NAME and FAME

BOOK I

CHAPTER I.

HUSBAND AND WIFE.

It was a brilliant day in June. The sky was cloudless and dazzlingly blue, but the heat of the sun's rays was tempered by a deliciously cool breeze, and the foliage of the trees that clothe the pleasant slopes round the vivacious little town of Aix-les-Bains afforded plenty of shade to the pedestrian. Aix was, as usual, very crowded and very gay. German potentates abounded: French notabilities were not wanting: it was rumored that English royalty was coming. A very motley crowd of divers nationalities drank the waters every morning and discussed the latest society scandal. Festivity seemed to haunt the very air of the place, beaming from the trim white villas with their smart green jalousies, the tall hotels with crudely tinted flags flying from their roofs, the cheery little shops with their cheerier dames de comptoir smiling complacently on the tourists who unwarily bought their goods. Ladies in gay toilets, with scarlet parasols or floating feathers, made vivid patches of color against the green background of the gardens, and the streets were now and then touched into picturesqueness by the passing of some half-dozen peasants who had come from the neighboring villages to sell their butter or their eggs. The men in their blue blouses were mostly lean, dark, and taciturn; the women, small, black-eyed, and vivacious, with bright-colored petticoats, long earrings, and the quaintest of round white caps. The silvery whiteness of the lake, flashing back an answer to the sunlight, gave a peculiarly joyous radiance to the scene. For water is to a landscape what the eye is to the human countenance: it gives life and expression; without it, the most beautiful features may be blank and uninteresting.

But the brightness of the scene did not find an echo in every heart.

"Dame!" said a French waiter, who stood, napkin in hand, at a window of the Hôtel Venat, watching the passers-by, "there they go, that cold, sullen English pair, looking as if nothing on earth would make them smile again!"

A bullet-headed little man in a white apron stepped up to the window and stared in the direction that Auguste's eyes had taken.

"Tiens, donc! Quelle tournure! But she is superb!" he exclaimed, as if in remonstrance.

"She is handsome—oui, sans doute; but see how she frowns! I like a woman who smiles, who coquettes, who knows how to divert herself—like Mademoiselle Lisette here, queen of my heart and life."

And Auguste bowed sentimentally to a pretty little chambermaid who came tripping up the stairs at that moment, and laid his hand upon his heart.

"You are too polite, Monsieur Auguste," Lisette responded amicably. "And at whom are you gazing so earnestly?"

"At the belle Anglaise—you can still see her, if you look—she is charmingly dressed, but——"

"She is magnificent! simply magnificent," murmured the bullet-headed Jean, who was not, like his friend, enamored of the pert Lisette. "I have never seen so splendid an Englishwoman, never! nor one who had so much the true Parisian air!"

Lisette uttered a shrill little scream of laughter. "Do you know the reason, mon ami? She is not English at all: she is a compatriot. He—the husband—he is English; but she is French, I tell you, French to the finger-tips."

"Voyons; what rooms have they?"

"They are au quatrième—they are poor—poor," said Lisette, with infinite scorn. "I wait on them a little—not much; they have been here three days, and one can see——But the gentleman, he is generous. When madame scolds, he gives me money to buy my forbearance; she has the temper of a demon, the tongue of a veritable fiend!"

"Ah! He loves her, then!" said Auguste, putting his head on one side.

Lisette snapped her fingers. "Ah, oui! He loves her so well that he will strangle her one of these days when she says a word too much and he is in his sombre mood! Quiet as he is, I would not go too far with him, ce beau monsieur! He will not be patient always—you will see!"

She went on her way, and the waiters remained at the window in the corridor. The lady and gentlemen of whom they spoke had turned into the hotel garden, and were walking up and down its gravelled paths, apparently in silence. Auguste and Jean watched them, as if fascinated by the sight of the taciturn pair, who now and then were lost to sight behind a clump of trees or in some shady walk, presently reappearing in the full sunshine, with the air of those who wish for some reason or other to show themselves as much as possible.

This, at least, was the impression produced by the air and gait of the woman; not by those of the man. He walked beside her gravely, somewhat dejectedly, indeed. There was a look of resignation in his face, which contrasted forcibly with the flaunting audacity visible in every gesture of the woman who was his wife.

He was the less noticeable of the two, but still a handsome man in his way, of a refined and almost scholarly type. He was tall, and although rather of slender than powerful build, his movements were characterized by the mingled grace and alertness which may be seen when well-proportioned limbs are trained to every kind of athletic exercise. His face, however, was that of the dreamer, not of the athlete. He had a fine brow, thoughtful brown eyes, a somewhat long nose with sensitive nostrils, a stern-set mouth, and resolute chin. The spare outlines of his face, well defined yet delicate withal, sometimes reminded strangers of Giotto's frescoed head of Dante in his youth. But the mouth was partly hidden beneath a dark brown moustache; a pity from the artistic point of view. Refinement was the first and predominating characteristic of his face; thoughtful melancholy, the second. It was evident, even to the most casual observer, that this man was eminently unfitted to be the husband of the woman at his side.

For a woman she was unusually tall. She was also unusually handsome. She had a magnificent figure, a commanding presence, good features, hair, and eyes; yet the impression that she produced was anything but pleasant. The flashing dark eyes were too bold and too defiant; the carmine on her cheeks was artificially laid on, and her face had been dabbed with a powder puff in very reckless fashion. Her black hair was frizzed and tortured in the latest mode, and her dress made in so novel a style that it looked outré, even at a fashionable watering-place. Dress, bonnet and parasol were scarlet of hue; and the vivid tint was softened but slightly by the black lace which fell in cascades from her closely-swathed neck to the hem of her dress, fastened here and there by diamond pins. If it were possible that, as Lisette had said, Mr. and Mrs. Alan Walcott were poor, their poverty was not apparent in Mrs. Walcott's dress. Black and scarlet were certainly becoming to her, but the effect in broad daylight was too startling for good taste. To a critical observer, moreover, there was something unpleasantly suggestive in her movements: the way in which she walked and held her parasol, and turned her head from side to side, spoke of a desire to attract attention, and a delight in admiration even of the coarsest and least complimentary kind.

There was certainly something in the bearing of husband and wife that attracted notice. Her vivacity and her boldness, a certain weariness and reluctance in his air, as if he were paraded up and down these garden walks against his will, led others beside inquisitive French waiters to watch the movements of the pair. And they were in full view of several gazers when an unexpected and dramatic incident occurred.

A man who had sauntered out of the hotel into the gardens directed his steps towards them, and met them face to face as they issued from one of the side-paths. He was not tall, but he was dapper and agile: his moustache curled fiercely, and his eyeglass was worn with something of an aggressive air. He was perfectly dressed, except that—for English taste—he wore too much jewellery; and from the crown of his shining hat to the tip of his polished pointed boot he was essentially Parisian—a dandy of the Boulevards, or rather, perhaps, of the Palais Royal—an exquisite who prided himself upon the fit of his trousers and the swing of his Malacca cane.

He paused as he met the Walcotts, and raised his hat with a true French flourish. The lady laughed, showing a row of very white, even teeth, and held out her hand. Her husband sprang forward, uttering an angry word of remonstrance or command. The Frenchman grinned insolently, and answered with a sneer.

The Englishman seemed to gain in dignity as he replied. His wife laughed loudly and unpleasantly, however, and then, with a quick movement which proved him agile as a cat, the Frenchman struck him with his cane across the face. In another moment, Alan Walcott had taken him by the collar and wrested the cane from his hand. Whether or no he would have administered the thrashing that the man deserved must remain an unsettled question, for hotel servants and functionaries came rushing to the rescue, guests flocked to the scene in hopes of further excitement, and all was bustle and confusion. Mrs. Walcott began to scream violently, as soon as she saw signs of an impending conflict, and was finally carried into the house in a fit of hysterics.

A very pretty little altercation between the two combatants—who were separated with difficulty—and the landlord and his myrmidons then followed. The police arrived rather late on the scene, but were speedily quieted by assurances that peace was restored, and by the transfer of a few coins from Alan Walcott's pockets to their own. The aggressor, who gave his name as Henri de Hauteville, was politely requested to leave the Hôtel Venat; and Mr. Walcott declared his own intention of proceeding to Paris next morning. Accordingly the Frenchman speedily disappeared, but it was noticed that he dropped a word to his enemy, which Walcott answered by a bend of his head, and that he was seen shortly afterwards arm-in-arm with a young officer who was known to be an enthusiast in the matter of duelling.

An hour later Alan Walcott was crossing the hall with a hurried step and a face expressive of deep anxiety and vexation, when he encountered a stout, fair Englishman, who greeted him with effusion.

"You here, Walcott? Never thought of meeting you."

"I'm glad to see you, Dalton. I was longing at that very moment for some one to act as my friend."

"Not in the conventional meaning, I hope," laughed Dalton. "Your way of putting it suggests a duel—which no Englishman of any sense would embark in, I should hope!"

Dalton was a fresh-colored, blue-eyed man, of nearly thirty years of age. His frankness of manner and shrewdness of expression contrasted forcibly with the subtle dreaminess characteristic of Alan Walcott's face. Alan eyed him curiously, as if doubtful whether he should proceed.

"I am not altogether an Englishman," he said presently, "which may account in your eyes for some lack of sense. I want you, as a friend, in the most conventional manner possible. Come out with me and let us talk it over."

The two men went out and talked together for upwards of an hour. When they separated the expression of their faces afforded a curious contrast. Alan looked defiant, resolved, almost triumphant; but Brooke Dalton went on his way wagging his head in a depressed and melancholy manner, as if his soul were afflicted by misgivings of many kinds.

Mr. Alan Walcott had said that he should leave Aix-les-Bains next day, but the state of his wife's health rendered it impossible for her to quit the hotel, and he could not very well separate himself from her. She continued for some time in shrieking hysterics, varied by fainting fits; and when she became quieter, under the influence of a soporific administered by the doctor, she declared herself quite too ill and exhausted to rise from her bed. Her husband remained with her night and day, until the second morning, when he escaped from her sight and ken for a couple of hours, and absolutely refused to tell her where he had been. His refusal seemed to produce a quieting effect upon her. She became very still, and lay watching him, with a sullen, puzzled look in her great dark eyes. He took up a paper and began to read, with an assumption of complete calmness and unconcern; but she saw that he was paler than usual, and that his hand shook a little as he turned the pages of his Galignani. Presently she asked, in a subdued voice, for something to drink. He brought her a glass of claret and water, and she raised herself a little on one arm to take it from him. Suddenly she uttered a loud cry, and fell back gasping upon her pillows.

"Mon Dieu!" she cried, "there is blood upon your cuff."

Alan looked down hastily. It was true enough: his white cuff was stained with red.

"You have killed him!" she said. "You have murdered him, you wretch, you murderer——"

"Not at all," said Walcott with the greatest composure. "Upon my word, I rather wish I had. I think he deserved it. He has got off very easily."

"You had a meeting?" his wife shrieked, her eyes beginning to flash with rage.

"We had a meeting. It was for that purpose that I left for two hours this morning. You don't suppose that I should let myself be struck in the face without demanding satisfaction? I have enough French blood in my veins to think it a very natural way of settling such a quarrel——"

"Was he hurt?" she asked, without waiting for him to finish.

"Very slightly. A sword-cut on the shoulder. The seconds interposed, or we should have gone on——"

"I have no doubt you wanted to kill him! I shall denounce you to the police!"

"As you please" said her husband indifferently, taking up his paper. "But M. de Hauteville has retired from the scene: he had a carriage waiting, and has crossed the frontier by this time. I assure you he is perfectly safe Switzerland."

There was a taunt in his voice which exasperated his wife's temper almost to madness.

"Scélérat!" she said, in a hissing, unnatural voice. "You would have killed him if you could? Beware of my vengeance then, for I swear that you shall suffer as he has suffered—and worse things too!"

Alan shrugged his shoulders. He had heard threats of this kind too often to be greatly moved by them. And Mrs. Walcott, after a few ineffectual remarks of the same sort, began to sob violently, and finally to work herself into another hysterical fit, during which her husband coolly rang the bell, and left her to Lisette's not very tender care.

When he returned she was once more quiet and subdued. He noticed that she was reading a letter, which, at his entrance, she thrust—somewhat ostentatiously—beneath her pillow. He took no notice. He was tired of taking notice. As a rule, he let her go her own way. He had been married for three years, and he had learned that, save in exceptional circumstances, it was better not to interfere. He was relieved, and somewhat surprised, when she suddenly declared herself better, and wishful to leave her bed. Before long she was sitting at an open window, with a cup of black coffee and a flask of cognac on a table before her, while Alan fanned her with a great red fan and occasionally bathed her temples with eau-de-cologne. He paid her these attentions with an air of gentle gravity which became him well, but the slight fold between his brows betokened irritation and weariness.

Cora Walcott seemed to delight in keeping him at her beck and call. She did not let him stir from her side for the whole of that sultry summer day. She put on a soft and languid manner: she shed tears and tried to say coaxing things, which were very coldly received; for there was a hard and evil look in her fine dark eyes that went far to neutralize the effect of her câlineries. Once, indeed, when Alan had gone into an adjoining room to fetch a vinaigrette, her true feeling found its vent in a few expressive words.

"Sacré," she muttered, drawing back the red lips from her white teeth, with the snarl of a vicious dog, "how I hate you, cochon! How I wish that you were dead!"

And then she smoothed her brows, and smiled at him as he re-entered the room.

In the course of the evening she made the suggestion that they should leave Aix-les-Bains next day.

"Certainly," Alan answered, more warmly than usual. "And where shall we go?"

"Oh, to Paris, I suppose. To Dijon first, of course—if I am strong enough to travel so far."

Alan was eager to make his preparations for departure, and pleased to find that his wife was as ready as he to hasten them. Only in one point did her behavior strike him as peculiar. She announced that she meant to leave Aix-les-Bains at an early hour, lunch and rest at Culoz, and go on to Dijon by the afternoon train.

"But why Culoz? Nobody stops at Culoz," he remonstrated.

"Why not Culoz? There is an inn. I suppose we can get some lunch," she answered. "Besides, I have always meant to go there, to look at the château on the hill! You English like 'views,' do you not? The 'view' must be magnificent."

She had never formerly shown any interest in scenery, and Alan stared at her for a moment with a puzzled look. If Henry de Hauteville had been likely to join her at Culoz he could have understood this whim of hers; but de Hauteville was safely lodged by this time in the nearest Swiss canton, and not at all likely to intercept their journey. He did her bidding, however, without comprehension of her reasons, as he had done many a time before. Again, he was discomfited by her behavior in the train, shortly after their departure from the station at Aix-les-Bains. She suddenly flung herself back in the corner of the coupé and burst into a prolonged fit of noisy laughter, which seemed as if it would choke her by its violence. Alan questioned and remonstrated in vain. Fortunately, they had the coupé to themselves; but the laughter continued so long that he began to doubt his wife's sanity, as well as her self-control. At last she sat up and wiped her eyes.

"You will know why I laugh some day, mon ami," she remarked. "Till then, ask no questions."

Alan was not disposed to ask them. He remained silent, and his silence continued until the little station of Culoz was reached.

"We change here, of course," he said. "But why should we leave the station?"

"Do you want to starve me?" his wife inquired angrily. "We will go to the inn. There is an inn on the road to the village; I asked about it yesterday."

Very few English tourists think it worth their while to spend any time at Culoz, pretty little place although it be; and the landlady of the quaint auberge, with its wooden, vine-grown piazza, was somewhat amazed and distracted by the appearance of foreign visitors. The dining-room seemed to be full of peasants in blue blouses, who had been attending a fair; but lunch was served to Mr. and Mrs. Walcott in the open air, on the verandah. Cora grumbled openly at the simple fare provided; and Alan thought how charming would be the scene and the rustic meal if only his companion were more congenial. For himself, he was quite satisfied with the long French loaf, the skinny chicken, the well-salted cream cheese, and the rough red vin du pays. The blue sky, the lovely view of mountain and valley, lake and grove, the soft wind stirring the vine leaves on the trellis-work of the verandah, would have given him unmixed delight if he had been alone. But all was spoiled by the presence of an unloved and unloving wife.

The road to the château leads upwards from Culoz, and is a trifle hot and dusty. Alan wondered dumbly whether Cora had an object in dragging him so far away from the inn, and what that object was. But he took small annoyances patiently. It was something gained, at least, that his wife should seem content. Anything was better than tearing rage or violent hysterical weeping, which were the phases of temper most frequently presented to his view. On this occasion she appeared pleased and happy. He surprised a touch of malignity in her tones, a glance of evil meaning now and then; but he did not greatly care. Cora could not keep a secret. If she had any ill-will or ill intention towards him he was sure to know it before long.

"I am tired," she said at last, abruptly. "Let us sit down and rest. Look, here is an entrance into the park of the château. Shall we go in?"

"Is it open to the public?" said Alan, with an Englishman's instinctive fear of trespassing. For, although he had had a French grandmother, and sometimes boasted himself of French descent, he was essentially English in his ideas. Cora laughed him to scorn.

"I go where I will," she said, "and nobody finds it in his heart to turn me out. Courage, mon ami, I will protect you, if necessary. Follow me!"

Piqued by her tone, he opened the gate for her, and they passed from the hot, white road into the green demesnes of the Count who owned the château above Culoz. It struck Alan that his wife knew the way wonderfully well. She turned without hesitation into a path which led them to a wooden seat shaded by two great trees, and so situated that it could not be seen by anyone passing on the high road. Here she seated herself and looked up at her husband with a defiant smile.

"You have been here before?" he said suddenly.

She nodded. "Precisely, mon ami, I have been here before. And with whom? With M. de Hauteville, when you imagined me suffering from a migraine a few days ago. Surely you did not think that it was his first appearance when he arrived at the hotel, the day before yesterday?"

"I do not wish to discuss M. de Hauteville," said Alan turning away.

"But perhaps I wish to discuss him. We discussed you at full length—that day last week. We chronicled your vices, your weaknesses, your meannesses in detail. One thing I might have told him, which I left out—the fact that you are no gentleman, not even bourgeois—a mere peasant clown. He would not have let you measure swords with him if he had known the baseness of your origin, my friend!"

Alan's lips moved as if he would have spoken, but he restrained himself. He saw that she wanted him to respond, to lose his temper, to give her some cause of complaint, some opening for recrimination; and he resolved that he would not yield to her desire. She might abuse him as she would and he would not reply. She would cease when she was tired—and not till then.

"You are a mean-spirited creature!" she said, her eyes flashing hatred at him as she spoke. "You have chained me to you all these years, although you know that I loathe the very sight of you, that I have worshiped Henri, my lover, all the while. Who but a base, vile wretch would not have given me my freedom? You have known all the time that he loved me, and you have pretended ignorance because you did not want to let me go. From the moment I found this out, I have hated and despised you. You have no courage, no spirit; there is nothing even to be afraid of in you. You would be brutal if you dared, but you do not dare. You can be spiteful and treacherous and villainous, that is all. And I hate you for all that you are and all that you do not dare to be!"

Alan ground his teeth, in a moment's raging desire to bring the woman to her senses by some actual exertion of his physical strength. But the impulse of anger lasted only for a moment. He knew that half her rage was simulated—that she was lashing herself up in preparation for some tremendous crisis, and all that he could do was to wait for it in silence. She had risen to her feet as she spoke. He rose too and leaned against the trunk of a tree, while she stormed and raved like a madwoman for some minutes in front of him.

"Now," she said at last, "you know what I think of you, how I hate you, how I despise you. But it is not enough. My father shot down twenty of his enemies in the siege of Paris. Do you think that his daughter is a coward, to be trampled on by a brutal, cold-blooded Englishman? No! Because I hate you, and because you have tried to kill the man I love, and because you are too mean and vile to live—I will kill you!"

Her hand darted to the bosom of her dress. Before Alan could stop her—almost before he realized what she was doing—she had drawn out a little pistol, cocked it, and pulled the trigger. But her hurry at the last moment spoiled her aim. Alan felt a sting in the left arm, and knew that she had so far succeeded in her intentions; but with his right hand he was able to snatch the pistol from her, and to fling it far into the brushwood.

Then came the reaction. She burst into loud, screaming sobs and tears, and flung herself on the ground, where she writhed for a time like one in convulsions. Alan seated himself, feeling somewhat sick and faint, and waited for the storm to spend itself. Some time elapsed before she became calm; but at last she raised herself panting from the ground and looked half timorously at her husband. His coolness and quietness often enraged, but now and then it frightened her.

"If you have not another pistol with you," said Alan, "you cannot kill me just now. Perhaps you have done enough to satisfy yourself for the moment. What do you propose to do next?"

"What do you mean to do?" she asked sullenly. "Of course, you can follow me and give me up to the police."

"I shall not do that."

"I will not return with you," she said in a furious tone.

"That is natural," Alan agreed politely. "What then?"

"I told you I knew this place," she answered. "I am to meet a friend upon the road, half a mile further on. I am going there now. He will take me to the next station on the line."

"Admirably planned!" said Alan. "Every detail fits in to perfection."

"And I shall never come back," she said, looking at him spitefully.

For answer, he raised his hat. She turned on her heel, went down the slope towards the road, and disappeared. It was a strange parting between husband and wife. Not a single feeling of reluctance existed in the mind of either; only a fixed resolve to have done with each other henceforth and for ever.

Alan bound up his wounds as well as he could, and retraced his steps to Culoz. He would have done better, possibly, to avoid the place. People stared at him curiously as he passed them by. Why had he come back alone? What had he done with the beautiful lady who had accompanied him when he set forth?

"Hé, monsieur," tried the black-eyed dame of the auberge, leaning over the rail of the verandah, as he passed: "ou donc est madame? Est-ce qu'elle ne revient pas?"

"Madame est partie," said Alan continuing his walk without turning round. The aubergiste looked after him in amaze. Where could madame have gone? There was no other road to the station, and she had been watching for the English milord and his lady for the last hour and a half! What had he done with madame?

It was a matter of speculation which lasted her for many a day, and was often recounted to new comers. It became the general opinion at Culoz that the Englishman had in some unaccountable manner killed his wife and disposed mysteriously of her body. But although search was made for it high and low, the murdered body was never found. Nevertheless, the stranger's guilt remained a tradition of the neighborhood, and the story of that marvelous disappearance is related by the villagers unto this day.

Alan went on his way rejoicing, although in somewhat grim and shame-faced wise. For three years he had been a miserable slave. Now he was free! And he determined that he would never submit to bonds again.

CHAPTER II.

AT THE RECTORY.

About the very time when Alan Walcott, at the age of three-and-twenty, was making a hasty match with the daughter of a French refugee—a match bitterly deplored before the first few weeks of married life were over—events, which afterwards very greatly affected his career, were quickly shaping themselves in a sleepy little English village not far from the place where he was born.

Angleford, a mere handful of red-brick cottages, five miles from a railway station, was little known to the outer world. Its nearest market-town was Dorminster, and the village of Thorley lay between Angleford and the county town. Birchmead, a hamlet which had some repute of its own as a particularly healthy place, stood further down the river on which Angleford was built, and its merits generally threw those of neighboring villages into the shade.

But Angleford was in itself a pretty little nook, and its inhabitants somewhat prided themselves on its seclusion from the world. These inhabitants, it must be confessed, were few. It had once been a larger and more important place, but had gradually dwindled away until the village contained less than three hundred persons, chiefly laborers and small shop-keepers. Beside these, there were the doctor, and his wife, the rector and his family, and the squire—a childless widower, who was of rather less account than anybody else in the parish.

The Rectory was a rambling, long, low, red-brick house standing in prettily-wooded grounds, bordered by the river, on the other side of which lay the park belonging to the squire. The park ran for some distance on both sides of the stream, and the Rectory grounds were, so to speak, taken out of the very midst of the squire's, demesne. The continuation of wooded ground on either side the narrow winding river made the place particularly picturesque; and it was a favorite amusement for the rector's son and daughter to push a rather crazy boat out of the little boat-house at the foot of the garden, and row up and down those reaches of the stream "between the bridges," which were navigable. One of the bridges warned them of the weir, which it was not very safe to approach; and beyond the other, three miles further down and close to Birchmead, the stream was shallow and clogged with reeds. But within these limits there was a peaceful tranquil beauty which made the boat a favorite resting place for the Rectory people during the long summer evenings and afternoons.

It was two o'clock on a late autumn afternoon, when a girl of sixteen came out of the Rectory door, which always stood hospitably open in fine weather, and walked to the boat-house, as if intending to launch out upon the water. The day was sunny on the whole, but not cloudless: the sun shone out brightly every now and then, and was again obscured by a filmy haze, such as rises so easily from the low-lying land in Essex. But the golden haze softened the distant outlines of wood and meadow, and the sun's beams rested tenderly upon the rapidly stripping branches, where a few rustling leaves still told of their departed glories. The long undefined shadows of the trees stretched far across the wide lawn, scarcely moving in the profound stillness of the air; and a whole assembly of birds kept up a low-toned conversation in the bushes, as if the day were hardly bright enough to warrant a full chorus of concerted song. It was a tender, wistful kind of day, such as comes sometimes in the fall of the year, before the advent of frost. And a certain affinity with the day was visible in the face of the girl who had walked down to the riverside. There was no melancholy in her expression: indeed, a very sweet and happy smile played about the corners of her sensitive mouth; but a slightly wistful look in the long-lashed grey eyes lent an unconscious pathos to the delicate face. But, although delicate, the face was anything but weak. The features were clearly cut; the mouth and chin expressed decision as well as sensibility; and beneath the thick, fine waves of shining brown hair, the forehead was broad and well-developed. Without pretension to actual beauty or any kind of perfection, the face was one likely to attract and then to charm; gentleness, thoughtfulness, intellectual power, might be read in those fair features, as well as an almost infantine candor and innocence, and the subtle and all too-transient bloom of extreme youth. Her hair, which constituted one of her best "points," was simply parted in the middle, fastened with a clasp at the nape of her neck, and then allowed to fall in a smooth, shining shower down to her waist. Mrs. Campion, who had been something of a beauty in her young days, was given to lamenting that Lettice's hair was not golden, as hers had been; but the clear soft brown of the girl's abundant tresses had a beauty of it's own; and, as it waved over her light woollen frock of grey-green hue, it gave her an air of peculiar appropriateness to the scene—as of a wood-nymph, who bore the colors of the forest-trees from which she sprang.

Such, at any rate, was the fancy of a man whose canoe came shooting down the river at this moment, like an arrow from a bow. He slackened pace as he came near the Rectory garden, and peered through the tangled branches which surrounded the old black boat-house, to catch another glimpse of Lettice. He wondered that she did not notice him: his red and white blazer and jaunty cap made him a somewhat conspicuous object in this quiet country place; and she must have heard the long strokes of his oars. But she remained silent, apparently examining the fastenings of the boat; absorbed and tranquil, with a happy smile upon her lips.

"Good afternoon, Miss Campion: can I help you there in any way?" he shouted at last, letting his boat slide past the boat-house entrance, and then bringing it round to the little flight of grassy steps cut in the bank from the lawn to the river.

"Oh, good afternoon, Mr. Dalton. Thank you, no; I don't want any help," said Lettice; but the young man had already set foot upon the lawn and was advancing towards her. He was the nephew and heir of the childless Squire at Angleford Manor, and he occasionally spent a few weeks with his uncle in the country. Old Mr. Dalton was not fond of Angleford, however, and the Campions did not see much of him and his nephew.

Brooke Dalton was six-and-twenty, a manly, well-looking young fellow, with fair hair and bright blue eyes. He was not very tall, and had already begun to develop a tendency towards stoutness, which gave him considerable trouble in after years. At present he kept it down by heavy doses of physical exercise, so that it amounted only to a little unusual fullness of body and the suspicion of a double chin. His enemies called him fat. His friends declared that his sunshiny look of prosperity and good-humor was worth any amount of beauty, and that it would be a positive loss to the world if he were even a trifle thinner. And Brooke Dalton was a man of many friends.

Lettice greeted him with a smile. "So you are here again," she said.

"Yes, I've been here a day or two. Have you heard from Sydney yet?"

"No, and we are dreadfully anxious. But papa says we shall hear very soon now."

"I don't suppose you need have the slightest anxiety. Sydney is sure to do well: he was always a clever fellow."

"Yes, but he has had no teaching except from papa: and papa torments himself with the idea that there may be better teachers than himself at Cambridge—which I am sure there couldn't be. And I am sure he will be disappointed if Sydney does not get at least an exhibition, although he tries to pretend that he will not mind."

"If he does not get it this year, he will be the surer of it next time."

"Yes," said Lettice rather doubtfully. "But I wish papa were not quite so anxious."

"Did he go to Cambridge with Sydney?"

"Yes, and stayed for a day or two; but he said he was rather glad to get home again—there had been so many changes since he was there."

"Here he comes," said Brooke, turning round.

The rector was a dignified-looking man, with a tall figure, handsome features, and hair and beard which had of late been growing very grey. He greeted Dalton cordially, and at once began to speak of his hopes and expectations for his son. To all of these Dalton responded good-humoredly. "Sydney has plenty of brains: he is is sure to do well," he said.

"Oh, I don't know—I don't know. I've been his only tutor, and I may not have laid the foundations with sufficient care. I shall not be at all surprised if he fails. Indeed"—with a transparent affectation of indifference—"I shall not be sorry to have him back for another year. He is not quite eighteen, you know. And Lettice will be glad to have him again."

"But I want him to succeed!" said Lettice eagerly.

"Of course you do. And he will succeed," said Brooke; an assurance which caused her to flash a glad look of gratitude to him in reply.

"Lettice has been Sydney's companion in his studies," said Mr. Campion, patting her hand gently with his long white fingers. "She has been very industrious and has got on very well, but I daresay she will be pleased to have a holiday when he is gone."

"Yes, I daresay," said Brooke; and then, looking at Lettice, he saw the manifestation of some strong feeling which he did not understand. The girl flushed hotly and withdrew her hand from her father's arm. The tears suddenly came into her eyes.

"I never wanted a holiday," she said, in a hurt tone.

"No, no, you were always a good girl," returned her father absently—his eyes had wandered away from her to the high-road beyond the glebe. "But of course there is a limit to a girl's powers; she can't compete with a boy beyond a certain point. Is not that a cab, Lettice? Surely it must be Sydney, and he has came at last. Well, now we shall know the result!"

"I'll go to the fence and look," said Lettice, running away. The tears of mortification and distress were still smarting in her eyes. Why should her father depreciate her to their neighbor because she was a girl? She did not mind Mr. Dalton's opinion of her, but it was hard that her father should give her no credit for the work that she had done in the study at his side. Step by step she had kept pace with her brother: sometimes he had excelled her, sometimes she thought that she was outstripping him. Now in the hour of his possible success (of which she would be proud and glad), why should her father seem to undervalue her powers and her industry? They would never bring her the guerdon that might fall to Sydney's lot; but she felt that she, too, had a right to her father's praise.

She had been vaguely hurt during Sydney's absence to find that Mr. Campion did not seem disposed to allow her to go on working alone with him. "Wait, my dear, wait," he had said to her, when she came to him as usual, "let us see how Sydney's examination turns out. If he comes back to us for another year you can go on with him. If not—well, you are a girl, it does not matter so much for you; and your mother complains that you do not sit with her sufficiently. Take a holiday just now, we will go on when Sydney comes back."

But in this, Lettice's first separation from her beloved brother, she had no heart for a holiday. She would have been glad of hard work to take her out of herself. She was anxious, sad, dés[oe]uvrée, and if she had not been taught all her life to look on failure in an examination as something disgraceful, she would have earnestly hoped that Sydney might lose the scholarship for which he was competing.

Brooke Dalton saw that his presence was scarcely desired just then, and took his leave, meditating as he pulled up the river on Lettice's reddened cheeks and pretty tear-filled eyes. "I suppose she thinks she'll miss her brother when he goes away," he decided at length, "and no doubt she will, for a time; but it is just as well—what does a girl want with all that Latin and Greek? It will only serve to make her forget to brush her hair and wear a frock becomingly. Of course she's clever, but I should not care for that sort of cleverness in a sister—or a wife." He thought again of the girl's soft grey eyes. But he had a hundred other preoccupations, and her image very soon faded from his brain.

Lettice ran to the fence to look at the cab, but Mr. Campion turned at once to the gateway and walked out into the road. He had not been mistaken, it was Sydney, indeed; and as soon as the young fellow saw his father he stopped the vehicle, told the driver to go on to the Rectory with his portmanteau, and turned to his father with a triumphant smile. Lettice did not meet the pair for a minute or two, so the son's communication was made first to Mr. Campion alone.

"Here I am, sir!" was the young man's greeting, "turned up again like a bad half-penny."

"Welcome anyhow, my boy," said the rector, "and sterling coin, I'll warrant, however much you may malign yourself." He was too nervous to ask a direct question about his son's success. "We have been very dull without you. Lettice is counting on your help to break in her pony to the saddle."

"You mustn't be dull after a week's absence. What would you do if I had to be more than half the year at Cambridge?"

"Ah, that would be a different thing. Have they given you an exhibition then?"

"Well, not exactly that." The rector's face fell, but it brightened as Sydney proceeded with a touch of youthful pomposity. "Your old pupil is a Scholar of Trinity."

The rector was carrying his cane as he walked along, and when Sydney had told his good news he stopped short, his face aglow, and for lack of any more eloquent mode of expressing his satisfaction, raised it in the air and brought it down with sounding emphasis on his companion's back.

Sydney laughed.

"Laudatur et alget," he said. "How many stripes would it have been if I had come home disgraced?"

"The stripes would have been my portion in that case," the rector answered, with a hearty laugh. He had not been so jovial for many months.

Then Lettice came running up, and had to be told the news, and clung to Sydney's neck with kisses, which he graciously permitted rather than returned. But he was gratified by her affection, as well as by the pride and pleasure which his father took in his success, and the less discriminating, but equally warm congratulations and caresses showered upon him by his mother.

Indeed for the rest of the day, Sydney was caressed and complimented to his heart's content. He preferred the compliments to the caresses, and he was not unloving to his parents, although he repulsed Lettice when she attempted to kiss him more than once. He had come back from Cambridge with an added sense of manliness and importance, which did not sit ill upon his handsome face and the frank confidence of his manner. It was Sydney who had inherited the golden hair and regular features which, as his mother said, ought to have belonged to Lettice and not to him; but she loved him all the more dearly for his resemblance to her family and to herself. It escaped her observation that Sydney's blue-grey eyes were keener, his mouth more firmly closed and his jaw squarer than those of most boys or men, and betokened, if physiognomy goes for anything, a new departure in character and intellect from the ways in which Mrs. Campion and her family had always walked. A fair, roseate complexion, and a winning manner, served to disguise these points of difference; and Mrs. Campion had not quick sight for anything which did not lie upon the surface, in the character of those with whom she had to do.

She was usually to be found in the drawing-room—a faded, pretty woman, little over fifty years of age, but with the delicate and enfeebled air of the semi-invalid—a white shawl round her shoulders, a bit of knitting or embroidery between her incapable, uncertain fingers. Her hair was very grey, but the curliness had never gone out of it, and it sprang so crisply and picturesquely from her white, unwrinkled forehead that it seemed a pity to hide any of the pretty waves even by the crown of fine old lace which Mrs. Campion loved. She was a woman at whom no one could look without a sense of artistic satisfaction, for her face was still charming, and her dress delicately neat and becoming. As for her mental and moral qualities, she was perfectly well satisfied with them, and her husband was as satisfied as she—although from a somewhat different point of view. And as she very properly remarked, if her husband were satisfied with her, she did not know why she should be called upon to regard any adverse opinion of the outer world. At the same time she was an ardent disciple of Mrs. Grundy.

How this woman came to be the mother of a child like Lettice, it were, indeed, hard to say. Sydney was fashioned more or less after Mrs. Campion's own heart: he was brisk, practical, unimaginative—of a type that she to some extent understood; but Lettice with her large heart, her warm and passionate nature, her keen sensibilities and tender conscience, was a continual puzzle to her mother. Especially at this period of the girl's life, when new powers were developing and new instincts coming into existence—the very time when a girl most needs the help and comfort of a mother's tender comprehension—Mrs. Campion and Lettice fell hopelessly apart. Lettice's absorption in her studies did not seem right in Mrs. Campion's eyes: she longed with all her soul to set her daughter down to crewel-work and fancy knitting, and her one comfort in view of Sydney's approaching separation from his home was her hope that, when he was gone, Lettice would give up Latin and Greek and become like other girls. She was ignorantly proud of Sydney's successes: she was quite as ignorantly ashamed of Lettice's achievements in the same lines of study.

"I can never forget," she said to Lettice that evening, when the rector and his son were discussing Cambridge and examination papers in the study, while the mother and her daughter occupied the drawing-room—Lettice, indeed, wild to join her father and brother in the study and glean every possible fragment of information concerning the place which she had been taught to reverence, but far too dutiful to her mother to leave her alone when Mrs. Campion seemed inclined to talk—"I can never forget that Sydney learned his alphabet at my knee. I taught him to spell, at any rate; and if your father had not insisted on taking the teaching out of my hands when he was seven years old, I am convinced that I should have done great things with him."

"Surely he has done great things already, mamma!" Lettice said with enthusiasm.

"Oh, yes!" said Mrs. Campion with a sigh. "But I don't think your father has given quite the bias to his mind that I should have liked best. I have always hoped that he would spend his strength in the service of the Church; but——You have not heard him say much about his future career, have you, Lettice?"

"I don't think he has considered it particularly," Lettice answered. "But he never speaks of taking Orders; he talked of the Bar the other day. There's no reason why he should make up his mind so soon, is there, mamma?"

"No, dear, no. But I am quite sure that if he went into the Church he would be a Bishop," said Mrs. Campion, with conviction. "And I should like him to be a Bishop."

"Well, perhaps he will be Lord Chancellor instead," said Lettice, merrily.

"There can be no doubt, my dear," said her mother, "that a Bishop of the Anglican Church is able to carry himself with more dignity and distinction in everyday life than a Lord Chancellor, who is only dignified when he is on the Bench. I think that Sydney would make an excellent Bishop—quite the most distinguished Bishop of the day."

It was not until next morning that Lettice had time to ply her brother with questions as to his examination and his Cambridge experiences generally. She did not ask about the visit to London which he had also paid. She had been to London herself, and could go there any day. But Cambridge!—the goal of Sydney's aspirations—the place where (the girl believed) intellectual success or failure was of such paramount importance—what was that like?

Sydney was ready to hold forth. He liked the position of instructor and was not insensible to the flattery of Lettice's intentness on his answers. But he was a little dismayed by one of her questions, which showed the direction of her thoughts.

"Did you hear anything about the women's college, Sydney?" For Girton and Newnham were less well known then than they are now.

"Women's colleges! No, indeed. At least, I heard them laughed at several times. They're no good."

"Why not?" said Lettice, wistfully.

"Now, Lettice," said the youthful mentor, severe in boyish wisdom, "I hope you are not going to take fancies into your head about going to Cambridge yourself. I should not like it at all. I'm not going to have my sister laughed at and sneered at every time she walks out. I don't want to be made a laughing-stock. Nice girls stay at home with their mothers; they don't go to colleges and make themselves peculiar."

"I am not going to be peculiar; but I don't want to forget all I have learned with you," said Lettice, quickly.

"You have learned too much already," said the autocrat, whose views concerning women's education had developed since his short stay in Cambridge. "Girls don't want Latin and Greek; they want music and needlework, and all that sort of thing. I don't want my sister to be a blue-stocking."

Lettice felt that her lot in life ought not to be settled for her simply as Sydney's sister—that she had an individuality of her own. But the feeling was too vague to put into words; and after Syndey had left her, in obedience to a call from his father, she sat on in the long, low room with its cushioned window-seats and book-covered walls—the dear old room in which she had spent so many happy hours with her teacher and her fellow-pupil—and wondered what would become of her when Sydney was really gone; whether all those happy days were over, and she must henceforth content herself with a life at Mrs. Campion's side, where it was high treason to glance at any book that was neither a devotional work nor a novel. Lettice loved her mother, but the prospect did not strike her as either brilliant or cheering.

It was the beginning, although at first she knew it not, of a new era in her life. Her happy childhood was over; she was bound henceforth to take up the heavy burden which custom lays on the shoulders of so many women: the burden of trivial care, unchanging routine, petty conventionalities—

"Heavy as frost and deep almost as life."

Sydney went out into the world to fight; Lettice sat in idleness at home; and society, as well as the rector and his wife, judged this division of labor to be fair and right. But to Lettice, whose courage was high and whose will and intellect were strong, it seemed a terrible injustice that she might not fight and labor too. She longed for expansion: for a wider field and sharper weapons wherewith to contest the battle; and she longed in vain. During her father's lifetime it became more and more impossible for her to leave home. She was five-and-twenty before she breathed a larger air than that of Angleford.

CHAPTER III.

PROGRESS.

In due time, Sydney proceeded to Cambridge, and Lettice was left alone. The further development of brother and sister can scarcely be understood without a retrospective glance at their own and their parents' history.

The Reverend Lawrence Campion, Rector of Angleford, was at this time a prosperous and contented man. Before he reached his fortieth year, he had been presented by an old college friend to a comfortable living. Married to the woman of his early choice, he had become the father of two straight-limbed, healthy, and intelligent children; and then, for another twenty years, he felt that he would not care to change his lot with that of the most enviable of his fellow-creatures.

Being himself a scholar and a student, he determined that his boy and girl, so far as he could shape their lives, should be scholars also. To teach them all he knew was henceforth his chief occupation; for he would not hand over to another a task which for him was a simple labor of love. Day by day he sat between them in his comfortable study, where roses tapped at the lozenge-shaped window panes all through the summer, and in winter the glow of the great logs upon the hearth was reflected from the polished binding and gilt lettering of his books in a thousand autumnal hues, as pleasing to his eyes as the tints of the summer flowers. Day by day he sat between his children, patiently laying the foundation of all they could thereafter learn or know. He made no distinction for age or sex; and in their case, at any rate, nature had set no stigma of inferiority on the intelligence of the girl. Sydney was the older of the two by eighteen months, and at first it seemed as though his mind was readier to grasp a new idea; but there awoke in Lettice a spirit of generous rivalry and resolution, which saved her from being far out-stripped by her brother. Together they studied Greek and Latin; they talked French and read German; they picked up as much of mathematics as their father could explain to them—which was little enough; and, best of all, they developed a literary faculty such as does not always accompany a knowledge of half-a-dozen dead and living languages.

The day came when Mr. Campion, not without misgiving, resolved to test the value of the education which he had given to his children. He had held a fellowship at Peterhouse up to the time of his marriage, and had intended that Sydney should try for a scholarship at the same college. But the boy aimed at a higher mark; he was bent on being a Scholar of Trinity. Perhaps it might have done him good to fail once or twice on the threshold of his life, had his father assured himself beforehand that he would not be disappointed if his pupil was sent back to him for another year of preparation. But, as we have already seen, Sidney succeeded, and, if the truth must be told, Mr. Campion was in no way surprised at his success.

From that time forward none of the Campions ever dreamed of failure in connection with Sydney's efforts. He certainly did not dream of failure for himself. He had that sublime confidence which swells the heart of every young man in the flush of his first victory. We laugh in the middle age at the ambitions which we nursed at twenty; but we did not laugh when the divine breath was in us, and when our faith removed mountains of difficulty from our path.

Sydney's career at Cambridge was one long triumph. He gained the Craven and Porson scholarships; his epigrams were quoted by college tutors as models of vigor and elegance; he was President of the Union; he took an excellent degree, and was elected to a fellowship in due course. He had, in fact, done brilliant things; and at the age of twenty-four he was—to those who knew him best, and especially to those who liked him least—that shining, glorified, inspired, and yet sophisticated product of modern university culture, an academic prig. The word is not of necessity a term of reproach. Perhaps we are all prigs at some season in our lives, if we happen to have any inherent power of doing great things. There are lovable prigs, who grow into admirable men and women; but, alas! for the prig whose self-love coils round him like a snake, until it crushes out the ingenuous fervor of youth, and perverts the noblest aspirations of manhood!

From Cambridge Sydney went to London, and was called to the bar. Here, of course, his progress was not so rapid. Briefs do not come for wishing, nor even for merit alone. Nevertheless he was advancing year by year in the estimation of good judges; and it was known to his father, and to his intimate friends, that he only waited a favorable opportunity to stand for a seat in parliament.

At Angleford, in the meantime, they watched his career with proud hearts and loving sympathy. Mrs. Campion, in particular, doted on her son. She even scanned the paper every morning, never by any chance missing an item of law intelligence, where occasionally she would be rewarded by coming across Sydney's name. She would not have considered any distinction, however great, to be more than his due.

Lettice never thought of disagreeing with her mother when she sang the praises of Sydney; but it must be confessed that both the rector and his wife displayed less than their ordinary balance of judgment in discussing the merits of their son. They unconsciously did much injustice to the girl, by their excessive adulation of her brother, and her interests were constantly sacrificed to his. She would have been the last to admit that it was so; but the fact was clear enough to the few persons who used to visit them at Angleford. Her friend, Clara Graham, for instance, the wife of a London journalist, who came down now and then to spend a holiday in her native village, would attempt to commiserate Lettice on the hardness of her lot; but Lettice would not listen to anything of the kind. She was too loyal to permit a word to be spoken in her presence which might seem to reflect upon her parents or her brother.

Yet it would have been impossible that she should not be in some way affected by the change which had come over her life since Sydney went to Cambridge. From that day her regular reading with her father had ceased, and she was left to direct her studies as she thought best. Mr. Campion was almost entirely absorbed in the prospects of his son, and if Lettice needed his assistance she had to ask for it, often more than once. The consequence was that she soon gave up asking, and her mind, left to its own devices, gradually found its true bent. She did not read much more Latin or Greek, but devoured all the Modern literature that came in her way. After that she began to write—not fiction in the first instance, but more or less solid essays on criticism and social philosophy, following the pattern of certain writers in the half-crown monthly magazines, which her father was wont to take in. If she had known that the time would come when she would have to earn her living by her pen, she could scarcely have adopted a better plan to prepare herself for the task.

In the first instance, whatever she did in this way had been for her own pleasure and distraction, without any clear idea of turning her abilities to practical account. She had no inclination for an idle life, but there was a limited period during which it rested with her father to say what her occupation as a woman should be. When Sidney went to Cambridge, Lettice had entreated that she might be sent to Girton or Newnham; but the young Scholar of Trinity had fought shy of the notion, and it was dropped at once. That, indeed, was the beginning of Lettice's isolation—the beginning of a kind of mental estrangement from her brother, which the lapse of time was to widen and perpetuate.

Mr. Campion and his wife were by no means unkind to their daughter; they simply put Sydney first in all their plans and anticipations of the future. Her education was supposed to be complete; her lot was to be cast at home, and not in the rough outer world, where men compete and struggle for the mastery. If she had complained, they might not have been shocked, but they would have been immeasurably astonished. The rector had given her an excellent training, and though his strongest motive was the desire to stimulate and encourage his son, no doubt he had her interests in view at the same time. But when he finished with Sydney he finished with Lettice, and it never occurred to him that there was any injustice in suddenly withdrawing from her the arm on which he had taught her to lean.

She did not complain. Yet as time went on she could not shut her eyes to Sydney's habit of referring every question to the test of personal expediency. It was her first great disillusion, but the pain which it caused her was on her parents' behalf rather than on her own. They were the chief sufferers; they gave him so much and received so little in return. To be sure, Sydney was only what they had made him. They bade him "take," in language which he could easily understand, but their craving for love, for tenderness, for a share in his hopes, ambitions, resolutions, and triumphs, found no entrance to his understanding.

Sydney had spent a large sum of money at Cambridge, and had left heavy debts behind him, although his father had paid without remonstrance all the accounts which he suffered to reach the old man's hands. He had what are called expensive tastes; in other words, he bought what he coveted, and did not count the cost. The same thing went on in London, and Mr. Campion soon found that his income, good as it was, fell short of the demands which were made upon it.

The rector himself had always been a free spender. His books, his pictures, his garden, his mania for curiosities, had run away with thousands of pounds, and now, when he surreptitiously tried to convert these things into cash again there was a woeful falling off in their value. He knew nothing of the art of driving a bargain; and, where others would have made a profit with the same opportunities, he invariably lost money. He had bought badly to begin with, and he sold disastrously. Being hard pressed on one occasion for a hundred pounds to send to Sydney, he borrowed it of a perfect stranger, who took for his security what would have sufficed to cover ten times the amount.

This was in the third year after Sydney was called to the bar. Lettice was in London that autumn, on a visit to the Grahams; and perhaps something which she contrived to say to her brother induced him to write and tell his father that briefs were coming in at last, and that he hoped to be able to dispense with further remittances from home. Mr. Campion rejoiced in this assurance as though it implied that Sydney had made his fortune. But things had gone too far with him to admit of recovery, even if the young man had kept to his good resolutions—which he did not.

The fact is that Sydney's college debts hung like a weight round his neck, and he had made no effort to be rid of them. The income of his fellowship and his professional earnings ought to have been ample for all his needs, and no excuse can be urged for the selfishness which made him a burden to his father after he had left Cambridge. But chambers in Piccadilly, as well as at the Inner Temple, a couple of West End clubs, a nightly rubber at whist, and certain regular drains upon his pocket which never found their way into any book of accounts, made up a formidable total of expenditure by the year's end. He was too clever a man of the world to let his reputation—or even his conscience—suffer by his self-indulgence, and, if he lived hard in the pursuit of pleasure, he also worked hard in his profession. In short, he was a well-reputed lawyer, against whom no one had a word to say; and he was supposed to have a very good chance of the prizes which are wont to fall to the lot of successful lawyers.

At the beginning of 1880, when Sydney Campion was in his twenty-seventh year, there came to him the opportunity for which he had waited. Mr. Disraeli had dissolved Parliament somewhat suddenly, and appealed to the country for a renewal of the support accorded to him six years before. He had carried out in Eastern Europe a policy worthy of an Imperial race. He had brought peace with honor from Berlin, filled the bazaars of three continents with rumors of his fame, and annexed the Suez Canal. He had made his Queen an Empress, and had lavished garters and dukedoms on the greatest of Her Majesty's subjects. But the integrity of the empire, safe from foes without, was threatened on either shore of St. George's Channel—by malignant treason on one side, and on the other by exuberant verbosity. It was a moment big with the fate of humanity—and he strongly advised the constituencies to make him Prime Minister again.

Then the country was plunged into the turmoil of a General Election. Every borough and shire which had not already secured candidates hastened to do so. Zealous Liberals and enthusiastic Tories ran up to town from the places where local spirit failed, or local funds were not forthcoming, convinced that they would find no lack of either in the clubs and associations of the metropolis. Young and ambitious politicians had their chance at last, and amongst others the chance came for Sydney Campion.

There is no difficulty about getting into Parliament for a young man who has friends. He can borrow the money, the spirit, the eloquence, the political knowledge, and he will never be asked to repay any of them out of his own resources. Now Sydney had a friend who would have seen him through the whole business on these terms, who would at any rate have found him money, the only qualification in which he was deficient. But he fell into a trap prepared for him by his own vanity, and, as it happened, the mistake cost him very dear.

"You see, Campion," his friend had said to him, after suggesting that he should go down as Conservative candidate for Dormer, "our people know very well what they would get for their money if you were elected. You would make your mark in the first session, and be immensely useful to us in ever so many ways."

"Would it cost much?" asked Sydney, rather nettled by the mention of money. He had known Sir John Pynsent at Cambridge, and had never allowed himself to be outdressed or outshone by him in any way. But Pynsent had beaten him in the race for political honors; and Sydney, like a showy player at billiards who prefers to put side on when he might make a straightforward stroke, resolved to take a high tone with his would-be patronizing friend.

"Much?" said Sir John. "Well, no, not much, as things go. But these worthies at Dormer have their own traditional ways of working the oracle. The Rads have got hold of a stockjobber who is good for a thousand, and Maltman says they cannot fight him with less than that. The long and short of it is that they want a strong candidate with five hundred pounds, and we are prepared to send you down, my boy, and to be good for that amount."

Sydney took out his cigar case, and offered the beaming baronet a choice Villar.

"It's uncommonly good of you, Pynsent, to give me a look in at Dormer, and to suggest the other thing in such a friendly way. Now, look here—can you let me have two days to say yes or no to Maltman?"

"I am afraid I can't. He must have his answer in twenty-four hours."

"Well, say twenty-four hours. He shall have it by this time to-morrow. And as for the five hundred, you may be wanting that by and by. Keep it for some fellow who is not in a position to fight for his own hand."

Sir John Pynsent left his friend with a greatly increased opinion of his spirit and professional standing—a result of the interview with which Sydney was perfectly satisfied.

Then came the serious question, how he was to deal with the emergency which had arisen—perhaps the most critical emergency of his life. Within twenty-four hours he must know when and how he could put his hand upon five hundred pounds.

He might easily have saved twice the sum before now; but he had never learned the art of saving. He thought of his father, whom he had not seen or written to for more than a month, and determined that he would at all events go down and consult the rector. He had not realized the fact that his father's resources were already exhausted, and that mere humanity, to say nothing of filial duty, required him to come to the old man's assistance, instead of asking him for fresh sacrifices.

"If he has not the money," Sydney said, "no doubt he can help me to raise it. It will be an excellent investment of our joint credit, and a very good thing for us both."

So he telegraphed to Angleford—

"I am going to contest a borough. Must make provision. Shall be with you by next train."

CHAPTER IV.

FATHER AND SON.

Sydney's telegram reached Angleford at an awkward time. Things had been going from bad to worse with Mr. Campion, who had never had as much money as he needed since he paid the last accounts of the Cambridge tradesmen. In the vain hope that matters would mend by and by—though he did not form any precise idea as to how the improvement would take place—he had been meeting each engagement as it came to maturity by entering on another still more onerous. After stripping himself of all his household treasures that could be converted into money, he had pledged his insurance policy, his professional and private income, and at last even his furniture; and he was now in very deep waters.

A great change had come over him. At sixty, when Sydney took his degree, he was still handsome and upright, buoyant with hope and energy. At sixty-six he was broken, weak, and disheartened. To his wife and daughter, indeed, he was always the same cheerful, gentle, sanguine man, full of courtesy and consideration. In the village he was more beloved than ever, because there was scarcely a man or woman who was not familiar with the nature and extent of his troubles. In a country parish the affairs of the parson, especially when they do not prosper, are apt to become the affairs of the congregation as well. Who should know better than a man's butcher and baker when the supply of ready money runs short, when one month would be more convenient than another for the settlement of a bill, or when the half-year's stipend has been forestalled and appropriated long before it fell due?

However great his trouble, the rector had generally contrived to put a good face on things. He considered his difficulties as entirely the result of his own improvidence, and rejoiced to think that Sydney's position was assured, no matter what might happen to himself. Yet often in the silence of the night he would toss upon his restless bed, or vex his soul with complicated accounts in the privacy of his study, and none but the two faithful women who lived with him suspected what he suffered in his weakest moments.

He had come to lean more and more constantly on the companionship of Lettice. Mrs. Campion had never been the kind of woman to whom a man looks for strength or consolation, and when she condoled with her husband he usually felt himself twice as miserable as before. Some wives have a way of making their condolences sound like reproaches; and they may be none the less loving wives for that. Mrs. Campion sincerely loved her husband, but she never thoroughly understood him.

When the boy arrived with Sydney's telegram, Lettice intercepted him at the door. She was accustomed to keep watch over everything that entered the house, and saved her father a great deal of trouble by reading his letters, and, if need be, by answering them. What he would have done without her, he was wont to aver, nobody could tell.

Time had dealt gently with Lettice, in spite of her anxieties, in spite of that passionate revolt against fate which from time to time had shaken her very soul. She was nearly five-and-twenty, and she certainly looked no more then twenty-one. The sweet country air had preserved the delicate freshness of her complexion: her dark grey eyes were clear, her white brow unlined by trouble, her rippling brown hair shining and abundant. Her slender hands were a little tanned—the only sign that country life had laid upon her—because she was never very careful about wearing gloves when she worked in the garden; but neither tan nor freckle ever appeared upon her face, the bloom of which was tender and refined as that of a briar-rose. The old wistful look of her sweet eyes remained unchanged, but the mouth was sadder in repose than it had been when she was a child. When she smiled, however, there could not have been a brighter face.

Notwithstanding this touch of sadness on her lips, and a faint shadow of thought on the clear fine brows, the face of Lettice was noticeable for its tranquillity. No storm of passion had ever troubled those translucent eyes: patience sat there, patience and reflection; emotion waited its turn. One could not doubt her capabilities of feeling; but, in spite of her four-and-twenty years, the depths of her heart had never yet been stirred. She had lived a somewhat restricted life, and there was yet very much for her to experience and to learn. Who would be her teacher? For Lettice was not the woman to go ignorant of life's fullest bliss and deepest sorrow to the grave.

She looked particularly slender and youthful as she stood that day at the hall window when Sydney's telegram arrived. She had a double reason for keeping guard in the hall and glancing nervously down the carriage-drive that led from the main road to the rectory front. Half-an-hour before, a hard-featured man had swaggered up the avenue, fired off a volley of defiance on the knocker, and demanded to see Mr. Campion.

"What do you want?" said Lettice, who had opened the door and stood boldly facing him.

"I want to see the parson. At once, miss, if you please."

"Perhaps I can do what is necessary, if you will tell me what your business is. You cannot see my father."

"Oh," said the man, with a little more respect. "You are his daughter, are you? Well, if you can do the needful I am sure I have no objection. Three hundred and twenty pound seventeen-and-six"—here he took out a stamped paper and showed it to Lettice. "That's the figure, miss, and if you'll oblige with coin—cheques and promises being equally inconvenient—I don't mind waiting five minutes to accommodate a lady."

"We have not the money in the house," answered Lettice, who had been reading the formidable document, without quite understanding what it meant.

"Ah, that's a pity," said the man. "But I didn't expect it, so I ain't disappointed."

"It shall be sent to you. I will see that you have it—within a week from this date—only go away now, for my father is unwell."

"Very sorry, miss, but I can't go without the money. This business won't wait any longer. The coin or the sticks—those are my orders, and that's my notion of what is fair and right."

"The sticks?" said Lettice faintly.

"The goods—the furniture. This paper is a bill of sale, and as the reverend gentleman doesn't find it convenient to pay, why, of course, my principal is bound to realize the security. Now, miss, am I to see the gentleman, or am I not?"

"Oh no," said Lettice, "it is useless."

"Then what I am going to do," said the man, "is this. I am going to get the vans, and fetch the goods right away. I may be back this afternoon, or I may be back to-morrow morning; but you take my advice, miss. Talk it over with the old gentleman, and raise the money somehow, for it really would go against me to have to sell you up. I'm to be heard of at the 'Chequers,' miss—William Joskins, at your service."

Then he had gone away, and left her alone, and she stood looking through the window at the dreary prospect—thinking, and thinking, and unable to see any light in the darkness.

One thing, at all events, she must do; a message must be sent to Sydney. It would not be just, either to him or to his father, that the extent of the disaster should be any longer concealed. She had just arrived at this determination, and was turning away to write the telegram, when the messenger from the post-office made his appearance.

In five minutes all the house was astir. A visit from Sydney was a rare occurrence, and he must be treated royally, as though he were a king condescending to quarter himself on his loyal subjects—which indeed, he was. When Lettice went to tell her father the news she found him seated by the fire, pondering gloomily on what the immediate future might have in store for him; but as soon as she showed him Sydney's telegram he sprang to his feet, with straightened body and brightly shining eyes. In one moment he had passed from despondency to the height of exultation.

"Two o'clock," he said, looking at his watch, "and he will be here at five! Dinner must be ready for him by six; and you will take care, Lettice, that everything is prepared as you know he would like to have it. Going into Parliament, is he? Yes, I have always told you that he would. He is a born orator, child; he will serve his country brilliantly—not for place, nor for corrupt motives of any kind, but as a patriot and a Christian, to whom duty is the law of his nature."

"Yes, papa. And you will be satisfied when he is a member of Parliament?"

"So long as Sydney lives, my dear, I know that he will grow in favor with God and man; and so long as I live, I shall watch his course with undiminished joy and satisfaction. What else have we left to live for? Wife!" said the rector, as Mrs. Campion entered the room, "do you know that our boy is to dine with us to-night?"

"Yes, Lawrence, I have seen his telegram; and Mollie is doing all she can at short notice. It will not be the kind of dinner I should like to put before him; but times are changed with us—sadly changed! I hope he will not miss the plate, Lawrence; and as for wine and dessert——"

"Oh, mother dear," said Lettice, interrupting, "I quite forgot to tell you about my letter this morning. Look here! It contained a cheque for ten pounds, for that article of mine in the Decade. I mean to go into Dorminster, and get one or two things we shall be wanting, and I shall probably drive back in Sydney's cab. So you can leave the wine and dessert to me. And, mother dear, be sure you put on your silver-grey poplin, with the Mechlin cap. Nothing suits you half as well!"

Lettice's earnings had sufficed for some years past for her dress and personal expenses; but latterly she had contrived to have a fair margin left for such emergencies as that which had now arisen. She was more than thanked by the gleam of love which lightened the eyes of her parents as she spoke. Even though Sydney was coming, she thought, that smile at any rate was all for her.

So she went into the town and made her purchases, and waited at the station, shivering in the cold March wind, for Sydney's train.

How much should she tell him to begin with? Or should she say nothing till after dinner? How would he take it? How would it affect him? And suppose for a moment that he had to choose between getting into Parliament and rescuing his father from ruin?

Clearly as she saw the worst sides of Sydney's character, yet she loved him well, and was proud of him. How often she had yearned for tenderness in the days gone by! What excuses she had framed for him in her own heart, when he seemed to forget their existence at Angleford for months together! And now, when she had this terrible news to tell him, was it not possible that his heart would be softened by the blow, and that good would come for all of them out of this menaced evil? What a happy place the old Rectory might be if her father's mind were set at rest again, and Sydney would come down and stay with them from time to time!

The train was at the platform before Lettice had decided what to do. Sydney looked rather surprised to see her, but gave her his cheek to kiss, and hurried her off to the cab stand.

"What brought you here?" he said. "How cold you are! All well at home?"

"Yes, they are well. But, oh, Sydney, they are growing old?"

"Growing old, child? Why, of course they are. We must expect it. Do you mean they look older than they are?"

"Yes—older, and—and more——"

"Well?"

He looked at her sharply, for she could not quite command her voice, and left the sentence unfinished. Then Sydney had an uncomfortable feeling. He saw that there was something amiss, but did not care at the moment to insist on further confidences. No doubt he would hear all that there was to be said by and by. Meanwhile he turned the conversation, and soon contrived to interest her, so that they reached the Rectory in excellent spirits. All that day poor Lettice alternated between despair and giddy lightness of heart.

So the hero came home and was feasted, and his father and mother did obeisance to him, and even he for an hour or two thought it good that he should now and then renew his contract with the earth from which he sprang, and remember the chains of duty and affection which bound him to the past, instead of dwelling constantly in the present and the future.

Throughout dinner, and at dessert, and as they drank the wine which Lettice had provided, Sydney spoke of his position and prospects, dazzling those who listened to him with his pictures of victory at Dormer, of Conservative triumphs all along the line, of Ministerial favor for himself, of "Office—why not?—within a twelvemonth." It would have been treason for any of his audience to doubt that all these good things would come to pass. If Lettice felt that there was a skeleton at the feast, her father at any rate had forgotten its existence. Or, rather, he saw deliverance at hand. The crisis of his boy's fortune had arrived; and, if Sydney triumphed, nothing that could happen to Sydney's father could rob Mr. Campion of his joy.

At last the women left the room, and Sydney proceeded to tell his father what he wanted. He must return to town by the first train in the morning, having made an appointment with Mr. Maltman for two o'clock. Of course he meant to contest Dormer; but it was desirable that he should know for certain that he could raise five hundred pounds within a week, to supplement his own narrow means.

His face fell a little when his father confessed—as though it were clearly a matter for shame and remorse—that he could not so much as draw a cheque for twenty pounds. But, in fact, he was not surprised. Recklessly as he had abstained from inquiring into the old man's affairs since Lettice spoke to him in London two years ago, he had taken it for granted that there were difficulties of some kind; and men in difficulties do not keep large balances at their bankers'.

"Well, father," he said, "I am sorry for that. Yes—it certainly makes the thing rather hard for me. I hoped you might have seen me fairly launched on my career; and then, you know, if the worst came to the worst, I could soon have repaid you what you advanced. Well, what I suggest is this. I can probably borrow the money with your assistance, and I want to know what security we could offer between us for the loan."

Mr. Campion looked mournfully at his son, but he was not ready with a reply.

"You see," said Sydney, "it would never do for me to miss this chance. Everything depends upon it, and I was bound to refuse Pynsent's offer of the money. But if you have something that we can lodge as security——"

Mr. Campion shook his head. The look of distress that came upon his face might have softened Sydney's heart, if he had been less intent on his object.

"There will be an insurance policy I suppose?"

"No, my boy! The fact is, I was obliged to assign it a few years ago, to cover a former engagement."

"Dear me!" said Sydney, in a tone of vexation, "what a nuisance! I am afraid our signatures alone would hardly suffice. A bill of sale is out of the question, for that would have to be registered."

Something in the old man's appearance, as he sank back in his chair and wrung his hands, struck Sydney with a sudden conviction. He sprang to his feet, and came close to his father's side, standing over him in what looked almost like an attitude of menace.

"Good heaven!" he cried. "Don't tell me that it has gone so far as that!"

The door opened, and Lettice stood before them, with pale cheeks and glistening eyes. She had guessed what would come of their conversation, and had held herself in readiness to intervene.

Sydney turned upon her at once.

"You," he said, as deliberate now as he had been excited a minute before, "you, with your fine head for business, will doubtless know as much about this as anybody. Has my father given a bill of sale on his furniture?"

"He has," said Lettice.

"When?"

"Months ago. I must have known it, for I read all his correspondence; but I hardly knew what a bill of sale meant. And Sydney," she continued, laying her hand on his arm, and whispering so that her father should not hear, "it may be only a threat, but a man was here this morning, who said he should come to-morrow and take the things away."

When he heard this, Sydney lost his self-command, and spoke certain words for which he never quite forgave himself. No doubt the blow was a heavy one, and he realized immediately all that it implied. But he did not foresee the effect of the harsh and bitter words which he flung at his father and sister, charging them with reckless extravagance, and declaring that their selfishness had ruined his whole career.

Lettice was stung to the quick, not so much by her brother's unjust accusations as by the suffering which they inflicted on her father. His childishness had increased upon him so much of late that he was in truth, at this moment, more like a boy under correction than a father in presence of his children. He buried his face in his hands, and Lettice heard a piteous groan.

Then she stood beside him, laid her arm upon his neck, and faced Sydney with indignant eyes.

"Look!" she said. "This is your work. Can you not see and understand? You accuse him of selfishness—him, whose life has been one long sacrifice for you! I tell you, Sydney, that your cruel neglect, your ingrained love of self, have dragged our father down to this. He gave you all that you have, and made you all that you are, and when you should have come to his succor, and secured for him a happy old age, you have left him all these years to struggle with the poverty to which you reduced him. He never murmured—he will never blame you as long as he lives—he is as proud of you to-day as he was ten years ago—and you dare, you dare to reproach him!"

Lettice ended in magnificent wrath; and, then, being a woman after all, she knelt by her father's side and burst into tears.

If Sydney's pride had not got the better of him he would have owned the justice of her words, and all might have been well. Instead of that, he went to his room, brooding upon his misfortune, and soothing his wounded feelings in an intense self-pity.

And next morning, when he came remorsefully to his father's bedside, intending to assure him that he would make it the first business of his life to rescue him from his difficulties, he found him rescued indeed, with placid face and silent heart, over which the cares of earth had no further dominion.

CHAPTER V.

SEVERANCE.

The rector's death was a terrible shock to Sydney. For a time his remorse for his own conduct was very great, and it bore good fruit in a perceptible softening of his over-confident manner and a more distinct show of consideration for his mother and sister. Little by little he drew from Lettice the story of her past anxieties, of his father's efforts and privations, of his mother's suffering at the loss of luxuries to which she had always been accustomed—suffering silently borne because it was borne for Sydney. Lettice spared him as far as she could; but there was much that she was obliged to tell, as she had been for so long the depositary of her father's secrets and his cares. Man-like, Sydney showed his sorrow by exceeding sharpness of tone.

"Why did you not write to me? Why was I never told?"

"I told you as much as I dared, when I was in London."

"As much as you dared?"

"Dear father would not let me tell very much. He laid his commands on me to say nothing."

"You should have disobeyed him," said Sydney marching up and down the darkened study, in which this conference took place. "It was your duty to have disobeyed him, for his own good——"

"Oh, Sydney, how can you talk to me of duty?" said Lettice, with a sob. "Why did you not come and see for yourself? Why did you stay away so long?"

The reproach cut deeper than she knew. "I thought I was acting for the best," said the young man, half defiantly, half apologetically. "I did what it was the desire of his heart that I should do—But you, you were at home; you saw it all, and you should have told me, Lettice."

"I did try," she answered meekly, "but it was not very easy to make you listen."

In other circumstances he would, perhaps, have retorted angrily; and Lettice felt that it said much for the depth of his sorrow for the past that he did not carry his self-defence any further. By and by he paused in his agitated walk up and down the room, with head bent and hands plunged deep into his pockets. After two or three moments' silence, Lettice crept up to him and put her hand within his arm.

"Forgive me, Sydney, I spoke too bitterly; but it has been very hard sometimes."

"I would have helped if I had known," said Sydney gloomily.

"I know you would, dear. And he always knew it, too. That was the reason why he told me to keep silence—for fear of hampering you in your career. He has often said to me that he wished to keep the knowledge of his difficulties from you, because he knew you would be generous and kind——"

Tears choked her voice. Her brother, who had hitherto been quite unresponsive to her caresses, put out his right hand and stroked the trembling fingers that rested on his left arm. He was leaning against the old oak table, where his father's books and papers had stood for so many years; and some remembrances of bygone days when he and Lettice, as boy and girl, sat together with their grammars and lexicons at that very place, occurred a little dimly to his mind. But what was a dim memory to him was very clear and distinct to Lettice.

"Oh, Sydney, do you remember how we used to work here with father?" she broke out. "How many hours we spent here together—reading the same books, thinking the same thoughts—and now we seem so divided, so very far apart! You have not quite forgotten those old days, have you?"

"No, I have not forgotten them," said Sydney, in a rather unsteady voice. Poor Lettice! She had counted for very little in his life for the last few years, and yet, as she reminded him, what companions they had been before he went to Cambridge! A suddenly roused instinct of compassion and protection caused him to put his arm round her and to speak with unusual tenderness.

"I won't forget those old times, Lettice. Perhaps we shall be able to see more of each other by and bye than we have done lately. You have been a good girl, never wanting any change or amusement all these years; but I'll do my best to look after you now."

"I began to think you did not care for any of us, Sydney."

"Nonsense," said Sydney, and he kissed her forehead affectionately before he left the study, where, indeed, he felt that he had stayed a little too long, and given Lettice an unusual advantage over him. He was not destitute of natural affections, but they had so long been obscured by the mists of selfishness that he found it difficult to let them appear—and more difficult with his sister than with his mother. Lettice seemed to him to exact too much, to be too intense in feeling, too critical in observation. He was fond of her, but she was not at all his ideal woman—if he had one. Sydney's preference was for what he called "a womanly woman": not one who knew Greek.

He made a brave and manly effort to wind up his father's affairs and pay his outstanding debts. He was so far stirred out of himself that it hardly occurred to his mind that a slur would be left on him if these debts were left unpaid: his strongest motive just now was the sense of right and wrong, and he knew, too late, that it was right for him to take up the load which his own acts had made so heavy.

The rector had died absolutely penniless. His insurance policy, his furniture, the whole of his personal effects, barely sufficed to cover the money he had borrowed. What Sydney did was to procure the means of discharging at once all the household bills, and the expenses connected with the funeral.

"And now," he said to Lettice, when the last of these dues had been paid off and they took their last stroll together through the already half dismantled rooms of the desolate old Rectory, "I feel more of a man than I have felt since that terrible night, and I want to get back to my work."

"I am afraid you will have to work very hard, dear!" said Lettice, laying her hand on his arm, rather timidly. How she still yearned for the full measure of mutual confidence and sympathy!

"Hard work will be good for me," he said, his keen blue eyes lighting up as if with ardor for the fray. "I shall soon wipe off old scores, and there's nothing like knowing you have only yourself to look to. My practice, you know, is pretty good already, and it will be very good by and bye."

"I am so glad!"

"Yes. And, of course, you must never have any anxiety about mother and yourself. I shall see to all that. You are going to stay with the Grahams for a while, so I can come over one day and discuss it. I don't suppose I shall ever marry, but whether I do or not, I shall always set apart a certain sum for mother and you."

"I have been thinking about the future," said Lettice, quietly. She always spoke in a low, musical voice, without gesture, but not without animation, producing on those who heard her the impression that she had formed her opinions beforehand, and was deliberate in stating them. "Do you know, Sydney, that I can earn a very respectable income?"

"Earn an income! You!" he said, with a wrinkle in his forehead, and a curl in his nostrils. "I will not hear of such a thing. I cannot have my sister a dependent in other people's houses—a humble governess or companion. How could you dream of it!"

"I have not dreamed of that," said Lettice. "I do not think I should like it myself. I simply stay at home and write. I earned seventy pounds last year, and Mr. Graham says I could almost certainly earn twice as much if I were living in London."

"Why was I not told of this?" said Sydney, with an air of vexation. "What do you write?"

"Essays, and now and then a review, and little stories."

"Little stories—ouf!" he muttered, in evident disgust. "You don't put your name to these things!"

"I did to one article, last March, in The Decade."

"That is Graham's magazine, and I daresay Graham asked you to sign your name. When I see him I shall tell him it was done without sufficient consideration."

"All articles are signed in The Decade," said Lettice. She did not think it worth while to mention that Graham had written her a very flattering letter about her article, telling her that it had attracted notice—that the critics said she had a style of her own, and was likely to make her mark. The letter had reached her on the morning before her father's death, and she had found but a brief satisfaction in it at the time.

"I think you had better not say anything to Mr. Graham," she continued. "They have both been very kind, and we shall not have too many friends in London."

"Why do you want to live in London?"

"I think I should like it, and mother would like it too. You know she has fifty pounds a year of her own, and if what Mr. Graham says is right we shall be able to live very comfortably."

"I can't say I like this writing for a living," he said.

"I suppose we cannot have everything as we like it. And, besides, I do like it. It is congenial work, and it makes me feel independent."

"It is not always good for women to be independent. It is dangerous."

She laughed—a pleasant little rallying laugh.

"I hope you will not be shocked," she said. "I have set my heart on being perfectly independent of you and everybody else."

He saw that she would have her way, and let the subject drop.

A few weeks afterwards, Lettice and her mother had packed up their belongings and went to London. The Grahams were delighted to have them, for Lettice was a great favorite with both. James Graham was a literary man of good standing, who, in addition to editing The Decade, wrote for one of the weekly papers, and reviewed books in his special lines for one of the dailies. By dint of hard work, and carefully nursing his connection, he contrived to make a living; and that was all. Literary work is not well paid as a rule. There is fair pay to be had on the staff of the best daily papers, but that kind of work requires a special aptitude. It requires, in particular, a supple and indifferent mind, ready to take its cue from other people, with the art of representing things from day to day not exactly as they are, but as an editor or paymaster wants them to appear. If we suffered our journalists to sign their articles, they would probably write better, with more self-respect and a higher sense of responsibility; they would become stronger in themselves, and would be more influential with their readers. As it is, few men with vigorous and original minds can endure beyond a year or two of political leader-writing.

Graham had tried it, and the ordeal was too difficult for him. Now he had a greater scope for his abilities, and less money for his pains.

Clara Graham was the daughter of a solicitor in Angleford, and had known Lettice Campion from childhood. She was a pretty woman, thoroughly good-hearted, with tastes and powers somewhat in advance of her education. Perhaps she stood a little in awe of Lettice, and wondered occasionally whether her husband considered a woman who knew Latin and Greek, and wrote clever articles in The Decade, superior to one who had no such accomplishments, though she might be prettier, and the mother of his children, and even the darner of his stockings. But Clara was not without wits, so she did not propound questions of that sort to her husband; she reserved them for her own torment, and then expiated her jealousy by being kinder to Lettice than ever.

Lettice's plans were far more fixed and decided than Sydney knew. She had corresponded very fully and frankly with the Grahams on the subject, and Mr. Graham was already looking about for a place where she could set up her household gods. It was no use to consult Mrs. Campion on the subject. Her husband's death had thrown her into a state of mental torpor which seemed at first to border upon imbecility; and although she recovered to some extent from the shock, her health had been too much shaken to admit of complete recovery. Thenceforward she was an invalid and an old woman, who had abnegated her will in favor of her daughter's, and asked for nothing better than to be governed as well as cared for. The change was a painful one to Lettice, but practically it left her freer than ever, for her mother wanted little companionship, and was quite as happy with the maid that Lettice had brought from Angleford as with Lettice herself. The visit to the Grahams was an excellent thing both for Mrs. Campion and for her daughter. Clara managed to win the old lady's heart, and so relieved her friend of much of her anxiety. The relief came not a moment too soon, for the long strain to which Lettice had been subjected began to tell upon her and she was sorely in need of rest. The last three or four years had been a time of almost incessant worry to her. She had literally had the care of the household on her shoulders, and it had needed both courage and endurance of no ordinary kind to enable her to discharge her task without abandoning that inner and intellectual life which had become so indispensable to her well-being. The sudden death of her father was a paralyzing blow, but the care exacted from her by her mother had saved her from the physical collapse which it might have brought about. Now, when the necessity for immediate exertion had passed away, the reaction was very great, and it was fortunate that she had at this crisis the bracing companionship of James Graham, and Clara's friendly and stimulating acerbities.

Lettice had reached the age of five and twenty without experiencing either love, or intimate friendship, or intellectual sympathy. She had had neither of those two things which a woman, and especially an intellectual woman, constantly craves, and in the absence of which she cannot be happy. Either of the two may suffice for happiness, both together would satisfy her completely, but the woman who has not one or the other is a stranger to content. The nature of a woman requires either equality of friendship, a free exchange of confidence, trust and respect—having which, she can put up with a good deal of apparent coldness and dryness of heart in her friend; or else she wants the contrasted savor of life, caressing words, demonstrations of tenderness, amenities and attentions, which keep her heart at rest even if they do not satisfy her whole nature. If she gets neither of these things the love or friendship never wakes, or, having been aroused, it dies of inanition.

So it was with Lettice. The one oasis in the wilderness of her existence had been the aftermath of love which sprang up between her and her father in the last few years, when she felt him depending upon her, confiding and trusting in her, and when she had a voice in the shaping of his life. But even this love, unsurpassable in its tenderness, was only as a faint shadow in a thirsty land. Such as it was, she had lost it, and the place which it had occupied was an aching void.

The one desire left to her at present was to become an absolutely independent woman. This meant that she should work hard for her living in her own way, and that she should do what seemed good and pleasant to her, because it seemed good and pleasant, not because it was the way of the world, or the way of a house, or the routine of a relative or an employer. It meant that she should keep her mother under her own eye, in comfort and decency, not lodged with strangers to mope out her life in dreary solitude. It meant also that she should not be a burden on Sydney—or, in plain terms, that she should not take Sydney's money, either for herself or her mother.

Indeed, the consciousness that she had to work for another, and to be her protection and support, was not only bracing but cheering in its effects, and Lettice now turned towards her writing-table with an energy which had been wanting when her efforts were for herself alone.

The Rectory household had been reduced as much as possible during the last few months, and only two servants remained at the time of the rector's death: one, an elderly cook, who was content for the love of "Miss Lettice" to do the work of a general servant; and a young girl of eighteen, who had lived at the Rectory and been trained for domestic service under Mrs. Campion's eye ever since her parents' death, which had occurred when she was fifteen years of age. Emily, or Milly Harrington, as she was generally called, was a quick, clever girl, very neat-handed and fairly industrious; and it seemed to Lettice, when she decided upon going to London, that she could not do better than ask Milly to go too. The girl's great blue eyes opened with a flash of positive rapture. "Go with you to London? Oh, Miss Lettice!"

"You would like it, Milly?" said Lettice, wondering at her excitement, and thinking that she had never before noticed how pretty Millie Harrington had grown of late.

"Oh, of all things in the world, miss, I've wanted to go to London!" said Milly, flushing all over her face through the clear white skin which was one of her especial beauties. There was very little trace of commonness in Milly's good looks. Three years of life at the Rectory had refined her appearance, as also her manners and ways of speech; and Lettice thought that it would be far pleasanter to keep Milly about her than to go through the agonies of a succession of pert London girls. Yet something in Milly's eagerness to go, as well as the girl's fresh, innocent, country air, troubled her with a vague sense of anxiety. Was not London said to be a place of temptation for inexperienced country girls? Could she keep Milly safe and innocent if she took her away from Angleford?

"You would have all the work of the house to do, and to look after Mrs. Campion a little as well," she said seeking to put her vague anxiety into the form of a warning or an objection. But Milly only smiled.

"I'm very strong, Miss Lettice. I am sure I can do all that you want. And I should like to go to London with you. One hears such fine tales of London—and I don't want to leave mistress and you." Though this was evidently an afterthought.

"You will see very little of London, Milly; I shall live in a very quiet part," said Lettice. "And I shall want you to be very good and steady, and take care of my mother when I am busy. I shall have to work hard now, you know; quite as hard as you."

Milly looked up quickly; there was inquiry in her eyes. But she answered only by protestations of good behavior and repeated desires to go with her young mistress; and Lettice gave her a promise, subject to the consent of Milly's grandmother, who lived at Birchmead, that she would take the girl with her when she went away.

Old Mrs. Harrington had no objection at all to Milly's going to London. "Indeed, Miss Lettice," she said, "I'm only too glad to think of your looking after her, for Milly's not got much sense, I'm afraid, although she's a woman grown."

"I always thought her unusually clever and sensible," said Lettice, in some surprise.

"Clever, miss, she always was, but sensible's a different affair. Her head's filled with foolishness, all along of her reading story books, I tell her; and she's got an idea that her pretty face will bring her a rich husband, and I don't know what beside. I shall be obliged to you, miss, if you'll kindly keep a sharp eye and a tight hand over Milly. Not but what she's a good kind-hearted girl," said the old woman, relenting a little, as she saw a rather startled expression on Miss Campion's face, "and I don't think there's any harm in her, but girls are always better for being looked after, that is all."

"I'll try to take care of Milly," said Lettice, as she rose to go. "But my care will be of very little use if she does not take care of herself."

She was fated on the same day to hear a remonstrance from the doctor's wife, Mrs. Budworth, on the subject of her choice of a servant. Mrs. Budworth was a noted busybody, who knew everybody's business better than the rest of the world.

"Oh, Lettice, dear," she said, "I do hope it's not true that you are going to take that silly girl, Milly Harrington, up to London with you."

"Why not? You cannot know anything against her," said Lettice, who was becoming a little angry.

"Well, perhaps not—only she is so very pretty, and London is so full of temptations for a pretty girl of that class!"

"We shall live so quietly that she will have no more temptations there than here, Mrs. Budworth."

"You can't tell that, my dear—once you get a girl away from her friends and relations. However, she has only her old grandmother to fall back on, and she seems a well-meaning girl enough, and perhaps she won't be considered so pretty in London as she has the name of being here. I hope she will keep straight, I'm sure; it would be such a worry to you, Lettice, if anything went wrong."

"Poor Milly!" said Lettice to herself, as she walked home in a state of blazing indignation; "how easily that woman would undermine your reputation—or that of anybody else! Milly is a dear, good little girl; and as for her being so pretty—well, it is not her fault, and I don't see why it should be her misfortune! I will look well after her when we are in London, and it will be for her good, I believe, to stay with us. What an absurd fuss to make about such a trifle!"

So she dismissed the matter from her mind, remembering it only from time to time when she was making her new household arrangements, and carefully planning to keep Milly out of every possible danger.

But dangers are oftener from within than from without. While Lettice walked homeward after her talk with Mrs. Budworth, Milly Harrington had locked herself into her own room, and was experimenting with her pretty curling hair before the looking-glass. She wanted to see herself with a "fringe"—a thing that was strictly forbidden at the Rectory, and she had brushed the soft little curls that were generally hidden beneath her cap well over her forehead. Then she stood and gazed at the reflection of the fair locks, the large blue eyes, the graceful neck and shoulders. "I suppose I look pretty," she was saying to herself. "I've been told so often enough. Mr. Sydney thought so when he was here at Christmas, I'm sure of that. This time, of course, he was so taken up with his father's death, and other things, that he never noticed me. But I shall see him again."

A faint color mantled in her cheeks, and her eyes began to sparkle.

"Beauty's a great power, I've heard," she said to herself, still looking at that fair image in the glass. "There's no knowing what I mayn't do if I meet the right person. And one meets nobody in Angleford. In London—things may be different."

Different, indeed, but not as poor Milly fancied the difference.

And then she brushed back her curls, and fastened up her black dress, and tied a clean muslin apron round her trim little figure before going downstairs; and when she brought in the tea-tray that afternoon, Lettice looked at her with pleasure and admiration, and thought how sweet and good a girl she was, and how she had won the Prayer-Book prize at the Diocesan Inspector's examination, and of the praise that the rector had given her for her well-written papers at the Confirmation Class, and of her own kindly and earnest teaching of all things that were good in Lettice's eyes; and she decided that Mrs. Harrington and Mrs. Budworth were mere croakers, and that poor Milly would never come to harm.

BOOK II.

CHANGE.

"Yet the twin habit of that early time
Lingered for long about the heart and tongue;
We had been natives of one happy clime,
And its dear accent to our utterance clung.

"Till the dire years whose awful name is Change
Had grasped our souls, still yearning in divorce,
And pitiless shaped them in two forms that range—
Two elements which sever their life's course."

George Eliot.

CHAPTER VI.

NEW BEGINNINGS.

"Poor dear Lettice! how she must have suffered!" said Clara Graham.

"Less than you suppose," rejoined her husband.

"Jim, what do you mean? You are very hard-hearted."

"No, I'm not! I'm only practical. Your friend, Miss Campion, has been a source of lamentation and woe to you ever since I made your acquaintance. According to you, she was always being sacrificed to that intolerable prig of a brother of hers. Then she was immolated on the altar of her father's money difficulties and her mother's ill-health. Now she has got a fair field, and can live where she likes and exercise her talents as she pleases; and as I can be as unfeeling as I like in the bosom of my family, I will at once acknowledge that I am very glad the old man's gone."

"I do hope and trust, Jim——"

"That I am not a born fool, my dear?"

"—That you won't say these things to Lettice herself."

"Exactly. That is what I knew you were going to say."

"If it weren't that I am certain you do not mean half you say——"

"I mean all that I say: every word of it. But I'll tell you what, Clara: I believe that Lettice Campion is a woman of great talent—possibly even of genius—and that she has never yet been able to give her talents full play. She has the chance now, and I hope she'll use it."

"Oh, Jim, dear, do you think she is so sure to succeed?"

"If she doesn't, it will be pure cussedness on her part, and nothing else," said Jim.

Clara reflected that she would tell Lettice what her husband said. She moved to the window and looked out. She was waiting for her guests, Lettice and Mrs. Campion, in the soft dusk of a sweet May evening, and she was a little impatient for their arrival. She had had a comfortable, nondescript meal, which she called dinner-tea, set ready for them in the dining-room, and as this room was near the hall-door, she had installed herself therein, so that she could the more easily watch for her visitors. Mr. Graham, a tall, thin man, with coal-black beard, deep-set dark eyes, and marked features, had thrown himself into a great arm-chair, where he sat buried in the current number of a monthly magazine. His wife was universally declared to be a very pretty woman, and she was even more "stylish," as women say, than pretty; for she had one of those light, graceful figures that give an air of beauty to everything they wear. For the rest, she had well-cut features, bright dark eyes, and a very winning smile. A brightly impulsive and affectionate nature had especially endeared her to Lettice, and this had never been soured or darkened by her experiences of the outer world, although, like most people, she had known reverses of fortune and was not altogether free from care. But her husband loved her, and her three babies were the most charming children ever seen, and everybody admired the decorations of her bright little house in Edwardes Square; and what more could the heart of womankind desire?

"I wonder," she said presently, "whether Sydney will come with them. He was to meet them at Liverpool Street; and of course I asked him to come on."

"I would have gone out if you had told me that before," said Mr. Graham, tersely.

"Why do you dislike Sydney Campion so much, Jim?"

"Dislike? I admire him. I think he is the coming man. He's one of the most successful persons of my acquaintance. It is just because I feel so small beside him that I can't stand his company."

"I must repeat, Jim, that if you talk like that to Lettice——"

"Oh, Lettice doesn't adore her precious brother," said Graham, irreverently. "She knows as well as you and I do that he's a selfish sort of brute, in spite of his good looks and his gift of the gab. I say, Clara, when are these folks coming? I'm confoundedly hungry."

"Who's the selfish brute now?" asked Clara, with triumph. "But you won't be kept waiting long: the cab's stopping at the door, and Sydney hasn't come."

She flew to the door, to be the first to meet and greet her visitors. There was not much to be got from Mrs. Campion that evening except tears—this was evident as soon as she entered the house, leaning on Lettice's arm; and the best thing was to put her at once to bed, and delay the evening meal until Lettice was able to leave her. Graham was quite too good-natured to grumble at a delay for which there was so valid a reason; for, as he informed his wife, he preferred Miss Campion's conversation without an accompaniment of groans. He talked lightly, but his grasp of the hand was so warm, his manner so sympathetic, when Lettice at last came down, that Clara felt herself rebuked at having for one moment doubted the real kindliness of his feeling.

Lettice in her deep mourning looked painfully white and slender in Clara's eyes; but she spoke cheerfully of her prospects for the future, as they sat at their evening meal. Sad topics were not broached, and Mr. Graham set himself to give her all the encouragement in his power.

"And as to where you are to set up your tent," he said, "Clara and I have seen a cottage on Brook Green that we think would suit you admirably."

"Where is Brook Green?" asked Lettice, who was almost ignorant of any save the main thoroughfares of London.

"In the wilds of Hammersmith——"

"West Kensington," put in Clara, rather indignantly.

"Well, West Kensington is only Hammersmith writ fine. It is about ten minutes' walk from us——"

"Oh, I am glad of that," said Lettice.

"—And it is not, I think, too large or too dear. You must go and look at it to-morrow, if you can."

"Is there any garden?"

"There is a garden, with trees under which your mother can sit when it is warm. Clara told me you would like that; and there is a grass-plot—I won't call it a lawn—where you can let your dog and cat disport themselves in safety. I am sure you must have brought a dog or a cat with you, Miss Campion. I never yet knew a young woman from the country who did not bring a pet animal to town with her."

"Jim, you are very rude," said his wife.

"I shall have to plead guilty," Lettice answered, smiling a little. "I have left my fair Persian, Fluff, in the care of my maid, Milly, who is to bring her to London as soon as I can get into my new home."

"Fluff," said Clara, meditatively, "is the creature with a tail as big as your arm, and a ruff round her neck, and Milly is the pretty little housemaid; I remember and approve of them both."

The subject of the new house served them until they went upstairs into Clara's bright little drawing-room, which Graham used to speak of disrespectfully as his wife's doll's house. It was crowded with pretty but inexpensive knick-knacks, the profusion of which was rather bewildering to Lettice, with her more simple tastes. Of one thing she was quite sure, that she would not, when she furnished her own rooms, expend much money in droves of delicately-colored china pigs and elephants, which happened to be in fashion at the time. She also doubted the expediency of tying up two peacocks' feathers with a yellow ribbon, and hanging them in solitary glory on the wall flanked by plates of Kaga ware, at tenpence-halfpenny a-piece. Lettice's taste had been formed by her father, and was somewhat masculine in its simplicity, and she cared only for the finer kinds of art, whether in porcelain or painting. But she was fain to confess that the effect of Clara's decorations was very pretty, and she wondered at the care and pains which had evidently been spent on the arrangement of Mrs. Graham's "Liberty rags" and Oriental ware. When the soft yellow silk curtains were drawn, and a subdued light fell through the jewelled facets of an Eastern lamp upon the peacock fans and richly-toned Syrian rugs, and all the other hackneyed ornamentation by which "artistic" taste is supposed to be shown, Lettice could not but acknowledge that the room was charming. But her thoughts flew back instantly to the old study at home, with its solid oak furniture, its cushioned window-seats, its unfashionable curtains of red moreen; and in the faint sickness of that memory, it seemed to her that she could be more comfortable at a deal table, with a kitchen chair set upon unpolished boards, than in the midst of Clara's pretty novelties.

"You are tired," Mr. Graham said to her, watching her keenly as she sat down in the chair that he offered her, and let her hands sink languidly upon her lap. "We won't let you talk too much. Clara is going to see after her bairns, and I'm going to read the Pall Mall. Here's the May number of The Decade: have you seen it?"

She took it with a grateful smile; but she did not intend to read, and Mr. Graham knew it. He perused his paper diligently, but he was sufficiently interested in her to know exactly at what point she ceased to brood and began to glance at the magazine. After a little while, she became absorbed in its pages; and only when she laid it down at last, with a half suppressed sigh, did he openly look up to find that her eyes were full of tears.

"I hope that you discovered something to interest you," he said.

"I was reading a poem," Lettice answered, rather guiltily.

"Oh—Alan Walcott's 'Sorrow'? Very well done, isn't it? but a trifle morbid, all the same."

"It is very sad. Is he—has he had much trouble?"

"I'm sure I couldn't tell you. Probably not, as he writes about it," said Graham, grimly. "He's a pessimist and a bit of a dilletante. If he would work and believe in himself a little more, I think he might do great things."

"He is young?"

"Over thirty. He comes to the house sometimes. I daresay you will meet him before long."

Lettice said nothing. She was not in a mood to enjoy the prospect of making new acquaintances; but the poem had touched her, and she felt a slight thrill of interest in its writer.

"Yes," she said, "I shall be pleased to make his acquaintance—some day." And then the conversation dropped, and Graham understood from her tone that she was not disposed as yet to meet new faces.

The house on Brook Green proved eminently satisfactory. She agreed to take it as soon as possible, and for the next few weeks her mind was occupied with the purchase and arrangement of furniture, and the many details which belong to the first start in a new career. Although her tastes differed widely from those of Clara Graham, she found her friend's advice and assistance infinitely valuable to her; and many were the expeditions taken together to the Kensington shops to supply Lettice's requirements. She had not Clara's love for shopping, or Clara's eagerness for a bargain; but she took pleasure in her visits to the great London store-houses of beautiful things, and made her purchases with care and deliberation.

So at the end of June she settled down with her mother in the pleasant cottage which was thenceforth to be their home. In addition to the new plenishing, there were in the house a few favorite pieces of furniture which had been saved from the wreck at Angleford; and Sydney—perhaps as a sign that he recognized some redeeming features in her desire to be independent—had made one room look quite imposing with an old-fashioned bookcase, and a library table and chair. There was a well-established garden behind the house, with tall box and bay-trees of more than a generation's growth, and plenty of those old English border plants without which a garden is scarcely worthy of its name. On the whole, Lettice felt that she had not made a bad selection out of the million or so of human habitations which overflow the province of London; and even Mrs. Campion would occasionally end her lamentations over the past by admitting that Maple Cottage was "not a workhouse, my dear, where I might have expected to finish my life."

The widow had a fixed idea about the troubles which had fallen upon her. She would talk now and then of the "shameful robberies" which had broken her husband's heart, and declare that sooner or later the miscreants would be discovered, and restitution would be made, and they would "all end their days in peace." As for Sydney, he was still her hero of heroes, who had come to their rescue when their natural protector was done to death, and whose elevation to the woolsack might be expected at any moment.

Lettice's friends, the Grahams, had naturally left her almost undisturbed during her visit to them, so far as invited guests were concerned. Nevertheless, she casually met several of Mr. Graham's literary acquaintances, and he took care to introduce her to one or two editors and publishers whom he thought likely to be useful to her. James Graham had plenty of tact; he knew just what to say about Miss Campion, without saying too much, and he contrived to leave an impression in the minds of those to whom he spoke that it might be rather difficult to make this young woman sit down and write, but decidedly worth their while to do it if they could.

"Now I have thrown in the seeds," Graham said to her before she left Edwardes Square, "and by the time you want to see them the blades will be springing up. From what you have told me I should say that you have quite enough to do in the next three months. There is that article for me, and the translation of Feuerbach, and the Ouf stories."

This reminiscence of Sydney's criticism made Lettice laugh—she was beginning to laugh again—and Graham's forecast of her future as a woman of letters put her into a cheerful and hopeful mood.

The summer passed away, and the autumn, and when Lettice lighted her first study fire, one cold day at the end of October, she could look forward to the coming winter without misgiving. In four months she had done fifty pounds' worth of work, and she had commissions which would keep her busy for six months more, and would yield at least twice as much money. Mr. Graham's seeds were beginning to send up their blades; and, in short, Lettice was in a very fair way of earning not only a living, but also a good literary repute.

One call, indeed, was made upon her resources in a very unexpected manner. She had put by four five-pound notes of clear saving—it is at such moments that our unexpected liabilities are wont to find us out—and she was just congratulating herself on that first achievement in the art of domestic thrift when her maid Milly knocked at her door, and announced a visitor.

"Please, miss, here is Mrs. Bundlecombe of Thorley!"

Mrs. Bundlecombe was a bookseller in her own right, in a village some three miles from Angleford. Her husband had died four years before Mr. Campion, and his widow made an effort to carry on the business. The rector in his palmy days had had many dealings with Mr. Bundlecombe, who was of some note in the world as a collector of second-hand books; but, as Lettice had no reason to think that he had bought anything of Mrs. Bundlecombe personally, she could not imagine what the object of this visit might be.

"Did she say what her business was, Milly?"

"No, miss. Only she said she had heard you were living here, and she would like to see you, please."

Milly's relations had lived in Thorley. Thus she knew Mrs. Bundlecombe by sight, and, being somewhat inquisitive by nature, she had already tried to draw the visitor into conversation, but without success.

"Show her in," said Lettice, after a moment's pause. It was pleasant, after all, to meet a "kent face" in London solitudes, and she felt quite kindly towards Mrs. Bundlecombe, whom she had sometimes seen over the counter in her shop at Thorley. So she received her with gentle cordiality.

Mrs. Bundlecombe showed symptoms of embarrassment at the quiet friendliness of Lettice's manners. She was not a person of aristocratic appearance, for she was short and very stout, and florid into the bargain; but her broad face was both shrewd and kindly, and her grey eyes were observant and good-humored. Her grey hair was arranged in three flat curls, fastened with small black combs on each side of her face, which was rosy and wrinkled like a russet apple, and her full purple skirt, her big bonnet, adorned with bows of scarlet ribbon, and her much be-furbelowed and be-spangled dolman, attested the fact that she had donned her best clothes for the occasion of her visit, and that Thorley fashions differed from those of the metropolis. She wore gloves with one button, moreover, and boots with elastic sides.

Mrs. Bundlecombe seemed to have some difficulty in coming to the point. She told Lettice much Angleford news, including a piece of information that interested her a good deal: namely, that the old squire, after many years of suffering, was dead, and that his nephew, Mr. Brooke Dalton, had at last succeeded to the property. "He's not there very much, however: he leaves the house pretty much to his sister, Miss Edith Dalton; but it's to be hoped that he'll marry soon and bring a lady to the place."

Lettice wondered again why Mrs. Bundlecombe had called upon her. There seemed very little point in her remarks. But the good woman had a very sufficient reason for her call. She was a practical-minded person, and she was moreover a literary woman in her way, as behoved the widow of a bookseller who had herself taken to selling books. It is true that her acquaintance with the works of British authors did not extend far beyond their titles, but it was to her credit that she contrived to make so much as she did out of her materials. She might have known as many insides of books as she knew outsides, and have put them to less practical service.

"Well," she said, after a quarter of an hour's incessant talk, "you will be wondering what brought me here, and to be sure, miss, I hardly like to say it now I've come; but, as I argued with myself, the rights of man are the rights of man, and to do your best by them who depend on you is the whole duty of man, which applies, I take it, to woman also. And when my poor dear husband died, I thought the path of duty was marked out for me, and I went through my daily exercises, so to speak, just as he had done for forty years. But times were bad, and I could make nothing of it. He had ways of selling books that I could never understand, and I soon saw that the decline and fall was setting in. So I have sold the business for what it would fetch, and paid all that was owing, and I can assure you that there is very little left. I have a nephew in London who is something in the writing way himself. He used to live with us at Thorley, and he is a dear dutiful boy, but he has had great troubles; so I am going to keep his rooms for him, and take care of his linen, and look after things a bit. I came up to-day to talk to him about it.

"Well, Miss Campion, the long and short of it is that as I was looking over my husband's state documents, so to speak, which he had kept in a private drawer, and which I had never found until I was packing up to go, I found a paper signed by your respected father, less than three months before my good man went to his saint's everlasting rest. You see, miss, it is an undertaking to pay Samuel Bundlecombe the sum of twenty pounds in six months from date, for value received, but owing to my husband dying that sudden, and not telling me of his private drawer, this paper was never presented."

Lettice took the paper and read it, feeling rather sick at heart, for two or three reasons. If her father had made this promise she felt sure that he would either have kept it or have put down the twenty pounds in his list of debts. The list, indeed, which had been handed to Sydney was in her own writing, and certainly the name of Bundlecombe was not included in it. Was the omission her fault? If the money had never been paid, that was what she would prefer to believe.

"I thought, miss," her visitor continued, "that there might be some mention of this in Mr. Campion's papers, and, having heard that all the accounts were properly settled, I made bold to bring it to your notice. It is a kind of social contract, you see, and a solemn league and covenant, as between man and man, which I am sure you would like to settle if the means exist. Not but what it seems a shame to come to a lady on such an errand; and I may tell you miss, fair and candid, that I have been to Mr. Sydney Campion in the Temple, who does not admit that he is liable. That may be law, or it may not, but I do consider that this signature ought to be worth the money."

Lettice took the paper again. There could be no doubt as to its genuineness, and the fact that Sydney had denied his liability influenced her in some subtle manner to do what she had already half resolved to do without that additional argument.

She looked at the box in which she had put her twenty pounds, and she looked at her father's signature. Then she opened the box and took out the notes.

"You did quite right in coming, Mrs. Bundlecombe. This is certainly my father's handwriting, and I suppose that if the debt had been settled the paper would not have remained in your husband's possession. Here is the money."

The old woman could scarcely believe her eyes; but she pocketed the notes with great satisfaction, and began to express her admiration for such honorable conduct in a very voluble manner. Lettice cut her short and got rid of her, and then, if the truth must be confessed, she sat down and had a comfortable cry over the speedy dissipation of her savings.

CHAPTER VII.

MRS. HARTLEY AT HOME.

After her first Christmas in London, Lettice began to accept invitations to the houses of her acquaintance.

She dined several times at the Grahams', where there were never more than eight at table, and, being a bright talker and an appreciative listener—two qualities which do not often go together—she was always an impressive personality without exactly knowing it. Clara was accustomed to be outshone by her in conversation, and had become used to it, but some of the women whom Lettice was invited to meet looked at her rather hard, as though they would have liked to draw her serious attention to the fact that they were better looking, or better dressed, or older or younger than herself, as the case might be, and that it was consequently a little improper in her to be talked to so much by the men.

Undoubtedly Lettice got on well with men, and was more at her ease with them than with her own sex. It was not the effect of forwardness on her part, and indeed she was scarcely conscious of the fact. She conversed readily, because her mind was full of reading and of thought, and her moral courage was never at a loss. The keenness of her perception led her to understand and respond to the opinions of the cleverest men whom she met, and it was not unnatural that they should be flattered.

It does not take long for a man or woman to earn a reputation in the literary circles of London, provided he or she has real ability, and is well introduced. The ability will not, as a rule, suffice without the introductions, though introductions have been known to create a reputation, lasting at any rate for a few months, without any real ability. Lettice advanced rapidly in the estimation of those whose good opinion was worth having. She soon began to discriminate between the people who were worth cultivating and the people who were not. If a person were sincere and straightforward, could say what he meant and say it with point and vivacity, or if he possessed for her those vaguely attractive and stimulating qualities which draw people together without their exactly knowing why (probably through some correlation of temperament), Lettice would feel this person was good to know, whether the world approved her choice of friends or not. And when she wanted to know man or woman, she exerted herself to please—mainly by showing that she herself was pleased. She did not exactly flatter—she was never insincere—but it amounted to much the same thing as flattery. She listened eagerly; her interest was manifested in her face, her attitude, her answers. In fact she was her absolute self, without reserve and without fence. No wonder that she incurred the jealousy of half the women in her set.

But this is how an intellectual woman can best please a man who has passed the childish age, when he only cared for human dolls and dolls' houses. She must carry her intellect about with her, like a brave costume—dressing, of course, with taste and harmony—she must not be slow to admire the intellectual costume of others, if she wants her own to be admired; she must be subtle enough at the same time to forget that she is dressed at all, and yet never for a moment forget that her companion may have no soul or heart except in his dress. If he has, it is for him to prove it, not for her to assume it.

It was because Lettice had this art of intellectual intercourse, and because she exercised it in a perfectly natural and artless manner, that she charmed so many of those who made her acquaintance, and that they rarely paused to consider whether she was prettier or plainer, taller or shorter, more or less prepossessing, than the women who surrounded her.

In due time she found herself welcomed at the houses of those dear and estimable ladies, who—generally old and childless themselves—love to gather round them the young and clever acolytes of literature and art, the enthusiastic devotees of science, the generous apprentices of constructive politics, for politicians who do not dabble in the reformation of society find other and more congenial haunts. This many-minded crowd of acolytes, and devotees, and apprentices, owe much to the hospitable women who bring them together in a sort of indulgent dame's school, where their angles are rubbed down, and whence they merge, perhaps, as Arthur Hallam said, the picturesque of man and man, but certainly also more fitted for their work in the social mill than if they had never known that kindly feminine influence.

Lettice became especially fond of one of these minor queens of literary society, who received her friends on Sunday afternoon, and whose drawing-room was frequently attended by a dozen or a score of well-reputed men and women. Mrs. Hartley was an excellent hostess. She was not only careful, to begin with, about her own acquaintance, cultivating none but those whom she had heard well spoken of by competent judges, but she knew how to make a second choice amongst the chosen, bringing kindred spirits together with a happy, instinctive sense of their mutual suitabilities. In spite of her many amiable and agreeable qualities, however, it took Lettice a little time to believe that she should ever make a friend of Mrs. Hartley, whose habit of assorting and labelling her acquaintances in groups struck her at first as artificial and conventional. Lettice objected, for her own part, to be classified.

She had been entreated so often by Clara to go to one of Mrs. Hartley's afternoons that it was with some compunction of heart that she prepared at last to fulfil her long-delayed promise. She walked from Brook Green to Edwardes Square, about three o'clock one bright Sunday afternoon, in February, and found Clara waiting for her. Clara was looking very trim and smart in a new gown of inexpensive material, but the latest, and she surveyed Lettice in a comprehensive manner from top to toe, as if to ascertain whether a proper value had been attached to Mrs. Hartley's invitation.

"You look very nice," was her verdict. "I am so glad that you have relieved your black at last, Lettice. There is no reason why you should not wear a little white or lavender."

And indeed this mitigation of her mourning weeds was becoming to Lettice, whose delicate bloom showed fresh and fair against the black and white of her new costume. She had pinned a little bunch of sweet violets into her jacket, and they harmonized excellently well with the grave tranquillity of her face and the soberness of her dress.

"I don't know why it is, but you remind me of a nun," Clara said, glancing at her in some perplexity. "The effect is quite charming, but it is nun-like too——"

"I am sure I don't know why; I never felt more worldly in my life," said Lettice, laughing. "Am I not fit for Mrs. Hartley's drawing-room?"

"Fit? You are lovely; but not quite like anybody else. That is the best of it; Mrs. Hartley will rave of you," said Clara, as they set forth. And the words jarred a little on Lettice's sensitive mind; she thought that she should object to be raved about.

They took an omnibus to Kensington High Street, and then they made their way to Campden Hill, where Mrs. Hartley's house was situated. And as they went, Clara took the opportunity of explaining Mrs. Hartley's position and claims to distinction. Mrs. Hartley was a widow, childless, rich, perfectly independent: she was very critical and very clever (said Mrs. Graham), but, oh, so kind-hearted! And she was sure that Lettice would like her.

Lettice meekly hoped that she should, although she had a guilty sense of wayward dislike to the woman in whose house, it appeared, she was to be exhibited. For some words of Graham's lingered in her mind. "Mrs. Hartley? The lion-hunter? Oh! so you are to be on view this afternoon, I understand." Accordingly, it was with no very pleasant anticipation that Lettice entered the lion-hunter's house on Campden Hill.

A stout, little grey-haired lady in black, with a very observant eye, came forward to greet the visitors. "This is Miss Campion, I feel sure," she said, putting out a podgy hand, laden with diamond rings. "Dear Mrs. Graham, how kind of you to bring her. Come and sit by me, Miss Campion, and tell me all about yourself. I want to know how you first came to think of literature as a profession?"

This was not the way in which people talked at Angleford. Lettice felt posed for a moment, and then a sense of humor came happily to her relief.

"I drifted into it, I am afraid," she answered, composedly.

"Drifted? No, I am sure you would never drift. You don't know how interested I am, Miss Campion, in the development of the human mind, or you would not try to evade the question. Now, which interests you most, poetry or prose?"

"That depends upon my mood; I am not sure that I am permanently interested in either," Lettice said, quietly.

Her hostess' observant eye was upon her for a moment; then Mrs. Hartley's face expanded in a benignant smile.

"Ah, I see you are very clever," she said. "I ask the question—not from idle curiosity, because I have representatives of both in the room at the present moment. There is a poet, whom I mean to introduce you to by and by, if you will allow me; and there is the very embodiment of prose close beside you, although I don't believe that he writes any, and, like M. Jourdain, talks it without knowing that it is prose."

Lettice glanced involuntarily at the man beside her, and glanced again. Where had she seen his face before? He was a rather stout, blonde man, with an honest open countenance that she liked, although it expressed good nature rather than intellectual force.

"Don't you remember him?" said Mrs. Hartley, in her ear. "He's a cousin of mine: Brooke Dalton, whose uncle used to live at Angleford. He has been wanting to meet you very much; he remembers you quite well, he tells me."

The color rose in Lettice's face. She was feminine enough to feel that a connecting link between Mrs. Hartley and her dear old home changed her views of her hostess at once. She looked up and smiled. "I remember Mr. Dalton too," she said.

"What a sweet face!" Mrs. Hartley said to herself. "Now if Brooke would only take it into his head to settle down——"

And aloud she added: "Brooke, come and be introduced to Miss Campion. You used to know her at Angleford."

"It seems a long time since I saw you," Mr. Dalton said, rather clumsily, as he took Lettice's hand into a very cordial clasp. "It was that day in December when your brother had just got his scholarship at Trinity."

"Oh, yes; that day! I remember it very well," said Lettice, drawing a long breath, which was not exactly a sigh, although it sounded like one. "I gave up being a child on that day, I believe!"

"There have been many changes since then." Brooke Dalton was not brilliant in conversation.

"You have heard of them all, I suppose? Yes, my mother and I are in London now."

"You will allow me to call, I hope?"

Lettice had but time to signify her consent, when Mrs. Hartley seized on her again, but this time Lettice did not so much object to be cross-examined. She recognized the fact that Mrs. Hartley's aim was kindly, and she submitted to be asked questions about her work and her prospects, and to answer them with a frankness that amazed herself. But in the very midst of the conversation she was conscious of being much observed by two or three people in the room; notably by Brooke Dalton, who had planted himself in a position from which he could look at her without attracting the other visitors' remark; and also by a tall man with a dark, melancholy face, deep-set eyes, and a peaked Vandyke beard, whose glances were more furtive than those of Dalton, but equally interested and intent. He was a handsome man, and Lettice found herself wondering whether he were not "somebody," and somebody worth talking to, moreover; for he was receiving, in a languid, half-indifferent manner, a great deal of homage from the women in the room. He seemed bored by it, and was turning away in relief from a lady who had just quoted half-a-dozen lines of Shelley for his especial behoof, when Mrs. Hartley, who had been discussing Feuerbach and the German materialists with Lettice, caught his eye, and beckoned him to her side.

"Mr. Walcott," she said, "I never heard that you were a materialist, and I don't think it is very likely; so you can condole with Miss Campion on having been condemned to translate five hundred pages of Feuerbach. Now, isn't that terrible?"

"I don't know Feuerbach," said the poet, after he had bowed to Lettice, "but it sounds warm and comfortable on a wintry day. Nevertheless, I do condole with her."

"I am not sure that I need condolence," said Lettice. "The work was really very interesting, and one likes to know what any philosopher has to say for himself, whether one believes in his theories or not. I must say I have enjoyed reading Feuerbach,—though he is a German with a translatable name."

This was a flippant speech, as Lettice acknowledged to herself; but, then, Mr. Walcott's speech had been flippant to begin with, and she wanted to give as good as she got.

"You read German, then?" said Walcott, sitting down in the chair that Mrs. Hartley had vacated, and looking at Lettice with interest, although he did not abandon the slight affectation of tone and manner that she had noted from the beginning of her talk with him. "How nice that must be! I often wish I knew something more than my schoolboy's smattering of Greek, Latin, and French."

Lettice had read Mr. Walcott's last volume of poems, which were just then exciting considerable interest in the literary world, and she could not help recalling one or two lyrics and sonnets from Uhland, Filicaja, and other Continentals. As though divining her thoughts, Walcott went on quickly, with much more sincerity of tone:

"I do try now and then to put an idea that strikes me from German or Italian into English; but think of my painful groping with a dictionary, before the cramped and crippled idea can reach my mind! I am the translator most in need of condolence, Miss Campion!"

"Yet, even without going to other languages," said Lettice, "there is an unlimited field in our own, both for ideas and for expression—as well as a practically unlimited audience."

"The artists and musicians say that their domains are absolutely unlimited—that the poet sings to those who happen to speak his language, whilst they discourse to the whole world and to all time. I suppose, in a sense, they are right."

He spoke listlessly, as if he did not care whether they were right or wrong.

But Lettice's eyes began to glow.

"Surely in a narrow sense! They would hardly say that Handel or Beethoven speaks to a wider audience than Homer or Shakspeare, and certainly no musician or painter or sculptor can hope to delight mankind for as many centuries as a poet. And, then, to think what an idea can accomplish—what Greek ideas have done in England, for instance, or Roman ideas in France, or French ideas in nearly every country of Europe! Could a tune make a revolution, or a picture destroy a religion?"

"Perhaps, yes," said Walcott, wishing to draw her out, "if the tunes or the pictures could be repeated often enough, and brought before the eyes and ears of the multitude."

"I do not think so. And, at any rate, that could not be done by way of systematic and comprehensive teaching, so that your comparison only suggests another superiority in literary expression. A poet can teach a whole art, or establish a definite creed; he can move the heart and mould the mind at the same time; but one can hardly imagine such an effect from the work of those who speak to us only through the eye or ear."

By this time Alan Walcott was fairly interested. What Lettice said might be commonplace enough, but it did not strike him so. It was her manner that pleased him, her quiet fervor and gentle insistance, which showed that she was accustomed to think for herself, and suggested that she would have the honesty to say what she thought. And, of course, he applied to himself all that she said about poets in general, and was delighted by her warm championship of his special vocation. As they went on talking for another quarter of an hour he recognized, without framing the admission in words, that Miss Campion was an exceedingly well-read person, and that she knew many authors—even poets—with whom he had the slightest acquaintance. Most of the people whom he met talked idle nonsense to him, as though their main object was to pass the time, or else they aired a superficial knowledge of the uppermost thoughts and theories of the day, gleaned as a rule from the cheap primers and magazine articles in which a bustled age is content to study its science, art, economy, politics, and religion. But here was a woman who had been a voracious reader, who had gone to the fountain-head for her facts, and who yet spoke with the air of one who wanted to learn, rather than to display.

"We have had a very pleasant talk," he said to her at last. "I mean that I have found it very pleasant. I am going now to dine at my club, and shall spend my evening over a monologue which has suggested itself since I entered this room. As you know the Grahams I may hope to meet you again, there if not here. A talk with you, Miss Campion, is what the critics in the Acropolis might call very suggestive!"

Again Lettice thought the manner and the speech affected, but there was an air of sincerity about the man which seemed to be fighting down the affectation. She hardly knew whether she liked him or not, but she knew that he had interested her and made her talk—for which two things she half forgave him the affectation.

"I knew you two would get on together," said Mrs. Hartley, who came up at the moment and dropped into Alan Walcott's chair. "I am not easily deceived in my friends, and I was sure you would have plenty to say to each, other. I have been watching you, and I declare it was quite a case of conversation at first sight. Now, mind you come to me often, Miss Campion. I feel that I shall like you."

And the fat good-natured little woman nodded her grey head to emphasize the compliment.

"It is kind of you to say that," said Lettice, warmly. "I will certainly take you at your word."

"My dear," said Mrs. Hartley, when Alan Walcott had left them, "he is a very nice and clever man—but, oh, so melancholy! He makes me feel quite unhappy. I never saw him so animated as he was just now, and it must be thoroughly good for him to be drawn out in that way."

"I suppose it is the natural mood of poets," Lettice answered with a smile. "It is an old joke against them."

"Ah, but I think the race is changing its characteristics in these days, and going in for cheerfulness and comfort. There is Mr. Pemberton, for instance—how aggravatingly prosperous he looks! Do you see how he beams with good nature on all the world? I should say that he is a jovial man—and yet, you know, he has been down there, as they said of Dante."

"Perhaps it goes by opposites. What I have read of Mr. Walcott's poetry is rather light than sad—except one or two pieces in The Decade."

"Poor man! I think there is another cause for his melancholy. He lost his wife two or three years ago, and I have been told that she was a charming creature, and that her death upset him terribly. He has only just begun to go about again."

"How very unfortunate!" said Lettice. "And that makes it still more strange that his poems should be so slightly tinged with melancholy. He must live quite a double life. Most men would give expression to their personal griefs, and publish them for everybody to read; but he keeps them sacred. That is much more interesting."

"I should think it is more difficult. It seems natural that a poet, being in grief, should write the poetry of grief."

"Yes—no doubt it is more difficult."

And Lettice, on her way home and afterwards, found herself pondering on the problem of a man who, recently robbed of a well-beloved wife, wrote a thousand verses without a single reference to her.

She took down his "Measures and Monologues," and read it through, to see what he had to say about women.

There were a few cynical verses from Heine, and three bitter stanzas on the text from Balzac:—"Vous nous promettiez le bonheur, et finissiez par nous jeter dans une précipice;" but not one tender word applied to a woman throughout the book. It was certainly strange; and Lettice felt that her curiosity was natural and legitimate.

Alan Walcott, in fact, became quite an interesting study. During the next few months Lettice had many opportunities of arriving at a better knowledge of his character, and she amused herself by quietly pushing her inquiries into what was for her a comparatively new field of speculation. The outcome of the research was not very profitable. The more she saw of him the more he puzzled her. Qualities which appeared one day seemed to be entirely wanting when they next met. In some subtle manner she was aware that even his feelings and inclinations constantly varied; at one time he did not conceal his craving for sympathy, at another he was frigid and almost repellent. Lettice still did not know whether she liked or disliked him. But she was now piqued as well as interested, and so it happened that Mr. Walcott began to occupy more of her thoughts than she was altogether willing to devote to him.

So far, all their meetings were in public. They had never exchanged a word that the world might not hear. They saw each other at the Grahams' dinner-parties, at Mrs. Hartley's Sunday afternoon "at homes," and at one or two other houses. To meet a dozen times in a London season constitutes intimacy. Although they talked chiefly of books, sometimes of men and women, and never of themselves, Lettice began to feel that a confidential tone was creeping into their intercourse—that she criticized his poems with extraordinary freedom, and argued her opinions with him in a way that would certainly have staggered her brother Sydney if he had heard her. But in all this friendly talk, the personal note had never once been struck. He told her nothing of his inner self, of his past life, or his dreams for the future. All that they said might have been said to each other on their first meeting in Mrs. Hartley's drawing-room. It seemed as if some vague impalpable barrier had been erected between them, and Lettice puzzled herself from time to time to know how this barrier had been set up.

Sometimes—she did not know why—she was disposed to associate it with the presence of Brooke Dalton. That gentleman continued to display his usual lack of brilliance in conversation, together with much good-heartedness, soundness of judgment, and thoughtfulness for others; and in spite of his slowness of speech Lettice liked him very much. But why would he persist in establishing himself within earshot when Alan was talking to her? If they absolutely eluded him, he betrayed uneasiness, like that of a faithful dog who sees his beloved mistress in some danger. He did not often interrupt the conversation. He sat silent for the most part, unconsciously throwing a wet blanket over both speakers, and sometimes sending Walcott away in a state of almost irrepressible irritation. And yet he seemed to be on good terms with Alan. They spoke to each other as men who had been acquaintances, if not friends, for a good number of years; and he never made an allusion to Alan, in his absence, which could in the least be deemed disparaging. And yet Lettice felt that she was watched, and that there was some mysterious anxiety in Dalton's mind.

Having no companions (for Clara was too busy with her house and her children to be considered a companion for the day-time), Lettice sometimes went for solitary expeditions to various "sights" of London, and, as usual in such expeditions, had never once met anybody she knew. She had gone rather early one summer morning to Westminster Abbey, and was walking slowly through the dim cloistered shades, enjoying the coolness and the quietness, when she came full upon Alan Walcott, who seemed to be doing likewise.

They both started: indeed, they both changed color. For the first time they met outside a drawing-room; and the change in their environment seemed to warrant some change in their relation to one another. After the first greeting, and a short significant pause—for what can be more significant than silence between two people who have reached that stage of sensitiveness to each other's moods when every word or movement seems like self-revelation?—Alan spoke.

"You love this place—as I do; I know you love it."

"I have never been here before," said Lettice, letting her eyes stray dreamily over the grey stones at her feet.

"No, or I should have seen you. I am often here. And I see you so seldom——"

"So seldom?" said Lettice in some natural surprise. "Why, I thought we met rather often?"

"Under the world's eye," said Alan, but in so low a voice that she was not sure whether he meant her to hear or not. However, they both smiled; and he went on rather hurriedly, "It is the place of all others where I should expect to meet you. We think so much alike——"

"Do we?" said Lettice doubtfully. "But we differ very much."

"Not in essentials. Don't say that you think so," he said, in a tone that was almost passionately earnest? "I can't tell you how much it is to me to feel that I have a friend who understands—who sympathizes—who would sympathize, I am sure, if she knew all——"

He broke off suddenly, and the emotion in his voice so far touched Lettice that she remained silent, with drooping head and lowered eyes.

"Yes," he went on, "you owe me your sympathy now. You have given me so much that you must give me more. I have a right to it."

"Mr. Walcott!" said Lettice, raising her head quickly, "you can have no right——"

"No right to sympathy from a friend? Well, perhaps not," he answered bitterly. "I thought that, although you were a woman, you could allow me the claim I make. It is small enough, God knows! Miss Campion, forgive me for speaking so roughly. I ask most earnestly for your friendship and your sympathy; will you not give me these?"

Lettice moved onward towards the door. "Do you think that we ought to discuss our personal concerns in such a place as this?" she asked, evading the question in a thoroughly feminine manner.

"Why not? But if not here, then in another place. By the bye"—with a sudden change of manner, as they stepped into the light of day—"I have a rare book that I want to show you. Will you let me bring it to your house to-morrow morning? I think that you will be interested. May I bring it?"

"Yes," said Lettice mechanically. The change from fierce earnestness to this subdued conventionality of tone bewildered her a little.

"I will come at twelve, if that hour will suit you?"

"It will suit me very well."

And then he raised his hat and left her. Lettice, her pulses throbbing strangely, took her way back to Hammersmith. As she grew calmer, she wondered what had agitated her so much; it must have been something in his look or in his tone, for every effort to assure herself by a repetition of his words that they were mere commonplaces of conversation set her heart beating more tumultuously than ever. She walked all the way from Westminster to Brook Green without once reflecting that she might save herself that fatigue by hailing a passing omnibus.

CHAPTER VIII.

AT THE OLIGARCHY CLUB.

Sydney Campion had done a year's hard and remunerative work since he paid his last visit to Angleford, and the result more than answered his expectations.

When the courts were sitting he was fully absorbed in his briefs; but now and again he took life easily enough—at any rate, so far as the law was concerned. In the autumn it had been his custom to live abroad for a month or two; at Christmas and Easter he invariably found his way to his club in the afternoon, and finished the evening over a rubber of whist.

It was a rare occasion when Sydney was able, in the middle of term, to leave his chambers between three and four o'clock, and stroll in a leisurely way along the Embankment, peacefully smoking a cigar. The chance came to him one sultry day in June. There was no case for him to master, nothing proceeding in which he was specially interested, and he did not feel disposed to sit down and improvise a case for himself, as he used to do in his earlier days. He was minded to be idle; and we may accompany him in his westward walk along the river side to Hungerford Bridge, and up the Avenue to Pall Mall.

On the steps of the Oligarchy Club he found his old friend, Pynsent, just starting for the House. The time was one of great excitement for those who had not lost their interest in the politics of the day. The Irish Land Bill was in Committee, and the Conservatives had strenuously opposed it, fighting, as they knew, a losing battle, yet not without consolations. This very week they had run the Government so close that the transfer of three votes would have put them in a minority; and Sir John Pynsent, who was always a sanguine man, had convinced himself that the Liberal party was on the point of breaking up.

"They are sure to go to pieces," he said to Campion; "and it would be a strange thing if they did not. What Heneage has done already some other Whig with a conscience will do again, and more effectually. You will see we shall be back in office before the year is out. No Ministry and no majority could bear the strain which the Old Man is putting on his followers—it is simply impossible. The worth and birth of the country are sick of this veiled communism that they call justice to Ireland—sick of democratic sycophancy—deadly sick of the Old Man. You mark my words, dear boy: there will be a great revolt against him before many months have passed. I see it working. I find it in the House, in the clubs, in the drawing-rooms; and I don't speak merely as my wishes lead me."

"No doubt you are right as to London; but how about the country?"

"The provinces waver more than the metropolis, I admit; but I don't despair of seeing a majority even in the English boroughs. Ah, Campion I never see you without saying to myself, 'There goes the man who lost us Dormer.' You would have won that election, I am certain."

"Well," said Sydney, "you know why I could not fight. The will, the money, everything was ready: but——"

"True, I forgot. I beg your pardon!"

"Not at all! But I will fight for you some day—as soon as you like. Bear that in mind, Pynsent!"

"To be sure I will, my dear fellow. We must have you in the House. I have often said so."

And the energetic baronet hurried away, whilst Sydney entered the Club, and made straight for the smoking-room. Here he found others just as eager to predict the downfall of the Government as Sir John Pynsent had been; but he was not in the mood to listen to a number of young men all of the same mind, all of-doubtful intellectual calibre, and all sure to say what he had heard a dozen times already. So he passed on to the billiard-room, and finding that a pool was just beginning, took a ball and played.

That served to pass the time until six o'clock, when he went upstairs and read the evening papers for an hour; and at seven he had his dinner and a bottle of wine. Meanwhile he had met two or three friends, with whom he kept up a lively conversation on the events of the day, seasoned by many a pungent joke, and fatal (for the moment) to many a reputation. It is a habit fostered by club life—as, no doubt, it is fostered in the life of the drawing-room, for neither sex is exempt—to sacrifice the repute of one's absent acquaintance with a light heart, not in malice, but more as a parrot bites the finger that feeds it, in sport, or even in affection. If we backbite our friends, we give them free permission to backbite us, or we know that they do it, which amounts to pretty much the same thing. The biting may not be very severe, and, as a rule, it leaves no scars; but, of course, there are exceptions to the rule.

The secret history of almost every man or woman who has mixed at all in polite society is sure to be known by some one or other in the clubs and drawing-rooms. If there is anything to your discredit in your past life, anything which you would blot out if you could with rivers of repentance or expiation, you may be pretty sure that at some time, when you might least expect it, this thing has been, or will be, the subject of discourse and dissection amongst your friends. It may not be told in an injurious or exaggerated manner, and it may not travel far; but none the less do you walk on treacherous shale, which may give way at any moment under your feet. The art of living, if you are afraid of the passing of your secret from the few who know to the many who welcome a new scandal, is to go on walking with the light and confident step of youth, never so much as quailing in your own mind at the thought that the ground may crumble beneath you—that you may go home some fine day, or to your club, or to Lady Jane's five o'clock tea, and be confronted by the grinning skeleton on whom you had so carefully turned your keys and shot your bolts.

No doubt there are men and women so refined and kindly in their nature that they have absolutely no appetite for scandal—never speak it, or listen to it, or remember what they have overheard. Sydney and his friends were troubled by no such qualms, and, if either of them had been, he would not have been so ill-mannered as to spoil sport for the rest.

After dinner they had gone upstairs to the members' smoking room, in a comfortable corner of which they were lazily continuing their conversation. It turned by chance on a certain barrister of Sydney's inn, a Mr. Barrington Baynes, whom one of the party not incorrectly described as "that beautiful, bumptious, and briefless barrister, B. B."

"He gives himself great airs," said Captain Williams, a swaggering, supercilious man, for whom Sydney had no affection, and who was not one of Sydney's admirers. "To hear him talk one would imagine he was a high authority on every subject under the sun, but I suspect he has very little to go upon. Has he ever held a brief, Campion?"

"I never heard of it, if he did. One of those poor devils who take to journalism, and usually end by going to the dogs. You will find his name on the covers of magazines, and I fancy he does something, in the reviewing way."

It was an unfortunate speech for Sydney to make, and Captain Williams did not fail to seize his opportunity of giving the sharp-tongued lawyer—who perhaps knew better how to thrust than to parry in such encounters—a wholesome snub.

Fortune favored him. The current number of The Decade was lying on the table beside him. He took it up in a casual sort of way, and glanced at the list of contents.

"By the bye, Campion," he said, "you are not a married man, are you? I see magazine articles now and then signed Lettice Campion; no relation, I suppose."

"That is my sister," Sydney answered, quietly enough. But it was plain that the hit had told; and he was vexed with himself for being so snobbish as to deserve a sneer from a man like Williams.

"I have had the pleasure of meeting Miss Campion two or three times lately at Mrs. Hartley's, in Kensington," said another of the quartette. This was none other than Brooke Dalton, whom Sydney always liked. He spoke in a confidential undertone, with the kindly intention of covering Sydney's embarrassment. "Mrs. Hartley is a cousin of mine; and, though I say it, she brings some very nice people together sometimes. By the way, have you ever seen a man of the name of Walcott—Alan Walcott: a man who writes poetry, and so forth?"

"I know him by name, that is all. I have heard people say he is one of the best poets we have; but I don't pretend to understand our latter-day bards."

"You never met him?"

"No."

"Well, then," said Mr. Dalton, who, though a justice of the peace, and the oldest of the four, could give them all points and beat them as a retailer of gossip; "well, then, that leaves me free to tell you as curious a little history as any I know. But mind, you fellows," he continued, as the others pricked up their ears and prepared to listen, "this is not a story for repetition, and I pledge you to silence before I say another word."

"Honor bright!" said Charles Milton; and the captain nodded his head.

"The facts are these: Five or six years ago, I knew a little of Alan Walcott. I had made his acquaintance in a fortuitous way, and he once did me a good turn by coming forward as a witness in the police court."

"Confession is good for the soul," Milton interjected.

"Well, I was summoned for thrashing a cabman, and I should certainly have been fined if Walcott had not contrived to put the matter in its proper light. For a month or two we saw a good deal of each other, and I rather liked him. He was frank and open in his ways, and though not a well-to-do man, I never observed anything about him that was mean or unhandsome. I did not know that he was married at first, but gradually I put two and two together, and found that he came out now and again to enjoy a snatch of personal freedom, which he could not always make sure of at home.

"Once I saw his wife, and only once. She was a strikingly handsome Frenchwoman, of that bold and flaunting type which generally puts an Englishman on his guard—all paint and powder and cosmetics; you know the style!"

"Not exactly a poetic ideal," said Sydney.

"That is just what I thought at the time; and she seems to have been still less so in character. When I saw her she was terribly excited about some trifle or other—treated Walcott like a dog, without the slightest consideration for his feelings or mine, stood over him with a knife, and ended with a fit of shrieking hysterics."

"Drink or jealousy?" Captain Williams asked.

"Perhaps a little of both. Walcott told me afterwards that that was his daily and nightly experience, and that he was making up his mind to end it. I never knew what he meant by that, but it was impressed upon my memory by the cool sort of way in which he said it, and a quiet look in his eyes which evidently meant mischief. About a fortnight later they went abroad, rather in a hurry; and for some time I heard nothing more of them. Then I went to Aix-les-Bains, and came on the scene just after a frightful row. It seems that a French admirer of hers had followed her to Aix, and attacked Walcott, and even struck him in the hotel gardens. The proprietor and the police had to interfere, and I came across Walcott just as he was looking for some one to act as second. There had been a challenge, and all that sort of thing; and, un-English as it seems, I thought Walcott perfectly right, and acted as his friend throughout the affair. It was in no way a remarkable duel: the French fellow was shot in the arm and got away to Switzerland, and we managed to keep it dark. Walcott was not hurt, and went back to his hotel."

"What did the woman do?" asked Williams, curiously.

"That's the odd part of it. Husband and wife seem to have made it up, for in a day or two they went on to Culoz, had luncheon there, and went out for a walk together. From that walk, Mrs. Alan Walcott did not return. Now comes the mystery: what happened in the course of that walk near Culoz? All that is known is that the landlady saw Walcott returning by himself two or three hours later, and that when she questioned him he replied that madame had taken her departure. What do you think of that for a bit of suggested melodrama?"

"It lacks finish," said Milton.

"I can't see where the poetry comes in," observed the captain.

"It certainly looked black for Walcott," Sydney remarked. "I suppose there was a regular hue and cry—a search for the body, and all that kind of thing?"

"So far as I know, there was nothing of the sort. Nobody seems to have had any suspicion at the time. The peasants at Culoz seemed to have talked about it a little, and some weeks afterwards the English people at Aix-les-Bains got hold of it, and a friend of mine tried to extract information from the landlady. But he was unsuccessful: the landlady could not positively affirm that there was anything wrong. And—perhaps there was not," Mr. Dalton concluded, with a burst of Christian charity which was creditable to him, considering how strong were his objections to Walcott's friendship with Miss Campion.

The captain leaned his head back, sent a pillar of smoke up to the ceiling, and laughed aloud.

"There is no question about it," said Milton, "that Walcott got out of it cheaply. I would not be in his shoes for any money, even now."

"Is this business widely known?" Sydney asked. "It is strange that I never heard anything about it."

He was thinking that the acquaintance of Mr. Alan Walcott could not in any case be a desirable thing for Miss Lettice Campion. From the manner in which Dalton had introduced the subject he felt pretty sure that the attention paid by this man to his sister had been noticed, and that his friend was actuated by a sense, of duty in giving him warning as to the facts within his knowledge.

"I don't wonder you never heard of it," said Dalton. "I am not aware of anyone in England who ever did, except myself. I have not mentioned it before, because I am not sure that it is fair to Walcott to do so. But I know you men will not repeat what I have been telling you."

"Not a word," said Captain Williams and Charles Milton, in a breath.

Yet in less than a week from that time the whole story made its appearance in one of the baser personal journals, and people were discussing who the "well-known poet" was, and whether "the buried secret" would presently come to light again.

And Alan Walcott saw the paragraph, and felt that he had not yet quite done with his past, and wondered at the dispensation of Providence which permitted the writers of such paragraphs to live and thrive.

But a good deal was to happen before that paragraph was printed; and in the meantime Dalton and Campion went off to look for partners in a rubber, without supposing for a moment that they had delivered a stab in the back to one who had never done an injury to either of them.

CHAPTER IX.

LETTICE RECEIVES A VISITOR.

The day following that on which Sydney Campion paid his afternoon visit to his club in Pall Mall was one of considerable importance to his sister Lettice.

She was an early riser, and generally contrived to write half-a-dozen pages of easy translation or straightforward fiction before ten o'clock. That was the hour when she was due in her mother's room, to help her in dressing, and to settle her comfortably in her arm-chair, with her Bible and spectacles at her side, and a newspaper or magazine waiting its turn after the lessons for the day had been read. Mrs. Campion was growing very feeble, both in mind and in body, but she got through her waking hours with a fair amount of satisfaction, thanks to the attention which was paid to all her wants and wishes. Lettice did not suffer anything to interfere with the regular routine which she had marked out for her mother's comfort. She and her maid Milly between them kept the old lady in peace of mind and constant good humor; and if Mrs. Campion still believed that Sydney was their great benefactor, and that it behoved her to comport herself with dignity and grace as the mother of a Lord Chancellor, Lettice did not attempt the hopeless task of undeceiving her.

On this particular day there had been a poor pretence of morning work. She had arranged her papers, the ink and pen were ready to her hand, and a few lines were actually written. But her ideas were all in confusion, and eluded her when she tried to fix them. She could not settle to anything, and instead of writing she found herself drawing figures on the blotting-pad. She knew that of old as a bad symptom, and gave up trying to be industrious. The French window stood open, and the balmy June morning tempted her out into the garden. She picked some flowers for her vases, and pinned a rosebud on the collar of her soft grey dress. It was a simple, straight-flowing dress, of the make which suits every woman best, tall or short, handsome or plain, depending for its beauty on shape and material alone, without any superfluous trimmings; for Lettice had a man's knack of getting her dressmaker to obey orders, and would have scorned to wear and pay for, as a matter of course, whatever trappings might be sent home to her in lieu of what she wanted.

Clearly there were special reasons for her perturbation of mind, and if any other woman had been at her side, and watched her in and out of the house for ten minutes at a time, she would have had no difficulty in divining that Lettice expected a visitor. She would probably go further than this, and draw some confident conclusion as to the kind of welcome likely to be accorded to the visitor; but here, at any rate, the criticism would have been premature. Lettice did expect a visitor—Mr. Alan Walcott to wit; but she had not the slightest notion as to how she should receive him, or whether she would prefer that he should come or stay away.

Her friendship with the poet had grown steadily since their first meeting, and they were now on tolerably familiar terms. His manner had made it impossible for her to doubt that he liked to talk and listen to her, that he sought her company, and even considered himself entitled to her sympathy. But when on the previous day he had gone so far as to assert his title in words, he had done so with what seemed to her remarkable audacity. And, although she had given him permission to come to her house this morning, she was thinking now whether it would not have been better if she had suggested the transfer of the volume of which he spoke at Mrs. Hartley's on the following Sunday, or if she had made her hint still broader by praising the cheapness and despatch of the Parcels Delivery Company.

She had done nothing of this kind. She had been neither rude nor effusive, for it was not in her nature to be either. He was coming "some time after twelve," and in fact, punctually as the clock struck twelve, Mr. Alan Walcott was at the door.

Milly announced him demurely. She observed him carefully, however, as she admitted him into Lettice's room, and studied his card with interest while carrying it to Miss Campion. No man so young and handsome had ever called at Maple Cottage in her time before.

Lettice had been sitting with her mother, and she came down to her study and received her visitor with a frank smile.

"It is really, very kind of you," she said, taking the innocent book which he held out as a sort of warrant for his intrusion, "to be at all this trouble. And this is a splendid copy, it reminds me of the volumes my father used to be so fond of. I will take great care of it. How long did you say I might keep it?"

"Till you have read it, at any rate. Or till I ask you for it again—which I don't think I shall. You say that you used to see volumes like this on your father's bookshelves. I should not wonder if you had seen this very book there. It is a strange coincidence that I should have had it in my possession for some time, and yet never noticed until this morning, when I took it down to bring to you, that it had your name on the fly-leaf. Look!"

He opened the book and held the fly-leaf against the window. The name had been rubbed out with a wet finger, after the manner of second-hand booksellers, but the "Lawrence Campion" was still easily legible. Lettice could not restrain a little cry of delight.

"Yes, that is his dear handwriting, I know it so well! And this is his book-plate, too, and his motto—'Vive ut vivas in vitam æternam.' Oh, where did you get the book? But I suppose my father's library was scattered all over the country."

"No doubt it was. I have a few—perhaps twenty—with the same plate. My uncle gave me them. I—a—Miss Campion—I came this morning—"

Apparently he did not quite know why he came, or at any rate he did not find it easy to say. Lettice spoke again in order to relieve his embarrassment, which she did not understand.

"It is so strange that I should have one of his books in my hand again. You can imagine what a grief it was to him when he had to let them go."

"I am so glad to have restored to you something that was your father's. I want you to give me a great pleasure, Miss Campion. These books—there are not more than forty outside—I want you to have them. They are yours, you know, because they were his, and he ought never to have been deprived of them."

"I could not take them, indeed, Mr. Walcott. You are most kind to think of it, but I could not!"

"Why?"

"That is hardly a reasonable question," she said, with a quiet little laugh. "How could I?"

"I see very well how you could, but why should you not? It will be a good deed, and there is no good deed without a sacrifice."

"And you want to sacrifice these books, which are so valuable!"

"No, it is no sacrifice to me, as I could easily prove to you. Believe that it pleases me, and sacrifice your own feelings by taking them."

"I don't see why you should ask me. It is too great a present to make, and—oh, dear me, I am afraid I do not know how to say what I mean! But if you will give me this one book, with my father's name in it, I will take it from you, and thank you very much for it."

"I shall not be satisfied if I may not send the rest. Miss Campion, I came to say——"

Again he stammered and broke down. Lettice, who thought that he had already delivered himself of his mental burden, was a little startled now, especially as he got up and stood by her chair at the window.

"What a lovely little garden!" he said. "Why, you are quite in the country here. What delightful roses! I—I want to say something else, Miss Campion!"

"Yes," said Lettice, faintly, and doing her best to feel indifferent.

"We have not known each other long, but it seems to me that we know each other well—at any rate that I know you well. Before I met you I had never made the acquaintance of a woman who at the same time commanded my respect, called my mind into full play, and aroused my sympathy. These last few months have been the happiest of my life, because I have been lifted above my old level, and have known for the first time what the world might yet be to me. There is something more I want to say to you. I think you know that I have been married—that my wife is—is no more. You may or may not have heard that miserable story, of my folly, and——"

"Oh, no!" cried Lettice, impulsively. "It is true that Mrs. Hartley told me of the great trouble which fell upon you in the loss of which you speak."

"The great trouble—yes! That is how Mrs. Hartley would put it. And the Grahams, have they told you nothing?"

"Nothing more."

A look as of relief passed across his face, followed by a spasm of pain; and he stood gazing wearily through the window.

"Perhaps they do not know, for I have never spoken of it to anyone. But I want to speak; I want to get rid of some of the wretched burden, and an irresistible impulse has brought me here to you. I am utterly selfish; it is like taking your money, or your manuscripts, or your flowers, or anything that you value, to come in this way and almost insist on telling you my sordid story. It is altogether unjustifiable—it is a mad presumption which I cannot account for, except by saying that a blind instinct made me think that you alone, of all the people in this world, could help me if you would!"

Lettice was deeply moved by various conflicting emotions; but there was no hesitation in the sympathy which went out to meet this strange appeal. Even her reason would probably have justified him in his unconventional behavior; but it was sympathy, and not reason, which prompted her to welcome and encourage his confidence.

"If I can help you—if it helps you to tell me anything, please speak."

"I knew I was not mistaken!" he said, with kindling eyes, as he sat down in a low chair opposite to her. "I will not be long—I will not tell you all; that would be useless, and needlessly painful. I married in haste, after a week's acquaintance, the daughter of a French refugee, who came to London in 1870, and earned a living by teaching his language to the poorest class of pupils. Don't ask me why I married her. No doubt I thought it was for love. She was handsome, and even charming in her way, and for some months I tried to think I was happy. Then, gradually, she let me wake from my fool's paradise. I found—you will despise me for a dupe!—that I was not the first man she had pretended to love. Nay, it was to me that she pretended—the other feeling was probably far more of a reality. Before the year was out she had renewed her intimacy with my rival—a compatriot of her own. You will suppose that we parted at once when things came to this pass; but for some time I had only suspicion to go upon. I knew that she was often away from home, and that she had even been to places of amusement in this man's company; but when I spoke to her she either lulled my uneasiness or pretended to be outraged by my jealousy. Soon there was no bond of respect left between us; but as a last chance, I resolved to break up our little home in England, and go abroad. I could no longer endure my life with her. She had ceased to be a wife in any worthy sense of the word, and was now my worst enemy, an object of loathing rather than of love. Still, I remember that I had a gleam of hope when I took her on the Continent, thinking it just possible that by removing her from her old associations, I might win her back to a sense of duty. I would have borne her frivolity; I would have endured to be bound for life to a doll or a log, if only she could have been outwardly faithful.

"Well, to make a long story short, we had not been abroad more than six weeks when this man I have told you about made his appearance on the scene. She must have written to him and asked him to come, at the very moment when she was cheating me with a show of reviving affection; and I own that the meeting of these two one day in the hotel gardens at Aix-les-Bains drove me into a fit of temporary madness. We quarrelled; I sent him a challenge, and we fought. He was not much hurt, and I escaped untouched. The man disappeared, and I have never seen him from that day to this, but I have some reason to think that he is dead."

He paused for a moment or two; and Lettice could not refrain from uttering the words, "Your wife?" in a tone of painful interest.

"My wife?" he repeated slowly. "Ah yes, my wife. Well, after a stormy scene with her, she became quiet and civil. She even seemed anxious to please me, and to set my mind at rest. But she was merely hatching her last plot against me, and I was as great a fool and dupe at this moment as I had ever been before."

And then, with averted face, he told the story of his last interview with her on the hills beyond Culoz. "I will not repeat anything she said," he went on—it was his sole reservation—"although some of her sentences are burned into my brain for ever. I suppose because they were so true."

"Oh, no!" Lettice murmured involuntarily, and looking at him with tear-dimmed eyes. She was intensely interested in his story, and Alan Walcott felt assured by her face that the sympathy he longed for was not withheld.

"My wound was soon healed," he said when the details of that terrible scene were told; "but I was not in a hurry to come back to England. When I did come back, I avoided as much as possible the few people who knew me; and I have never to this moment spoken of my deliverance, which I suppose they talk of as my loss."

"They think," said Lettice, slowly, for she was puzzled in her mind, and did not know what to say, "that you are a widower?"

"And what am I?" he cried, walking up and down the room in a restless way. "Am I not a widower? Has she not died completely out of my life? I shall never see her again—she is dead and buried, and I am free? Ah, do not look at me so doubtfully, do not take back the sympathy which you promised me! Are you going to turn me away, hungry and thirsty for kindness, because you imagine that my need is greater than you thought it five minutes ago? I will not believe you are so cruel!"

"We need not analyze my feelings, Mr. Walcott. I could not do that myself, until I have had time to think. But—is it right to leave other people under the conviction that your wife is actually dead, when you know that in all probability she is not?"

"I never said she was dead! I never suggested or acted a lie. May not a man keep silence about his own most sacred affairs?"

"Perhaps he may," said Lettice. "It is not for me to judge you—and at any rate, you have told me!"

She stood up and looked at him with her fearless grey eyes, whilst his own anxiously scanned her face.

"I am very, very sorry for you. If I can do anything to help you, I will. You must not doubt my sympathy, and I shall never withdraw my promise. But just now I cannot think what it would be best to do or say. Let me have time to think."

She held out her hand, and he took it, seeing that she wanted him to go.

"Good-bye!" he said. "God bless you for being what you are. It has done me good to talk. When we meet again—unless you write and give me your commands—I promise to do whatever you may tell me."

And with that, he went away.

CHAPTER X.

THE POET SPEAKS.

As soon as her visitor was gone, Lettice fell into a deep study. She had two things especially to think about, and she began by wondering what Mrs. Hartley would say if she knew that Alan Walcott's wife was alive, and by repeating what he had said to her that morning: that a man was not bound to tell his private affairs to the world. No! she told herself, it was impossible for any man of self-respect to wear his heart on his sleeve, to assume beforehand that people would mistake his position, and to ticket himself as a deserted husband, lest forward girls should waste their wiles upon him.

The thought was odious; and yet she had suggested it to him! Had she not done more than that? Had she not implied that he had done a dishonorable thing in concealing what he was in no way bound to reveal? What would he think of her, or impute to her, for raising such a point at the very moment when he was displaying his confidence in her, and appealing for her sympathy? She blushed with shame at the idea.

He was already completely justified in her mind, for she did not go so far as to put the case which a third person might have put in her own interest. If Alan had been unfair or inconsiderate to anyone, it was surely to Lettice herself. He had spoken familiarly to her, sought her company, confessed his admiration in a more eloquent language than that of words, and asked for a return of sentiment by those subtle appeals which seem to enter the heart through none of the ordinary and ticketed senses. It is true that he had not produced in her mind the distinct impression that she was anything more to him than an agreeable talker and listener in his conversational moods; but that was due to her natural modesty rather than to his self-restraint. He had been impatient, at times, of her slowness to respond, and it was only when he saw whither this impatience was leading him that he resolved to tell her all that she ought to know. It was not his delay, however, that constituted the injustice of his conduct, but the fact of his appealing to her in any way for the response which he had no right to ask.

Lettice was just as incapable of thinking that she had been unjustly treated as she was of believing that Alan Walcott loved her. Thus she was spared the humiliation that might have fallen on her if she had understood that his visit was partly intended to guard her against the danger of giving her love before it had been asked.

Having tried and acquitted her friend, and having further made up her mind that she would write him a letter to assure him of his acquittal, she summoned herself before the court of her conscience; and this was a very different case from the one which had been so easily decided. Then the presumption was all in favor of the accused; now it was all against her. The guilt was as good as admitted beforehand, for as soon as Lettice began to examine and cross-examine herself, she became painfully aware of her transgressions.

What was this weight which oppressed her, and stifled her, and covered her with shame? It was not merely sorrow for the misfortunes of her friend. That would not have made her ashamed, for she knew well that compassion was a woman's privilege, for which she has no reason to blush. Something had befallen her this very morning which had caused her to blush, and it was the first time in all her life that Lettice's cheek had grown red for anything she had done, or thought, or said, or listened to, in respect of any man whatever. Putting her father and brother on one side, no man had had the power, for very few had had the opportunity, to quicken the pulses in her veins as they were quickened now. She had not lived to be six and twenty years old without knowing what love between a man and woman really meant, but she had never appropriated to herself the good things which she saw others enjoying. It was not for want of being invited to the feast, for several of her father's curates had been ready to grace their frugal boards by her presence, and to crown her with the fillets of their dignity and self-esteem. The prospect held up to her by these worthy men had not allured her in any way; she had not loved their wine and oil, and thus she had remained rich, according to the promise of the seer, with the bread and salt of her own imaginings.

It would be wrong to suppose that Lettice had no strong passions, because she had never loved, or even thought that she loved. The woman of cultivated mind is often the woman of deepest feeling; her mental strength implies her calmness, and the calm surface indicates the greatest depth. It is in the restless hearts which beat themselves against the shores of the vast ocean of womanhood that passion is so quick to display itself, so vehement in its shallow force, so broken in its rapid ebb. The real strength of humanity lies deep below the surface; but a weak woman often mistakes for strength her irresistible craving for happiness and satisfaction. It is precisely for this reason that a liberal education and a full mind are even more essential to the welfare of a woman than they are to the welfare of a man. The world has left its women, with this irresistible craving in their hearts, dependent, solitary, exposed to attack, and unarmed for defence; and as a punishment it has been stung almost to death by the scorpions which its cruelty generates. But a woman who has been thoroughly educated, a woman of strong mind and gentle heart, is not dependent for happiness on the caprice of others, or on the abandonment of half the privileges of her sex, but draws from an inexhaustible well to which she has constant access.

So Lettice, with the passions of her kind, and the cravings of her sex, had been as happy as the chequered circumstances of her outer life would permit; but now for the first time her peace of mind was disturbed, and she felt the heaving of the awakened sea beneath.

Why had her heart grown cold when she heard that Alan Walcott's wife was still alive? Why had her thought been so bitter when she told herself that she had no right to give the man her sympathy? Why had the light and warmth and color of life departed as soon as she knew that the woman whom he had married, however unworthy she might be, was the only one who could claim his fidelity? Alas, the answer to her questions was only too apparent. The pain which it cost her to awake from her brief summer's dream was her first admonition that she had dreamed at all. Not until she had lost the right to rejoice in his admiration and respond to his love, did she comprehend how much these things meant to her, and how far they had been allowed to go.

The anguish of a first love which cannot be cherished or requited is infinitely more grievous when a woman is approaching the age of thirty than it is at seventeen or twenty. The recoil is greater and the elasticity is less. But if Lettice suffered severely from the sudden blow which had fallen upon her, she still had the consolation of knowing that she could suffer in private, and that she had not betrayed the weakness of her heart—least of all to him who had tried to make her weak.

In the course of the evening she sat down and wrote to him—partly because he had asked her to write, and partly in order that she might say without delay what seemed necessary to be said.

"Dear Mr. Walcott,—After you were gone this morning I thought a great deal about all that you said to me, and as you asked me for my opinion, and I promised to give it, perhaps I had better tell you what I think at once. I cannot see that you are, or have been, under any moral compulsion to repeat the painful events of your past life, and I am sorry if I implied that I thought you were. Of course, you may yourself hold that these facts impose a certain duty upon you, or you may desire that your position should be known. In that case you will do what you think right, and no one else can properly decide for you.

"I was indeed grieved by your story. I wish it was in my power to lessen your pain; but, as it is not, I can only ask you to believe that if I could do so, I would.

"You will be hard at work, like myself (as you told me), during the next few months. Is not hard work, after all, the very best of anodynes? I have found it so in the past, and I trust you have done so too, and will continue to do so.

"Believe me, dear Mr. Walcott, yours very sincerely,

"Lettice Campion."

She hesitated for some time as to whether she had said too much, or too little, or whether what she had said was expressed in the right way. But in the end she sent it as it was written.

Then, if she had been a thoroughly sensible and philosophical young woman, she would have forced herself to do some hard work, by way of applying the anodyne of which she had spoken. But that was too much to expect from her in the circumstances. What she actually did was to go to bed early and cry herself to sleep.

She had not considered whether her letter required, or was likely to receive an answer, and she was therefore a little surprised when the postman brought her one on the afternoon of the following day. Not without trepidation, she took it to her room and read it.

"Dear Miss Campion"—so the letter began—"I thank you very much for your kindness. I have learned to find so much meaning in your words that I think I can tell better than anyone else how to interpret the spirit from the letter of what you say. So, when you tell me that no one can decide for me what it is my duty to do, I understand that, if you were in my position at this moment, you would rather desire that it should be known. Henceforth I desire it, and I shall tell Mrs. Hartley and Mrs. Graham as much as is necessary the next time I see them. This will be equivalent to telling the world—will it not?

"Two other things I understand from your letter. First, that you do not wish to meet me so often in future; and, second, that though you know my pain would be diminished by the frank expression of your sympathy, and though you might find it in your heart to be frankly sympathetic, yet you do not think it would be right, and you do not mean to be actively beneficent. Am I wrong? If I am, you must forgive me; but, if I am not, I cannot accept your decision without entering my protest.

"Think, my dear friend—you will allow me that word!—to what you condemn me if you take your stand upon the extreme dictates of conventionality. You cannot know what it would mean to me if you were to say, 'He is a married man, and we had better not meet so frequently in future.' To you, that would be no loss whatever. To me, it would be the loss of happiness, of consolation, of intellectual life. Listen and have pity upon me! I could not say it to your face, but I will say it now, though you may think it an unpardonable crime. You have become so necessary to me that I cannot contemplate existence without you. Have you not seen it already—or, if you have not, can you doubt when you look back on the past six months—that respect has grown into affection, and affection into love? Yes, I love you, Lettice!—in my own heart I call you Lettice every hour of the day—and I cannot live any longer without telling you of my love.

"When I began this letter I did not mean to tell you—at any rate not to-day. Think of the condition of my mind when I am driven by such a sudden impulse—think, and make allowance for me!

"I am not sure what I expected when I resolved to make my sad story known to you. Perhaps, in my madness, I thought, 'There is a right and a wrong above the right and wrong of society's judgments; and she is on the higher levels of humanity, and will take pity on my misfortunes.' I only say, perhaps I thought this. I don't know what I thought. But I knew I could not ask you to be my wife, and I determined that you should know why I could not.

"Oh, how I hate that woman! I believe that she is dead. I tell myself every day that she is dead, and that there is nothing to prevent me from throwing myself at your feet, and praying you to redeem me from misery. Is not my belief enough to produce conviction in you? No—you will not believe it; and, perhaps, if you did, you would not consent to redeem me. No! I must drag my lengthening chain until I die! I must live in pain and disgust, bound to a corpse, covered with a leprosy, because the angel whose mission it is to save me will not come down from her heaven and touch me with her finger.

"You shall not see these words, Lettice—my dear Lettice! They are the offspring of a disordered brain. I meant to write you such a calm and humble message, telling you that your counsel was wise—that I would follow it—that I knew I had your sympathy, and that I reverenced you as a saint. If I go on writing what I do not mean to send, it is only because the freedom of my words has brought me peace and comfort, and because it is good that I should allow myself to write the truth, though I am not allowed to write it to you!

"Not allowed to write the truth to you, Lettice? That, surely, is a blasphemy! If I may not write the truth to you, then I may not know you—I may not worship you—I may not give my soul into your keeping.

"I will test it. My letter shall go. You will not answer it—you will only sit still, and either hate or love me; and one day I shall know which it has been. Alan."

Whilst Lettice read this wild and incoherent letter, she sank on her knees by her bedside, unable in any other attitude to bear the strain which it put upon her feelings.

"How dare he?" she murmured, at the first outbreak of his passionate complaint; but, as she went on reading, the glow of pity melted her woman's heart, and only once more she protested, in words, against the audacious candor of her lover.

"How could he?"

And as she finished, and her head was bowed upon her hands, and upon the letter which lay between them, her lips sought out the words which he had written last of all, as though they would carry a message of forgiveness—and consolation to the spirit which hovered beneath it.

CHAPTER XI.

SYDNEY GIVES ADVICE.

The day after Sydney Campion had heard Brooke Dalton's story of the disappearance of Alan Walcott's wife had been a very busy one for him. He had tried to get away from his work at an early hour, in order that he might pay one of his rare visits to Maple Cottage, and combine with his inquiries into the welfare of his mother certain necessary cautions to his sister Lettice. It was indispensable that she should be made to understand what sort of man this precious poet was known to be, and how impossible it had become that a sister of his should continue to treat him as a friend.

Why, the fellow might be—probably was—a murderer! And, if not that, at all events there was such a mystery surrounding him, and such an indelible stain upon his character, that he, Sydney Campion, could not suffer her to continue that most objectionable acquaintance.

But his duties conspired with his dinner to prevent the visit from being made before the evening, and it was nearly eight o'clock when he arrived at Hammersmith. He had dined with a friend in Holborn, and had taken a Metropolitan train at Farringdon Street, though, as a rule, he held himself aloof from the poison-traps of London, as he was pleased to call the underground railway, and travelled mostly in the two-wheeled gondolas which so lightly float on the surface of the stream above.

As he was about to leave the station, his eye encountered a face and figure which attracted him, and made him almost involuntarily come to a standstill. It was Milly Harrington, Lettice's maid, who, having posted her mistress' letter to Alan Walcott, had turned her listless steps in this direction.

Milly's life in London had proved something of a disappointment to her. The cottage on Brook Green was even quieter than the Rectory at Angleford, where she had at least the companionship of other servants, and a large acquaintance in the village. Lettice was a kind and considerate mistress, but a careful one: she did not let the young country-bred girl go out after dark, and exercised an unusual amount of supervision over her doings. Of late, these restrictions had begun to gall Milly, for she contrasted her lot with that of servants in neighboring houses, and felt that Miss Lettice was a tyrant compared with the easy-going mistresses of whom she heard. Certainly Miss Lettice gave good wages, and was always gentle in manner and ready to sympathize when the girl had bad news of her old grandmother's health; but she did not allow Milly as much liberty as London servants are accustomed to enjoy, and Milly, growing learned in her rights by continued comparison, fretted against the restraints imposed upon her.

She might have "kept company" with the milkman, with the policeman, with one of the porters at the station: for these, one and all, laid their hearts and fortunes at her feet; but Milly rejected their overtures with scorn. Her own prettiness of form and feature had been more than ever impressed upon her by the offers which she refused; and she was determined, as she phrased it, "not to throw herself away."

Her fancy that "Mr. Sydney" admired her had not been a mistaken one. Sydney had always been susceptible to the charms of a pretty face; and Nature had preordained a certain measure of excuse for any man who felt impelled to look twice at Milly, or even to speak to her on a flimsy pretext. And Milly was on Nature's side, for she did not resent being looked at or spoken to, although there was more innocence and ignorance of evil on her side than men were likely to give her credit for. Therefore Sydney had for some time been on speaking terms with her, over and above what might have been natural in an occasional visitor to the Rectory and Maple Cottage. He saw and meant no harm to her in his admiration, and had no idea at present that his occasional smile or idle jesting compliment made the girl's cheeks burn, her heart beat fast, made her nights restless and her days long. He took it for granted that gratified vanity alone made her receive his attentions with pleasure. His gifts—for he could be lavish when he liked—were all, he thought, that attracted her. She was a woman, and could, no doubt, play her own game and take care of herself. She had her weapons, as other women had. Sydney's opinion of women was, on the whole, a low one; and he had a supreme contempt for all women of the lower class—a contempt which causes a man to look on them only as toys—instruments for his pleasure—to be used and cast aside. He believed that they systematically preyed on men, and made profit out of their weakness. That Milly was at a disadvantage with him, because she was weak and young and unprotected, scarcely entered his head. He would have said that she had the best of it. She was pretty and young, and could make him pay for it if he did her any harm. She was one of a class—a class of harpies, in his opinion—and he did not attribute any particular individuality to her at all.

But Milly was a very real and individual woman, with a nature in which the wild spark of passion might some day be roused with disastrous results. It is unsafe to play with the emotions of a person who is simply labelled, often mistakenly and insufficiently, in your mind as belonging to a class, and possessing the characteristics of that class. There is always the chance that some old strain of tendency, some freak of heredity, may develop in the way which is most of all dangerous to you and to your career. For you cannot play with a woman's physical nature without touching, how remotely soever, her spiritual constitution as well; and, as Browning assures us, it is indeed "an awkward thing to play with souls, and matter enough to save one's own."

Sydney Campion, however, concerned himself very little with his own soul, or the soul of anybody else. He went up to Milly and greeted her with a smile that brought the color to her face.

"Well, Milly," he said, "are you taking your walks abroad to-night? Is your mistress pretty well? I was just going to Maple Cottage."

"Yes, sir, mistress is pretty well; but I don't think Miss Lettice is," said Milly, falling back into her old way of speaking of the rector's daughter. "She mentioned that she was going to bed early. You had better let me go back first and open the door for you."

"Perhaps it would be best. Not well, eh? What is the matter?"

"I don't know, but I think Miss Campion has a bad headache. I am sure she has been crying a great deal." Milly said this with some hesitation.

"I am sorry to hear that."

"I am afraid Mr. Walcott brought her bad news in the morning, for she has not been herself at all since he left."

"Do you say that Mr. Walcott was there this morning?"

Sydney spoke in a low tone, but with considerable eagerness, so that the girl knew she had not thrown her shaft in vain.

"Milly, this concerns me very much. I must have a little talk with you, but we cannot well manage it here. See! there is no one in the waiting-room; will you kindly come with me for a minute or two? It is for your mistress' good that I should know all about this. Come!"

So they went into the dreary room together, and they sat down in a corner behind the door, which by this time was almost dark. There Sydney questioned her about Alan Walcott, with a view to learning all that she might happen to know about him. Milly required little prompting, for she was quite ready to do all that he bade her, and she told him at least one piece of news which he was not prepared to hear.

Five minutes would have sufficed for all that Milly had to say; but the same story may be very long or very short according to the circumstances in which it is told. Half-an-hour was not sufficient to-night: at any rate, it took these two more than half-an-hour to finish what they had to say. And even then it was found that further elucidations would be necessary in the future, and an appointment was made for another meeting. But the talk had turned on Milly herself, and Milly's hopes and prospects, before that short half-hour had sped.

"Good-night, Milly," said Sydney, as they left the station. "You are a dear little girl to tell me so much. Perhaps you had better not say to your mistress that you saw me to-night. I shall call to-morrow afternoon. Good-night, dear."

He kissed her lightly, in a shadowy corner of the platform, before he turned away; and thought rather admiringly for a minute or two of the half-frightened, half-adoring eyes that were riveted upon his face. "Poor little fool!" he said to himself, as he signalled a cab. For even in that one short interview he had mastered the fact that Milly was rather fool than knave.

The girl went home with a light heart, believing that she had done a service to the mistress whom she really loved, and shyly, timorously joyous at the thought that she had met at last with an admirer—a lover, perhaps!—such as her heart desired. Of course, Miss Lettice would be angry if she knew; but there was nothing wrong in Mr. Sydney's admiration, said Milly, lifting high her little round white chin; and if he told her to keep silence she was bound to hold her tongue.

This was a mean thing that Sydney had done, and he was not so hardened as to have done it without a blush. Yet so admirably does our veneer of civilization conceal the knots and flaws beneath it that he went to sleep in the genuine belief that he had saved his sister from a terrible danger, and the name of Campion from the degradation which threatened it.

On the next day he reached Maple Cottage between four and five o'clock.

"How is your mistress?" he said to Milly.

She had opened the door and let him in with a vivid blush and smile, which made him for a moment, and in the broad light of day, feel somewhat ashamed of himself.

"Oh, sir, she is no better. She has locked herself in, and I heard her sobbing, fit to break her heart," said Milly, in real concern for her mistress' untold grief.

"Let her know that I am here. I will go to Mrs. Campion's room."

"Well, mother!" he said, in the hearty, jovial voice in which he knew that she liked best to be accosted, "here is your absentee boy again. How are you by this time?"

"Not very bright to-day, Sydney," said his mother. "I never am very bright now-a-days. But what are you doing, my dear? Are you getting on well? Have they——"

"No, mother, they have not made me Lord Chancellor yet. We must wait a while for that. But I must not complain; I have plenty of work, and my name is in the papers every day, and I have applied for silk, and—have you found your spectacles yet, mother?"

Details of his life and work were, as he knew, absolutely unmeaning to Mrs. Campion.

"Oh, the rogue! He always teased me about my spectacles," said Mrs. Campion, vaguely appealing to an unseen audience. "It is a remarkable thing, Sydney, but I put them down half an hour ago, and now I cannot find them anywhere."

"Well, now, that is strange, Mrs. Campion; but not very unusual. If I remember right, you had lost your spectacles when I was here last; and as I happened to pass a good shop this morning, it occurred to me that you would not object to another pair of pebbles. So here they are; and I have bought you something to test them with."

He produced a cabinet portrait of himself, such as the stationers were beginning to hang on the line in their shop windows. The fact marked a distinct advance in his conquest of popularity; and Sydney was not mistaken in supposing that the old lady would appreciate this portrait of her handsome and distinguished son. So, with her spectacles and her picture, Mrs. Campion was happy.

When Sydney's knock came to the door, Lettice was still crouching by her bedside over the letter which had reached her an hour before. She sprang up in nervous agitation, not having recognized the knock, and began to bathe her face and brush her hair. She was relieved when Milly came and told her who the caller was; but even Sydney's visit at that moment was a misfortune. She was inclined to send him an excuse, and not come down; but in the end she made up her mind to see him.

"My dear child," Sydney said, kissing her on the cheek, "how ill you look! Is anything the matter?"

"No, nothing. Don't take any notice of me," Lettice said, with a significant look at her mother.

They conversed for a time on indifferent matters, and then Sydney asked her to show him the garden. It was evident that he wanted to speak to her privately, so she took him into her study; and there, without any beating about the bush, he began to discharge his mind of its burden.

"I want to talk to you seriously, Lettice, and on what I'm afraid will be a painful subject; but it is my manifest duty to do so, as I think you will admit before I go. You are, I believe, on friendly terms—tolerably familiar terms—with Mr. Walcott?"

This was in true forensic style; but of course Sydney could not have made a greater mistake than by entering solemnly, yet abruptly, on so delicate a matter. Lettice was in arms at once.

"Stay a moment, Sydney. You said this was to be a painful subject to me, and then you mention the name of Mr. Walcott. I do not understand."

"Well!" said Sydney, somewhat disconcerted; "I don't know what made me conclude that it would be painful. I did not mean to say that. I am very glad it is not so."

He stopped to cough, then looked out of the window, and softly whistled to himself. Lettice, meanwhile, cast about hastily in her mind for the possible bearing of what her brother might have to say. She was about to take advantage of his blunder, and decline to hear anything further; but for more than one reason which immediately occurred to her, she thought that it would be better to let him speak.

"I do not think you could have any ground for supposing that such a subject would be specially painful to me; but never mind that. What were you going to say?"

Now it was Sydney's turn to be up in arms, for he felt sure that Lettice was acting a part.

"What I know for a fact," he said, "is that you have seen a good deal of Mr. Walcott during the past six months, and that people have gone so far as to remark on your—on his manifest preference for your company. I want to say that there are grave reasons why this should not be permitted to go on."

Lettice bit her lip sharply, but said nothing.

"Do you know," Sydney continued, becoming solemn again as he prepared to hurl his thunderbolts, "that Mr. Walcott is a married man?"

"Whether I know it or not, I do not acknowledge your right to ask me the question."

"I ask it by the right of a brother. Do you know that if he is not a married man, he is something infinitely worse? That the last time his wife was seen in his company, they went on a lonely walk together, and he came back again without her?"

"How do you know this?" Lettice asked him faintly. He set down her agitation to the wrong cause, and thought that his design was succeeding.

"I know it from the man who was most intimately connected with Walcott at the time. And I heard it at my club—in the course of the same conversation in which your name was mentioned. Think what that means to me! However, it may not have gone too far if we are careful to avoid this man in future. He does not visit here, of course?"

"He has been here."

"You surely don't correspond?"

"We have corresponded."

"Good heavens! it is worse than I thought. But you will promise me not to continue the acquaintance?"

"No, I cannot promise that!"

"Not after all I have told you of him?"

"You have told me nothing to Mr. Walcott's discredit. I have answered your questions because you are, as you reminded me, my brother. Does it not strike you that you have rather exceeded your privilege?"

Sydney was amazed at her quiet indifference.

"I really cannot understand you, Lettice. Do you mean to say that you will maintain your friendship with this man, although you know him to be a——"

"Well?"

"At any rate, a possible murderer?"

"The important point," said Lettice coldly, "seems to be what Mr. Walcott is actually, not what he is possibly. Your 'possible' is a matter of opinion, and I am very distinctly of opinion that Mr. Walcott is an innocent and honorable man."

"If you believe him innocent, then you believe that his wife is living?"

"I know nothing about his wife. That is a question which does not concern me."

"Your obstinacy passes my comprehension." When Sydney said this, he rose from the chair in which he had been sitting and stood on the hearth-rug before the grate, with his hands behind him and his handsome brows knitted in a very unmistakable frown. It was in a lower and more regretful voice that he continued, after a few minutes' silence: "I must say that the independent line you have been taking for some time past is not very pleasing to me. You seem to have a perfect indifference to our name and standing in the world. You like to fly in the face of convention, to——"

"Oh, Sydney, why should we quarrel?" said Lettice, sadly. Hitherto she had been standing by the window, but she now came up to him and looked entreatingly into his face. "Indeed, I will do all that I can to satisfy you. I am not careless about your prospects and standing in the world; indeed, I am not. But they could not be injured by the fact that I am earning my own living as an author. I am sure they could not!"

"You say that you will do all you can to satisfy me," said Sydney, who was not much mollified by her tenderness. "Will you give up the acquaintance of that man?"

"I am not certain that I shall ever see Mr. Walcott again; but if you ask me whether I will promise to insult him if I do see him, or to cut him because he has been accused of dishonorable acts, then I certainly say, No!"

"How you harp upon his honor! The honor of a married man who has introduced himself to you under a false name!"

"What do you mean?" said Lettice, starting and coloring. "Are there any more charges against him?"

"You seem to be so well prepared to defend him that perhaps you will not be surprised to hear that his name is not Walcott at all, but Bundlecombe, and that his mother kept a small sweet-stuff shop, or something of that kind, at Thorley. Bundlecombe! No wonder he was ashamed of it!"

This shaft took better than either of the others. Lettice was fairly taken aback. The last story did not sound as if it had been invented, and Sydney had evidently been making inquiries. Moreover, there flashed across her mind the remembrance of the book which Alan Walcott had given her—only yesterday morning. How long ago it seemed already! Alan Bundlecombe! What did the name signify, and why should any man care to change the name that he was born with? She recollected Mrs. Bundlecombe very well—the old woman who came and took her first twenty pounds of savings; the widow of the bookseller who had bought part of her father's library. If he was her son, he might not have much to be proud of, but why need he have changed his name?

Decidedly this was a blow to her. She had no defence ready, and Sydney saw that she was uncomfortable.

"Well," he said, "I must not keep you any longer. I suppose, even now"—with a smile—"you will not give me your promise; but you will think over what I have told you, and I dare say it will all come right."

Her eyes were full of wistful yearning as she put her hand on his shoulder and kissed him.

"You believe that I mean to do right, don't you, Sydney?" she asked.

He laughed a little. "We all mean to do right, my dear. But we don't all go the same way to work, I suppose. Yes, yes; I believe you mean well; but do, for heaven's sake, try to act with common-sense. Then, as I said, everything will come right in the end."

He went back to his mother's room, and Lettice stood for some minutes looking out of the window, and sighing for the weariness and disillusion which hung like a cloud upon her life.

"All will come right?" she murmured, re-echoing Sydney's words with another meaning. "No. Trouble and sorrow, and pain may be lived down and forgotten; but without sincerity nothing can come right!"

BOOK III.

AMBITION.

"I count life just a stuff
To try the soul's strength on, educe the man,
Who keeps one end in view makes all things serve."

Robert Browning.

CHAPTER XII.

ALAN WALCOTT.

Alan Walcott knew perfectly well that he had done a mad, if not an unaccountable thing in writing his letter to Miss Campion. He knew it, that is to say, after the letter was gone, for when he was writing it, and his heart was breaking through the bonds of common-sense which generally restrained him, he did not feel the difficulty of accounting either for his emotions or for his action. The wild words, as he wrote them, had for him not only the impress of paramount truth, but also the sanction of his convictions and impulse at the moment. No stronger excuse has been forthcoming for heroic deeds which have shaken the world and lived in history.

Who amongst us all, when young and ardent, with the fire of generosity and imagination in the soul, has not written at least one such letter, casting reserve and prudence to the winds, and placing the writer absolutely at the mercy of the man or woman who received it?

This man was a poet by nature and by cultivation; but what is the culture of a poet save the fostering of a distempered imagination? I do not mean the culture of a prize poet, or a poet on a newspaper staff, or a gentleman who writes verses for society, or a professor of poetry, or an authority who knows the history and laws of prosody in every tongue, and can play the bard or the critic with equal facility. Alan Walcott had never ceased to work in distemper, because his nature was distempered to begin with, and his taste had not been modified to suit the conventional canons of his critics. Therefore it was not much to be wondered at if his prose poem to the woman he loved was a distempered composition.

The exaltation of the mood in which he had betrayed himself to Lettice was followed by a mood of terrible depression, and almost before it would have been possible for an answer to reach him, even if she had sat down and written to him without an hour's delay, he began to assure himself that she intended to treat him with silent contempt—that his folly had cost him not only her sympathy but her consideration, and that there was no hope left for him.

He had indeed told her that he did not expect a reply; but now he tortured himself with the belief that silence on her part could have only one explanation. Either she pitied him, and would write to prevent his despair, or she was indignant, and would tell him so, or else she held him in such contempt that she would not trouble herself to take the slightest notice of his effusion. He craved for her indignation now as he had craved for her sympathy before; but he could not endure her indifference.

A man of five-and-thirty whose youth has been spent amongst the prodigal sons and daughters of the world's great family, who has wasted his moral patrimony, and served masters and mistresses whom he despised, is not easily brought to believe that he can be happy again in the love of a pure woman. He has lost confidence in his own romantic feelings, and in his power to satisfy the higher needs of a woman's delicate and exacting heart. Usually, as was once the case with Walcott, he is a cynic and a professed despiser of women, affecting to judge them all by the few whom he has met, in spite of the fact that he has put himself in the way of knowing only the weakest and giddiest of the sex. But when such a man, gradually and with difficulty, has found a pearl among women, gentle and true, intellectual yet tenderly human, with whom his instinct tells him he might spend the rest of his life in honor and peace, he is ready in the truest sense to go and sell all that he has in order to secure the prize. Nothing has any further value for him in comparison with her, and all the roots of his nature lay firm hold upon her. Alas for this man if his mature love is given in vain, or if, like Alan Walcott, he is debarred from happiness by self-imposed fetters which no effort can shake off!

For four-and-twenty hours he struggled with his misery. Then, to his indescribable joy, there came a message from Lettice.

It was very short, and it brought him bad news; but at any rate it proved that she took an interest in his welfare, and made him comparatively happy.

"I think you should hear"—so it began, without any introductory phrase—'that the story you told me of what happened at Aix-les-Bains is known to men in this country who cannot be your friends, since they relate it in their own fashion at their clubs, and add their own ill-natured comments. Perhaps if you are forewarned you will be fore-armed.

"Lettice Campion."

Not a word as to his letter; but he was not much troubled on this score. That she had written to him at all, and written evidently because she felt some concern for his safety, was enough to console him at the moment.

When he began to consider the contents of her note it disturbed him more than a little. He had not imagined that his secret, such as it was, had passed into the keeping of any other man, still less that it had become club-talk in London. He saw at once what evil construction might be put upon it by malicious gossip-mongers, and he knew that henceforth he was face to face with a danger which he could do little or nothing to avert.

What should he attempt in his defence? How should he use the weapon which Lettice had put into his hand by forewarning him? One reasonable idea suggested itself, and this was that he should tell the true story to those who knew him best, in order that they might at any rate have the power to meet inventions and exaggerations by his own version of the facts. He busied himself during the next few days in this melancholy task, calling at the house of his friends, and making the best pretext he could for introducing his chapter of autobiography.

He called on the Grahams, amongst others, and was astonished to find that they knew the story already.

"I have told the facts to one or two," he said, "for the reason that I have just mentioned to you, but I think they understood that it would do me no good to talk about it, except in contradiction of unfriendly versions. How did you hear it?"

Graham took out of his pocket a copy of The Gadabout and said,

"I'm afraid you have made enemies, Walcott, and if you have not seen this precious concoction it would be no kindness to you to conceal it. Here—you will see at a glance how much they have embellished it."

Walcott took the paper, and read as follows:—

"It is probable that before long the public may be startled by a judicial inquiry into the truth of a story which has been told with much circumstantiality concerning the remarkable disappearance of the wife of a well-known poet some three or four years ago."

Then came the details, without any mention of persons or places, and the paragraph concluded in this fashion. "It is not certain how the matter will come into court, but rumor states that there is another lady in the case, that the buried secret came to light in a most dramatic way, and that evidence is forthcoming from very unexpected quarters."

The victim of this sorry piece of scandal gazed at the paper in a state of stupefaction.

"Of course," said Graham, "it is not worth while to notice that rag. Half of what it says is clearly a downright invention. If only you could get hold of the writer and thrash him, it might do some good; but these liars are very hard to catch. As to the 'other lady,' there is nothing in that, is there?"

Both Graham and his wife looked anxiously at Walcott. They knew of his attentions to Lettice, and were jealous of him on that account; and they had been discussing with each other the possibility of their friend's name being dragged into a scandal.

Walcott was livid with rage.

"The cur!" he cried; "the lying hound! He has entirely fabricated the beginning and the end of this paragraph. There is no ground whatever for saying that a case may come into court. There is no 'lady in the case' at all. He has simply put on that tag to make his scrap of gossip worth another half-crown. Is it not abominable, Graham?"

"It is something more than abominable. To my mind this sort of thing is one of the worst scandals of the present day. But I felt sure there was nothing in it, and the few who guess that it refers to you will draw the same conclusion. Don't think any more about it!"

"A lie sticks when it is well told," said Walcott, gloomily. "There are plenty of men who would rather believe it than the uninteresting truth."

But the Grahams, relieved on the point that mainly concerned them, could not see much gravity in the rest of the concoction, and Walcott had scant pity from them. He went home disconsolate, little dreaming of the reception which awaited him there.

He occupied a floor in Montagu Place, Bloomsbury, consisting of three rooms: a drawing-room, a bed-room, and a small study; and, latterly, Mrs. Bundlecombe, whose acquaintance the reader has already made, had used a bed-room at the top of the house.

Alan's mother and Mrs. Bundlecombe had been sisters. They were the daughters of a well-to-do farmer in Essex, and, as will often happen with sisters of the same family, brought up and cared for in a precisely similar way, they had exhibited a marked contrast in intellect, habits of thought, and outward bearing. The one had absorbed the natural refinement of her mother, who had come of an old Huguenot family long ago settled on English soil; the other was moulded in the robust and coarse type of her father. Bessy was by preference the household factotum not to say the drudge of the family, with a turn for puddings, poultry, and the management of servants. Lucy clung to her mother, and books (though both were constant students of The Family Herald), and was nothing if not romantic. Both found some one to love them, and both, as it happened, were married on the same day. Their parents had died within a year of each other, and then the orphaned girls had come to terms with their lovers, and accepted a yoke of which they had previously fought shy. Bessy's husband was a middle-aged bookseller in the neighboring town of Thorley, who had admired her thrifty and homely ways, and had not been deterred by her want of intelligence. Lucy, though her dreams had soared higher, was fairly happy with a schoolmaster from Southampton, whose acquaintance she had made on a holiday at the seaside.

Alan, who was the only offspring of this latter union, had been well brought up, for his father's careful teaching and his mother's gentleness and imagination supplied the complementary touches which are necessary to form the basis of culture. The sisters had not drifted apart after their marriage so much as might have been expected. They had visited each other, and Alan, as he grew up, conceived a strong affection for his uncle at Thorley, who—a childless man himself—gave him delightful books, and showed him others still more delightful, who talked to him on the subjects which chiefly attracted him, and was the first to fire his brain with an ambition to write and be famous. Aunt Bessy was tolerated for her husband's sake, but it was Uncle Samuel who drew the lad to Thorley. In due time Alan began to teach in his father's school, and before he was twenty-one had taken his degree at London University. Then his mother died, and shortly afterwards he was left comparatively alone in the world.

Now, school-keeping had never been a congenial occupation to Alan, whose poetic temperament was chafed by the strict and ungrateful routine of the business. His father had been to the manner born, and things had prospered with him, but Alan by himself would not have been able to achieve a like success. He knew this, and was proud of his incapacity; and he took the first opportunity of handing over the establishment to a successor. The money which he received for the transfer, added to that which his father had left, secured him an income on which it was possible to live, and to travel, and to print a volume of poems. For a short time, at least, he lived as seemed best in his own eyes, and was happy.

When he was in England he still occasionally visited Thorley; and it was thus that Milly Harrington came to know him by sight. Her grandmother did not know the Bundlecombes, but Milly came to the conclusion that Alan was their son, and this was the tale which she had told to Sydney Campion, and which Sydney had repeated to his sister.

The last visit paid by Alan to Thorley was some time after his uncle's death, and he had then confided to his aunt the story of his marriage, and of its unfortunate sequel. He happened to have learned that the man with whom he had fought at Aix-les-Bains was back in London, and it seemed not improbable at that moment that he would soon hear news of his fugitive wife. When he mentioned this to the widow—who was already taking steps to sell her stock-in-trade—she immediately conceived the idea that her boy, as she called Alan, was in imminent danger, that the wife would undoubtedly turn up again, and that it was absolutely necessary for his personal safety that he should have an intrepid and watchful woman living in the same house with him. So she proposed the arrangement which now existed, and Alan had equably fallen in with her plan. He did not see much of her when she came to London, and there was very little in their tastes which was congenial or compatible; but she kept him straight in the matter of his weekly bills and his laundress, and he had no desire to quarrel with the way in which she managed these affairs for him.

When Alan came home after his call at the Grahams', weary and disconsolate, with a weight on his mind of which he could not rid himself, the door was opened by his aunt. Her white face startled him, and still more the gesture with which she pointed upstairs, in the direction of their rooms. His heart sank at once, for he knew that the worst had befallen him.

"Hush!" said his aunt in a hoarse whisper, "do not go up. She is there. She came in the morning and would not go away."

"How is she? I mean what does she look like?"

He was very quiet; but he had leaned both hands upon the hall table, and was gazing at his aunt with despairing eyes.

"Bad, my boy, bad! The worst that a woman can look, Oh, Alan, go away, and do not come near her. Fly, immediately, anywhere out of her reach! Let me tell her that you have gone to the other end of the world rather than touch her again. Oh, Alan, my sister's child!—go, go, and grace abounding be with you."

"No, Aunt Bessy, that will never do. I cannot run away. Why, don't you see for one thing that this will prove what lies they have been telling about me? They said I was a murderer—" he laughed somewhat wildly as he spoke—"and here is the murdered woman. And they said there was evidence coming to prove it. Perhaps she will tell them how it happened, and how she came to life again. There, you see, there is good in everything—even in ghosts that come to life again!"

Then his voice dropped, and the color went out of his face.

"What is she doing?" he asked, in a sombre tone.

"She went to sleep on the sofa in the drawing-room. She made me send out for brandy, and began to rave at me in such a way that I was bound to do it, just to keep her quiet. And now she is in her drunken sleep!"

Alan shuddered. He knew what that meant.

"Come," he said: "let us go up. We cannot stand here any longer."

They went into his study, which was on the same floor as the drawing-room, and here Alan sank upon a chair, looking doggedly at the closed door which separated him from the curse of his existence. After a while he got up, walked across the landing, and quietly opened the door.

There she lay, a repulsive looking woman, with the beauty of her youth corrupted into a hateful mask of vice. She had thrown her arms above her head and seemed to be fast asleep.

He returned to the study, shut the door again, and sat down at the table, leaning his head upon his hands. Aunt Bessy came and sat beside him—not to speak, but only that he might know he was not alone.

"That," he muttered to himself at last, "is my wife!"

The old woman at his side trembled, and laid her hand upon his arm.

"I am beginning to know her," he said, after another long pause. "Some men discover the charms of their wives before marriage; others—the fools—find them out after. In the first year she was unfaithful to me. Then she shot me like a dog. What will the end be?"

"It can be nothing worse, my boy. She has ruined you already; she cannot do it twice. Oh, why did you ever meet her! Why did not Heaven grant that a good woman, like Lettice Campion——"

"Do not name her here!" he cried sharply. "Let there be something sacred in the world!"

He looked at his aunt as he spoke; but she did not return his gaze. She was sitting rigid in her chair, staring over his shoulder with affrighted eyes. Alan turned round quickly, and started to his feet.

The woman in the other room had stealthily opened the door, and stood there, disheveled and half-dressed, with a cunning smile on her face.

"Alan, my husband!" she said, in French, holding out both hands to him, and reeling a step nearer, "here we are at last. I have longed for this day, my friend—let us be happy. After so many misfortunes, to be reunited once again! Is it not charming?"

She spoke incoherently, running her words into one another, and yet doing her best to be understood.

Alan looked at her steadily. "What do you want?" he asked. "Why have you sought me out?"

"My faith, what should I want? Money, to begin with."

"And then?"

"And then—justice! Bah! Am I not the daughter of Testard, who dispensed with his own hand the justice of Heaven against his persecutors?"

"I have heard that before," Alan said. "It was at Aix-les-Bains. And you still want justice!"

"Justice, my child. Was it not at Aix-les-Bains that you tried to kill Henri de Hauteville? Was it not in the park hard by that you shot at me, and almost assassinated me? But, have no fear! All I ask is money—the half of your income will satisfy me. Pay me that, and you are safe—unless my rage should transport me one of these fine days! Refuse, and I denounce you through the town, and play the game of scandal—as I know how to play it! Which shall it be?"

"You are my wife. Perhaps there is a remedy for that—now that you are here, we shall see! But, meanwhile, you have a claim. To-morrow morning I Will settle it as you wish. You shall not be left to want."

"It is reasonable. Good-night, my friend! I am going to sleep again."

She went back into the drawing-room, laughing aloud, whilst Alan, after doing his best to console Mrs. Bundlecombe, departed in search of a night's lodging under another roof.

CHAPTER XIII.

SIR JOHN PYNSENT PROPHESIES.

On a sultry evening in the middle of August, a few choice spirits were gathered together in one of the smoking-rooms of the Oligarchy.

All but one were members of the Upper or Lower House, and they were lazily enjoying the unusual chance (for such busy men, and at such a critical period of the session) which enabled them to smoke their cigars in Pall Mall before midnight on a Tuesday. Either there had been a count-out, or there was obstruction in the House, which was no immediate concern of theirs, or they had made an arrangement with their Whip, and were awaiting a telegram which did not come; but, whatever the reason, here they were, lazy and contented.

There was our old friend, Sir John Pynsent; and Charles Milton, Q.C., certain to be a law officer or a judge, as soon as the Conservatives had their chance; and Lord Ambermere; and the Honorable Tom Willoughby, who had been trained at Harrow, Oxford, and Lord's Cricket Ground, and who was once assured by his Balliol tutor that his wit would never make him a friend, nor his face an enemy. The last of the circle was Brooke Dalton, of whom this narrative has already had something to record.

"So Tourmaline has thrown up the sponge, Pynsent?" Charles Milton began, after a short pause in the conversation. "Had enough of the Radical crew by this time!"

"Yes. Of course, he has been out of sympathy with them for a long while. So have twenty or thirty more, if the truth were known."

"As you know it!" Dalton interjected.

"Well, I know some things. The line of cleavage in the Liberal party is tolerably well marked, if you have eyes to see."

"Why does Tourmaline leave the House? I hear he would stand an excellent chance if he went to Vanebury and started as an Independent."

"No doubt he would; but in a weak moment he pledged himself down there not to do it."

"What hard lines!" said Tom Willoughby. "Just one pledge too many!"

"And so," continued Pynsent, without noticing the interruption, "we have had to look out for another candidate. I settled the matter this afternoon, and I am glad to say that Campion has promised to go down."

"Just the man for the job," said Milton, who looked upon Sydney as sure to be a formidable rival in Parliament, and more likely than any other young Conservative to cut him out of the Solicitorship. "He has tongue, and he has tact—and he has something else, Sir John, which is worth the two put together—good friends!"

"We think very highly of Campion," said Sir John Pynsent, "and I am very glad you confirm our opinion."

"I certainly think he will make his mark," said Dalton. "He comes of a very able family."

Dalton found himself recalling the appearance and words of Miss Lettice Campion, whom he had met so often of late at the house of his cousin, Mrs. Hartley, and who had made a deeper impression than ever on his mind. Impressions were somewhat fugitive, as a rule, on Brooke Dalton's mind; but he had come to admire Lettice with a fervor unusual with him.

"From all I can learn," said the baronet, "we ought to win the seat; and every two new votes won in that way are worth half-a-dozen such as Tom Willoughby's, for instance, whose loyalty is a stale and discounted fact."

"Oh, yes, I know that is how you regard us buttresses from the counties! I declare I will be a fifth party, and play for my own hand."

"It isn't in you, my boy," said Lord Ambermere; "I never knew you play for your own hand yet."

"Then what am I in Parliament for, I should like to know?"

"For that very thing, of course; to learn how to do it." Willoughby laughed good-naturedly. He did not object to be made a butt of by his intimate friends.

"Seriously, Tom, there is plenty of work for a fellow like you to do."

It was Pynsent who spoke, and the others were always ready to lend him their ears when he evidently wanted to be listened to.

"The main thing is to get hold of the Whigs, and work at them quietly and steadily until the time comes to strike our blow. The great Houses are safe, almost to a man. When it comes to choosing between Democracy rampant, with Gladstone at its head, assailing the most sacred elements of the Constitution, and a great National Party, or Union of Parties, guarding Property and the Empire against attack, there is no question as to how they will make their choice. But if every Whig by birth or family ties came over to us at once, that would not suffice for our purpose. What we have to do is get at the—the Decent Men of the Liberal Party, such as the aldermen, the shipowners, the great contractors and directors of companies, and, of course, the men with a stake in the land. No use mentioning names—we all know pretty well who they are."

"And when you have got at them?" asked Willoughby.

"Why, lay yourself out to please them. Flatter them—show them all the attention in your power; take care that they see and hear what is thought in the highest quarters about the present tendency of things—about Ireland, about the Empire, about the G. O. M. Let them understand how they are counted on to decide the issue, and what they would have to look for if we were once in power. Above all, ride them easy! It is impossible that they should become Tories—don't dream of such a thing. They are to be Liberals to the end of their days, but Liberals with an Epithet."

"Imperi——"

"No, no, no, no, my dear boy! Any number of noes. You must not live so much in the past. The great idea to harp upon is Union. Union against a common enemy. Union against Irish rebels. Union against Gladstone and the Democracy; but draw this very mild until you feel that you are on safe ground. Union is the word, and Unionist is the Epithet. Liberal Unionists. That is the inevitable phrase, and it will fit any crisis that may arise."

"But suppose they dish us with the County franchise?"

"We must make a fight over that; but for my part I am not afraid of franchises. There is a Tory majority to be picked out of manhood suffrage, as England will surely discover some day. Possibly the County franchise must be cleared out of the way before we get our chance. What will that mean? Why, simply that Gladstone will think it necessary to use his first majority in order to carry some great Act of Confiscation; to make Hodge your master; or to filch a bit of your land for him; or to join hands with Parnell and cut Ireland adrift. Then we shall have our opportunity; and that is what we have to prepare for."

Lord Ambermere, and Dalton, and Milton, Q.C., nodded their heads. They had heard all this before; but to Willoughby it was new, for he had only just begun to put himself into the harness of political life.

"How can we help ourselves," he said, "if the laborers have returned a lot of new men, and there is a big Liberal majority?"

"That is the point, of course. Well, put it at the worst. Say that Gladstone has a majority of eighty, without Parnell, and say that Parnell can dispose of eighty. Say, again, that the Irishmen are ready to support Gladstone, in the expectation of favors to come. Now let the Old Man adopt either a Nationalist policy or an out-and-out Democratic policy, and assume that the Union for which we have been working takes effect. In order to destroy Gladstone's majority of one hundred and sixty, at least eighty of his nominal followers must come over. Of these, the pure Whigs will count for upwards of forty, and another forty must be forthcoming from the men I have just described. That is putting it at the worst—and it is safer to do so. Now the question is, Tom Willoughby, what can you do, and whom can you tackle? I don't want you to give me an answer, but only to think it over."

"Oh, if you only want thinking, I'm the beggar to think. But—suppose you land your alderman, and he don't get re-elected in 1885 or thereabouts? That would be a frightful sell, don't you know!"

"Why, that is just where the beauty of the plan comes in! A seat in the House of Commons will always be more or less of a vested interest, however low the franchise may descend; and the men we are speaking of are precisely those most likely to continue in the House. It is especially so in the case of very wealthy men, who have made their own money; for they look out for comfortable seats to begin with, and then nurse their constituencies by large charitable donations, so that the chances are all in their favor. At any rate this is the best way of setting to work—and who can tell whether the struggle may not come to a crisis in the present Parliament?"

"And you feel as confident as ever, Sir John, that this Union will be effected?"

"My dear Lord Ambermere, I assure you I am more confident than ever, and if I were at liberty to say all I know, and to show my private memoranda, you would be astonished at the progress which has been made in this Confederation of Society against the Destructive Elements."

It was a great comfort in listening to Sir John Pynsent, that one could always tell where he wanted to bring in his capital letters. And there was no doubt at all about the uncial emphasis with which he spoke of the Confederation of Society against the Destructive Elements.

At this moment Sydney Campion came in and the conclave was broken up.

Sydney was full of excitement about his contest at Vanebury, and he received the congratulations and good wishes of his friends with much complacency. He was already the accepted Conservative candidate, being nominated from the Oligarchy Club in response to an appeal from the local leaders. He had even been recommended by name in a letter from Mr. Tourmaline, the retiring member, whose secession to the Conservative party had demoralized his former friends in the constituency, and filled his old opponents with joy. He was going down the next day to begin his canvass, and to make his first speech; and he had come to the Club to-night for a final consultation with Sir John Pynsent.

This Vanebury election would not, there was reason to think, be so much affected by money-bags as the election at Dormer was supposed to be, sixteen or eighteen months before. Yet money was necessary, and Sydney did not on this occasion refuse the aid which was pressed upon him. He was responding to the call of his party, at a moment which might be (though it was not) very inconvenient for him; and, having put down the foot of dignity last year, he could now hold out the hand of expediency with a very good grace.

So he took his money, and went down, and before he had been in Vanebury six hours the Conservatives there understood that they had a very strong candidate, who would give a good account of himself, and who deserved to be worked for.

His personal presence was imposing, Sydney was above the middle height, erect and broad-shouldered, with a keen and handsome, rather florid, face, a firm mouth, and penetrating steel-blue eyes. He was careful of his appearance, too, and from his well-cut clothes and his well-trimmed brown hair, beard, and whiskers, it was easy to see that there was nothing of the slipshod about this ambitious young emissary from the Oligarchy Club.

In manner he was very persuasive. He had a frank and easy way of addressing an audience, which he had picked up from a popular tribune—leaning one shoulder towards them at an angle of about eighty degrees, and rounding his periods with a confidential smile, which seemed to assure his hearers that they were as far above the average audience as he was above the average candidate. He did not feel the slightest difficulty in talking for an hour at a stretch, and two or three times on the same day; and, indeed, it would have been strange if he had, considering his Union experience at Cambridge and his practice at the Bar.

Sydney won upon all classes at Vanebury, and the sporting gentlemen in that thriving borough were soon giving odds upon his chance of success. The Liberals were for the most part careless and over-confident. Their man had won every election for twenty years past, and they could not believe that this Tory lawyer was destined to accomplish what all the local magnates had failed in attempting. But a few of the wisest amongst them shook their heads, for they knew too well that "Tourmaline the Traitor and Turncoat" (as the posters described him) was by no means alone in his discontent with the tendencies of the party.

The attention of the country was fixed upon the Vanebury election, and Sydney Campion had become at once the observed of all observers. He knew it, and made the most of the situation, insisting in his speeches that this was a test-election, which would show what the country thought of the government, of its bribes to ignorance and its capitulation to rebellion, of its sacrifice of our honor abroad and our interests at home. He well knew what the effect of this would be on his friends in London, and how he would have earned their gratitude if he could carry the seat on these lines.

On the day before the poll, Sir John Pynsent came to Vanebury, to attend the last of the public meetings.

"Admirably done, so far!" he said, as he grasped Sydney's hand at the station. "How are things looking?"

"It is a certain win!" said Sydney. "No question about it."

And a win it was, such as any old campaigner might have been proud of. The numbers as declared by the returning officer were:

Campion (C.)	4765
Hawkins (L.)	4564
	——
Majority	201

At the last election Tourmaline had had a majority of six hundred over his Conservative opponent, so that there had been a turnover of about four hundred voters. And no one doubted that a large number of these had made up their minds to turn since Campion had begun his canvass.

This was a complete success for Sydney. He was now Mr. Campion, M.P., with both feet on the ladder of ambition. Congratulations poured in upon him from all sides, and from that moment he was recognized by everybody as one of the coming men of the Conservative party.

CHAPTER XIV.

SYDNEY MAKES A MISTAKE.

There was a social side to Sydney's success which he was not slow to appreciate. A poor and ambitious man, bent on climbing the ladder of promotion, he was willing to avail himself of every help which came in his way. And Sir John Pynsent was good-naturedly ready to give him a helping hand.

During the past season he had found himself welcome in houses where the best society of the day was wont to congregate. He had several invitations for the autumn to places where it was considered a distinction to be invited; and, being a man of much worldly wisdom, he was disposed to be sorry that he had made arrangements to go abroad for two or three months. He was vague in detailing his plans to his friends; but in his own mind he was never vague, and he knew what he meant to do and where he was going to spend the vacation well enough, although he did not choose to take club acquaintances into his confidence.

But one invitation, given by Sir John Pynsent, for the Sunday subsequent to his election—or rather, from Saturday to Monday—he thought it expedient as well as pleasant to accept. Vanebury was a very few miles distant from St. John's country-house, and when the baronet, in capital spirits over his friend's success, urged him to run over to Culverley for a day or two, he could not well refuse.

"I am going for the Sunday," Sir John said confidentially, "but my wife doesn't expect me to stay longer until the session is over. I run down every week, you know, except when she's in town; but she always leaves London in June. My sister is under her wing, and she declares that late hours and the heat of London in July are very bad for girls. Of course, I'm glad that she looks after my sister so well."

Sydney recognized the fact that he had never before been taken into Sir John's confidence with respect to his domestic affairs.

"Lady Pynsent asked me the other day whether I could not get you to come down to us," Sir John continued. "I am always forgetting her messages; but if you can spare a couple of days now, we shall be very glad to have you. Indeed, you must not refuse," he said, hospitably. "And you ought to see something of the county."

Sydney had met Lady Pynsent in town. She was a large, showy-looking woman, with fair hair and a very aquiline nose; a woman who liked to entertain, and who did it well. He had dined at the Wentworths' house more than once, and he began to search in his memory for any face or figure which should recall Sir John's sister to his mind. But he could not remember her, and concluded, therefore, that she was in no way remarkable.

"I think I have not met Miss Pynsent," he took an opportunity of saying, by way of an attempt to refresh his memory.

"No? I think you must have seen her somewhere. But she did not go out much this spring: she is rather delicate, and not very fond of society. She's my half-sister, you know, considerably younger than I am—came out the season before last."

Another acquaintance of Sydney's privately volunteered the information later in the day that Miss Pynsent had sixty thousand pounds of her own, and was reputed to be clever.

"I hate clever women," Sydney said, with an inward growl at his sister Lettice, whose conduct had lately given him much uneasiness. "A clever woman and an heiress! Ye gods, how very ugly she must be."

His friend laughed in a meaning manner, and wagged his head mysteriously. But what he would have said remained unspoken, because at that moment Sir John rejoined them.

Sydney flattered himself that he was not impressible, or at least that the outward trappings of wealth and rank did not impress him. But he was distinctly pleased to find that Sir John's carriage and pair, which met them at the station, was irreproachable, and that Culverley was a very fine old house, situated in the midst of a lovely park and approached by an avenue of lime-trees, which, Sir John informed him, was one of the oldest in the country. Sydney had an almost unduly keen sense of the advantage which riches can bestow, and he coveted social almost as much as professional standing for himself. It was, perhaps, natural that the son of a poor man, who had been poor all his life, and owed his success to his own brains and his power of continued work, should look a little enviously on the position so readily attained by men of inferior mental calibre, but of inherited and ever-increasing influence, like Sir John Pynsent and his friends. Sydney never truckled: he was perfectly independent in manner and in thought; but the good things of the world were so desirable to him that for some of them—as he confessed to himself with a half-laugh at his own weakness—he would almost have sold his soul.

They arrived at Culverley shortly before dinner, and Sydney had time for very few introductions before going to the dining-room. He was surprised to find a rather large party present. There were several London men and women whom he knew already, and who were staying in the house, and there was a contingent of county people, who had only come to dinner. The new member for Vanebury was made much of, especially by the county folk; and as Sydney was young, handsome, and a good talker, he soon made himself popular amongst them. For himself, he did not find the occasion interesting, save as a means of social success. Most of the men were dull, and the women prim and proper: there were not more than two pretty girls in the whole party.

"That's the heiress, I suppose," thought Sydney, hearing a spectacled, sandy-haired young woman who looked about five-and-twenty addressed as Miss Pynsent. "Plain, as I thought. There's not a woman here worth looking at, except Mrs. George Murray. I'll talk to her after dinner. Not one of them is a patch on little Milly. I wonder how she would look, dressed up in silks and satins. Pynsent knows how to choose his wine and his cook better than his company, I fancy."

But his supercilious contempt for the county was well veiled, and the people who entered into conversation with Sydney Campion, the new M.P. for Vanebury, put him down as a very agreeable man, as well as a rising politician.

His own position was pleasant enough. He was treated with manifest distinction—flattered, complimented, well-nigh caressed. In the drawing-room after dinner, Sydney, surrounded by complacent and adulating friends, really experienced some of the most agreeable sensations of his life. He was almost sorry when the group gradually melted away, and conversation was succeeded by music. He had never cultivated his taste for music; but he had a naturally fine ear, upon which ordinary drawing-room performances jarred sadly. But, standing with his arms folded and his back against the wall, in the neighborhood of Mrs. George Murray, the prettiest woman in the room, he became gradually aware that Lady Pynsent's musicians were as admirable in their way as her cook. She would no more put up with bad singing than bad songs; and she probably put both on the same level. She did not ask amateurs to sing or play; but she had one or two professionals staying in the house, who were "charmed" to perform for her; and she had secured a well-known "local man" to play accompaniments. In the case of one at least of the professionals, Lady Pynsent paid a very handsome fee for his services; but this fact was not supposed to transpire to the general public.

When the professionals had done their work there was a little pause, succeeded by the slight buzz that spoke of expectation. "Miss Pynsent is going to play," Mrs. Murray said to Sydney, putting up her long-handled eyeglass and looking expectantly towards the grand piano. "Oh, now, we shall have a treat."

"Sixty thousand pounds," Sydney said to himself with a smile; but he would not for the world have said it aloud. "We must put up with bad playing from its fortunate possessor, I suppose." And he turned his head with resignation in the direction of the little inner drawing-room, in which the piano stood. This room should, perhaps, be described as an alcove, rather than a separate apartment: it was divided from the great drawing-room by a couple of shallow steps that ran across its whole width, so that a sort of natural stage was formed, framed above and on either side by artistically festooned curtains of yellow brocade.

"Isn't it effective?" Mrs. Murray murmured to him, with a wave of her eyeglass to the alcove. "So useful for tableaux and plays, you know. Awfully clever of Lady Pynsent to use the room in that way. There used once to be folding doors, you know—barbarous, wasn't it? Who would use doors when curtains could be had?"

"Doors are useful sometimes," said Sydney. But he was not in the least attentive either to her words or to his own: he was looking towards the alcove.

Miss Pynsent—the young woman with sandy locks and freckled face, on which a broad, good-humored smile was beaming—was already seated at the piano and turning over her music. Presently she began to play, and Sydney, little as was his technical knowledge of the art, acknowledged at once that he had been mistaken, and that Miss Pynsent, in spite of being an heiress, played remarkably well. But the notes were apparently those of an accompaniment only—was she going to sing? Evidently not, for at that moment another figure slipped forward from the shadows of the inner drawing-room, and faced the audience.

This was a girl who did not look more than eighteen or nineteen: a slight fragile creature in white, with masses of dusky hair piled high above a delicate, pallid, yet unmistakably beautiful, face. The large dark eyes, the curved, sensitive mouth, the exquisite modelling of the features, the graceful lines of the slightly undeveloped figure, the charming pose of head and neck, the slender wrist bent round the violin which she held, formed a picture of almost ideal loveliness. Sydney could hardly refrain from an exclamation of surprise and admiration. He piqued himself on knowing a little about everything that was worth knowing, and he had a considerable acquaintance with art, so that the first thing which occurred to him was to seek for a parallel to the figure before him in the pictures with which he was acquainted. She was not unlike a Sir Joshua, he decided; and yet—in the refinement of every feature, and a certain sweetness and tranquillity of expression—she reminded him of a Donatello that he had seen in one of his later visits to Florence or Sienna. He had always thought that if he were ever rich he would buy pictures; and he wondered idly whether money would buy the Donatello of which the white-robed violin-player reminded him.

One or two preliminary tuning notes were sounded, and then the violinist began to play. Her skill was undoubted, but the feeling and pathos which she threw into the long-drawn sighing notes were more remarkable even than her skill. There was a touch of genius in her performance which held the listeners enthralled. When she had finished, she disappeared behind the curtains as rapidly as she had emerged from the shadows of the dimly-lighted inner room; and in the pause that followed, the opening and shutting of a door was heard.

"Who is she?" said Sydney to his neighbor.

"Oh, Miss Pynsent, of course," said Mrs. Murray. "Delightful, isn't she?"

"I don't mean Miss Pynsent," said Sydney, in some confusion of mind; "I mean——"

But Mrs. Murray had turned to somebody else, and scraps of conversation floated up to Sydney's ears, and gave him, as he thought, the information that he was seeking.

"So devoted to Lady Pynsent's children! Now that little Frankie has a cold, they say she won't leave him night or day. They had the greatest trouble to get her down to play to-night. Awfully lucky for Lady Pynsent," and then the voices were lowered, but Sydney heard something about "the last governess," and "a perfect treasure," which seemed to reveal the truth.

"The governess! A violin-playing governess," he thought, with a mixture of scorn and relief, which he did not altogether understand in himself. "Ah! that's the reason she did not come down to dinner. She is a very pretty girl, and no doubt Lady Pynsent keeps her in the nursery or schoolroom as much as possible. I should like to see her again. Perhaps, as to-morrow is Sunday, she may come down with the children."

It will be evident to the meanest capacity that Sydney was making an absurd mistake as to the identity of the violinist. The most unsophisticated novel-reader in the world would cast contempt and ridicule on the present writers if they, in their joint capacity, introduced the young lady in white as actually Lady Pynsent's governess. To avoid misunderstanding on the point, therefore, it may as well be premised that she was in fact Miss Anna Pynsent, Sir John's half sister, and that Mr. Campion's conclusions respecting her position were altogether without foundation.

Having, however, made up his mind about her, Sydney took little further interest in the matter. One or two complimentary remarks were made in his hearing about Miss Pynsent's playing; but he took them to apply to the sandy-haired Miss Pynsent whom he had seen at dinner, and only made a silent cynical note of the difference with which the violinist and the accompanist were treated. He never flew in the face of the world himself, and therefore he did not try to readjust the balance of compliment: he simply acquiesced in the judgment of the critics, and thought of the Donatello.

A long conference in the smoking-room on political matters put music and musicians out of his head; and when he went to sleep, about two o'clock in the morning, it was to dream, if he dreamt at all, of his maiden speech in Parliament, and that elevation to the woolsack which his mother was so fond of prophesying.

Sydney was an early riser, and breakfast on Sundays at Culverley was always late. He was tempted by the beauty of the morning to go for a stroll in the gardens; and thence he wandered into the park, where he breathed the fresh cool air with pleasure, and abandoned himself, as usual, to a contemplation of the future. The park was quickly crossed, for Sydney scarcely knew how to loiter in his walking, more than in any other of his actions; and he then plunged into a fir plantation which fringed a stretch of meadow-land, now grey and drenched with dew and shining in the morning sun. Even to Sydney's unimaginative mind the scene had its charm, after the smoke of London and the turmoil of the last few days: he came to the edge of the plantation, leaned his elbows on the topmost rail of a light fence, and looked away to the blue distance, where the sheen of water and mixture of light and shade were, even in his eyes, worth looking at. A cock crowed in a neighboring farmyard, and a far-away clock struck seven. It was earlier than he had thought.

Two or three figures crossing the meadow attracted his attention. First came a laboring man with a pail. Sydney watched him aimlessly until he was out of sight. Then a child—a gentleman's child, judging from his dress and general appearance—a boy of six or seven, who seemed to be flying tumultuously down the sloping meadow to escape from his governess or nurse. The field ran down to a wide stream, which was crossed at one point by a plank, at another by stepping-stones; and it was towards these stepping-stones that the boy directed his career. Behind him, but at considerable distance, came the slender figure of a young woman, who seemed to be pursuing him. The child reached the stream, and there stood laughing, his fair curls floating in the wind, his feet firmly planted on one of the stones that had been thrown into the water.

Sydney was by no means inclined to play knight-errant to children and attendant damsels, and he would probably have continued to watch the little scene without advancing, had not the girl, halting distressfully to call the truant, chanced to turn her face so that the strong morning light fell full upon it. Why, it was the violinist! Or was he deceived by some chance resemblance? Sydney did not think so, but it behoved him instantly to go and see.

Indeed, before he reached the stream, his help seemed to be needed. The boy, shouting and dancing, had missed his footing and fallen headlong in the stream, which, fortunately, was very shallow and not very swift. Sydney quickened his pace to a run, and the girl did the same; but before either of them reached its bank the boy had scrambled out again, and was sitting on the further side with a sobered countenance and in a very drenched condition.

"Oh, Jack!" said the girl reproachfully, "how could you?"

"I want some mushrooms. I said I would get them," Jack answered, sturdily.

"You must come back at once. But—how are you to get over?" she said, contemplating the slippery stones with some dismay. For Jack's fall had displaced more than one of them, and there was now a great gap between the stones in the deepest part of the little stream.

"Can I be of any assistance?" said Sydney, availing himself of his opportunity to come forward.

She turned and looked at him inquiringly, the color deepening a little in her pale face.

"I am staying at Culverley," he said, in an explanatory tone. "I had the pleasure of hearing you play last night."

"You are Mr. Campion, I think?" she said. "Yes, I shall be very glad of your help. I need not introduce myself, I see. Jack has been very naughty: he ran away from his nurse this morning, and I said that I would bring him back. And now he has fallen into the brook."

"We must get him back," said Sydney, rather amused at her matter-of-fact tone. "I will go over for him."

"No, I am afraid you must not do that," she answered. "There is a plank a little further down the stream; we will go there."

But Sydney was across the water by this time. He lifted the child lightly in his arms and strode back across the stones, scarcely wetting himself at all. Then he set the boy down at her side.

"There!" he said, "that is better than going down to the plank. Now, young man, you must run home again as fast as you can, or you will catch cold."

"I am very much obliged to you," said the young lady, looking at him, as he thought, rather earnestly, but without a smile. "Jack, you know, is Sir John Pynsent's eldest son."

"So I divined. I think he would get home more quickly if I took one of his hands and you took the other, and we hurried him up the hill; don't you think so?"

He had no interest at all in Jack, but he wanted to talk with this dark-eyed violin-playing damsel. Sydney had indulged in a good deal of flirtation in his time, and he had no objection to whiling away an hour in the company of any pretty girl; and yet there was some sort of dignity about this girl's manner which warned him to be a little upon his guard.

"You are member for Vanebury," she said, rather abruptly, when they had dragged little Jack some distance up the grassy slope.

"I have that honor."

"I hope," she said, with a mixture of gentleness and decision which took him by surprise, "that you mean to pay some attention to the condition of the working-classes in Vanebury?"

"Well, I don't know; is there any special reason?"

"They are badly paid, badly housed, over-worked and under-educated," she said, succinctly; "and if the member for Vanebury would bestir himself in their cause, I think that something might be done."

"Even a member is not omnipotent, I'm afraid."

"No, but he has influence. You are bound to use it for good," she returned.

Sydney raised his eyebrows. He was not used to being lectured on his duties, and this young lady's remarks struck him as slightly impertinent. He glanced at her almost as if he would have told her so; but she looked so very pretty and so very young that he could no more check her than he could have checked a child.

"You have very pretty scenery about here," he said, by way of changing the conversation.

The girl's face drooped at once; she did not answer.

"What an odd young woman she is," said Sydney to himself. "What an odd governess for the children!"

Suddenly she looked up, with a very sweet bright look. "I am afraid I offended you," she said, deprecatingly. "I did not mean to say anything wrong. I am so much interested in the Vanebury working people, although we are here some miles distant from them, that when I heard you were coming I made up my mind at once that I would speak to you."

"You have—friends, perhaps, in that district?" said Sydney.

"N—no—not exactly," she said, hesitating. "But I know a good deal about Vanebury."

"Nan goes there very often, don't you, Nan?" said little Jack, suddenly interposing. "And papa says you do more harm than good."

"Nan" colored high. "You should not repeat what papa says," she answered, severely. "You have often been told that it is naughty."

"But it's true," Jack murmured, doggedly. And Sydney could not help smiling at the discomfited expression on "Nan's" face.

However, he was—or thought he was—quite equal to the occasion. He changed the subject, and began talking adroitly about her tastes and occupations. Nan soon became at ease with him and answered his questions cheerfully, although she seemed puzzled now and then by the strain of compliment into which he had a tendency to fall. The house was reached at last; and Jack snatched his hands from those of his companions, and ran indoors. Nan halted at a side-door, and now spoke with the sweet earnestness that impressed Sydney even more than her lovely face.

"You have been very kind to us, Mr. Campion. I don't know how to thank you."

It was on the tip of Sydney's tongue to use some badinage such as he would have done, in his light and easy fashion, to a servant-maid or shop-girl. But something in her look caused him, luckily, to refrain. He went as near as he dared to the confines of love-making.

"Give me the flower you wear," he said, leaning a little towards her. "Then I shall at least have a remembrance of you."

His tone and his look were warmer than he knew. She shrank back, visibly surprised, and rather offended. Before he could add a word she had quietly taken the rosebud from her dress, handed it to him, and disappeared into the house, closing the door behind her in a somewhat uncompromising way. Sydney was left alone on the gravelled path, with a half-withered rosebud in his hand, and a consciousness of having made himself ridiculous.

"She seems to be rather a little vixen," he said to himself, as he strolled up to his rooms to make some change in his clothes, which were damper than he liked. "What business has a pretty little governess to take that tone? Deuced out of place, I call it. I wonder if she'll be down to breakfast. She has very fetching eyes."

But she was not down to breakfast, and nothing was said about her, so Sydney concluded that her meals were taken in the schoolroom with the children.

"Such a pity—poor dear Nan has a headache," he heard Lady Pynsent saying by and by. "I hoped that she would come down and give us some music this evening, but she says she won't be able for it."

Sydney consoled himself with pretty Mrs. Murray.

"The fair violinist is out of tune, it seems," he said, in the course of an afternoon stroll with the new charmer.

"Who? Oh, Nan Pynsent."

"Pynsent? No. At least, I don't mean the pianiste: I mean the young lady who played the violin last night."

"Yes, Nan Pynsent, Sir John's half-sister. The heiress—and some people say the beauty of the county. Why do you look so stupefied, Mr. Campion?"

"I did not know her, that was all. I thought—who, then, is the lady who played the piano?"

"Mary Pynsent, a cousin. You surely did not think that she was the heiress?"

"Why did not Sir John's sister come down to dinner?" said Sydney, waxing angry.

"She has a craze about the children. Their governess is away, and she insists on looking after them. She is rather quixotic, you know; full of grand schemes for the future, and what she will do when she comes of age. Her property is all in Vanebury, by the bye: you must let her talk to you about the miners if you want to win her favor. She will be of age in a few months."

"I shall not try to win her favor."

"Dear me, how black you look, Mr. Campion. Are you vexed that you have not made her acquaintance?"

"Not at all," said Sydney, clearing his brow. "How could I have looked at her when you were there?"

The banal compliment pleased Mrs. Murray, and she began to talk of trivial matters in her usual trivial strain. Sydney scarcely listened: for once he was disconcerted, and angry with himself. He knew that he would have talked in a very different strain if he had imagined for one moment that Jack's companion was Miss Pynsent. He had not, perhaps, definitely said anything that he could regret; but he was sorry for the whole tone of his conversation. Would Miss Pynsent repeat his observations, he wondered, to her sister-in-law? Sydney did not often put himself in a false position, but he felt that his tact had failed him now. He returned to the house in an unusually disturbed state of mind; and a sentence which he overheard in the afternoon did not add to his tranquillity.

He was passing along a corridor that led, as he thought, to his own room; but the multiplicity of turnings had bewildered him, and he was obliged to retrace his steps. While doing so, he passed Lady Pynsent's boudoir. Although he was unconscious of this fact, his attention was attracted by the sound of a voice from within. Nan Pynsent's voice was not loud, but it had a peculiarly penetrating quality; and her words followed Sydney down the corridor with disagreeable distinctness.

"Selina," she was saying—Selina was Lady Pynsent's name—"I thought you said that Mr. Campion was a gentleman!"

"Well, dear——" Lady Pynsent was beginning; but Sydney, quickening his steps, heard no more. He was now in a rage, and disposed to vote Miss Pynsent the most unpleasant, conceited young person of his acquaintance. That anybody should doubt his "gentilhood" was an offence not to be lightly borne. He was glad to remember that he was leaving Culverley next day, and he determined that he would rather avoid the female Pynsents than otherwise when they came to town. He could not yet do without Sir John, and he was vexed to think that these women should have any handle—however trifling—against him. He thanked his stars that he had not actually made love to Miss Anna Pynsent; and he hurried back to town next morning by the earliest train, without setting eyes on her again. In town, amidst the bustle of political and social duties, he soon forgot the unpleasant impression that this little episode of his visit to Culverly had left upon his mind.

He went to Maple Cottage on the very day of his return to London, to hear what his mother and sister had to say about his success. And he took an opportunity also of telling Milly Harrington something of the glories which he had achieved, and the privilege which he enjoyed in being able to absent himself from his native country for two or three months at a stretch.

About the end of August, Lettice had to look out for a new maid. Milly went away, saying that she had heard of a better place. She had obtained it without applying to her mistress for a character. She had not been so attentive to her duties of late as to make Lettice greatly regret her departure; but remembering old Mrs. Harrington's fears for her grand-daughter, Lettice made many inquiries of Milly as to her new place. She received, as she thought, very satisfactory replies, although she noticed that the girl changed color strangely, and looked confused and anxious when she was questioned. And when the time came for her to go, Milly wept bitterly, and was heard to express a wish that she had resolved to stay with Miss Lettice after all.

CHAPTER XV.

SOME UNEXPECTED MEETINGS.

Two or three months had passed since Alan's wife came back to him.

He had arranged, with the aid of a lawyer, to allow her a certain regular income—with the consequence to himself that he had been obliged to give up his floor in Montagu Place and settle down in the humbler and dingier refuge of Alfred Place. Meanwhile, he had taken steps to collect sufficient evidence for a divorce. He had not yet entered his suit, and he felt pretty certain that when he did so, and Cora was made aware of it in the usual manner, she would find some way of turning round and biting him.

But the desire to be free from his trammels had taken possession of him with irresistible force, and he was prepared to risk the worst that she could do to him in order to accomplish it. Even as it was, he had reason to think that she was not true to her undertaking not to slander or molest him so long as she received her allowance. He had twice received offensive post-cards, and though there was nothing to prove from whom they came, he could have very little doubt that they had been posted by her in moments when jealous rage or intoxication had got the better of her prudence.

The scandal which began to fasten upon his name after Sydney Campion had heard Brooke Dalton's story in the smoking-room of the Oligarchy was almost forgotten again, though it lurked in the memory of many a thoughtless retailer of gossip, ready to revive on the slightest provocation.

More for Lettice's sake than his own, he lived in complete retirement, and scarcely ever left his lodgings except to spend a few hours in the Museum Reading Room. In this way he avoided the chance of meeting her, as well as the chance of encountering his wretched wife, concerning whose mode of life he had only too trustworthy evidence from the lawyer to whom he had committed his interests.

Then there came a day when he could not deny himself the pleasure of attending a conversazione for which tickets had been sent him by an old friend. The subject to be discussed in the course of the evening was one in which he was specially interested, and his main object in going was that he might be made to forget for a few hours the misery of his present existence, which the last of Cora's post-cards had painfully impressed upon him.

He had not been there more than half-an-hour, when, moving with the crowd from one room to another, he suddenly came face to face with Lettice and the Grahams. All of them were taken by surprise, and there was a little constraint in their greeting. Perhaps Lettice was the least disturbed of the four—for the rest of them thought chiefly of her, whilst she thought of Alan's possible embarrassment, which she did her best to overcome, with the ready tact of an unselfish woman.

Alan had grown doubly sensitive of late, and his one idea had been that Lettice must be preserved from all danger of annoyance, whether by the abandoned woman who had so amply proved the shrewdness of her malice, or by himself—who had no less amply proved his weakness. In pure generosity of mind he would have contented himself with a few grave words, and passed on. But it seemed to her as if he had not the courage to remain, taking for granted her resentment at his unfortunate letter. To her pure mind there was not enough, even in that letter, to cause complete estrangement between them. At any rate, it was not in her to impose the estrangement by any display of anger or unkindness. The sublime courage of innocence was upon her as she spoke.

"See," she said, "the professor is going to begin. The people are taking their seats, and if we do not follow their example all the chairs will be filled, and we shall have to stand for an hour. Let us sit down."

She just glanced at Alan, so that he could regard himself as included in the invitation; and, nothing loth, he sat down beside her. The lecturer did not start for another ten minutes, and Lettice occupied the interval by comparing notes with Clara Graham: for these two dearly loved a gossip in which they could dissect the characters of the men they knew, and the appearance of the women they did not know. It was a perfectly harmless practice as indulged in by them, for their criticism was not malicious. The men, after one or two commonplaces, relapsed into silence, and Alan was able to collect his thoughts, and at the same time to realize how much happiness the world might yet have in store for him, since this one woman, who knew the worst of him, did not think it necessary to keep him at a distance.

Then the professor began to speak. He was a small and feeble man, wheezy in his delivery, and, it must be confessed, rather confused in his ideas. He had been invited to make plain to an audience, presumably well read and instructed, the historical bearings of certain recent discoveries in Egypt; and the task was somewhat difficult for him. There were seven theories, all more or less plausible, which had been started by as many learned Egyptologists; and this worthy old gentleman, though quite as competent to give an opinion, and stick to it, as any of the rest, was so modest and self-depreciatory that he would not go further than to state and advocate each theory in turn, praising its author, and defending him against the other six. After doing this, he was bold to confess that he did not altogether agree with any of the seven. He was on the point of launching his own hypothesis, which would have been incompatible with all the rest, when his heart failed him. He therefore ended by inviting discussion, and sat down, blushing unseen beneath his yellow skin, exactly as he used to blush half a century ago when he was called up to construe a piece of Homer. Three of the seven Egyptologists were present, and they now rose, one after another, beginning with the oldest. Each of them stated his own theory, showing much deference to the lecturer as "the greatest living authority" on this particular subject; and then, after politely referring to the opinions of the two rival savants whom he saw in the audience, became humorous and sarcastic at the expense of the absent four.

But, as the absent are always wrong in comparison with the present, so youth is always wrong in comparison with age. The youngest Egyptologist—being in truth a somewhat bumptious man, fresh from Oxford by way of Cairo and Alexandria—had presumed to make a little feint of sword-play with one of the lecturer's diffident remarks. This brought up the other two who had already spoken; and they withered that young man with infinite satisfaction to themselves and the male part of the audience.

Name and Fame: A Novel