ease ; only a consummate actress could 
 have carried on for so many years with success 
 the drama she had sustained ; but now that she 
 heard the footsteps of retribution echoing close 
 and fast after her vain flight, nature overpowered 
 art, and she betrayed again and again to those 
 who were on the watch that Fate had run her 
 out of breath, and that in a very little while her 
 last strength would be spent. 
 
 " Now tell me about your travels," she began 
 as soon as they were alone. " Mortimer wrote 
 
FOUND. 
 
 145 
 
 that he had met you at several places on the 
 Rhine, and that you appeared to be enj(^ing 
 your independence amazingly. Did you and 
 your friend quite agree ? A solitary tour has 
 Its charms, but if you go double, your com- 
 panion must either suit you to the core, or be- 
 come speedily a thorn in the flesh. But I sup- 
 pose you two, having known each other from 
 your youth upward, are as familiar with each 
 other's quips and cranks of character as you 
 are with your own. It must have been ex- 
 tremely pleasant. I could find in my heart to 
 envy you ! No ties, no troubles, no any thing 
 to interfere with the delightful -novelty. Well, 
 and where did you sail from to come home ? 
 Fi'om Boulogne, I suppose, as that is the short- 
 est and easiest passage." > 
 
 " No, we went by Dieppe, and through Nor- 
 mandy ; so in returning we took the route 
 through Belgium by way of making the most of 
 our holiday to the end." 
 
 " Ah, you sailed from Antwerp to London 
 then ? Interesting old city Antwerp is, but the 
 crossing to England very bad. I made it once, 
 but I should never choose to make it again. 
 We had a very rough night out." 
 
 " But we did not sail from Antwerp ; we took 
 the boat from Ostend to Dover, and that is a 
 disagreeable passage too." 
 
 Lady Georgiana was seated opposite to the 
 light, and Rachel with her back to it ; at the 
 name of Ostend Lady Georgiana's eyes blinked — 
 it might be from the dazzle of the sun, but it 
 was more probably from a sudden pang ; how- 
 ever, she made the glitter on the glass her ex- 
 cuse for changing her seat, and took a chair 
 ^here the green curtains threw a ghastly sha- 
 dow on her pallid face, and made it impossible 
 to detect any fluctuations of feeling which she 
 might not have force enough to iiide. 
 
 " From Ostend you sailed — detestable place, 
 Ostend," then said she in her dulcet tones. 
 "Pray what could take you to Ostend?" 
 
 " My friend's longing for the sea. She makes 
 her home in London, and she wished foT a few 
 days' breeze and bathing before plunging into 
 its dusty toils again." 
 
 " Really — ^very nice and convenient, indeed." 
 Lady Georgiana was reflecting — Rachel was re- 
 flecting too. After a few seconds' pause. Lady 
 Georgiana asked at what date they were at 
 Ostend, and if the weather was agreeable. She 
 was told that it was at the beginning of July, 
 and that it was very wild and dismal weather 
 for the season. " And of course you did not 
 continue long? The Germans go there be- 
 cause it is the only place they have, but you 
 who know Claymire and all our lovely Devon- 
 shire coasts could hardly be inclined to linger." 
 
 " No, we did not enjoy it much, and I should 
 certainly never care to revisit it," said Rachel. 
 She began to perceive that this close interroga- 
 tory had a design -in it ; Lady Georgiana's next 
 words unfolded it, and made her heart leap. 
 
 " I read in Tlie Times not long ago that poor 
 Mr. Gilsland was dead at Ostend. We attended 
 his church once. What a very eloquent man 
 he was, but sadly unprincipled. You used to 
 know him — did you happen to see him while 
 you were there ?" 
 
 " Once, for a few minutes only. It was on 
 the Marine Parade, one very windy afternoon, 
 when we had gone down to see the English boat 
 
 come in. He looked very ill then — yes, I knew 
 that he was dead. Miss Delia Ferrand received i 
 a mourning card fron#his widow, and she men- 
 tioned it to me." Deceitful Rachel ! she had 
 told no one, nor did she mean to tell any one, 
 how she had followed the forlorn, forsaken 
 wretch to his grave in the wind and the rain. 
 
 "Miss Delia Ferrand? Oh, yes, of course, 
 the melancholy intelligence would be sent to her 
 as having charge of his niece. Did you know, 
 Rachel, that my poor boy took a fancy to that 
 child's pretty face last summer, and nothing 
 would satisfy him but he must follow her abroad 
 this spring ? But it was to no purpose — he came 
 back as he went. Sinclair Ferrand had used his 
 opportunities and secured her beforehand — rath- 
 er an unusual ending between two young people 
 who have been almost brought up together. I 
 suppose it is a suitable marriage ; I liked her 
 appearance, and if Mortimer had had better luck 
 neither his father nor I would have regretted it." 
 
 "Every one approves of the match," said 
 Rachel. " They are deeply attached ; they are 
 young, and they are good. Alice has been like 
 a daughter to the ladies at Brookfall. Mortimer 
 is light-hearted, and wjU find him a new love by 
 and by." 
 
 " No fear of it ! He has not taken his disap- 
 pointment au grand sirieux." Here ensued a 
 brief silence ; Lady Georgiana's dread lest Rachel 
 might have had any communication with or from 
 Mr. Gilsland at Pstend was set at rest ; but she 
 had further inquisitions to make, and she next 
 introduced the subject of Prior's Bank and of 
 Sinclair Ferrand's being there at present ; pre- 
 luding it with an allusion to Sir Laurence's ex- 
 tensions of territory in Hurtledale. 
 
 " My husband used to say that his brother's 
 property here would never be complete until he 
 could add to it the gem of Hurtledale ; but when 
 Mr. Bond negotiated with Philip Grantley lately 
 for the purchase of some land adjacent he was 
 assured that Prior's Bank would not be sold on 
 any terms as the owner himself intended hving 
 there. I understand young Ferrand is here now, 
 though we have none of us seen him. I tell 
 Mortimer it would only be courteous if he called. 
 WUl he settle here when he marries ? He was all 
 for wide-world travel when I had a little gossip 
 with him once during our stay at Claymire, but 
 perhaps a wife will change his ways." 
 
 Rachel could not enlighten her — she had 
 heard very little talk of the marriage. In spite 
 of all her efforts to be at ease, a certain guarded 
 formality would creep over her manner while 
 talking to Lady Georgiana, who seemed to be 
 endeavoring to sift her^-to find out if she had 
 any thing to hide. Rachel had nothing to hide, 
 but she caught herself speculating more than 
 once on what it could be that she was supposed 
 to have. John and Katherine came in before 
 the sitting was at an end, but Lady Georgiana 
 did not remain long after they appeared ; and 
 the few minutes she did remain were taken up 
 with inquiries about her husband. As she was 
 shaking hands at the last she begged Rachel to 
 go up to luncheon at the Hurtlemere House on 
 the following day. " Oliver would like to see 
 you, and hear about your travels. - He has so 
 few pleasures now that it is a charity when any 
 one will come up for an hour or two and talk to 
 him," said she. 
 
 Rachel had no excuse ready, and therefore she 
 
146 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 acquiesced, though she would have been glad to 
 evade the visit. She did not relish the close 
 catechizations to which* Lady Georgiana sub- 
 jected her because she could not see their drift. 
 This morning's tallc had confused her a good 
 deal, and present thinking did not make the 
 confusion clear. But she took a walk with Sacha- 
 rissa Tulip and the boys over the fell, and that 
 did her a benefit ; strengthened her and steadied 
 her for what was to come when she got back to 
 the rectory again and found John and Katherine, 
 Arthur Hill and Grace sitting in secret conclave 
 in the study with locked doors. 
 
 John came out and took her in amongst the 
 other white faces, just saying, " Take off your 
 bonnet and lay it down here, Eachel. We have 
 something dreadful to tell you. A rumor is fly- 
 ing all round the dales that Sir Laurence War- 
 leigh's poor little wildling is alive. There — don't 
 scream or faint, but just sit down and try if you 
 can throw any light on it ; for none of us know 
 whence it has arisen, or what spark has kindled 
 up this little fire and much smoke.'f 
 
 " If she he alive I know her — if she he alive, 
 Alice Gilsland and Annis Warleigh are one and 
 the same person" said Rachel, speaking slowly, 
 deliberately, with the voice of full conviction. 
 
 "Alice Gilsland — that is the girl Lady Geor- 
 giana has been so anxious for Mortimer to mar- 
 ry," added Grace. 
 
 " Then the whole plot is out," said Arthur 
 Hill, and every body was silent, each one looking 
 on another with pallid dismay. The whole plot 
 was out. 
 
 Upon Rachel it came In an instant, like a flash, 
 a revelation. Her heart bounded as if.it had 
 been let go out of a vice, and all the dead facts 
 that had been accumulating in her mind, silently. 
 Insensibly, ever since she looked through the 
 old county history for the Lady Eleanour Seymor 
 whose portrait was a likeness of Alice, and found 
 that her maiden name was Gvn/nne, sprang up 
 quickened into perfect life ! Her face became 
 the color of pale gray marble, and when the si- 
 lence was broken and every tongue began to 
 question her at once, she could only articulate a 
 faint supplication that they would let her get 
 away to her own room, and give her time to 
 think it out. 
 
 Shut up alone in that retreat, Rachel threw 
 open the window, locked the door, and secure 
 from interruption, set her mind to work. She 
 endeavored to feel her way through the web 
 mesh by mesh ; to arrange her recollections in 
 order ; to marshal her facts in rank. First re- 
 turned Mrs. Lupton's garrulous prattle, and her 
 story, distinct, entire; then Lady Geor^ana's 
 few trivial sounding words of information about 
 the nurse and the doctor which had tinged her 
 mind with suspicion anew after it had been free 
 for years from the doubts that Bittersweet had 
 discouraged as dangerous. 
 
 Then she recalled certain incidents of the last 
 twelve years which wove themselves into a per- 
 fect network. A thousand trifles, each one light 
 as air, added themselves into a, complete whole 
 within the circle of her memory, until the sum 
 of them grew into an invincible conviction that 
 Annis, the poor little gipsy long mourned as 
 dead, and Alice, the bonnie Sunshine of Brook- 
 fall, were one — identical. ' 
 
 The very steps that had been taken to impede 
 discovery now helped it. So many things inex- 
 plicable at the time of their occurrence now ex- 
 plained fhemselves — the peculiar familiarity of 
 intimacy with Mr. Gilsland, the straitened means 
 of Oliver Warleigh and his wife ; Alice's repu- 
 diation of her mother's supposititious miniature ; 
 her wild-sounding talk on the downs, which was 
 after all the truth glimmermg through a haze. 
 And earlier circumstances than these — the avoid- 
 ance of her godmamma Grandage and herself 
 by the Gilslands at Amiens when they were re- 
 moving the child from .her temporary conceal- 
 ment in Paris ; the pitiful sketch of Annis at 
 her barred prison-window ; the poor little waifs 
 flight from her merciless jailers at Welsbeck, and 
 all the hurried tragedy of Mr. Gilsland's death. 
 And last but not least, Alice's persistent faith in 
 what were called her delusions, and the mutual 
 reoognitjon which she asserted to have passed 
 between.herself and Lady Georgiana when they 
 met at Claymire in the rectory gardens after the 
 lapse of a dozen years. There was not an essen- 
 tial link wanting. Rachel's great marvel when 
 she held the complete chain in her grasp was 
 that she had not seen it growing. 
 
 And then there was the telling of the whole 
 wicked story over to John and Arthur, Katherine 
 and Grace : and she told it. Katherine heard 
 it, her hands twisted together, and uttering 
 every now and then inarticulate cries of suffer- 
 ing. She was thinking of her brother Oliver, 
 and of his most wicked and miserable wife. 
 During his long affiiotion she had grown very 
 pitying and tender over him. 
 
 " Oh, Rachel," said she at the end, " if it hi 
 true, it is very terrible ; if it he true, they di^ 
 the child a cruel, cruel wrong, but it has brought 
 forth to them none but bitterest fruit !" 
 
 " No ; whatever she may have suffered, God 
 knows they have suffered, tenfold more!" re 
 sponded John. 
 
 They sat silent a little while after this, each 
 one endeavoring to grasp the facts as Rachel's 
 memory and' imagination had pieced them to- 
 gether. At length Arthur Hill asked how she, 
 who had known Alice now two or three years 
 intimately, never came to discover the truth be- 
 fore. " How can I tell — ^I did not discover it 
 finally," replied she. " I am no plotter or hunter 
 after secrets. Suspicion seems to me to have 
 been converging toward the light from every 
 side ; I have no evidence to give beyond what 
 you have now heard ; but it is enough." 
 
 ■" Enough, yes ! It can not be shut up in the 
 dark any longer ; the whole disgraceful &aud 
 must be searched into, let the results be what 
 they thay," said John. " It has triumphed too 
 long already." 
 
 " Oh, dear John, let nothing be done in haste,'' 
 pleaded Katherine. " Wait and see ; Lady 
 Georgiana says Mortimer has a fancy for the 
 poor child — if they could marry, would not that 
 right it all without need of blazouin'g it to the 
 world ?" 
 
 John shook his head, smiling pitifully over 
 his wife's womanish device for righting so great 
 a wrong, and then turning to Rachel he asked 
 what Alice herself remembered. " She was be- 
 tween four and five years old when she went to 
 Hastings ; she must have been fully five when 
 rescued from the Gilslands — she should have her 
 recollections." 
 
FOUND. 
 
 147 
 
 " And so she has," said Eaohel. Then she 
 recited Alice's repudiation of the false miniature, 
 her rejection of all Mr. Gilsland's accounts of her 
 father, and her romantic, hazy reminiscences of 
 her home with him. " But thinic how cruelly 
 they used her," she went on, " they tried to 
 crush all life out of her memory, and that long 
 sickness at Brookfall would help their malice. 
 She fully believes that her father is alive, and I 
 have little doubt but that she would recognize 
 him did they meet." 
 
 " Laurence is abroad, contented and unsuspi- 
 cious," interposed Katherine. " It is not certain, 
 John ; it may half of it be the tissue-work of 
 Eachel's imagination ; Lady Foulis is doting, 
 and wider tales than this have been bruited 
 abroad which have turned out false when put to 
 the proof. Think what agony for Laurence, 
 what shame for Oliver, for all of us, if the 
 dreadful accusation were made and found incap- 
 able of being sustained." 
 
 " My Kate, you believe it yourself," was John's 
 conclusive answer. " We have a work of jus- 
 tice, of restitution put upon us to do, and we 
 must do it without fear or favor. Only the 
 means must be well considered first. Laurence 
 is in Holland — ^him we must summon. She is 
 coming to Prior's Bank in a week — a meeting 
 must be the test ; perhaps it will be the quick- 
 est and least painful test, from what Kachel 
 says." 
 
 " You will warn them at the Hurtlemere 
 House first — don't let Laurence see Oliver in 
 his first rage," said Grace, who had not spoken 
 yet. " And there are those kind old ladies who 
 have taken care of her to be thought of" 
 
 " And Sinclair Ferrand," added Kachel ; and 
 then she {old them of Alice's engagement to the 
 nephew of her benefactresses. 
 
 " Moral certainties are very well as far as they 
 go, but they are not evidence," said Arthur Hill. 
 " If the grave were opened and found to con- 
 tain the remains of a child tallying in age with 
 Annis; if the meeting on which you rely so 
 much were not crowned by a recognition ; and if 
 the instruments of the abduction kept faith with 
 each other and dared you for proofs, I do not 
 see where you would be. There have been mys- 
 terious disappearances and reappearances before 
 this which have afforded a good, deal of legal 
 fighting gjpund. Mrs. Lupton looks good me- 
 tal — she will tell no tales ; and Doctor Frith, un- 
 less his countenance sorely belie him, is capable 
 of worse things than giving false certificates of 
 death ; while Gilsland is gone out of the reach of 
 making tardy amends by confession. Before 
 taking any other step I should, were I you, call 
 Mr. Bond into counsel. He will advise as to the 
 likeliest and safest measures. Meanwhile we 
 had best be dumb, and go on as heretofore. We 
 can not challenge Oliver or Lady Georgiana on 
 pure hearsay." 
 
 To this every one acceded ; and the next 
 morning when Kachel, in most reluctant redemp- 
 tion of her promise, walked up to luncheon at 
 the Hurtlemere House, John Withers and Ar- 
 thur Hill rode over to the old lawyer's at Bi^af- 
 ferton. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh appeared to Kachel Withers 
 very much broken and wasted indeed since she 
 
 saw him last in London, though Lady Georgiana 
 protested that he was stronger than he had been 
 for a long while, and in better spirits. He said 
 to her when she went in, wringing her hand 
 with his yellow skeleton fingers as he spoke : 
 " I have had a long agony, Rachel, a very long 
 agony ; but something whispers me it is draw- 
 ing near to an end now." 
 
 " You must not give way, sir ; there's years 
 of life in you yet," shrilled Mrs. Lupton, who 
 was standing by his chair in the attitude of at^ 
 tentive nurse. He was not deaf, but she always 
 raised her voice as if he were, and stooped her 
 mouth to his ear, from which he visibly recoiled 
 as if he expected her to bite. 
 
 Lady Georgiana was seated at her work-table 
 in the window. " He desponds sometimes, Ra- 
 chel, and it can not be wondered at," said she, 
 looking wearily toward him. She was busy on a 
 fine piece of tapestry, of which she must have 
 had an acre put away somewhere ; for it was her 
 constant occupation, and never appeared made 
 up or put to any use. Rachel had never seen 
 her at home that she had not a large square of 
 canvas and a basket of bright wools and silks 
 before her. Who knows how many aching ter- 
 rors that monotonous labor helped her to smoth- 
 er ! She spoke again. " Tell Oliver about your 
 holiday, Rachel ; it will divert his mind from 
 dwelling on his own sensations for half an hour 
 and that will be so much gained. You would 
 like to hear what Rachel Withers saw and did 
 abroad, ^ould you not, Oliver ?" 
 
 He inclined his head in courteous assent, but 
 did not appear to listen after she had spoken a 
 few sentences. It would have had to be a much 
 more vital subject than any traveler's talk to at- 
 tract his attention away from himself for more 
 than a minute or two now. His eyes fixed them- 
 selves on the smouldering logs that heaped the 
 wide range ; for he was so chilly in his feebleness 
 that he needed a fire during the hottest days of 
 summer. Perhaps the tone of Rachel's soft voice 
 going on in a continuous strain of chat had a 
 soothing effect, and enabled him to give himself 
 up to his own train of thought more entirely 
 than if he had been addressed at intervals only ; 
 BO, at least, she fancied from the set quietness 
 that presently stole over his countenance. He 
 seemed rapt away into a world of his own, where 
 his gnawing miseries grew dull and lethargic. 
 He passed whole days now sunk in this semblance 
 of deep reverie, which, if it could have been 
 dived into, would, perhaps, have been found 
 sheer vacancy. Body, mind, and spirit were all 
 alike worn down to the lowest ebb. It seemed 
 as if deliverance by death could not be far dis- 
 tant from him. 
 
 While Kachel engaged her master, Mrs. Lup- 
 ton retired to her own place and took up her 
 sewing with an air of perfect peace and com- 
 fort. What a woman that was ! Sleek, fair, 
 plump, even comely to the casual glance ; but 
 her eyes were hard and cold as steel, and the 
 lines about her mouth might have been carved 
 with th^ graver instead of by a natural smile. 
 She was a woman who with a purpose to serve 
 would hesitate at no cruelty, no crime, no des- 
 perate, long-sustained iniquity, and she looked 
 like what she was. 
 
 It was not until Rachel had been full an hour 
 in this room, from which Oliver Warleigh now 
 
148 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 rarely stirred save to his bed in that which ad- 
 joined it, before luncheon was announced ; and 
 then Lady Georgiana and she went down-stairs 
 together, leafing him alone with Mrs. Lupton. 
 Rachel observed that he watched them away, 
 and that his eyes expressed terror of being thus 
 left — the terror of a helpless person abandoned 
 to a torturer. 
 
 They sat down to the table by themselves, for 
 Mortimer was not in the house ; but he made 
 his appearance before they had finished, an- 
 nouncing as he joined them that he had met 
 Sinclair Ferrand on the moor, and had wallsed 
 round by the Force with him. His mother re- 
 ceived this intelligence calmly, but an awful 
 ghastliness overspread her countenance when 
 her son went on with heedless inobservance to 
 say that Dr. Ferrand and all the Brooltfall party 
 were expected at Prior's Bank in a few days — 
 evidently she had not heard a whisper of this 
 before. She felt the net closing round her in- 
 evitably now ; Rachel averted her gaze from 
 her — great as had been her crime, her cruelty, 
 pity for her was at that moment the uppermost 
 feeling in her inind. 
 
 "Why did you not tell me this before?" said 
 Lady Georgiana suddenly in a voice that made 
 her shrink ; so forced and yet so stifled with 
 thick thronging agonies. "Why did you not 
 tell me this yesterday when we were speaking 
 of her !" Rachel looked up and their eyes met ; 
 and in that instant, though not a word was ut- 
 tered, a whole revelation was made. Miere was 
 no longer any secret about Alice as between 
 those two. Lady Georgiana was self-betrayed 
 and she knew it. 
 
 Mortimer, startled into attention by his moth- 
 er's tone and manner, intercepted that swift 
 glance which told so much, but he did not speak. 
 The color fled out of his face too, and he looked 
 from one to the other with vivid, silent inquiry 
 as to what it all meant. Lady Georgiana was 
 the first to recover her composure. ■" Tou eat 
 nothing, Rachel," said she, and Rachel as quietly 
 responded that she would not take any thing 
 more, she thanked her. "Are you afrdd we 
 shall poison you ?" asked Lady Georgiana again, 
 then laughed her harsh laugh which could con- 
 ceal so niuch. 
 
 They all rose together from the table and 
 passed into the hall, the door of which stood 
 «pen with the full mid-day glow pouring in on 
 the checkered marble of the floor. Lady Geor- 
 giana paused a moment meditative, and then 
 invited Rachel to come out into the garden. 
 " There are peaches ripe on the south-wall," 
 said she ; " and they are always best plucked 
 and eaten when the sun is hot upon them." 
 Rachel obeyed her behests, and when she said 
 again, " Take my arm, Rachel," she took it with- 
 out hesitation. 
 
 If any one had warned her beforehand that 
 thus and thus would she behave toward a woman 
 who had been guilty of such stupendous wicked- 
 ness as had Oliver Warleigh's wife, she would 
 have scouted the accusation vehemently. She 
 could only have imagined herself shrinking away 
 froin her with loathing or denouncing her with 
 horror, but the sacredness of suffering humanity 
 was in her still, and that overpowered all senti- 
 ments in Rachel's soul but one of awed, wonder- 
 ing compassion. The judgment of God was so 
 
 close upon her now that mortal hatred of her 
 guilt shrank away and hid its face from the 
 spectacle of her punishment. 
 
 Mortimer followed into the garden and gath- 
 ered the fruit for them from the sunny wall, and 
 they ate it, walking leisurely to and fro under 
 the hedge of clipped holly that screened the west 
 winds from the lower terrace — ate it, and talked 
 about it as if that dreadful quarter of an hour 
 were a pleasant interval of idleness and nothing 
 more. The heat and glare were, however, very 
 great, and Lady Georgiana proposed by and by 
 that they should go indoors ; and leaving Mor- 
 timer below they returned to Oliver Warleigh's 
 room. Then again did his wife apply herself 
 mechanically to her tapestry, and again was poor 
 Rachel invited to amuse the invalid with her 
 reminiscences of travel until three o'clock struck, 
 and she could decently take leave. If Lady 
 Georgiana had one doubt of her knowledge left, 
 Rachel wished fervently that she should retain 
 it, and not a single word of explanation or inquiry 
 ppssed between them to clear up that glance of 
 terrible intelligence they had exchanged. 
 
 As Rachel was biding Oliver Warleigh good- 
 by, his lips formed the almost soundless words, 
 " John, I want to see John," with low, tremu- 
 lous, beseeching energy. No one overheard 
 him but herself ; for Lady Georgiana and Lup- 
 ton were at the lower end of the room, as far 
 away from the fire as they could get ; a pressure 
 of his hand was the only response she ventured 
 on, but he understood it, and gave her a stealthy 
 gesture of acknowledgment in reply. 
 
 Mistress Dobie put herself in the way to have 
 a few words with Rachel as she was leaving the 
 house. 
 
 " What do yon think of Master Oliver, Miss 
 Rachel ? I think he's ower beset wi' doctors an' 
 nurses to ha' half a chance. Poor mortial man ! 
 God knows why he is as he is, an' mayhap t' 
 Auld 'Tin knaws, but nare a ane o' us can guess." 
 The dame peered at Rachel with shrewd intelli- 
 gence as if, with encouragement, she could have 
 said much more than she did, but Rachel de- 
 clined to take the hint. It was not likely that 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh's brother could have 
 come to his present mysterious and miserable 
 condition without a world of back-stairs talk 
 and speculation having been lavished upon him ; 
 and notwithstanding Mistress Dobie's disclaimer 
 she had a tolerably just suspicion of ^hat had 
 brought it about ; she was too shrewd and clear- 
 witted a woman to have lived for eight or ten 
 months in hostility with Mrs. Lupton, and not 
 to have discovered the secret of her power and 
 influence over Lady Georgiana Warleigh. 
 
 Rachel met Mortimer loitering near the gate, 
 as she believed on purpose to speak to her, but 
 if so his courage failed him; for though he 
 wallied nearly all the way to the rectory with 
 her he never once referred to the scene at lunch- 
 eon. He looked perplexed and out of spirits ; 
 up to that day he had lived without a suspicion, 
 l(,ut now he perceived some danger dimly and 
 darkly threatening his mother, but of what na- 
 ture or whence coming he could not conjecture 
 even yet. 
 
 Mr. Bond was thunderstruck by the commu- 
 nication which John Withers and Arthur Hill 
 
POUND. 
 
 149 
 
 made to him. At first he exclaimed that the 
 s^ory was too wildly improbable to be true, but 
 being' reminded that not one of them in Hurtle- 
 dale had seen Annis dead — not even himself, 
 thougli he had gone to Hastings for the very 
 purpose of looking after her and watching that 
 all was right — he began to blame himself and 
 say, how should he answer to his master for his 
 cowardly neglect ? But for that, the conspiracy 
 might liave been detected at the first step, and 
 those wiclced women circumvented. He asked 
 time to consider of the measures that must be 
 taken to verify the story, and promised to go 
 over to the rectory on the following morning af- 
 ter breakfast, and this he did accordingly, ar- 
 riving there to find confirmation strong of every 
 particular that had been told him on the previous 
 day. 
 
 This confirmation had come to Rachel With- 
 ers in the shape of a confession\written by Mr. 
 Gilsland shortly before his death. He began it 
 by expressing his disappointment at her non- 
 appearance on the Monday according to her 
 promise, and went on in the supposition that 
 she did not intend to redeem it ; or that she had 
 left Ostend. It was very brief and very expli- 
 cit ; almost the only novelty in it being the in- 
 formation that the coffin buried in Hurtledale 
 churchyard as that of Annis contained no mor- 
 tal relics at all. There was a touch of grotesque 
 vanity in its conclusion. It was one of his bit- 
 terest regrets, he said, that he had made Eachel's 
 life so desolate and wretched. But it never 
 was desolate or wretched ; perhaps she had borne 
 her few trials as lightly as ever a woman in the 
 world ; for she had always set herself with pious 
 fortitude to endure what could not be evaded, 
 and it is our struggles that gall us often more 
 than our bonds. She now found herself under 
 the necessity of telling the incidents of her few 
 days at Ostend. 
 
 " Poor wretch, and he had not even the con- 
 solation of knowing himself not utterly desert- 
 ed !" remarked Katherine, and no one ever 
 touched on that part of the subject again. 
 
 The letter had been detained amongst others 
 and forwarded to Mr. Gilsland's widow ; it hav- 
 ing. Sis it appeared, no address upon it when he 
 died and left his work undone. At least it was 
 a feminine hand that had addressed it to Rachel 
 at Claymire, whence Hanson had forwarded it 
 to Hurtledale. 
 
 " It will prevent a struggle or shorten it at 
 least," remarked Arthur Hill. " I am thankful 
 one of the crew has confessed." 
 
 And then, prepared for whatever might occur, 
 John Withers set off to the Hurtlemere House 
 for his interview with Oliver Warleigh, and a 
 most sad and terrible interview it was. Lady 
 Georgiana opposed his seeing her husband at 
 first, but when he firmly insisted, she penetrated 
 his designs, lost all self-command, and exclaim- 
 ed : " Then Rachel Withers has told you her 
 fancies? But she has no proof — I defy any of 
 you to bring evidence against us that will hold 
 water." 
 
 John's calmly crushing reply was : 
 
 " Lady Georgiana, we need neither proof nor 
 evidence, for you will bring no opposition to 
 bear against the facts. Mr. Gilsland cleansed 
 his conscience before he died by confessing the 
 whole base conspiracy." 
 
 " It was ke betrayed us then, the vaporing, 
 lying wretch ! I knew he was not to be trusted, 
 nor Frith either ; wild horses would not have 
 dragged it from Lupton or from me !" And 
 for several minutes the baffled woman walked 
 about the room, lost to sense in her rage, grind- 
 ing her teeth, and uttering the inarticulate ani- 
 mal sounds of a passion and an agony too great 
 for words. With a desperate effort she recov- 
 ered her self-control at last and stood still, her 
 bosom heaving, her visage livid with suppressed - 
 emotion, and said with her sneer of bitterest 
 contempt : " Oliver has had a long hankering to 
 cleanse his conscience too ; since that hound 
 has done it, let him have what shred of peaee 
 such confession can give him. He would have 
 been beforehand with Gilsland if he had not 
 had me at his elbow all these years to bolster 
 up his courage." And so she led the way to her 
 husband's room at the door of which stood Mrs. 
 Lupton. 
 
 " It is over, Lupton. Ton can do the best 
 that remains for yourself, and go," said Lady 
 Georgiana, addressing the nurse. 
 
 Mrs. Lupton stared at her patroness for a 
 moment, horribly dismayed, and then asked : 
 " Who was it told — ^Frith or Gilsland ?" Being 
 informed that it was Mr. Gilsland, she answer- 
 ed, while a significant grin writhed her lips 
 away from her shining teeth : " He is dead al- 
 ready — so much the better for him perhaps." 
 A demon revealed itself in her countenance at 
 that moment; she would not have stuck at 
 murder just then to compass a revenge. 
 
 John Withers could not enter the room until 
 she stood away from the door, which she was 
 in no haste to do ; her reign of terror was 
 over, but she had too much confidence in her 
 personal resources to beat a cowardly retreat. 
 
 " I shall always respect and admire you. Lady 
 Georgiana Warleigh," said she, with a grave 
 assumption that her respect and admiration were 
 desirable things. " Tou have stood firm from 
 beginning to end — firmer than I looked for^ 
 and if there had been only us two in the secret 
 as I proposed. Doomsday might have told a tale, 
 but it would never have got out before." And 
 with that she stepped aside from the doorway 
 and let John pass her. 
 
 Oliver Warleigh had been wide awake to the 
 unusual disturbance, and was staring ■ affrighted 
 toward the entrance when John went in— his 
 cowering figure, hands clutching the sides of 
 his chair, and head thrust forward, all hideously 
 expressive of the terror that had laid hold on 
 him. When he saw who his visitor was he fell 
 back and essayed to smile— a feeble, dismal 
 effort that ended in a whining cry. 
 
 " I am living in hell, John, I am living in 
 heU, and they have sent for Frith again ?" whis- 
 pered he. " I thought he was come — ^was it 
 only you talking to Lupton at the door ? Keep 
 him away if you can — she is always promising 
 to give me a dose when he is here ; and she will 
 some day when my lady is out of the way. She 
 uses me shamefully, shamefully ! I hate her !" 
 The vehemence of his passion lifted him for 
 a moment erect in his cliair, but only to shrink 
 down again more abased and fear-stricken than 
 ever, as he went on : " You are a good man, John, 
 and can know nothing of the temptations the 
 devil puts in the road of the wicked. If I tell 
 
ISO 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 you what we did many, many years since, you 
 will not be hard on me, will you, though you 
 are a priest ?" He waited panting for the as- 
 surance, and then went on in a voice so low as 
 to be almost inaudible. "I would have told 
 Laurence when he came home from America, 
 but they took me abroad and shut me uj) for 
 six years. Sis child did not die at Hastings of 
 that fever ; we got her conveyed away, and in 
 the co£Sn we buried here there was nothing but 
 - a swathed log of wood — if you have it taken up 
 you will find I speak the truth. They say she 
 really is dead now, but they have told me so 
 many lies that may be a lie too. I saw her once 
 in Paris, again in London, and at Claymire last 
 summer, and they swear I was mistaken — ^but I 
 know better. It was Gipsy and no other." 
 
 "Would it be any relief to you to hear that 
 she was not dead ?" John asked him. 
 
 " I can not tell — it would make Laurence 
 amends. But there is poor Mortimer — ^he has 
 been brought up to think; himself heir to Whin- 
 stane and Penslaven — but still, is she alive?" 
 John then told him that she was. "Would 
 Laurence know her?" was the next inquiry. 
 John thought it extremely probable he might. 
 " I hated her, the little serpent, but I am glad 
 she is not dead — yes, it-is safe$t," replied Oli- 
 ver. " Mortimer will not take so much harm, 
 for he does not care about money. It is the 
 dishonor, the shame he will feel. My lady says 
 cynically she does not know how we come to 
 have a son so sensitive. They have tried to 
 persuade me that I am mad, John ; but I have 
 been sane enough not to escape one wrench of 
 the screw they have put upon me !" And thus 
 he moaned on, poor feeble wretch; not too 
 weak to imagine a crime, but ever too weak 
 to act it out ; earning for his guerdon in the end 
 nothing but the scorn and tyranny of his mean 
 and miserable associates in guilt. At this mo- 
 ment even he pleaded with John not to betray 
 him to his nurse, lest she should take on him 
 her long-threatened revenge for his suspicion- 
 breeding fears. 
 
 John bade him set his mind at rest, and prom- 
 ised that she should molest him no more ; the 
 secret had been oozing out for some time and 
 many had guessed it before he spoke. He also 
 told him of Mr. Gilsland's confession, and then 
 he felt rather than heard him ask the question, 
 " Does Laurence know it ?" » John said No, but 
 he must now be immediately warned and sum- 
 moned home, whereupon Oliver fell into such a 
 trembling and faintness that John was relieved 
 to see Lady Georgiana enter; rigid, emotion- 
 less, as if she wer6 formed compact of ice and 
 iron. 
 
 Before she spoke her husband conjectured her 
 design — she was come to tell him they must 
 leave the Hurtlemere House instantly. 
 
 " No, no, no !" shrieked he piteously. " I 
 will not go away with Lupton any more ; John, 
 stand between me and that fiend." 
 
 " Will you remain here and meet your brother 
 Laurence in his own house ? Will you dare 
 that ?" demanded his wife. 
 
 " I will dare any thing rather than fall into 
 
 Lupton'a hands away from here," was his reply. 
 
 " So be it — what you dare, I dare ; but it is 
 
 not wise ; it is running more risks than needs." 
 
 " Laurence is a good fellow ; I was never 
 
 afraid of Laurence from a boy. I wish we had 
 never seen that girl — he has behaved better to 
 me than any of you ; and I know he love? poor 
 Mortimer." 
 
 At these words a spasm of anguish disturbed 
 Lady Georgiana's frozen face, and turning to 
 John, she said, — 
 
 " Who will tell him ? I can not." 
 
 It was a scene of sickening weakness, wicked- 
 ness, wretchedness. John Withers looked quite 
 ill and worn out when he went home after it, 
 and this was by no means the last act in the 
 pitiful tragedy. What he said to them in his 
 character of priest need not be quoted here ; but 
 in his position as kinsman he was kind. Morti- 
 mer did not appear so long as he waited ; and 
 Mistress Dobie on being Inquired of, said she 
 had watched him go over the fell before the 
 rector arrived. He left without seeing him, 
 therefore, and for all that the revelation must 
 come, John fancied Lady Georgiana was thank- 
 ful even for this brief reprieve. 
 
 It was a very sad evening at the rectory. 
 Letters were written to Sir Laurence at the 
 H^ue, where he was almost sure to go sooner 
 or later, though his exact whereabouts was not 
 known ; and in John's was inclosed a copy of 
 Mr. Gilsland's confession. Katherine was ex- 
 ceedingly anxious that Oliver should be moved 
 down to the rectory before Sir Laurence came 
 home ; let him have been ever so weak, ever so 
 wicked, he was still a brother, and a brother to 
 all appearance, hanging now on the verge of the 
 grave. John did not gainsay her wishes, and 
 as Arthur Hill and Grace seconded them, it was 
 determined that the proposal of a refuge there 
 should be made to Lady Georgiana. It was im- 
 possible that Oliver could travel far in his pres- 
 ent condition, and it was equally impossible that 
 he could remain where he was. He could not 
 be left under the roof of his injured brother 
 through the crisis that was now drawing nearer 
 every day. 
 
 The family at the rectory were all seated at 
 breakfast the next morning when Mortimer 
 Warleigh was seen to come in at the gate, saun- 
 tering and slow as his manner was. Having 
 closed it he stood leaning upon it and looking 
 back up the road by the way he had come for sev- 
 eral minutes ; then turned along the path to the 
 side-door. John left the table to go to him, and 
 for the next ten minutes after the library door 
 was heard to close upon them, the rest of the 
 party sat almost without a word, hushed and 
 anxious waiting for the issue. At the end of 
 that time the two reappeared in the garden, 
 John without his hat, holding the young man's 
 arm and speaking to him with grave earnestness. 
 Grace watched them through the window, her 
 mild eyes brimming with tears, and Catherine 
 covered her face to hide hers. 
 
 " It will fall very cruelly upon him," remark- 
 ed Arthur Hill ; and the young folks stared and 
 marveled and held their peace, impressed most 
 deeply as the young always are by the sense of 
 a surrounding atmosphere of trouble when they 
 do not understand whence it arises. At length 
 the two in the garden parted ; Mortimer went off 
 at his leisurely pace, and John returned sadly to 
 the breakfast-room. 
 
/ 
 
 POUND. 
 
 151 
 
 "How does the poor fellow bear it?" said 
 Arthur Hill aa- his brother-in-law reappeared ; 
 the women with their eyes mutely asking the 
 same. 
 
 " It is hard to judge. He says nothing — he 
 seems stunned," was the answer. " Mortimer 
 has a high mind — it is the fraud, the hideous 
 disgrace that touch him ; not the loss of money 
 or of position." Katherine asked if her hus- 
 band had had to tell him the story or only to 
 confirm it. " Only to confirm it," he replied. 
 " Lady Georgiana spoke to him last night, and 
 Lupton added her testimony. That woman has 
 'not left the Hurtlemere House yet." 
 
 " Did you tell Mortimer that we wish him to 
 come down here with his father and mother, 
 John ? If not I shall go up myself," said Kath- 
 erine. John remonstrated faintly, but his wife 
 repeated her determination. " Yes — Grace and 
 I will walk up after prayers. "We shall put them 
 all somewhere. The boys may sleep at the 
 Force Farm till they go back to school ; Mary 
 Wray will take care of them ; and when Rachel 
 goes to Prior's Bank her room will be at liber- 
 ty." It sounded strange, these trivial domestic 
 arrangements coming athwart such serious 
 events — but it is always thus in common life. 
 
 And about midway the morning Katherine 
 and Grace did go up to the Hurtlemere House, 
 and settled every thing to their satisfaction. 
 Oliver Warleigh acceded to their proposal eager- 
 ly, whispering to Katherine that she must not 
 offer to take in his nurse, as he could do per- 
 fectly well without her ; he did not seem to be 
 suffering much in any way that day ; whether 
 he felt that the worst was over, and was rally- 
 ing against it, or whether he was growing too 
 weak to be any loi%er shaken by pangs of hu- 
 man fear, was not easy to tell. He looked like 
 a man who has finished a tremendous task or 
 put off a heavy burden, and was now preparing 
 to enjoy rest. After the long and terrible dis- 
 quietudes he had borne, his present position 
 must have been one of comparative ease and 
 comfort. Natures of his base sort suffer more 
 from the dread of discovery and the penalties 
 of guilt than from the inward conscience. 
 
 It was not thus with Lady Georgiana. She 
 sat like a statue, defying fate, not conquered by 
 it. She had told all to her favorite son, and he 
 had not reproached her. He had made no com- 
 plaint ; he had not uttered one harsh or unkind- 
 ly word ; he had not given her one cold or angry 
 look, and yet she knew he was lost to her love for- 
 ever. If this cruel woman cherished any thing 
 it was Mortimer — ^the only plea she had for her 
 crime was that she did it to advance him ; and 
 if he abandoned her in her disgrace, she would 
 suffer ■vyith tenfold bitterness the anguish of be- 
 reavement that she had callously inflicted on 
 poor little Gipsy and her father a dozen years 
 before. 
 
 The facts could not be long in getting abroad 
 now ; as soon as the rectory received its un- 
 happy guests, Mistress Dobie would have leisure^ 
 to carry her gossip to market. There were a 
 thousand revelations in her wrinkled sagacious 
 visage that morning, but no one invited her to 
 talk. She only delivered herself of one remark- 
 able criticism on the obnoxious nurse whose 
 reign she perceived was over. " There is, 
 ma'am," said she, addressing Katherine, "brass 
 
 enough in that woman's face to make a warming- 
 pan ;" and she appeared to derive an exquisite 
 additional satisfaction from the utterance of it, 
 when she became aware that Mrs. Lupton was 
 behind her and had overheard it. 
 
 Two days after this Rachel Withers prepared 
 to move to Prior's Bank. She had seen Sin- 
 clair Ferrand, who had begged her to be there 
 when his aunts and Alice arrived with the doc- 
 tfft. She was nothing loth, though it was some- 
 thing of a trial too, to enter as guest those 
 familiar rooms that had so long been home. 
 Before she left the rectory, John agreed with 
 her that he would come to Prior's Bank the 
 next day, and lay before the doctor and his son 
 all the discoveries that had been made affecting 
 Alice, and after that they might judge how far 
 the intelligence need go before Sir Laurence 
 arrived at the Hurtlemere House. Every body 
 in the secret now thought it would be best and 
 safest to withhold it from her until her father 
 was present to reclaim her. 
 
 CHAPTER THE SECOND. 
 
 ALICE IN HUBTLEnALE. 
 
 Old faces glimmered through the doors. 
 
 Old footsteps tvod the upper floors. 
 
 Old voices called her from without. — Tbnntson. 
 
 The travelers arrived at Prior's Bank about 
 six o'clock, all much tired, and not entirely 
 exempt from those little infi^rmities of temper 
 which a long journey through a sultry summer's 
 day is apt to stir up. But Sinclair soon smooth- 
 ed the ruflSed plumes of the elder ladies, and 
 Alice's wanted no smoothing ; for she was as 
 bright as a humming-bird, and beautifully, frank- 
 ly happy at seeing him again. As for the doc- 
 tor, the hight of his disturbance never reached 
 beyond the comfort of a classical quotation, and 
 when the party sat down to dinner all the cares 
 of the world might have been banished a hun- 
 dred miles off for any appearance they made at 
 the board. 
 
 Miss Delia had quite recovered from her dis- 
 inclination to the journey. " It is very pleasant 
 dining with Sinclair in his own house after all, 
 and this is excellent lamb, my dear," said she, 
 nodding her cap toward her nephew with great 
 benignity. "And how are you getting on, Sun- 
 shine ? remember you ate nothing at Inncheon. 
 It is many, many years since pleasure and ex- 
 citement took away my appetite — a little more 
 mint sauce, if you please; thank you. Tes, 
 take care of her, Sinclair ; I-give her into your 
 charge here. As I tell her, it is impossible to 
 live without eating." 
 
 Alice blushed and laughed at her aunt Delia's 
 prosaic remarks, and then Miss Flora had her 
 little unconscious revelation to make of how 
 Sunshine had been in the clouds for a week, 
 and, in consequence, the very worst of company 
 to them at Brookfall. Rachel Withers suggest- 
 ed that she had perhaps been scribbling another 
 fairy fantasia, but Sinclair looking at her mer- 
 rily, read "No" in her clear candid eyes. Say 
 that she had been in dreamland, sheenland, love- 
 land, dreaming of him, who will assert but that 
 she had her right to dream ? 
 
 Thrae was light enough when dinner was over, 
 
162 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 to go o>it into the garden, and even to sec the 
 beauty of the surrounding country in the maize- 
 colored and purple tints of twilight and moon- 
 light mellow and mingled. The lawn had been 
 newly mown in the morning, and was as smooth 
 and even as the turf of the Claymire downs ; so 
 there staid the doctor, smoking his after-dinner 
 ' cigar, and there staid the aunts with Rachel, 
 though chary of possible dews attending the 
 nightfall. By the river under the asli-tvees tllfey 
 could see now and then the figures of Sinclair 
 and Alice passing to and fro. Miss Delia re- 
 marked once that they did not scom to have 
 much to say to each other, but perhaps the si- 
 lence of happy lovers is as sociable. Her flu- 
 ency, however, fatigue had by no means dimin- 
 ished. She had u hundred and fifty things to 
 talk of, each one more trivial than the other ; 
 but in her moods of excitement the excellent 
 old lady, like many virtuous persons of her sex, 
 always prattled fastest. Rachel was her patient 
 listener. 
 
 First she reviewed the daily life at Claymiro 
 since Rachel left it ; enlarging on the delinquen- 
 cies of a scapegrace little scholar in her class at 
 the school, and devoutly hoping that no greater 
 harm than ordinary would befall him in her ab- 
 sence. Then she expatiated on the propriety 
 and expedience of Mr. Clarke, the curate, sock- 
 ing him a wife to replace his sister in the parish ; 
 for she was going to marry. "A sensible, staid, 
 active woman, something like yourself ho should 
 choose, Rachel," she was pleased to say; to 
 which Rachel replied that he would show very 
 little judgment if he selected a wife of her 
 yjars when there wore nice girls to be had for 
 t le asking. Next a remark Miss Flora made on 
 the excellence of the peas she had oaten at din- 
 ner, sent her sister off on the sulflect of maiTow- 
 fats, and of kitchen-garden produce in general ; 
 thence to the kitchen-garden of Prior's Bank in 
 particular ; its aspect, its situation, its product- 
 iveness, and its liability to visitations from frogs 
 and toads by reason of its proximity to the river. 
 The allusion to amphibious veiiuin abbreviated 
 the walk. Miss Delia observed that this was 
 the time of night for them to come out, there- 
 fore she should go in.; and as she was not dis- 
 posed for solitude it became necessary that Miss 
 JFlora and Rachel Withers should go in too. 
 
 Trivial talk is supposed to be very wearisome 
 when the mind is heavy with serious thoughts, 
 but it rather relieved Raohel'to witness the old 
 lady's buoyant mood, and to listen to her cheer- 
 ful prattle. Lulls and levels are good for all of 
 us in the intervals between exciting events. It 
 would kill us to be always at high pressure of 
 excitement whether of joy or sorrow ; and dur- 
 ing the last few weeks, Rachel had been terribly 
 strung up. She wisely let herself go now, and 
 rested on Miss Delia's chat as on a wholesome 
 mental and moral relaxation ; and it was deci- 
 dedly refreshing in its effects. 
 
 " I begin to think we shall enjoy our visit 
 here very much, sister Flo'," reoommoucod tho 
 old lady, appropriating to herself with a sigh of 
 exceeding comfort what had been Mrs. Sara 
 Grandage's favorite easy chair. " It is nice to 
 see wliore our dear child is to make her homo ; 
 the only drawback is that it is so far away from 
 Brookfall. But they will visit us every year — 
 only to tliink of it I Sinclair looks very prpud 
 and happy — cunning fellow, imagine, Rachel, 
 
 that he has had his eye on Sunshine ever since 
 he grow up I Ho never had a suspicion of Mr. 
 More — I do not dare to fancy what he might 
 have done had ho found out wliile it was going 
 on I And I need not have worried myself about 
 that beautiful young Warlcigh — it seems she 
 only mixed him up in some wonderful way witli 
 her vagaries about her childhood before she 
 came to us. I was really afraid at one time she 
 was going to be fond of him, and he would 
 never have suited us. I object to weak men ; 
 if a woman can not rest in implicit reliance ou 
 her husband, my feeling is. that she would be 
 better without ono. Now, I consider t^inelair a 
 very fine character — plenty of moral bono and 
 nmsclo about him ; but in Mortimer Warleigh it 
 had oil run to sentiment." 
 
 " Did you perceive a shade of anxiety in Sin- 
 clair's countenance, when he first met us, Delia 
 dear?" asked Miss Flora at tho eai'liest pause in 
 her sister's rivulet of talk. " It soon disappear- 
 ed when he looked at Sunshine, but I almost 
 began to fear there might bo something amiss." 
 
 No, Miss Delia had observed nothing but 
 what wos perfectly delightful ; she had never 
 seen Sinclair appear to greater advantage in his 
 life ; she should have considered it a very poor 
 compliment had he looked glum when he was 
 welcoming them to his house for the first time, 
 especially when his father was there and dear 
 Alice ; how could sister Flo' fancy such a thing 1 
 
 It was not difficult to understand how sister 
 Flo' had fancied it. Sincliur had been looking 
 very grave and thoughtful — even oppressed — 
 for the last few days. With Alice's vagaries, as 
 he had considered them, strong in liis mind, ho 
 had lioarii one or two of the wild stories then 
 circulating about the dales concerning the Oliver 
 Warleighs and Sir Laurence's lost daughter ; 
 and adding them together with the almost in- 
 evitable interpretation, he began to see changes 
 awaiting his Sunshine, and shoals of kinsfolk 
 ready to claim her. lie was very well contented 
 with things as they were ; he did not desire a 
 division and sub-division of her affections ; he 
 would have preferred to keep thera all to him- 
 self. Perhaps a little cloud of doubt and un- 
 certainty beset his own prospects in the antici- 
 pation of what was coming, but Alice's radiant 
 face effectually dispersed it, and when he sat by 
 her at dinner there was not a shadow remaining. 
 Before a real and present love like hers lul 
 manner of anxieties fell efflioed. Let come 
 what might of external changes her faitliftil 
 heart for him would never change I 
 
 When tho dootor's cigar was smoked out, ho 
 stepped through the gloss-door and joined his 
 sisters, and soon after come in the two young 
 ones ; she with a damask rose in her hair, and 
 a soft, happy light shining \\\ her eyes. She 
 did not look like lost Gipsy now. Tho berry- 
 brown skin of that sun-burnt darling was no 
 longer hers; but a warm, creamy fint, into 
 which molted a pure, healthy blush on either 
 rounded cheek, Her movements had acquired 
 a now, uneopsfiioua grace ; she was always an 
 affectionate, caressing creature, but hitherto she 
 had certainly worn her mad cap rather airily ; 
 fqr the present, however, she acemod to hove 
 laid it aaido, and taken to wearing in its stead 
 the coif of maidenly dignity ; and tho one suited 
 her even more charmingly than tho other. 
 
 She sang seveiul of the doctor's favorite 
 
POUND. 
 
 153 
 
 songs in her sweet flute-like, voice, and Sinclair 
 stood by looking and listening in a trance of 
 delight. His aunt Delia addressed him thrice 
 in vain, and indemnified herself for his uncivil 
 absence of mind by remarking audibly, " He is 
 in the clouds now, I suppose ; it is a merciful 
 provision of Providence that we are not all 
 there together." 
 
 Alice overheard her through the symphony 
 of one of her ballads, and glancing round with 
 a rosy smile, whispered, " Sinclair, auntie Dee is • 
 speaking to you ;" when the absent lover came 
 back to himself and said, " It was divine !" but 
 what was divine, whether the song, or his own 
 reverie, or Miss Delia's voice, did not clearly 
 appear. 
 
 After dark it came on to rain, softly, but with 
 an even-down pertinacity that threatened con- 
 tinuance. It would be a pity, Rachel Withers 
 said, if the weather broke up now ; for half the 
 beauty of Hurtledale was in the sun, and it 
 would be disappointing if Alice did not see it 
 at its best. So it would, ^11 agreed, but then 
 nobody could bespeak fine weather ! 
 
 II. 
 
 The first person Rachel saw on coming down- 
 stairs next morning was Alice, leaning her fore- 
 head against the window-glass and watching with 
 disconsolate eyes the slow trickling of the rain- 
 drops down the streaming pane. She was in 
 the morning-room alone, and as Rachel joined 
 her she turned round and said ; " This is going 
 to be a thorough wet day, Rachel, is it not ?" 
 
 " Yes," replied Rachel, imitating her aggriev- 
 ed tone; and looking out she saw that woods, 
 river, moor, fells, were all wiped away from the 
 landscape as by a sponge of dense gray mist. 
 It certainly was unlucky — they could not even 
 see the limits of the lawn ; and the roses on the 
 verandah hung their drowned heads down heavy 
 and hopeless. It had not ceased raining for a 
 minute throughout the night. 
 
 "Is it often like this at Prior's Bant?" 
 Alice asked again. Rachel told her no ; she 
 thought the fog must have come on for pure 
 perversity; for, in fact, Hurtledale was much 
 less troubled with fogs than was Claymire with 
 sea-mist. This comforted her a little and she 
 came away from the dispiriting window. 
 
 " You must make acquaintance with in- 
 doors," suggested Rachel, and at that her coun- 
 tenance brightened altogether. 
 
 " It is really prettier than Brookfall, Rachel, 
 though I would not grieve auntie Dee by allow- 
 ing her to suppose I thought so," said she, with 
 natural cheerfulness. " Sinclair tells me he has 
 made no material alterations — do you see any 
 changes ?" 
 
 "No — he has left them for your taste to 
 direct." Rachel preferred to talk of the future 
 rather than of the past just now ; she did not 
 like to think of kind old Bittersweet when this 
 young generation was taking possession of her 
 abdicated house. 
 
 They had not been many minutes alone when 
 Sinclair looked in at the door, and holding out 
 his hand to Alice bade them come to breakfast ; 
 the aunts and doctor were already there. It is 
 an old-fashioned custom, that of .offering the 
 hand to conduct a lady, but there is more of 
 grace and courtesy in it than in offering the arm, 
 
 or the elbow, as some men do. And the pretty 
 way in whicb Alice gave him hers ! If the 
 ghost of Bittersweet, who held to all ancient 
 politenesses, could have seen her at that mo- 
 ment, it would have smiled on her benignant for 
 the admiration its original had of simple, easy, 
 modest manners ! 
 
 The weather did not clear. They watched it 
 through breakfast, and they watched it after 
 breakfast, but still down came the rain with a 
 vicious, steady, unwearying persistence. The* 
 doctor betook himself to the library, and the 
 ladies retired to the morning-room, where some 
 of them worked and some of them made believe 
 to work, while Sinclair read aloud to them that 
 famous dissertation of Ella's on roast-pig, which 
 is more delicious than the tenderest suckling 
 that ever made its last public appearance sheath- 
 ed in crisp brown armor of crackling. But on 
 that point, of course, opinions might differ. 
 Miss Delia, though no epicure, confessed to a 
 /weakness for the real thing, even while men- 
 tioning that it always suggested to her hqked 
 baby — and witness the singular connection of 
 ideas ! Charles Lamb never meant that exqui- 
 site humorous chapter to transport its readers 
 to the remote Fiji Islands, but it did so, and 
 left them stranded there, bemoaning the evil 
 praotioea of the cannibals until only Miss Delia 
 and Rachel were left to bemoan. Miss Delia 
 petted the unsavory subject, and dived into 
 deep speculations on what doleful stories the 
 first missionaries who went thither to reform the 
 taste of the inhabitants might have told if they 
 would; until they heard from the adjoining 
 room a swift chromatic scale followed up by a 
 spirited • waltz. This sufficiently betrayed the 
 whereabouts of Sunshine and Sinclair, and Miss 
 Flora having mentioned something about a let- 
 ter to cook at home had no doubt retired to 
 write it beyond the scent of the Fiji ovens. 
 
 Rachel rendered herself up an unwilling sac- 
 rifice for an hour or more, longing and yet trem- 
 bling for her brother John's arrival. He came 
 about eleven o'clock, and having inquired first 
 for her, was introduced into the room where she 
 sat with Miss Delia alone. He handed her a 
 letter, and then gave her the opportunity of 
 reading it undisturbed by taking the old lady to 
 talk to meanwhile. It was from Sir Laurence 
 Warleigh, written at Leyden, whence he was 
 going to the Hague two days later ; and at the 
 Hague, he said, letters would find him till the 
 month's end. By this date, therefore, he had 
 probably received the copy of Mr. Gilsland's 
 confession and the letters that accompanied it ; 
 and if so, he might be in Hurtledale on the day 
 after the mOfrow. 
 
 Rachel sat quiet for a minute or two after she 
 had read it, listening to the waltz-music that 
 flowed from Alice's deft and rapid fingers, and 
 thinking whitt extremes meet in this strange 
 world of ours, until John intimated to her that 
 he wished to pay his respects to Doctor Ferrand 
 on his arrival in the dale — Sinclair he had seen 
 once already. Miss Delia parted with her new 
 acquaintaiice cordially, and Rachel herself was 
 bidden to usher him into the library, where the 
 doctor was supposed to be. The room was emp- 
 ty, however, when they entered it, so she rang 
 the bell, and asked the servant who answered it 
 to seek both the gentlemen ; then sat down with 
 
154 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 her brother, and endured a few very agitated 
 momenta in. contemplation of the interview that 
 was about to take place. 
 
 Rachel Withers always connected the telling 
 of Annis's story afterward with the scent of 
 white moss roses ; for the library was fragrant 
 with them, newly gathered the day before. She 
 would fain have left John to ^et through it by 
 himself, but this he would not permit for he 
 rightly conjectured that there would be a hun- 
 dred slight details asked for that only she could 
 give. The glass-door was shut, but it looked 
 out on a pretty shady nook of the garden with 
 beech-trees encircling it and a basket of scarlet 
 geraniums in the center of the grass-plot. She 
 made conversation about those geraniums with 
 a view of steadying her nerves ; but the faster 
 she talked the more excited she grew, and soon 
 . she reached that point when she did not know 
 what she was saying. How she envied people 
 who were always masters of their parts of speech ! 
 John was strung up too ; the irrelevance of his 
 replies to her prattle betrayed it. He did not 
 like his task, which yet must be done ; and by 
 and by they dropped into silence — the silence of 
 waiting and expectancy, than which there are 
 few states of being more thoroughly trying and 
 uncomfortable. 
 
 The doctor had had courage to turn out in 
 the rain, and a fine gleam having made itself 
 ■ apparent just at the moment when Rachel and 
 her brother passed from the morning room to 
 the library, Alice and Sinclair had taken imme- 
 diate advantage of it to sally forth too ; but the 
 servant sent in quest of them found them all in 
 the garden, and in about ten minutes the doctor 
 came in by the glass door with his son close be- 
 hind him. John Withers was introduced to his 
 father by Sinclair, and after a few every-day ex- 
 pressions of courtesy the group subsided into 
 chairs, all but Rachel, who continued standing 
 and looking very helpless. 
 
 "1 hope there is nothing amiss, my dear?" 
 said the cordial old doctor; "pray sit down — 
 you arc as white as a ghost." 
 
 It would have relieved her inexpressibly had 
 she possessed the vanishing powers of one ! 
 
 Sinclair perceived that something very serious 
 was in the wind, and toojt his seat in silence at 
 the farther side of the library table, upon which 
 he leant his arms, drawing toward him the per- 
 fumy bowl of white roses, over which he bent 
 his face while watching Rachel with shrewd 
 scrutiny. He had a good guess what was com- 
 ing. 
 
 She could never afterward recall the exact 
 terms with which John approached his subject, 
 but she knew there was confusion and iteration 
 in his beginning, and that after a few seconds 
 of patient listening the doctor crossed his legs, 
 leant back in his chair and took a pinch of snuff, 
 while Sinclair pushed away the roSes and woke 
 up into keen aad vivid interest. And at last it 
 was all out. She heard John say, with that pe- 
 culiar muffled indistinctness that clothes the 
 sounds heard between sleeping and waking, " It 
 is beyond a, doubt that Alice is Sir Laurence 
 Warleigli's daughter. Dr. Ferrand. We haye 
 every proof of it. His brother and his brother's 
 wife admit the fact, and we have besides the 
 written confession of Mr. Gilsland, from whom 
 your most excellent sisters received her, and who 
 was one of the chief agents in her abduction." 
 
 Then Rachel seemed to be suddenly roused 
 to a clear comprehension of all that was passing, 
 and Sinclair, upon whom certainty came with a 
 shock, notwithstanding all his previsions, sprang 
 up impetuous, exclaiming : " And Sunshine's 
 delmions are truths? It was no idle caprice 
 that turned her with such fear and loathing from 
 Lady Georgiana Warleigh and attracted her 
 with such a tantalizing curiosity toward Morti- 
 mer." 
 
 "Let us hear the particulars, Sinclair,'' in- 
 terposed the doctor, cutting short his energetic 
 speech ; " and close that window — we left her 
 about the garden somewhere, and she had better 
 not come in here just now." 
 
 The window was shut, and that commonplace 
 measure of precaution seemed to sober the 
 whole party down into self-possession. John 
 drew an audibly long breath, and Rachel tried 
 to clear her head by pushing the hair away from 
 her brow with tremulous cold hands. The doc- 
 tor bade her not get excited if she could help it. 
 
 " I have always suspected that Gilsland knew 
 more about the child than he chose to tell," said 
 he, " but this revelation certainly comes upon 
 me as a surprise. Let us see the confession — 
 let us have it read out. Eh, Sinclair, my boy, , 
 this makes a new chapter In your romance — I 
 wish it may have a good ending." 
 
 " It can make no difference between Alice and 
 me, sir," replied the young man, calmly drawing 
 Jjack the white roses. 
 
 Then John Withers having produced the doc- 
 ument, the doctor read it without interruption, 
 his comment at the conclusion being, 
 
 " That is as complete and foul a bit of vil- 
 lainy as ever came within the scope of my 
 knowledge." 
 
 " What Toj darling must have suffered !" 
 muttered Sinclair passionately, his face kindling 
 with indignation. . - 
 
 " And the principal actors in the crime are 
 not publicly unmasked yet?" said the doctor. 
 
 " There are many innocent persons to be con- 
 sidered," replied John. " We wait for Sir Lau- 
 rence — even to him the recovery of his daughter 
 can not be all joy, seeing it will reveal the long- 
 continued treachery of his brother." 
 
 Sinclair now moved toward the glass door, 
 but his father stretched out a hasty hand to 
 arrest him ; had he not been withheld, he would 
 have sought Alice there and then to comfort 
 her for all sorrows past and gone with the good 
 news. 
 
 " Wait awhile — let us consider the ways and 
 means, my boy," said the kind old doctor. 
 "There are your aunts to be thought of — 
 Alice's great gain will look at first sight to them 
 a great loss, I sadly fear." 
 
 Thus admonished, Sinclair put a restraint 
 upon himself ; but though he did not follow the 
 promptings of his tender impatience, he watched 
 the garden closely that he might see the light 
 of his eyes if she chanced to flit round that 
 way, and so full was he of his thoughts of her 
 sweet self, that he did not hear one half of the 
 details now given to the doctor by John Withers 
 and Rachel. Perhaps the main feeling in his 
 heart was that, let her be whose child she might, 
 she was his own dear love and troth-plighted 
 darling beyond the power of ail the fathers in 
 Christendom to divide them. 
 
 The result of further debate w5s that Alice 
 
FOUND. 
 
 155 
 
 should not be told the truth until Sir Laurence 
 arrived in Hurtledale, and' that the good old 
 aunts should be spared the pains of expectation 
 too — there could not be long to wait for the end 
 now. Just when they had arrived at this con- 
 clusion, the servant announced luncheon, and 
 they all passed into the dining-room together ; 
 talking ^ airily as they could of the things of 
 every day ; the doctor with full success, but Ra- 
 chel with a conspicuous absence of even com- 
 mon-sense. The other two were midway be- 
 tween the extremes. 
 
 The sky had brightened at noon and given 
 some hope of a fine after part to the day ; but 
 the hope in an hour or so proved fallacious ; the 
 clouds came over again thicker and blacker than 
 ever, and the pelting rain lashed violently 
 against the windows, causing the doctor to re- 
 mark that he did not envy John his walk home 
 to the rectory. 
 
 " I must ask you to give me shelter until my 
 wife and sister-in-law come down in the car- 
 riage this afternoon to pay you a visit of neigh- 
 borly courtesy — then they will carry me back 
 dry," said John, appealing to Miss Flora and 
 Miss Delia, who bowed, smiled, and looked 
 pleased at the very prompt civility of Hurtle- 
 dale — not that it was always so prompt by any 
 means. 
 
 In readiness for the anticipated call, the two 
 old ladies betook themselves to the drawing- 
 room afterward, and there sat in state with their 
 prettiest pieces of company-work displayed. 
 Alice also was exhorted to employ herself be- 
 comingly, and this she did with a volume of 
 Bon Gaultier's Ballads ; edifying their serenities 
 every now and then with some grotesque paro- 
 dy of serious sentiment that especially tickled 
 her sense of fun. Miss Delia f errand did not 
 think her cousin Sara's stand of favorite books 
 in a corner of this room, which Sinclair had left 
 precisely as it was, at all well selected for a 
 Christian gentlewoman ; for the library she was 
 not responsible — that was the collection of gen- 
 erations; but for her pet volumes — let any 
 body look at them I Not a good book amongst 
 them! 
 
 They had to play a rather tedious game of 
 patience before Katherine and Grace appeared, 
 but about half-past four a carriage was heard 
 driving round to the door, and a minute after- 
 ward they presented themselves, splendid in 
 garb and card-case in hand, as if this were a 
 mere formal ceremony like any other first visit 
 to new settlers in the dale.,. What born actress- 
 es most women are ! Rachel knew by herself 
 what Kate must be feeling, and she watched 
 her anxiously, but could not for the life of her 
 detect that her countenance changed by a single 
 shade when Alice was introduced to her. The 
 sisters had expected John's report of their new 
 niece before encountering the ordeal of a meet- 
 ing, but his remaining at Prior's* Bank had left 
 them without that help ; nevertheless, they 
 looked her full in the face, and inclined their 
 heads with smiling pleasantness ; and then they 
 sat and talked of the weather, of this, of that, 
 of the other, of every insipidity that enters into 
 the dull conversational mosaic of a morning 
 call, with admirable ease and self-possession. 
 They were for the first five minutes six women 
 together, but presently in came Sinclair, and 
 
 after him John and the dpctor, and then the 
 chat ran, if not more fluently, at all events, 
 more variously. Katherine then took an oppor- 
 tunity of drawing near to Alice, but even then 
 the shrewdest observer would not have detected 
 any special interest in her air or tone. Even 
 John looked at her astonished and perplexed. 
 
 Sunshine was her perfect self. Her manner 
 was very quiet and composed on ordinary oc- 
 casions, and this seemed to her no more. Mrs. 
 Withers and Mrs. Hill were two quite indiffer- 
 ent names to her ears — had they been announced 
 as Katherine and Grace Warleigh there would 
 have been a show of far greater interest. 
 Strangers did not flurry or abash her; she 
 thought too little of herself to be shy, there- 
 fore Katherine saw her and read her for what 
 she was. Miss Delia had taken possession of 
 Grace, whose blue mild eyes Tcould now and 
 then wander to where Alice and her sister sat, 
 and then her mind wandered too from the old 
 lady's tedious ditty of her journey, to poor lit- 
 tle, long-lost Gipsy, sitting there in the midst 
 of them, so fair and maidenly, and utterly un- 
 conscious of the interest circling closer and 
 closer around her. 
 
 The visit passed off without incident, and the 
 very brief opportunity Rachel had of a private 
 word with her sister-in-law, she of course avail- 
 ed herself of to ask how she liked Alice. Kath- 
 erine gave her a rueful look and a quite woman- 
 ish answer. " If she were a seraph I could not 
 be glad to acknowledge her Laurence's child 
 yet ^ oh! there's a world of trouble to come! 
 But she is beautiful, lovely ; I quite exonerate 
 you from any charge of dullness in not recog- 
 nizing her before; I could look at her for a 
 month without finding in her any trace of re- 
 semblance to Annis. Gipsy was almost as dark 
 and rough as a real gipsy. It will be rather 
 hard on Laurence to offer him this fair, daiaty, 
 princess-like damsel for a daughter in lieu of 
 his little passionate unkempt wildling. If she 
 be like any of the family it is Lady Foulis — she 
 is quite as tall and has her air. She is not in 
 the least what I pictured her to myself. Her 
 lover will be a man after Laurence's own heart 
 from the look of him — I wish for all our sakes 
 Mortimer stood in his shoes !" 
 
 " Quite, qtite vain to wish thai" responded 
 Rachel ; and then they parted, and the carriage 
 drove away, and Sunshine summoned Rachel to 
 hear the conclusion of a merry ballad which 
 their arrival had interrupted. 
 
 On their homeward road, John gave his wife 
 and Grace an account of his critical interview 
 with the doctor and his son; a.nd explained 
 how Alice and the aunts were to be kept in 
 ignorance of it until Sir Laurence came back 
 from abroad, and was on the spot to reclaim his 
 child without any long agony of waiting and 
 
 I saw she did not know the moment I saw 
 her — we were speculating all the way to Prior's 
 Bank whether you would have told her or not," 
 said Grace. 
 
 " Of course I left that for her present guard- 
 ians to decide," replied John. "What good 
 people they are, and how good they have been 
 to her ! I fancied once or twice I detected in 
 her bits of Gipsy as she used to be." 
 
 " Did you — I did not," said his wife. " I was 
 
1^6 
 
 ANNIS WARLBIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 afraid Lauvepce would never know her again. 
 Perhaps he may." 
 
 " I hope so — hbw will he feel it, I wonder ? I 
 wish Bond could intercept him in London, and 
 travel down with him. I can not imagine to 
 myself what will be his mode of action at all — 
 how he will deal with Oliver and the rest." 
 
 Neither could Katherine nor Grace, though 
 they might be supposed to know their brother 
 best. When Sir Laurence returned from Amer- 
 ica the year after his child's reputed death, he 
 went out into the churchyard with Katherine, 
 and read the inscription on the memorial stone 
 which had replaced the cedar he had planted on 
 Helena's grave; and after speaking a little of 
 Annis'a affectionate ways and ^reat fondness for 
 himself, he said he ought never to have let her 
 leave him. And from that day to this no one 
 had ever heard him mention the names of either 
 wife or child again. 
 
 The following day rose fine after the heavy 
 rain, and all the landscape showed exquisitely 
 fresh, bright, and beautiful. Alice walked into 
 the garden before breakfast with the doctor to 
 and fro the wild-flower bank, and came in look- 
 ing like a rose of May, as Miss Delia poetically 
 expressed it. The old lady had quite come out 
 in the way of compliments since she arrived in 
 the north, and had a pleasant word for every 
 body. 
 
 Immediately after prayers were over. Sunshine 
 donned her liat for a ramble on the moors — ■ 
 nothing less would content her ; so Sinclair ac- 
 quiesced and proposed a round by which the old 
 Hurtlemere House would be avoided. 
 
 " We will go over the fell toward Mirkdale 
 and show her our grandest view, and home by 
 the Force and the high beck," said he. " Tou 
 will come with us, Miss Withers, and you, sir ?" 
 to his father ; " but the distance would be too 
 great for my aunts." They agreed that it would, 
 and preferred besides a quiet morning indoors ; 
 therefore they were left to keep each other com- 
 pany, and the rest set forth in search of the pic- 
 turesque. 
 
 There was a delicious breeze blowing on the 
 fell, quite as sweet as if sharper .than the air on 
 the Claymire downs ; but here all was more rug- 
 ged ; stronger in color, in form, and in whatever 
 constitutes the distinctive character of scenery. 
 They went high up on the hill, and then turned 
 off by a path through the heather toward a cairn 
 that marked the topmost point of Hurtlefell, 
 whence they could see outspread below them all 
 the glowing panorama of Mirkdale. In all the 
 range of the world there can be no more truly 
 satisfying prospect to heart and eye than one of 
 our English valleys when the time is tending to- 
 ward harvest ; when the meadows, lately mown, 
 lie green as emerald along the marge of the riv- 
 ers, and the sloping cornlands further up are 
 changing to gold and burnished brown in the 
 fervent August sun. Standing by the cairn with 
 the waves of heather around them, and big gray 
 rocky boulders rising out of the purplfe sea_, in 
 the midst of the silence of the hills — which is a 
 silence such as there is none other — they cried 
 one and all that not any part of their holiday- 
 tour had shown them a lovelier, happier scene 
 than this unsung valley at home ! 
 
 After her first impulsive words of delight, 
 Alice was peculiarly quiet in her admiration and 
 enjoyment of it ; she thoroughly appreciated and 
 felt the charm of fine scenery ; but she never 
 worked off her sentiment in the exclamatory 
 fashion. Those who did not know her might 
 think lier apathetic; but those who did, one 
 glance at the glow and expression of her face 
 was enough to convince of her enthusiasm. She 
 would sit silent for an hour sometimes, brooding^- 
 over the features of a beautiful landscape ; and 
 to her, as to all the true lovers of nature, the 
 familiarity of a place only enhanced its attrac- 
 tion ; often as she had wandered round about 
 Claymire, neither sea, nor downs, nor shore, nor 
 green luxuriant glen, looked to her eyes ever twice 
 the same. 
 
 They sat down at the foot of the cairn for a 
 long time, and Rachel acted as guide to point 
 out the special objects of interest in the dale 
 below. Penslaven Castle stood out on the hori- 
 zon with more than common distinctness, and 
 Whinstane Tower showed itself faintly against 
 a dusk background of wood to those who knew 
 just where to look for it — only to herself, that is. 
 Sinclair betrayed no interest in these places that 
 Rachel could perceive ; he was almost as silent as 
 Alice, though probably less absorbed in admu-ing 
 contemplation. Perhaps he was meditating on 
 the new interest that was coming into her life — 
 perhaps he was even doubting whether or not it 
 might interfere with his own claims. His char- 
 acter was generous ; he would rather have her 
 with no other dower but her beauty and her 
 sunshine, than dowered with all these rich pos- 
 sessions which must eventually become hers. 
 He loved her for herself, and felt as if she be- 
 longed to him of right more than to any other ; 
 and, her promise given, she did. 
 
 When they had gazed their fill from this point 
 of the moors, they proceeded for nearly two miles 
 in a direct line on the high level until they 
 reached the Force, and here occurred the event 
 of the day. When Sinclair Ferrand had settled 
 their route so very carefully to exclude the Hur- 
 tlemere House, it had struck Rachel, though she 
 said nothing, that if Mary Wray happened to 
 be about the farm-yard, feeding her poultry, 
 pigs, or other dependents, they should in fact 
 run greater risk from her than from the bleak 
 gray outside walls of Gipsy's old home ; and so 
 it really turned out. Bicky and Andrew were 
 sleeping at the farm now, to leave room at the 
 rectory for the Oliver Warleighs; and it ap- 
 peared that they found enough amusement about 
 the place to like breakfasting there as well ; for 
 they were presiding over the maneuvers of a 
 sturdy, shaggy colt which the rough rider was 
 breaking in when Smclair opened the gate for 
 the party to pass through the farm-yai-d after 
 leaving the Force. The two boys were perched 
 on the half-door of the barn, looking on in glee 
 and security ; and it would hardly have been like 
 Dicky had he not hailed his new friend Sinclair 
 Ferrand to stop and witness the fun. 
 
 Whether there was any vein of recollection in 
 Alice's mind connected with the place, Rachel 
 could not tell, but she gazed wistfully about her, 
 and then sat down on the mounting steps against 
 ■the house-wall close by the back door, apparently 
 as well pleased to see the tough, self-willed little 
 colt broken-in.as the boys themselves. Rachel, 
 
FOUND. 
 
 isr 
 
 on the contrary, did not like tlie straggles and 
 kickings and crackings of the whip inevitable to 
 the disciplinary process, and therefore she went 
 round into Mary Wray's pretty span of a garden 
 in. front of the house, wliioh was always in sum- 
 mer a perfect nest of flowers. 
 
 She had not been there more than five minutes 
 enjoying the brightness and fragrance of some 
 old-fashioned red and purple double stocks when 
 Mary Wray, with a face as white as the apron 
 with which she was hurriedly wiping the suds of 
 the wash-tub from her stout arms, looked out of 
 the house, and vehemently beckoned Rachel to 
 go to her. Rachel _guessed what had come to 
 pass. Mary drew her into the best parlor, fra- 
 grant of roses and sweet-bHer which filled a^ 
 china bowl on the. table, and having shut to the 
 door, faced her almost fiercely, saying in a low 
 voice, but a voice full of conviction, 
 
 " Miss Rachel, who's yon i' the broad brown 
 hat sitting o' the steps i' the yard ? She's ta'en 
 her hat off to make hersen a fan of it, and there 
 sits Sir Laurence Warleigh's ain bairn as sure 
 as I am a living woman ! If I rive that cofiin 
 out o' th' ground wi' my ain hands it sal be 
 done ! There was nare a speck or a spot upo' 
 all her fair body where th' sun had na' touched 
 it, but token or no token, / knaw her as I 
 nursed at my breast when the, Lord he took my 
 ain babe, an' all the dale sal knaw her too or 
 ever I be a day aulder. You'll tell me. Miss Ra- 
 chel, is yon Miss Annis come back ?" 
 
 Evasion would have been here equally unfeel- 
 ing and unwise ; Rachel therefore said that it 
 was Annis and no other, on which Mary burst 
 into a passion of tears, dropped into a chair, and 
 flung her apron over her head to cry unseen, 
 rocking hesself to and fro and sobbing at inter- 
 vals — "My puir lost bairn, my ain lost bairn!" 
 until it made Rachel almost weep for sympathy 
 to see her. When at last she uncovered her 
 face, her first .question was, did Sir Laurence, 
 know ? Rachel told her that by that time he 
 did, and was now no doubt hastening home to 
 reclaim his child. She then gave her to under- 
 stand that she would distress and injure many 
 did she publish her discovery before his arrival, 
 and promised if she would come down to Prior's 
 Bank in the afternoon and inquire for her, she 
 would tell her the whole tragical history. Mary 
 promised, and Rachel then made her escape, 
 dreading every, moment lest the boys should 
 come round into the house and surprise her in 
 her unwonted agitation. It seemed singular that 
 Mary should recognize in an instant the like- 
 ness of poor Gipsy in Alice when Katherine and 
 Grace could detect no trace of her, and Rachel 
 hardly. Perhaps her relation to the child as 
 foster-mother quickened her natural instinct ; 
 and it was an augury that Sir Laurence himself 
 might not find a perfect stranger in his daughter. 
 
 About four o'clock of the afternoon JMary 
 Wray came down to Prior's Bank in a state of 
 eager, affectionate excitement and longing to 
 see her nursling again.. She had dressed herself 
 in her Sunday Best and put qn her most formal 
 face to pass through the scrutiny of the servants', 
 hall, but when she was safe in the privacy of 
 Eachel's room, with the door locked to prevent 
 interruptions, she broke out weeping for joy, 
 and it was some time before she was calm 
 enough to listen to the tale she was trembling 
 
 with anxiety to hear. But when Rachel began 
 she listened breathlessly, every now and then 
 venting her iudigftation, pity or silrprise in low- 
 voiced, intense ejaculations. 
 
 "Didn't I alius tell folks she hadn't fair 
 play !" she said appealingly, when Rachel had 
 made an end of the first part of her story. 
 " That Lady Georgiana is a bad lot, an' I care 
 na who hears me say it ! For that matter I ha' 
 said it oft enew afore this for all t' world to 
 know." 
 
 She then allowed Rachel to proceed, and when 
 she heard how poor Gipsy had been found in the 
 storm on the down by Sinclair Ferrand and taken 
 in at Brookfall, her tears burst out again and 
 she cried, " Oh ! but there was angels on earth 
 yet an' suldn't she like to kiss that young tyke 
 who was so good to her bairn!" Rachel told 
 her she had seen him in the farm-yard with her 
 that morning, to which she replied, " I took no 
 heed to him — none. My eyes was fastened on 
 her that I couldna' get 'em awa'. It didn't come 
 upon me wi'out a sort o' warning, though it came 
 sudden. Mistress Dobie, an' Lucy Robb, an' me, 
 we've oft got talking about her lately, an' Mis- 
 tress Dobie alius persisted i' saying how strange 
 it was as them White Hands hadn't blessed th' 
 innioent bairn if she was to be ta'en awa' ; an' 
 ane night Mathew, he'd been rgading in a book 
 o' 't master's how a bairn that had been hidden 
 fra his family's gret enemy an' counted for dead 
 years an' years i' them long ago times n' civil 
 war, turned up again when peace came an' was 
 ca'ed ever after t' Shepherd Lord. An' Lucy 
 Robb says, for she fond o' a romance is Lucy, 
 ' What if our Miss Annis had been put out o' t' 
 road like yon ?' an' Mathew too, he said as there 
 had been more unlikely things heerd tell on, not 
 a hunder miles fra Hurtledale. An' that set us 
 reckoning he guessed somewhat, but we could 
 nane on us get him to speak plain out. We 
 didn't forget his words tho', and sin' there's been 
 such strange goings on at 't auld Hurtlemere 
 House wi' yon Dr. Frith, an' nurse Lupton, as 
 was regular tyrants over Master Oliver an' Lady 
 Georgiana, Mistress Dobie has got an inkling o' 
 many queer things." 
 
 When Rachel had quite finished her narrative , 
 Mary gave audible thanks to God that the wick- 
 ed were discomfited, and then begged that she 
 might be brought to a sight of her darling if it 
 were only for a single instant. " Let me ha' ane 
 glint o' her bonny face afore I go. Miss Rachel," 
 she pleaded with tears in her eyes and voice. " I'll 
 not speak a word an' when I get home I'll shut 
 myself up out o' folk's way lest I suld be tempt- 
 ed to prate o' my gret joy." 
 
 Rachel had not the heart to say her nay and 
 yet her request was not easy to grant. In the 
 first place she did not know Sunshine's where- 
 abouts, and in the second she feared that as 
 Mary had recognized her at a glance so also 
 might she recognize Mary ; and though the end 
 could not be far off now, yet it would be safest 
 to keep her in peace until the happiness of re- 
 gaining her father could be at once perfected by 
 his presence. However, as Mary was in no 
 haste to return home, Rachel kept her there in 
 her room until the dressing-bell rang, and a min- 
 ute or two after came Alice's light step past her 
 door. She then bade Mary place herself away 
 from the window and as much in the shade as 
 
158 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 she could, promising to call Gipsy in as she went 
 by again on ber way down-stairs ; and this she 
 did, making a pretense that she wanted one of 
 her bracelets linking. 
 
 Alice entered without observing Mary's re- 
 tired figure, clad all in white, with a cluster of 
 scarlet geramums and some light drooping ferns 
 in her hair. Her dress, high to the throat and 
 long to the wrists, yet defined a perfectly grace- 
 ful, girlish form, and her face had the lustre and 
 freshness of youth and beauty at their best and 
 their brightest. 
 
 The bracelet fastened, Kachel said thanks to 
 dismiss her ;, but instead of going she stood still, 
 and looked straight into the glass in front of 
 which they were both standing ; not at herself, 
 as Rachel saw with dismay, but at the tearful, 
 excited face of Mary which it reflected in the 
 background. After the pause of a moment, she 
 withdrew her gaze from the mirror to direct it 
 full on Mary herself with the same perplexed 
 thoughtful expression as she always wore when 
 some sensitive chord in her memory was struck. 
 The situation was critical, but poor Mary be- 
 haved well ; she got up, courtesied, and sidled 
 out by the door that was behind her, saying, " It 
 was time for her to be going and right glad she 
 was to see Miss Rachel so nicely," in a simple, 
 natural way such as could hardly have been 
 looked'for in a moment so trying to her faithful 
 afiection. Rachel expected Alice would pass 
 some remark on her when she was gone, and so 
 she did. 
 
 "What a good, kind face that woman has, 
 Rachel — I felt a longing to kiss her," she began. 
 " I caught her in the glass looking at me as if 
 she loved me too. This has been such a strange 
 day — I know something is in the air, something 
 is going to happen to me. But that I have 
 promised Sinclair not to fret er be unhappy until 
 he can discover and tell me all about papa and 
 where I lived when I was little, I should have 
 asked her if she knew me ; for my heart whis- 
 pers me that I know her. I should like Sinclair 
 to see her ; I wish she had not gone away so 
 abruptly — will she be coming to see you again 
 soon, Kachel?" And so she talked on, ques- 
 tioning, asserting, speculating, until to her com- 
 panion's great relief, the dinner-bell rang and 
 stopped her. 
 
 In the garden afterward Sinclair joined Ra- 
 chel for five minutes to inquire who it was Alice 
 had seen in her room. She told him, and also 
 how, Mary Wray having recognized her fos- 
 ter-child, she had Judged it expedient to let 
 her into the truth of the fast escaping mys- 
 tery. 
 
 "Alice knew her too," replied he. "She 
 has been telling me that she is sure it was Mam- 
 sie, which was probably her pet name for nurse. 
 I have consented to her going to see the Hur- 
 tlemere House to-morrow ; she is so restless and 
 inquisitive about it that there is no chance of 
 peace for her until she has been. Your brother 
 says Sir Laurence may arrive at almost any' 
 hour — do you not think that good woman had 
 better be there and Alice with her when he ar- 
 rives?" . 
 
 Rache agreed that this proposal was excel- 
 lent. Mary Wray used to stani^ in Gipsy's af- 
 fections second, only to her father, and if she 
 had not vanished tohen she did and as she did, 
 
 the whole secret must have inevitably come out. 
 Alice's memory had been awakened and set on 
 the alert more than ever by this glimpse of a 
 person whom she felt she had once known and 
 dearly loved, and it would never slumber again 
 until its yearnings were satisfied. She looked 
 dreamily happy that evening, but her thoughts 
 were often astray ; and some instinct warned 
 her that what she had so long and persistently 
 waited and hoped for was drawing near its ful- 
 fillment. 
 
 Sinclair suggested that on the morrow the 
 doctor should tell his aunts the true story of 
 their darling while she was away at the Hurtle- 
 mere House ; and thus the crisis would be over 
 for all at the same hour. And to this the doc- 
 tor himself readily acceded, though he anticipat- 
 ed in it a difficult and painful task ; for the dear 
 old ladies were as far from a suspicion of the 
 facts now as they were on the first night when 
 the poor forlorn little waif was adopted under 
 their hospitable roof. 
 
 CHAPTER THE THIRD. 
 
 KEUNION. 
 There is no instinct like tlie lieart. — Btron. 
 
 The next morning, as was fitting on such a 
 day of joy, the'sun rose splendidly, and Rachel 
 Withers did what she had not attempted now 
 for many many years — that is, took a long walk 
 before breakfast ; first to the Force Farm, set- 
 ting off by six o'clock, and then to the Rectory. 
 At the farm she foimd Mary Wray busy butter- 
 making, and with a penitent, deprecating air 
 she began to say, ere Rachel had time to speak,' 
 that she had been obliged to tell her good man 
 what she had discovered about "lileMissAn- 
 nis." 
 
 " When he started o' complaining last night, 
 ' Mary, my lass, thee's gotten summat upo' thy 
 mind,' what was a poor wife to do ? Why, I 
 just made a clean breast of it, as was most com- 
 fortable. That's the blessin' o' a husband. Miss 
 Rachel; if you've gotten a secret you're bound 
 i' love an' duty to tell, an' not let it go on wor- 
 ritting your inside out. But he's away reaping 
 i' th' barley this morning wi' yon crew o' Irish- 
 ers, so he'll ha' no chance o' saying ought to 
 any body, an' you've no call to be afeard lest 
 he suld be tempted." 
 
 It mattered little then if he were — all the . 
 world must know the secret soon ; and Rachel 
 only replied by explMning to Mary why she was 
 there so early ; namely, that it was desired site 
 should be up at the Hurtlemere House when 
 her foster-child arrived there, that if any thing 
 happened before Sir Laurence appeared, she 
 might be ready to take her in hand and pacify 
 her with talk of old times as no one else could. 
 Mary was oveijoyed at the reliance placed in 
 her, and having further received permission to 
 take Mistress Dobie into her confidence, she 
 promised just to see breakfast done with, Dicky 
 and Andrew packed off to the rectory out of 
 the way of mischief, and the house riffhted-up, 
 and then to start across the fields by the short- 
 est road, to be in readiness for whatever might 
 occur. 
 
FOUND. 
 
 159 
 
 At the Rectory no one was down-stairs but 
 jTohn, whom Rachel found reading his newly 
 come-in letters ; one being from Sir Laurence 
 himself and another from Mr. Bond, who had 
 traveled to town to meet him. " Sir Laurence 
 will be here this afternoon, as I expected," an- 
 nounced her brother the moment she entered 
 the room. " I hope you are prepared at Prior's 
 Banlc. He wishes me to arrange for her being 
 at the Hurtlemere House When he arrives." 
 
 Rachel replied by telling him what Sinclair 
 had proposed, and how she had just given Mary 
 Wray her cue ; which appeared to him very 
 wise as a precautionary measure ; but to pre- 
 vent any possible disappointment to Sir Lau- 
 rence, he said he would carry his letter to 
 Prior's Bank by and by, and then he gave it to 
 Rachel to read, while he opened Mr. Bond's. 
 
 Sir Laurence was very brief — ^he had never 
 been a long-winded correspondent nor a frequent 
 one. He began by mentioning how he had 
 found John's letter and inclosure at the Hague 
 on the day he arrived there, with a second epie- 
 /tie from Katherine, giving him information that 
 Annis was coming Into Hurtledale with the kind 
 and charitable women who had adopted her and 
 brought her up. He wrote merely to send 
 warning of his immediate return home, as he 
 should follow his letter within a few hours. 
 Bond, who had met him, had prevailed on him 
 to rest a night in London, and he felt it wise to 
 do so. He was well, but the news had shaken 
 and excited him Jerribly. Of his brother' Oli- 
 ver not a word ; of Lady Georgiananot a word ; 
 no expression of resentment, disgust, or even 
 surprise ; — simply, " Let the child be at home 
 when I come." That one thought of beholding 
 again his darling had thrust every other out of 
 . his mind. 
 
 Mr. Bond wrote more at large. He was with 
 Sir Laurence at his hotel, and should return 
 with him to Hurtledale on the morrow. He 
 intimated that it would be advisable for the 
 Oliver Warleigha to remove from the old house 
 if they had not already done so, but went on 
 to say that Sir Laurence gave no vent to even 
 a natural indignation against them. " In fact," 
 added the steward toward the close of his let- 
 ter, " my dear master's whole heart is possessed 
 with the joy of regaining his daughter ; she will 
 take the loneliness out of his life, of having no 
 one and nothing to come home to after his 
 wanderings. He has travelecf day and night 
 from the Hague, and is in high health and spirits, 
 but more excited and impatient than I have 
 known him since he was a lad. / am thankful' 
 to see him give in to sleeping here to-night, for 
 rest is very needful to him ; he would have 
 made one long spell of his journey had I not 
 been here to hinder it, and would have arrived 
 knocked up." 
 
 Thus it fortunately happened that all the ar- 
 rangements were in accordance with Sir Lau- 
 rence's wishes and Mr. Bond's suggestions; 
 Alice would be at hom^, and the Oliver War- 
 leighs out of the way, secluded in safety at the 
 rifctory. Rachel did not see any of them that 
 morning. Lady Georgiana kept herself entirely 
 to her own rooms ; and poor Mortimer had taken 
 a, staff in his hand, a knapsack on his back, and 
 ten pounds which John had given .him in his 
 pocket, and gone off on --^ walking expedition 
 
 into Cumberland; When he would return was 
 not known. Was it part of his character to get 
 away from the sight of guilt and shame? 
 Neither Katherine nor Grace could approve of 
 his abandonment of father and mother in their 
 present miserable circumstances. He had not 
 uttered d word of his sentiments to any one, 
 nor had Jie in departing said " Good-by." Lady 
 Georgiana felt his going thus most poignantly, 
 but she acknowledged that it was no more than 
 her deserts — if he loatlied her it would be but 
 juat. 
 
 Rachel breakfasted at the rectory, rested a 
 couple of hours with Katherine and Grace, and 
 then walked up to the Hurtlemere House, pro- 
 posing to sit quietly in the garden and read imtil 
 Sinclair Ferrand and Alice appeared. Mary 
 Wray had arrived a few minutes before her, and 
 was standing with Mistress Dobie in the porch 
 engaged in high sensational talk. So enthralled 
 were they that they did not observe Rachel until 
 she was close upon them, and then did Mistress 
 Dobie indeed greet her with loudly jubilant ex- 
 clamations. 
 
 " She'd as good as guessed it lang syne, but 
 wasn't it gret news about Sir Laurence War- 
 leigh's bairn?" said she. "She'd getten a bit 
 scart o' writing fra Mr. Bond only that morning 
 to tell her t' master was coming home, an' she 
 must mak preparation for a second person be- 
 side ; an' who did»Miss Rachel think this second 
 person was ? Why, no other than lile Miss' An- 
 nis who was dead and is alive again, an' was lost 
 an' is found ! An' she hoped it was no sin to 
 quote Scripter to say that, for common words 
 wouldn't do it." 
 
 ■ Fain would she have staid to talk longer, but 
 she suddenly remembered there was " a sight p' 
 ^things wanted doing indoors," and so she dis- 
 appeared, taking Mary Wray with her to help 
 work, and perhaps help gossip as well, while 
 Rachel Withers remained in the porch nesting 
 on one of the quaint old stone benches which 
 had never been removed from it since Moor 
 Murray's ancestors of many generations back 
 placed them there, as Matthew Dobie, who prac- 
 tically understood the indulgence, averred, for 
 the free and pleasanter enjoyment of their even- 
 ing pipes. He smoked his own in the porch of 
 summer nights when his master was away, and 
 had smoked himself into a full conviction that 
 the stone benches had been put there wholly 
 and solely to promote the ease and comfort of 
 all sound lovers of tobacco. ■ 
 
 Rachel had seen the Hurtlemere House in all 
 weathers, and the view from it under all aspects 
 of time and season, but she never remembered 
 to have thought the landscape lovelier than it 
 was on this day. The calm rich glow and full- 
 ness of August, when summer was greenest in the 
 woods, and the moors had donned their mantle 
 of splendid purple, took away the air of chill de- 
 solation from about^ the lonely old house. In 
 the sun the tarn lay bright and still, glittering 
 like a gem, while the terrace and sloping lawns 
 of the old-fashioned garden were gay with roses, 
 pinks, stocks and other hardy flowers such as 
 ask but little tendance and cultivation. Rachel 
 had brought up with her a book, extracted from 
 her godmamma Grandage's clioice shelf, but 
 she could not read it successfully ; if she sent 
 her eye traveling along the lines^ in due time 
 
160 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 the foot of the page was reached, but not the 
 sense of a single word had penetrated to her 
 mind ; therefore she gave herself up perforce to 
 the luxury of laziness and meditation, beguiling 
 the time as best she might by inspecting the 
 borders and making discoveries of plants for- 
 gotten, or perhaps never noticed before, but 
 continually wending round by the gate to watch 
 if Sunshine and Sinclair were yet a-coming. 
 
 She had long to wait — very long it seemed to 
 her impatience. One o'clock struck, then two ; 
 and leg-tired at last, she retreated to the porch 
 again, and once more appealed to the old book 
 to amuse her, but with no better results than 
 before : then she fell to thinking of Helena, and 
 recalled several sunny hours with her in this 
 very place whence her child, had been banished 
 for so many years. Then she drew round to 
 this present time, and her imagination antici- 
 pated in a hundred foolish, dramatic, impossible 
 fashions the manner of the meeting that was 
 now so near at hand. Still there was no sign of 
 Alice or her lover. She could not help begin- 
 ning to wonder then, and to speculate over their 
 delay, hoping it portended no intervention of 
 evil mischance. Thrice did Mary Wray come 
 out to ask if she thought it possible they had 
 changed their minds, but Rachel was positive 
 they would not do that. Nevertheless her anx- 
 iety increased to a painful pitch, and she could 
 have screamed for joy when at about a quarter 
 befose three they actually presented themselves, 
 Sunshine beaming bright as the day, but Sinclair 
 unusually grave. The sight of Eachel appeared 
 to relieve him ; he said he had begun to fear she 
 might have given them up and have gone away ; 
 but there had been small risk of that. 
 
 "It is a steep climb up-hill, and there are so 
 many beauties to admire by the road that we 
 could not make up for the time lost before, so 
 Rachel must forgive us," said Alice, drawing a 
 long breath ; then she stood still gazing round 
 on the prospect with clear, happy, earnest eyes. 
 " It seems half familiar to me," she added after 
 a pause of leisurely contemplation ; and next, 
 in answer to a question of Rachel's, she began 
 to explain the cause of their tardy arrival. As 
 usual, it was the merest trifles in the world that 
 had procured for her such a tedious interval of 
 waiting and anxiety. 
 
 "It was not quite our fault," said Alice, 
 , "Aunt Delia wanted me to hem a missionary- 
 basket petticoat after breakfast, and even Sin- 
 clair bade me be obedient to-day, and that kept 
 us until twelve o'clock. Then I incautiously 
 told her that if we found you here, we should 
 spend the afternoon in the woods round about, 
 and not go back until dinner-time. That pro- 
 duced another hindrance — we must not start 
 until after luncheon ; so luncheon was ordered 
 half-an-hour earlier, and here we are at last. 
 But how could you Say the Hurtlemere House 
 was wild and desolate, Rachel ? I think it is 
 the most romantic and picturesque spot in the 
 dale." 
 
 " Not the prettiest or the pleasantest to live 
 in, though," replied Rachel. "It is showing 
 you its best face now, and I am glad you like 
 it." 
 
 " JUke it" said she, and was going to expati- 
 ate on its peculiar attractions, when she caught 
 sight of Mary Wray who was looking out of 
 
 one of the upper windows. Mary drew back 
 when she saw herself observed, but Alice's mood, 
 tone, and manner changed completely. " Rachel, 
 who is that person who was with you yester- 
 day ?" she asked in a low voice but with pas- 
 sionate earnestness. " She is here now ; I want 
 to speak to her. Let me speak to her. May 
 we go into the house?" She was steadily draw- 
 ing Rachel toward it all the while, recognition 
 dawning clearer and clearer in her wide-eyed 
 gaze, until near the porch she stopped, and 
 crushing Rachel's wrist painfully hard in her ex- 
 citement, cried, "Oh, look at that porch, at 
 those steps and the golden moss ! Look at those 
 stone seats, Sinclair ! I know them all. I have 
 either dreamt this place or I have been here be- 
 fore ! Dear Sinclair, let me go in, let me go in !" 
 
 " If you will try to be still," said he, and tak- 
 ing both her hands, turned her toward him, 
 looking at her with a pleading, controlling kind- 
 ness. 
 
 " I will not fret if I can help it — I will be 
 good, I will, indeed !"> and she smiled over her 
 childlike promise' with lips that quivered and 
 eyes glittering through tears. Rachel was no 
 firmer ; emotion is catching, but she kept be- 
 hind the two as they entered the porch where 
 now stood Mistress JDobie, her shrewd old vis- 
 age twisted up into a knot with suppressed 
 curiosity and feeling. 
 
 Alice was too much agitated to notice any 
 thing but that she was not " mamsie ;" and 
 when the dame said, "Tou'U mayhap like to 
 walk in wi' your friends. Miss Rachel, an' tak' a 
 rest," it was clear she meant to wait for a recog- 
 nition. Rachel asked her to show them into the 
 large old dining-hall, which she remembered as 
 the room chiefly occupied by Sir Laurence and 
 Gipsy in former days ; and when she threw the 
 door wide open, whispered her to send in Mary 
 Wray at once. 
 
 Alice stood still as a statue just in the door- 
 way for perhaps the space of half a minute, then 
 uttered a cry of ecstasy that rang again in the 
 hollow, raftered roof. " It is, it is, it is !" she 
 reiterated, her voice mounting higher and high- 
 er, and all her tears vanishing in the supreme 
 moment of joy.' "Here is Sir Sumfit and the 
 Ogre, and here are Ye Babes ! Oh, Sinclair, 
 dear Sinclair, this is where I lived with papa!" 
 She darted to the fireplace, now filled with sum- 
 mer-green boughs, and began fingering over 
 with tender touch the grotesquely carved heads 
 that ornamented the high oaken mantle-piece, 
 her face kindled with passionate gladness, her 
 breath coming in short, quick, panting gasps. 
 
 At that instant entered Mary Wray, who had 
 overheard her voice, trembling and saying, 
 " Oh, my sweet bairn, my blessed bairn, that's 
 what you ca'ed 'em when you only lisped, an' 
 fed 'em wi' biscuit every night that Magsie could 
 hardUnga pyke it out o' theu? jaws i' the morn- 
 ing. Oh, my lile Annis, that I ha' whipped, an' 
 cuddled, an' kissed, an' kissed again, surely 
 you'll knaw me ? You'll knaw mamsie — ^pretty 
 Mamsie, you did use to say, but I an't pretty 
 now but to my good man at home !" 
 
 If Annis knew her ! It was touching to wit- 
 ness the rapture of recognition, to see the tears, 
 to hear the broken words in which there was so 
 much meaning, aiid so little verbal sense ! Mary 
 felt all a mother's passionate yearning of love 
 
FOUND. 
 
 161 
 
 over the child, and fondled and caressed her as 
 if she had been a tiny thing again ; stroking 
 her glossy hair, her rosy cheeks, and lifting up 
 her dimpled chin to tell her with tender flattery 
 she was bonnier than the bonniest flower that 
 ever grew; but "like Gipsy every bit of her, 
 an' she should have known her amongst ten 
 thousand !" 
 
 Alice was quite carried out of herself for 
 some minutes ; but at length she looked slowly 
 round from face to face, and seeing nothing but 
 a glad sympathy in any, asked, 
 
 "Where is papa, Sinclair? This was our 
 home, but where is he P' 
 
 " On his road, Sunshine — you will see him 
 before the day is over, if all be well," replied 
 Sinclair. 
 
 " All is well ! all shall be well !" cried she, 
 passionately. "Oh, mamsie, press your hand 
 over my heart!" She twisted herself half 
 round as if in physical pain ; the exquisite joy 
 touched very close on the borders of anguish. 
 
 "Come to the w^odow," interposed Sinclair 
 in his firm, kind, soothing voice ; and taking 
 her away from Mary, he made her stand by him 
 quiet and silent, looking out on the hushed 
 afternoon until the oppressive flood of feeling 
 went down. Then, when she was able to bear 
 it, he told her how he had come to know her 
 secret two days before. 
 
 " And you did not tell me. — ah ! it was un- 
 kind," said she reproachfully. 
 
 "Was it unkind? then you must forgive me, 
 for I meant it to be kind — I kept it that you 
 might not have long to wait ; because excite- 
 ment wears you out, and I can not bear to see 
 you fret." 
 
 Gipsy did not look very implacable ; she ac- 
 cepted Sinclair's plea — even tried to interrupt it. 
 
 " I am sure you love me," said she, and was 
 therewith content. He then told her how aunt 
 Delia and aunt Flora had been kept in the dark 
 like herself, and how she must endeavor to 
 cheer and comfort them ; for if she were mak- 
 ing a great gain, they would feel it almost like 
 suffering a loss. 
 
 " Dear old auntie Dee !" murmured she, with 
 andden compunction for many a past and gone 
 bit of rebellion ; "I am glad I hemmed that 
 ugly striped Abbeokouta petticoat this morning ! 
 I will work nothing but missionary-basket for a 
 month ; I will read dull books, and be as good 
 as gold all day that you shall hardly know me !" 
 Then she grew excited again. " I have such 
 an ache at my heart — say it once more, Sinclair, 
 say it once more — I shall see papa to-day." 
 Sinclair repeated the assurance with every va- 
 riety of speech, but even then hardly could he 
 satisfy her ears with hearing it. " Let him not 
 be long or I shall die !" exclaimed she with 
 strongly repressed emotion, looking up in her 
 lover's face as if he could help her. 
 
 Sinclair tried the effect of tender, soothing 
 words upon her, but the sob swelled in her 
 throat and the tears in her eyes, until Mary 
 Wray with practical ||rewdness, having master- 
 ed her own feelings, introduced herself into the 
 conversation. 
 
 " Whisht, my bairn, whisht !" cried she, cheer- 
 fully. " Who talks o' dying when a' is just 
 coming bright side up for 'em i' th' world ? 
 Main foolish wad it be to die now ; just when 
 K 
 
 your father's coming back after he's lived all 
 these years wi' out you. Ha' done wi' fretting 
 an' such nonsense^ an' let us talk o' better 
 things nor dying which is t' last an' worst we 
 can do." 
 
 And so they did talk, Mary sustaining the 
 chief burden of it for the next half hour. But 
 Alice could not be still in one place, and it need- 
 ed a visible effort to keep down her agitation as 
 she went about the room, holding Sinclair's arm 
 and trying to recognize other old acquaintance 
 in the stags' heads and curious spoils of the 
 chase which still decorated the walls as in for- 
 mer times. But it was only the sculptured faces 
 of the chimney-piece that she was able to re- 
 member distinctly; the general aspect of the 
 room seemed familiar to her but not its details. 
 It had just now the same air of dismal, forlorn 
 emptiness as it wore on that memorable winter 
 afternoon when Oliver Warleigh came to Hur- 
 tledale on his first mission. 
 
 Alice paused by and by on the hearth, and 
 said musingly, as she gazed down on the bare 
 boards : "I wonder what became of all the 
 dogs ?" 
 
 Mary Wray suggested that perhaps Mistress 
 Dobie could tell ; and Mistress Dobie to her fer- 
 vent delight was summoned, dropt curtesies, and 
 very respectfully acknowledged her master's 
 daughter on Mary's introduction. 
 
 " But I don't think as I suld ha' known her 
 in a crowd," said she when appealed to on that 
 point. " When you tell me it's Miss Annis, I 
 see them's her eyes, an' she has a look o' her 
 poor young mother, for all she's not so fair. 
 But it's the voice as is most like her — oh ! but 
 Sir Laurence '11 knaw it well. He used to say 
 long after she were gone, as he heard her call- 
 ing to him in that pretty, petted, impatient way 
 she had, ' Laurie, Laurie !' I could ha' believed 
 at odd times I've heard her myself round about 
 i' the garden o' the long summer nights !" 
 
 Alice listened with tearful eyes, and drew a 
 deep quivering breath as Mistress Dobie ceased, 
 but Sinclair was determined if possible to keep 
 her calm, and quietly set aside tenderer remi- 
 niscences by asking the fanner's wife if she could 
 tell what had become of Gipsy's old canine 
 friends. Mistress Dobie, who plumed herself 
 justly on the possession of an excellent mem- 
 ory, needed no second invitation to open out 
 her chronicle of defunct dogs, dating from 
 Annis's babyhood. Considering the ordinary 
 term of dog-life, it was not probable that any 
 should survive which had been the little wild- 
 ling's playmates, and she was therefore not sur- 
 prised when the good dame began by saying 
 with a suitable pathetic sigh, "Eh, Miss Annis, 
 I'm thinking they're all dead. There were 
 Cosmo dropt only three jear sin' come Martin- 
 mas; he was very auld — a black dog, if you 
 mind him, wi' a white breast — a good-natureder 
 beast never lived ; an' you' tewed him about 
 awful, you did — put him on a nightcap, an 
 Matt's spectacles, an' a short pipe in his mouth 
 as he was a pioter to see ; our Magsie'U talk 
 about it to this day she will, laughing and cry- 
 ing together. An' Jet — he were all black an' a 
 bit cross-grained when things didn't suit him, 
 which was pretty oft; an' a terrier as Matt 
 ca'ed Mixty-maxty, but he were properly christ- 
 ened Yapp, for all his noise he made when he 
 
162 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 were >. pup, as he might ha' had three hcad'o' 
 his ain to make it wi.' An' t' auld lass.Juao,— 
 there's a grandson o' hers i' t' yard now, an' 
 another down at the Mill— Lucy Robb has him ; 
 but t' Danish dog's new, an' we an't had t' 
 Boosian retriever long, nor t' Samplong beast as 
 is as big as a donkey, an' o' no use at a' i' this 
 cauntry unless it be to eat us out o' house an' 
 home, an' keep Magsie doing for iver wi' bis- 
 cuit, and tallow-crap, an' a copperful o' butcher's 
 meat every day." Mistress Dobie's present ca- 
 nine grievances threatened to be long drawn out, 
 and they were still in progress when a sound of 
 wheels was heard to which every ear listened. 
 The dame bustled oflf, but returned in a minute 
 explaining that it was only Matt coming up the 
 hill with the cart. 
 
 Alice bore this marvelously well ; just a lit- 
 tle sigh escaped her, and then she asked, break- 
 ing a pause of painful stillness, if there were not 
 in the house a small, curiously decorated rfiom 
 with many pictures and ornaments on the walls. 
 " That'll be the bit chapel-place — ^has my bairn 
 kept memory o' that ?" said Mary Wray; and 
 Mistress Dobie added solemnly, " Yes, it's here 
 an' just as it was. Master alius spent in it th' 
 day he married his wife an' the day she died, 
 poor thing. Hr carries t' key awa wl' him, an' 
 when he comes home, he takes me in an' sits 
 by while I rightle It up. There's her prayer- 
 books an' things he must do himself, they're 
 that holy to him. An' you recollect it. Miss 
 Aunis ? It was the spot i' all the house your 
 mother loved best; she wer a good young cre- 
 tur as ever lived she wer, though she might be 
 a papist. It wer i' that faith she'd been brought 
 up : an' I ha' but sma' opinion o' them that chang- 
 es fra' what they were taught when they were 
 bairns. There's a sight mair conceat 1' such fet- 
 tle folks religion than there was 1' t' good auld 
 fashioned sort o' catechism piety which speaks 
 plain, an' bids us love God an' our neebors ; an' 
 she did that, she did ; she was gentle to t' meanest 
 thing alive — she wadn't harm a worm ; an' what 
 was harder to my mind, she forgave them as 'ud 
 never look at her ; as treated her worse than 
 the ground under their feet, as darkened her 
 death-bed wi' fear an' sorrow for her bairn, ay' 
 an' robbed her bairn away when she were dead !" 
 It was of no use now. Mistress Dobie had 
 worked herself up into a state of angry vindic- 
 tiveness as she recalled her young mistress's 
 wrongs and sufferings, and Alice was infected by 
 the feeling. She began to weep, softly at first, 
 but as her passion gathered strength by its in- 
 dulgence it quite overpowered her, and swept 
 away all her hardly maintained self control. She 
 could know nothing of the real truth, but an 
 impression of deep sorrow inflicted on her moth- 
 er, innocent as herself, stung her heart, and over 
 that came the dark array of her own childish 
 agonies ; until the sense of accumulated pity 
 and pain utterly overwhelmed and crushed her. 
 There she was, kneeling on the floor, her face 
 hidden in Mary's bosom, and Mary's kind. arms 
 encircling her, while Sinclair Ferrand stood by 
 helpless and grieved, when unmistakably a car- 
 riage drove in at the gate, round to the porch and 
 stopped. But she was past hearing it now, as she 
 was past hearing her Mamsie's soothing and ten- 
 der "Whisht, my bairn, whisht !" 
 It might be about three minutes after when I 
 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh entered the room with 
 Mr. Bond behind him and Mistress Dobie who 
 had hurried off on their arrival, leadmg the way. 
 " She's "here, Sir Laurence, she's here, lile Miss 
 Annis, but she ain't lile any longer as you'll say 
 when you see her !" cried the dame, performing 
 the introduction in her own fashion, which; as 
 it happened, was as good a fashion as any — not 
 erring on the sentimental side at least, and mak- 
 ing few words do. 
 
 ' " She is just what I expected — ^little lasses 
 have a trick of growing up," observed Mr. Bond, 
 chuckling at his own wit. 
 
 Sir Laurence spoke not a word, but as Annis 
 rose from her knees, looking up at him wistfully 
 and searchingly, he took her face between his 
 hands and kissed her ; then put her off a little 
 way, smiling down into her eyes until the bright 
 light came back to them, and she half sighed, half 
 sobbed : " I know you, papa 1" 
 
 "And I know my Gipsy too," replied he ; "we 
 must give Rachel Withers a pair of spectacles 
 for not having been quick-sighted enough to 
 find her our for me before."' 
 
 Bachel was taken aback, she thought the re- 
 mark cruel, but every body else laughed. 
 
 " A vara gradely lass," growled a husky voice 
 at the open door, echoed by a shrill cry of, "Oh, 
 but she's bonnie !" and behold there was Ma- 
 thew Dobie and Maggie with him, both gapmg 
 and jubilant, staring in upon the scene. These 
 sounds awoke Mistress Dobie to a sense of the 
 proprieties, and she immediately whisked her- 
 self off, carrying Mary Wray and the others with 
 her. 
 
 And in this manner came about the reiimon ' 
 that had been the long hope of Sunshine's heart 
 while all the world was against her. Just " I 
 know you, papa ;" and " I know my Gipsy too V- 
 Nothing could have been quieter, easier, simpler, 
 more natural ; and it was over in a tithe of the 
 time that it has taken to record it. 
 
 Alice countenance cleared, and she kept, a 
 loving gaze on her father as he did on her. He 
 was the less changed of the two ; twelve years 
 of exile and wandering had not altered his ap- 
 pearance ; his hair and beard were grizzled, but 
 he was still in the full vigor of life. 
 
 " If I had met you by chance, papa, I should 
 have claimed you," said Alice presently. " We 
 have been once before under the same roof to- 
 gether — that was at Remagen this summer, yet 
 we missed. If you had seen me there, should 
 you have thought I was Gipsy, or should you 
 have gone by without remembering me I" 
 
 " I did see you — I saw you with your kind 
 friends coming up from the boat, and again on 
 the balcony in the twilight, but I believed my 
 little wildling to lie buried in Hurtledale church- 
 yard with her mother. She haunted my fancy 
 strangely that night, and in the morning I got 
 away to escape from melancholy. My own dar- 
 ling, we have a world of acquaintance to make 
 over the years we have lost since we said good- 
 by on the sea-shore at Hastings." 
 
 "You are not stran^^to me, papa,'' mur- 
 mured Alice with a so^accent of complaint 
 " So many things come back into my mind — 
 you do not remember as well as I do." 
 
 "I remember my Gipsy so high," leveling 
 his hand considerably below Sunshine's present 
 hight ; " first as a shaggy, brown elf, whom no 
 
FOUND. 
 
 163 
 
 one could break-in 'to docile behavior except by 
 petting and infinite patience and love ; then 
 trimmed and pruned and primmed into the lilre- 
 ness of a wee qnakeress, the picture of precision 
 and demure obedience. That ira.s my last 
 glimpse of my wildling until now that she re- 
 turns herself on my hands, a taU, well-grown 
 maiden, old as her mother was when I first saw 
 her — ^my Gipsy evidently, but with a diflference." 
 
 Mr. Bond had fully prepared his master for 
 the position of affairs at Prior's Bank, and re- 
 taining his daughter with one arm Sit Laurence 
 now held out his right hand to Sinclair Ferrand, 
 and they exchanged a, cordial, heartfelt grasp ; 
 friends at first sight. Then Sunshine blushed 
 and smiled saying, " This is Sinclair, papa — I 
 wish auntie Dee and aunt Flora were here. Shall 
 you be too tired to come down to Prior's Bank 
 and see them this evening ?" 
 
 " I shall not be* too tired to do whatever will 
 most gratify my dear little daughter," replied 
 Sir Laurence in a cheerful tone. " I ain anxious 
 to see all to whom she and I owe so much." 
 
 And then every thing went pleasantly, serene- 
 ly, and happily ; there was not incessant talk, 
 but the intervals of silence were as expressive ; 
 heart speaking to heart the love and joy and 
 gratitude that the lips were too weak to utter. 
 
 A pang of self-reproach had flashed across 
 Rachel Withers just at this climax. What right 
 had she to be where she was while Miss Delia, 
 who had been as a mother to the child, was ab- 
 sent ? She felt almost vexed at herself for the 
 prominence she had needlessly assumed; and 
 bethought her that the wLsest step she could now 
 take would be to go away. By and by Mr. Bond 
 went quietly out, then she followed, and having 
 escaped unobserved made her way swiftly down 
 to Prior's Bank. 
 
 As she passed the drawing-room window she 
 saw Miss Delia seated at work in her usual place, 
 with her sister opposite, and the doctor, for a 
 miracle, bearing them company. If he had not 
 prepared them, she thought ; and for a little 
 while she staid outside and gathered a rose or 
 two off the wall, deferring the troublesome mo- 
 ment as long as possible ; but when she nerved 
 herself up and entered at last, she found them 
 arranged all in state in their best caps and silver- 
 silk dresses, prattling very fast and excitedly, 
 but looking as blithe and pretty and happy as it 
 was possible for two old ladies to do. 
 
 " Well, Rachel, here you are back again, and 
 a nice maneuverer you are !" exclaimed Miss 
 Delia as she presented herself. "Did you im- 
 agine we could not bear good news ? and to keep 
 dear Sunshine in the dark as well ! — it was too 
 .bad." 
 
 " I am to be blamed first and Sinclair second, 
 sister Delia," interposed the doctor. " We ad- 
 vised your being excluded from the secret for 
 the peace' sake of the household. Perhaps it 
 was rather shabby behavior, but any thing for a 
 quiet life !" • 
 
 " Any thing for a q^t life, indeed ! a pretty 
 excuse — but it was ahaSieful !" returned the old 
 lady, half in jeat, half in earnest. "Has he 
 come, Rachel? Don't stand there mute, but 
 tell us, has Sir Laurence Warleigh come, and 
 has he seen his daughter ? I shall always feel 
 and say that it was my place to have been at the 
 Hurtlemere House to give her up to him, and 
 
 not yours or Sinclair's. I am not superannuated 
 yet, and who should be so glad as myself that 
 the dear child was right in believing lier father 
 to be alive ? Nobody loves her better, or would 
 do more or sacrifice more for her, I'm sure." 
 
 "We agreed beforehand, sister, not to allude 
 to this part of the subject," said Miss Flora sooth- 
 ingly. " It is a very happy event, and we will 
 all rejoice in it. Rachel has been a good deal 
 worried lately, and we will not distress her now.' 
 
 " Far be it from me to distress her, but she is 
 sometimes too clever by half; yes, Rachel, that 
 is your fault, you always like to manage every 
 body and every thing in a way of your own," 
 said Miss Delia, launching at her a gknce of tart 
 rebuke. 
 
 This was not the first time by many that Rachel 
 had heard people unconsciously attribute their 
 own peculiar virtues to others by way of accu- 
 sation, therefore she bore her rebuke meekly. 
 But while she was undergoing her lecture, of 
 course the flow of news ceased, and Miss Flora 
 being affectionately impatient to hear all there 
 was to tell, begged her sister to put off her 
 scolding for the present, and to let Rachel speak. 
 And then Rachel entered on a full and particular 
 account of every thing that had happened from 
 the moment of Sunshine's arrival with Sinclair 
 at the Hurtlemere House, interrupted only by 
 tender ejaculations of " Poor darling !" and 
 " Bless her dear heart !" until she came to men- 
 tion that Sir Laurence would walk down that 
 evening to see them, arriving probably with 
 Alice and Sinclair to dinner, when Miss Delia, in 
 an accent of vehement impatience, exclaimed, 
 " Really, Rachel, I think you have lost your 
 head ! Why did you not mention that at first ? 
 Flora, dear, I must speak to James," and with 
 sudden hospitable cares on her mind the old 
 lady vanished. 
 
 " I advise you to brace up your mind to bear 
 blame from all quarters, Rachel," whispered the 
 doctor mischievously, when she was gone out of 
 hearing. " I have done wonders for you in the, 
 way of pacification, but Delia has not been fairly 
 treated — she has been robbed of conversation." 
 He took a pinch of snuff and offered Rachel 
 another to comfort her, but she declined it with 
 thanks. Then Miss Flora asked if it was dear 
 Sunshine's own suggestion that Sir Laurence 
 should visit them immediately, and being told 
 that it was, she called her a " good little heart !" 
 and went off to communicate to her sister this 
 gratifying fact. As soon as Rachel and the doc- 
 tor were alone, the doctor gave his companion 
 some details of how he had accomplished his 
 task, and congratulated her on being absent 
 from the house when he undertook it ; adding, 
 however, that though his sisters felt rather hurt 
 in their dignity at being kept in ignorance to 
 the last as to what was impending, they did 
 nothing but rejoice in the event itself. 
 
 Indeed, Rachel had perceived by their having 
 donned their moat becoming attire that they 
 were treating the day as one of vast pleasantness 
 and importance, altogether worthy to be marked 
 with white ; and thereby paying a delicate com- 
 pliment to Alice, who liked to see them look 
 nice, and often fondly objected to aunt Delia's 
 caps garnished with flat ascetic-hued ribbons. 
 She was sure to be pleased when she saw them, 
 for when not purposely disfigured by some un- 
 
164 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 manageably ugly article of raiment they were 
 as pretty a pair of old ladies as any in England. 
 She liked to tease them by telling them so ; for 
 petulant, perverse, willful as she had ofttimes 
 been by their accusation and her own penitent 
 confession, she loved them as dearly and as fond- 
 ly as they deserved she should. 
 
 Eachel Withers was in her room when Sir 
 Laurence arrived and his meeting with the aunts 
 took place ; but a few minutes after Sunshine 
 burst in upon her, exclaiming, " Oh, Rachel, I 
 am too, too happy !" She was like an April 
 shower, half mirth, half tears, when she flung 
 her arms round her sober friend as a slight vent 
 to her feelings. "There is papa down-stairs, 
 and I wish you had seen hiin hug auntie Dee ! 
 She is in ecstasies, and so is aunt Flora ; look, 
 there they are in the garden with him now — 
 Rachel, I know papa as well as if I had only 
 been taken away from him yesterday, we are 
 not at all shy of each other. I could go on 
 talkmg to him forever. But oh, you dear old 
 wicked blind mole, why did you not discover 
 me long ago, and comfort me up when I fell 
 into my cruel moods ?" 
 
 " I shall collect evidence as to who knew you 
 and who did not — only Mary Wray and your 
 father have done so as yet," retorted Rachel, 
 with feigned vexation; whereupon Alice gave 
 her a vehement embrace, protested she loved 
 her, and acknowledged that it was she who had 
 given her her first crumb of encouragement and 
 comfort; and then as Rachel was dressed for 
 dinner already, her impetuous young companion 
 carried her off to her own sanctum to help her. 
 
 " I want to look pretty for papa as well as for 
 Sinclair to-night," said she with a shy laugh at 
 her own innocent vanity. " I should not like 
 him to think me not so nice as his fancy — ^he 
 hoped I should be like mamma." 
 
 The dinner and the evening passed over very 
 happily; there was no stiffness or uncomfort- 
 ableness by reason of people not understanding 
 each other. Sir Laurence's reception of Sinclair 
 had vouched already for his acquiescence in his 
 daughter's engagement, and removed any irk- 
 some doubts that the young man might have very 
 naturally entertained. He looked gay, and Sun- 
 shine at his right hand beamed lovely, while Sir 
 Laurence with his fine bronzed traveler's face 
 seemed quite at ease and at home in his un- 
 wonted company. He watched Alice incessantly 
 and with visible delight, and when they were all 
 out on the lawn after dinner, and she was prat- 
 tling in fond, affectionate, cooing tones to aimt 
 Delia, whom she had taken to petting especially, 
 he laid a caressing hand on her bright head, and 
 said, in a tone of infinite, touching tenderness, 
 "Oh, my little Gipsy, thou hast thy mother's 
 sweet tongue !" Mistress Dobie had recognized 
 the familiar tone in her voice too. 
 
 Great excitements are but coldly set forth in 
 words and phrases ; but it would be impossible 
 to imagine a happier group of people than those 
 gathered together at Prior's Bank that night. 
 The aunts, as usual, bore a very disproportionate 
 share of the conversation, but no one begrudged 
 it them ; the doctor's voice was rarely heard, he 
 took snuff often, and quoted his favorite authors 
 silently. Sinclair and Rachel looked on ; Gipsy 
 tried to sing but could not — she broke down in 
 her first ballad, and rushing to Sir Laurence 
 
 flung herself on her knees beside him, crying, ■ 
 "It is only because I am so glad, papa !" And 
 for the rest of the evening she was suffered to 
 stay by him in silent enjoyment of her unutter- 
 able happiness. 
 
 About eleven o'clock he went away, leaving 
 Alice with her aunts until the morrow, and the 
 doctor and Sinclair bore him company in the 
 moonlight half the way back to the Hurtlemere 
 House. All the womankind then adjourned to 
 Miss Delia's room, and prattled themselves weary. 
 And so this great day came to an end. 
 
 " You need none of you look for Sunshine to- 
 day," was Miss Delia's circular address as she 
 entered the breakfast-room alone on the follow- 
 ing morning. The doctor immediately inquired. 
 Why so ? and Sinclair echoed the question. 
 
 " Because she has gone off to the Hurtlemere 
 House to make quite sure her father is there," 
 was the answer. " She woke me up this morn- 
 ing before six o'clock with a pathetic plea that 
 she had not slept a wink, and yesterday felt so 
 like a dream, might she go and see papa again ? 
 I could not refuse her permission, and it would 
 have been of no use if I had, for she was ready 
 dressed for a start. I only hope she put on her 
 over-shoes or strong boots, because there was a 
 heavy dew and the grass is still wet. She could 
 come to no harm, and her restless feeling is very 
 natural; but, perhaps, you had better go and 
 look after her, Sinclair, when breakfast is over." 
 This Sinclair said he should certainly do, and he 
 expressed a little lover-like disapproval of her 
 having set off across the fields unattended ; he 
 would have been ready to go with her at a word 
 of warning. 
 
 The elders had a very quiet day down at Pri- 
 or's Bank without the young folks; for when 
 Sinclair once left them he did not return. John 
 Withers came in for half an hour to talk events 
 over ; he had been up to the Hurtlemere House 
 already to congratulate Sir Laurence on the re- 
 storation of his daughter. Sinclair Perrand ar- 
 rived while he was there, and he had left the trio 
 in the porch, all very happy together with two 
 dogs at their feet ; Sir Laurence smoking, and 
 Gipsy asking him to tell her about his wander- 
 ings, and quite familiar friends already. The 
 aunts missed their capricious Sunshine very 
 much ; and all the more, perhaps, because they 
 felt this present absence was only a foretaste of 
 what must by and by be the every-day atmos- 
 phere at Brookfall; nevertheless Miss Delia, 
 busily stitchmg at a missionary frock, said in her 
 most amiable way, "We must not be selfish, 
 sister Plo'.^ — it would have been much the same 
 had our dear girl married Mr. More ; what a 
 mercy it is that Providence sometimes sees fit to 
 defeat our best intentions ! Mr. More would not 
 have suited Sir Laurence as a son-in-law at all!" 
 Miss Flora cordially acquiesced — she thought it 
 had been quite a dfliveranee. 
 
 " You may smile, Radiel, you were right for 
 once," Miss Delia contiWed, with an air of cheer- 
 ful candor ; " and it has turned out for the best. 
 But supposmg it had not done so — ^life is uncer- 
 tain, and had any thing happened to us, there 
 would she have been left at the mercy of that 
 man who called himself her uncle. As for her 
 having other opportunities of marrying, I am not 
 
FOUND. 
 
 165 
 
 so sure — men grow scarcer and scarcer every- 
 day; I wonder sometimes where they are all 
 gone to. Look what thousands of nice girls are 
 unmarried — Mrs. Wallis declares it is quite me- 
 lancholy at Knowle, she could tell of fifty on her 
 fingers whom she has watched blushing out at 
 eighteen, and fading down to thirty with never a 
 chance of settling. Look at me — I was neither 
 ugly nor penniless, and I never had an offer in 
 my life; there's Flora, too, she never had but 
 one, and he was only a cousin, and poor papa 
 would not hear of him. And you yourself, Ra- 
 chel, I never heard that any body proposed to 
 you but Mr. Gilsland. I know one lady, to be 
 sure, who had fourteen offers, and the fourteenth 
 was but a crooked stick, though she married 
 him ; to be rid of the rest, I suppose, or else 
 because she was afraid he might be the last ; but 
 she was uncommonly lovely, and the men ran 
 after her like a flock of sheep. I think it is the 
 prettiest and nicest women who get married, or 
 else it improves a woman to marry her. Sun- 
 shine with her beauty might h.ave found other 
 lovers had not SinclairVanted her, but I am sure 
 at Claymire there is nobody possible but Mr. 
 Clarke, and she would never have made a profit- 
 able wife to a curate. We none of us have faith 
 enough — we want to lay out the world too far 
 beforehand; if I could have imagined matters 
 would turn out as they have done, what hours 
 of fret and worry I might have spared myself" 
 
 During the afternoon Rachel Withers fell in 
 with Farmer Robb, who said his wife had charged 
 him with a message that she hoped she was not 
 forgotten ; she had heard the great news about 
 Sir Laurence and his daughter, but she was laid 
 fast at present and could not go up to see Miss 
 Annis ; would Miss Annis therefore go down to 
 see her ? Rachel promised that she should, and 
 then inquired if Lucy were ill. "No, she were 
 not exactlings ill," the miller cautiously replied ; 
 " but she were occupied wi' another babby as 
 she mostlings was now abouts. It were the sev- 
 enth, an' a vera fine lad th' women told him, but 
 he thought it nobbut small." Rachel ended her 
 walk by paying Lucy a visit, and when her wee 
 whimperer would allow any voice but his own to 
 be heard, she told her about Annis. 
 
 " I'm noways surprised she should be living," 
 was Lucy's comment on the story. "It was 
 always suspicious to my mind that Lady Georgi- 
 ana should be in such a hurry to get Salter out 
 of the way when I was gone ; for she was a 
 good nurse, and attached to the children, all of 
 'em, and not to one more than another : but she 
 was not the body to wink at what was wrong or 
 to lend herself to any bad, underhand doings. 
 Lupton was another sort — I could not abide 
 that woman ! She went away as bowld as Hec- 
 tor when it was all found out ; Mistress Dobie 
 would have a good riddance of her ! She'll 
 come to a bad end, it's in her face. She's over 
 high learnt in doctor's wares an' drugs to be a 
 safe nurse, and it's my belief she'd not be par- 
 ticular about mixing something not wholesome 
 in either physio or &pd for them that stood in 
 her way. All the same, she gave Mathew Dobie 
 a recipe that worked like a charm on his rheu- 
 matics ; I got it made up last winter for Robb — 
 he has it bad In his back in damp weather." 
 
 The distrust of Mrs. Lupton was growing 
 universal. Rachel Withers had received a let- 
 
 ter from Carrie Martin only that morning in 
 which she mentioned the nurse's return to her 
 own house. When she came to Hurtlemere to 
 attend on Oliver Warleigh she had placed a 
 woman in it, under Dr. Frith's supervision to 
 attend to her lodgers. Carrie had retained her 
 apartments during the interregnum, and still 
 tenanted them, but she was now contemplating 
 an immediate change of quarters. 
 
 "I know too much of the beneficent crea- 
 ture's secret history to find her coffee any longer 
 safe or . pleasant drinking," said she, writing in 
 her ironical fashion. "I shall nevertheless re- 
 gret leaving her ; the house is quiet, the neigh- 
 borhood retired, and the service respectful, while 
 the domestic confiscations are very trifling — also 
 she makes the best omelettes souMees I ever tast- 
 ed out of Paris. I think she would be the 
 better for a good hanging, but that is quite 
 between- ourselves at present — the public will 
 probably participate in the sentiment by and by. 
 Tour Hurtledale romance under the transparent 
 mask of initials has already crept into one of 
 the daily papers; the amiable Mrs. Lupton 
 handed it to me and pointed out the story ; but 
 I flatter myself she did not detect in my open 
 countenance any tokens that I knew her share 
 in it. I asked her if she believed it possible 
 such things could be — out of a novel — and smil- 
 ing in derision at my simplicity, she cried, ' Ay, 
 possible enough ! I have known darker deeds 
 done than that, deeds that bided in the dark 
 too.' I encouraged her to carry the masked 
 lantern of her talk down into the crypt of her 
 iniquities, and she told me a little narrative of a 
 suicide which would be a capital foundation for 
 a winter's tale ; only for suicide I should write 
 murder, and fix the guilt of it on the phantom 
 representing herself. She is an inveterate 
 boaster, and always betrays an inclination to 
 adopt the first r61e in her melodramas, so that 
 she may not be quite so black as she paints her- 
 self. These bad clever women blunder into 
 one fatal mistake — they believe all the world to 
 be fools except themselves." 
 
 in. 
 The next day Sir Laurence Warleigh moved 
 down to Prior's Bank to live there during the 
 stay of his daughter's kind benefactresses ; it 
 was the easiest and pleasantest way of inuring 
 their minds to the idea of a brief separation 
 froiii her by and by. Grouse-shooting was just 
 beginning, and he and Sinclair Ferrand were 
 much out on the moors together, when ' the 
 aunts were left in full enjoyment of their Sun- 
 shine as before. She had several pleasant du- 
 ties of affection to do, such as showing them 
 the Hurtlemere House, which they thought a 
 dismal dungeon, and going with them to visit 
 Lucy. Neither Lucy nor Alice recognized each 
 other, but they spent a long hour together ; 
 Lucy telling her old nursling of her mother's 
 life at Everham before her marriage, and of the 
 strange feeling it was to both when they first 
 came into the dales. Alice had a thousand 
 questions to ask of those days, and Lucy as 
 many reminiscences to detail. When Alice' 
 went home after this exoitmg talk she was glad 
 to be still and think it all over in a quiet corner 
 of the garden by herself The last few days 
 had opened up new depths in her character; 
 
166 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 she was calmer, gentler, more considerate and 
 yielding to every body about her. She had got 
 rid of the thorn from her heart which had 
 grievously pricked and pained her while she 
 believed her father to be alive, and others treat- 
 ed the belief as an extravagant delusion. 
 
 One day she rode over to Bristowe with Sir 
 Laurence and Sinclair to be presented to Mrs. 
 Damer Warleigh, who was the only member of 
 her father^ family who had known or acknowl- 
 edged her mother ; and the next morning's post 
 brought to the gratified aunts a letter from the 
 exceUent old lady. She could not come over to 
 Prior's Bank, said she, for she was very old, 
 weak, and half blind ; but she begged them all 
 to visit her at Bristowe before their return to 
 the south, that she might thank them in person 
 for the loving labor they had lavished on her 
 dear Laurence's child, whom she found beauti- 
 ful and with every sign of goodness and virtue 
 in her countenance. She also expressed her 
 satisfaction that the tie of adoption by which 
 she had been so long bound to her benefactress- 
 es was to be strengthened and made permanent 
 by her marriage with their nephew, Sinclair; 
 who, she added, must be worthy of her being 
 akin to them. The dignified grandame had lost 
 none of her grace or graciousness, and the 
 aunts were touched and delighted by her letter. 
 There was some suggestion of Sunshine's 
 being taken to Whinstane to visit Lady Foulis 
 in her tower, but this was forestalled by a rather 
 striking coincidence. Kachel Withers while at 
 the rectory had heard from Kester Graves that 
 Effie Benson had inquired for her several times, 
 and expressed an earnest wish to see her ; but 
 the events that were just then happening had 
 been too absorbing to leave her leisure to grati- 
 fy the poor old woman's desire. She had now, 
 however, time on her hands, and one morning 
 after a brief call at the rectory, she dropped in 
 at Effie's cottage for a gossip and a longer rest 
 such as the lonely old dame always expected 
 from her. It was wonderful how Effie preserved 
 her faculties and her strength of body still ; she 
 told Rachel that day she was turned of eighty- 
 five. The little house was as neat and clean as 
 possible, every bit of metal about it shining like 
 looking-glass ; and there was Effie seated in her 
 chimney-corner knitting the .rector's annual sup- 
 ply of winter socks without even spectacles. 
 
 "My mind's been- running strangely on Lady 
 Foulis this last day or two," she said, as sodn as 
 personal civilities had been exchanged with her 
 visitor. 
 
 '• Have you seen her since you came into 
 Hurtledale this time. Miss Eachel?" Kachel 
 replied that she had not, but she hoped to do so 
 before leaving the north again. "Ay, do, an' 
 let me inow how she fares, will you ?" added 
 Effie. "I can't get her out o' my head. I 
 think t' Lord's forgotten to call on her, for she's 
 a good ten years aulder than me. She must be 
 ninety-seven or ninety-eight at the least. I 
 could teE exactlings if I had th' old Bible, but 
 Jack carried it away — she was born the same 
 day as him, and he's been dead now going on 
 for sixty years; but what became of th' old 
 Bible I don't know — ^fell into strange hands like- 
 lings; th' Lord' give 'em a blessing with it!" 
 She was silent for a few minutes gazing musing- 
 ly into the embers until Kachel asked her if she 
 
 knew Lady Foulis when she was young. " Yes, 
 I knew her — every body about the coimtry 
 knew her when I was a little 'un," was the an- 
 swer. " My father held a farm under th' auld 
 colonel's father — th' gret squire as we called 
 him — an' awful doings there was np at the 
 tower in th' gret squire's times. She was very 
 bonny but wickeder than she was bonny, and 
 she over the border at last wi' divil Foulis and 
 married him in Scotland. He was a gentleman 
 bom, but he'd ruined himself wi' gambling an' 
 wastry, and was no better nor a horse-jock when 
 she took off wi' him. She'd a bad bringing up, 
 she had; but o' th' Sundays in church, I re- 
 member when I was a little lass staring at her 
 and thinking surely the angels in heaven must 
 sing like yon. Th' gret squire died about a 
 year after she left him, and then t' auld colonel, 
 but he was a youngish man then, came into the 
 property. 'Twas t' colonel adopted him as was 
 Sir William after — he was the very moral of 
 divil Foulis when he grew up, but nobody 
 guessed then whose son he was. What got 
 divil Foulis none of u8 ever heard, but she 
 came back ragged and raving one blazing hot 
 day in the harvest time, and the colonel kept 
 her shut up ever after in the north tower. 
 Dear, how well I remember the talk of it when. 
 I was a lass! Folks called her a witch, and 
 every mishap in the dale was laid on her — and 
 oh, the ghost-music she played in the dead o' 
 the night ! It gave me the creeps to listen, but 
 oft and oft when mother was in bed have I got 
 up an' opened the window to hear it. They 
 said she grew right of her wits in a year or two, 
 but she never stirred out in the sun any more, 
 and I never saw her face again after the last 
 time I saw her singing i' church. It is like what 
 she was then she keeps running over and over 
 again in my mind." 
 
 It was very remarkable that Kachel Withers, 
 just as she was leaving the cottage, should meet 
 Mathew Dobie, who stopped her to say : 
 
 "Ha' ye heerd,1Hiss Eachel, as auld Leddy 
 Foulis is dead ?" 
 
 She turned back at once -and told the news 
 to Effie. 
 
 "Eh, that's been It," responded she; "I was 
 looking for it. The Lord Almighty's thought 
 on her at last. Christ give her rest to her soul, 
 for she dreed an awful penance if she did mur- 
 der him as they said." 
 
 The last words were spoken very low, but 
 Rachel caught them. Perhaps they revealed 
 the kernel of that dark mystery which hung so 
 long, and hangs yet, round the north tower at 
 Whinstane. The country-folk say Lady Foulis 
 haunts it dead as she haunted it living, and that 
 the shepherds on the hills at night still hear her 
 eerie ghost-music floating out upon the wind as 
 .they used to hear it before her body was laid 
 with her kinsfolk in the vault of Penslaven 
 Church. 
 
 In passing by Helena's grave on her way to 
 the rectory that morning, Eachel had observed 
 that the inscription on the memorial stone com- 
 memorative of her child had been carefully 
 erased ; and from the trampled appearance of 
 the turf about it, she conjectured that the coffin 
 also had been removed. It had. The rector 
 had caused the grave to be opened in the pres- 
 ence of suitable witnesses at daybreak, and the 
 
FOUND. 
 
 167 
 
 coffin was found to contain what Oliver War- 
 leigh hiid stated, a mere log of wood swathed 
 in flannel, the whole now crumbling down into 
 decay. Certainly the conspirators had had great 
 faith in that somebody who helped them when 
 they trusted him so far as this, and showed so 
 little fear of the curiosity of those who had lov- 
 ed the child, and who might have been tempted, 
 notwithstanding the fever she was said to have 
 died of, to seek a last glimpse of her darling 
 face! 
 
 After Mrs. Lupton's return to London Dr. 
 Frith had the audacity to write threatening let- 
 ters to John Withers, to Lady Georgiana, and 
 even to Sir Laurence Warleigh himself, declar- 
 ing his resolve to publish the whole disgraceful 
 story of Annis's abduction to the world unless 
 he were duly bribed into silence. But no notice 
 was taken of them, and he might make up his 
 mind that he had received his last sixpence of 
 wages for the share he Jiad in that villainy. Be- 
 fore she made her exit from the Hurtlemere 
 House, the worthy nurse plundered Lady Geor- 
 giana of all her jewelry, ready money, and other 
 portable things of value ; she even stripped her 
 of clothing down to bare necessities, and with 
 some articles her sisters-in-law had even been 
 obliged to supply her. 
 
 Few who saw Lady Georgiana now could help 
 pitying her. She had sunk into a state of apa- 
 thetic despair ; she said Frith might do his worst, 
 for she had nothing left .either to hope or to 
 fear. Mortimer had not returned, neither had 
 he written a single line to any one at the rec- 
 tory since he went away. " He left us without 
 a word, and it is borne in upon my mind that I 
 shall never see him again," she said to Kather- 
 ine one evening. " He will not hate me — Mor- 
 timer never vehemently loved or hated any 
 thing, but he will forsake us. I do not expect 
 ever to hear of him more." 
 
 Hehad been gone a fortnight now, and every 
 one was anxious to hear some news of him — 
 perhaps Sir Laurence the most anxious of any. 
 He had not seen Oliver or Oliver's wife ; he was 
 not one to go out of his way to crush those who 
 were crushed already ; he never even mentioned 
 their names, but of Mortimer he said he would 
 take care ; promising to fulfill the expectations 
 in which he had been brought up to the utmost 
 limits of his power. No one who knew Sir 
 Laurence was surprised, but strangers and vin- 
 dictive persons thought his generosity sheer 
 quixotism. Oliver, since his residence at the 
 rectory, had begun to rally, and Dr. Beane said 
 there was no reason why he should not recover 
 health and strength and outlive all his betters. 
 He had taken to reading again, a custom for 
 many years abandoned, and seemed even to en- 
 joy his book. Miss Delia Ferrand could not be 
 withheld from sending him a few specimens of 
 her choice literature, which the Christian woman 
 esteemed appropriate to his evil, sinful case, 
 but it was not known that he gave them his at- 
 tention — ^probably he did not ; they were milk 
 for babes. 
 
 A few evenings before the party at Prior's 
 Bank broke up there was a large family gath- 
 ering at dinner there ; John Withers and Kath- 
 erine, Arthur Hill and Grace, Dicky, merry 
 
 Andrew and Saoharissa Tulip came, the three 
 last on the plea of making cousin Annis's ac- 
 quaintance. The young people behaved with 
 remarkable discretion, accepting her quite as a 
 ' person of course, though they, had been used to 
 see her name on a gravestone for a dozen years ; 
 but no doubt there was a good deal .of specula- 
 tive discussion about her amongst themselves 
 afterward. With her they kept to their own 
 favorite topics of general interest ; inquiring if 
 she liked dogs and horses, if she could shoot or 
 play cricket, and so forth, and finding they were 
 of one mind on these great subjects, they pro- 
 nounced her " very weU for a girl," Sacharissa 
 Tulip leading the eulogium. To hear that 
 home-bred child of thirteen talk, strangers 
 might have fancied she confused herself with 
 her brothers, and impertinently believed herself 
 their equal in point of sex ! Her mamma quite 
 openly deplored her hoydenishness, forgetting 
 that she had been almost as wild at the same 
 age. Eachel, who was her godmother, and 
 therefore directly responsible for her morals 
 and maimers, was much less anxious ; the child 
 was generously disposed, very brave ai|d truth- 
 ful ; not clever, and thus far not handsome, 
 though she had been a lovely baby. Dicky call- 
 ed her "a good fellow," and so she was. A 
 girl of her kind here and there makes a pleasing 
 Variety — ^Katherine admitted this in theory her- 
 self, but regretted that the practical specimen 
 had fallen to her lot. Gipsy fraternized with 
 her rough-girl cousin on the spot, and Sacha- 
 rissa Tulip immediately fell in love with her, 
 according to the enthusiastic manner of her time 
 of life. 
 
 The guests were late in separating, for the 
 hours were shortened by Sir Laurence's delight- 
 ing the young folks' adventurous spirits with 
 various anecdotes of his travels north, south, 
 east, west — there seemed to be no known coun- 
 try in the world that he had not visited. Alice, 
 who had contrived herself a seat close beside 
 him, listened breathless as he told of joumey- 
 ings through primeval forests, monotonous in a 
 dead silence, unstirred by voice of beast or bird, 
 where the long vistas of road stretched straight 
 between the ranks of giant pines for miles with- 
 out change, or break, jourueyings that lasted for 
 days. She asked if he had seen the Falls of 
 Niagara. 
 
 " Tes," replied he, smiling at her ardent in- 
 terest in every word that dropped from his lips. 
 " Tes, I have seen the falls. My first sensation 
 was almost one of disappointment, but they' 
 grow on the imagination until in their vast pow- 
 er and grandeur they overwhelm it with awe. 
 There is a little vessel, the Maid of the Mist, in 
 which if you be a man swathed in waterproof, 
 and if you be a lady, shut up in a sort of glass 
 case, you may go as near the boiling torrent as 
 is pleasant — ^much nearer, in fact. It is a gal- 
 lant little boat, and rides the waters like a sea- 
 /bird ; I relish the sense of some dangers, but I 
 was not sorry to be off that dancmg foam-sprite, 
 and safe on solid ground again. There were 
 five persons that went under the fall that day 
 besides myself, and. the youngest of us, a tall 
 lathy fellow as big as our friend Sinclair here, 
 felt the strain on his nerves so terribly that he 
 cried like a child when the feat was accomplish- 
 ed. I remained a week at Niagara, and each day 
 
168 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 the scene was more and more terrifically grand. 
 The morning I left a great raft of timber that 
 had broken from its moorings high up the rirer 
 went over the falls ; it was composed of gigan- 
 tic forest trees, but when it reappeared a mile 
 or more below it waa all broken up like a mere 
 fagot of sticks." 
 
 The doctor wished to learn something of the 
 traveling arrangements on the lakes, and Sir 
 Laurence gave him a vivid sketch of a race when 
 he was on board one of the contending steam- 
 boats. They were about ten miles out when the 
 race began, and the excessive density of the 
 smoke from the funnels first warned him of what 
 was going forward. He spoke to the captain, 
 asking if he felt himself justified in thus imperil'- 
 ing the lives of his passengers, but he acknowl- 
 edged himself utterly powerless over hia ex- 
 cited crew. They were all blacks, and on going 
 down into the engine-room Sir Laurence saw 
 them stripped to the skin, some smearing great 
 junks of wood with lard and pitch, then thrust- 
 ing them into the furnace holes to force the fires, 
 while others played with water on the machinery 
 to prevait it becoming red hot. They worked 
 at their task like demons, heedless of danger. 
 The vessel was a new one, very elegantly but 
 slightly built, and walking on the deck Sir Lau- 
 rence compared to walking with the undulating 
 motion of a serpent under the feet. 
 
 " And what was the end of it?" asked Dicky, 
 who had followed the story with increasing ex- 
 citement at each novel incident. 
 
 " The end of it was that I went ashore at 
 Buffalo," replied Sir Laurence, "and the race 
 being continued next day the vessel I had left 
 blew up ; onlyfourteen persons being saved out 
 of a crew and passengers numbering a hundred 
 and eleven. They were thirty miles from land, 
 and the survivors were picked up by the rival 
 boat, which was astern." 
 
 Alice shuddered to think of her father's nar- 
 row escape, and Miss Flora addressing her 
 nephew, said with great solemnity, 
 
 " Let me beg of yon, dear Sinclair, when you 
 go to America never on any account to sail in a 
 racing-boat." 
 
 "He might be taken unawares as I was," re- 
 marked Sir Laurence. " But if he accepts my 
 warning he will never engage his passage in any 
 vessel but the mail-packets. They are timed at 
 each station and restricted to a moderate speed ; 
 and it is at the captain's peril if he suffer the 
 rules to be infringed." • 
 
 Miss Delia in her spirit of universal philan- 
 thropy now wished to hear something of the 
 slaves in the South from an eye-witness, but Sir 
 Laurence had nothing very shocking to tell her — 
 or would not tell it. He thought the system 
 most costly, but had not witnessed any of the 
 desperate cruelties he had read of in books 
 of romance. Miss Delia then proclaimed herself 
 an abolitionist pure and simple — all the slaves 
 free to-morrow ! to which Sir Laurence replied 
 with a quotation that " suddenly to abandon the 
 worst of vices was sometimes to entail the worst 
 of consequences." If the three millions could be 
 provided with free passes to the nearest fixed 
 star, and there encouraged to found a sable repub- 
 lic, -her prompt measures might be safe, otherwise 
 he was of opinion that gradual ones would serve 
 the purpose better. She shook her head — a 
 
 nation ought not to continue in sin a day after 
 its sinfulness was acknowledged — do right and 
 trust to Providence to bring His own good ends 
 out of it. Sir Laurence dropped the argument, 
 and no sooner had he done so than the discursive 
 old lady was off to Central Africa, inquiring into 
 the condition and prospects of her beloved hea- 
 then-tribes, and questioning the traveler straight- 
 ly of his acquaintance among the dear mission- 
 aries. He went through his catechism with 
 considerable spirit ; and with interest to all his 
 hearers ; gave the missionaries high testimony 
 for their courage and faithfulness, but did not 
 express much tenderness for the object of their 
 endeavors ; appearing to feel that if all the sav- 
 ages were civilized off the face of the earth and 
 numbered with extinct races it would be much 
 more comfortable for the decent people left. 
 
 He had some hunting adventures to detail of 
 this portion of his wanderings which held his 
 listeners in thrall for ever so long ; and Miss 
 Delia remarked thereanent that Claymire would 
 be proud if he would give them a lecture when 
 he went down there, introducing these charming 
 anecdotes into a general account of missionary 
 labors in Western Africa. Poor Sir Laurence 
 looked dismayed at this suggestion, and protest- 
 ed that he was nothing of a public speaker; but 
 the enthusiastic old lady assured him his success 
 would be conspicuous, and only relaxed in her 
 efforts to extract a promise from him when she 
 discovered that he entertained certain views far 
 from orthodox and not at all suitable to be de- 
 veloped before a village audience. 
 
 For instance he did not wish to see caste abol- 
 ished in India until there was something better 
 to replace it, and thought moreover that caste 
 prevailed amongst Christians as well as amongst 
 Hindoos — did they not even go to the Lord's 
 Table in castes? It appeared to him so. He 
 had no great faith in the conversion of Jews ; he 
 thought it was 'once a Jew, always a Jew.' 
 He believed that little progress would be made 
 in Christianizing the heathen until native pastor- 
 ates were rooted amongst them ; and considered 
 that as remnants of pagandom yet survived 
 amongst nations enlightened a thousand and 
 more years ago, so would they continne to sur- 
 vive wherever new religious systems were graft- 
 ed in ; and therefore teachers of the gospel must 
 take wider views of social politics than they 
 seemed commonly inclined to do. And finally 
 he admired the spirit of the Roman Catholic mis- 
 sions as much as any ; their priests being simple, 
 devoted men, ready to brave poverty and labor 
 of body in addition to all their other trials as he 
 found few others were. 
 
 This silenced Miss Delia for good and alL 
 " Sir Laurence is a brave and generous gentle- 
 man, but his views are unsound and unsettled," 
 said she in confidence to her sister afterward. 
 " He seems to think all faiths equally true and 
 good if their holders be only sincere in their 
 profession. I trust dear little Sunshine will re- 
 main firm to her principles. I would rather see 
 the poor heathens left in their gross darkness 
 than enlightened by the torch of Borne !" Miss 
 Flora ventured to demur to this, but Miss Delia 
 would not hear her. No good could come out 
 of Rome — she had made up her mind to that 
 long ago, and to suggest that any parts of its 
 system might with advantage be restored to 
 
FOUND. 
 
 169 
 
 Protestantism was as exciting and exasperating 
 to her spirit as tlie fluttering of a red flag before 
 tlie eyes of an infuriated bull. Her theories 
 were of the narrowest, but her practical charity 
 of the widest ; to hear her harangue she might 
 have been supposed a bigot and persecutor in 
 grain ; to see her life, none but must acknowl- 
 edge her a kind, genuine, well-meaning Christian 
 as ever lived. 
 
 Sir Laurence told his daughter he hved her ; 
 she w.ia thorough ; and thorough people were 
 the only people to be trusted ; and when he 
 went to Brookfall, as he did about a fortnight 
 after the aunts returned home, carrying Sunshine 
 with him that they might have a Jast glimpse of 
 her before she went abroad with him for the 
 winter, he actually delivered that lecture in the 
 school-room at Claymire ; hurt nobody's feel- 
 ings, and was himself complimented. From that 
 evening Miss Delia excused his peculiar views, 
 and was his friend for life ; all the faster friend 
 perhaps that she has not yet succeeded in get- 
 ting him quite converted to her own. 
 
 CHAPTER THE FOURTH. 
 
 ' WEDDIN8 BELLS. 
 
 There is a garden in her face, 
 
 Where roses and white lilies grow ; 
 A heavenly paradise is that place, 
 
 Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow 
 
 There cherries grow that none may buy. 
 
 Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry. 
 
 Richard Allison. 
 L 
 
 The time of singing birds had come again, and 
 with the singing birds came back its Sunshine to 
 Brookfall. The aunts had had a very quiet cold- 
 feeling winter at Claymire while she was abroad 
 with her father. They arrived last from Pen- 
 slaven, where Sinclair Ferrand had been staying 
 with them since their return from Italy in March. 
 Penslaven was to be the future home of Sinclair 
 and Anuis — Annis as we will now again call her 
 since she has gotten back her kinsfolk and her 
 rights. The lease on which it had been held had 
 expired at Michaelmas, and Sir Laurence had de- 
 termined to restore it, and fit it up anew for them. 
 It was a pleasanter place than Whinstane Tower 
 and in every way more desirable as a residence ; 
 the country round was richer and less wild, and 
 there were more sociable neighbors near. Whin- 
 stane Tower was taken by the people who had 
 hitherto had Penslaven ; they were a large fam- 
 ily, and wealthy and liberal, and it was thought 
 better for the sake of the village that it should 
 have a tenant than stand any longer empty. 
 Katherine would fain have had Sir Laurence live 
 there himself, but that he said he should never 
 do ; the Hurtlemere House would serve him as a 
 retreat between his wanderings as heretofore, 
 and when he was disposed for society the youug 
 folks would give him a corner by their hearth at 
 Penslaven. 
 
 The destiny of pretty Prior's Bank was not 
 settled yet. There had been a suggestion in the 
 autumn that the Oliver Warleighs should take it 
 and live there, but no conclusion was arrived at. 
 They were still at the rectory, and every body 
 began to think it time some change was made ; 
 for their permanent occupancy of so much of 
 
 the house prevented the rector and his wife from 
 conveniently entertaining other guests. Of Mor- 
 timer there had been received as yet no tidings 
 whatever ; every possible effort had been made 
 to trace him, but without success. Long since 
 he must have been penniless, and he was not a 
 young man ready enough either of wit or of hand 
 to achieve sudden independence. On Lady Geor- 
 giana the suspense weighed more cruelly than 
 could have done the saddest certainty ; she 
 seemed to be punished for her crime with a re- 
 finement of the very pains she had remorselessly 
 inflicted. 
 
 One day soon after her return to Brookfall 
 Annis fell to talkirtg of Mortimer with Rachel 
 Withers. 
 
 " I am sorry for Mortimer because the wrong 
 was none of his doing," said she. "And papa 
 too is greatly hurt that he should have shown so 
 little trust in him after he had treated him in 
 every respect like a son. He had not much 
 courage or he would have staid by his father 
 and mother. You fancied once, and so did aunt 
 Delia, that I was in danger of loving him, but 
 it was not really so. I never had any heart but 
 for Sinclair. I was attracted to Mortimer be- 
 cause I felt at first sight that he was a link be- 
 tween me and the past, and any person or thing 
 that promised to clear up the mystery of my 
 childhood had a strong fascination for me. My 
 conscience is clear with regard to him. I know 
 by SinclMr's love for me that Mortimer never 
 loved me — aunt Katherine doubts it, and I most 
 earnestly wish, if he be living, that he would re- 
 turn or let us know where he is wandering. 
 He does not remain away because of me, ani 
 I dislike the imputation that he should." 
 
 " I can not remember the time when I did not 
 love Sinclair beyond all the world besides," she 
 added by and by. " He was rest and refuge to 
 me when I was unhappy, and when I was gay 
 he was my merriest companion. He was never 
 wearied or impatient with me, let me be as ca- 
 pricious as I would. From the night he carried 
 me in his arms to Brookfall, and set me down 
 by the dog in front of the kitchen fire, a little, 
 hungered, beaten, miserable wretch, I have loved 
 him and looked up to him as braver, better and 
 kinder than any body save papa. So long ago as 
 that, in his ways he reminded me of papa, and 
 since Ihaveseen them together, I think they are 
 in disposition more alike than ever. He loves me 
 faithfully, and I have grown to feel of late that 
 apart from him I should only half live." 
 
 They were to be married in June, and the in- 
 terval Annis was to spend with the aunts while 
 preparations were being made. The good old 
 ladies gave a solemn dinner-party to welcome 
 Sir Laurence and his daughter, to which were 
 invited all the old friends who had hitherto 
 known Annis only as the bright and bonny Sun- 
 shine of Brookfall. She appeared in" full-dress 
 with pearls in her hair and on her satiny neck, 
 and every body said she had bloomed into a more 
 radiant loveliness than ever during her few 
 months of absence. The little airs of dignity and 
 responsibility she was acquiring suited her even 
 more charmingly than her ancient caprices — 
 not that they were to be considered aa spirited 
 away altogether, but simply that they had re- 
 tired into the background, and were becoming 
 less exacting. 
 
170 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 Every body seemed to consider it right and 
 delightful that Sunshine should be about to mar- 
 ry Sinclair, and merry little Miss Crispe who 
 was amongst the guests said so expressly. 
 
 " It is so pretty of her— just like a fairy tale 
 princess espousing her valiant deliverer from the 
 fiery-eyed dragon," whispered she to Rachel 
 "Withers confidentially. " Since Claymire adopt- 
 ed her it is onlyjust she should choose her prince 
 there. I enjoy a true-love story as much by 
 sympathy as if it were my own. I hope it won't 
 come in at prayers to-night that this is a wicked, 
 miserable world, for if it should I shall feel in 
 duty bound to groan dissent. Look at those two 
 — it does one's heart good to see them. Eden 
 itself was not happier than this prettified little 
 drawing-room with them in it." 
 
 Mr. More was invited to the feast but he de- 
 clined it. He was courting again, and hia pres- 
 ent flame was Phcebe Wallis, who was seventeen 
 last October ; but even she turned up her little 
 nose at him, though her probable alternative 
 would be going out to teach, Mr. More looked 
 too exclusively for youth and beauty, and youth 
 and beauty do not like green spectacles and what 
 Alice called " squeak-leather," in a lover's boots. 
 But he had bought him a chestnut wig of the 
 modem sort undistinguishable from natural hair, 
 and had come out more brisk and gallant than 
 ever since he went wooing to Knowle ; and the 
 gossips said that under maternal pressure there 
 was every prospect of Phoebe giving way and 
 becoming Mrs. More. 
 
 Sir Laurence Warleigh went and came and 
 did not remain permanently at Brookfall — ^the 
 quiet discipline of the aunt's establishment being 
 possibly too strict for his vagrant tastes and hab- 
 its. ' On one occasion he set off with Sinclair for 
 a few days' ramble along the coast, and in their 
 double absence the time hung rather long on 
 Sunshine's hands. Under these circumstances 
 she bestowed some of her leisure on Kachel 
 Withers as of old. One morning she came down 
 to her sober friend's astonishment, in very 
 clouded mood. 
 
 " How fast the time flies, how thickly events 
 crowd one upon another," said she taking a 
 seat by the open window and looking out at 
 the spring flowers. "It is April again — last 
 April I was without papa, I was not promised 
 to Sinclair, poor consul Mortimer was safe and 
 well, and auntie Dee lectured me when I had 
 my moods. It is a different world, this that 1 
 am living in now, Bachel ; it is one full of hap- 
 piness and contentment. If I were to set my 
 heart to wish I do not know what more I could 
 desire." 
 
 " Then you have but to learn to be thankful," 
 responded Rachel. " A thankful spirit must be 
 as acceptable to the Giver of good as one that 
 has many needs and prays that they may be 
 satiefied." 
 
 Annis paused thoughtfully on her words for a 
 moment, and then went on. 
 
 " Is it wise to tell each other we must feel 
 this and we ought to feel that ? I was express- 
 ing my great happiness to auntie Dee this morn- 
 ing, hoping she would rejoice and sympathize 
 with me, but I took her at a wrong moment ; for 
 she chilled it all by bidding me remember how 
 
 suddenly it might be blasted or taken utterly 
 away from me. ' In the midst of life we are in 
 death,' she said. It is the manner of her piety, 
 for she is pious, Rachel ; she is as genuinely true 
 and good as any woman breathing. I did not 
 need the familiar reminder, and it shocked and 
 pained me inexpressibly. It is her way to dash 
 every sweet cup with a drop of bitter — then I was 
 vexed and sarcastic, and she was grieved and hurt. 
 I am no better than I was for all I am so happy ; 
 and I have been haunted ever since with a dread 
 lest papa or Sinclair should not come back to 
 me — lest some accident should befall them. 
 Things as strange and cruel have happened to 
 other women.". 
 
 " I would not imagine any event so improba- 
 ble," returned Kachel, surprised but encour- 
 agingly. "I would have more trust were I 
 you than to fear lest God should suffer my life 
 to be destroyed just at its best and its brightest." 
 
 "But if I am not bearing my blessings as I 
 ought ?" she suggested further. 
 
 " If you are a fsuthleBs, fanciful little goose," 
 was Rachel's irreverent answer ; for she saw 
 that tears would be the issue were no check ad- 
 ministered to her whimsical disquietudes — dis- 
 quietudes which she would never have felt bad 
 they not been put into her head. 
 
 About the middle of May Jane Grantham ar- 
 rived at Brookfall to officiate as bridesmaid to 
 Annis in conjunction with Rachel Withers's boy- 
 ish madcap of a god-daughter. They would bo 
 a queer contrast those two. Sacharissa Tulip 
 brought with her a new riding-suit ; her first 
 regular " all-of-cloth suit," as she apprised her 
 godmamma, and she was ambitious of wearing it 
 on the solemn occasion ; being aware that she 
 appeared to much better advantage in it than in 
 any puffery of muslin or silk or lace. But An- 
 nis laughed at her and said, no, she would have 
 none of the riding-habit on her wedding day ; 
 her maidens must look maidenly and keep her 
 in countenance by being dressed alike all in 
 white. 
 
 Jane Grantham showed hke a sort of quaker- 
 ish dove beside Rachel's hoyden niece. It was 
 her fate to be a governess, but she had not yet 
 had time to take the formal stamp of her order, 
 and was fair, plump, cheerful and serene as if 
 her monotonous working-life suited her to per- 
 fection. " I find her a most amiable young per- 
 son and full of principle — ^we all like her," Miss 
 Flora said to one of her friends ; " but she is 
 too retiring ; she never speaks unless she be first 
 spoken to, which is proper in her situation, I 
 presume, but we could dispense with silence at 
 holiday time ; it makes her look shy and dull, 
 and she has plenty both of sense and conversa- 
 tion when she is alone with us." 
 
 Rachel Withers walked up to Brookfall by in- 
 vitation to inspect the bridal splendors when 
 they came from town, and there she found the 
 three young ones with the aunts and Miss Crispe 
 enjoying the sober pleasures of contemplation 
 each in her own way. Annis stood the center 
 of an admiring group, submitting herself to the 
 manipulations of the skillful waiting-woman who 
 had been her maid " all to herself " since her 
 change of fortune, while the wedding-dress of 
 richest silk and costliest lace wa,3 being fitted 
 on. The aunts were seated in silent dignity of 
 watchfulness, and Jane Grantham leaned agiunst 
 
FOUND. 
 
 in 
 
 the window-sill holding the Brussels vail and 
 crown of myrtle and orange blossoms; Miss 
 Crispe flitted round and round, aotive and help- 
 ful, settling here a plait and there a fold, while 
 Saoharissa Tulip who never could sit down in 
 private like any other young Christian gentle- 
 woman, was perched on the top of a chest of 
 drawers, arrayed in full equestrian costume, her 
 plumed hat m one hand, and her whip in the 
 other, impatient to be off for a promised gallop 
 on the downs with her uncle Laurence, and pre^ 
 tending that the whole ceremony of "trying 
 on" was unnecessary and a bore. Nobody be- 
 lieved her, of course; for to women worth a 
 chip such ceremonies are perfect enjoyment. 
 
 " It will be your turn some day, missikin, and 
 then you will talk quite differently," said Miss 
 Crispe, wagging her head at the scornful chit. 
 
 " No, it will never be my turn, for I propose 
 to lead a single life," retorted she. I shall keep 
 two horses, a big dog, a man and a maid, and 
 be like that celebrated lady called 'Boy in Blue,' 
 who was extant in Moor Murray's time, and the 
 most famous toast in the dales." 
 
 " You are forming yourself on a distinguished 
 model then, are you, my dear? We fancied 
 you were perfectly original," said Miss Delia, 
 dryly. Sacharisaa Tulip was not very quick, but 
 she detected the slight flavor of sarcasm in the 
 old lady's speech ; for she rapped her lips with 
 the gold foxiead of her riding-whip, and made 
 no reply. 
 
 " The wonder and admiration of the men is 
 your ambition after all," added Miss Flora, who 
 as strongly as her mildness permitted made a 
 point of disooura^ng mannish girls. " It is only 
 that you take a longer way round to win them 
 than most women think it worth while to do. 
 And the ' Boy in Blue ' was married finally, you 
 know, and had children three or four. I have 
 ^ heard that she was a very peaceable sort of old 
 woman and took snuff copiously in the later 
 years of her life. You must ask the doctor — 
 he can tell you all about her ; for he knew her 
 when he was a boy and we lived in the north." 
 
 Sacharissa Tulip evidently felt this turn of the 
 conversation distasteful; she did not like the 
 degradation of her ideal mto a snuffy old gran- 
 dame; she would have preferred to hear that 
 she died in harness over a hurdle at a steeple- 
 chase, perhaps ; at any rate she forsook the 
 feminine society and went off whistling to cover 
 her defeat. Annis was by this time invested in 
 as much of her bridal raiment as she would al- 
 low to be put on, and the result having been 
 pronounced from every point of view perfect, 
 the retrograde process commenced and all 
 tongues were set free. 
 
 "It is a pity and a shame, yes, I declare it is, 
 that every girl has not your chance of looking 
 beautiful once in her life. Sunshine !" cried Miss 
 Crispe with great energy. " I should like to 
 see you married too, my dear," addressing Jane ; 
 " and perhaps we shall. There is r(o telling what 
 may happen one of these fine days." 
 
 " There won't happen a chance for me," re- 
 sponded Jane, airily. " I have quite made up 
 my mind that it is my vocation to be a good 
 teacher -and nothing else or better. I have had 
 a lucky beginning, and as there is a baby only a 
 year old where I am, I may perhaps have the 
 enviable luck to stay until she is seventeen — 
 and that will make me seven and thirty myself" 
 
 " Stuff and nonsense ! " ejaculated Miss 
 Crispe. " I won't listen to you ; nice, soft, fair 
 thing that you are, how dare you talk in that 
 way ; I call it perfectly wicked, setting nature 
 at defiance I You will be some good man's de- 
 light yet, I know." 
 
 Jane smiled unmoved, but Miss Flora pres- 
 ently whispered something about Mr. Wilson's 
 having cast sheep's eyes on her. "He dined 
 here yesterday and I shall ask him again. It 
 would be the very thing for them both — pity 
 she has no money ; I am not sure he could 
 afford to marry without, but we shall see." 
 
 Miss Wilson had married in February, and 
 since she left him her brother had looked rather 
 forlorn, as if his buttons were not seen after 
 with the domestic punctuality essential to the 
 well-being of a man and a curate. The elderly 
 housekeeper she had provided for him was too 
 old to undertake the responsibility of buttons, 
 and in the end, if he valued his comfort he 
 would have to provide her with a younger sub- 
 stitute — he would have to go far to find a 
 better than Jane Grantham. He was thirty- 
 four, diligent in the parish work, pleasant- 
 looking, pleasant-mannered and with a fund of 
 quiet good sense. Jane was one-and-twenty 
 and something more than pretty; she had a 
 bright, kind face, a lovely figure, and a capital 
 temper, and was altogether very nice and 
 womanly. They were just the sort of people 
 who thrown together under favora hle auspices 
 would take to each other with a beautitui spoA 
 taneity| Miss Flora was no advocate for mar- 
 riages of convenience with trust in Providence 
 for the love coming after, but she believed this 
 would be a very desirable match, and for the 
 first time in her Ufe she turned maneuverer in 
 endeavoring to bring it about. 
 
 About a fortnight before the wedding, Kachel 
 Withers one morning received a letter from her 
 friend Carrie Martin, who had just gone down 
 for a month to a favorite retreat of hers on 
 the Scotch coast. Carrie believed she had come 
 upon traces of Mortimer Warleigh, but if so, 
 they ended in a grave — in an unmarked grave 
 in the stranger's nook of a little low-land coast 
 churchyard. When Carrie went down to Fra- 
 sersbum she lodged in a cottage detached from 
 the village inn, but belonging to the landlady 
 and under her management. She was friends 
 with the fishermen, with their wives and bairns 
 every one ; and here she rusticated cheaply and 
 happily, rubbing off the dust of work, and living 
 almost wholly on the sea and rooks. She had 
 known the place a dozen years, and had visited 
 it almost every summer with one companion as 
 well able to enjoy roughing it as herself; grow- 
 ing at each return more attached to the pictur- 
 esque beauty of the place, and the kindly sim- 
 plicity of the people. It was from the landlady 
 at the inn in the course of one of those inci- 
 dent gossips of which Carrie was so fond that 
 she learned the circumstances that she now 
 wrote in full detail to Eachel. 
 
 One Saturday night in the early autumn, 
 when the days first began to draw in, there had 
 come to the inn a young, south-country traveler; 
 the landlady did not like the look of him, and 
 shut the door against him, suspecting that he 
 belonged to a set of tramps who had haunted 
 
xT2 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 about the place all summer, committing de- 
 predations on hen-roosts and the like ; but as 
 she went about the house getting supper ready 
 for her family, her mind troubled her that he 
 looked ill, and might be a traveler as he pro- 
 fessed, and that if he ^bere there was no other 
 inn within three miles or more. So she opened 
 the door to see if he remained still within hail, 
 and found to her grief and surprise that he had 
 lain down in an open cartshed by the collie-dog, 
 too weary, worn, and dejected to seek any other 
 shelter ; the beast though savage enough to 
 most wayfarers had not molested him — a derelic- 
 tion from his duty which appeared forcibly to 
 have struck her. She exalted her voice and 
 bade the stranger come in, but he did not stir, 
 and being alarmed she called to her son to 
 bring a light, when they found that he was in 
 the death agony. He was carried into the 
 house, and laid gently on a heap of sacking 
 within the glow of the fire ; then one lad went 
 for the doctor and another for the minister, and 
 the mother and the lass did their best to stay 
 the fluttering spark of existence with such 
 restoratives as they possessed; but all would 
 not do — " his life's days were sped." He passed 
 away about an hour after, never reawaking to 
 consciousness, with a quiet sigh as of one sink- 
 ing to welcome rest. On the body there was 
 found nothing by which to identify him. His 
 clothing was coarse and ragged, but his hands 
 were soft and white, and had never done a day's 
 work since he was born. The personal de- 
 scription given of him tallied in most respects 
 with Mortimer ; the only discrepancy was in the 
 color of their hair ; Mortimer's was glossy light 
 brown, thick and waved, the wanderer's was 
 said to have been quite dark. 
 
 Rachel Withers mentioned nothing of what 
 she had heard to any one at Brookfall, but sent 
 the letter straight to her brother John, who 
 went to Frasersbum accompanied by Lady 
 Georgiana immediately; but after the amplest 
 investigations they returned to the rectory, 
 having come to the conclusion that the hapless 
 stranger was not Mortimer. The same dreary 
 uncertainty as before therefore still continued 
 to hang over his fate. It was a desperate ordeal 
 for his mother to go through. 
 
 " If it was not my boy it might have been," 
 she said to Katherine. " If he be not at rest, 
 somewhere in the world my boy may be suffer- 
 ing what that poor soul suffered. It is God's 
 judgment upon me — God's judgment upon 
 me!" 
 
 It was strange — no, it was not strange — it 
 was simply in harmony with the original warp 
 of his character, but it seems to excuse a thing 
 of which humanity might be ashamed when we 
 say it is strange or out of nature ; but Oliver 
 Warleigh seemed to feel his position scarcely at 
 all. Of Mortimer he never spoke either ten- 
 derly or regretfully. He was safe — he had no 
 new penalty to pay ; he had escaped from a long 
 direful captivity to false pretenses. The worst 
 was over and he was unharmed ; his dreaded 
 tyrant was gone and he was free. The hideous 
 dishonor did not gall him ; he was sensible 
 only of the relief from a haunting terror such 
 as the sins and iniquities of but very few it is 
 to be hoped create for them. He had not seen 
 his injured brother nor expressed a wish to see 
 
 him ; neither had he said a word tending to 
 prove a wholesome sense of his guUt. Perhaps 
 active repentance was not to be expected from 
 a soul dulled by long continuance in its sin. His 
 health was gradually becoming reestablished ; 
 and as pity for his once obtrusive wretchedness 
 grew out of place, his stolid, selfish ease and 
 apathy were sickening to contemplate. 
 
 Lady Georgiana's journey to Frasersbum spur- 
 red her up to plan a removal from Hurtledale ; 
 she soon after announced a design of going to 
 settle permanently abroad where Roderick would 
 enter some foreign service. Neither John nor 
 Katherine sought to gainsay her resolve — the 
 rectory began to feel that it ha,d borne their 
 burden long enough ; and even under the pro- 
 tection of that roof the guilty pair were not safe 
 from the perscution of their former accomplices. 
 Mrs. Lupton and Dr. Frith would be thorns in 
 their flesh as long as they lived, and not thorns 
 only, but greedy leeches to keep them per- 
 petually poor in purse. Lady Georgiana had 
 twice satisfied their rapacity since Christmas, 
 and their claim on her thus reacknowledged 
 was never again likely to be withdrawn. Sir 
 Laurence, though he in a manner subsidized 
 these wretches by every guinea he allowed his 
 brother, told Mr. Bond he had no new orders to 
 give respecting the sum that had been paid to 
 Oliver on Mortimer's account, and it was there- 
 fore continued. He was in bo humor for paltry 
 revenges ; he took his daughter and was thank- 
 ful ; saying that if his brother did not repent of 
 the great wrong he had done him as it was, he 
 would not repent when suffering under a mean 
 punishment. Time and age had mellowed this 
 man who was vindictive as a pagan in his 
 younger days, and he showed it in letting his 
 forgiveness take the most practical and unusual 
 form. 
 
 Wedding-bells are not always joy-bells, but 
 on the day when Sinclair and Sunshine were 
 married every body allowed there was not the 
 faintest echo of minor in their melody. It was 
 a fine morning— resplendent — and the Brookfall 
 garden with the glow on its crimson, pink and 
 white showers of roses looked in full bridal 
 summer array. 
 
 Leaving John and Katherine, Arthur Hill and 
 Grace to follow an hour later, Rachel Withers 
 and her promising god-daughter went up to the 
 cottage betimes; Sacharissa Tulip, in spite of 
 herself, quite gay and girlish in raiment of snow, 
 while the beloved riding-habit was left reposing 
 it dark, heavy folds in the wardrobe. 
 
 " I know I look like a silly goose," said she, 
 as much ashamed and as little at ease in her 
 unaccustomed finery as if she had been Dicky or 
 merry Andrew himself " My bonnet won't 
 stick on !" And here she gave it a vicious pull 
 which threatened to sever the union between 
 brim and cro*n at once. 
 
 Rachel was truly thankful to get her safely 
 landed in the Brookfall drawing-room ; for she 
 was understood to be responsible for her ap- 
 pearance when her mamma arrived ; they two 
 with aunt Grace's help having dressed her under 
 a flow of lingual derision positively marvelous 
 at her years. She declined doing^-her duty of 
 assistance at the bride's toilet, so Rachel left 
 
FOUND. 
 
 173 
 
 her down-stairs, defending lierself in a spirited 
 way under the sarcasm of her uncle Laurence, 
 who professed to sympathize in her abhorrence 
 of smart clothes ; but having got rid of her god- 
 mamma, she employed the interval before the 
 arrival of the guests in visiting a paddock ad- 
 joining the garden, where was a nice little colt 
 with its mother. Sir Laurence aided, abetted 
 and accompanied her, and the consequence was 
 that when Katherine next saw her hopeful 
 daughter, she had good reason for saying to 
 Kachel in accents of deep reproach : " Look at 
 that child's bonnet, Rachel ; and where has she 
 been with the hem of her dress ? You promised 
 me to keep an eye upon her !" Whatever 
 Rachel had promised beforehand, she was glad 
 to shut both her eyes to her for the remainder 
 of the day ! 
 
 Annis was nearly ready when Rachel went up 
 to her room, and though not conversationally 
 disposed she was nevertheless as blithe and as 
 smiling as a bride should be on the crowning 
 day of her life. The aunts looked a good dead 
 excited as was only natural. 
 
 "You are come then, dear Rachel?" cried 
 Miss Delia, greeting her with a gush of feel- 
 ing. " The day is here at last that takes our 
 Sunshine from us, and we are all wishing it well 
 over." 
 
 " Don't say that, sister, when it is our own 
 Sinclair who wins her. Young folks should 
 marry, and we have every thing to be thankful 
 for — and we are thankful," said Miss Flora, 
 taking her invariable line of thought. 
 
 " I shall be very happy, auntie Dee, and we 
 shall soon see you again," murmured Annis, 
 caressing her benefactress. 
 
 " I am not so sure of that when once you 
 take wing," was the old lady's pathetic rejoinder. 
 "I would not undertake to predict your return 
 under three or four years at the shortest. These 
 children are going into Switzerland first, Rachel ; 
 then into Italy, and they talk about the Isles of 
 Greece, and I^ypt, and Syria, and if they wan- 
 der off there it will have to be a long whistle 
 indeed, my dear, that will bring them back. 
 Happy, of course, you will be happy with Sin- 
 clair and your father; who doubts it? And 
 with pyramids to climb, and risks to run, and a 
 general picnic sort of life on camels and asses 
 as they travel in those countries, you will be in 
 what you used to call ' a state of beatitude,' but 
 it will be very dull often at Brookfall — it wiU 
 be like November all the year round." 
 
 " No, no, Delia dear, there will be frequent 
 letters," interrupted Miss Flora with gentle 
 remonstrance. 
 
 " And mind you write long ones, and full of 
 details — don't think any incident too trifling to 
 amuse us !" added Miss Delia. 
 
 " I will write just as I should talk if I were 
 with you — ^half a volume a day," replied Annis 
 
 gayiy- 
 
 While they were thus exchanging last words 
 as it were, Hawkins was packing into a small 
 traveling trunk some of the bride's most need- 
 ful belongings, and she was superintending the 
 process between whiles and giving directions. 
 
 " It is my fear, auntie Dee, that Sinclair 
 intends to lose our large luggage at the first 
 opportunity, and I know when papa joins us he 
 wiU never let us carry about those great im- 
 
 perials that are standing in the hall," said she, 
 exciting a spur of alarm in the old lady's temper' 
 with a view of suppressing more sentimental 
 emotions ; but Mrs. Crofts, her own maid, in- 
 terposed with a solemn assurance that she un- 
 derstood traveling, and that she would take 
 good care that nothing went astray that was 
 under her charge, which assurance mitigated 
 Miss Delia's anxiety. 
 
 " Lose your luggage, Sunshine, you had not 
 need lose your luggage !" cried the old lady. 
 " Consider all those elegant dresses, and your 
 lovely pearls, and emeralds, and diamonds ! Not 
 but that a simple flower in your hair is quite as 
 pretty, but jewels are jewels ! Lose them, in- 
 deed ! But I can trust Mrs. Crofts — she is a 
 responsible person and will look after you." 
 
 This setting off into the world of " the child- 
 ren " seemed as critical an event to Miss Delia 
 as her baby's first step alone is to a mother. 
 She had a thousand doubts of how her prot6g6e 
 would get on without her watchful eye. 
 
 Annis was standing fully attired, a vision of 
 beauty and delight, when there come a knock at 
 the door, and Grace and Katherine entered ; 
 then there was a little fuss in the old nursery 
 adjoining, and that was Sir Laurence and Sin- 
 clair, who. Miss Delia said; according to etiquette, 
 had no right to be there ; but as he was there, 
 he might have just one glimpse of his Sunshine. 
 Sinclair, in his way, looked as well as she did, 
 his aunts thought. 
 
 After the ordinary amount of bustle the party 
 started to church. All the village had turned 
 out to see. The school-girls, according to im- 
 memorial custom, scattered flowers in the bride's 
 path, and the boys took up posts of vantage 
 ready to cheer the " weddingers " when they 
 issued forth again. The doctor was to marry 
 the young couple, not assisted by any body, and 
 when they entered the church, he was in his 
 place, robed and ready. The sun was pouring 
 through the chancel window like a glory, and as 
 it fell on the two heads bowed reverently before 
 the altar, the witnesses accepted it, one and all, 
 for an omen of good, and a token of blessing. 
 
 It was soon over, and every body on the way 
 back to Brookfall again. Sacharissa Tulip's free 
 and easy comments on the chief actors in the 
 ceremony made on the homeward drive, were 
 eminently characteristic. " Sinclair Ferrand 
 behaved well, I will say that for him," she 
 began. " It is so silly of a man to be nervous 
 when he is getting married — that is the bride's 
 prerogative ; but he looked as cool, determined 
 and self-possessed as if he were going to take a 
 rasper out hunting. When Mr. Simmonds was 
 married to Blanche Fielding, he stood all the 
 while on one leg like a meditative fowl — so 
 absurd ! and as every body said it was too late 
 to be meditating then. Cousin Annis was very 
 nice too, but I did not expect to see tears in her 
 eyes, — but they looked pretty for her, so there- 
 fore it did not matter. As they are so des- 
 perately fond, I suppose they liked to get mar- 
 ried, but for the other people it is not half such 
 good fun as a picnic or a riding party 1" 
 
 No — the day altogether disappointed the 
 young Amazon. There was the solemnity of 
 the breakfast during which, not being hungry, 
 she had nothing to do but to keep critical watch 
 over Sinclair, who was not betrayed into aiy 
 
) 
 
 174 
 
 ANNIS WARLEIGH'S FORTUNES. 
 
 awkwardness, and did not even trip or stumble 
 in his little speech of thanks for congratulation. 
 It was all monotonously easy. But there was 
 the setting off, and the showers of old satin 
 shoes to throw after the departing pair for luck ; 
 this was her little opportunity ; one of them 
 sent the postillion's hat flying ; she clapped her 
 hands at her successful aim, and that was her 
 solitary triumph — the one bright spot in her 
 day — knocking off the postillion's hat. 
 
 The dinner in the evening was a very quiet 
 celebration, all the wedding guesta having left 
 
 after the breakfast except the members of the 
 two families and Mr. Wilson, who staid for his 
 own and Jane Grantham's sake. The dear old 
 aunts went through the excitement splendidly, 
 and when the friends who had remained were 
 finally wishing them good-night and good com- 
 fort, and committing them to the care of Sir 
 Laurence, Miss Delia said with profound fervor 
 and simple truth — "It has been the happiest 
 day of my life, my dears !" and Miss Flora for 
 once entirely agreed with her. It was a day 
 marked with chalk to all concerned. 
 
W. M. THACKERAY'S WORKS. 
 
 Thackeray's novels are an indispensable portion of every well-selected library. His vivid pic- 
 tures of real life, his keen perception of the shams and pretense that lurk under an imposing ex- 
 terior, his biting sarcasm on fashionable follies, his anatomical dissection of character, with the 
 torse and pointed vigor of his style, place him in the front rank of English fictiorfwriters, and 
 assure a lasting fame to his productions. The personages who have been the subjects of his 
 daustic pen appear like the men and women whom we meet in the daily walks of society, and, 
 by their life-like naturalness, make an indelible impression on the imagination and memory. No 
 popular novelist has succeeded so well in representing the darker shades of humari nature with- 
 out indulging in exaggeration or description of low depravity. His works are no less valuable 
 as an introduction to a knowledge of the world than as an inexhaustible fund of entertainment 
 
 Why have I alluded to this man ? I have alluded to him, reader, because I think I see in him 
 an intellect profounder and more unique than his contemporaries have yet recognized; because 
 . I regard him as the first social regenerator of the day — as the very master df that working corps 
 •who would restore to rectitude the warped system of things ; because I think no commentator on 
 his writings has yet found the comparison that suits him, the terms which rightly characterize 
 his talent. They say he is like Fielding ; they talk of his wit, humor, comic powers. He resem- 
 bles Fielding as an eagle does a vulture : Fielding could stoop on carrion, but Thackeray never 
 does. His wit is bright, his humor attractive; but both bear the same relation to his serious 
 genius that the mere lambent sheet-lightning, playing under the edge of the summer cloud, does 
 to the electric death-spark hid in its womb. — " Cukrer Bell," Author of Jam Eyre, Shirley, 
 Villette, and The Professor. 
 
 VAKITT FAIR. A Novel withoHt a Hero. With Il- 
 lustrations. 8vo, Cloth, $3 00 ; Half Calf, $3 25. 
 
 THE KEWCOMES. Memoirs of a Most Respectable 
 Family. A NoveL Edited by Aethdb Pendenhis, Esq. 
 Illustrated. 8to, Cloth, $2 00 ; Half Calf, $3 25. 
 
 FEKDENMIS. The History of Pendennis. Ilia For- 
 tunes and his Misfortunes, his Friends and his Great- 
 est Enemy. A Novel. With Illustrations. 2 vols,' 
 8vo, Cloth, $4 00 ; HaU Calf, $6 60. 
 
 THE VIHGIWIAWS. A Novel. With Illustrations by 
 the Author. 8to, Clothj $2 00 ; Half Calf, $3 25. 
 
 THE ADVEKTTJEES OF PHILIP on hia Way 
 through the World ; showing who robbed Him, who 
 helped Him, and who passed Him by. A Novel; With 
 Illuatrations. Svo, Cloth, $2 00 ; Half Calf, $3 25. 
 
 HEWKY ESMOND. The History of Henry Esmond, 
 Esq., Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen 
 Anne. A NoveL Written by Himself. Svo, Paper, 
 50 cents. 
 
 LOVEL THE WIDOWER. A Novel With Illustra- 
 tioQS. Svo, Paper, 25 cents. 
 
 THE GREAT HOGGAETY DIAMOND. A Novel. 
 Svo, Paper, 25 cents. 
 
 EOUNDABODT PAPERS. With Illustrations. 12mo, 
 Cloth, $1 25; Half Morocco, $2 50. 
 
 These papers are most of them pregnant with wit, hu- 
 mor, sense, and observation. They are wise, thoughtful, 
 truthful, original, delightful. They are brilliant, satiri- 
 cal, ironical, genial, pathetic, solacious, fine, ripe, mellow, 
 delectable. And there is a flavor, a relish, a tang in their 
 style that is delicious, that is superior to the exquisite fla- 
 vor of Congreve'3 style. Those who love pure, simple, 
 strong, racy, idiomatic English, should read these '' Round- 
 about Papers." — Tom Folio, In the Bottm, Transcript, 
 
 THE ENGLISH HUMORISTS OF THE EIGHT- 
 EENTH CENTURY. Together with the Author's 
 Lecture on *' Charity and Humor." 12mo, Cloth, 
 $1 25 ; Half Morocco, $2 50. 
 
 In none of the productions of Thackeray' s pen is his ad- 
 mirable genius exhibited to greater advantage than in 
 these exquisite sketches of the Eogliah humorists. His 
 fine and subtle criticisms of their literary characteristics 
 are by no means the most valuable feature of the work. 
 He aims rather at giving a faithful portraiture of their 
 personal traits ; at presenting them in the lamiliarity of 
 their homes and habitual haunts ; at showing us the men 
 whom we have chiefly known as writers, and enabling the 
 readers to trace their characters in their productions. 
 Such a gallery of intellectual celebrities, with pictures so 
 accurately ^drawn, so brilliantly colored, and so exqui- 
 sitely shaded, is not to be found in any language. 
 
 THE FOUR GEORGES. Sketches of Manners, Morals, 
 Court and Town Life. With Illustrations. New Edi- 
 tion. 12mo, Cloth, $1 00 ; Half Morocco, $2 50. 
 
 We have perused them several times, and on each oc- 
 casion with an increased admiration for then- remarkable 
 condensation and unrivaled brilliancy. The research of 
 the author has been conscientious and complete. Mr. 
 Thackeray has selected only the choicest grapes for his 
 vintage, and has certainly presented us with a wine of 
 rich and peculiar flavor. The literary excellence is con- 
 summate, aided by an artistic use of the costume of the 
 period and the limner*s skill, and not disdaining the ju- 
 dicious use of rhetoric. It is not difficult to perceive that 
 Mr. Thackeray is very capable of taking broad and states- 
 manlike views of the lives he is discussing. It is, per- 
 haps, rather unfortunate for his great reputation that he 
 has so exclusively embraced the province of satire. What- 
 ever subject he discusses, he is expected to be sarcastic 
 and funny. As his genius has matured and his fame in. 
 creased, this great writer has taken more earnest views 
 of human life. — London Literary Oasette. 
 
 THE ROSE AND THE RING; or, the History of 
 Prince Giglio nnd Prince Bulbo. A Fireside Panto- 
 mime for Great and Small Children. By Mr. A. M. 
 TiTMABsn. Numerous Illustrations. Small 4to, Cloth, 
 75 cents. 
 
 Fubliahed by HARPER & BROTHERS, Franklin Square, New York 
 
 1^" Sent by mail, postage-free, on receipt of pric*. 
 
STANDARD WORKS 
 
 DISCOYEEY Am ADVENTURE IN AFRICA. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 HAEPER & BROTHEES, Franklin Square, JST. Y. 
 
 S^~ Sent hy MaiU postage pj'e-paidt ov- receipt of price. 
 
 Tlie amount of travel literature wJiich Haspkb AJBeotheks have published relating to Africa makes a cwious 
 lisU and illustrates the bent of geographical andpolitical examination for some timepast. Theoctavos of Burton, 
 Earthy Livingstone^ Du Chaillu, Davis^ and a number of other celebrated travellers^ form a small library, all Vie 
 resuU of the last few years^ devotion to African exploration — N. Y, Jodenal of Commebce. 
 
 SPEKE'S AFRICA. Journal of the Discovery of the 
 Source of the Nile. By John Hanming Speke, Captain 
 H. Bt Indian Army, Fellow and Gold Medalist of the 
 Royal Geographical Society, Hon. Corr. Member and 
 Gold Medalist of the French Geographical Society, &c. 
 With Map and Portraits, and numerous Illustrations, 
 chiefly from Drawings by Captain Gbant. 8vo, Cloth, 
 uniform withLiviNGSTONE, Babth, Bcbton, &c. {Xear- 
 ly Ready.') 
 
 READE'S SAVAGE AFRICA. Western Africa: being 
 the Narrative of a Tour in Equatorial, Southwestern, 
 and Northwestern Africa ; with Notes on the Hiibits of 
 the Gorilla; on the Exiatence of Unicorns and Tailed 
 Men ; on the Slave Trade ; on the Origin, Character, 
 and Capabilities of the Negro, and of the futui'e Civili- 
 zation of Western Afiica. By W. Winwood Reade, 
 Fellow of the Geog. and Anthropological Soc. of Lond., 
 and Corr. Member of the Geog. Soc. of Paris. With 
 Illustrations and a Map. 12mo. (Jn Press.) 
 
 DU CHAILLU' S EQUATORIAL AFRICA. Eiplorations 
 and Adventures in Equatorial Africa; with Accounts 
 of the Mannera and Customs of the People, and of the 
 Chase of the Gorilla, the Crocodile, Leopard, Elephant, 
 Hippopotamus, and other Animals. By Paitl B. dv 
 Chailltt, Corr. Member of the Amer. Etlinological Soc. ; 
 of the Geog. and Statwtical Soc. of N. Y. , aud of the 
 Bost. Soc. of Nat. Hist. Maps and numerous Illustra- 
 tions. 8vo, Cloth, $3 75. 
 
 BALDWIN'S AFRICAN HUNTING. African Hunting 
 from Natal to the Zambesi, including Lake Ngami, the 
 Kalahari Desert, &c., from 1852 to 1866. By William 
 Charles Baldwin, F.RG.S. With Map, Fifty Illus- 
 trations by Wolf and Zwecker, and a Portrait of the 
 Great Sportsman. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50. 
 
 ANDERSSON'S OKAVANGO RIVER. The Okavango 
 
 River : A Narrative of Travel, Exploration, and Adven- 
 ture. By Charles John Ahderbson, Author of " Lake 
 Ngami." With Steel Portrait of the Author, numerous 
 Wood-cuta, and a Map showing the Regions explored 
 by Andersson, Cumming,. Livingstone, Burton, and Du 
 Chaillu. Bvo, Cloth, $2 50. 
 
 ANDERSSON'S LAKE NGAML Lake Ngami; or, Ex- 
 plorations and Discoveries during Four Years' Wander- 
 ings in the Wilds of Southwestern Africa, By Charles 
 John Andersson. With numerous Illustrations, rep- 
 resenting Sporting Adventures, Subjects of Natural His- 
 tory, Devices for Destroying Wild Animals, &c. New 
 Edition. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50. 
 
 LIVINGSTONE'S SOUTH AFRICA Missionary Trav- 
 els and Researches in South Africa ; including a Sketch 
 of Sixteen Years' Residence in the Interior of Africa, 
 and a Journey from the Cape of Good Hope to Loando 
 on the West Coast; thence across the Continent, down 
 the River Zambesi, to the Eastern Ocean. By David 
 Livingstone, LL.D., D.C.L. With Portrait, Maps, and 
 numerous Illustrations. 8vo, Cloth, $3 00. 
 
 DAVIS'S CARTHAGE. Carthage and her Remains t 
 Being an Account of the Excavations and Researcltea 
 on the Site of the Phrenician Metropolis in Africa »iid 
 other adjacent Places, under the Auspices of Her Biaj- 
 esty's Government. By Dr. N. Davis, F.RG.S. 1 lo- 
 fusely illustrated with Maps, Wood-cuts, Chromo-LUh- 
 ographs, &c., &c. 8vo, Cloth, $3 00- 
 
 BURTON'S CENTIUL AFRICA. The Lake Regions tf 
 Central Africa. A Picture of Exploration. By Eini- 
 AKD F. Bdeton, Capt. H.M.I. Anny; Fellow and Gold 
 Medalist of the Royal Geographical Society. With Maps 
 and Engravings on Wood. Svo, Cloth, $3 75. 
 
 EARTH'S NORTH AND CENTRAL AFRICA. Travels 
 and Discoveries in North and Central Africa. Being a 
 Journal of an Expedition undertaken under the Au- 
 spices of H.B.M.'s Government, in the Years 1849-1855. 
 By Henry Bakth, Ph.D., D.C.L. Profusely and ele- 
 gantly Illustrated. Complete in 3 vols. Svo, Cloth, $9 00. 
 
 CUMMING'S SOUTH AFRICA Five Years of a Hunt- 
 er's Life in the Interior of South Africa. With Notices 
 of the Native Tribes, and Anecdotes of the Chase of the 
 Lion, Elepliant, Hippopotamus, Giraffe, Rhinoceros, &c. 
 By Gordon Cumming. With Illustrations. 3 vols. 
 12mo, Cloth, $2 50. 
 WILSON'S WE3Tli;RN AFRICA. Western Africa: Its 
 History, Condition, and Prospects. By Rev. J. Lbigb* 
 TON Wilson, Eighteen Years a Missionary in Africa. 
 With numerous Engravings. 12mo, Cloth, $1 25. ,. 
 Mr. Wilson, an American missionary, has written the 
 best bookvl have seen on the West Coast. — Dr. Living- 
 stone, Rivershire^ W. Africa, Feb. 20, 1863. 
 
 DISCOVERY AND ADVENTURES IN AFRICA. Con- 
 densed Abstracts of the Narratives of African Travel- 
 lers. By Professor Jameson, James Wilson, and Hugh 
 Mureay. 18mo, Cloth, 50 cents. 
 
 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF BRUCE, THE 
 AFRICAN TRAVFXLER. By Major Sir Francis B. 
 Head. 18mo, Cloth, 50 cents. 
 
 LANDER'S NIGER EXPiDITION. Jounial of anExpe- 
 dition to explore the Course and Termination of the Ni- 
 ger. With a Narrative of a Voyage down that River 
 to its Termination. By R. and J. Lahdkil Engrav- 
 ings. 2 vols. ISmo, Cloth, $1 00. 
 
 URQUHARTS PILLARS OF HERCULES. The Pillars 
 of Hercules ; or, A Narrative of Travels in Spain and 
 Morocco hi 1848. By David Usquhabt, M.P. 2 vols. 
 12mo, Cloth, $2 50. 
 
 OWEN'S VO^^AGES. Voyages to explore the Shores of 
 AfricS, Arabia, and Madagascar: performed under the 
 Direction of Captain W. F. W. Owen, R.N. 3 vols. 
 12mo, Cloth, $1 60. 
 
 MUN(JO PARK'S CENTRAL AFRICA. Travels of Mub- 
 go ipark, with the Account of his Death, from the Jour- 
 nal of Isaaco, and later Discoveries relative to his la- 
 mented Fate, and the Termination of the Niger. ISmo, 
 Cloth, 50 cents. 
 
 MADAGASCAR. 
 
 THE LAST TRAVELS OP IDA PFEIFFER: inclusive 
 of a Visit to Madagscar. Witii an Autobiograpiiical 
 Memoir of tlie Author. Translated by H. W. Ddloken. 
 Steel Portrait. 12mo, Cloth, $1 28. (Uniform with 
 Ida Pfeiffer'B " Second Journey round the World.") 
 
 THREE VISITS TO MADAGASCAR, during the Yeaia 
 1853-1834-1856. Including a Journey to the Capital, 
 with Notices of the Natural History of the Country and 
 of the Present Civilization of the People. By the Rev. 
 William Ellis, F.H.S. With a Map and Wood-cuta 
 {rem Fhotograplis, i&c. Svo, Cloth, $3 00, 
 
HAEPER'S' WEEKLY FOR 1861 
 
 Harper*8 "Weeklt is devoted to Art, Literature, General Information, and Politics. It will 
 contain a carefully condensed and impartial record of the events of the day, pictorially illustra- 
 ted wherever the pencil of the Artist can aid the pen of the Writer. In Politics it will advocate 
 the National Cause, wholly irrespective of mere party grounds^ Its Essays, Poems, and Tales 
 >vill be furnished by the ablest writers of both Continents. A new Novel, by Mr, George Au- 
 gustus Sala, entitled ''QUITE ALONE," will, by special arrangement with the Author, ap- 
 pear in the "Weekly simultaneously with its publication in Mr. Dickens's **AU the Year Round," 
 The Publishers will see to it that the current Volume shall justify the favorable opinioos express- 
 ed by the loyal Press upon the Volume which has just closed. 
 
 Eartxacts firom Notices by the Press. 
 
 **Uabpeb*s Wbekt^t is the best publication of its claes 
 ia Americai aa4 so f&r ahead of all oilier weekly journals 
 as not to permit of any compariaoa between it and any of 
 their number. Ita columns contain the finest colleotions 
 of reading matter that are printed. Thus, if you look into 
 the Volume for 1863, you will find tliat its storiea, and 
 miscellaneous articles, and poetry are from the minds of 
 some of the leading writers of the time. Its matter is of 
 a very various character from elaborate tales and well- 
 considered editorial articles to the airiest and briefest 
 jests, good-humored hits at the expense of human follies, 
 which proceed from the livelieet of mlnde. It is a vigor- 
 ous supporter of the war— discussing all questionB that 
 concern the contest in which we are engaged with an am- 
 plitude of perception and a breadth of patriotism that 
 place it very high indeed on the roll of loyal and liberal 
 puhlications. Its illustrations are numerous and beauti- 
 fnl, being fiiroished by the chief artists of the country. 
 Mo:^t of the illustrations are devoted to the war, including 
 battle-pieces, scenes made renowned by great events there 
 occurring, and portraits of eminent military and civil 
 leaders. Even a person who could not read a line of its 
 letter-press could intelligently follow the history of the 
 war through 1863 by going over the pictured pages of this 
 volume." — Evening Traveller (Boston.) 
 
 " Uabf^'b Weekly, besides being a lltetfary paper of the 
 firat class— the only one among American or Kuropean 
 Pictorials with a definite purpose consistently and con- 
 etantly carried out — Is at once a leading political and his- 
 torical annalidt of the nation. From the commencement 
 it has been faithful to the great cause of patnotis^, hu- 
 manity, and loyalty. It has been uncomprising, as -hmU 
 as able, in supporting the great policy of President mn.- 
 coln, not alone because that poliey is expedient under the 
 circumstances, but because it is just. It has devoted 
 heart and hand to this great purpose. Its authors and 
 its artists are as one with the proprietors on tliis sublime 
 issue,'*— TAe Press (Philadelphia). 
 
 "Harpee'8 Wkekly. — The bound volume of last year 
 is laid on our table. A large and elegant repository of 
 history, literature, and general intelligence. No paper in 
 the world gives a greater variety of better executed pic- 
 torial Illustrations of the passing events of the day; and 
 all the prominent events of the war are presented in splen- 
 did engravings, with full letter-press deacriptions." — The 
 Observer (New York). 
 
 "Habpeb'8 WEBKLTi.— In tumlng over its pages, we 
 were struck anew with the fidelity with which it deline- 
 ate passing events: a true picture of the times. The 
 scenes of the war, portrayed by the graphic pencils of art- 
 ists on the battle-field and in the camp, are le-produced 
 in excellent wood-cuts with marvelous promptness and 
 accuracy. The letter-press furnishes an appropriate ac- 
 companiment to the illustrations ; presenting a pleasing 
 variety, sprightly and entertaining. We can not wonder 
 at the popularity of the Weekly when we observe the 
 spirit and enterprise with which it is ooadatited.*'- Jour- 
 nal (Boston). 
 
 "Haepbr*s Wmbkly fob 1863.— .From a careful exam- 
 ination of this work, as it came out in its weekly form, we 
 can honestly advise our readers to purchase the stately 
 ftad pictured to1uui& We dare not say how many duo- 
 
 decimo volumes of matter, and of good and interesting 
 natter, it contains. As a record of the events and opin- 
 ions of the past year, and as literally a picture of the 
 time, it has a permanent value, while its wealth of excel- 
 lent stories and essays makes it an endless soiurce of enter- 
 tainment. The original editorial articles are of a very 
 high order of merit, and relate to subjects lyhich attract 
 the attention of all intelligent and patriotic minds. 
 Soundness of thought, liberality of sentiment, and thor- 
 ough<.goinp loyalty find expression in the most exquisite 
 English. Altogether, we should say that Harper^s Week- 
 ly \a Vk necessity in every household.*' — The Trariaeript 
 (Boston). 
 
 ^^Habpeb's Weekly and MAGAzms, with their im- 
 mense circulation, are gi'andly loyal and influential. The 
 Weekly especially has been true to the cause ; and while 
 it gives in admirable correspondence and accurate pic- 
 tures a complete illustrated history of the war, with all 
 its battles, incidents, and portraits of generals, it has 
 splendidly enfbrced by argument and example its princi- 
 ples. Closer reasoning is not to be found than that to 
 which its editors might fairly challenge answer.*' — City 
 Items (Philadelphia). 
 
 " Habpeb's Weekly, of which the Seventh Volume is 
 now issued in neat, substantial binding, shows the indus- 
 try and zeal with which the cause of the Union has been 
 maintained in its columns during the year 1863. It has 
 continued to increase the fervor of patriotic seniiment as 
 well by Its appropriate pictorial illustrations as by its able 
 editorial leaders commenting on the events of the day. 
 In its present shape^ the journal furnishes copious mate- 
 rials for the history of the war, and can not fail to find a 
 place in public and private libraries as an impoiliant vol- 
 lune for perinanent reference." — Tribune (New Yoi-k). 
 
 **Haepeb's Weekly for 1S63— a journal of the year, 
 kept in the moat iUteresting way ; and as we turn over 
 the pages we revive many now almost foi^otten sensa- 
 tions, end see, bit by bit, how histoiy has grown. The 
 volume olosed and botmd up becomes history; but it 
 would not be just to this publication to omit a remark on 
 the influence whieh it has exerted during the year, and 
 which it continues to exert. An illustrated journal like 
 Harper^s Weekly^ which circulates, as we have heard, 
 over one hundred and twenty thousand copies per week, 
 chiefly among families, and which has prol»bIy a million 
 of readers, has necessarily a great influence iu the coun- 
 try. The Weekly has consistently and very ably support- 
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 develop which the Union was founded. Unlike most il- 
 lustrated journals. Harper's Weekly has displayed politi- 
 cal and literary ability of a high order as well as artistic 
 merit. Its political discussions are sound, clear, and con- 
 vincing, and have done their share to educate the Ameri- 
 can people to a right understanding of their dangei-s and 
 duties. In its speciality—ill ustratfons of passing events 
 —it is unsurpassed ; and many of the pictures of the year 
 do honor to the genius of the artists and engraven of this 
 country. Thus complete in all the departments of an 
 American Family Journal, Harper's Weekly has earned 
 for Itself a right to the title which it assumed seven years 
 ago, • A JoCSHAL OF CiYu^CSATiOM.* '* — Ev&iiing Po»t 
 (New York). 
 
 TERnas. 
 
 One Copy for Pour Months $1 00 
 
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 a« $2 75 each ; or, Eleven Copies for $W 50. 
 
■ ♦ 
 FeankUn. Square, New Yoek, March 1, 1864. 
 
 A New Novel by Dickens. 
 
 The Puhlishers have the pleasure to announce that, hy sjjecial ar- 
 oxmgement tvith the Author, A NEW NOVEL, hy MR. CHARLES 
 DICKENS, loill appear in HARPER'S MAGAZINE simultaneously, 
 with its 2yublication in England. This Novel will be commenced iwthe 
 Magazine Jbr April or May. 
 
 Harpek's Magazine has contained several of the best Serial Novels of Bulwer, 
 Dickens, Thactei'ay, Lever, Trollope, Reade, Miss Evans, and" Miss Mulock, besides 
 Essays,- Tales, and Poems from the foremost American and British writers. 
 
 Historical jind Biographical Papers, especially those relating to American subjects, 
 have formed a distinctive feature of the Magazine. These papers alone, if published 
 separately, would cost more than the price of the Magazine. 
 
 The results of the Explorations and Adventures of the most distinguished travelers 
 have been presented in careful abstracts. 
 
 The Editorial Departments comprise a careful summary of the history of the times, 
 comments upon the current topics of thought and remark, and an immense collection 
 of anecdotes and facetiiB, furnished by hundreds of voluntary correspondents. 
 
 Wherever Pictorial Illustrations could add to the value or interest of an article they 
 have been freely used. The Magazine has contained nearly nine thousand engravings, 
 executed in the best style of the art. 
 
 The result of the enterprise has exceeded the highest anticipations of the Publishers. 
 The Magazine gained at once the foremost place among American periodicals ; and its 
 circulation has for years exceeded, as it now exceeds, that of all other periodicals of its 
 class issued in the United States. No effort *r cost will be spared by the Publishers 
 to insure that the Magazine shall maintain the position which it has won. 
 
 The Postag'e Law. 
 
 Habfeb*s Magazine is charged 24 Cents a year, instead of 36 cents, as heretofore : Postage to be paid in adTanee, yearly, 
 semi-yearly, or quarterly. — {Section-BG.) 
 
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 serai-yearly, or quarterly (Section 35.) 
 
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 The Twenty-seven Volumes of the Magazine contain matter equivalent to more than two hundred duO; 
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 sets, neatly bound in Cloth, for One Dollar and Eighty-Eight Cents per Volume — $50 76 for the whole,, 
 nett Cash, the freight to be paid by the purchaser. The same amount of matter, with an equal number 
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 volume will be sent by mail, post-paid, to any place in the United States within 1500 miles from New 
 York, for Two Dollars and Fifty Cents; or any single Number for Twenty-five Cents. 
 
 TERMS.— One Copy for One Year, $3 00; Two Copies for One Ycir, $5 50; "Haupie's Maqazine" and "Habpse's 
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PR 5126.P8A6 """'"''''"' '■'''"'^ 
 , Ajnis Warlelgh's fortunes. 
 
 3 1924 013 532 241