The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Serpent's Tooth, by B. M. (Bithia Mary) Croker

THE SERPENT’S TOOTH

THE SERPENT’S
TOOTH

BY
B. M. CROKER

NEW YORK
BRENTANO’S
1913

Printed in Great Britain

THE SERPENT’S TOOTH

CHAPTER I

COLONEL FENCHURCH stood on his own hearthstone—that is to say, the smoking-room rug—with his back to the fire, and a cup of tea in his hand. He was a good-looking dapper little man, with a neat white moustache, a cheery voice, and an unfailing flow of talk.

“I say, Doodie,” turning to a lady in a splashed habit, who was meditatively consuming buttered toast, “weren’t the roads beastly? Just look at my boots and leathers!”

Doodie, his wife, nodded, but made no other reply.

“A clinking run,” he continued, “and a lot of those thrusters got left—you went well—eh?—that was a nasty place out of the round plantation!—on the whole—a good hard day!”

Once more his better-half inclined her hatted head; evidently her mind was preoccupied. She was staring fixedly at a certain pattern in the carpet, with a remote and far-away gaze; a plain weather-beaten lady whose age—much discussed among her acquaintances—was probably five-and-forty; her habit displayed a slight square-shouldered figure; a pot hat pushed to the back of her head disclosed the inevitable red mark, a long but aristocratic nose, and a clever resolute countenance.

Dorothy Fenchurch was a notable example of the strong-willed active woman, mated to a weak, easy-going, good-tempered man: and the match had proved a conspicuous success. In the opinion of Tom Fenchurch, no wife in the County was fit to hold a candle to his wonderful Dorothy—what a housekeeper, horsewoman, companion!—and for her part, his Dorothy was contented. Greedy of influence, social and domestic, she thoroughly enjoyed the rôle of manager and mentor. How much more satisfactory to rule in a small establishment, and over a limited circle, than to languish at home, the insignificant member of an important house, who kept their women-folk inflexibly in the background; and so it came to pass that twelve years previously, the Honourable Dorothy Claremont bestowed her hand and her fortune on agreeable Colonel Fenchurch, who had little to offer her, besides his handsome face, his retired pay, and his heart.

The couple had settled down in a ramshackle old house, in a ramshackle old village in the Midlands, inconveniently remote from the railway, but within easy reach of the principal Meets of a well-known sporting pack. The bride’s relations—who had not favoured the alliance—shrugged their shoulders and commiserated ‘poor Dorothy.’ They little knew that ‘poor Dorothy,’ now thoroughly free and independent, was as happy as the day was long!

Here, in the sleepy hamlet of Thornby, the Honble. Mrs. Fenchurch soon made her presence felt. She, so to speak, ‘took hold’ with both hands; stirred up the villagers, the parson, and the doctor; improved the old manor out of all recognition—and that at no great expense.

This energetic lady had the good fortune to discover a priceless treasure in the village carpenter, and he and a journeyman mason, a few odd men, with Mrs. Fenchurch as architect, threw out a window here, shut up a door there, and boldly altered the principal staircase. By and by when visitors arrived to call, and were beholders of these amazing triumphs, more than one exclaimed:

“Why on earth did we not think of taking The Holt, and doing it up? It is perfectly delightful—who would have guessed at its capabilities?”

But these envious folk never considered that its present tenant was endowed with an unusual supply of brains, enterprise, and courage. She was a born decorator, a skilled upholsteress, and had a positive genius for gardening. Before long, the attractions of The Holt were famous within a radius of ten miles—Mrs. Fenchurch seemed to know exactly where to find the prettiest chintzes, the most unique furniture, the newest roses; and her cleverness in picking up prizes in old curiosity shops had become a proverb. It was said, that in a back street of the county town she had actually bought a wonderful old Chippendale sideboard for fifteen shillings—but this would appear to be incredible.

For twelve years The Holt was acknowledged to be one of the pleasantest houses in the County, its inmates the most popular, important, and influential couple of the neighbourhood, and here Doodie Fenchurch (with good-natured Tom as her consort) reigned alone and supreme.

But now a change was imminent; a princess was about to enter into this kingdom—yes, and to enter within half an hour. Possibly this was why its mistress seemed so unusually silent and distrait.

The only sister of Colonel Fenchurch had made a runaway match with a harum-scarum Irishman, who was killed in India, leaving his widow almost penniless. She died soon afterwards, and the unnecessary infant who ought to have accompanied her mother, survived to be supported by the Fenchurch family—themselves uncomfortably impecunious. Now this girl was seventeen, and in spite of Mrs. Fenchurch’s lamentations, protestations, and suggestion that she should remain another year, Letty Glyn had left school, and was on her way to take up her abode with darling Uncle Tom, and dearest Aunt Dorothy.

Apparently dearest Aunt Dorothy was not warmly enthusiastic respecting her niece by marriage; but she was a woman who sedulously studied appearances. If Tom’s niece were turned out to earn her bread as companion or governess, what a talk there would be! There was positively no alternative, the girl must make her home at The Holt, in the character of le fâcheux troisième.

As a child, Letty had promised to be rather pretty, and Mrs. Fenchurch believed that with her own social advantages, she would marry her off ere long; but before arriving at this happy period, she resolved to make the poor relation useful in the house. She should dust china, arrange flowers, pour out tea, help in the garden, and take over the Mothers’ Sewing Club. Her own hands were more than full both at home and abroad (indeed, the influence of Mrs. Fenchurch now radiated far and wide), she was secretary here, treasurer and chairwoman there, and was often sorely pressed for time. Oh yes, Letty would have her uses; but all the same a girl in the house—a girl, who was always en evidence, to whom one must be a sort of model and sheep dog, would undoubtedly be an intolerable nuisance.

“I say,” began her husband, breaking in upon her reflections. She looked up at him quickly. “Isn’t Letty due about now? Six-thirty?”

“Oh yes, if the train is pretty punctual; but you know what these cross lines are.”

“Do you think she will be a little hurt at no one going to meet her—eh?”

“Hurt! My dear boy, what nonsense!”

“Well, of course, hunting is hunting, and Garfield Cross is our best meet. By the way, I suppose you sent the brougham? It’s an uncommonly cold, raw night.”

“The brougham? Certainly not! I sent the governess-car—yes,” in answer to his exclamation. “You see, dear, Collins has had three horses to do up—you know you had out two—you extravagant man, and I really couldn’t ask him to leave them all to James, so the boy took the car with the garden pony, and her luggage will come up to-morrow by the market-cart.”

“I say, old girl,” suddenly putting down his cup and going over to her, “it’s not a very warm reception, eh? The child has not been near us this five years—and it’s a long journey from Dresden, eh?” Then, in another and more caressing tone, he added, “You will be good to her, Doodie darling, won’t you? You can make it so awfully nice, if you like to, you know!”

“Am I not always what you call ‘good’ to my guests?” she demanded rather sharply.

“Oh, hang it all, Doodie, but she won’t be a guest! Letty is one of us, eh—isn’t she, old woman? Of course, I know it’s hard on you, and she has only her little bit of a pension; but a girl in the house will be cheery, eh? And you’ll take to her, I know,” and he put his arm round her neck, and gazed into her shrewd, thin face, and repeated, “Eh, darling, won’t you?”

Just at this moment the door opened, and a formal voice announced ‘Mrs. Hesketh.’

Mrs. Hesketh, a middle-aged lady with a stately carriage and the remains of great beauty, entered just in time to witness the caressing attitude of Colonel Fenchurch.

“We have had a row, you see!” he explained to the visitor with the gaiety of a schoolboy; “the old woman and I have had a shake-up, and been making it up—she will pound me out hunting. I call it deuced bad form, eh?”

Mrs. Hesketh, a widowed cousin who lived in the only other ‘house’ in the village, carefully removed her heavy sables before she replied.

“I should think, Tom, that you are used to that by this time. Had you had a good day?”

“Ripping!”

“Many out?”

“Oh, the usual lot, and Hugo Blagdon. By Jove! he does have wonderful cattle. I hear he pays as much as five hundred for a hunter. Yes, and he can ride them too,” he added with unusual generosity.

“But what brings him over to this side?” enquired Mrs. Hesketh with languid curiosity.

“He’s only staying at the ‘Black Cock’ at Ridgefield for a week or so—it’s more central than Sharsley. Sharsley is a good bit out of the way for everything; seven miles from a railway station—monstrous, isn’t it in these days?”

“Yes, but we need not boast. Sharsley is a lovely old place; I shouldn’t mind living there myself!”

“No,” he answered with a laugh; “and a heap of other ladies will say ditto to Mrs. Hesketh, eh, Doodie?” appealing to his wife.

“I can’t think what’s keeping her,” was the irrelevant reply.

Mrs. Hesketh stared at her cousin with grave-eyed interrogation.

“Oh, I mean Letty Glyn, Tom’s niece, you know, Maudie. Didn’t I tell you that we expect her this evening, by the two o’clock from St. Pancras?”

“So you did; and she is coming to stay for some time?”

“To live with us altogether,” eagerly amended Colonel Fenchurch. “She is an orphan, the daughter of my poor sister Kathleen.”

Mrs. Hesketh glanced from him to his wife, but Mrs. Fenchurch’s expression was blank and noncommittal; she rose, walked to the fire, and brushed the crumbs from her habit into the fender.

“We are her only relations,” continued Colonel Fenchurch.

“Except her father’s people, who are paupers,” corrected a thin, high-pitched treble from the fire-place. “Irish paupers—with nothing to live on but family pride.”

“If she is like my poor sister, she ought to be a beauty,” urged her uncle, and his tone was anxious and conciliatory.

“She was some way from that when we last saw her,” declared his wife, turning to face them; “a long-legged creature, with a pair of sunken eyes and quantities of tousled hair. Of course, she may have improved,” she added tolerantly; “and,” with a glance at her husband’s chiselled profile, “I hope she will take after the Fenchurch family. A girl with a pretty face does get such a splendid start.”

“She does,” agreed Mrs. Hesketh, whose own beautiful face had been her fortune; “but if she hasn’t something to back it up in the way of character, or brains, or charm,—it’s not so much of a start, after all.”

“Hullo—wheels!” announced Colonel Fenchurch. “Here she is!” and he dashed into the hall.

“I think I ought to go,” murmured the visitor, reaching for her boa; “this is a family affair,” she added with a smile.

“And you are one of the family, Maudie,” declared Mrs. Fenchurch, laying a strong detaining hand upon her arm; “so you must stay.” Then, removing her hat, which she tossed on the sofa, she was about to follow her husband, when the door was thrown wide, and Colonel Fenchurch advanced into the room, beaming with pride, and leading a tall girl in a fur-lined cloak, who looked both timid and tired.

“My dear Letty, how late you are!” exclaimed her aunt, taking both her hands in hers and pecking her on the cheek; “and how frozen!”

“There was a slight accident which delayed us,” explained the girl nervously.

“Now, then, give me your cloak, and have some tea, and tell us all about it,” said her uncle, fussing round her.

“I am afraid the tea is rather cold,” said Mrs. Fenchurch, moving towards the tea equipage; “but we will have some more at once,” and she rang the bell violently.

“Maudie, this is my niece Lettice,” said Colonel Fenchurch, presenting her with ceremony. “Letty, Mrs. Hesketh is our nearest neighbour and your aunt’s cousin, and I hope you may find a corner in her heart.”

“My dear, you must be perished,” said the lady kindly. “Why, I declare you are positively shivering!”

“Oh no, no,” she protested, whilst her uncle helped her to remove her wrap. “This room is delightfully warm.”

“Now, Letty, take off your hat,” he urged eagerly.

“I am afraid my hair is dreadfully untidy,” but she nevertheless removed a fur cap, and bared a head of beautiful light brown hair, which exhibited a natural wave.

“So you have had a long journey,” continued Mrs. Hesketh.

“Yes, nearly two days—we all travelled together—I mean the girls at my school—as far as London.”

“And the crossing?”

“Oh,” with a quick, expressive gesture, “dreadful! I’d rather not think of it! Sometimes the boat stood upright!”

“Come tell us about your railway accident,” said her uncle cheerfully.

“It was really nothing,” she answered; “we ran past another train that had been shunted, and the end of it caught our carriage doors, or something—at any rate we were nearly shaken off the line. It gave us a shock, for we were travelling fast, and were dreadfully mixed up in our compartment.”

“And who were you mixed up with?” he enquired jocosely.

“The young man in the opposite seat,” and she coloured and laughed. “He wore an enormously thick ulster, and so I wasn’t a bit hurt.”

“And afterwards?”

“We had all to get out and wait at a tiny station for more than an hour—such a bare miserable——”

“Do you take sugar?” interrupted Mrs. Fenchurch, with the tongs in her hand.

“Yes, if you please, aunt—one lump.”

“Then here is your tea at last, and some nice hot toast,” said Colonel Fenchurch, approaching. As he sat down beside her he said, “And how did you and the young man continue the acquaintance so violently begun?”

“He asked me if I was hurt—that was all.”

“The least he could do! Why, bless my soul, he might have knocked all your front teeth down your throat, or put out one of your eyes—and then he would have had to marry you, eh?”

“I am sure he wouldn’t have agreed to that,” she answered gaily.

“He might go further, and fare worse,” rejoined her uncle, with a proud and significant glance at his wife, who had now approached the sofa.

“Of course, you left your luggage at Tatton, Letty?”

“Yes, Aunt Dorothy; I only brought up my dressing-bag. The boy gave me your message.”

“That was right. And now, as soon as you feel a little rested, I will take you upstairs. Your quarters are at the top of the house, but large and sunny—with a funny little staircase all to yourself!”

“I am sure it is charming, aunt,” rising as she spoke; “it will be delightful to have not only a staircase, but a whole room to myself,” and with a pretty little foreign curtsey to Mrs. Hesketh, the girl collected her wraps and followed Mrs. Fenchurch into the hall.

“Well, what do you think of her, eh?” enquired Colonel Fenchurch, retiring to the hearth-rug as to a vantage ground, and sticking his thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat.

“She is lovely,” replied his companion, after a moment’s deliberation. “When one sees a girl so fresh, so exquisite, and so unconscious, one cannot help thinking of the quotation, ‘What of the lovers in the hidden years?’”

“Lovers be hanged!” he exclaimed irritably. “Letty is too young yet—we shall keep her with us as long as we can. She seems as simple as a child, doesn’t she?—and rather shy?”

“I fancy she is one of those girls who develop slowly. Her age may be seventeen, but in experience of life probably she is not more than ten or twelve.”

“Lots of girls know their way about the world at seventeen, and are one too many for many a man,” declared Colonel Fenchurch; “but I remember that my sister, ten years my junior, was extraordinarily young in her ideas, easily influenced, ready to be ordered about, and as obedient as if she were a kid. She never knew her own mind—or had any fixed opinions—except about Glyn. He made up her mind, and ordered her to run away with him, a handsome, reckless, dare-devil. They went out to India to his regiment, and he was killed within a year up on the frontier, some fool-hardy exploit, or he would be alive now.”

“And take his daughter off your hands,” suggested the lady.

“Oh, well, I am happy and proud to adopt his daughter—especially since I have none of my own.”

He paused, and stared down into the fire; his companion well knew that this was the one grief of his married life. Tom loved children, and was ever the most popular and entertaining guest at their dances and amusements; he longed to hear the patter of quick little feet up and down The Holt’s uneven passages. Doodie, his wife, had never shared this craving—the whole County was, so to speak, her child. Possibly she would not have objected to a fine clever boy, who excelled at games and was a brilliant success as a prize-winner, but a large family of daughters—no, thank you! Her husband, on the contrary, had a particular partiality for girls. Often, as he smoked a solitary pipe in the fire-light, with half-closed eyes, he seemed to see a golden-haired darling, the daughter of his dreams, sitting on the hearth-rug, or standing by the window. And here to-day, had actually come to him, the realisation of his visions!

“I do hope—I do hope——” he began, then hesitated.

Mrs. Hesketh raised her dark discontented eyes to his, and murmured an interrogative “Yes?”

After a momentary struggle between inclination and discretion, he continued, “Between you and me, Maudie,” lowering his voice to a whisper, “I hope to goodness that Doodie will take to her!”

CHAPTER II

IT must be admitted that November is not an auspicious month for a stranger to make acquaintance with the English country; the trees are bare and leafless, the fields empty and uninteresting, and what can be said for monotonous, muddy roads, cold frosty mornings, and long dark nights?

However, Letty speedily settled into her awarded niche, and endeavoured to make herself at home. She soon became acquainted with the dogs and horses, with her uncle’s little fads, and her aunt’s peculiarities, duly appeared at church, was presented to the parson’s afflicted wife, and made a state call upon Mrs. Hesketh. Also, she did her utmost to be useful; but her well-meaning efforts were not always successful. For instance, with respect to arranging flowers, the schoolgirl had no experience, her vases looked ragged, or in clumps; she lacked the ‘airy, fairy’ touch of an expert—but that, no doubt, would come. Then as to dusting the valuable old china; here again she was something of a failure. In handling a cherished blue plate, it slipped through her fingers as a thing alive, rolled defiantly along a stone passage, and subsided in a dozen pieces. Although Mrs. Fenchurch had picked this up for sevenpence in a village inn, it was a good specimen, and she showed her displeasure and annoyance plainly—in fact so plainly, that Letty wept! However, day by day the new-comer improved; she helped her aunt to feed the fowls, and date and pack the eggs for sale, assisted in the greenhouse, brushed and exercised the dogs, and took an humble and subordinate part in Mrs. Fenchurch’s numerous and absorbing occupations.

The Holt was situated at the extremity of a picturesque village, which consisted of a rambling street of red brick or black and white houses; half-way down this, perched on a high bank, was a fine old church, with its surrounding graveyard; and here and there, were little shops, and quaint signboards, and what had once been a celebrated posting inn—now used for the storage of grain. At the further end of Thornby was a grim-faced Georgian mansion, standing back from the road, its lawn and approach well screened from view by thick laurel hedges; immediately behind the residence, were large and unexpectedly delightful grounds. Mrs. Hesketh, who had occupied Oldcourt for ten years, was a childless widow, with few belongings or intimates; once a notable leader in society, but latterly indifferent health, and serious money losses, had swept her out of the social current, and she had come to Thornby to live near her active cousin, Dolly Fenchurch, possibly in hopes of catching the contagion of her love for a busy rural life. An intellectual woman, and an omnivorous reader, Maude Hesketh dwelt to a great extent within herself; eagerly watching, through the columns of the Press, the great world as it went rolling by.

Once a year she emerged from her retirement, and went to take the waters at Aix; but the remainder of the time she occupied herself with her books, her flowers, and her own thoughts. In spite of her solitude, Mrs. Hesketh was beautifully dressed, she dressed to please and satisfy a dainty, fastidious taste. Her house, too, was refined, and filled with old French furniture, clever impressionist sketches, bibelots, and exquisitely bound books; and although she had lost a considerable part of her income in a notorious financial failure, she was comfortably off, and kept a carriage, which she rarely used. The lady had the reputation of being eccentric, and something of a mystery; chiefly because she held herself studiously aloof from her neighbours, and was said to give herself ridiculous airs! This was a mistake. Mrs. Hesketh did not cultivate local society, simply because it bored her. She was not interested in parish squabbles, county scandals, or domestic servants; but she visited in the village, where she was much beloved by the poor.

To sum her up, Maude Hesketh was a clever, noble-hearted, dissatisfied woman, bitterly disappointed to find that with all her gifts and opportunities, she had made so little of her life. And now, as she would say to herself, “There is no time—it is almost over!”

But to return to The Holt after this digression. The new inmate was beginning to make her presence felt in the household, she was a ready learner, being both keen and adaptable; her aunt’s example and capabilities impressed her enormously; every day, every hour seemed to have its own particular task. Mrs. Fenchurch had a wonderful sense of organisation and routine, and never one moment to spare. Her writing-room was the nucleus of her activities; here on a neat bureau were ‘the books.’ The house books, the village books, the visitor’s book, the clothing club book, the letter book, the garden book, and last but not least—the egg book! A certain amount of this order and energy was imparted to her niece; the mistress of the house knew how to make use of capable subordinates—she would have made an efficient, though not very popular or gracious abbess—was thoroughly practical, and far-reaching—and particularly prided herself on her sense of justice!

As it happened to be good hunting weather, and an open winter, she left Letty at home as often as three days a week, to act as regent, answer messages, visit the greenhouses, and the poultry-yard, attend the sewing club, and exercise the dogs.

Colonel Fenchurch had suggested that his niece should learn to ride. He had even put her up on old Playboy, and taken her round the fields with a leading-rein, declaring that “the girl really had the riding flair—it was her Irish blood no doubt; she was not a bit afraid, and stuck on like a leech,” but his wife had negatived the idea with prompt decision.

“No, no,” she replied; “if Letty began to ride, she’d be wanting a hunter next, and this winter has been so frightfully expensive, what with the new flues in the greenhouse, and the kitchen range, and then I must get her some frocks for Christmas and the balls. She has nothing now, but hideous German clothes—her school-room horrors—but next year,” pursing up her lips, “perhaps—we shall see!”

And meanwhile Colonel Fenchurch gave his niece riding lessons on the sly; he took her out into the fields on off days when his wife was buried in important letters, and exercised the pony that in summer drew the garden mower. (The Holt was celebrated for its lawns of beautiful old turf.) Letty found her gaunt, hard-featured aunt both cold and unresponsive—the typical English character—but oh, so marvellously clever! As for her uncle—who was of her own blood—she adored him, and manifested this affection in many pretty ways; brought him his pipe and matches, folded up his gloves and mufflers, ran for his cap or hunting-crop. Tom Fenchurch liked it; it warmed his old heart to see this charming girl waiting upon him so eagerly; but his wife contemplated such attentions with a frosty eye. In her opinion, Letty was too impulsive and gushing; and she gave her sundry sharp hints and raps, generally accepted in silence and humility—for all her life long the girl was accustomed to the yoke of obedience. Her mental attitude was another affair, and though she loved her uncle, sad to relate niece Letty was now beginning to detest her aunt.

Accepting Letty as a mere child, and no more, Mrs. Fenchurch was astonished to discover that she was highly accomplished (but why not? She had been at school since she was five years old). She played music at sight, was an excellent German scholar, spoke French fluently, and executed most delicate embroideries—but was deplorably ignorant as to the cutting out and manufacture of garments, that were desirable and useful for the clothing club. It was evident that to her, life outside school and school routine was an absolutely unknown land. She had never seen a Meet, never been to a ball, or taken part in any social festivity. However all that would come in good time; meanwhile the girl was no trouble in the house, and proved surprisingly docile; never advanced opinions of her own, and did precisely as she was told. This aspect of her character appealed to Mrs. Fenchurch; there was nothing she enjoyed so keenly as settling the minds, and arranging the plans of others; and Letty, so to speak, left her life, her aims, and her future, entirely at her aunt’s disposal. Her will was really too flexible, she had no self-confidence, and in the anatomy of her individuality there was no such article as the proverbial backbone!

Mrs. Hesketh, who had taken one of her rare fancies to her cousin’s niece, invited her frequently to tea. It amused and interested her to sound the depths of this transparent young soul—to endeavour to draw out the ideas of sweet seventeen.

“My dear child, you are charming,” she declared, “and you are accomplished, but you cannot possibly go through life without a mind and opinion of your own! When I called to take you for a drive the other day, you could not positively say yes or no—but shall I? And then ‘Perhaps I’d better not,’ and then ‘I’m not sure if aunt won’t want me when she comes in,’ and again, ‘I’d like to go above all things, but I’m afraid I’ve kept you so long that I won’t have time to get ready now.’ And at the end, just as I was getting into the carriage, ‘Oh, how I wish I was going with you!’ Now if you continue like this—always standing between two forked roads, what will become of you? At present your aunt decides, but you cannot always be a tender plant, clinging to a stout support, can you?”

“No,” Letty replied; “I see what you mean, and I feel it myself; but all my days have been ordered for me; my clothes have been chosen, my letters read, my books and companions have been the choice of others; I have always walked in the path that was traced for me, and I seem to expect a guiding hand. If I ever had any will of my own—I believe it died years ago.”

“Look here, my good girl,” said Mrs. Hesketh impatiently, “if you have no will of your own, you must grow one! Now I will plant a little seed. You are asked to sing in the Parish Room on Saturday at the Penny Reading. I hear that your answer, since the matter has been left to you, is undecided.”

“Yes.”

“Tell me honestly, would you like to sing—or are you too nervous?”

“I am not the least nervous. I have been accustomed to sing and play at school concerts for years. I was quite a star!” and she laughed gaily; “and I really would like to sing on Saturday if I thought it would give people pleasure; but I have a sort of suspicion, that Aunt Dorothy would rather I didn’t!”

“That’s imagination,” protested Mrs. Hesketh. “Dorothy knows we are badly off for performers, much less stars. It isn’t as if this was to be a big public performance; there will only be the village folk that you see every day, the parson, the doctor, and myself. Now, Letty, look me straight in the face and tell me, do you wish to give these poor people a little pleasure? Will you sing? There must be no shilly-shallying—it’s yes or no—now.”

“Then,” lifting her laughing eyes, “yes.”

“That’s right. Just go over to my writing-table and write a note to Mr. Denton, and tell him that you will sing two songs with pleasure—you can drop it at the Rectory as you pass by.”

Letty rose and did as she was told, with her usual docile obedience, and presently returned with a note in her hand.

“Ah-ha!” said Mrs. Hesketh, giving her a sharp look, “thus we have planted the first seed!”

Saturday evening arrived, the Parish Room was packed to the doors and window-sills, and there was a good deal of clapping when Miss Glyn, radiantly pretty in her white school frock, was led upon the platform by the Rector. Her aunt, sitting in the front row, looked distinctly grim. Letty’s instinct was correct; it was true that she had been fiercely if secretly opposed to this exhibition! she did not wish to see the girl brought forward—at least not yet: Colonel Fenchurch, on the other hand, was the embodiment of triumphant expectation, and was prepared to lead the claque.

When the prelude on the battered village piano had ceased, Miss Glyn opened her pretty mouth, and began to sing “The Sands of Dee.”

Her voice was exquisite; honey-sweet, and full of restrained passion. She gave this most beautiful tragic song, with extraordinary dramatic expression, and yet in a simple, natural fashion, from the authoritative—

“Go, Mary, call the cattle home,”

till where the last words died away in a tremulous, half-stifled sob.

When she ceased, there was an awestruck breathless silence; in fact, you might have heard the fall of the proverbial pin.

What sort of singing was this? people asked themselves. Something new; something that gripped your heart-strings, something wonderful! Then came thunders of applause, shouts and hammerings and stamping with sticks and feet, such as never had been heard within the walls of the Parish School-house, yells of ‘Encore!’ to which the singer smilingly acceded and gave them “Robin Adair.” Again her audience listened with rapture.

Mrs. Fenchurch was equally astonished, and annoyed, by the composure and aplomb of a girl who in every-day life was so timid and retiring. To-night, she presented the confidence and air of a prima donna of twenty years’ experience; but Letty was for once upon solid ground; she knew her own capabilities, and the radiant and acclaimed Miss Glyn, was a totally different individual from the timid, wistful girl, who suffered herself to be scolded and hustled about The Holt.

In short, that evening Miss Glyn made her name, not only as a marvellous singer with a voice which the baker’s wife—who had been to London—compared to Patti’s—but also as a beauty!

Her fame now gradually oozed through the stolid clay surroundings, and reached villages and market towns that were afar off. These learnt, that the prettiest girl in the whole country-side was a little slip of seventeen, who lived in Thornby village.

It was about this period that Mrs. Fenchurch began to feel seriously jealous of her bright and charming inmate; so popular with the neighbours, with the household, and last, but not least—her husband.

She hated to see her looking at him, or speaking to him, with eyes at once innocent and caressing; and as for Tom, he was simply idiotic about his niece; from time to time, he would come into her bedroom, dressed, or half-dressed, as the case might be, to rave of Letty’s perfections and beauty; to descant on her sweet disposition, and to wind up by declaring, “She’s like sunshine in the house.” The poor man was undoubtedly bewitched, and his enthusiasm received but a tepid acknowledgment. (If you really wish to know a woman’s bad points—praise her to another.)

His wife very solemnly and deliberately, enumerated the girl’s many failings. She was unpunctual, she was forgetful, she was untidy—and she was weak. As for him, he was too silly for anything, and was only making himself absolutely ridiculous, and the laughing-stock of the whole neighbourhood!

But as it happened few of the Neighbourhood (spelt with a capital N) had beheld Colonel Fenchurch’s young relative. County folk do not visit in winter; the great summer gatherings, at cricket matches, tennis, garden parties, and picnics, were over: friends and acquaintances, for the most part, met and exchanged news and gossip in the hunting-field, and for this reason the beautiful flower blooming at The Holt, was so far blushing unseen.

It was Letty’s daily task to take the dogs out for exercise; Sam, the apoplectic pug, Jerry, the impetuous Irish setter, and Locky, the aggressive Aberdeen. One afternoon, as she was plodding along through a muddy lane accompanied by her usual escort, she heard the horn in the distance, and presently the trotting of horses, who were evidently approaching rapidly. And yes, here, coming round a sharp bend, was the whole red-coated hunt.

She hurried into the field with her precious charges, and snatching up the snorting and bewildered pug, established herself behind the gate, from where she could safely watch the cavalcade, as it splashed and pounded by.

A stout, dark-eyed man on a magnificent horse, glanced at her casually, then stared hard—finally he looked back. This individual was Mr. Blagdon, who was enjoying a day’s run, and rather middling sport with the Brakesby pack. He was struck by the figure at the gate; a girl with a beautiful eager face, holding in her arms a struggling dog; but although he made prompt enquiries, not one among his many acquaintances could tell him the name of the young lady in the blue cloak, whom they had passed in Rapstone lane.

CHAPTER III

CHRISTMAS was approaching, and so far, Miss Glyn’s acquaintance was confined to the village of Thornby. Now and then her aunt and uncle went from home for a dine and a shoot, and on these occasions, Mrs. Hesketh took charge of the young lady, who was delighted to be her guest. At Oldcourt the atmosphere was reposeful, the surroundings subdued and luxurious, and life was leisured. Here it was seemingly ‘always afternoon.’ Letty was not sure that she would enjoy it as a permanence; perhaps there was too much of the hothouse in the air, but it was an agreeable change from The Holt, where it was figuratively a perpetual Monday, with a large washing on hand!

Cousin Maudie, an accomplished musician, encouraged her guest to practise, played her accompaniments, and delighted in her voice. Now Mrs. Fenchurch hated ‘squalling,’ had no ear, and was actually proud of the fact, that she only knew “God Save the King” by seeing people rise to their feet! Mrs. Hesketh also loved books, and the tables at Oldcourt were loaded with the newest and best publications, whether in magazine, pamphlet, or book form. Letty laid greedy hands on these, but her hostess prudently withdrew a certain amount—sociological and theological works—which were not suitable reading for Sweet Seventeen.

Letty admired—and loved—her beautiful (if rather faded) hostess, and the love and admiration were mutual. The new-comer had also made friends with the Vicar and his wife. Mr. Denton, a hale, active man of fifty, much praised by his own flock, and respected by others. Mrs. Denton, though she had lost the use of her limbs through sleeping in a damp bed, was her husband’s helper in the parish, and it was surprising what an amount of work, correspondence, and interviews centred round her sofa. She was a frail, delicate Irishwoman, with a sense of humour, a cheerful disposition, and a warm heart. Both she and her husband had taken a fancy to the ‘little girl at The Holt,’ as they called her. She reminded them of their own little girl, who had married and gone to India; to see Letty flitting about the drawing-room, or seated in Mabel’s chair, was a sight that gave them sincere pleasure. And the child was so simple and unaffected, she looked into one’s face with such sweet candid eyes, and was ever ready and glad to carry a message, sing, play, or read, to the invalid, keenly interested in little village events, and the weekly Madras letter—all she asked for in return, was to be liked!

In a surprisingly short time, this attractive stranger had entirely wound herself into the affections of the Dentons; her visits were not frequent, but on hunting days, after she had exercised the dogs, she would turn into the Rectory drawing-room, and pour out tea.

Immediately before Christmas, Mrs. Fenchurch, who was absorbed in her correspondence, sent Letty down to the Rectory with a note. When she arrived there it was still teatime, and she was surprised to find that Mrs. Denton had a guest, a good-looking young man, who appeared to find himself completely at home, since he was sitting on the end of the sofa, nursing the Rectory cat.

“Oh, Letty, so there you are!” said Mrs. Denton. “Let me introduce my nephew, Lancelot Lumley. He has come to spend Christmas with us. Lancelot, this is Miss Glyn—you have heard of her?”

“We have met before,” he said eagerly; “a couple of months ago, I think, in that railway shake-up?”

“Yes,” she assented, for here was the very travelling companion, who had worn the buffer coat, “in the train.”

“It might have been a bad business,” he continued, and described the incident to his aunt.

“I suppose it happened when you were on your way home?”

“Yes, I took first leave this year, and I’m sorry to say I have nearly come to the end of it.”

“And give us only two days, Lance—you ought to be ashamed of yourself!”

“The fact is, Frances wouldn’t let me off, and Colonel Kingsnorth lent me a hunter; we have had some ripping good runs.”

“Ah!” said his aunt, “I think it was the hunter that wouldn’t let you off.” Then, turning to Letty, she explained, “My brother-in-law, Lancelot’s father, has a living twenty miles from here, at a place called Sharsley; but he might as well be in London, for it’s so dreadfully out of the way. We don’t see one another half a dozen times in the year. This note,” holding it up to Letty, “is from your aunt; she says she is so desperately busy, that she can’t help with the church decorations. You know she has always undertaken the pulpit, she sends you as her deputy, and will supply the usual pots of palms and chrysanthemums. Lancelot,” looking over at her nephew, “I intend to make use of you—you and Miss Glyn must do the pulpit between you.”

“All right,” he answered, “I am agreeable, if Miss Glyn is; but let me warn you that I have no more idea of decorating than I have of making a watch.”

“I am afraid I am not much good either,” supplemented the girl; “I’ve had no practice.”

“Miss Glyn left school two months ago,” explained Mrs. Denton.

“Were you sorry?” enquired the young man, looking over at her.

“Yes,” then with a burst of artless honesty—“I have been to school nearly all my life.”

“She is coming out at the Hunt Ball early in January,” announced Mrs. Denton.

“Yes, and I won’t know a single creature at it!”

“Oh, your aunt will find you plenty of partners. You could not be in better hands. I feel sure she will make a most capable chaperon. It is miraculous how she manages to get rid of the most hopeless articles at bazaars. No one can resist her!”

“And you think she will get me off!” Letty laughed, and her laugh was joyous.

“Not a doubt of it! Sooner than see you sitting out, she’d dance with you herself. And about her note—so it is all settled, Letty. You will be down here at eleven o’clock to-morrow; bring a large ball of twine, and a pair of scissors, and Miss Hoare, the schoolmistress, will start you. Remember I shall expect you and Lancelot to turn out the most beautiful pulpit that has ever been seen in Thornby.”

“I can only say that I will do my best,” said Letty, rising.

“What! you are not going yet?”

“I am afraid I must. Aunt Dorothy has quantities of things she wants me to do this evening—there’s the ticketing for the Christmas Tree.”

“Oh, poor child, I don’t envy you,” said Mrs. Denton with upraised hands. “Well, in that case, I won’t detain you—Lancelot will escort you home,” and subsequently he and the young lady left the room together; she protesting, he assuring her that if she didn’t mind, he would be glad to make the stroll an excuse for a pipe. Strange to record, until that evening, Letty had never realised how short was the distance between the Rectory and The Holt! Here in the entrance hall she encountered her aunt; Mrs. Fen, who was overwhelmed with affairs, wore a frowning brow, and carried half a dozen parcels and a Directory.

“Who was that I heard speaking just now?” she enquired sharply; “it sounded like a man’s voice?”

“It was only Mr. Lumley, Mrs. Denton’s nephew; he walked home with me.”

“Oh, so he is here, is he?” she remarked over her shoulder, as she swept into the smoking-room.

“Is that Lancelot Lumley you are talking of?” enquired Colonel Fenchurch, who was reading. “I suppose he bicycled over to spend Christmas—they find it hatefully dull without Mabel. You’d better ask him up to lunch, or something.”

“I think at this time of the year, when one has so much to do,” and Mrs. Fenchurch shot a glance at her husband, and then at Letty, “people don’t expect to be entertained.”

“Of course not,” agreed the Colonel; “I expect Lumley to entertain me—you forget that he is in my old regiment. I want to hear how the old corps is getting along. To think that a boy who joined a few years before I left, is commanding them now!”

“Oh, very well, Tom, then do as you like—ask him up to lunch or dinner.”

“He is an awfully good sort,” Colonel Fenchurch explained to Letty; “one of my favourites—none of your ‘haw-haw’ chaps. His father is a poor parson, and this boy has worked himself on—getting scholarships; he passed first out of Sandhurst. I believe he scarcely cost old Lumley a ten-pound note—he’s the hope of the family—such a good——”

“There—there, Tom,” interrupted his wife, “that’s quite enough about young Lumley! He doesn’t interest Letty, or me. Now, Letty, I can’t have you standing idle, run away, take off your things, and go out into the laundry and help Fletcher to ticket the things for the Christmas Tree.”

It is extraordinary the amount of intimacy that can result from a mutual undertaking, in which two young people are engaged. After Mr. Lumley and Miss Glyn had finished the pulpit—which to do them justice was a work of great labour crowned with success—they felt as if they had been acquainted, not for hours, but for weeks. This impression, was further strengthened when they met at dinner. Letty, wearing her plain white school frock, the young man looking handsome and well groomed in the regulation swallow tail. It transpired, that they had been engaged in decorating the church, and Mrs. Fenchurch and her husband might have been a little surprised at finding they already knew one another so well, had not the Colonel been absorbed in regimental stories, and Mrs. Fenchurch mentally composing an important letter, that was to go by that night’s post.

After dinner, when Colonel Fenchurch and his guest had each smoked an excellent cigar, the former said:

“Now you must come into the drawing-room and hear my niece sing,” and in spite of her aunt’s protestations that Letty had too much to do, and she could not possibly spare her, she was led to the piano and enchanted her listeners with two or three of Schumann’s songs, and Gounod’s “Ave Maria,” and the extraordinary impression that this beautiful girl had made upon a susceptible young man, was now complete.

Lancelot Lumley looked and listened in silence, and surrendered his heart without a further struggle. Although he knew, that it was absolute madness for him to think of Miss Glyn as anything but a star that dwelt apart! He had his way to make—she was penniless—her face, her lovely face, was her fortune.

On Christmas morning as he sat alone in the Rectory pew, his eyes often wandered across the aisle, in search of Miss Glyn. How her sweet voice appeared to rise and swell above all others; and to the infatuated lover it seemed, that the beautiful fair-haired girl, with the rapt, devotional expression, was the embodiment of a Herald angel! When the service was over, Lumley met his angel in the porch; here they exchanged seasonable greetings and received congratulations on their joint embellishment of the pulpit. Then, very late on Christmas night, Lumley ran up to The Holt to bid them all good-bye. He was hurrying home early the next morning, as his leave had nearly expired; but brief as this visit was, he found an opportunity to say to Letty:

“I hear you are coming out at the Hunt Ball the end of January? Perhaps I can get leave for it. I generally try to put in an appearance—you know it’s in my part of the world, and I see all my friends there.”

The real gist of these explanations and excuses was summed up at the end of the sentence:

“I say, Miss Glyn, if I do manage to turn up—will you keep a couple of waltzes for me?”

At which request the young lady coloured, and replied:

“Yes, with pleasure.”

By and by the little seed planted by Mrs. Hesketh began to peep above ground, and Letty Glyn’s will came to life. It made its first appearance on the arrival of certain patterns from London, and the question of a selection from among these, for a best afternoon, and two evening dresses. Mrs. Fenchurch was not disposed to allow her niece any choice in the matter. After looking at them critically, and fingering the textures, she said:

“The dark green will make you a nice afternoon frock; and you will want a smart black evening dress, and a ball-gown. Fletcher can make them all with a little assistance from Mrs. Cope in the village. For the ball dress, I fancy this white brocade trimmed with apple-green satin. How do you think that will look?”

“I don’t think I should care about it,” replied Letty.

“What!” exclaimed her aunt, staring at her in glassy amazement, “it would be charming. I remember I had a ball dress something like it years ago.”

“But fashions have changed since then,” objected the girl; “don’t you think a dress for a débutante should be soft, and all white, with perhaps a little silver?”

“Now, my dear, what can you possibly know about it?”

“Not much, I admit; we were very plainly dressed at school, and our clothes, I must confess, were dowdy, yet now and then, one had a chance of seeing what was worn—for instance, at the opera.”

“Do you mean on the stage?”

“Oh no, I mean the lovely elegant Court ladies that were in the boxes.”

“Then what is your own idea?” her aunt enquired sarcastically.

“I should like a soft white crêpe over white satin—with some silver embroidery on the body.”

“Yes, I daresay you would!” sneered Mrs. Fenchurch; “why the materials alone of such a dress would cost at least ten pounds.”

“I have ten pounds,” was the unexpected reply; then, colouring a little in answer to her aunt’s sharp interrogative glance, “uncle gave it to me for a Christmas box.”

For a moment Mrs. Fenchurch was speechless; she had never heard a word of this present, and to tell the truth, Uncle Tom when he placed the ten-pound note in the girl’s hand had said:

“This is just a little secret between you and me.” Now it was a secret no longer!

Mrs. Fenchurch’s feelings were altogether too much for her. She hastily collected her patterns, rose, and without a word flounced out of the room.

It seemed to Mrs. Fenchurch, that this simple schoolgirl was obtaining an extraordinary and disastrous ascendancy not only in the village, but in the household. The servants—little country chits, whom she had herself trained since they went out of pinafores—would do anything for Miss Glyn. Sam the pug (Mrs. Fenchurch’s own private dog) had handed over his heart to the girl, and attached himself to her exclusively—and as for Tom, he was her slave! It was Letty, Letty, Letty, all day; and when this girl began to make her appearance in a wider circle, would she, Mrs. Fenchurch—influential Mrs. Fenchurch—have to take a back seat?

It was also evident to Mrs. Fenchurch, that of late this interloper had developed in many ways, and was inclined to enter into conversation, and even to offer opinions! This sort of thing must be nipped without delay. Once she began to take an inch, it would soon become an ell—the inch, would be the selection of her ball-gown. It was too ridiculous that a girl of seventeen who had never been to a dance in her life, should dare to set up her taste in opposition to her own.

With a stern resolve implanted in her mind, Mrs. Fenchurch sat down and wrote off to London, ordering materials, which included the white brocade, and green satin trimming.

In two or three days the order had arrived, and after breakfast, she summoned Letty into her bedroom—a delightful chamber with large bow windows and bright chintzes, facing full south, and overlooking the lawns.

“You want to see me, aunt?” she asked as she entered (inwardly quaking) and awaited instructions.

In the long glass which faced them from floor to ceiling, Mrs. Fenchurch beheld the full-length reflections of her niece and herself; she, in a rough tweed gown, spare, weather-beaten, long-nosed, elderly; the girl, in a cheap blue serge, slim, erect, beautiful as the morning—and with all her best days to come! A sharp spasm of anger and jealousy darted through her mind. Alas! alas! Her own best days had gone by. She, Dorothy Fenchurch, was entering on the season of the sere and yellow leaf—and was conscious of an agonising self-pity.

“Oh yes, it’s about your ball dress. Here,” tearing open her parcel, “are the materials—they came to-day.”

It was undeniably a heavy and matronly brocade that she unfolded, and as for the green satin ribbon, whatever it might look at night, it was hideous by day!

“Oh!” exclaimed the girl, “so you got the brocade after all—and I have sent for the white crêpe.”

“You have sent for the white crêpe—without consulting me!” repeated Mrs. Fenchurch, speaking as it were in capital letters.

“Well, you see uncle gave me the money to spend as I pleased. The crêpe has come too, and is really lovely. May I show it to you?”

“No, I don’t want to see it! I am amazed at your daring to do such a thing as order a dress without my permission. One thing I can promise you, and that is, that it won’t be made up! You go to the ball—if you go at all—in a gown of my selection.”

“Then, I think,” and the girl became very red, “that I will stay at home. Yes—I should look too ridiculous.”

“You will look exactly as I choose!” declared Mrs. Fenchurch, suddenly losing her self-control; the smouldering resentment which had been gathering for weeks now bursting into flames; a strange, wild fury, all the long-pent-up grievances, annoyances, jealousies, finding outlet at last. It must be confessed that just at the moment, she was suffering torture from neuralgia in her face—the result of long rides in piercing cold, or damp evenings, when the day’s sport was over.

“May I ask if you understand your position here? Do you realise that but for me, you would be now out earning your bread as a nursery governess—are you aware, that ever since you were born, your father’s people have never given you a single penny, and that all the burden of your maintenance has fallen on us—or rather, I should say, on me? And here, instead of being grateful for a happy home, and for every luxury and indulgence, you are setting yourself up, and saying what you will wear, and defying me to my face. Go to your room—I hate the sight of you!”

Letty had listened to this bitter indictment with rapidly changing colour; she knew that her aunt had never cared for her; but that she absolutely hated her, and felt her to be a burden and an interloper, came as a revelation. She left the room in silence, and Mrs. Fenchurch, who was trembling with passion, snatched up the brocade, carried it into the maid’s working-room, and commanded her to lose no time about making it up for Miss Glyn. But afterwards, when she had cooled, Mrs. Fen began to realise that she had gone too far; for once in her life she acknowledged to herself, that she had said too much.

Colonel Fenchurch was surprised and concerned when he saw his niece at lunch with a very white face, and very red eyes. She ate scarcely a morsel, and seemed to find considerable difficulty in swallowing or speaking. On his wife’s brow there sat a heavy cloud, and he noticed the servants glancing significantly at one another—something had happened—there had been a blow up! But he, being a cautious and somewhat nervous little gentleman, talked about the weather and a lame horse, and withdrew as soon as possible into the shelter of his smoking-room; where he consoled himself with a recent copy of the Field, and a good cigar.

During the afternoon, Mrs. Fenchurch, having fortified herself with a large glass of port and quinine, climbed up to the top of the house, to make the amende to her niece.

“Well, Letty,” she began as she entered, “I am sorry we have had a difference of opinion; but I suppose you will allow that you are little more than a child, and that I am a woman of experience, and should know what should be done, and worn, better than yourself?”

Letty stood up, her lips twitched, and her eyes filled with tears as she answered:

“I am sorry, aunt, that you are displeased with me, and I—I—suppose I was impertinent. I meant no harm in sending for the crêpe dress, and indeed I thought it would save you buying my ball-gown.”

This was precisely the attitude of which Mrs. Fenchurch most warmly approved, and as the girl looked completely cowed, she said:

“I am sorry that I lost my temper—so let us make it up; and as you have bought the white crêpe, you shall wear it. The other will come in later,” and having offered, what she considered, a most remarkable concession, Mrs. Fen kissed her niece sharply, and walked downstairs. After she had departed, Letty stood listening to her descending footsteps; somehow her aunt’s footsteps, coming or going, invariably made her heart flutter like that of some terrified animal. When the last sound had died away, she flung herself down upon her bed. She didn’t care about the ball, or the crêpe dress—or anything! She was an interloper; no one wanted her. How bitter it was, to eat bread that was begrudged. In what shape or form could she ever find release?

It was agonising to reflect, that she might go on living month after month, and year after year, under the roof of a woman who had called her a pauper, and a burden.

CHAPTER IV

THE great day dawned at last; the day of the Hunt Ball, which took place annually in the Town Hall of Ridgefield, and was attended by everybody who was anyone—and many nobodies.

Letty’s white crêpe, completed with her assistance, was charming; soft, girlish, and yet distinguished—for her mental eye had copied it from one of the trousseau gowns of a young and royal princess.

Mrs. Fenchurch, who was not remarkable for her taste in dress, wore a ginger-coloured velvet, with opal ornaments; but she carried herself with dignity and looked a Claremont, and a personage! Colonel Fenchurch, in his pink coat, black satin breeches, and neat silk stockings, squeezed himself into the brougham, with many compliments for his two companions.

The town of Ridgefield was eight miles away, and as the family bowled along the road at a steady pace, the Colonel dozed, his wife meditated with closed eyes; but their niece all the time stared out on the brown hedges and bare ditches, which were illuminated by the flashing carriage lamps. Of what was she thinking? Was it possible that she was wondering if Lancelot Lumley would be at the ball?

The Holt party were somewhat late arrivals, and when the carriage drew up under an awning in front of the Town Hall, the first to step out and run the gauntlet of many spectators was Colonel Fenchurch. He had a remarkably well-turned leg, and looked particularly spruce. His wife followed with impressive deliberation, and last of all came the young lady in white. Her appearance was greeted with a loud murmur, as she floated up the steps in the wake of her relations.

As they left the cloak-room, Mrs. Fenchurch, who had received many greetings, was confronted with a lady in a superb sable cloak; a handsome woman with flashing black eyes, and wearing in her hair a magnificent diamond ornament.

“Oh, Mrs. Fen,” she exclaimed, “how are you? Going strong, eh?” Then her eyes suddenly alighted on Mrs. Fen’s companion, and she gave her a hard, critical stare.

“Ah, I suppose this little girl is the niece? going to take her preliminary canter?” and with a patronising nod, she passed on to the dressing-room.

Letty encountered her aunt’s eye, who, seizing her arm to lead her forward, said:

“That is Mrs. Flashman, a wonderful rider, but an odious, detestable creature, who slams gates, jostles you at fences, and swears at her horses, and her servants.”

Two minutes later, Miss Glyn found herself with a programme in her hand, standing in the ball-room. This was beautifully decorated, a military band was established in the gallery, and the sides of the room and a sort of platform at the upper end were densely crowded with guests. Others were promenading up and down impatiently awaiting the next waltz. Many neighbours had brought large house-parties, whose smart gowns and splendid jewels, gave an air of London society to the Brakesley Hunt Ball.

Mrs. Fenchurch paced slowly towards the dais. On her way, she encountered several acquaintances, and introduced her niece to Lord Seafield—a thin young man with a very prominent nose and no chin—to Sir Edgar Broome, the M.F.H., and to the Dowager Duchess of Campshire.

Before ascending the platform, she was accosted by Lancelot Lumley, who came forward eagerly, programme in hand, and said:

“I hope Miss Glyn can spare me a couple of waltzes?”

Miss Glyn promptly produced her programme, and he scribbled his initials before three. The next, which was just beginning, the one before supper, and number twelve.

Mrs. Fenchurch looked on with glum disapproval. Three dances to an impecunious subaltern! But she could not offer any audible objection, and as the band struck up he said:

“Shall we make a start now before the room gets crammed?” and light as a feather the young lady was whirled away, and the elder was compelled to mount to the platform alone. But from this and other coigns of vantage, the extraordinary beauty of Miss Glyn was soon remarked. Indeed, her own chaperon, as she surveyed her through her best gold glasses, assured herself, that she had never until now realised the girl’s astonishing good looks! Of course dress went a long way, so did youth—and candle-light; but Letty’s profile was perfect, her complexion, the shape of her face, the setting on of her head, were beyond criticism—and then her grace!

As Dorothy Fenchurch watched the white form revolving round and round, she began to experience an intoxicating sensation; the stimulating conviction was borne in upon her, that she had a valuable prize to offer in the marriage market!

Seen just at home, running about in her school frocks and garden apron, Letty was merely a pretty girl, with lots of hair, and a good complexion; here, in the midst of the magnates of the land, she was the beauty of the evening! People—her neighbours—gathered about Mrs. Fenchurch and began to talk, discussing local news, the recent weather, the various notable magnates who had honoured the ball.

“I say, Mrs. Fen, have you noticed the lovely nymph in white and silver?” enquired the Secretary of the Hunt. “I haven’t seen anything so exquisite for years; do let me show her to you?”

“There is no occasion, thank you, she is my niece, Miss Glyn,” proclaimed the uplifted aunt.

“What—your niece?” echoed a matron. “Why, my dear lady, where have you kept her all this time?”

“She has only been with us about two months.”

“And you have defrauded us of two months,” burst in a young man. “Mrs. Fen, how dared you?”

“No, no,” protested Mrs. Flashman of the bold eyes and a scandalously décolleté dress. “Mrs. Fenchurch is a clever woman. She understands the art of an effective surprise!”

By this time the music had ceased, and Miss Glyn, a little breathless and looking radiantly happy, was brought back to her aunt—now encompassed by a number of men clamouring for introductions. In the midst of this triumphant scene, a square-shouldered individual, perfectly groomed, with the blue of his strong beard showing through his heavy, clean-shaven face, stepped up on the platform. It was the psychological moment! Here was the girl he had noticed at the gate, surrounded by competitive partners, and he said to himself, “No wonder!” This dazzling vision in white and silver, eclipsed every woman in the room! He accosted Mrs. Fenchurch with unusual empressement, and then glanced interrogatively at her companion.

“Oh, let me present you to my niece—Mr. Blagdon—Miss Glyn,” she murmured with effusive haste.

“Got any dances to spare?” he asked with an off-hand air.

“Yes,” she answered; “I have two or three left—but——”

“Are you engaged for the next?” he interrupted brusquely.

As this happened to be a set of Lancers, she breathed a reluctant “No.”

“Oh, then I may have it?” he declared, confronting her with a bold and confident eye. As she yielded her card, he wrote himself down for this, as well as two others (which Letty had secretly been keeping for Lancelot Lumley). “H. Blagdon” was also marked before an extra; but a man with many thousands a year is granted a liberal margin. Mrs. Fenchurch was looking on; her eyes glittered, a real colour came into her thin cheeks. Supposing that he had taken a fancy to Letty? It would be too wonderful to think of! The most promising suitor she had allowed herself to expect, was some officer from a neighbouring depôt; but then, until that evening she had never fully understood the value of the treasure she had hidden at The Holt. Now, her ambition, determination, and energy, were stirred, and she was resolved that Letty should make a great match. Everyone knew that Hugo Blagdon ‘barred girls’: he never noticed them, never danced with them—indeed, he rarely danced at all—generally he sat in a remote corner with some notorious married woman—yet here he was, filling up the programme of her niece, and devouring her shy beauty with his hard, bold eyes.

Undoubtedly most people liked to look at Letty. Was there ever such a perfect little nose, such a short upper lip, delicately cut mouth, or sweeping black lashes?

Presently the Lancers struck up, and Blagdon, offering his arm, conducted his partner down the room, as it were in triumph; undoubtedly she was the star of the evening! As he passed along, he noticed that the eyes of everyone were fixed upon his companion. This was just the sort of girl that would suit him for a wife! a girl so remarkable, so absolutely perfect in appearance, that all the jealous world would stare at her open-mouthed.

Having invited an aristocratic vis-à-vis, they took their places in a set and danced. Blagdon found Miss Glyn shy—she had not much to say for herself. With difficulty he gathered that she didn’t hunt, had only lately left school, and was seventeen last birthday; but it was sufficiently agreeable for him to feel that she was the cynosure of all eyes, and that he was the envy of every man in the room!

Mrs. Flashman, who was in the same set, swam hither and thither in her gorgeous French gown, and now and then darted glances of sarcastic amusement at her friend Hugo and the little baby; and whispered en passant in the Grand Chain:

“Where is the bread and butter?”

The remainder of that evening was, from her aunt’s point of view, an uninterrupted triumph for Letty: a number of influential people had begged to make her acquaintance; envious and rancorous rivals—mothers of large families, had uttered spiteful things about Hugo Blagdon. He had taken her niece to supper, had only danced with her that night, and when not dancing, had posted himself where he could keep her in view—all of which signs and tokens even the most comatose chaperon could not fail to note! Oh, it was undoubtedly a case.

Had Letty enjoyed her first ball? She was not sure. She enjoyed dancing with Mr. Lumley and with various other young men; she enjoyed the band, and the ices, and loved dancing for dancing’s sake, but somehow there seemed to be between Mr. Lumley and Mr. Blagdon a sharp but secret conflict for her company. When she was swinging round in the arms of Mr. Lumley, she was aware that the other was watching them closely; and when it was Blagdon’s dance he stalked up and claimed her with an air of appropriation, that she found both disagreeable and disconcerting.

However she danced the last waltz that evening with the soldier—who informed her that he had come all the way from Aldershot on purpose to claim her promise! He was so good-looking, he had a charming voice and such nice eyes; little Letty’s heart beat quickly, and the colour came into her cheeks.

“Give my love to Aunt Harriet,” he said; “and tell her that I will run over and see her before very long, and stay three or four days.”

For a moment the girl felt ecstatically happy, inspired by an unreasoning joy and strangely moved and uplifted; but it was Mr. Blagdon who escorted her to have a cup of soup at the buffet before she departed, who stared at her with an expression that frightened her, and who conducted her down to the entrance hall through a long line of spectators. And never had Letty known her aunt to be so gracious, so affectionate, or in such talkative good-humour; she had actually called her ‘darling!’

“I hope you are well wrapped up,” she urged; “take care of your dress, darling.”

“And mind you take great care of her,” supplemented Blagdon at the carriage window. He held out his hand to Letty, kept hers an unnecessary length of time, and squeezed it painfully ere he closed the door of the brougham and they drove off. The last object she beheld, thrown into sharp relief by the glaring lamps and red carpet, was his hard, staring brown eyes, his stolid, complacent face, and she sank into her corner with a sigh of relief. Thank goodness she would never see him again!

She was to hear of him, however! On the way home her aunt loudly sang the praises of Hugo Blagdon, the richest man in the county. He had the most lovely place, and was so popular; he had travelled a great deal, and owned a yacht and a coach, indeed everything—just like a prince in a fairy tale. During all these eulogiums and dazzling descriptions Colonel Fenchurch maintained an unusual silence.

“What do you think of him, Letty?” he enquired at last.

“He dances well,” she answered carelessly, “though he soon gets out of breath, and has rather an old-fashioned step.”

“Well, there is not a woman in this part of the world that isn’t delighted to have him for a partner,” said her aunt, with an air of finality; then, changing the subject, she proceeded to discuss the ball in detail, from the decorations to the soup. Her remarks about the guests—especially girls—were not altogether generous; now that she had, so to speak, her own goods to offer, Mrs. Fenchurch was a merciless critic of the wares of others.

“Did you notice Lady Vera, Tom? She’s supposed to be a beauty, a tall, scraggy, spotty creature, with a wreath over her nose?” A pause. “And how can Mrs. Reed allow her daughters to be seen in such filthy frocks!—anything good enough for the country. Those poor Bradfields hardly left their seats—so humiliating for a chaperon to have her charges on hand all the time—what do you say, Tom?”

But Tom’s sole reply was a gentle snore.

Then, turning to Letty and stroking her arm, her aunt said:

“My dear child, you were perfectly right about the white crêpe, you looked charming—charming! I was proud of you!” and as she pinched her wrist, playfully, the girl, with the quick insight of youth, divined that here was an entirely different relative to the one who had told her she was a ‘pauper, and a burden.’ She now addressed her, as if she were an equal—and indeed there was actually a tinge of deference in her remarks. What did it mean?

The Belle of the Hunt Ball toiled up to bed tired and footsore at five o’clock in the morning. She had enjoyed the evening immensely, and yet she had not enjoyed it! On the one hand, there was the dancing, the good partners, the charming things people had said to her, and the agreeable inward conviction of having been whispered about, and admired; on the other, there was the rich man, with his staring eyes and brusque, imperious manner—and the inexplicable rise in the temperature of her aunt’s affection. What did it mean?

And still wondering, Letty tumbled into bed, and presently entered the land of dreams.

CHAPTER V

THE morning after the ball, Letty was aroused from the profound sleep of youth and exhaustion by a stealthy, grating sound, and opening her eyes, to her amazement she beheld Jones, the under-housemaid, kneeling on the hearth-rug, intent on kindling a particularly sulky fire.

As she raised herself on her elbow, blinking and bewildered, the maid sat up on her heels and proceeded to explain the situation with glib volubility.

“Oh, miss, I’m sorry; the mistress gave orders you were not to be disturbed, and I was to light your fire; but there ain’t been one in the grate this forty year, and it’s a sore job. Hawkins is bringing up your breakfast.”