« f .. • y ■■•:»*-■; :<■?-.•■ »«• DNfV. OF CALFF. LIBRARY. LOS ANGELES RHODA FLEMING Mr. Georgt Meredith is the greatest English tiozWist living; lie is probably the greatest novelist of our time. He is a man 0/ genius, a literary artist, and truly a great writer. — The Beacon. GEORGE MEREDITH'S NOVELS. TITLES. THE ORDEAL OF R'OHARD RhODA FLEMING. FEVEREL. BEAUCHAMP S CAREER. EVAN HARRINGTON. THE EGOIST. HARRY RICHMOND. DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS. SANDRA BELLONI. THE SHAVING OF SHAGPAT. VITTORIA. AND FARINA. ONE OF OUR CONQUERORS. THE TRAGIC COMEDIANS. SOME PRESS NOTICES. Mr. Meredith's novels are an intellectual tonic. 'I'liey are the Rreat, and in- deed, we may say, they are the only novels of any livinp author which deserve to be called great. Thcv will take the same hii;h and peiinanent rank that is as- sisned to the novels of George Eliot and Georj;e Sand. They are deeper m intellectual power than Dickens, while they have less of his dramatiiations. They are an intellectual mine, and will repay careful study. — Boston Traveller. The London " Athenxum " says of "Diana of the Crossways": "It is a study of character, and it is also a study of emotion ; it is a picture of fact and ol the world, and it js touched with generous romance ; it is rich in kindly comedy, and it abounds in natural passion ; it sets forth a selection of many hum.in ele- ments, and it is joyful and sorrowful, wholesome with laughter and fruitful of tears IS life itself." Mr. Meredith's novels certainly have the qualities which we marked as essen- tial to permanent literature. Thev can set before you pictures of happv love, or of youth and nature that can never be forgotten ; scenes that flash before your eyes when your thoughts are elsewhere. . . . Whoever reads Mr. Meredith does not waste his time. He is in good company, among gentlemen and ladies ; above all, in the company of a Genius. — Daily News. Genius of a truly original and spontaneous kind shines in every one of these books; of fancy there is only too much, perhaps; with healthy benevolent sym- pathy they abound; and if there exists anv greater master of his native tongue than Mr. Meredith, we have yet to hear of the gentleman's name. — .S"/. James s Gazette. It was not until 1859, when he had reached the age of thirty-two, that he pro- duced " The Ordeal of Richard Feverel," his first mature novel, charged to the brim with earnestness, wit, strength of conception. Meredith's stories generally end happilv ; but this one is profoundly tragic. I have read many of his chapters without being moved, even when the situation in itself must theoretic.illy be ac- knowledged an affectin':: one. Hut it seems to me that the heart which is not touched, and the eves that do not become moist, in the re.iding of the last portions of " Richard Feverel " must be indurated with a glaze of indi.fereiice which is not to be envied. — G. P. Lathrop, in Atlantic Monthly. 12 Volumes, English Edition, uncut, izmo. Price, $2.00. 12 Volumes, English Edition, half calf. Extra, $3000 the set. 12 Volumes, Popular American Edition, i6mo, cloth. Price, $1.50. ROBERTS BROTHERS, Publishers, BOSTON, MASS. RHODA FLEMING A S TOR Y BY GEORGE MEREDITH AUTHOR'S EDITION BOSTON ROBERTS BROTHERS 1891 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGB I. THE KENTISH FAMILY ...... 1 II. QUEEN ANNe's FARM . ' . . . , .8 III. SUGGESTS THE MIGHT OF THE MONEY DEMON . . 18 IV. THE TEXT FROM SCRIPTURE ..... 25 T. THE SISTEKS MEET . . . ^ . . 32 VI. EDWARD AND ALGERNON . . , . .35 VII. GREAT NEWS FROM DAHLIA 46 VIII. INTRODUCES MRS. LOVELL 55 IX. ROBERT INTERVENES . . . . . . 62 X. DAHLIA IS NOT VISIBLE 67 XI. AN INDICATIVE DUET IN A MINOR KEY , . .76 XII. AT THE THEATRE 85 XIII. THE FARMER SPEAKS 93 XIV. BETWEEN EHODA AND ROBERT .... 100 XV. A VISIT TO WREXBT HALL 107 XVI. AT FAIRLY PARK Il4 XVII. A YEOMAN OF THE OLD BREED .... 121 VI CONTENTS. criAP. PAcn X7III. AN ASSEJinLT AT THE PILOT INN .... I'M XIX. nOBKRT SMITTKN LOW ...... 147 XX. MRS. LOVELL SHOWS A TAME RHUTE . . . 159 XXI. GIVES A GLIMPSE OF WHAT POOR VILLAMES THE STORY CONTAINS 164 XXII. EDWARD TAKES HIS COURSE 176 XXIII. MAJOR PERCY WARING 187 XXIV. WAKREACn VILLAGE CIIURCn lOS XXV. OP THE FEARFUL TEMPTATION WHICH CAME UPON ANTHONY HACKBUT, AND OF HIS MEETING WITH DAHLIA 205 XXVI. IN THE PARK 220 XXVII. CONTAINS A STUDY OF A FOOL IN TROURLB . . 226 xxviii. Edward's letter 232 XXIX. FURTHERMORE OF THE FOOL 237 XXX. THE EXPIATION 24S XXXI. THE MELTING OF THE THOUSAND .... 201 XXXII. LA QUESTION d'aRGENT 277 XXXIII. bDWARO's RETURN 287 XXXIV. FATHER AND SON 297 XXXV. THE NIGHT BEFORE 303 XXXVI. EDWARD MEETS HIS MATCH ..... 307 XXXVII. EDWARD TRIES HIS ELOQUENCE. . . . ■ 31-i XXXVIII. TOO LATE , . . . . . - .318 XXXIX. DAHLIA GOES HOME 326 XL. A FREAK OF THE MON lOY-DEMUN, illAT MAY HAVE BEEN ANTICIPATED 334 CONTENTS- Vll CHAP. XLi. dahlia's frenzy . . XLII. ANTHONY IN A COLLAPSE XLIII. RHODA PLEDGES HER HAND . XLIV. THE ENEMY APPEARS . . XLV. THE FARMER IS AWAKENED . XLVI. WHEN THE NIGHT IS DARKEST XLVII. DAWN IS NEAR , . , XLVIII. CONCLUSION . . . PAQB 344 350 361 370 375 380 390 395 RHODA FLEMING. CHAPTER I. THE KENTISH FAMILY, Remains of onr good yeomanry blood will be found in Kent, developing stiff, solid, unobtrusive men, and very personable ■women. The distinction survives there between Kentish ■women and women of Kent, as a true South-eastern dame will let yoa know, if it is her fortune, or her fancy, to belong to that favoured portion of the county where the great battle was fought, in which the gentler sex pei'formed manful work, bat on what luckless heads we hear not ; and when garrulous tradition is discreet, the severe historic Muse declines to hazard a guess. Saxon, one would presume, since it is thought something to hare broken them. My plain story is of two Kentish damsels, and runs from a home of flowers into regions where flowers are few and sickly, on to where the flowers which breathe sweet breath have been proved in mortal fire. Mrs. Fleming, of Queen Anne's Farm, w'as the wife of a yeoman-farmer of the couuty. Both were of sound Kentish extraction, albeit varieties of the breed. The farm had its name from a tradition, common to many other farmhouses "within a circuit of the metropolis, that the ante-Hanoverian B 2 RHODA FLEMING. lady had used the place in her day as a nursery-hospital for the royal little ones. It was a square three-storied buildinj^ of red-biick, much beaten and stained by the weather, with an ivied side, up which the ivy grew stoutly, topping the roof in triumpliant lumps. The house could hardly be termed picturesque. Its aspect had struck many eyes as being very much that of a red-coat sentinel grenadier, battered with service, and standing firmly enoui^li, though not at case. Surrounding it was a high wall, built partly of Hint and partly of brick, and ringed all over with grey lichen and brown spots of bearded moss, that bore witness to the touch of many winds and rains. Tufts of pale grass, and gilliflowers, ami travelling stone-crop, hung from the wall, and driblets of ivy ran broadening to the oiitcr ground. The royal Arms were said to have .surmounted the great iron ga 'way ; but they had vanished, cither with the family, or at the indications of an approaching rust. Rust deli led its bars ; but, when you looked through them, the splendour of an unrivalled garden gave vivid signs of youth, and of the taste of an orderly, laborious, and cunning hand. The garden was under Mrs. Fleming's charge. The joy of her love for it was written on its lustrous beds, as poets write. She had the poetic passion for flowers. Perhaps her taste may now seem questionable. She cherished the old-fashioned delight in tulips ; the house was reached on a gravel-path between rows of tulips, rich with one natural blush, or freaked by art. She liked a bulk of colour ; and when the dahlia dawned upon our gardens, she gave her heart to dahlias. By good desert, the fervent woman gained a prize at a flower-show for one of her dahlias, and "Dahlia" was the name uttered at the christening of her eldest daughter, at which all Wicxby parish laughed as long as the joke could last. Tliere was laughter also when Mrs. Fleming's second daughter received the name of " Rhoda "; but it did not endure for so long a space, as it was known tha* she had taken more to the solitary and reflective rcadin r of her Bible, and to thoughts upon flowers eternal. Count y people are not inclined to tolerate the display ol a pas ion for anything. They find it as intrusive and exaspe ating as is, in the midst of larger congregations, what we call genius. For some years, Mrs. Fleming's pro THE k:enttsh family. 3 ceedino-s were simplj atliemefor gossips, and her vanity -vvna openly pai'doned, until that delusively prosperous appearance ■which, her hibour lent to the house, was worn through by the enforced confession of there being poverty in the household. The ragged elbow was then projected in the face of Wrexby in a manner to preclude it from a sober appreciation of the fairness of the face. Critically, moreover, her admission oE great poppy-heads into her garden was objected to. She Avould squander her care on poppies, and she had been heard to say that, while she lived, her children should be fully fed. The encouragement of flaunting weeds in a decent garden was indicative of a moral twist that the expressed resolution to supply her table with plentiful nourishment, no matter whence it came, or how provided, sufficiently confirmed. The reason with which she Avas stated to have fortified her stern resolve was of the irritating order, right in the abstract, and utterly unprincipled in the application. She said, " Good, bread, and good beef, and enough of both, make good blood; and my children shall be stout." This is such a thing as may be announced by foreign princesses and rulers over serfs ; but English Wresb}'-, in cogitative mood, demanded an equivalent for its beef and divers economies consumed by the hungry children of the authoritative woman. Practically it was obedient, for it had got the habit of supplying her. Though payment was long in arrear, the arrears were not treated as lost ones by IMrs. Fleming, who, without knowing it, possessed one main secret for mastering the custodians of credit. She had a considerate remembrance and regard for the most distant of her debts, so that she seemed to be only always a little late, and exceptionally wrong-headed in theory. Wrexby, therefore, acquiesced in helping to build up her children to stoutness, and but for the blindness of all people, save artists, poets, novelists, to the grandeur of their own creations, the inhabitants of this Kentish village might have had an enjoyable pride in the beauty and robust grace of the young girls— fair-haired, black-haired girls, a kindred con- trast, like fire and smoke, to look upon. In stature, in bearing, and in expression, they were, if 1 may adopt the eloquent modern manner of eulogy, strikingly above their class. They carried erect shoulders, like creatures not ashamed of showing a merely animal pride, -which is ne er B 2 A HnODA FLEMING. qnite apart from the pride of developed beauty. They •were as upright as Oriental erirls, whose heads are nobly poised from cai-rying the ])itcher to the well. Daik Rlioda might have pa.s.sed for Jiaclul, and IJaldia called lier Rachel. Tliey tos.sed one another their mutual compliments, drawn from the chief book of their rtalied, imitating an arbitrary juvenile. " You're as tight locked in as if you was in di'ead of all the thieves of London. You ain't afraid QUEEN ANNE's farm. 13 o' me, miss ? I'm not tlie party generally oiatside of a for- tification ; I ain t, I can assure you. I'm a defence party, and a reg'lar lion when I've got tlie law backing me." He spoke in a queer, wheezy voice, like a cracked flute, combined with the efl'ect of an ill-resined fiddle-bow. " You are in the garden of Queen Anne's Farm," said Rhoda. " And you're my pretty little niece, are you ? ' the darkie lass,' as your father says. ' Little,' says I ; why, you needn't be ashamed to stand beside a grenadier. Trust the country for growing fine gals." " Tou are my uncle, then ?" said Rhoda. " Tell me how my sister is. Is she well ? Is she quite happy ?" " Dahly ?" returned old Anthony, slowly. "Yes, yes; my sister!" Rhoda looked at him with dis- tressful easjerness. " Now, don't you be uneasy about your sister Dahly," Old Anthony, as he spoke, fixed his small brown eyes on. the girl, and seemed immediately to have departed far away in speculation. A question recalled him. " Is her health good ?" "Ay; stomach's good, head's good, lungs, brain, what not, all arood. She's a bit giddy, that's all." " In h'er head ?" "Ay; and on her pins. IS^ever you mind. Yon look a steady one, my dear. I shall take to you, I think." " But my sister " Rhoda was saying, when the farmer came out, and sent a greeting from the threshold : " Brother Tony !" " Here he is, brother William John." " Surely, and so he is, at last." The farmer walked up to him with his hand out. " And it ain't too late, I hope. Eh ?" " It's never too late — to mend," said the farmer. " Eh ? not my manners, eh ?" Anthony struggled to keep np the ball ; and in this way they got over the confusion of the meeting after many years and some differences. " Made acquaintance with Rhoda, I see," said the farmer, as they turned to go in. " The ' darkie lass' you write of. She's like a coal nigh a candle. She looks, as you'd say, ' t'other side of her sister,* Yes, we've had a talk." 14 EnODA PLEMINO. " Just in time for dinnor, brotlicr Tony. "Wo ain't j^ot mnch to offer, but what there is, is at your service. Step aside with me." The fai-nier got Anthony out of hearing a moment, ques- tioned, and was answered : after whieli he looked less anxious, but a trifle perplexed, and nodded his head as Anthony occasionally lifted his, to enforce certain points in some halting explanation. You Avould have said that a debtor was humbly putting his case in his creditor's ear, and could only now and then summon courage to meet the cen- sorious eyes. They went in to Mrs. Sumfit's shout that the dumplings were out of the pot : old Anthony bowed upon he announcement of his name, and all took seats. But it was not the same sort of dinner-hour as that which the inhabitants of the house were accustomed to ; there was conversation. The farmer asked Anthony by what conveyance he had come. Anthony shyly, but not without evident self-appro- bation, related how, having come by the train, he got into conversation with the driver of a fly at a station, who advised him of a cart that would be passing near Wrexby. For threepennyAvoi'th of beer, he had got a fi-iendly intro- duction to the carman, who took him within two miles of the farm for one shilling, a distance of fifteen miles. That was pretty good ! " Home pork, brother Tony," said the farmer, approv- ingly- " And home-made bread, too, brother William John," said Anthony, becoming brisk. " Ay, and the beer, such as it is." The farmer di'ank and sighed. Anthony tried the beer, remarking — " That's good beer ; it don't cost much." " It ain't adulterated. By what I read of your London beer, this stuff's not so bad, if you bear in mind it's pure. Pui-e's my motto. ' Pure, though poor !' " " Up there, yon pay for rank poison," said Anthony. " So, what do I do ? I drink water and thank'em, that's wise." " Saves stomach and purse." The farmer put a little stress on " purse." " Yes, I calculate I save threepence a day in beer alone,** >aid Anthony. QUEEN ANNe's FAEM. 15 " Three times seven's twenty-one, ain't it ?" Mr. Fleming said this, and let out his elbow in a small perplexity, as Anthony took him up : — " And fifty-two times twenty- one ?" " Well, that's, that's — how much is that, Mas' Gammon ?" the farmer asked in a bellow. Master Gammon was laboriously and steadily engaged in tightening himself with dumpling. He relaxed his exertions sufficiently to take this new burden on his brain, and imme- diately cast it off. " Ah never thinks when I feeds — Ah was al'ays a bad hand at 'counts. Gi'es it up." "Why, you're like a horse that never was rode! Try again, old man," said the farmer. " If I drags a cart," Master Gammon replied, " that ain't no reason why I should leap a gate." The farmer felt that he was worsted as regarded the illus- tration, and with a bit of the boy's fear of the pedagogue, he fought Anthony ofi by still pressing the arithmetical problem upon Master Gammon, until the old man, goaded to exas- peration, rolled out thunderingly — " If I works f er ye, that ain t no reason why I should think fer ye," which caused him to be left in peace. "Eh, Kobert ?" the farmer transferred the question; " Come ! what is it ?" Robert begged a minute's delay, while Anthony watched him with hawk eyes. " I tell you what it is — it's pounds," said Robert. This tickled Anthony, who let him escape, crying: " Capital! Pounds it is in your pocket, sir, and you hit that neatly, I will say. Let it be five. Tou out with your five at interest, compound interest ; soon comes another five ; treat it the same : in ten years — eh ? and then you get into figures; you swim in figtu'es !" " I should think you did !" said the farmer, winking slyly. Anthony caught the smile, hesitated and looked shrewd, and then covei-ed his confusion by holding his plate to Mrs. Sumfit for a help. The manifest evasion and mute declara- tion that dumpling said "mum" on that head, gave the farmer a quiet glow. _ ^ _ ^ " When you are ready to tell me all about my darHn'^ sir, Mrs. Sumfit suggested, coaxingly. 16 EHODA PLEMINQ. " After dinner, mother — after dinner," said the farmer. " And we're waitiii,' are we, till them dumpling's is finished ?" she exclaimed, piteously, with a glance at Master Gammon's ])hite. " After dinner we'll have a talk, mother." Mrs. Sum tit feared from this delay that there was queer news to be told of Dahlia's temper; but she longed for the narrative no whit the less, and again cast a sad eye on the leisurely proceedings of ^Master Gammon. The veteran was still calmly tightening. His fork was on end, with a vast mouthful impaled on the prongs. Master Gammon, a thoughtful eater, was always last at the meal, and a latent, deep-lying irritation at Mrs. Sumfit for her fidgetiness, day after day, toward the finish of the dish, added a i-elish to his engulphing of the monstrous morsel. He looked at her steadily, like an ox of the fields, and consumed it, and then holding his plato out, in a remorseless way, said, "You make 'em so good, marm." Mrs. Sumiit, fretted as she was, was not impervious to the sound sense of the remark, as well as to the compliment. " I don't want to hurry you, Mas' Gammon," she said ; " Lord knows, I like to see you and everybody eat his full and be thankful; but, all about my Dahly waitin', — I feel pricked wi' a pin all over, I do ; and there's my blessed in. London," she answered, " and we knowin' nothin' of her, and one close by to tell me ! I never did feel what slow things dumplin's was, afore now !" The kettle simmered gently on the hob. Every other knife and fork was silent ; so was every tongue. Master Gammon ate and the kettle hummed. Twice Mrs. Sumfit sounded a despairing, "Oh, dear me!" but it was useless. No human power had ever yet driven Master Gammon to a demonstration of haste or to any acceleration of the pace he had chosen for himself. At last, she was not to be restrained from crying out, almost teax-f uUy : "When do you think you'll have done, IMas' Gammon ?" Thus pointedly addressed, ^Master Gammon laid down his knife and fork. He half raised his ponderous, curtaining eyelids, and replied : " When I feels my buttons, marm." After which he deliberately fell to work again. •Mrs. Sumfit drojjped back in her chair as fi'om a blow. QUEEN ANNb's FARM. 17 But even dumplings, though they resist so doggedly for a space, do ultimately submit to the majestic march of Time, and move. Master Gammon cleared his plate. There stood in the dish still half a dumpling. The farmer and Rhoda, deeming that there had been a show of inhospitality, pressed him to make away with this forlorn remainder. The vindictive old man, who was as tight as dumpling and buttons could make him, refused it in a drooping tone, and went forth, looking at none. Mrs. Sumiit turned to all parties, and begged them to say what more, to please Master Gammon, she could have done ? When Anthony was ready to speak of her Dahlia, she obtruded this question in utter dolefulness. Robert was kindly asked by the farmer to take a pipe among them. Rhoda put a chair for him, but he thanked them both, and said he could not neglect some work to be done in the fields. She thought that he feared pain from hearing Dahlia's name, and followed him with hei* eyes commiseratingly. " Does that young fellow attend to business ?" said Anthony. The farmer praised Robert as a rare hand, but one affected with bees in his nightcap : who had ideas of his own about farming, and Avas obstinate with them ; " pays you due respect, but's got a notion as how his way of thinking's better'n his seniors. It's the style now with all young folks. ]\Iakes a butt of old Mas' Gammon ; laughs at the old man. It ain't respectful t' age, I say. Gammon don't understand nothing about new feeds for sheep, and dam nonsense about growing such things as melons, fiddle-faddle, for 'em. Robert's a beginner. What he knows, I taught the young fellow. Then, my question is, where's his ideas come from, if they're contrary to mine ? If they're contrary to mine, they're contrary to my teaching. Well, then, what are they worth ? He can't see that. He's a good one at work — I'll Bay so much for him." Old Anthony gave Rhoda a pat on the shoulder. 18 EnODA FLEMING, CHAPTER III. SUGGESTS THE MIGHT OF THE MONEY DEMOW. "Pipes in the middle of the day's regular revelry," ejacu- lated Anthony, whose way of holding the curved pipe-stem displayed a mind bent on reckless enjoyment, and said a3 much as a label issuing from his mouth, like a figure in a comic wood-cut of the old style : — " that's," he pursued, " that's if you haven't got to look up at the clock every two minutes, as if the devil was after you. But, sitting here, you knoNV, the afternoon's a long evening; nobody's your master. You can on -wi' your slippers, up wi' your legs, talk, or go for'ard, counting, twicing, and threetimesing ; by George ! I should take to drinking beer if I had my after- noons to myself in the city, just for the sake of sitting and doing sums in a tap-room ; if it's a big tap-room, with pew sort o' places, and dark red curtains, a fire, and a smell of sawdust, ale, and tobacco, and a boy going by outside whistling a tune of the day. Somebody comes in. ' Ah, thei'c's an idle old chap,' he says to himself, (meaning me), and where, I should like to ask him, 'd his head be if he sat there di\nding two hundred and fifty thousand by forty-five and a half !" The farmer nodded encouragingly. He thought it not improbable that a short operation with these numbers would give the sum in Anthony's possession, the exact calculation of his secret hoard, and he set to work to stamp them on his brain, which rendered him absent in manner, while Mrs. Sumfit mixed liquor with hot water, and pushed at his knee, doubling in her enduring lips, and lengthening her eyes to aim a side-glance of reprehension at Anthony's wandering loquacity. Ehoda could bear it no more. " Is ow let me hear of my sister, uncle," she said. "I'll tell you what," Anthony responded, "she hasn't got such a pretty sort of a sweet blackbirdy voice as you've got." The girl blushed scarlet. •' Oh, she can mount them colours, too," said Anthony. THE MIGHT OF THE MONEY DEMON. 19 His ■way of speakins: of Dahlia indicated that he and she had enough of one another ; but of the peculiar object of his extraordinary visit not even the farmer had received a hint. Mrs. Sumfit ventured to think aloud that his grog was not stiff enough, but he took a gulp under her eyes, and smacked his lips after it in a most convincing manner. " Ah ! that stuff wouldn't do for me in London, half- holiday or no half-holiday," said Anthony. " Why not r" the farmer asked. " I should be speculating — deep — couldn't hold myself in : — Mexicans, Peroovians, Venzeshoolians, Spaniards, at 'em I should go. I see bonds in all sorts of colours, Spaniards in black and white, Peruvians — orange, Mexicans — red as the British army. Well, it's just my whim. If I like red, I go at red. I ain't a bit of reason. What's more, I never speculate." " Why, that's safest, brother Tony," said the farmer. " And safe's my game — always was, always will be ! Do you think" — Anthony sucked his grog to the sugar-dregs, till the spoon settled on his nose — " do you think I should hold the position I do hold, be trusted as I am trusted ? Ah ! you don't know much about that. Should I have money placed in my hands, do you think — and it's thousands at a time, gold, and notes, and cheques — if I was a risky chap ? I'm known to be thoroughly respectable. Five and forty years I've been in Boyne's Bank, and thank ye, ma'am, grog don't do no harm down here. And I tcill take another glass. ' When the heart of a man !' — but I'm no singer." Mrs. Sumfit simpered, " Hera ; it's the heart of a woman, too : and she have one, and it's dying to hear of her darlin' blessed in town, and of who cuts her hair, and where she gets her gownds, and whose pills " The farmer interrupted her irritably. " Divide a couple o' hundred thousand and more by forty- five and a half," he said. " Do wait, mother; all in good time. Forty-five and a-half, brother Tony, that was your sum — ah ! — you mentioned it some time back — half of what ? Is that half a fraction, as they call it ? I haven't forgot fractions, and logareems, and practice, and so on to algebrae, where it always seems to me to blow hard, for, whizz goes my head in a jiffy, as soon as I've mounted the ladder to look into that country. How 'bout that forty-five and a c2 20 RnODA FLEMING. half, brother Tony, if you don't mind condescending to explain ?" " Forty-five and a half ?" muttered Anthony, mystified. " Oh, never mind, you know, if you don't like to say^ brother Tony." The farmer touched him up with his pipe- Btcm. " Five and a half," Anthony speculated. " That's a fraction you got hold of, brother William John : — I remember the parson calling out those names at your -wedding: 'I, William John, take thee, Susan:' yes, that's a fraction, but •what's the good of it ?" " What I mean is, it ain't forty-five and half of forty-five. Half of one, eh ? That's identical -with a fraction. One — a stioke — and two under it." " You've got it correct," Anthony assented. " How many thousand divide it by ?" " Divide ivJtat by, bi'other William John ? I'm beat." " Ah ! out comes the keys : lock up everything : it's time !" the farmer laughed, rather proud of his brother-in-law's perfect wakefulness after two stiff tumblers. He saw that Anthony was determined with all due friendly feeling to let no one know the sum in his possession. " If it's four o'clock, it is time to lock up," said Anthony, " and bang to go the doors, and there's the money for thieves to di-eam of — they can't get a-nigh it, let them dream as they like. What's the hour, ma'am ?" "Xot three, it ain't," returned Mrs. Sumfit, "and do be good creatures, and begin about my Dahly, and where she got that sumptions gownd, and the bonnet with blue flowers lyin' by on the table : now, do !" . Rhoda coughed. " And she wears lavender gloves like a lady," Mrs. Sumfit was continuing. Rhoda stamped on her foot. "Oh! cruel!" the comfortable old woman snapped in pain, as she applied her hand to the inconsolable fat foot, and nursed it. " What's roused ye, you tiger girl ? I shau't be able to get about, I shan't, and then who's to cook for ye all ? For you're as ignorant as a raw kitchen wench, and knows nothing." " Come, Dody, you're careless," the fai-mer spoke chidingly through Mrs. Sumfit's lamentations. THE MIGHT OF THE MONEY DEMON. 21 " Ste stops uncle Anthony when he's just ready, father," Baid Rhoda. " Do you want to "know ?" Anthony set his small eyes on her : " do you want to know, my dear ?" He paused, finger- ing his glass, and went on: "I, Susan, take thee, William John, and you've come of it. Says I to myself, when I hung sheepish by your mother and by your father, my dear, says I to myself, I ain't a marrying man : and if these two, says I, if any progeny comes to 'em — to bless them, some people 'd say, but I know what life is, and what young ones are — if — where was I ? Liquor makes you talk, brother William John, but where's your ideas ? Gone, like hard cash ! What I meant was, I felt I might some day come for'ard and help the issue of your wife's weddin', and wasn't such a shady object among you, after all. My pipe's out." Rhoda stood up and filled the pipe, and lit it in silence. She divined that the old man must be allowed to run on ia his own way, and for a long time he rambled, gave a picture of the wedding, and of a robbery of Boyne's Bank : the firm of Boyne, Birt, Hamble, and Company. At last, he touched on Dahlia. " What she ivants, I can't make out," he said ; " and what that good lady there, or somebody, made mention of — how she manages to dress as she do ! I can understand a little goin' a gi^eat way, if you're clever in any way ; but I'm at my tea :" Anthony laid his hand out as to exhibit a picture. *' I ain't a complaining man, and be young, if you can, I say, and walk about and look at shops ; but, I'm at my tea : I come home rather tired : there's the tea-things, sure enough, and tea's made, and, may be, there's a shrimp or two ; she attends to your creature comforts. When everything's locked up and tight and right, I'm gay, and ask for a bit of society : well, I'm at my tea : I hear her foot thumping up and down her bed-room overhead : I know the meaning of that : I'd rather hear nothing : down she runs : I'm at my tea, and in she bvu-sts." — Here followed a dramatic account of Dahlia's manner of provocation, which was closed by the extinction of his pipe. The farmer, while his mind still hung about thousands o£ pounds and a certain incomprehensible division of them to produce a distinct intelligible total, and set before him the sum of Anthony's riches, could see that his elder daughter 22 RHODA FLEMING. ■was behaving fliglitily and neglecting the true interests of the family, and he wa? chagi-ined. But Anthony, before he enti'ird the house, had assured him that Dahlia was well, and that nothing was wrong with her. So he looked at Mrs. Sumtit, Avho now took upon herself to plead for Dahlia : a young thing, and such a handsome creature ! and we were all young some time or other ; and would heaven have mercy on ns, if we were hard upon the young, do you think ? The motto of a trulv i-eligfious man said, try 'em aLrain. And, may be, people had been a little hard upon Dahlia, and the girl was apt to take offence. . In conclusion, she appealed to Rhoda to speak up for her sister. Rhoda sat in quiet reserve. She was sure her sister must be justified in all she did : but the pictui-e of the old man coming from his work every night to take his tea quite alone made her sad. She found herself unable to speak, and as she did not, Mrs. Sum lit had an acute twinge from her recently trodden foot, and called her some bitter names ; which was not an unusual case, for the kind old woman could be querulous, and belonged to the list of those whose hearts are as scales, so that they love not one person devotedly without a corresponding spirit of oppo- sition to another. Rhoda merely smiled. By-and-by, the women left the two men alone. Anthony turned and struck the farmer's knee. " You've got a jewel in that gal, brother William John." " Eh ! she's a good enough lass. Not much of a manager, brother Tony. Too much of a thinker, I reckon. She's got a temper of her own too. I'm a bit hurt, brother Tony, about that other girl. She must leave Loudon, if she don't alter. It's flightiness ; that's all. You musn't think ill of poor Dahly. She was always the pretty one, and when they know it, they act up to it : she was her mother's favoui-ite." " Ah ! poor Susan ! an upright woman befoi-e the Lord." " She was," said the farmer, bowing his head. " And a good wife," Anthony interjected. " None better — never a better ; and I Avish she was living to look after her girls." " I came through the churchyard, hard by," said Anthony; " and I read that writing on her tombstone. It went like a choke in my throat. The first person I saw next was her child, this young gal you call Rhoda; and, thinks I to myself, THE MIGHT OP THE MONET DEMON. 23 yon miglit ask me, I'd do anything for ye — that I could, of course." The farmer's eye had lit up, but became overshadowed by the characteristic reservation. " Nobody'd ask you to do more than you could," he remarked, rather coldly. " It'll never be much," sighed Anthony. " Well, the world's nothing, if you come to look at it close." The farmer adopted a similar tone. " What's money !" said Anthony. The farmer immediately resumed his this-worldliness : " Well, it's fine to go about asking us poor devils to answer ye that" he said, and chuckled, conceiving that he had nailed Anthony down to a partial confession of his ownership of some worldly goods. " What do you call having money ?" observed the latter clearly in the trap. " Fifty thousand ?" " Whew !" went the farmer, as at a big di-aught of power- ful stuff. " Ten thousand ?" Mr. Fleming took this second gulp almost contemptuously, but still kindly. " Come," quoth Anthony, " ten thousand's not so mean, you know. You're a gentleman on ten thousand. So. on five. I'll tell ye, many a gentleman 'd be glad to own it. Lor' bless you 1 But, you know nothing of the world, brother William John. Some of 'em haven't one — ain't so rich as you !" " Or you, brother Tony ?" The farmer made a grasp at his will-o'-the-wisp. "Oh! me!" Anthony sniggered. ''I'm a scraper of odds and ends. I pick up things in the gutter. Mind you, those Jews ain't such fools, though a curse is on 'em, to wander forth. They know the meaning of the multiplication table. They ea,n turn fractions into whole numbers. No; I'm not to be compared to gentlemen. My property 's my respect- ability. I said that at the beginning, and I say it now. But, I'll tell you what, brother William John, it's an emotion ■when you've got bags of thousands of pounds in your arms." Ordinarily, tbe farmer was a sensible man, as straight on. the level of dull intellia:ence as other men : but so credulous was he in regard to the riches possessed by his wife's brother, 24 TjnODA FLEMINa. that a very little tempted him to childish exncrcrPratioTi of the ]n-obabIe amount. Now that Anthouy himst'lf i'urnislied the incitement, he was quite lifted from the earth. He had, besides, taken more of the strong mixture than he was ever accustomed to take in the middle of the day; and as it seemed to him that Anthony was really about to be seduced into a particular statement of the extent of the property which formed his respectability (as Anthony had chosen to put it), he got up a little game in his head by guessing how much the amount might positively be, so that he could subst!quently compare his shrewd reckoning with the avowed fact. He tamed his wild ideas as much as possible; thought over what his wife used to say of Anthony's saving ways from boyhood, thought of the dark hints of the Funds, of many bold strokes for money made by sagacious persons ; of Anthony's close style of living, and of the lives of celebrated misers ; this done, he resolved to make a sure guess, and therefore aimed below the mark. Money, when the imagin- ation deals with it thus, has no substantial relation to mortal affairs. It is a tricksy thing, distending and c iti-acting as it dances in the mind, like sunlight on the CDiliug cast from a morning tca-cup, if a forced simile will aid tlie conception. The farmer struck on thirty thousand and some odd hndred pounds — outlying debts, or so, excluded — as what Aniiiony's -will, in all likelihood, would be sworn under : say, thirty thousand, or, safer, say, twenty thousand. Bequeathed— how ? To him and to his children. But to the children in reversion after his decease ? Or how ? In any case, they might make capital marriages ; and the farm estate should go to w^hichever of the two young husbands he liked the best. Farmer Fleming asked not for any life of ease and splendour, though thirty thousand pounds was a fortune ; or even twenty thousand. Noblemen have stooped to marry heiresses owning no more than that! The idea of their having done so actually shot across him, and his heart sent up a warm spring of tenderness toward the patient, good, grubbing old fellow, sitting beside him, who had lived and died to enrich and elevate the family. At the same time, he could not lefrain from thinking that Anthony, broad- shouldered as he was, though bent, sound on his legs, and well-coloured for a Londoner, would be accepted by any Life Insurance oflice, at a moderate rate, considering his age. THE TEXT FROM SCRIPTUEE. 25 Tte farmer thought of his own health, and it was with a pang that he fancied himself being probed by the civil- speaking Life Insurance doctor (a gentleman who seems to issue upon us applicants from out the muffled foldino- doors of Hades ; taps us on the chest, once, twice, and forthwith writes down our fateful dates). Probably, Anthony would not have to pay a higher rate of interest than he. "Are you insui-ed, brother Tony?" the question escaped him. " 1^0, I ain't, brother William John ;" Anthony went on nodding like an automaton set in motion. " There's two sides to that. I'm a long-lived man. Long-lived men don't insure ; that is, unless they're fools. That's how the Offices thrive." " Case of accident ?" the farmer suggested. " Oh ! nothing happens to me," replied Anthony. The farmed jumped on his legs, and yawned. *• Shall we take a turn in the garden, brother Tony ?" "With all my heart, brother William John." The farmer had conscience to be ashamed of the fit of irritable ve.xarion which had seized on him; and it was not till Anthony being asked the date of his birth, had declared himself twelve yeai-s his senior, that the farmer felt his speculations to be justified. Anthony was nearly a genera- tion ahead. They walked about, and were seen from the windows touching one another on the shoulder in a brotherly way. When they came back to the women, and tea, the farmer's mind was cooler, and all his reckonings had gone to mist. He was dejected over his tea. " What is the matter, father ?" said Rhoda. " I'll tell you, my dear," Anthony replied for him. "He's envying me some one I want to ask me that question when I'm at my tea in London." CHAPTER IV. THE TEXT FROM SCRIPTURE. Mr. Fleming kept his forehead from his daughter's good- night kiss until the room was cleared, after supper, and then 2n RITODA FLKMIXO. embracing: ber very heartily, he informed her that licr uncle had (illVrod to ]»ay Ikt expenses on u visit to Jjondon, by which lie conti-ived tu hint that a pcohlen j)ath had opened to his girl, and at the same bime entreated her to think nothing of it; to dismiss all expectations and dreams of impossible sums from her mind, and simply to endeavour to please her uncle, who had a riulit to his own, and a rii^ht to do what he liked with his own, thou^'-h it were forty, fifty times as much as he ])ossessed — and what that miL,^ht amount to no one knew. In fact, as is the way with many exjicrienced persons, in his attempt to give advice to another, he was very impressive in lecturing himself, and warned lliat other not to succumb to a temptation princi|)ally by indicating tlie natural basis of the allurement. Happily for young and for old, the intense insight of the young has much to distract or soften it. Khoda thanked her father, and chose to think that she had listened to good and wise things. " Your sister," he said — " but we won't speak of her. If I could part with you, my lass, I'd rather she was the one to come back." " Dahlia would be killed by our quiet life now," said Rhoda. "Ay," the farmer mused. "If she'd got to pay six men every Saturday night, she wouldn't complain o' the quiet. But, there ! — you neither of you ever took to farming or to housekeeping; but any gentleman might be proud to have one of you for a wife. I said so when you was girls. And if you've been dull, my dear, Avhat's the good o' society ? Tea- cakes mayn't seem to cost money, nor a glass o' grog to neighbours ; but once open the door to that sort o' thing and your reckoning goes. And what I said to your poor mothei-'s true. I said : our girls, they're mayhap not erpials of the Hollands, the Nashaws, the Perrets, and the others about here — no ; they're not equals, because the others are not equals o' them, maybe." The yeoman's pi'ide struggled out in this ob.scure way to vindicate his unneighbourliness and the seclusion of his daughters from the society of gii'ls of their age and condition; nor was it hard for Rhoda to assure him, as she earnestly did, that he had acted rightly. Rhoda, assisted by Mrs. Sumfit, was late in the night look- ing up what poor decorations she possessed wherewith to THE TEXT PROM SCRIPTURE. 27 enter Lotic!oti, and be worthy of her sister's embrace, so that she might not shock the lady Dahlia had become. "Depend you on it, my dear," said Mrs. Sumfit, "my Dahly's grown above him. That's nettles to your uncle, my dear. He can't abide it. Don't you see he can't ? Some men's like that. Others 'd see you dressed like a princess, and not be satisfied. They vary so, the teasin' creatures ! Eut one and all, whether they likes it or not, owns a woman's the better for bein' dressed in the fashion. What do grieve me to my insidest heart, it is your bonnet. What a bonnet that was lying beside her dear round arm in the po'trait, and her finger up making a dimple in her cheek, as if she was thinking of us in a sorrowful way. That's the arts o' being lady-like : — look sad-like. How could we get a bonnet for you r " My own must do," said Rhoda. " Yes, and you to look like lady and servant-gal a-going out for an airin' ; and she to feel it ! Pretty, that 'd be !" " She won't be ashamed of me," Rhoda faltered ; and then hummed a little tune, and said firmly — " It's no use my trying to look like what I'm not.'' " No, truly ;" Mrs. Sumfit assented. " But it's your bein' behind the fashions what hurt me. As well you might beau old thing like me, for any pleasant looks you'll git. Now, the country — you're like in a coal-hole for the matter o' that. While London, my dear, its pavement and gutter, and omnibus traffic ; and if you're not in the fashion, the little wicked boys of the streets themselves '11 let you know it ; they've got such eyes for fashions, they have. And I don't want my Dahly's sister to be laughed at, and called ' coal-scuttle,' as happened to me, my dear, believe it or not^ — and shoved aside, and said to — ' who are you ?' For she reely is nice-looking. Your uncle Anthony and Mr. Robert agreed upon that." Rhoda coloured, and said, after a time, " It would please me if people didn't speak about my looks." The looking-glass probably told her no more than that she was nice to the eye, but a young man who sees anything should not see like a mirror, and a girl's instinct whispers to her, that her image has not been taken to heart when she is accurately and impartially described by him. The key to Rhoda at this period was a desire to be made warm with praise of her person. She beheld her face at 28 RHODA FLEMINO. times, and shivered. The face Tvas so fitrariG^e witli its dark thifk eyebrows, and peculiarly stniio-ht-gazin^ brown eyes; the level lonL,' red iindei'-lip and curved U|i])er; and the chia and nose, so unlike Dahlias, whose nose was, alter a little dip from the forehead, one soft line to its extremity, and whose chin seemed shaped to a cup. Rhoda's outlines were harder. There was a suspicion of a heavenward turn to her nose, and of squareness to her chin. Her face, when studied, inspired in its owners mind a doubt of her beinii^ even nice to the eye, thouch she knew that in exercise, and when smitten by a blush, briixhtness and colour aided her claims. She knew also that her head was easily poised on her neck ; ami that her fio-iire was reasonably i^ood ; but all this was uncon- firmed knowledge, quickly shadowed by the doubt. As the sun is wanted to glorify the right features of a landscape, this only wants a husband who will keep her well in hand." These sentences scarcely cai'ried actual comj)liments when you knew the speakers ; but outraged lovers cannot talk in that style after they have broken apart. It is possible that Margaret and Edwaid conveyed to one another as shaip a sting as en- venomed lovers attempt. Gossip had once betrothed them, but was now at fault. The lady had a small jointni'e,*and lived partly with her uncle. Lord Elling, partly with .Squire Blancove, her aunt's husband, and a little by herself, which was Avhen she counted money in her pui-se, and chose to assei't her independence. She had a name in the world. Tliere is a fate attached to some women, from Helen of Troy downward, that blood is to be shed for them. One duel ou behalf of a woman is a reputation to her for life ; two are notoriety. If she is very young, can they be attributable to her ? We charge them naturally to her overpowering beauty. It happened that Mrs. Lovell was beautiful. Under the light of the two duels her beauty shone as from an illumination of black flame. Bovs adored Mrs. Lovell. These are moths. But more, the birds of air, nay, grave owls (who stand in this metaphor for whiskered expe- rience) thronged, dashing at the ai)parition of terrible splen- dour. Was it her fault that she had a name in the woi'ld ? Mrs. Margaret Lovell's portiait hung in Edwiiid's room. It was a ])hotograph exipiisitely coloured, and was on the left of a dark Judith, dark with a serenity of sternness. On the right hung another coloured photograph of a young lady, EDWARD AND ALGERNON. 39 also fair ; and it was a point of taste to choose between them. Do you like the hollowed lily's cheeks, or the plump rose's ? Do yoTi like a thinnish. fall of golden hair, or an abundant cluster of nut-brown ? Do you like your blonde with limpid blue eyes, or prefer an endowment of sunny hazel ? Finally, are you taken by an air of artistic innocence winding ser- pentine about your heart's fibres ; or is blushing simplicity sweeter to you ? !Mrs. Lovell's eyebrows were the faintly- marked trace of a perfect arcb. The other young person's were thickish, more level ; a full brown colour. She looked as if she had not yet attained to any sense of her being a professed beauty : but the fair widow was clearly bent upon winning you, and had a shy, playful intentness of aspect. Her pui^e white skin was iiat on the bone ; the lips came forward in a soft curve, and if they were not artistically stained, were triumphantly fresh. Here, in any case, she beat her rival, whose mouth had the plebeian beauty's fault of being too straight in a line, and was not trained, appa- rently, to tricks of dainty pouting. It was morning, and the cousins having sponged in plea- sant cold water, arranged themselves for exercise, and came out simultaneously into the sitting-room, slippered, and in tlannels. They nodded and went througb certain curt gi-eetings, and then Algernon stepped to a cupboard and tossed out the leather gloves. The room was larg-e and they had a tolerable space for the work, when the breakfast- table had been drawn a little on one side. You saw at a glance which was the likelier man of the two, when they stood opposed. Algernons rounded features, full lips and falling chin, were not a match, though he was quick on his feet, for the wary, prompt eyes, set mouth, and hardness oE Edward. Both had stout muscle, but in Edward there was vigour of brain as well, which seemed to knit and inform his shape : without which, in fact, a man is as a ship under no command. Both looked their best ; as, when sparring, men always do look. "Now, then," said Algernon, squaring up to his cousin in good style, " now's the time for that unwholesome old bny underneath to commence groaning." " Step as light as you can," replied Edward, meeting him with the pretty motion of the gloves. " I'll step as light as a French dancing- master. Let's go 40 EHODA PLKMINQ. to Paris and learn the savate, Ned. It mnst be a new sen- sation to stand on one leg and knock a fellow's hat off with the other." " Stick to your fists." *' Hang it ! I wish your fists wouldn't stick to me so.** *' Yon talk too much." " 'Gad, I don't get puffy half so soon as you." " I want country air." *' Ton said you were going out, old Ned." "I changed my mind." Saying which, Edward shut his teeth, and talked for two or three hot minutes wholly with his fists. The room shook under Algernon's boundings to right and left, till a blow sent him back on the breakfast-table, shattered a cup on the floor, and bespattered his close flannel shirt with a funereal coffee-tinge. " What the deuce I said to bring that on myself, I don't know," Alerernon remarked as he rose. " Anything con- nected wit'i the country disagreeable to yon, Ked ? Come! a bout of quiet scientific boxing, and none of these beastly rushes, as if you were singling me out of a crowd of mags- men. Did you go to church yesterday, Ned ? Confound it, you're on me again, are you !" And Algernon went on spouting unintelligible talk under a torrent of blows. He lost his temper and fought out at them; but as it speedily became evident to him that the loss laid him open to punishment, he prudently recovered it, sparred, danced about, and contrived to shake the room in a manner that caused Edward to drop his arms, in con- sideration for the distracted occupant of the chambers below. Algernon accepted the truce, and made it peace by casting off one glove. " Tlierc ! that's a pleasant morning breather," he said, and sauntered to the window to look at the river. " I always feel the want of it when I don't get it. 1 could take a thrashing rather than not on with the gloves to begin the day. Look at those boats ! Fancy my having to go down to the city. It makes me feel like my blood circulating the wrong way. My father'll suffer some day, for keeping me at this low ebb of cash, by jingo !" lie uttered this with a projjhetic fierceness. " I cannot even scrape together enough for entrance money EDWARD AND ALGEENON. 41 to a Club. It's sickening ! I wonder whether I shall ever get used to banking work ? There's an old clerk in our office who says he should feel ill if he missed a day. And the old porter beats him — bangs him to fits. I believe he'd die off if he didn't see the house open to the minute. They say that old boy's got a pretty niece ; but he don't bring her to the office now. Rewai'd of merit! — Mr. Anthony Hackbut is going to receive ten pounds a year extra. That's for his honesty. I wonder whether I could earn a reputation for the sake of a prospect of ten extra pounds to my salary. Pve got a salary ! hurrah ! But if they keep me to my hundred and fifty per annum, don't let them trust me every day with the bags, as they do that old fellow. Some of the men say he's good to lend fifty pounds at a pinch. — Are the chops coming, Ned ?" " The chops are coming," said Edward, who had thrown on a boating-coat and plunged into a book, and spoke echoing. " Here's little Peggy Lovell." Algernon faced this por- trait. " It don't do her justice. She's got more life, more change in her, more fire. She's starting for town, I hear." " She is starting for town," said Edward. " How do yoi^ know that ?" Algernon swung about to ask. Edward looked round to him. " By the fact of your not having fished for a holiday this week. How did you leave her yesterday, Algy ? Quite well, I hope." The ingenuous face of the young gentleman crimsoned. "Oh, she was well," he said. "Ha! I see there can be some attraction in your dark women." " You mean that Judith ? Yes, she's a good diversion." Edward gave a two-edged response. " What train did you come up by last night '?" " The last from Wrexby. That reminds me : I saw a young Judith just as I got out. She wanted a cab. I called it for her. She belongs to old Hackbut of the Bank — the old porter, you know. If it wasn't that there's always some- thing about dark women which makes me think they'i'e going to have a moustache, I should take to that giil s face." Edward launched forth an invective against fair women. " What have they done to you — what have they done ?'* said Algernon. EHODA FI.EMTNO. " My f^ood fellow, tlio^'Vc nothing' but colour. TlicyVeno conscience. It" thej swear a ihinjif to you one moment, they break it the next. They can't help doing it. You don't ask a gilt weathercock to keep faith Avith anything but the wind, do you ? It's an ass that trusts a fair woman at all, or hfis anything to do with the confounded set. Cleopatra was fair ; so was Delilah; so is the Devil's wife. Reach me that book of Reports." " By jingo !" cried Algernon, " my stomacb reports that if provision doesn't soon approach Why don't you keep a French cook here, Ned Y Let's give up the women, and take to a French cook." Edward yawned horribly. " All in good time. It's what we come to. It's philosophy — your French cook! I wish I had it, or him. I'm afraid a fellow can't anticipate his years — not so lacky !" " By Jove ! we shall have to be philosophers before we breakfast !" Algernon exclaimed. " It's nine. I've to be tied to the stake at ten, chained and muzzled — a leetle — a dawg ! I wish I hadn't had to leave the service. It was a vile conspiracy against me there, Ned. Hang all tradesmen ! I sit on a stool, and add up tigui-es. I work haidei- than a nigger in the office. That's my life : but I must feed. It's no use going to the ofRce in a rage." " Will you try on the gloves again ?" was Edward's mild suggestion. Algernon thanked him, and replied that he knew him. Edwai'd hit hard when he was empty. They now affected patience, as far as silence went to make up an element of that sublime quality. The chops arriving, they disdained the mask. Algernon fired his glove just over the waiter's head, and Edward put the case to his conscience ; after which they sat and ate, talking little. The difference between them was, that Edward knew the state of Algernon's mind, and what was working within it, while the latter stared at a blank wall as regarded Edward's. " Going out after breakfast, Ned ?" said Algernon, quietly. "We'll walk to the city together, if you like." Edwai-d fixed one of his intent looks upon his cousin ** You're not going to the city to-day "r"' EDWAED AND ALGERNON. 43 " The clence, I'm not !" " You're going to dance attendance on Mrs. Lovell, wliom it's your pleasure to call Peggy, when you're some leagues out of her hearing." Algernon failed to command his countenance. He glanced at one of the portraits, and said, " Who is that girl up there ? Tell us her name. Talking of Mrs. Lovell, has she ever seen it ? " If you'll put on your coat, my dear Algy, I will talk to you about Mrs. Lovell." Edward kept his penetrative eyes on Algernon. " Listen to me : you'll get into a mess there." " If I must listen, Ned, I'll listen in my shirt-sleeves, with all respect to the lady." " Very well. The shirt-sleeves help the air of bravado. Ifow, you know that I've what they call ' knelt at her feet.* She's handsome. Don't cry out. She's dashing, and as near being a devil as any woman I ever met. Do you know why we broke? I'll tell you. Plainly, because I refused to believe that one of her men had insulted her. You understand what that means. I declined to be a chief party in a scandal." " Declined to fight the fellow ?" interposed Algernon. " More shame to you !" " I think you're a year younger than I am, Algy. You have the privilege of. speaking with that year's simplicity. Mrs. Lovell will play you as she played me. I acknowledge her power, and I keep out of her way. I don't bet ; I don't care to waltz ; I can't keep horses ; so I don't lose much by the privation to which I subject myself." " I bet, I waltz, and I ride. So," said Algernon, *' I should lose tremendously." " You will lose, mark my words." " Is the lecture of my year's senior concluded ?" said Algernon. " Yes ; I've done," Edward answered. " Then I'll put on my coat, ISTed, and I'll smoke in it. That'll giv^e you assurance I'm not going near Mrs. Lovell, if anything will." " that gives me assurance that Mrs. Lovell tolerates in you what she detests," said Edward, relentless in his in- sight ; " and, consequently, gives me assurance that she finds you of particular service to her at present." 44 EHOnA FLEMIXa. AlcomoTi lifid a lielitcrl mafrh in his liand. He. fluno: it into tlio fire. " I'm hanijod if T don't tliiiik you have the confounded vanity to suppose she sets me as a spy upon you!" A .smile ran along Edward's lips. "I don't think you'd know it, if she did." " Oh, you're ten years older ; you're twenty," bawled Altrernon, in an extremity of disjirnst. "Don't I know what game you're following up ? Isn't it clear as day you've got another woman in your eye ?" " It's as clear as day, my good Algy, that you see a por- trait hanging in my chambers, and you have heard j\Irs. Lovell's opinion of the fact. So much is perfectly clear. There's my hand. I don't blame you. She's a clever woman, and like many of the sort, shrewd at guessing the worst. Come, take my hand. I tell you, I don't blame you. I've been little dog to her myself, and fetched and carried, and waeged my tail. It's charming while it lasts. Will you shake it ?" " Your tail, man ?" Algernon roared in pretended amaze- ment. Edward eased Mm back to friendliness by laughing. *No/, my hand." They shook hands. "All right," said Algernon. "You mean well. It's very ■well for you to preach virtue to a poor devil ; you've got loo'-e, or you're regularly in love." "Virtue! by heaven!" Edward cried; "I Tvish I were entitled to preach it to any man on earth." His face flushed. " There, good-bye, old fellow," he added. " Go to the city. I'll dine with you to-night, if you like ; come and dine with me at my Club. I shall be disengaged." Algernon mumliled a flexible assent to an ajiiiointment at Edward's Club, dressed himself with care, borrowed a sovereign, for which he nodded his acceptance, and left him. Edward set his brain upon a book of law. It may have been two hours after he had sat thus in his Cistercian stillness, when a letter was delivered to him by one of the Inn porters. Edward read the superscri])ti(m, and asked the porter who it was that brought it. Two young ladies, the porter said. These were the contents :— EDWARD AND ALGERNON. 45 ** I am not sure that you will ever forgive me. I cannot forgive myself when I think of that one word I -n-as obliged to speak to you in the cold street, and nothing to explain why, and how much I love you. Oh ! how I love you ! I cry while I write. I cannot help it. I was a sop of tears all night long, and oh ! if you had seen my face in the morning. I am thankful you did not. Mother's Bible brought me home. It must have been guidance, for in my bed there lay my sister, and I could not leave her, I love her so. I could not have got down stairs again after seeing her there ; and I had to say that cold word and shut the window on you. May I call you Edward still ? Oh, dear Edward, dc make allowance for me. Write kindly to me. Say you forgive me. I feel like a ghost to-day. My life seems quite behind me somewhere, and I hardly feel anything I touch. I declare to you, dearest one, I had no idea my sister was here. I was surprised when I heard her name mentioned by my landlady, and looked on the bed ; suddealy my strength was gone, and it changed all that I was thinking. I never knew before that women were so weak, but now I see they are, and I only know I am at my Edward's mercy, and am stupid ! Oh, so wretched and stupid. I shall not touch food till I hear from you. Oh, if you are angrj-, winte so ; but do write. My suspense would make you pity me. I know I deserve your anger. It was not that I do not trust you, Edward. My mother in heaven sees my heart and that I trust, I ti-ust my heart and everything I am and have to you. I would almost wish and wait to see you to day in the Gardens, but my crying has made me such a streaked thing to look at. If I had rubbed my face with a scrubbing-bn sh, I could not look worse, and I cannot risk your seeing me. It would excuse you for hating me. Do you ? Does he hate her r She loves you. She would die for you, dear Edward. Oh ! I feel that if I was told to-day that I should die for you to-mori'ow, it would be happiness. I am dying — yes, I am dying till 1 hear from you. " Believe me, " Tour tender, loving, broken-hearted, "Dahlia." There was a postscript : — ** May I still go to lessons ?'* 46 EHODA FLEMING. Edward finished tlie letter with a calmly perusing eye. Ho had winced triflingly at one or two expressions contained in it ; forcible, perhaps, but not such as Mrs. Lovell smiling from the wall yonder would have used. " The poor cliild threatens to eat no dinner, if I don't write to her," he said ; and replied in a kind and magnanimous spirit, concluding — " Go to lessons, by all means." lliiving aceomplishcd this, he stood up, and by hazard fell to comparing the rival portraits ; a melaneholy and a comic thmrr to do, as you will find if you put two ])aiiited heads side"^by side, and set their merits contesting, and reflect on the contest, and to what advantages, personal, or of the artist's, the winner owes the victory. Dalilia had been admirably dealt with by the artist ; the charm of pure in- genuousness without rusticity was visible in her face and fifjure. Hanging there on the waH, she was a match for Mrs. Lovell. CHAPTER VII. GREAT NEWS FROM DAHLIA. RnODA returned home the heavier for a secret that she bore with her. All thiough the first night of her sleeping in London, Dahlia's sobs, and tender hugs, and self-reproaches, had penetrated her dreams, and when the morning came she had scarcely to learn that Dahlia loved some one. The con- fession was made; but his name was reserved. Dahlia spoke of him with such sacreduess of respect that she seemed lost in him, and like a creature kissing his feet. With tears rolling down her cheeks, and with moans of anguish, she spoke of the deliciousness of loving : of know- ino- one to whom she abandoned her will and her destiny, until, seeing how beautiful a bloum love threw upon the tearful worn face of her sister, ilhoda was imi)i-essed by a mystical veneration for this man, and readily believed him to be above all other men, if not superhuman : for she was of an age and an imagination to conceive a spiritual pre- eminence over the weakness of mortality. She thought that one who could so transform her sister, touch her with awe. GREAT NEWS PROM DAHLIA. 47 and give her gracefulness and liumilitj, must be what Dahlia said he was. She asked shyly for his Christian name ; but even so little Dahlia withheld. It was his wish that Dahlia should keep silence concerning him. " Ha.ve you sworn an oath ?" said Rhoda, wonderingly. " No, dear love," Dahlia replied ; " he only mentioned what lie desired." Rhoda was ashamed of herself for thinking it strange, and she surrendered her judgement to be stamped by the one who knew him well. As regarded her uncle, Dahlia admitted that she had behaved forgetfully and unkindly, and promised amendment. She talked of the Farm as of an old ruin, with nothing but a thin shade of memory threading its walls, and appeared to marvel vaguely that it stood yet. " Father shall not always want money," she said. She was particular in prescribing books for Rhoda to read ; good authors, she emphasized, and named books of history, and poets, and quoted their verses. " For my darling will some day have a dear husband, and he must not look down on her." Rhoda shook her head, full sure that she could never be brought to utter such musical words naturally. " Yes, dearest, when you know what love is," said Dahlia, in an underbreath. Could Robert inspire her with the power ? Rhoda looked npon that poor homely young man half-curiously when she returned, and quite dismissed the notion. Besides she had no feeling for herself. Her passion was fixed upon her sister, whose record of emotions in the letters from London placed her beyond dull days and nights. The letters struck many chords. A less subservient reader would have set them down as variations of the language of infatuation ; but Rhoda was responsive to every word and change of mood, from the, "I am unworthy, degraded, wretched," to "I am blest above the angels." If one letter said, " We met yester- day," Rhoda's heart beat on to the question, " Shall I see him again to morrow ?" And will she see him ? — has she seen him ? — agitated her and absorbed her thoughts. So humbly did she follow her sister, without daring to forecast a prospect for her, or dream of an issue, that when on a summer morning a letter was brought in at the break- fast-table, marked ' urgent and private,' she opened it, and 48 EHODA FLEMINQ. the first line dazzled her eyes — the surprise was a shock to her brain. She rose from her unfinished meal, and walked out into the wide air, lueliug as if she walked on thunder. The letter ran thus : — "My own Innocknt! "I am married. We leave Enq'land to-day. I must not love you too much, for I have all my love to give to my Edward, my own now, and I am his trustiiiti'ly for ever. But he will let me give you some of it — and lllioda is never jealous. She shall have a great deal. Only 1 am frightened when I think how immense my love is for him, so that any- thing — everything he thinks right is right to me. I am not afraid to think so. If I were to try, a cloud would come over me — it does, if only I fancy for half a moment I am rash, and a straw. I cannot exist excejit through him. So I must belong to him, and his will is my law. My prayer at my bedside every night is that I may die for him. We used to think the idea of death so terrible! Do you remember how we iised to shudder togetliei' at night when we thought of people lying in the grave ? And now, when I think that perhaps I may some day die for him, I feel like a crying in my heart with joy. " I have left a letter — sent it, I mean — enclosed to uncle for father. He will see Edward by-and-by. Oh ! may heaven spare him from any grief. Rhoda will comfort him. Tell him hosv devoted I am. I am like drowned to every- body but one. " We are looking on the sea. In half an hour I shall have Forgotten the tread of English eai th. 1 do nut know that I breathe. All 1 know is a fear that I am Hying, and my strength will not continue. That is when I am not touching his hand. There is France opposite. I shut my eyes and see the whole country, but it is like what I feel for Edward — all in dark moonlight. Oh! I trust him so! I bleed for him. I ?ould 77itike all my veins bleed out at a .sad thought about him. And from France to Switzerland and Italy. The sea sparkles just as if it said ' Come to the sun ;' and I am going. Edward calls. Shall I be punished for so much hapjiiness ? [ am too happy, I am too happy. " God bless my beloved at home I That is my chief prayer aow. 1 shall think of her when I am in the cathedi'ala. GEE AT NEWS FROM DAHLIA. 49 " Oh, my Father in heaven ! bless them all ! bless Rhoda ! forgive me ! " I can hear the steam of the steamer at the pier. Here is Edward. He says 1 may send his love to you. " Address : — "Mrs. Edward Ayrton, " "Poste Restante, " Lausanne, " Switzerland. " P.S. — Lausanne is where — but another time, and I will always tell yon the history of the places to instruct yon, poor heart in dull England. Adieu ! Good-bye and God bless my innocent at home, my dear sister. I love her. I never can forget her. The day is so lovely. It seems on purpose for us. Be sure you write on thin paper to Lausanne. It is on a blue lake ; you see snow mountains, and now there is a bell ringing — kisses from me ! we start. I must sign. " Dahlia." By the reading of this letter, Rhoda was caught vividly to the shore, and saw her sister borne away in the boat to the strange countries ; she travelled with her, following her with gliding speed through a multiplicity of shifting scenes, opal landscapes, full of fire and dreams, and in all of them a great bell towered. "Oh, my sweet! my own beauty!" she cried in Dahlia's language. Meeting Mrs. Sumfit, she called her "Mother Dumpling," as Dahlia did of old, affectionately, and kissed her, and ran on to Master Gammon, who was tramping leisurely on to the oatfield lying on toward the millholms. " My sister sends yon her love," she said brightly to the old man. Master Gammon responded with no remarkable flash of his eyes, and merely opened his mouth and shut it, as when a duck divides its bill, but fails to emit the custom- ary quack. " And to yon, little pigs ; and to you. Mulberry , and you, Dapple ; and you, and yon, and you." Rhoda nodded round to all the citizens of the farmyard ; and so eased her heart of its laughing bubbles. After which, she fell to a meditative walk of demurer joy, and had a 60 EUODA rLKMlNO. regret. It was simply that Dalilia's hurry in signing the letter, had rol)l)c(l licr of the delight of seeing " Dahlia Ayrton " writti-n ])rou(lly out, with its wonderful signifi- cation of the chaiigo in her life. That was a trifling matter; yet Rhoda felt the letter was not complete in the al)scnce of the biidal name. She fancied Dalilia to have meant, pei-hap.s, that she was Dahlia to her as of old, and not a stranger. "Dahlia ever; Dahlia nothing else for you," she heard her sister say. But how delicious and mournful, how terrible and sweet with moaning would " Dahlia Ayrton," the new name in the dear handwiitiug, have looked ! " And I have a brothei'-in-law," she thought, and her cheeks tingled. The banks of fern and foxglove, and the green young oaks fringing the cop.se, gi-ew rich in colour, as she reflected that this beloved unknown husband of her sister embi-aced her and her father as well ; even the old bent beggarman on the sandy ridge, though he had a starved frame and carried pitiless faggots, stood illumined in a soft warmth. Ilhoda could not go back to the house. It chanced that the farmer that morning had been smitten ■with the virtue of his wife's opinion of liobert, and her parting recommendation concerning him. " Have you a mind to either one of my two girls V" he put the r|nestion bluntly, finding himself alone with Hobert. R 'bcrt took a quick breath, and replied, " I have." '' Then make your choice," said the farmer, and tried to go about his business, but hung near Robert in the fields till he had asked : " Which one is it, my boy ? " Robert turned a blade of wheat in his mouth. " I tliink I shall leave her to tell that," was his answer. " Why, don't ye know which one you prefer to choose, man ?" quoth Mr. Fleming. " I mayn't know whether she prefers to choose me," said Roliei't. The farmer smiled. " You never can exactly reckon about them ; that's true." He was led to think: "Dahlia's the lass;" seeing that Robert had not had many oppox-tunities of speaking with her. " When my girls are wives, they'll do their work in the house," he pursued. " They may have a little bit o' pro])ei-ty in land, ye know, and they may have a share in — in gold. GREAT NEWS PEOM DAHLIA. 51 That's not to be reckoned on. We're an old family, Eobert, and I suppose we've our pride somewhere down. Anyhow, you can't look on my girls and not own they're superior girls. I've no notion of forcing them to clean, and dish up, and do dairying, if it's not to their turn. They're handy with th' needle. They dress conformably, and do the mil- linery themselves. And I know they say their prayers of a night. That I know, if that's a comfort to ye, and it should be, Kobert. For pray, and you can't go far wrong ; and it's particularly good for girls. I'll say no more." At the dinner-table, Rhoda was not present. Mr. Fleming fidgeted, blamed her and excused her, but as Robert appeared indifferent about her absence, he was confirmed in his idea that Dahlia attracted his fancy. They had finished dinner, and Master Gammon had risen, when a voice immediately recognized as the voice of Anthony Hackbut was heard in the front part of the house. Mr. Fleming went round to him with a dismayed face. " Lord ! " said Mrs. Sumfit, " how I tremble ! " Robert, too, looked grave, and got away from the house. The dread of evil news of Dahlia was common to them all ; yet none had mentioned it, Robert conceiving that it would be impertinence on his part to do so, the farmer, that the policy of permitting Dahlia's continued residence in London concealed the peril ; while Mrs. Sumfit flatly defied the threatening of a mischance to one so sweet and fair, and her favourite. It is the insincerity of persons of their class ; but one need not lay stress on the wilfulness of uneducated minds. Robert walked across the fields, walking like a man with an object in view. As he dropped into one of the close lanes ■which led up to Wrexby Hall, he saw Rhoda standing under an oak, her white morning-dress covered with sun-spots. His impulse was to turn back, the problem, how to speak to her, not being settled within him. But the next moment his blood chilled ; for he had perceived, though he had not felt simultaneously, that two gentlemen were standing near her, addressing her. And it was likewise manifest that she listened to them. These presently raised their hats and dis- appeared. Rhoda came on toward Robert. " You have forgotten your dinner," he said, with a queer sense of shame at dragging in the mention of that meal. "I have been too happy to eat," Rhoda replied. ^2 52 EHODA FLEMING. Robert glanced np the lane, but she gave no heed to thia indication, and asked : " Has uncle come ? " " Did you expect him ?" " I thought he would come." " What has made you happy ?** "Yon will h(>ar from uncle." " Shall I go and hear what those " Kobert checked himself, but it would have been better had he spoken out. Klioda's face from a light of interrogation lowered its look to contemj)t. She did not aft'ect the feminine simplicity which can so prettily misunderstand and ])ut by an implied accusation of thafc nature. Doubtless her sharp instinct served her by telling her that her contem])t would hui-t him shrewdly now. The foolishness of a man ha^nng much to say to a •woman, and not knowing how well, or whei-e the beginning of it might be, was perceptible about him. A shout from her father at the o]ien garden-gate, hurried on Rhoda to meet him. Old Anthony was at ^Ir. Fleming's elbow. "You know it? You have her letter, father?" said Rhoda, gaily, beneath the shadow of his forehead. " And a Queen of the Egyptians is what you might have been," said Anthony, with a speculating eye upon Kiioda's dark bright face. Rhoda put out her hand to him, but kept her gaze on her father. William Fleming relaxed the knot of his brows and lifted the letter. " Listen all ! This is from a daughter to her father." And he read, oddly accentuatiug the first syllables of the sentences : — " Dear Father, "My husband will bring me to see you when I return to dear England. I ought to have concealed nothing, I know. Try to forgive me. I hope you will. I shall always thiidc of you. God bless you ! I am, "Ever with respect, "Your dearly loving Daughter, " Dadlia.** GREAT NEWS TEOM DAHLIA. 53 "Dahlia Blant! " Said the farmer, turning his look from face to face. A deep fire of emotion was evidently agitating him, for the letter rustled in his hand, and his voice was uneven. Of this, no sign was given by his inespressH's features. The round brown eyes and the ruddy varnish on his cheeks were a mask upon grief, if not also upon joy. "Dahlia — what ? What's her name?" he resumed. *' Here — ' my husband will bring me to see you ' — who's her husband ? Has he got a name F And a blank envelope to her uncle here, who's kept her in comfort for so long ! And this is all she writes to me ! Will anyone spell out the meaning of it ?" " Dahlia was in great haste, father," said Rhoda. " Oh, ay, you ! — you're the one, I know," returned the farmer. " It's sister and sister, with you." " But she was very, very hurried, father. I have a letter from her, and I have only ' Dahlia ' written at the end — no other name." " And you suspect no harm of your sister." " Father, how can I imagine any kind of harm ?" " That letter, my girl, sticks to my skull as though it meant to say, 'You've not understood me yet.' I've read it a matter of twenty times, and I'm no nearer to the truth of it. But, if she's lying, here in this letter, what's she walk- ing on ? How long are we to wait for to hear ? I give you my word, Robert, I'm feeling for you as I am for myself. Or, wasn't it that one ? Is it this one F" He levelled his finger at Rhoda. " In any case, Robert, you'll feel for me as a father. I'm shut in a dark room with the candle blowa out. I've heard of a sort of fear you have in that dilemmer, lest you should lay your fingers on edges of sharp knives, and if I think a step — if I go thinking a step, and feel my way, I do cut myself, and I bleed, I do. Robert, just take and say, it wasn't that one." Such a statement would carry with it the confession that it was this one for whom he cared — this scornful one, this jilt, this brazen girl who could make appointments with gentlemen, or suffer them to speak to her, and subsequently look at him with innocence and with anger. * Believe me, Mr. Fleming, I feel for you as much as a man can," he said, uneasily, swaying half round as he spoke. 54 EHODA FLEMING. " Do yon snappot nnythinn; bad ?" The fnrmor ropoatod the question, like one wlio only wanted a eontiniiatiou of liis own suspicions to see the fact built up. " Robert, does this look like the letter of a married woman ? Is it daui,'hter- like — eh, man? Help another: I can't think for myself — • she ties my hands. Speak out." Robert set his eyes on Rhoda. He would have given much to have been able to utter, " I do." Her face was like an eager flower straining for light; the very beauty of it swelled his jealous passion, and he flattered himself with hia incapacity to speak an aljject lie to propitiate her. " She says she is married. We're bound to accept what she says." That w^as his answer. ^'' Is she married?" thundered the farmer. "Has she been and disgi-aced her mother in her grave ? What am I to think ? She's my flesh and blood. Is she " " Oh, hush, father!" Rhoda laid her hand on his arm. " What doubt can there be of Dahlia? You have forgotten that she is always truthful. Come away. It is shameful to stand here and listen to unmanly things." She turned a face of ashes upon Robert. " Come away, father. She is our own. She is my sister. A doubt of her is an insult to us." " But Robert don't doubt her — eh ?" The farmer was ali-eady half distriicted from his suspicions. " Have you any real doubt about the girl, Robert ?" " I don't trust myself to doubt anybody," said Robert. " You don't cast us ofl', my boy ?" " I'm a labourer on the farm," said Robert, and walked away. " He's got reason to feel this more'n the rest of us, ])oor lad ! It's a blow to him." With which the farmer struck his hand on Rhoda's shoulder. " I wish he'd set his heart on a safer young woman." Rhoda's shudder of revulsion was visible as she put her mouth up to kiss her father's cheek. INTEODUCES MES. LOVELL. 65 CHAPTER VIII. INTRODUCES MES. LOVELL. That is "Wrexby Hall, upon the hill between Penhurstand Wrexby : the white square mansion, with the lower di^awing. room windows one full bow of glass against the sunlight, and great single trees spotting the distant green slopes. From Queen Anne's Farm you could read the hour by the stretching of their shadows. Squire Blancove, who lived there, was an irascible, gouty man, out of humour with his time, and beginning, alas for him ! to lose all true faith ia his Port, though, to do him justice, he wrestled hard with this great heresy. His friends perceived the decay in his belief sooner than he did himself. He was sour in the even- ing as in the morning. There was no chirp in him when the bottle went round. He had never one hour of a humane mood to be reckoned on now. The day, indeed, is sad when we see the skeleton of the mistress by whom we suffer, but cannot abandon her. The squire drank, knowing that the issue would be the terrific, curse-begetting twinge in his foot; but, as he said, he was a man who stuck to his habits. It was over his Port that he had quarrelled with his rector oa the subject of hopeful Algernon, and the system he adopted with that young man. This incident has something to do with Rhoda's story, for it was the reason why Mrs. Lovell went to Wrexby Church, the spirit of that lady leading her to follow her own impulses, which were mostly in opposition. So, when perchance she visited the Hall, she chose not to accompany the squire and his subservient guests to Fen- hurst, but made a point of going down to the unoccupied Wrexby pew. She was a beauty, and therefore powerful ; otherwise her act of nonconformity would have produced bad blood between her and the squire. It was enough to have done so in any case ; for now, instead of sitting at home comfortably, and reading off the week's chronicle of sport while he nursed his leg, the unfor- tunate gentleman had to be up and away to FenhiTrst every Sunday morning, or who would have known that the old cause of his general abstention from Sabbath services lay iv the detestable doctrine of Wrexby's rector ? 56 RnODA FLKMIXG. Mrs. Lovell was now at the Hall, and it was Sunday mornintr aftiT breakfast. The lady 8tot)d like a rival head aiimnLT the other fjuests, listeniiiA FLEMING. through tho buzzing of liis uncertain grief, only sighing for jinswt'r. " It" ever you come up to Loiuhm, brother' Williiun John," said Anthony, " you mind you go about arm-iu-urm with me, or you'll be judging by appearances, and says you, 'Lor', Avhat a thousander fellow tiiis is !' and ' What a niil- lioncr fellow that is !' You'll be giving your millions and your thousands to the wrong people, when they haven't got a penny. All London '11 be topsy-turvy to you, unless you've got a guide, and he'll show you a shabby-coated, head-in-the gutter old man '11 buy up the lot. Kverj'body that doesn't know him says — look at him! but they that knows him — hats oir, I can tell you. And talk about lords ! We don't mind their coming- into the city, but they know the scent of cash. I've had a lord take oii" his hat to me. It's a fact, I have." In spite of the extreme caution Anthony had impressed upon his country relative that he should not judge by appeaiunces, he was nevertheless under an apprehension that the farmer's opinion of him, and the luxurious, almost voluj)tnoiis, enjoyment he had of it, were in peril. When he had purchased the well-probed fat goose, the shrimps, and the cheese, ho was only half-satistied. His ideas shot boldly at a bottle of wine, and he employed a summer-lighted even- ing in going a round of wine-merchants' placards, and look- ing out for the cheapest bottle he could buy. And he would have bought one — he had sealing-wax of his own and could have stamped it with the olliee-stamp of IJovne's Bank tor that matter, to make it as dignified and costly as the vaunted red seals and green seals of the placards — he would have bought one, had he not, by one of his lucky mental illumi- nations, recollected that it was within his power to procure an order to taste wiTie at the Docks, where you may get as much wine as j'ou like out of big sixpenny glasses, and try cask after cask, walking down gas-lit paths between the huge bellies of wine which groan to be tapped and ti-ied, that men may know them. The idea of paying two sliillings and sixpf nee for one miserable bottle vanished at the richly- coloured ])rospect. " That'll show him something of what London is," thought Anthony; and a companion thought told him in addition that the farmer, with a skinful of wine, would emerge into the open-air innigining no small things of tho man who could gain admittance into those marvellous DAHLIA IS NOT VISIBLE. 69 caverns "By George! it's like a boy's story-'boolv," cried Anthony, in liis soul, and he chuckled over the vision of the farmer's amazement — acted it with his arms extended, and his hat unseated, and plunged into whfeezy tits of laughter. He met his guests at the station. Mr. f^leming was soberly attired in what, to Anthony's London eye, was a curiosity costume ; but the broad brim of the hat, the square , cut of the brown coat, and the leggings, struck him as being very respectable, and worthy of a presentation at any Bank in London. " You stick to a leather purse, brother William John ? " he inquired, with an artistic sentiment for things in keeping. " I do," said the farmer, feeling seriously at the button over it. " All right ; I shan't ask ye to show it in the street," Anthony rejoined, and smote Rhoda's hand as it hung : " Glad to see your old uncle — are ye ? " Rhoda repliecl quietly that she was, but had come with the principal object of seeing her sister. "There!" cried Anthony, "you never get a compliment out of this gal. She gives ye the nut, and you're to crack it, and thei-e may be, or there mayn't be, a kernel inside — she don't care." " But there ain't much in it ! " the farmer ejaculated, withdrawing his fingers from the button they had been teas- ing for security since Anthony's question about the purse. "Not much — eh! brother William John?" Anthony threw up a puzzled look. " Not much baggage — I see that!" he exchximed ; " and, Lord be thanked ! no trunks. Aha, my dear" — he turned to Rhoda— "you remember your lesson, do ye ? Now, mark me — I'll remember you for it. Do you know, my dear," he said to Rhoda confidentially, "that sixpenn'orth of chaiS which I made the cabman pay for — there was the cream of it ! — that was better than Peruvian bark to my constitution. It was as good to me as a sniff of sea-breeze and no excursion expenses. I'd like another, just to feel young again, when I'd have backed myself to beat — cabmen ? Ah ! I've stood up, when I was a young 'un, and shut up a Cheap Jack at a fair. Circulation's the soul o' chaff. That's why I don't mind tackling cabmen — they sit all day, and all they've got to say is ' rat-tat,' and they've done. But I let the boys roar. I know what I 70 iniODA FLKMINO. was whon a boy myself. I've got devil in mc — never you fear — but's it all on the side of the law. Now, let's olT, for the gentlemen are stai-in' at you, which "won't hurt ye, ye know, but makes me jealous." Uefoi-e the party moved away from tlie platform, a shai-p tussle took jtlaee between Anthony and the faiiiier as tu the porterage of the bulky bag; but it being only half-earnest, the farmer did not put out his strength, and Anthony had his way. "I rather astonished you, brother William John," he said, when thev were in the street. The farmer admitted that he was stronger than he looked. " Don't you judge by appearance.s, that's all," Anthony remarked, setting down the bag to lay his tinger on one side of his nose for iinpi-essiveness. " Now, there we leave London Bridge to the right, and we slioulder away to the left, and quiet parts." He seized the bag anew. " Just listen. That's the roaring of cataracts of gold you hear, brother William John. It's a good notion, ain't it ? Hark ! - I got that notion from one of your penny papers. You can buy anj amount for a penny, now-a-days — poetry up in a corner, stories, tales o' tem]itation — one fellow cut his lucky with his master's cash, dashed away to Australia, made millions, fit to be a lord, and there he was ! liable to the law ! and everybody bowing their hats and their heads oH" to him, and his knees knocking at the sight of a policeman — a man of a red complexion, full habit of body, enjoyed his dinner and his wine, and on account of his turn- ing white so often, tluy called him — ' Sealing-wax and Parch- ment' was one name; 'Carrots and tuinips' was another; ' Bliimnnge and something,' and ."io on. Fancy his having to pa}' hilf his income in pensions to chaps who could have had him out of his town or country mansion and ])0])ped into gaol in a jiffy. And found out at last 1 Them tales set you thinking. Once I was an idle voting scaramouch. But you can buy every idea that's useful to you for a ])enny. I tried the halfpenny journals. Cheapness ain't always profitable. The moral is, Make your money, and you may buy all the rest." Discoursing thus by the way, and resisting the farmer's occasional efforts to relieve him of the bag, with the obser- vation that aijpearances weredeceiviiig, and that he intended, DAHLIA IS NOT VISIBLE. 71 please tis Malcer, to live and turn over a little more interest vet, Anthony brouo-ht them to Mrs. Wicklow's house. Mrs. Wicklow pi'omised to put them into the track of the omni- buses runnino- toward Dahlia's abode in the South-west, and Mary Ann Wicklow, who had a burning desire in her bosom to behold even the outside shell of her friend's new grandeur, undertook very disinterestedly to accompany them. An- thony's strict injunction held them due at a lamp-post out- side Boyne's Bank, at half -past three o'clock in the afternoon. " My love to Dahly," he said. " She was always a head and shoulders over my size. Tell her, when she rolls by in her cai^riage, not to mind me. I got my own notions of value. And if that Mr. Ayrton of hers '11 bank at Boyne's, I'll behave to him like a customer. This here's the girl for my money." He touched Rhoda's arm, and so disappeared. The farmer chidded her for her cold manner to her uncle, murmuring aside to her : " You heard what he said." Rhoda was frozen with her heart's expectation, and insensible to hints or repi'oof. The people who entered the omnibus seemed to her stale phantoms bearing a likeness to every one she had known, save to her beloved whom she was about to meet, after long separation. She marvelled pityingly at the sort of madness which kept the streets so lively for no reasonable purpose. When she Avas on her feet again, she felt for the first time, that she was nearing the sister for whom she hungered, and the sensation beset her that she had landed in a foreign country. Mary Ann Wicklow chattered all the while to the general ear. It was her pride to be the discoverer of Dahlia's terrace. "J^ot for worlds would she enter the house," she said, in a general tone ; she knowing better than to present herself where downright entreaty did not invite her. Rhoda left her to count the numbers along the terrace- walk, and stood out in the road that her heart might select Dahlia's habitation from the other hueless residences. She fixed upon one, but she was wrong, and her heart sank. The fair Mary Ann fought her and beat her by means of a care- ful reckoning, as she remarked : — " I keep my eyes open ; ISTumber 15, is the corner house, the bow- window, to a certainty." Gardens were in front of the houses ; or, to speak more correctly, strips of garden- walks. A cab was drawn up close 72 EHODA FLEMING. by tho shrnh-covcrcd iron gate leading np to Ifo. 15. Mary Ann luuTiod tliem on, dcclai-ing tliat they might be too late even now at a couple of dozen paces distant, seeing that London cabs, crawlers as they usually -were, could^ when reciuircd, and paid for it, do their business like lightning. Her observation was illustrated the nionicnt al'toi- they had left her in the rear; for a gentleman suddenly s])rang across the pavement, jumped into a cab, and was whirled away, with as mucli apparent magic to provincial eyes, as if a pantomimic trick had been performed. llhoda pressed forward a step in advance of her father. " It may have been her husband," she thought, and trembled. The curtains up in the drawing-room were moved as by a hand; but whei-e was Dahlia's face? Dahlia knew that they were coming, and she was not on the look-out for them ! — a strange conflict of facts, over which Rhoda knitted her black brows, so that she looked menacing to the maid opening the door, whose " Oh, if you please, Miss," came in contact with "My sister — ^Irs. , she expects me. I mean, Mrs. " but no other name than "Dahlia" would fit itself to Rhoda's mouth. " Ayrton," said the maid, and recommenced, " Oh, if you please, Miss, and you are the young lady, Mrs. Ayrton is very sorry, and have left word, would you call again to- morrow, as she have made a pressing appointment, and was sure you would excuse her, but her husband was very anxious for her to go, and could not put it off, and was very sorry, but would you call again to-moiTow at twelve o'clock ? and punctually she woultl be here." The maid smiled as one who had fairly accomplished the recital of her lesson. Rhoda was stunned. " Is Mrs. Ayrton at home ? — Not at home ?" she said. " No : don't ye hear ?" quoth the farmer, sternly. " She had my letter — do you know ?" Rhoda appealed to the maid. " Oh, yes, ]\Iiss. A letter from the country." "This morning?" "Yes, Miss; this morning." "And she has gone out? What time did she go out? When will she be in ?" Her father plucked at her dress. " Best not go making the young woman repeat herself. She says, nobody's at DAHLIA IS NOT VISIBLE. 73 home to ask us in. There's no more, then, to trouLle her for." " At twelve o'clock to-morrow ?" Rhoda faltered. " \Yould you, if you please, call again at twelve o'clock to-morrow, and punctually she would be here," said the maid. The farmer hung his head and turned. Rhoda followed him from the garden. She was immediately plied with queries and interjections of wonderment by Miss Wicklow, ajid it was not until she said : " You saw him go out, didn't you ? — into the cab ?" that Rhoda awakened to a meaning in her gabble. Was it Dahlia's husband whom they had seen ? And if so, why was Dahlia away from her husband ? She questioned in her heart, but not for an answer, for she allowed no sus- picions to live. The farmer led on with his plodding country step, burdened shoulders, and ruddy-jowled, serious face, not speaking to Rhoda, wlio had no desire to hear a word from him, and let him be. jNlary Ann steered him and called from behind the turnings he was to take, while she speculated aloud to Rhoda upon the nature of the business that had torn Dahlia from the house so inopportunely. At last she announced that she knew what it was, but Rhoda failed to express curiosity. IMary Ann was driven to whisper some- thing about strange things in the way of purchases. At that moment the farmer threw up his umbrella, shouting for a cab, and Rhoda ran up to him : " Oh, father, why do we want to ride?" "Yes, I tell ye!" said the farmer, chafing against his coat-collar. " It is an expense, when we can walk, father." " What do I care for th' expense ? I shall ride." He roared again for a cab, and one came that took theija in ; after which, the farmer, not being spoken to, became gravely placid as before. They were put down at Boyne's Bank. Anthony was on the look-out, and signalled them to stand away some paces fi^om the door. They were kept about a quarter of an hour waiting between two tides of wayfarers, which hustled them one way and another, when out, at last, came the old, broad, bent figui^e, with little finicking steps, and hurried past them head foremost, his arms narrowed ■cross a bulgy breast. He stopped to make sure that they 74 RnODA FLEMING. ■were followinp^, beckoned with liis chin, and procccfled at a mighty rate. Marvellous was his rounding of corners, his threading of obstructions, his skilful diplomacy with pas- sengers. Presently they lost sight of him, and stood lieu il- dered; but while they were deliberating they heard his voice. He was above them, having issued from two swing- ing brio^ht doors; and he laughed and nodded, as he ran down the steps, and made signs, by Avhich they Avere to understand that he was relieved of a weight. " I've done that twenty year of my lil'e, brother William John," he said. " Eh ? Perhaps you didn't guess I w us worth some thousands when I got away from you just now ? Let any chap try to stop me ! They may just as well try to stop a railway train. iSteam's up, and I'm oif." He laughed and wiped bis forehead. Slightly vexed at the small amount of discoverable astonishment on the fai-mer's face, he continued : " You don't thiidv much of it. TVhy, there ain't another man but myself Boyne's Bank would trust. They've trusted me thirty year: — why shouldn't they go on trust iiiLf me another thirty year? A good character, brother William John, goes on compound-interesting, just like good coin. Didn't you feel a sort of heat as I brushed by you — eh ? That was a matter of one — two — three — four ;" Anthony watched the farmer as his voice swelled up on the heighten- ing numbers : " five — six — six thousand pounds, brother "William John. People must think something of a man to trust him with that sum pretty near every day of their lives, Sundays excepted — eh ? don't you think so r'" He dwelt upon the immense ccmfidence reposed in him, and the terrible temptation it Avould be to some men, and how they ought to thank their stars that they were never thrown in the way of such a temptation, of which he I'eally thought nothing at all — nothing ! until the farmer's coun- tenance was lightened of its air of oppression, for a puzzle was dissolved in his brain. It was now manifest to him that Anthony Avas trusted in this extraordinary manner because the heads and managers of Boyne's Bank knew the old man to be possessed of a certain very respectable sum : in all probability they held it in their coffers for safety and credited him Avith the amount. Nay, more; it was fair to imagine that the guileless old fellow, Avho conceived himself DAHLIA IS NOT VISIBLE. 75 to be SO deep, had let tliem get it all into their hands Tvith- out any suspicion of their prominent object in doing so. Mr. Fleming said, "Ah, yes, surely." He almost looked shrewd as he smiled over Anthony's hat. The healthy exercise of his wits relieved his appre- hensive paternal heart ; and when he mentioned that Dahlia had not been at home when he called, he at the same time sounded his hearer for excuses to be raised on her behalf, himself clumsily suggesting one or two, as to show that he was willing to swallow a very little for comfort. " Oh, of coui^se !" said Anthony, jeeriugly. " Out ? If you catch her in, these next three or four days, you'll be lucky. Ah, bi-other William John '" The farmer, half frightened by Anthony's dolorous shake of his head, exclaimed : " What's the matter, man ?" " How proud I should be if only you was in a way to bank at Boyne's !" " Ah !" went the farmer in his turn, and he plunged his chin deep in his neckerchief. " Perhaps some of your family will, some day, brother William John." " Happen, some of my family do, brother Anthony!" " Will is what I said, brother William John ; if good gals, and civil, and marry decently — eh ?" and he faced about to Rhoda who was walking with Miss Wicklow. " What does she look so down about, my dear ? iN'ever be down. I don't mind you telling your young man, whoever he is ; and I'd like him to be a strapping young six-footer I've got in my eye, who faims. What does he farm with to make farming answer now-a-days P Why, he farms with bi-ains. You'll find that in my last week's Joiu-nal, brother William John, and thinks I, as I conned it — the farmer ought to read that ! You may tell any young man you like, my dear, that your old uncle's fond of ye." On their ari-ival home, Mrs. Wicklow met them with a letter in her hand. It was for Rhoda from Dahlia, saying that Dahlia was grieved to the heart to have missed her dear father and her darling sister. But her husband had insisted upon her going out to make particular purchases, and do a dozen things ; and he was extremely sorry to have been obliged to take her away, but she hoped to see her dear sister and her father very, very soon. She wished she were 76 EHODA FT.EMIXO. her o^wTi mistress that she inii^ht i-un to thom, but men when thej are husbaiuls recjuire so much waiting on that she coukl never call live minutes her own. She would entreat them to call to-mori-ONV, only she would then be moving to her new lodgings. " Ihit, oh ! my dear, my blessed Hhoda !" the letter concluded, " do keep fast in your heart that 1 do love you .so, and ])ray that we may meet soon, as I ]>ray it every night and all day long. i>i'g father to stop till we meet. Things will soon be arranged. They must. Oh! oh, my Khuda, love! how handsome you have grown. It is very well to be fair for a time, but the brunettes have the hajtpiest lot. They last, and when we blonde ones cry or grow thin, oh! what objects we become !" There were some final affectionate words, but no further explanations. The wrinkles again settled on the farmer's mild, uncom- plaining forehead. Khoda said : " Let us wait, father." When alone, she locked the letter against her heart, as to suck the secret meaning out of it. Thinking over it was useless ; except for this one thought : how did her sister know she had grown very handsome ? Perhaps the house- maid had prattled. CHAPTER XI. AN INDICATIVE DUET IN A MINOR KEY. DAnr.TA, the perplexity to her sister's heart, lay RtretcTied at full length upon the sofa of a pleasantly furnished London drawing-room, sobbing to herself, with her handkerchief across her eyes. She had cried passion out, and sobbed now for comfort. She lay in her rich silken dress like the wreck of a joyful creature, while the large red Winter sun rounded to evening, and threw deep-coloured beams against the wall above her head. They touched the nut-brown hair to vivid thi-eads of fire: but she lay faceless. Utter languor and the dread of looking at her «^'elids in the glass kept her prostrate. AN INDICATIVE DUET. 77 So, fhe darkness closed her about; the sickly gas-lamps of the street showing her as a shrouded body. A girl came in to spread the cloth for dinner, and went through her duties with the stolidity of the London lodgine- house maidservant, poking a clogged fire to perdition, and repressing a songful spirit. Dahlia knew well what was being done ; she would have eriven much to have saved her nostrils from the smell of dinner ; it was a great immediate evil to her sickened senses ; but she had no energy to call out, nor will of any kind. The odours floated to her, and passively she combatted them. At first she was nearly vanquished ; the meat smelt so acrid, the potatoes so sour ; each afflicting vegetable asserted itself peculiai'ly ; and the bread, the salt even, on the wings of her morbid fancy, came steaming about her, subtle, pene- trating, thick, and hateful, like the pressure of a cloud out of which disease is shot. Such it seemed to her, till she could have shrieked ; but only a few fresh tears started down her cheeks, and she lay enduring it. Dead silence and stillness hung over the dinner-service, when the outer door below was opened, and a light foot sprang up the stairs. There entered a young gentleman in evening dress, with a loose black wrapper drooping from his shoulders. He looked on the table, and then glancing at the sofa, said : " Oh, there she is !" and went to the window and whistled. After a minute of great patience, he turned his face back to the room again, and commenced tapping his foot on the carpet. " Well ?" he said, finding these indications of exemplary self-command unheeded. His voice was equally powerless to provoke a sign of animation. He now displaced his hat, and said, " Dahlia !" She did not move. " I am here to very little purpose, then," he remarked. A fluttering fall of her bosom was perceptible. " For heaven's sake, take away that handkerchief, my good child ! Why have you let your dinner get cold ? Here," he lifted a cover ; " here's roast-beef. Tou like it — - why don't you eat it ? That's only a small piece of the 78 EnODA FLEMING. general inconsistency, I know. And why haven't they pnt champagne on tlie table for yon ? You lose your spirits without it. If you took it Avhen those moody iits came on — but tliere's no advising a Avomaii to do anything foi- her own good. Dalilia, wi ' you do mc the favour to speak two or tliree words with me before I go ? I would have dim>d here, but I have a man to meet me at the Club. Of what mortal service is it shamming the insensible ? You've produced the re(|uired effect, I am as uncomfortable as I need be. Absolutely ! " Well," seeing that words were of no avail, he summed ■up expostulation and reproach in this sigh of resigned jthilo- BO])hy : " I am going. Let me see — I have my Temple keys? — ves ! I am afraid that even when vou are inclineil to be gi-acious and look at me, I shall not be visible to you for some days. I start for Lord Lliing's to-mori-ow morning at five. I meet my father there by appointment. I'm afraid we shall have to stay over Chi'istraas. Good-bye." He pau-ed. " Good-bye, my dear." Two or three steps nearer the door, he said, " By the way, do you want anything ? Money r* — do you happen to want any money ? I will send a blank cheque to-morrow. I have suilicient ..ir both of us. I shall tell the landlady to order your Christmas dinner. How about wine ? There is cham- pagne, I know, and bottled ale. Sherry ? I'll drop a letter to my wine-merchant ; I think the sherry's running dry." Her sense of hearing was now alHicted in as gross a manner as had been her sense of smell. She could not have spoken, though her vitality had pressed for S])eeeh. It would have astonished him to hear that his solicitude concerning pro- vender for her during liis absence was not esteemed a kind- ness ; for surely it is a kindly thing to think of it ; and for •whom but for one for whom he cared would he be counting the bottles to be left at her disposal, insomuch that the paucity of the bottles of sherry in the establishment dis- tressed his mental faculties ? " Well, good-bye," he said, finally. The door closed. Had Dahlia's misery been in any degree simulated, her eyes now, as well as her ears, would have taken positive assurance of his departure. But with the removal of her handkerchief, the loathsome sight of the dinner-table would have saluted her, and it had already caused her suifering AN INDICATIVE DUET. 79 enough. She chose to remain as she was, saying to herself, " I am dead ;" and softly revelling in that corpse-like senti- ment. She scarcely knew that the door had opened again. " Dahlia !" She heard her name pronounced, and more entreatingly, and closer to her. " Dahlia, my poor girl !" Her hand was pressed. It gave her no shudders. " I am dead," she mentally repeated, for the touch did not run up to her heart and stir it. " Dahlia, do be reasonable ! I can't leave you like this. We shall be separated for some time. And what a miser- able fire you've got here ! You have agreed with me that we are acting for the best. It's very hard on me ! I try what I can to make you comf — happy ; and really, to see you leaving your dinner to get cold ! Your hands are like ice. The meat won't be eatable. You know I'm not my own master. Come, Dahly, my darling !" He gently put his hand to her chin, and then drew away the handkerchief. Dahlia moaned at the exposure of her tear-stained face she turned it languidly to the wall. " Are you ill, my dear ?" he asked. Men are so considerately practical ! He begged urgently to be allowed to send for a doctor. But women, when they choose to be unhappy, will not accept of practical consolations ! She moaned a refusal to see the doctor. Then what can I do for her F he naturally thought, and he naturally uttered it. " Say good-bye to me," he whispered. " And my pretty one will write to me. I shall reply so punctually ! I don't like to leave her at Christmas; and she will give me a line of Italian, and a little French — mind her accents, though ! — and she needn't attempt any of the nasty German — kshrra- houzzra-hratz ! — which her pretty lips can't do, and won't do; but only French and Italian. Why, she learnt to sjicak Italian ! ' La dolcezza ancor deniro me suona.' Don't you remember, and made such fun of it at first ? ' Amo zoo ;' * 110 amo me .'" my sweet !" This was a specimen of the baby-lover talk, which is charming in its season, and may be pleasantly cajoling to a 80 RnODA FLEMINa. loving woman at .all times, save when she is in Dahlia's con- dition. It will sei-ve even then, or she will pass it forrrivinq-ly, as not the food she for a moment i-ei|uire.s; but it must be pni-ely simple in its utterance, otherwise she detects the poor chiciineiy, anr, tluiiigh ho was by no means answerable for a young mail's follies. He was a little frightened by the farmer's having said that Dahlia, according to her own declaration Avas married, and therofoi'e himself the more anxious to see !Mr. Algernon, and hear the truth from his estimable oifspring, whom he again stigmatized as a curse terrible to him as his gouty foot, but nevertheless just as little to be left to his own devices. The farmer bowed to these observations ; as also when the squire counselled him, for his own sake, not to talk of his misfortune all over the parish. " I'm not a likely man for that, scpiire ; but there's no tellinGT where gossips get their crumbs. It's about. It's about." " About my son ?" cried the squire. "My daughter!" " Oh, well, good day," the squire resumed more cheer- fully. " I'll go down to Fairly, and you cant ask more than that." When the farmer was oiit of the house and out of hearing, he rebuked llobert for the inconsiderate rashness of his behaviour, and pointed out how he, the farmer, by being patient and peaceful, had attained to the object of his visit. Robert laughed without defending himself. " I shouldn't ha' known ye," the farmer repeated fre- quently ; " I shouldn't ha' known ye, Robert." " No, I'm a triiie changed, may be," Robert a^ri'eed. " I'm going to claim a holiday of you. I've told Rhoda that if Dahlia's to be found, I'll find her, and I can't do it by stick- ing here. Give me three weeks. The land's asleep. Old Gammon can hardly turn a furrow the Avi-ong way. Tliere's nothing to do, which is his busiest occupation, when he's not interrupted at it." " Alas' Gammon's a rai*e old man," said the farmer, emphatically. " So I say. Else, how would you see so many farms flourishing !" "Come, Robert: you hit th' old man hard: you should leai'u to forgive." AT FAFRLY PARK". 113 " So I do, and a telling blow's a man's best road to charity. I'd forgive the squire and many another, if I had them within two feet of my fist." " Do you forgive my girl Rhoda for putting of you off ?" Robert screwed in his cheek. " Well, yes, I do," he said. " Only it makes me feel thirsty, that's all." The farmer remembered this when they had entered the farm. "Our beer's so poor, Robert," he made apology; "but Rhoda shall get you some for you to try, if you like. Rhoda, Robert's solemn thirsty." " Shall I ?" said Rhoda, and she stood awaiting his bid- ding. " I'm not a thirsty subject," replied Robert. " You know I've avoided drink of any kind since I set foot on this floor. But when I drink," he pitched his voice to a hard, sparkling heartiness, " I drink a lot, and the stuff must be strong. I'm very much obliged to you. Miss Rhoda, for what you're so kind as to offer to satisfy my thirst, and yoa can't give better, and don't suppose that I'm complaining ; but your father's right, it is rather weak, and wouldn't break the tooth of my thirst if I drank at it till Gammon left off thinking about his dinner." With that he announced his approaching departure. The farmer dropped into his fireside chair, dumb and spiritless. A shadow was over the house, and the inha- bitants moved about their domestic occupations silent as things that feel the thunder-cloud. Before sunset Robert was gone on his long walk to the station, and Rhoda felt a •woman's great envy of the liberty of a man, who has not, if it pleases him not, to sit and eat grief among familiar imao-es in a home that f ui-nishes its altai'-flame. 114 EQODA FLEJIINO. CHAPTER XVL AT FAIRLY rAKK. Fairly, Lord Ell hire's seat in Hampsliire, lay over the Waiboach river; a white mansion among f^reat oaks, in view of the summer sails and winter masts of the yachting squadron. The house was ruled, during the congregation of the Christmas guests, by charming Mrs. Lovell, who relieved the invalid Lady of the house of the many serious cares attending the reception of visitors, and did it all with ease. Under her sovereignty the place was delightful, and if it •was by repute pleasantor to young men than to any other class, it will be admitted that she sat is Hud those who are loudest in giving tongue to praise. Edward and Algernon journeyed down to Fairly together, after the confidence which the astute young lawyer had been compelled to repose in his cousin. Sir William Blancove ■was to be at Fairly, and it was at his father's pointed request that Edward had accepted Mrs. Lovell's invita- tion. Half in doubt as to the lady's disposition toward him, Edward eased his heart with sneers at the soft, sanguinary graciousness they were to expect, and racked mythology for spiteful comparisons ; while Algernon vehe- mently defended her with a battering fire of British adjectives in superlative, lie as much as hinted, under instigation, that he was entitled to defend her; and his claim being by-and-by yawningly allowed by Edward, and presum- ing that he now had Edward in his power and need not fear him, he exhibited his weakness in the guise of a costly gem, that he intended to present to Mrs. Lovell — an opal set in a cross pendant from a necklace ; a really fine opal, coquet- ting with the lights of every gem that is known : it shot succinct red Hashes, and gi-een,and yellow ; the emerald, the amethyst, the topaz lived in it, and a remote ruby ; it was veined with lightning hues, and at times it slept in a milky- cloud, innocent of fire, quite maidenlike. " That will suit her," was Edward's remark. " I didn't want to get anything common," said Algernon, making the gem play before liis eyes. "A pretty stone," said Edward. AT PAIKLY PARK. Il5 ** Do you tliink so ? " "Very pretty iTideed.'* *' Harlequin pattern." " To be presented to Columbine I" " The Harlequin pattern is of the best sort, yon tnow. Perhaps you like the watery ones best P Tliis is fresh from Russia. There's a set I've my eye on. I shall complete it in time. I want Peggy Lovell to wear the jolliest opals in the world. It's rather nice, isn't it ?" " Its a splendid opal," said Edward. " She likes opals," said Algernon. " She'll take your meaning at once," said Edward. " How ? I'll be hanged if I know what my meaning is, Ned." "Don't you know the signification of your gift ?" "Not a bit." " Oh ! you'll be Oriental when you present it." "The deuce I shall !" " It means, 'You're the prettiest widow in the world."* " So she is. I'll be right there, old boy." " And, ' You're a rank, right-down widow, and no mistake you're everything to everybody; not half so innocent as you look : you're green as jealousy, red as murder, yellow as jaundice, and put on the whiteness of a virgin when you ought to be blushing like a penitent.' In short, ' You have no heart of your own, and you pretend to possess half a dozen : you're devoid of one steady beam, and play tricks with every scale of colour : you're an arrant widow, and that's what you are.' An eloquent gift, Algy." " Gad, if it means all that, it'll be rather creditable to me," said Algernon. " Do opals mean widows ? " " Of course," was the answer. "Well, she is a widow, and T suppose she's going to remain one, for she's had lots of offers. If I marry, a girl I shall never like her half as much as Peggy Lovell, She's clone me up for every other woman living. She never ts me feel a fool with her ; and she has a way, by Jove, of looking at me, and letting me know she's up to my thoughts and isn't angry. What's the use of my thinking of her at all ? She d never go to the Colonies, and live in a loge hut and make cheeses, while I tore about on horseback: gathering cattle." i2 116 RHODA ''LEMINQ. " 1 don't think she would," observed Edward, emphati. cally ; " 1 don't think she would." " And I shall never have money. Confound stingy parents ! It's a question whether I shall get Wrcxby : there's no entail. I'm heir to the governor's temper and his gout, I dare say. He'll do as he likes with the estate. I call it beastly unfair." Edwaid asked how much the opal had cost. " Oh, nothing," said Algernon ; " that is, I never pay for jewellery." Edward was curious to know how he managed to obtain it. " Why, you see," Algernon explained, " they, the jewellers — I've got two or three in hand — the fellows are acquainted with my position, and they speculate on my expectations. There is no harm in that if they like it. 1 look at their trinkets, and say, ' I've no money ;' and they Bay, ' Never mind ;' and I don't mind much. The under- standing is, that I pay them when I inherit." " In gout and bad temper ?" " Gad, if I inherit nothing else, they'll have lots of that for indemnification. It's a good system, Ned ; it enables a young fellow like me to get through the best years of his life — which I take to be his youth — without that squalid poverty bothering him. You can make presents, and wear a pin or a ring, if it takes your eye. You look well, and you make yourself agreeable ; and I see nothing to complain of in that." " The jewellei'S, then, have established an institution to correct one of the errors of Providrnce." " Oh ! put it in your long-winded way, if you like," said Algernon ; " all I know is, that I should often have wanted a five pound note, if— that is if I hadn't happened to be dressed like a gentleman. With your prospects, Ned, I should propose to charming Peggy to-morrow morning early. We mustn't let her go out of the family. If I can't have her, I'd rather you would." " You forget the incumbrances on one side," said Edward, his face darkening. "Oh! that's all to be managed," Algernon rallied him. " Why, Ned, you'll have twenty-thousand a-year,_if you have a penny ; and you'll go into Parliament, and give dinners, AT FAIRLY PAEK. 117 and a woman like Peggj Lovell 'd intrigue for you like the deuce." " A great deal too like," Edward muttered. " As for that pretty girl," continued Algernon ; but Edward peremptorily slopped all speech rcga-ding Dahlia. His desire was, while he made holiday, to shut the past behind a brazen gate ; which being communicated sympa- thetically to his cousin, the latter chimed to it in boisterous shouts of anticipated careless jollity at Fairly Park, crying out how they would hunt and snap fingers at Jews, and all mortal sorrows, and have a fortnight, or three weeks, perhaps a full month, of the finest life possible to man, with good horses, good dinners, good wines, good society, at com- mand, and a queen of a woman to rule and order everything. Edward affected a disdainful smile at the prospect ; but was in reality the weaker of the two in his thirst for it. They arrived at Fairly in time to dress for dinner, and in the drawing-room Mrs. Lovell sat to receive them. She looked up to Edward's face an imperceptible half-second longer than the ordinary form of welcome accords — one of the looks which are nothing at all when there is no spiritual apprehension between young people, and are so much when there is. To Algernon, who was gazing opals on her, she simply gave her fingers. At her right hand, was Sir John Capes, her antique devotee ; a pure milky-white old gentle- man, with sparkling fingers, who played Apollo to his Daphne, and was out of breath. Lord Suckling, a boy with a boisterous constitution, and a guardsman, had his place near her left hand, as if ready to seize it at the first whisper of encouragement or opportunity. A very little lady of seventeen. Miss Adeline Gosling, trembling with shyness under a cover of demureness, fell to Edward's lot to conduct down to dinner, where he neglected her disgracefully. His father. Sir William, was present at the table, and Lord Elliug, with whom he was in repute as a talker and a wit. Quickened with his host's renowned good wine (and the bare renown of a wine is inspiriting), Edward pressed to be brilliant. He had an epigrammatic turn, and though his mind was prosaic when it ran alone, he could appear in- ventive and fanciful with the rub of other minds. Now, at a table where good talking is cared for, the triumphs of the excelling tongue are not for a moment to be despised, even 118 EnODA FLEMING. by tlie hncre appetite of the monster Vanity, For a year, Edward had abjured this feast. Before the birds apyjeared and the champiiLfiie had ceased to make its circle, he felt that he was no\» at home again, and that the term of his wandering away from society was one of folly. He felt the ■joy and vigour of a creature returned to his element. Why had he ever quitted it ? Already he looked back upon Dahlia from a prodigious distance. He knew that there was something to be smoothed over ; something written in the book of facts which had to be smeared out, and he seemed to do it, w^hile he drank the babbling Avine and heard himself talk. Not one man at that table, as he i-e- flected, would consider tho bond which held him in any serious degree binding. A lady is one thing, and a girl of the class Dahlia had sprung from altogether another. He could not help imagining the sort of appearance she would make there ; and the thought even was a momentary clog upon his tongue. IIow he used to despise these people ! Especially he had despised the young men as brainless cowai'ds in regard to their views of women and conduct toward them. All that was changed. He fancied now that they, on the contrary, would despise him, if only they could be aware of the lingering sense he entertained of liis being in bondage under a sacred obligation to a farmer's daughter. But he had one thing to discover, and that was, why Sir William had made it a peculiar request that he should come to meet him here. Could the desire possibly be to reconcile him with Mrs. Lovell ? His common sense rejected the idea at once. Sir William boasted of her Avit and tact, and ad- mired her beauty, but Edward rcmombeied his having responded tacitly to his estimate of her character, and Sir William was not the man to coui't the alliance of his son with a woman like !Mrs. Lovell. He perceived that his father and the fair widow frequently took counsel together. Edward laughed at the notion that the grave senior had himself become fascinated, but Avithout utterly scouting it, until he found that the little lady whom he luid led to dinner the first day, was an heiress ; and from that, and other indi- cations, he exactly divined the nature of his father's provi- dent Avishes. But this revelation rendered Mrs. Lovell's behaviour yet more e.xtraoi-dinary. Could it bo credited that she was abetting Sir William's schemes Avith all her AT FAIKLT PARK. 119 woman's craft? "Has she," thought Edward, "become so indifferent to me as to care for my welfare ?" He deter- mined to pnt her to the test. He made love to Adeline Gosling. N'othing that he did disturbed the impenetrable complacency of Mrs. Lovell. She threw them together as she shuffled the guests. She really seemed to him quite in- different enough to care for his welfare. It was a point in the mysterious ways of women, or of widows, that Edward's experience had not yet come across. All the parties imme- diately concerned were apparently so desperately acquiescing in his suit, that he soon grew uneasy. Mrs. Lovell not only shuffled him into places with the raw heiress, but with the child's mother ; of whom he spoke to Algernon as of one too strongly breathing of matrimony to appease the cravings of an eclectic mind. " Make the path clear for me, then," said Algernon, " if you don't like the girl. Pitch her tales about me. Say, I've got a lot in me, though I don't let it out. The game's up between you and Peggy Lovell, that's clear. She don't forgive you, my boy." " Ass !" muttered Edward, seeing by the light of his per- ception, that he was too thoroughly foi-given. A principal charm of the life at Fairly to him was that there was no one complaining. JS'o one looked reproach at him. If a lady was pale and reserved, she did not seem to accuse him, and to requii^e coaxing. All faces here were as light as the flying moment, and did not carry the shadowy weariness of years, like that burdensome fair face in the London lodging-house, to which the Fates had terribly attached themselves. So, he was gay. He closed, as it wei'e, a black volume, and opened a new and a bright one. Young men easily fancy that they may do this, and that when the black volume is shut the tide is stopped. Saying, " I was a fool," they believe they have put an end to the foolishness. What father teaches them that a human act once set in motion flows on for ever to the great account ? Our deathlessness is in what we do, not in what we are. Comfortable Youth thinks otherwise. The days at a well-ordered country-house, where a divining lady rules, speed to the measure of a waltz, in harmonious circles, dropping like crystals into the gulfs of Time, and appearing to write nothing in his book. Not a single hinge 120 RnODA FLKMINO. ot existence is heard to creak. Tliere is no after-dinner "bill. You are waited on, without beinpf elbowed by the humanity of your attendants. It is a civilized Arcadia. Only, do not desire, that you may not envy. Accept humbly what rights of citizenship are accorded to you upon entering. Discard the passions when you cross the thresludd. To breathe and to swallow merely, ai'e tlie duties which should prescribe your conduct; or, such is the swollen condition of the auimal in this enchanted region, that the spirit of man becomes dauLierously beset. Edward breathed and swallowed, and never went beyond the prescription, save by talking. No other junior could enter the library, without encountering the scorn of his elders ; so he enjoyed the pi-ivilege of hearing all the scandal, and his natural cynicism was plentifully fed. It was more of a school to him than he knew. These veterans, in their arm-chairs, stripped the bloom from life, and showed it to be bare bones. They took their ■wisdom for an experience of the past: they were but giving their sensaKons in the present. Not to perceive this, is Youth's eiTor when it hears old gentlemen talking at their ease. On the third morning of their stay at Fairly, Algernon came into Edwaid's rooua with a letter in his hand. " There ! read that !" he said. " It isn't ill-luck ; it's infernal persecution ! What, on earth ! — why, I took a close cab to the station. You saw me get out of it. I'll swear no creditor of mine knew I was leaving London. My belief is that the fellows who give credit have spies about at every railway terminus in the kingdom. They won't give me thi-ee days' peace. It's enough to disgust any man with civilized life ; on my soul, it is !" Edward glanced at the superscription of the letter. " Not posted," he remarked. " No ; delivered by some confounded bailiff, who's been bounding me." "Bailiffs don't generally deal in warnings." " Will you read it!" Algernon shouted. The letter ran thus : "Mr. Alckrnon Blancovk; •' The writer of this intends taking the first opportunity of A YEOMAN OF THE OLD BKEED. 121 meeting you, and gives you warning, you will have to answer his question with a Yes or a No; and speak from your con- science. The respectfulness of his behaviour to you as a gentleman will depend upon that." Algernon followed his cousin's eye down to the last letter in the page. " What do you think of it ?" he asked eagerly, Edward's broad thin-lined brows were drawn down in gloom. Mastering some black meditation in his brain, he answered Algernon's yells for an opinion : — " 1 think — well, 1 think bailiifs have improved in their manners, and show you they are determined to belong to the social march in an age of universal progress. Nothing can be more comforting." " But, suppose this fellow comes across me ?" " Don't know him." *' Suppose he insists on knowing me ?" " Don't know youi\self." " Yes ; but hang it ! if he catches hold of mo ?** " Shake him off." " Suppose he won't let go ?" *' Cut him with your horsewhip." " You think it's about a debt, then ?" " Intimidation, evidently." " 1 shall announce to him that the great Edward BlancoYO is not to be intimidated. " You'll let me borrow your name, old Ned. I've stood by you in my time. As for leaving Fairly, I tell you 1 can't. It's too delightful to be near Peggy Lovell." Edward smiled with a peculiar friendliness, and Algernon ■went off, very well contented with his cousin. CHAPTER XVII. A YEOMAN OP THE OLD BREED. "Within a mile of Fairly Park lay the farm of another yeoman ; but he was of another character. The Hampshire- 122 RHODA FLEMING. man was a farmor of renown in his profession ; fifth of a family that had cultivated a small domain of ono liundred and seventy acres with sterling profit, and in a style to make Sutton the model of a perfect farm throuti;hout the countjy. Royal eyes had inspected his pigs approvingly ; Royal wits had taken hints from Jonathan Eccles in matters agricul- tural ; and it was his comforting joke that he had taught his Prince good breeding. In return for the service, his Prince had transformed a lusty Radical into a devoted Royalist. Framed on the walls of his parloui's were letters from his Prince, thanking him for specimen seeds and worthy counsel : veritable autograph lettei-s of the highest value. The Prince had steamed up the salt river, upon which the Sutton harvests were mirrored, and landed on a spot marked in honour of the event by a broad grey stone ; and from that day Jonathan Eccles stood on a pinnacle of pride, enabling him to see horizons of despondency hitherto unknown to him. For he had a son, and the son was a riotous devil, a most wild young fellow, who had no taste for a farmer's life, and openly declared his determination not to perpetuate the Sutton farm in the hands of the Eccles's, by running off one day and entering the I'anks of the British army. Those framed letters became melancholy objects for con- templation, Avhen Jonathan thought that no posterity of his would point them out gloryingly in emulation. Man's aim is to culminate; but it is the saddest thing in the world to feel that we have accomplished it. Mr. Eccles shrugged with all the philosophy he could summon, and transferred his private disappointment to his country, whose agricul- tural day was, he said, doomed. " We shall be beaten by those Yankees." He gave Old England twenty years of continued pre-eminence (due to the impetus of the present generation of Englishmen), and then, said he, the Yankees will flood the market. No more green pa,stures in Great Britain ; no pretty clean, footed animals; no yellow harvests; but huge cliimney pots everywhere; black earth under black vapour, and smoke-begrimed faces. In twenty years' time, sooty England was to be a gigantic manufactory, until tho Yankees beat us out of that field as well ; l)cyond which Jonathan Eccles did not care to spread any distinct border of piT)|)hecy ; merely thanking the Lord that he should then bo under grass. The decay of our glory was to be edged A YEOFAN OF THE OLD EBEED. 123 t- With blood ; Jonathan admitted that there would be stuff iu the fallen race to deliver a sturdy fight beL'ore they went to their doom. For this prodigious curse, England bad to thank young Robert, the ei^ratic son of Jonathan. It was now two years since Robert had inherited a small legacy of money from an aunt, and spent it in waste, as the farmer bitterly supposed. He was looking at some immense seed-melons in his garden, lying about in morning sunshine — a new feed for sheep, of bis own invention, — when the call of the wanderer saluted kis ears, and be beheld his son Robert at the gate. " Here I am, sir," Robert sang out from the exterior. " Stay there, then," was bis welcome. They were alike in their build and in their manner of speech. The accost and the reply sounded like reports from the same pistol. The old man was tall, broad-shouldered, and muscular — a grey edition of the son, upon whose dis- orderly attire he cast a glance, while speaking, with settled disgust. Robert's necktie streamed loose; his hair was un- combed ; a handerchief dangled from his pocket. He had the look of the prodigal, returned with impudence for bis portion instead of repentance. " 1 can't see how you are, sir, from this distance," said Robert, boldly assuming his privilege to entei-. "Are you drunk P" Jonathan asked, as Robert marched tip to him. " Give me your hand, sir." " Give me an answei- first. Are you drunk ?" Robert tried to force the complacent aspect of a mind un- abashed, but felt that he made a stupid show before that clear-headed, virtuously-living old man of iron nerves. The alternative to flying into a passion, was the looking like a fool. " Come, father," he said, with a miserable snigger, like a yokel's smile ; " here I am at last. I don't say, kill the fatted calf, and take a lessoji from Scripture, but give me your hand. I've done no man harm but myself — damned if I've done a mean thing anywhere ! and there's no shame to you in shaking your son's hand after a long absence." Jonathan Eccles kept both hands firmly in his pockets. *^ Are jou drunk ?" he repeated. 124 I?nOT>A FLEMING. Roliort controllfd himself to answer, " T'm not." " Well, tlieii, just ti'U me when you were drunk last." "This is a pleusimt fatherly greeeting!" Hobert inter- jected. " You get no good by fighting shy of a simple question, Mr. Bob," said Jonathan. Robert cried querulously, " I don't want to fight shy of a simple question." "Well, then; when were you drunk last? answer mo that." " Last night." Jonatlian drew his hand from his pocket to thump his leg. " I'd have sworn it !" All Robert's assurance had vanished in a minute, and ho stood like a convicted culprit before his fathei-. " You know, sir, I don't tell lies. I xcas drunk last night. I couldn't help it. " No more could the little boy." *' I was drunk last night. Say, I'm a beast." "I shan't!" exclaimed Jonathan, making his voice sound as a defence to this vile charge against the brutish cha- racter. J " Say, I'm worse Ihan a beast, then." cried Robei-t, in exasperation. " Take my word tliat it hasnt hapjiencd to me to be in that state for a year and more. Last night I •was mad. I can't give you any reasons. I thought I was cured ; but I've trouble in my mind, and a tide swims you over the shallows — so I felt. Come, sir — father, don't make me mad again." " Whei-e did you get the liquor ?" inquired Jonathan. "I drank at 'The Pilot.'" "Ha ! there's talk there of ' that damned old Eccles ' for a mouth to come — ' the unnatural parent.' How long have you been dowii here ?" " Eight and twenty hours." " Eight and twenty hours. When are you going ?'* " I want lodging for a night." "What else?" ** The loan of a horse that'll take a fence." "Goon." "And twenty pounds." A YEOMAN OP THE OLD BREED. 125 " Oil !" went Jonathan. " If farming came as easy to you as face, you'd be a prime aginculturalist. Just what I thought ! What's become of that money your aunt Jane was fool enough to bequeath to you ?" " I've spent it." *' Are you a Deserter ?" For a moment Robert stood as if listening, and then white grew his face, and he swayed and struck his hands together. His recent intoxication had unmanned him. " Go in — go in," said his father in some concern, though wrath was predominant. " Oh, make your mind quiet about me." Robert dropped his arms. "I'm weakened somehow — damned weak, I am — I feel like a woman when my father asks me if I've been guilty of villany. Desert ? I wouldn't desert from the hulks. Hear the worst, and this is the worst : I've got no money — I don't owe a penny, but I haven't got one." " And I won't give yon. one," Jonathan appended ; and they stood facing one another in silence. A squeaky voice was beard from the other side of the garden hedge of clipped yew. " Hi ! farmer, is that the missing young man ?" and pre- sently a neighbour, by name John Sedgetfc, came trotting through the gate, and up the garden path. " I say," he remarked, "here's a rumpus. Here's a bob- bery up at Fairly. Oh ! Bob Eccles ! Bob Eccles ! At it again !" Mr. Sedgett shook his wallet of gossip with an enjoying chuckle. He was a thin-faced creatuz-e, rheumy of eye, and drawing his breath as from a well ; the ferret of the village for all underlying scandal and tattle, whose sole humanity was what he called pitifully ' a peakin ' at his chest, and who had i^etired from his business of grocer in the village upon the fortune brought to him in the energy and capacity of a third wire to conduct affairs, while he wandered up and down and knitted people together — an estimable office in a land where your house is so grievously your castle. " What the devil have yoa got in you now ?" Jonathan cried out to him. Mr. Sedgetfc was seized by his complaint and demanded commiseration, but recovering, he chuckled again. 126 RHODA FLEWINO. "Oh, Bob Eccles ! Don't you never grow older? And the first day down among us again, too. Why, Bob, as a military man, you ought to acknowledge your superiors. "Why, Stephen JJilton, the huntsman, says, Bob, you pulled the young gentleman oil' his horse — you on foot, and him mounted. I'd ha' given pounds to be there. And ladies present! Lord help us ! I'm glad you're returned, though. These melons of the farmer's, tlicy'i-e a wonderful invention; people are speaking of 'em right and left, and says, says they, Farmer Eccles, he's best farmer going — Hampshire ought to be proud of him — he's Avorth two of any others: that they are fine ones ! And you're come back to keep 'em up, eh, Bob ? Are ye, though, my man ?" " Well, here I am, iMr. Sedgett," said Robert, " and talking to my father." " Oh ! I YTOuldn't be here to interrupt ye for the world." Mr. Sedgett made a show of retij-ing, but Jonathan insisted npon his disburdening himself of his talc, saying: "Damn your raw beginnings, Sedgett ! What's been up? Nobody can hui't me." " That they can't, neighbour ; nor Bob neither, as far as Btand-up man to man go. I give him three to one —Bub Eccles ! He took 'em when a boy. He may, you know, he may have the law agin him, and by Gearge ! if he do — why, a man's no match for the law. No use bein' a hero to the law. The law masters every man alive ; and there's law in everything, neighbour Eccles ; eh, sir ? Your friend, the Prince, owns to it, as much as you or me. But, of course, you know what Bob's been doing. What I dropped in to ask was, why did ye do it. Bob ? Why pull the young gentleman oft" his horse ? I'd ha' given pounds to be there !" " Pounds o' tallow candles don't amount to much," quoth Robert. "That's awful bad brandy at the 'Pilot,'" said Mr. Sedgett, venomously. " Were you drunk when you committed this assault ?" Jonathan asked his son. " I drank afterwards," Robert replied. " ' Pilot' brandy's poor consolation," remarked Mr. Sfcdgett. Jonathan had half a mind to turn his son out of the gate, but the Tiresenr-e of Sedgett advised him that his doings were naked to the world. A YEOMAN OP THE OLD BREED. 127 " Ton kicked up a shindy in the hunting-field — what about ? Who mounted ye ?" Robert remarked that he had been on foot. " On foot — eh Y on foot !" Jonathan speculated, unable to realise the image of his son as a foot-man in the hunting- field, or to comprehend the insolence of a pedestrian who should dare to attack a mounted huntsman. " You were on foot ? The devil you were on foot ! Foot ? And caught a man out of his saddle ?" Jonathan gave up the puzzle. He laid out his forefinger decisively : — " If it's an assault, mind, you stand damages. My land gives and my land takes my money, and no drunken dog lives on the produce. A row in the hunting-field's un-English, I call it." " So it is, sir," said Robert. " So it be, neighbour," said Mr. Sedgetfc. Whereupon Robert took his arm, and holding the scraggy wretch forward, commanded him to out with what he knew. " Oh, I don't know no more than what I've told you." Mr Sedgett twisted a feeble remonstrance of his bones, that were chiefly his being, at the gripe ; " except that you got hold the horse by the bridle, and wouldn't let him go, because the young gentleman wouldn't speak as a gentleman, and — oh! don't squeeze so hard : " " Out with it ! " cried Robert. "And you said, Steeve Bilton said, you said — 'Where is she ?' you said, and he swore, and you swore, and a lady rode up, and you pulled, and she sang out, and off went the gentle- man, and Steeve said she said, ' For shame.' " "And it was the truest word spoken that day !" Robert released him. "You don't know much, Mr. Sedgett ; but it's enough to make me explain the cause to my father, and, with your leave, I'll do so." Mr. Sedgett remarked: "By all means, do;" and rather preferred that his wits should be accused of want of bright- ness, than that he should miss a chance of hearing the rich history of the scandal and its origin. Something stronger than a hint sent him off at a trot, hugging in his elbows. " The postman won't do his business quicker than Sedgett *11 tap this tale upon every door in the parish," said Jonathan. 128 RHODA FLEMFXO. " I can only pay I'm sorry, for your sake ;" Robert was exprcssinj^ his contn'tii;n, when liis fatht-r caught huu up: "Who can hurt me ? — my sake ? Have I got the habits of a sot ? — what you'd call ' a boast !' but I know the ways o' beasts, and if you did too, you wouldn't brinc^ them in to bear your beastly sins. Who can hurt me? — You've been quar- rellincr with this young gentleman about a woman — did you damat^e him ?" " If knucKlcs could do it, I should have brained him, sir," said Robert. " You struck him, and you got the best of it ?" " He got the worst of it any way, and will again." " Then the devil take you for a fool ! why did you go and drink ? I could understand it if you got licked. Drown your memory then, if that filthy soaking's to your taste ; but why, when you get the prize, Ave'll say, you go off headlong into a manure pond ? — there ! except that you're a damned idiot !" Jonathan struck the air, as to observe that it beat him, but for the foregoing elucidation : thundering afresh, *' Why did you go and drink ?" " I went, sir, I went — why did I go ?" Robert slapped his hand despairingly to his forehead. " What on earth did I go for? — because I'm at sea, I suppose. Nobody cares for me. I'm at sea, and no rudder to steer me. I suppose that's it. So, I drank. I thought it best to take spirits on board. 'No; this was the reason — I remember: that lady, whoever she was, said something that stung me. 1 held the fellow under her eyes, and shook him, though she was begging me to let him off. Says she — but Ivc drunk it clean out of my mind." " There, go in and look at yourself in the glass," said Jonathan. "Give me your hand first," — Robert put his own out humbly. "Ill be hanged if I do," said Jonathan firmly. "Bed and board you shall have while I'm alive, and a glass to look at yourself in ; but my hand's for decent beasts. Move one way or t'other : take your choice." Seeing Robert hesitate, ho added, " I shall have a damned deal more respect for you if you toddle." He waved hia hand away from the premises. A YEOMAN OP THE OLD BREED. 129 " I'm sorry you've taken so to swearing of late, sir," said Robert. " Two flints strike fire, my lad. When you keep distant, I'm quiet enough in my talk to satisfy your aunt Anne." " Look here, sir ; I want to make use of you, so I'll go in." " Of course you do," returned Jonathan, not a whit dis- pleased by his son's bluntness ; " what else is a father good for ? I let you know the limit, and that's a brick wall ; jump it, if you can. Don't fancy it's your aunt Jane you're going in to meet." Robert had never been a favourite with his Aunt Anne, who was Jonathan's housekeeper. " Xo, poor old soul ! and may God bless her in heaven !" he cried. " For leaving you what you turned into a thundering lot of liquor to consume — eh ?" " For doing all in her power to make a man of me ; and she was close on it — kind, good old darling, that she was ! She got me with that money of hers to the best footing I've been on yet — bless her heart, or her memory, or whatever a poor devil on earth may bless an angel for ! But here I am." The fever in Robert blazed out under a pressure of extin- guishing tears. " There, go along in," said Jonathan, who considered drunkenness to be the main source of water in a man's eyes. " It's my belief you've been at it already this morning." Robert passed into the house in advance of his father, whom he quite understood and appreciated. There was plenty of paternal love for him, and a hearty smack of the hand, and the inheritance of the farm, when he turned into the right way. Meantime Jonathan was ready to fulfil his parental responsibility, by sheltering, feeding, and not publicly abusing his offspring, of whose spirit he would have had a higher opinion if Robert had preferred, since he must go to the deuce, to go without troublinar any of his relatives ; as it was, Jonathan submitted to the infliction gravely. Neither in speech nor in tone did he solicit from the severe maiden, known as Aunt Anne, that snub for the wanderer whom he introduced, which, when two are agreed upon the infamous character of a third, through whom they are suf- £ 130 EHOUA FLEMING. ferinf^, it is nlways agreoable to hear. He said, "Here, Anno ; here's Hubert. He hasn't breaklasted." " He likes his cold bath beforehand," said Robert, pre- sentinsf his clieek to the fleslik-ss, semi-transparent woman. Aunt Anne divided hei- lips to pronounce a crisp, subdued *' Ow !" to Jonathan after inspectini^ liubei't ; and she shud- dered at sight of Robert, and said "Ow!" repeatedly, by way of an interjectory token of compreliension, to all that was uttered ; but it was a hoi'rified " No !" when Robert's cheek pushed nearer. " Then, see to getting some breakfast for him," said Jona- than. "You're not anyway bound to kiss a drunken ." " Dog's the word, sir," Robert helped him. " Dogs can afford it. I never saw one in that state ; so they don't lose character." He spoke lightly, but dejection was in his attitude. When, his aunt Anne had left the room, he exclaimed : " By jingo ! women make you feel it, by some way that they have. She's a religious creature. She smells the devil in me." " More like, the brandy," his father responded. "Well! I'm on the road: I'm on the road!" Robert fetched a sigh. " I didn't make the road," said his father. "No, sir; you didn't. Work hard: sleep sound: that's happiness. I've known it for a year. You're the man I'd imitate, if I could. The devil came first: the brandy's secondary. I was quiet so long. I thought myself a safe man." He sat down and sent his hair distraught with an effort at smoothing it. " Women brought the devil into the world first. It's women who raise the devil in us, and why they ?" He thumped the table just as his Aunt Anne was pre- paring to spread the cloth. " Don't be frightened, woman," said Jonathan, seeing her start fearfully back. " You take too many cujjs of tea, morning and night — hang the stuff !" " Never, never till now have you abused me, Jonathan," she whimpered, severely. " I don't tell you to love him ; but wait on him. That's AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 131 all. And I'll about my business. Land and beasts — they anstver to you." Robert looked up. " Land and beasts ! They sound like blessed things. When next I go to church, I shall know what old Adam felt. Go along, sir. I shall break nothing in the house." " Tou won't go, Jonathan ?" begged the trembling spinster. " Give him some of your tea, and strong, and as much of as he can take — he wants bringing down," was Jonathan's answer ; and casting a glance at one of the framed letters, he strode through the doorway, and Aunt Anne was alone with the flushed face and hurried eyes of her nephew, who was to her little better than a demon in the flesh. But there was a Bible in the room. An hour later, Robert was mounted and riding to the meet of hounds CHAPTER XYIII. AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. A SINGLE night at the Pilot Inn had given life and vigour to Robert's old reputation in Warbeach village, as the stoutest of drinkers and dear rascals throughout a sailor- breeding district, where Dibdin was still thundered in the ale-house, and manhood in a great degree measured by the capacity to take liquor on board as a ship takes ballast. There was a profound affectation of deploring the sad fact that he drank as hard as ever, among the men, and genuine pity expressed for him by the women of Warbeach ; but his fame was fresh again. As the Spring brings back its flowers, Robert's presence revived his youthful deeds. There had not been a boxer in the neighbourhood like Robert Eccles, nor such a champion in all games, nor, when he set himself to it, such an invincible didnker. It was he who thrashed the brute, Nic Sedgett, for stabbing with his clasp- knife Harry Boulby, son of the landlady of the Pilot Innj k2 132 RHODA FLEMING. thiaslicd him publicly, to llic comfort of all "Warlieach. He had rescued old Dumo Garljlo from hor burning cottage, and made his father house the old creature, and worked at farm- ini,', though he hated it, to pay for her subsistence. He vindicated the honour of Warbcach by drinking a match against a Yorkshire skipper till four o'clock in the morning, ■when it was a gallant sight, my boys, to see Hampshire steadying the defeated Xorth-countrynum on his astonished zigzag to hi£j flattish-bottomed billyboy, all in the cheery sunrise on the river — yo-ho ! ahoy ! Glorious Robert had tried, tirst the sea, and then soldier- ing. Now let us hope hell settle to farming, and follow his rare old father's ways, and be back among his own people for good. So chimed the younger ones, and many of the elder. Danish blood had settled round "Warbeach. To be a really popular hero anywhere in Britain, a lad must still, I fear, ha.ve something of a Scandinavian gullet ; and if, in addition to his being a powerful drinker, he is pleasant in his cups, and can sing, and forgive, be free-handed, and roll out the grand risky phrases of a fii-ed brain, he stamps himself, in the ap})rehension of his associates, a king. Much of the stuff was required to deal King Robert of Warbeach the capital stroke, and commonly he could hold on till a puff of cold air from the outer door, like an admoni- tory messenger, reminded him that he was, in the greatness of his soul, a king of swine ; after which his way of walking off, without a woi'd to anybody, hoisting his whole stature, while others were staggering, or roaring foul rhymes, or feeling consciously mortal in their sensation of feverishness, became a theme for admiration : ay, and he was fresh as an orchard apple in the morning ! there lay his commandership convincingly. What was proved overnight was confirmed at da vn. Mr. Robert had his controst in Sedgett's son, Nicodemus Sedgett, whose unlucky Christian name had assisted the wits of Warbeach in bestowing on him a darkly-luminous relationship. Young Nic loved also to steep his spirit in the bowl ; but, in addition to his never ])aying for his luxury, he drank as if in emulation of the colour of his reputed patron, and neighbourhood to Xic Sedgett was 7iot liked when that young man became thoughtful over his glrss. AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 133 The episode of Lis stabbing the landlady's son Harry clung to him fatally. The wound was in the thigh, and nothing serious. Harry was up and olf to sea before Nic had ceased to show the marks of Robert's vengeance upon him ; but blood-shedding, even on a small scale, is so detested by Englishmen, that Nic never got back to his right hue in the eyes of Warbeach. None felt to him as to a country- man, and it may be supposed that his face was seen no more in the house of gathering, the Pilot Inn. He rented one of the Fairly farms, known as the Three- Tree Farm, subsisting there, men fancied, by the aid of his housekeeper's money. For he was of those evil fellows who disconcert all righteous prophecy, and it was vain for Mrs. Boulby and Warbeach village to declare that no good could come to him, when Fortune manifestly kept him going. He possessed the rogue's most serviceable art : in spite of a countenance that was not attractive, this fellow could, as was proved by evidence, make himself pleasing to women. *' The truth of it is," said Mrs. Boulby, at a loss for any other explanation, and with a woman's love of sharp general- ization, " it's because my sex is fools." He had one day no money to pay his rent, and forthwith (using for the purpose his last five shillings, it was said) advertized for a housekeeper ; and before Warbeach had done chuckling over his folly, an agreeable woman of about thirty- five was making purchases in his name ; she made tea, and the evening brew for such friends as he could collect, and apparently paid his rent for him, after a time ; the distrc as was not in the house three days. It seemed to Warbeach an erratic p]OC3edingon the part of Providence, that Nic should ever be helped to swim ; but our modern prophets have small patience, aTid summon Destiny to strike without a prepara- tion of her we ipons or a warning to the victim. More than Robert's old occasional vice was at the bottom of his populHvity, as I need not say. Let those who gene- ralize upon ethnology determine whether the ancient opposi- tion of Saxon and Norman be at an end ; but it is certain, to my thinking, that when a hero of the people can be got from the common popular stock, he is doubly dear. A gentleman, however gallant and familiar, will hardly ever be as much beloved, until he dies to inform a legend or a ballad : seeing that death only can remove the peculiar distinctions and 134 RHODA FLEMING. distanoos wliit^h tho peo])le foel to exist between tTiemselve* and the ^eiitlemaii-class, and which, not to credit them with preternatural discernment, they are carefully taught to feel. Dead llritons are all 13ritons, but live Britons are not quite brothers. It was as the son of a yeoman, showing comprehensible accomplishments, that Robert took his lead. He was a veiy brave, a sweot-hcarted, and a handsome young man, and he had very chivalrous views of life that were understood by a sulHcient number under the influence of ale or brandy, and by a few in default of that material aid ; and they had a family ])ride in him. The pride was mixed with fear that threw over it a tender light, like a mother's dream of her child. The people, I have said, are not so lost in self-con- tempt as to undervalue their best men, but it must be admitted that they rarely produce young fellows wearing the undeniable chieftain's stamp, and the rarity of one like Robert lent a hue of sadness to him in their thoughts. Fortune, moreover, the favourer of Nic Sedgett, blew foul whichever the way Robert set his sails. He would not look to his own advantage ; and the belief that man should set his little traps for the liberal hand of his God, if he wishes to prosper, rather than strive to be merely honourable in his Maker's eye, is almost as general among poor people as it is with the moneyed classes, who survey them from their height. When jolly Butcher Billing, who Avas one of the limited company which had sat with Robert at the ' Pilot ' last niglit, re]iorted that he had qiiitted the «army, he was heark- ened to dolefully, and the feeling was univer.sal that glorious Robert had cut himself off from his pension and his hospital. But when gossip Sedgett went his rounds, telling that Robert was down among them again upon the darkest expe- dition their minds could conceive, and rode out every morn- ing for the purpose of encountering one of the gentlemen up at Fairly, and had already pulled him off his horse and laid him in the mnd, calling him scoundrel and cliallenging him either to yield his scciet or to light, and that he followed him, and was out after him publicly, and matched himself against that gentleman, who had all the either gentlemen, and the earl, and the law to back him, the little place AN ASSEilBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 135 buzzed with. Avonder and alarm. Faint hearts declared that Robert was now done for. All felt that he had gone miles beyond the mark. Those were the misty days when fogs rolled up the salt river from, the winter sea, and the sun lived but an hour in the clotted sky, extinguished near the noon. Robert was seen riding out, and the tramp of his horse was heard as he returned homeward. He called no more at the 'Pilot.' Darkness and mystery enveloped him. There were niglitly meetings under Mrs. Boulby's roof, in the belief that he could not withstand her temptations ; nor did she imprudently discourage them ; but the woman at last over- came the landlady within her, and she wailed : " He won't come because of the drink. Oh ! why was I made to sell liquor, w^hich he says sends him to the devil, poor blessed boy ? and I can't help begging him to take one little drop. I did, the first night he was down, forgetting his ways ; he looked so desperate, he did, and it went on and went on, till he was primed, and me proud to see him get out of his misery. And now he hates the thought of me." In her despair she encoui'aged Sedgett to visit her bar and parlour, and he became everywhere a most important man. Farmer Eccles's habits of seclusion (his pride, some said), and more especially the dreaded austere Aunt Anne, who ruled that household, kept people distant from the Warbeach farm-house, all excepting Sedgett, who related that every night on his return, she read a chapter from the Bible to Robert, sitting up for him patiently to fulfil his duty ; and that the farmer's words to his son had been : " Rest here ; eat and drink, and ride my horse ; but not a penny of my money do you have." By the help of Steeve Bilton, the Fairly huntsman, Sedgett was enabled to relate that there was a combination of the gentlemen against Robert, whose behaviour none could absolutely approve, save the landlady and jolly Butcher Billing, who stuck to him with a hearty blind faith. "Did he ever," asked the latter, "did Bob Eccles ever conduct himself disrespectful to his superiors ? Wasn't he always found out at his wildest for to be right — to a sensible man's way of thinking ? — though not, I grant ye, to his own interests — there's another tale." And Mr Billing's staunch adherence to the hero of the village was cried out to his credit 136 RHODA FLEMING. when Sedgett stated, on Stephen Bilton's authority, that Robert's errand was the defence of a girl wlio had been wronged, and whose whcreabont, that she might be restored to her parents, was all ho wanted to know. This story passed from mouth to mouth, receiving much ornament in the passage. The girl in question betame a lady; for it is required of a mere common girl that she should display remarkable character before she can be accepted as the fitting companion of a popular hero. She became a young lady of fortune, in love with llobert, and concealed by the artilice of the oiTending gentleman whom Robert had challenged. Sedgett told this for truth, being instigated to boldness of invention by pertinacious inquiries, and the dignified sense which the Avhole stoiy hung npon him. Mrs. Boulby, who, as a towering woman, despised Sedgett's weak frame, had been willing to listen till she perceived him to be but a man of fiction, and then she gave him a flat con- tradiction, having no esteem for his custom. " Eh ! but. Missis, I can tell you his name — the gentle- man's name," said Sedgett, placably. " He's a Mr. Algernon Blancove, and a cousin by marriage, or something, of Mrs. Lovell." " I reckon you're right about that, goodman," replied Mrs. Boulby, with intuitive discernment of the true from the false, mingled with a desire to show that she was under no obliga- tion for the news. "All t'other's a tale of your own, and you know it, and no more true than your rigmaroles about my brandy, which is French ; it is, as sure as my blood's British." " Oh ! Missis," quoth Sedgett, maliciously, " as to tales, you've got witnesses enough it crasscd chanu'l. Aha ! Don't bring 'em into the box. Don't you bring 'em into ne"er a box." " You mean to say, ^Ir. Sedgett, they won't swear ?" " No, Missis ; they'll swear, fast and sale, if you teach 'em. Dashed if they won't run the ' Pilot ' on a rock with their swearin'. It ain't a good habit." " Well, Mr. Sedgett, the next time you drink my brandy and find the consequences bad, you let me hear of it." " And what'U you do. Missis, may be ?" Listeners were by, and Mrs. Boulby cruelly retoited : " I won't send you home to your wife ;" which created a roai against this hen-pecked man. AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 137 *' As to consequences, Missis, it's for your sake I'm loolrin^ at them," Sedgett said, when lie had recovered from the blow. " You say that to the Excise, Mr. Sedgett ; it, belike, 'II make 'em sorry." " Brandy's your weak point, it appears, Missis." *' A little in you would stiffen your back, Mr. Sedgett." ** Poor Bob Eccles didn't want no stiffening when he come down first," Sedgett interjected. At which, flushing enraged, Mrs. Boulby cried : " Mention him, indeed ! And him and you, and that son of your'n — the shame of your cheeks if people say he's like his father. Is it your son, Nic Sedgett, thinks to inform against me, as once he swore to, and to get his wage that he may step out of a second bankruptcy ? — and he a farmer ! You let him know that he isn't feared by me, Sedgett, and there's one here to give him a second dose, without waiting for him to nse clasp-knives on harmless innocents." " Pacify yourself, ma'am, pacify yourself," remarked Sed- gett, hardened against words abroad by his endurance of blows at home. " Bob Eccles, he's got his hands full, and he, may be, '11 reach the hulks before my Wic do, yet. And how 'm I answerable for Nic, I ask you ?" "More luck to you not to be, I say; and either, Sedgett, you does woman's work, gossipin' about like a cracked bell- clapper, or men's the biggest gossips of all, which I believe ; for there's no beating you at your work, and one can't wish ill to you, knowing what you catch." " In a friendly way, Missis," — Sedgett fixed on the compli- ment to his power of propagating news — " in a friendly way. You can't accuse me of leavin' out the ' 1 ' in your name, now, can you ? I make that observation," — the venomous tattler screwed himself up to the widow insinuatingly, as if her understanding could only be seized at close quarters, — " I make that observation, because poor Dick Boulby, your lamented husband — eh ! poor Dick ! You see, Missis, it ain't the tough ones last longest : he'd sing, ' Tm. a ISea- Boohy,' to the song, ' Tm a green Mermaid :' poor Dick ! ' a-shinin ujjon the sea-deeps.' He kept the liquor from his head, but didn't mean it to stop down in his leg." " Have you done, Mr. Sedgett?" said the widow, blandly, "You ain't angry, Missis ?" 138 SHODA PLEMTNO. " Not a bit, Mr. Sedgett ; and if I knock you over with the flat o' my hand, don't you tliink so." iSedi,''ett tlirow up the wizened skin of his forehead, and reti-eated fr(tm the liar. At a sufe distance, he called : "Bad news that about Bob Eecles swallowing a blow yesterday !"' Mrs. Boulby faced him complacently till he retired, and then observed to those of his sex surrounding' her, " Don't * woman-and-dog-and- walnut-tree ' me! Some of you men *d be the better for a drubbing every day of your lives. Sedgett yond' 'd be as big a villain as his son, only for what he gets at home." That was her way of replying to the Parthian arrow ; but the barb was poisoned. The village was at fever heat con- cerning Robert, and this assertion that he had swallowed a blow, produced almost as great a constei-nation as if a fleet of the enemv had been reported off Sandy Point. ]\Ii;5. lioulby went into her parlour and wrote a letter to Robert, which she despatched by one of the loungers about the bar, who brought buck news, that three of the gentlemen of Fairly were on horseback, talking to Fai-mer Eecles at his garden gate. Affairs were waxing hot. The gentlemen had only to threaten Farmer Eecles, to make him side with Iiia son, right or wrong. In the evening, S';ephen Bilton, the huntsman, pi'csented himself at the door of the long parlour of the ' Pilot,' and loud cheers were his greeting from a full company. "Gentlemen all," said Stephen, with dapper modesty; and acted as if no excitement were current, and he had nothing to tell. " AVell, Steeve ?" said one, to encoTirage him. " How about Bob, to-day '*" said another. Before Stephen had spoken, it was clear to the apprehen- sion of the whole room that he did not share the ])opu]ar view of Robert. Pie declined to understand who was meant by ' Bob.' He played the questions off ; and then shrugged, with, " Oh, let's have a quiet evening." It ended in his saying, " About Bob Eecles ? There, that's summed up pretty quick — he's mad." " i\fad!" shouted Warbeaoh. "Tlnit's a lie," said Mrs. Boulby, from the doorway. " Well, mum, I let a lady have her own opinion." Stephen nodded to her. " There ain't a doubt as t' what the doctors AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 139 'd brinq- him in. I ain't speaking my ideas alone. It's written like the capital letters in a newspaper. Lunatic's the word ! And I'll take a glass of something warm, Mrs. Boulby. We had a stiff run to-day." " Where did ye kill, Steeve ?" asked a dispirited voice. " We didn't kill at all : he was one of those 'long shore dogfoxes, and got away home on the cliff." Stephen thumped his knee. " It's my belief the smell o' sea gives 'em extra cunning." "The beggar seems to have put ye out rether — eh, Steeve ?" So it was generally presumed : and yet the charge o£ madness was very staggering ; madness being, in the iirst place, indefensible, and everybody's enemy when at large ; and Robert's behaviour looked extremely like it. It had already been as a black shadow haunting enthusiastic minds in the village, and there fell a short silence, during which Stephen m.ade his preparations for filling and lighting a pipe. " Come ; how do you make out he's mad ?" Jolly Butcher Billing spoke ; but with none of the irony of confidence. '■ Oh !" Stephen merely clapped both elbows against his sides. Several pairs of eyes were studying him. He glanced over them in turn, and commenced leisurely the puff con- templative. " Don't happen to have a grudge of e'er a kind against old Bob, Steeve ?" "Not I!" Mrs. Boulby herself brought his glass to Stephen, and, retreating, left the parlour-door open. " What causes you for to think him mad, Steeve ?" A second " Oh !" as from the heights dominating argu- ment, sounded from Stephen's throat, half like a grunt. This time he condescended to add : " How do you know when a dog's gone mad ? Well, Robert Eccles, he's gone in like manner. If you don't judge a man by his actions, you've got no means of reckoning-. He comes and attacks gentlemen, and swears he'll go on doing it." 140 EnODA PLEMINO. " "Well, and what does tliat prove ?" said jolly Butcher Billinj^. Mr. William ^Moody, boat-builder, a liver-complexioned citizen, undei-took to reply, "What does tliat prove? What does that prove when the niidshipmite was found with his head in the mixed- pickle jar? It proved that his head was lean, and t' otlier pai't was rounder." The illustration appeared forcible, but not direct, and nothing more was understood from it than that bloody, and two or three others who had been struck by the image of the infatuated young naval officer, were going over to the enemy. The stamp of madness upon Robert's acts certainly saved perplexity, and was the easiest side of the argum(>nt. By this time Stephen had finished his glass, and the efl'cct was seen. "Hang it!" he exclaimed, "I don't agree he deserves shooting. And he may have had harm done to him. In that case, let him light. And I say, too, let the gentleman give him satisfaction." " Hear ! hear !" cried several. "And if the gentleman refuse to give him satisfaction in a fair stand-up fight, I say he ain't a gentleman, and deserves to be trealed as such. My objection's personal. I don't like any man who spoils sport, and ne'er a rascally vulpeci' spoils sport as he do, since he's been down in our parts again. I'll take another brimmer, Mrs. Boulby." " To be sure you will, Stephen," said ]\Irs. Boulby, bending as in a curtsey to the glass ; and so soft with him that foolish fellows thought her cowed by the accusation thrown at her favourite. " There's two questions about they valpecies. Master Stephen," said Farmer Wainsby, a farmer with a grievance, fixing his elbow on his knee for serious utterance. " There's to ask, and t' ask again. Sport, I grant ye. All in doo season. But," he performed a circle with his pipe stem, and darted it as from the centre thereof toward Stej)hen's breast, with the poser, " do we s'pport thieves at public expense for them to keep thievin' — black, white, or brown — no matter, eh ? Well, then, if the public want bear it, dang me if I can see why individles .shud bear it. It ent no AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 141 maimer o' reason, net as I can see ; let gentlemen Lave their opinion, or let 'em not. Foxes be hanged !" Much slow winking was interchanged. In a general sense, Farmer Wainsby's remarks were held to be un- English, though he was pardoned for them as one having peculiar interests at stake. "Ay, ay! we know all about that," said Stephen, taking succour from the eyes surrounding him. " And so, may be, do we," said Wainsby. " Fox-hunting '11 go on when jour great-grandfather '3 your youngest son, farmer; or t' other way." " I reckon it '11 be a stuffed fox yojir chil'ern '11 hunt, Mr. Steeve ; more straw in 'em than bow'ls." " If the country," Stephen thumped the table, "were what you'd make of it, hang me if my name 'd long be English- man ! " Hear, hear, Steeve !" was shouted in support of the Conservative principle enunciated by him. " What I say is, flesh and blood afore foxes !" Thus did Farmer Wainsby likewise attempt a rallving- cry; but Stephen's retort, "Ain't foxes flesh and blood :*" convicted him of clumsiness, and, buoyed on the uproar of cheers, Stephen pursued, " They are ; to kill 'em in cold blood's beast-murder, so it is. What do we do ? We give 'em a fair field — a fair field and no favour ! We let 'em trust to the instincts Nature, she's given 'em ; and don't the old woman know best ? If they can get away, they win the day. All's open, and honest, and aboveboard. Kill your rats and kill your rabbits, but leave foxes to your betters. Foxes are gentlemen. You don't understand ? Be hanp-ed if they ain't ! I like the old fox, and I don't like to see him murdered and exterminated, but die the death of a gentle- man, at the hands of gentlemen ." " And ladies," sneered the farmer. All the room was with Stephen, and would have backed him uproariously, had he not reached his sounding period without knowing it, and thus allowed his opponent to slip in that abominable addition. " Ay, and ladies," cried the huntsman, keen at recovery. " Why shouldn't they ? I hate a field without a woman in it i don't you ? and you ? and jou ? And you, too, Mrs. 142 EHODA FLEMING. Boulby ? There you are, and tlie room looks better for you • — don't it, lads ? Hurrah !"' The cheering was now aroused, and Stephen had his glass filled again in triumph, Avhilc the t'ai-mcr meditated tliickly over the ruin of his argument from that fatal efYort at fortifying it by thi-owing a hint to the discredit of the sex, as many anol'Iier man has meditated before. " Eh ! poor old IJob !" Stephen sighed and sipped. " I can cry that with any of you. It's worse, for me to see than for vou to hear of him. Wasn't I always a friend f)f his, and said he was worthy to be a gentleman, many a time ? He's got the manners of a gentleman now ; ofTs with his hat, if there's a lady present, and such a neat way of speaking. But there, acting's the thing, and his behaviour's beastly bad ! You can't call it no other. There's two Mr. Blancovea tip at Fairly, relations of Mrs. Lovell's — whom I'll tako the liberty of calling My Beauty, and no offence meant : and it's before her that Bob only ye.stei'day rode up — one of the gentlemen being Mr. Algernon, free of hand and a good seat in the saddle, t'other's ]\Ir. Edward ; but Mr. Algernon, he's Robert Eccles's man — up rides Bob, just as we was tying Mr. Reenard's brush to the pommel of the lady's saddle, down in Ditley Marsh ; and he bows to the lady. Says he — but he's mad, stark mad,!" Stephen resumed his pipe amid a din of disappointment that made the walls ring and the glasses leap. " A little more sugar, Stephen ?" said Mrs. Boulby, moving in lightly from the doorway. " Thank ye, mum ; you're the best hostess that ever breathed." "So she be; but how about Bob?" cried her guests — some asking whether he cai-ried a pistol or flourished a stick. " Ne'er a blessed twig, to save his soul ; and there's the madness written on him," Stephen roared as loud as any of them. " And me to see him riding in the ring there, and knowing what the gentleman had sworn to do if he eamo aci'oss the hunt ; and feeling that he was in the wrong ! I haven't got a oath to swear how mad I was. Fancy your- selves in my place. I love old Bob. I've drunk with him; I owe him obligations from since I was a boy up'ard ; 1 don't know a butter than Bob in all England. And there he was: AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INN. 143 and says to ]\Ir. Algernon, ' You know what I'm come for.' I nev^er did behold a gentleman so pale-shot all over his cheeks as he was, and pinkish under the eyes ; if you've ever noticed a chap laid hands on by detectives in plain clothes. Smack at Bob went Mr. Edward's whip." " Mr. Algernon's," Stephen was corrected. " Mr Edward's, I tell ye — the cousin. And right across the face. My Lord ! it made my blood tingle." A sound like the swish of a whip expressed the sentiments of that assemblage at the Pilot. " Bob swallowed it ?" " What else could he do, the fool ? He had nothing to help him but his hand. Says he. That's a poor way of trying to stop me. My business is with this gentleman ; and Bob set his horse at Mr. Algernon, and Mrs. Lovell rode across him with her hand raised ; and just at that moment up jogged the old gentleman. Squire Blancove, of Wrexby: and Robert Eccles says to him, ' You might have saved your son something by keeping your word.' It appears according to Bob, that the squire had promised to see his son, and settle matters. All Mrs. Lovell could do was hardly enough to hold back Mr. Edward from laying out at Bob. He was like a white devil, and speaking calm and polite all the time. Says Bob, I'm willing to take one when I've done with the other : and the squire began talking to his son, Mrs. Lovell to Mr. Edward, and the rest of the gentlemen all round poor dear old Bob, rather bullying-like for my blood ; till Bob couldn't help being nettled, and cried out, Gentlemen, I hold him in my power, and I'm silent so long as there's a chance of my getting him to behave like a man with human feelings. If they'd gone at him then, I don't think I could have let him stand alone : an opinion's one thing, but blood's another, and I'm distantly related to Bob ; and a man who's always thinking of the value of his place, he ain't worth it. But Mrs. Lovell, she settled the case — a lady, Farmer Wainsby, with your leave. There's the good of having a lady present on the field. That's due to a lady !" " Happen she was at the bottom of it," the farmer returned Steplien's nod grumpily. " How did it end, Stephen, my lad ?" said Butcher Billing, indicating a ' never mind him.^ " It ended, my boy, it ended like my glass here — hot and 144 EnODA FLEMiyO. BtroTif^ sttiff, with sugar at the bottom. And I don't sec thia^ so glad as I saw that, my word of honour on it ! Boys all !" Sti'i)lii'n (Irank tho drt'L;s. ^Irs. ]}i)ulby was still in attendance. Tlie talk over the circumstances Avas sweeter than tho bare facts, and the reple- nished glass cnaVilod 8to]>hen to add tho ]iicturesque bits of tho affray, unspurrcd by a suirouiuling eagerness of his lis- teners — too exciting for imaginative effort. In particular, he dwelt on Kobert's dropping the reins and riding with hia heels at Algernon, when Mrs. Lovell put her horse in hia way, and the pair of horses rose like waves at sea, and both riders showed their horsemanship, and Robert an adroit courtesy, for which the lady thanked him with a bow of her head. "I got among the hounds, pretending to pacify them, and call 'em together," said Stephen, " and I heard her say^ just before all was over, and he turned off — 1 heard her say: 'Trust this to me: I will meet you.' I'll swear to them exact words, though there was more, and a ' where ' in the bargain, and that I didn't hear. Aha! by George! thinka I, old Bob, you're a lucky beggar, and be hanged if I wouldn't go mad too for a minute or so of short, sweet, private talk with a lovely young widow lady as ever the sua did shine upon so boldly — oho ! You've seen a yacht npon the sea, She diinces ami she dunces, O 1 As fair is my wild maid to mo ... , Something annut 'prances, !" on her horse, yon know, or you're a hera'd fool if you don't. I never could sing; wish I conld ! It's the joy of life I It's utterance! Hey for harmony !" •'Eh! bray vo ! now you're a man, Steeve! and welcomer and welcome*"^ ; yi — yi, 0!" jolly Butcher Billing sang out sharp. " Life wants watering. Here's a health to Robei't Eccles, wheresoever and whatsoever ! and ne'er a man shall say of me I didn't stick by a friend like Bob. Cheers, my lads !" Robert's health was drank in a thunder, and praises of the purity and the brandy followed the grand roar. Mrs. Boulby received her compliments on that head. "'Pends upon the tide, Missis, don't it?" one remarked, AN ASSEMBLY AT THE PILOT INJT. 145 witli a grin broad enough to make the slyness written on it easy i-eading. " Ah ! first a flow and then a ebb," said another. ** It's many a keg I plant i' the mud, Coastguardsman, come ! and I'll have your blood I" Instigation cried, "Cut along;" but the defiant smuggler was deficient in memory, and like Steeve Bilton, was reduced to scatter his concluding rhymes in prose, as ' something about;' whereat jolly Butcher Billing, a reader of song- books from a literary delight in their contents, scraped his head, and then, as if he had touched a spring, carolled: " In spite of all you Gov'ment pack, I'll land my kegs of the good CognyAC " — " though," he took occasion to observe when the chorus and a sort of cracker of irrelevant rhymes had ceased to explode ; " I'm for none of them games. Honesty! — there's the sugar o' my grog." " Ay, but you like to be cock-sure of the stuff you drink, if e'er a man did." said the boatbuilder, whose eye blazed yellow in this frothing season of song and fan. " Right so. Will Moody !" returned the jolly butcher : " which means — not wrong this time !" " Then, what's understood by your sticking prongs into your hostess here concerning of her brandy ? Here it is — which is enough, except for discontented fellows." " Eh, Missus ?" the jolly butcher appealed to her, and pointed at Moody's complexion for proof. It was quite a fiction that kegs of the good cognac were sown at low water, and reaped at high, near the river-gate of the old Pilot inn garden; but it was greatly to Mrs. Boulby's interest to encourage the delusion which imaged her brandy thus arising straight from the very source, without villanous contact with excisemen and corrupting* dealers ; and as, per- haps, in her husband's time, the thing had happened, and still did, at rare intervals, she complacently gathered the profitable fame of her brandy being the best in the district. " I'm sure I hope you're satisfied, Mr. Billing," she said. The jolly butcher asked whether Will Moody was satisfied, and Mr. William Moody declaring himself thoroughly satis- 146 EHODA FLEMING. Bed, " then I'm sntisfiod too !" said the jolly butcher ; upon which tho boathuildcT heightened the langh bj sayinfi;' he was not satisfied at all ; and to escape from the execrations of the niJijoiit y, ])lea'eTnent on her coTiduct. Women can make for themselves new spJiercs, new l:iws, if tlu>v will assume their right to be ccccriliio as an unquestionable thing, and always reserve a season for showing forth like the conventional women of society. The evening was Mrs. Lovell's time for this important re-establishment of her position ; and many a silly youth who iiad sailed pleasantly with her all the ilay, was wrecked when he tried to carry on the topics where she reigned the lady of the drawing-room. ^Moreover, not being eccentric from vanity, but siin[)ly to accommodate what had once been her tastes, and were now her necessities, she avoided slang, and all the insignia of eccentricity. Thus she mastered the secret of keeping the young men respectfully enthusiastic ; so that their irrepressible praises did not (as is usual when these are in acclamati(m) drag her to their level ; nnd the female world, with which she was perfectly feminine, and as silkeuly insipid every evening of her life as was heeded to restore her reputation, admitted that she belonged to it, which is everything to an adventur- ous spirit of that sex : indeed, the sole secure basis of operations. You are aware that men's faith in a woman whom her sisters discountenance, and partially re])udiate, is uneasy, however deeply they may be charmed. On the other hand, she may be guilty of prodigious oddities without ipuch dis- turbing their i-everence, while she is in the feminine circle. But what fatal bieath was it coming from ^li-s. Lovell that was always inflaming men to mutual animosity ? What encouragement li;id slie given to Algerncm, that Lord Suck- ling should be jealous of him ? And what to Lord .Suckling, that Algernon should loathe the sight of the young lord ? And why was each desirous of showing his manhood in com- bat before an eminent peacemaker ? Edward laughed — " Ah-ha !" and rubbed his hands as at a special confirmation of his prophecy, when Algernon came into his room and said, " I shall light that fellow Suckling. Hang me if I can stand his impudence ! I want to have a shot at a man of my own set, just to let Peggy Lovell see! I know what she thinks." " Just to let Mrs. Lovell see !" Edward echoed. " She has seen it lots of times, my dear Algy. Come ; this looks THE POOR VILLANIES OF THE STORY. 1 f)7 lively. I was sure she would soon be sick of the water-gruel of peace." " I tell you she's got nothing to do with it, Xed. Don't be confoundedly unjust. She didn't tell me to go and seek him. How can she help his whispering to her ? And then she looks over at me, and I swear I'm not going to be de- fended by a woman. She must fancy 1 haven't got the pluck of a flea. I know what her idea of young fellows is. Why, she said to me, when Suckling went off from her, the other day, ' These are our Guai'ds.' I shall fight him." " Do," said Edward. ** Will you take a challenge ?" " I'm a lawyer, Mr. Mars." " You won't take a challenge for a friend, when he's in- sulted ?" " I reply again, I am a lawyer. But this is what I'll do, if you like. I'll go to Mrs. Lovell, and inform her that it is your desire to g-ain her esteem by fighting with pistols. That will accomplish the purpose you seek. It will possibly dis- appoint her, for she will have to stop the affair ; but women are born to be disappointed — they want so much." " I'll fight him some way or other," said Algernon, glower- ing ; and then his face became bright : " I say, didn't she manage that business beautifully this morning? Not another woman in the world could have done it." " Oh, Una and the Lion ! Mrs. Valentine and Orson ! Did you bet with the rest ?" his cousin asked. " I lost my tenner ; but what's that !" " There will be an additional five to hand over to the man Sedgett. What's that!" " No, hang it !" Algernon shouted. " You've paid your ten for the shadow cheerfully. Pay your five for the substance." " Do you mean to say that Sedgett " Algernon stared. " Miracles, if you come to examine them, Algy, have gene- rally had a pathway prepared for them ; and the miracle of the power of female persuasion exhibited this morning was not quite independent of the preliminary agency of a scoun- drel." *' So that's why you didn't bet." Algernon signified the opening of his intelligence with his eyelids, pronouncing ' by jingos ' and ' by Joves,' to ease the sudden rush of ideas ins ETIODA FLEMINa. Avitliin lum. " You might have lot me into the secret, T^ed. I'd lose any number of tens to Pt'ggJ Lovell, but a follow don't like to be in the dark." "Except, Altry, that when you carry licht, you're illy for it ; you'd liave to draw in advance, by degices : anyhow, look here: — Tliere are lots of young farmers who want to emigiate and w.-iut wives and money. I know one. It's no use going into ])ar- ticulars, but its worth thinking over. Life is nuide up of mutual help, Ned. You c;in help another fellow better than yourself. As for me, when I'm in a hobble, I give you my word of honour, I'm just like a baby, and haven't an idea at my own disposal. The same with others. Yoa cant manage without somebody's assistance. What do you say, old boy ?" Edward raised his head from his book. " Some views of life deduced from your private experience?" he observed; and Algernon cursed at book-worms, who would never take hints, and left him. liut when he was by himself, Edward pitched his book •npon the floor and gat reflecting. The sweat started on his forehead. He was compelled to look into his black volume and study it. His desire was to act humanely and gener- ously ; but the question inevitably recurred: "How can I utterly dash my pros|)eets in the world ?" It would be impossible to bring Dahlia to great houses; and he liked great houses and the charm of mixing among delicately-bred women. On the other hand, lawyers have married beneath them — mai-ried cooks, housemaids, governesses, and .so forth. And what has a lawyer to do with a dainty lady, who t\ill constantly distract him with finicking civilities and specula- tions in unprofitable regions? What he does want is a woman amiable as a surface of pai'chment, serviceable as his inkstand ; one who will be like the wig in which he closes his forensic term, disreputable from overwear, but suited to the purpose. "Ah ! if I meant to be nothing but a lawyer!" Edward stopped the flow of this current in Dalilia's favour. His jiassiou for her was silent. AVas it dead ? It was certainly silent. Since Robert had come down to play his wild giuue of persecution at Fairly, the simple idea of Dahlia had been Edward's fever. He detested brute force, with a finely- "witted man's full loathing; and Dahlia's ;)bnoxious chiitu- pion had grown to be associated in his mind with Dahlia. THE POOR VILLANIES OF THE STORY. 171 He swept them both from his recollection abhorrently, for in his recollection he could not divorce them. He pretended to suppose that Dahlia, whose only reproach to him was her suffering, participated m the scheme to worry him. He could even forget her beauty — forget all, save the unholy fetters binding him. She seemed to imprison him in bare walls. He meditated on her character. She had no strength. She was timid, comfort-loving, fond of luxury, credulous, preposterously conventional ; that is, desirous more than tho ordinary run of women of being hedged about and guarded by ceremonies — " mere ceremonies," said Edward, forgetting the notion he entertained of women not so protected. But it may be, that in playing the part of fool and coward, we cease to be mindful of the absolute necessity for sheltering the weak from that monstrous allied arn}y, the cowards and the fools. He admitted even to himself that he had deceived hei', at the same time denouncing her unheard-of capacity of belief, which had placed him in a miserable hobble, and that was the truth. Now, men confessing themselves in a miserable bobble, and knowing they aj^e guilty of the state of things lamented by them, intend to drown that part of their nature which disturbs thom by its outcry. The submission to a tangle that could be cut through instantaneously by any exertion of a noble will, convicts them. They had better not confide, even to their secret hearts, that they are afflicted by their conscience and the generosity of their sentiments, for it will be only to say that these high qualities are on the failing side. Their inclination, under the circumstances, is generally base, and no less a counsellor than uncorrupted common sense, when they are in such a hobble, will sometimes advise them to be base. But, in admitting the plea which common sense puts forward on their behalf, we may fairly ask them to be masculine in their baseness. Or, in other words, since they must be selfish, let them be so without the poltroonery of selfishness. Edward's wish w^as to be perfectly just, as far as he could be now — just to himself as well ; for how was he to prove of worth and aid to anyone depending on bim, if he stood crippled ? Just, also, to his family; to his possible posterity ; and just to Dahlia. His task was to reconcile the variety of justness due upon all sides. The struggle, we will assume, was severe, for he thought so; he 172 lUIODA PLKMINO. thought or poincr to Diililia and Rpcakiiiir t1io word of sopnra- tion ; of g'oiii^' lo lier lainily and stuliny liis uilence, without personal exculpation ; thus masculine in baseness he was ir idea ; but poltroonery triumphed, the picture of himself faeiuf^ his sin and its vietiius dismayeil him, and his strugi.'-lo ended in his considering' as to the fit employmi'ut of one thousand pounds in his ])ossession, the remainder of a small legacy, hitherto much cherished. A day later, ^Irs. Lovell said to him: "Have you heard of that unfortunate young man ? I am told that he lies in great danger from a blow on the back of his head. He looked ill when 1 saw him, and however mad he may be, I'm sorry harm should have come to one who is really bi-ave. Gentle means are surely best. It is so with horses, it 7>iiist be so with men. As to women, I don't pretend to unritldle them." " Gentle means are decidedly best," said Edward, per. ceiving that her little dog Algy had carried news to her, and tliat she was setting herself to fathom him. " Yon gave an eminent example of it yesterday. I was so tsure of the result that 1 didn t bet against you." " Why not have backed me ?" The hard young legal face withstood the attack of her soft blue eye.s, out of which a thousand needles tlew, seeking a weak point in the mask. " The compliment was, to incite you to a superhuman e£fIu pob;iCiJ!iiun of htr, and. crush her. CHAPTER XXII. EDWARD TAKES HIS COCESB. The writing of a letter to Dahlia had previon which were so foolish that if she could have the cou ag to look at them after they were written, they would ne. ^r be sent. He was slightly revolted by one exclamation: " How ambitious you are!" " Because I cannot sit down for life in a London lodging- house !" he thought, and eyed her distantly as a poor good creature who had ah-eady accepted her distinctive residence in another sphere than his. From such a perception of her humanity, it was natural that his livelier sense of it should diminish. He felt that he had awakened; and he shook her off. And now he set to work to subdue Mrs. Lovell. His owti subjugation was the first fruit of his effort. It was quite unacknowledged by him : but when two are at this game, the question arises — " Which can live without the other ?" and horrid pangs smote him to hear her telling musically of the places she was journeying to, the men she would see, and the chances of their meeting again before he was married to the heiress Adeline. " I have yet to learn that I am engaged to her," he said. Mrs. Lovell gave him a fixed look : " She has a half-brother." He stepped away in a fury. N 2 180 RTTODA FLEMmfJ. "Devil!" ho muttered, absolutely muttered it, knowing tliat lie fooled and frowned like a stage- hero tin stagey liei'oics. " You think to hound me into this brutal stu- pidity of fighting, do you ? Upon my honour," he added in his natural manner, " I believe she does, though!" Rut the look became his companion. It touched and called up great vanity in his breast, and not till then could ho placably confront the look. He tried a course of reading. Every morning he was down in the library, lookiiig old in an arm-chair over his book ; an intent abstracted figure. Airs. Lovell would enter and eye him carelessly ; utter little commonplaces and go forth. The silly words struck on his brain. The book seemed hollow; sounded hollow as he shut it. This woman breathed of active st-riving life. She was a spur to black energies; a plumed glory; impul- sive to chivalry. Everything she said and did held men in scales, and approved or rejected them. Intoxication followed this new conception of her. He lost altogether his right judgement ; even the cooler after- thoughts were lost. What sort of man had Harry been, her first husband ? A dashing soldier, a quarrelsome duel- list, a (lull (log. But, dull to her ? She, at least, was reverential to tlie memory of him. She lisped now and then of " my husband," very prettily, and with intense provocation ; and yet she Avorshipped brains. Evidently she thirsted for that rare union of brains and bravery in a man, and would never surrender till she had discovered it. Perhaps she fancied it did not exist. It might be that she took Edward as the type of brains, and Harry of bravery, and supjjosed that the two qualities were not to be had actually in couj unction. Her admiration of his (Edward's) wit, therefore, only sti-engthened the idea she entertained of his deficiency in that other companion manly virtue. Edward mast have been possessed, for he ground his teeth villanously in supposing himself the victiin of this oiit- rageous suspicion. And how to prove it false ? How to prove it false in a civilized age, among sober-living men and women, with whom the violent assertion of bravery Avould certainly imperil his claim to brains r" His head was like a stew-pan over the fire, bubbling endlessly. He railed at her to Algernon, and astonished the youth EDWAKD TAKES HIS COURSE. ISl wTio fhoiiglit t"hem in a fair way to make an alliance. " Milk and capsicums," he called her, and compared her to bloody mustard-haired Saxon Queens of history, and was childishly spiteful. And Mrs. Lovell had it all reported to her, as he was quite aware. " The woman seeking for an anomaly wants a master." With this pompous aphorism, he finished his reading of the fair Enigma. Words big in the mouth serve their turn when there is no way of satisfying the intelligence. To be her master, however, one must not begin by writhing as her slave. The attempt to read an inscrutable woman allows her to dominate us too commandingly. So the lordly mind takes her in a hard grasp, cracks the shell, and drawing forth the kernel, says, " This was all the puzzle." Doubtless it is the fate which women like Mrs. Lovell provoke. The truth was, that she could read a character when it was under her eyes ; but its yesterday and to- morrow were a blank. She had no imaginative hold on anything. For which reason she was always requiring tansrible sio^ns of virtues that she esteemed. The thirst for the shows of valour and wit was insane with her ; but she asked for nothing that she herself di 1 not give in abundance, and with beauty superadded. Her pro- pensity to bet sprang- of her passion for combat ; she was not greedy of money, or reckless in using it ; but a difference of opinion arising, her instinct forcibly prompted her to back her own. If the stake was the risk of a lover's life, she was ready to put down the stake, and would have marvelled contemptuously at the lover complaining. " Sheep ! sheep !" she thought of those who dared not fight, and had a waver- ing tendency to afiix the epithet to those who simply did not fight. Withal, Mrs. Lovell was a sensible person ; clear-headed and shrewd ; logical, too, more than the run of her sex : I may say, profoundly practical. So much so, that she sys- tematically reserved the after-years for enlightenment upon two or three doubts of herself, which struck her in the calm of her spirit, from time to time. " France," Edward called her, in one of their colloquies. It was an illuminating title. She liked the French 182 nnODA PLEMIXG. (tlinntrli no one was keener for the honour of her oa\ti country in opposition to them), she liked their splendid boyishness, tlu-ir iiin-quallod devotion, theii' merciless in- tellects ; the oneness ui" the nation when the sword is bare and pointing to chivalrous enterprise. Slie liked their line varnish of sentiment, which appears BO much on the surface that Englishmen suppose it to have nowhere any depth ; as if the outer coating must necessarily exhaust the stock, or as if what is at the source of our being can never be made visible. .She had her imagination of them as of a streaming banner in the jaws of storm, with snows among the cloud-rents and \ightuing in the chasms: — which image may be accounted for by the fact that when a girl she had in adoration kissed the feet of Napoleon, the giant of the later ghosts of history. It was a princely com])lim(>Tit. She received it curtseying, and disarmed the intended irony. In re])ly, she called him ' Great Britain.' 1 regret to say that he stood less proudly for his nation. Indeed, ue flushed. He remembered articles girding at the policy of peace at any price, and half felt that Mrs. Lovell had meant to crown him with a Quaker's hat. His title fell speedily into disuse ; but, " Yes, France," and " JSTo, France," continued, his effort being to fix the epithet to frivolous allusions, from which her ingenuity rescued it honourably. Had she ever been in love? He asked her the question. She stabbed him with so straightforward an ailirniative that he could not conceal the wound. " Have I not been married ?" she said. He began to experience the fretful ciaving to see the ante- cedents of the torturing woman spread out before him. He conceived a passion for her girlhood. He begged for portraits of her as a girl. She showed him the ])ortrait of Harry Lovell in a locket. He held the locket between his fingei-s. Dead Harry was kept very warm. Could brains ever touch her emotions as bravery had done ? " AV^here are the brains I boast of ?" he groaned, in the midst of these sensational extravagances. The lull of action was soon to be disturbed. A letter waa brought to him. He opened it and read— EDWARD TAKES HIS COURSE. 183 ** Mr. Edward Blancove, " When you rode by me under Fairly Park, I did not know you. T can give you a medical certificate tliat since then I have been in the doctor's hands. I know you now. I call upon you to meet me, with Avhat weapons you like best, to prove that you are not a midnight assassin. The place shall be where you choose to appoint. If you decline, I will make you publicly acknowledge what you have done. If you answer, that I am not a gentleman and you are one, I say that you have attacked me in the dark, when I was on horse- back, and you are now my equal, if I like to think so. You will not talk about the law after that night. The man you employed I may punish or I may leave, though he struck the blow. But I will meet you. To-morrow, a friend of mine, who is a major in the army, will be down here, and will call on you from me ; or on any friend of yours you are pleased to name. I will not let you escape. Whether I shall face a guilty man in you, God knows ; but I know I have a right to call upon you to face me. " 1 am. Sir, " Yours truly, " Robert Eccles." Edward's face grew signally white over the contents of this unprecedented challenge, The letter had been brouglit in to him at the breakfast table. " Read it, read it," said Mrs. Lovell, seeing him put it by ; and he had read it with her eyes on him. The man seemed to him a man of claws, who clutched like a demon. Would nothing quiet him ? Edward thought of bribes for the sake of peace ; but a second glance at the letter assured his sagacious mind that bribes were powerless in this man's case ; neither bribes nor sticks were of service. Departure from Fairly would avail as little: the tenacio is devil would follow him to London ; and what was worse, as a hound from Dahlia's family he was now on the right scent, and appeared to know that he was. How was a scandal to be avoided ? By leaving Fairly instantly for any place on earth, he could not avoid leaving the man behind ; and if the man saw Mrs. Lovell again, her instincts as a woman of her class were not to be trusted. As likely as not ehe would side with the ruffian ; that is, she would think he 184 RHODA FLEMING. had been "wroncfod — ppi-haps think that he oucrht to have been met. There is the democratic virus secret in every vs'omaii ; it was predominant in Mrs. Lovell, according to Edward's observation of the lady. The riprhts of individual maidiood were, as he anjij^rily perceived, likely to be recopf- nized by her spirit, if only they were stoutly asserted ; and that in defiance of station, of reason, of all the ideas incul- cated by education and society. " I believe she'll expect me to ficrht him," he exclaimed. At least, he knew she would despise him if he avoided the brutal challeng'e without some show of dignity. On rising from the table, he drew Algernon aside. It was an insuffei-able thought that he was compelled to take his brainless cousin into his conlidence, even to the extent of Boliciting Ins council, but there was no help for it. In vain Edward asked himself why he had been such an idiot as to stain his hands with the affair at all. He atti-ibuted it to his regard for Algernon. Having commonly the sway of his passions, he was in the habit of forgetting that he ever lost control of them ; and the fierce black mood, engendei-ed by Robert's audacious persecution, had passed from hiti memory, though it was now recalled in full force. " See what a mess you drag a man into," he said. Algernon read a line of the letter. " Oh, confound this inferaal fellow !" he shouted, in sickly wonderment ; and snapped shai-p, " I drag you into the mess ? Upon my honour, your coolness, Ned, is the biggest part about you, if it isn't the best." Edward's grip fixed on him, for they were only just out of earshot of ]\Irs. Lovell. They went upstairs, and Algernon read the letter through. " ' Midnight assas.sin,' " he repeated ; " by Jove ! how beastly that sounds. It's a lie that you attacked him in the dark, Ned— eh ?" " I did not attack him at all," said Edward. " He behaved like a ruffian to you, and desei'ved shooting like a mad dog." " Did you, though," Algernon ])ersisted in questioning, despite his cousin's manifest shyness of the subject; " tlid you really go out with that man Sedgett, and stop this fellow on horse])ack ? He speaks of a blow. You didn't strike him, did you, Ned ? I mean not a hit, except in self-defence ?" Edward bit his lip, and shot a level reflective side-look, EDWARD TAKES BTS COURSE. 185 peculiar to him when meditating. He wished his cousin to propose that Mrs. Lovell should see the letter. He felt that by consulting with her, he could bring- her to apprehend the common sense of the position, and be so far responsible for what he might do, that she would not dare to let her heart be rebellious toward him subsequently. If he himself went to her it would look too much like pleading for her inter- cession. The subtle directness of the woman's spirit had to be guarded against at every point. He replied to Algernon : "What I did was on youi' behalf. Oblige me by not interrogating me. I give you my positive assurance that I encouraged no unmanly assault on him." " That'll do, that'll do," said Algernon, eager not to hear more, lest there should come an explanation of what he had heard. " Of course, then, this fellow has no right — the devil's in him ! If we could only make him murder Sedgett and get hanged for it ! He's got a friend who's a major in the army ? Oh, come, I say ; this is pitching it too stiff. I shall insist upon seeing his commission. Really, Ned, 1 can't advise. I'll stand by you, that you may be sure of — stand by you ; but what the deuce to say to help you ! Go before the magis- trate. . . . Get Lord Elling to issue a warrant to prevent a breach of the peace. No ; that won't do. This quack of a major in the army's to call to-morrow. I don't mind, if he shows his credentials all clear, amusing him in any manner he likes. I can't see the best scheme. Hang it, Ned, it's very hard upon me to ask me to do the thinking. I always go to Peggy Lovell when I'm bothered. There — Mrs. Lovell ! Mistress Lovell ! Madame ! my Princess Lovell, if you want me to pronounce respectable titles to her name. You're too proud to ask a woman to help you, ain't you, Ned ?" " No," said Edward, mildly. " In some cases their wits are keen enough. One doesn't like to drag her into such a business." " Hm," went Algernon. *' I don't think she's so innocent of it as you fancy." " She's very clever," said Edward. "She's awfully clever!" cried Algernon. He paused to give room for more praises of her, and then pursued : " She's so kind. That's what you don't credit her for. I'll go and consult her, if positively you don't mind. Trust her for 186 EnODA PLEMINO. keeping' if, qnirt. Come, Ned, she's sure to tit upon the right thiuLT. ^l;iy J tror" " It's your all'air, more than mine," said Edward. "Have it so, if you like," returned the good-natnred fellow. " It's worth while consulting her, just to see how neatly she'll take it. Bless your heart, she won't know a bit more than you want her to know. I'm oS to her now." He carried away the letter. Edward's own practical judgement would have advised his instantly sending a short reply to Robert, explaining that he was simply in conversation with the man Scdgett, Avlien Robert, the old enemy of the latter, rode by, an