THE HAMPSTEAD MYSTERY.

A Novel.

BY

FLORENCE MARRYAT,

AUTHOR OF ‘LOVE’S CONFLICT,’ ‘VÉRONIQUE,’ ‘MY OWN CHILD,’ ‘MY SISTER THE ACTRESS,’ ‘HOW LIKE A WOMAN,’ ‘PARSON JONES,’ ETC., ETC.

IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.

LONDON:
F. V. WHITE & CO.,
14 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND, W.C.
1894.

CONTENTS.

THE HAMPSTEAD MYSTERY.

The Hampstead Mystery.

CHAPTER I.

‘Once for all,’ exclaimed Mr Crampton, bringing down his broad fist heavily upon the table, ‘once for all, I tell you, I will not have it.’

At this terrible assertion, Mrs Crampton shivered as if she had been struck, and Aunt Clem silently dissolved into tears. Henry Hindes, of all the party, alone preserved his composure. He leaned back in his chair, carefully trimming his filbert nails with a penknife, as if the affair under discussion were not of the slightest moment.

‘Of course you will not have it,’ he said after a pause to Mr Crampton, ‘no man in his senses would. Mr Frederick Walcheren has money and good looks, but there his claims to admiration end. The first you do not require for your daughter, and the second would have no weight with anyone but a woman. To place against these supposed advantages, Mr Walcheren is a young man of dissolute habits, and lavish expenditure. You should hear what his cousin, Philip Walcheren, says of him.’

‘I want no one’s opinion but my own,’ replied Mr Crampton vehemently. ‘Jenny will have all my money by-and-by, and she shall marry no man that will make ducks and drakes of it. Besides, he isn’t good enough for her in any way. He thinks, I suppose, because his family have been a set of idle scoundrels for centuries past, while my progenitors have been working to support their children, that his is the better of the two, but I don’t see it. Besides, if he were the heir to the Crown, he shouldn’t have my daughter. He’s a Roman, that’s more than enough for me. I’ll have no Papists in my family. I hate the whole crew, with their cunning, underhand ways. If Jenny won’t give this Walcheren fellow over, I’ll lock her up on bread and water till she comes to her senses again.’

As neither of the ladies made any answer to this threat, Mr Hindes interfered again.

‘Surely,’ he said with an incredulous smile, ‘Miss Crampton will not dream of opposing your wishes in this particular, when so much depends upon her obedience. What can she see in this young man to attract her, above others of his kind; she who has a crowd of admirers wherever she goes, and is the acknowledged beauty of Hampstead? I believe, Crampton, that you are alarming yourself without cause. Miss Crampton means nothing serious. She is merely amusing herself with the sight of young Walcheren’s infatuation for her.’

‘It’s more than that,’ returned the older man; ‘I’ve forbidden the girl to dance with him when she meets him out, or to receive him here during my absence. And now, her mother tells me, she met them riding together yesterday afternoon, and has intercepted a letter from him to Jenny, in which he writes as though they were promised to each other. What am I to do? I can’t be always at my daughter’s elbow, and her mother can’t go galloping all over the country after her. It is disgraceful to think that a young lady of twenty can’t be trusted to behave herself properly as soon as she is out of her parents’ sight!’

‘Don’t you think you are making rather a mountain out of a molehill?’ inquired Henry Hindes, in the same calm way. ‘Doubtless, Miss Crampton is young and thoughtless, and, if I may venture to say so—perhaps just a wee bit spoilt; but is that any reason that you should suspect her of impropriety? And, after all, is there anything wrong or unusual in a lovely girl being followed and persecuted by her admirers? Perhaps, if the truth were known, Miss Crampton might be as well pleased to get rid of Mr Walcheren as you would be.’

At this juncture, Mrs Crampton took heart of grace to put in her oar.

‘Oh, thank you, dear Mr Hindes!’ she exclaimed. ‘I am sure you are right. That is, I feel certain that Jenny cares no more for Mr Walcheren than for anyone else. She is a trifle wilful and does not brook contradiction well—I acknowledge that—and perhaps papa and I have spoilt her a little; she is such a darling, you know, that it is very difficult not to spoil her—but she would never really oppose our wishes. Papa has only to speak to her—’

‘Nonsense!’ interposed Mr Crampton gruffly. ‘I have spoken to her a dozen times already, and she laughs in my face and disobeys me as soon as my back is turned. But this business has gone far enough, and I mean to put a stop to it. Where is the girl?’ he continued, turning to his wife; ‘go and tell her I wish to speak to her at once!’

‘My dear, she has not risen yet. I do not suppose she is awake!’

‘And it is past eleven,’ said her husband.

‘Yes; but remember how late she was up last night. I don’t think we were home till past two o’clock.’

‘Whilst she was dancing with this young jackanapes, I conclude, and letting him make eyes at her! Well! it is for the last time, I can tell Miss Jenny that! If she disobeys me again, I’ll take her right away from Hampstead, and she shall never see it till the fellow’s dead, or married. No Papistical grandchildren for me! I can tell her that!’

‘Oh, Mr Crampton!’ cried his wife, with affected horror.

‘Yes, it is “Oh! Mr Crampton,”’ repeated the old man angrily, mimicking her thin tones, ‘and it’ll be “Oh! Mrs Crampton,” if you don’t take care. It’s more than half your fault! You should look better after your daughter, and then these unpleasantries wouldn’t happen. But you let her have her own way in everything. She just rules you and Miss Bostock, and then you leave me to rectify your errors. It isn’t fair on either me or the child!’

Mrs Crampton and her sister, Miss Bostock, familiarly known as Aunt Clem, were now weeping in concert.

‘I am sure,’ sobbed the mother, ‘I’ve done everything in my power, short of turning Mr Walcheren out of doors, to prevent his calling here so often, because I knew you didn’t wish it, John. Last time he came I would not order up tea, until Jenny made such a point of it that I could not refuse. And when the dear child rides, or drives, you know it is impossible for me to supervise her actions.’

‘You should go with her,’ grumbled her husband.

‘Oh! dear! I wouldn’t sit behind those cobs of hers for all the world! It frightens me to see her drive them. And she won’t come out in the barouche with Aunt Clem and me. She laughs at the very idea. She is so very high-spirited, you see. She must have her own way in everything!’

‘Well, go and fetch her here,’ said Mr Crampton shortly; ‘I must speak to her before I go to town.’

‘But if she is not dressed, my dear,’ remonstrated his wife.

‘Tell her to dress at once and come to me! Now, no nonsense, or I’ll pull her out of bed myself.’

The two women flew from the room to prevent so awful a contingency, and the men were left alone. They were partners in the well-known firm of Messrs Hindes & Crampton, wool-staplers in the city.

Henry Hindes, although much the younger of the two, was head of the business, having inherited his share through the death of his father. He was a man of about five or seven and thirty, smooth and solid looking, but much more polished in manners and appearance than his partner. His fair, thin hair was parted in the middle, and combed close to his head. He possessed a powerful brain and a good knowledge of business. His blue eyes, straight thick nose, and smiling mouth, gave him a benevolent and cordial look, which made him a favourite in society. He was always perfectly dressed, and was proud of his white hands and filbert nails.

People who wished to do business with the firm, always preferred to see the senior partner to the junior, because the former was so suave and courteous, and the latter so rough and curt.

But Mr Crampton was the tenderer-hearted man of the two, though he did not show it so much. His private purse-strings were always open to help a disabled workman, or to head a subscription for the widows and orphans of those who were removed by death. He was a man of strong views, however, and a somewhat obstinate temperament, and this business of his daughter and Mr Frederick Walcheren had disturbed him very much. A Scotchman by birth, and brought up as a Nonconformist, he had a righteous horror of Popery, and everything connected with it. On this account alone he had, from the first, discountenanced the acquaintanceship of Mr Walcheren with his family; and to find that his daughter had, in express opposition to his wishes, made an intimate friend of the young man, wounded him in his tenderest point. He sat very gloomy and silent after his wife and sister-in-law had left the room, and Mr Hindes tried his utmost to make him regard the matter in a more hopeful light. For years he had been as intimate in the domestic circle of the Crampton family, as he was with his partner in the city, and was regarded as their nearest friend by them all.

‘This is a matter that only requires a few words of explanation to set it right, Crampton,’ he remarked, ‘so it’s no use looking so black about it. You must allow that you and your wife have rather given Miss Jenny her own way, and naturally she clings to it. But she loves you both too much to wilfully oppose you.’

‘I hope so, I hope so!’ replied the old man. ‘But spoilt children are not always the most grateful, Hindes. I trust that Jenny may listen, as you say, to reason, but I would rather appeal to the young man himself. Perhaps, if he knew that we will never give our consent to her marrying a Papist, he might see the advisability of giving up the pursuit.’

‘I will speak to him, if you empower me to do so,’ said Hindes, eagerly. ‘He is sure to be at the Bouchers’ dance to-night. I did not intend to go, but I believe Hannah wishes to do so, and the opportunity will be an excellent one, particularly if Miss Crampton is to be there, and carries out your prohibition with respect to dancing with him. He will sulk and sit out, and I shall be able to give him a hint as to your disapproval of his suit.’

‘Do so, Hindes, and I shall be exceedingly obliged to you,’ replied Mr Crampton. ‘And, if that fails, we must take Jenny away, for, by hook or by crook, I am determined to shake that young fellow off.’

‘Hannah is going with the little ones to Broadstairs next week. What do you say to Miss Crampton accompanying her? You know how fond my wife is of your daughter, and she would watch over her like a mother. At all events, it is worth thinking of.’

‘It would be a capital plan,’ said Mr Crampton; ‘but why are you going?’

‘Because it is time one of us was at the office, my dear fellow; and, since you are about to speak to your daughter on this subject, it is just as well I should be out of the way. I shall see you later in the afternoon, but don’t hurry on my account. And I shall not forget to speak to Mr Walcheren this evening. I shall not spare him, I promise you, but lay it on as thick as I know how, and, if he doesn’t like it, he must do the other thing. By the way, I know the cousin, Philip Walcheren, as well as their mutual director, Father Tasker, so, if the young man won’t hear reason, I will appeal to them. There is one convenience about these Papists, you can generally wield them through their directors.’

‘Yes, the silly fools!’ said Crampton contemptuously. ‘They’re afraid to say their lives are their own if the priests say they’re not. Pooh! call them men. They’re more like a flock of silly sheep, who run baa-ing after their shepherd.’

‘In that case,’ replied Mr Hindes, smiling, ‘I’m afraid Mr Frederick Walcheren must be one of the lost sheep, for, from all I hear, he does not trouble the church, nor the director of his conscience much. But I’ll do my level best to bring him to hear reason in this instance. Au revoir.’

And, with a nod and a smile, he was gone.

‘He’s a true friend,’ thought Mr Crampton to himself, as he took up the Times, and tried to possess his soul in patience until the appearance of his daughter.

Meanwhile, Mrs Crampton and Miss Bostock were making their way, timidly, towards the young lady’s bedroom. In the ante-chamber they encountered her maid, employed in sewing.

‘Is Miss Crampton awake yet, Ellen?’ demanded her mother.

‘Oh! no, ma’am, I haven’t heard a sound of her, and she begged me particularly not to call her till she rung. She was terrible tired, she said, and didn’t wish to be disturbed.’

‘I’m sorry, Ellen, but I’m afraid I must wake her now. It’s past eleven, and her papa particularly wishes to see her before he leaves for the city,’ replied Mrs Crampton.

‘Oh, dear! I’m sure I don’t know what she’ll say,’ remarked the maid, as she re-applied herself to her work, and looked as if she was glad the task had not fallen to her.

The two ladies entered the adjoining bedroom on tip-toe, and as if they feared the result of the least noise. It was one of the most perfectly-arranged chambers a young girl could desire, and it was pre-evident that its furnishings had been selected with the greatest care, and for someone who was much loved and treasured. The walls and chintzes were all of palest pink, the woodwork of white enamel, and the hangings of lace. On the walls were hung a selection of photographs, chiefly of dogs and horses, for Miss Crampton’s tastes ran in that line, and the low, walnut-wood bookcase was filled with the best authors. Everywhere were signs of profusion and luxury, for the Cramptons were rich and spared no expense for this one beloved child, who made all the joy of their lives. The toilet table was covered with silver and cut glass, and on the mantelpiece stood a handsome clock and candelabras of Sevres china; but the fairest sight in all the room was Jenny Crampton herself, as she lay, flushed, dishevelled and palpitating on her bed, one of the most beautiful specimens of work that ever proceeded from the Creator’s hand. It was difficult to believe that the two plain women who stood gazing at her from the foot of the bed, could be her nearest blood relations. The questions of hereditary resemblances and non-resemblances are amongst the most anomalous in Nature. Whence did Jenny Crampton inherit her perfect features and colouring? Her father was a type of the average middle-class Englishman. He had a broad-set, muscular figure, with legs too short for his size, a florid complexion, with thick bushy eyebrows, a heavy nose, and a long upper lip. His small grey eyes were shrewd, but honest and benevolent-looking, and his hands and feet were large and coarse. His wife and her sister might have stood, with a little caricaturing, for the Frenchman’s notion of an ‘English Mees.’

Mrs Crampton had the shapelier and more matured figure of the two, and her soft brown eyes, attenuated nose, and weak drooping mouth, might once have been styled pretty, but they both possessed the same tall, flat frames, with sloping shoulders, long hands and feet, and limp, lustreless hair. In what enchanted moment, then, had such progenitors given life to such a lovely creature, as lay asleep upon the bed before them? Her rounded dimpled arms were thrown restlessly above her head (for it was summer weather), and were half hidden by the mass of light chestnut hair, that strayed over her pillow. Her tints were those of a maiden-blush rose. From her neck and shoulders to her flushed cheeks, her skin was of one uniform texture, of a pale cream, just touched with pink. Her lips were slightly parted as she slept and showed the row of white teeth within. The lashes of her eyes lay thick and long upon her cheeks; and those eyes, when open, formed, perhaps, the very chief of her attractions. They were long, limpid eyes, of a light hazel colour, and with the startled expression in them of a deer or a child; eyes which made strangers think that Jenny Crampton was one of the most innocent of God’s creatures upon earth, but which changed considerably in expression when Jenny’s wishes were in any way crossed, or her requests disregarded. From the time when she was a lovely little child (the only one they had ever kept since its earliest infancy) Mr and Mrs Crampton had learned to dread the clouding over of those beautiful orbs, and the pouting of those pretty lips. It was in their power to gratify every wish of their child, and so they gratified themselves at the same time by avoiding anything so distressing to them as her tears. Everyone had combined to spoil Jenny Crampton from her babyhood, and by this time the young lady was pretty well beyond all control. The father acceded to her every request, however unreasonable or extravagant; and the mother and aunt only lived to worship her. Even poor Aunt Clem, who was the standing butt for Jenny’s ridicule, or the mark for her ill-humour, considered herself well repaid for all her patience and endurance if the spoilt beauty gave her an occasional hasty kiss (or rather peck) on her cheek, or her cap, or wherever it might chance to fall, or honoured her by a request to tie her sash, or do a commission for her. This was the sort of education the poor girl had received to enable her to face the rebuffs of the world. But, though her bringing-up had been very faulty, there was no mistake about her beauty. Far or near, all round Hampstead and its environs, there was not a girl who could vie in good looks with old Crampton’s daughter, and, as her father was known to be a very wealthy man, Jenny had more admirers than she could count on her ten fingers. But, of them all, none had really appealed to her senses but Frederick Walcheren. The Cramptons and Aunt Clem had a tough time before them.

‘How lovely she is!’ sighed Miss Bostock, as an intuition of their presence, even through her dreams, made Jenny turn restlessly and throw herself into another becoming attitude on the other side of the bed.

‘Yes! indeed, Clem; but I’m afraid I must rouse her,’ whispered Mrs Crampton. ‘Papa is really vexed about this business, and, if she doesn’t see him at once, I fear he may be more so. Jenny, my darling!’ she continued, going round to the girl’s side and laying her hand gently on her shoulder, ‘Jenny, dear love, wake up; there’s a dear! Papa wants to see you before he goes into the city.’

‘Eh! what?’ said the girl drowsily, as she turned away, ‘it’s not time to get up yet. I’m so sleepy.’

‘But, Jenny, love, try and rouse yourself,’ repeated her mother, rather tremblingly, ‘your father wants you, dear. He won’t keep you long. You need only put on a tea-gown and can come back and finish your toilet afterwards. Come Jenny, make an effort, love, for papa won’t be denied.’

The girl opened her big hazel eyes then, and stared stupidly at her aunt and mother.

‘You here, mamma!’ she ejaculated, ‘and Aunt Clem! What on earth is the matter? Is the house on fire?’

‘No! no! dear, of course not, but papa wants to speak to you for a minute before he leaves home.’

‘Then he must wait till he comes back,’ replied Jenny, as she closed her eyes again, ‘for I’m a great deal too sleepy to see anyone. Go away, do! mamma, and leave me alone. It’s a shame to go waking me in this way, when you know I was dancing up to three o’clock this morning.’

‘I know, darling, I know!’ said Mrs Crampton, almost weeping, ‘and I wouldn’t have done it for the world, only papa insisted on it, and you know what he is when he’s set on having his way. Jenny, my dear; do try and rouse yourself a little, for papa says if you don’t go down and see him, he will come up here and pull you out of bed himself.’

At this intelligence, Miss Crampton did see fit to open her eyes a little wider, and sit up in bed. Perhaps her conscience warned her what this unusual severity on the part of her father might portend, but she looked exceedingly cross as she did so.

‘I never heard such nonsense in all my life,’ she exclaimed, ‘what can he have to say to me, that will not keep till dinner time? I can’t be down for half an hour, at anyrate, so papa must wait my pleasure. Where’s Ellen? She must come and help me dress! My goodness me, Aunt Clem,’ she broke off suddenly, as she caught sight of that lady’s sympathetic features regarding her wistfully from the foot of the bed, ‘don’t stand there goggling at me like a stork on one leg, or you’ll drive me out of my senses. Go and call Ellen, do! If I’m to see papa, someone must dress me. I don’t suppose he wants me to walk downstairs in my night-dress, though he is in such a hurry.’

‘No! no! love, of course not!’ returned her mother, hastily. ‘Clem! call Ellen, and tell her Jenny is going to get up. Now, darling! what can I do to help you?’

‘Nothing,’ replied her daughter peevishly, ‘unless you will give papa a dose of morphia to keep him quiet till I can dress myself. What is all this mystery about? Why can’t you say why the old gentleman is so desirous of my company this morning. He is not in the habit of dragging me out of bed, after a ball, at this unearthly hour.’

‘It is nearly twelve o’clock, my dear!’ said Mrs Crampton evasively.

‘What of that? I ordered my trap to be round at four this afternoon, and told Ellen particularly that she was not to come near me till I rang. You know the Bouchers’ dance is on to-night, and a nice figure I shall look at it if I do not have my sleep out first.’

‘Well, dear,’ replied her mother, soothingly, ‘you can come to bed again, if you think fit, in the afternoon. You know I wouldn’t have disturbed you for all the world, but gentlemen are not always so considerate. And your father insisted upon my doing so, so what could I say?’

‘What’s the row about?’ repeated Jenny, as her maid began to brush out and twist up her superabundant hair.

But Mrs Crampton was too discreet to say all she knew before a servant.

‘Oh! it’s nothing particular, my love, and your father had best tell you himself. You needn’t be afraid, he loves you too dearly ever to scold you, whatever you may do or say.’

‘Oh! I’m not afraid of the old man!’ rejoined the young lady; ‘only he’d better not go too far with me. I can guess what all the fuss is about, mamma, and I’ve got a will of my own, as well as he has. If papa is going to lecture me about Mr—’

‘Now, dear, don’t mention any names,’ interposed Mrs Crampton quickly, ‘for it may only lead to mischief. Your papa must tell you his own business, and I’m sure you’ll do all in your power to fall in with his wishes.’

‘I’m not so sure of that,’ replied the young lady, with a moue. ‘Here, Ellen, give me my blue tea-gown! My hair will do very well, for I shall most likely be in bed again in half an hour. Go down, whilst I’m with Mr Crampton, and fetch me some chocolate and a piece of toast, and let it be ready when I come back. Now! mamma, we’ll go and beard the old lion in his den.’

CHAPTER II.

Jenny looked, if possible, lovelier than usual as she tripped downstairs beside her mother and her aunt. Her face was still flushed from sleep, and her hair had been twisted up anyhow, whilst the pale blue gown she wore accorded well with her rose-leaf complexion. Mrs Crampton and Miss Bostock accompanied her in trembling dread of the coming encounter, but the girl herself was perfectly confident and fearless. As they reached the door of the library, where her father awaited her, she caught sight of Aunt Clem’s visage and burst out laughing.

‘Oh, dear!’ she cried, ‘Aunt Clem, if you don’t put on some other kind of face, you’ll kill me! When you assume that lugubrious expression, you look so like a cow that I always expect to hear you low.’

‘Dearest child! that is not kind,’ remarked her mother, with mild reproof.

‘Oh! never mind, it doesn’t signify, I am sure dear Jenny doesn’t mean it,’ interposed Aunt Clem, who had, nevertheless, winced under the sarcasm.

‘I did mean it, though,’ cried Jenny boldly; ‘one would think I was going to be hanged to see your long faces. Well, papa!’ she continued, as they entered the presence of Mr Crampton, ‘and what may you have to say to me this morning? You’ll have to pay for dragging me out of my bed in this outrageous manner, you know, and I sha’n’t be pacified until you buy me that little Arab mare of Mr Winchers’. Is it a bargain?’

She looked so saucy and so pretty as she said this, and perched herself on her father’s knee, that Mr Crampton, in his pride and affection, was very nearly granting her request without further protest. But the remembrance of the Popish admirer intruded itself just in time to prevent the folly. Nevertheless, he kissed his daughter’s blooming cheek, and said,—

‘If you will be a good girl, and do exactly as I tell you, you shall have a dozen Arab mares if they will please you, Jenny.’

‘All right, old gentleman! that’s a bargain. Now for the conditions.’

‘But we must speak seriously, my dear, for I am quite in earnest in this matter. You have been encouraging a young man to come about here, Jenny, of whose acquaintanceship you know I do not approve—I mean Mr Frederick Walcheren. Now, I must have a stop put to it at once. He never comes here again, nor will I allow you to meet him out of the house, unless it should be by accident, nor to dance with him if you do meet him. I hope you understand me plainly. I will not permit you to know any of the Walcherens from this time forward. You must entirely drop them. Nor shall your mother ask them to my house. And I shall never remove this prohibition from you—never!’

‘Anything more?’ asked Jenny, shortly.

A close observer might have seen and interpreted the change in her countenance as she listened to her father’s mandate. Into the light hazel eyes had crept a much darker shade, and the full lips had pouted till they had become sullen. But all she said was ‘Anything more?’

‘I do not know that, as your father, I am in any way called upon to give you my reasons, my dear, but, since you seem to ask for them, I will. You appear to me to have shown a marked preference for Mr Frederick Walcheren’s society, and, as it would be impossible for you to marry him, it is best the affair should be put an end to at once.’

‘He has plenty of money,’ argued the young lady.

‘I am aware of that, and the uses he has hitherto put his money to. He is a gambler and a loose liver. But that is not the chief objection to him in my eyes. His vices might be reformed, but not his religion. Young creatures like yourself do not think of such things, but the Walcherens are all Roman Catholics, and that fact puts an insuperable barrier between them and us. I would never, under any circumstances, give my consent to your marriage with a Papist. I would rather see you in your grave, Jenny, and I cannot say more than that. If you have entertained any such idea, you must dismiss it from your mind at once. And in order that there may be no fear of such a thing—in order to secure your happiness and safety, I insist upon your giving up the acquaintanceship of this young man altogether. You must not ask him to the house again, and, if he calls, your mother will order the servant to say that she is not at home. If you meet him out, you have my strict commands not to dance with him, or to talk more than the merest politeness necessitates. If, notwithstanding these precautions, I find Mr Walcheren is obstinately bent on thrusting himself where he is not welcome, I shall take the law into my own hands, by carrying you away from Hampstead to some place where it is impossible you can meet him. Don’t think me harsh, Jenny, for, God knows, that is the last thing I wish to be towards you, but I have spoken to you on this subject several times before, and I find you have taken no heed, so you force me to speak more plainly. Do you quite understand me now?’

‘Yes, I understand,’ said the girl sullenly.

‘And you promise obedience?’

‘How can I do otherwise than obey?’ she broke out passionately. ‘The house is yours, and you can do as you choose with it and those who enter it. And Frederick Walcheren is not a man to thrust his company where it is not wanted. All these accusations you bring against him—what authority have you for them? He is to be condemned unheard, and his religion is brought against him as a crime. If that is what you call Christian, I’d rather be a Jew any day.’

The tone she had adopted made the old man angry. He was devotedly fond and proud of her, but he had an obstinate temper, and would not brook opposition to his wishes.

‘Now, now, that’s enough!’ he answered. ‘My word is law here, and I will stand no arguments about the matter. I don’t approve of the man—that is sufficient! Neither shall my daughter know him. As for condemning him unheard, that is all rubbish. Hindes knows his character as well as I do. He says—’

‘Oh! then it is to Mr Hindes I owe this unpleasant interview,’ cried Jenny. ‘What business has he to poke his nose into my affairs? He’s always meddling in some way or another. Mr Hindes made you sell my beautiful hunter, because he said it was not safe for me to ride; and Mr Hindes prevented my accepting Lady Makewell’s invitation to the Castle, on account of some absurd rumours he had heard of her former life. But, if Mr Hindes thinks he is to be the judge of all my actions and the ruler of my destinies, he is very much mistaken, and so I will let him know before he is many days older. I won’t have any man interfering with me in this way, and turning my own parents against me.’

‘Don’t be a fool!’ exclaimed Mr Crampton, roughly. ‘Hindes is the best friend you have—that any of us have—and it would be a bad day for the firm and the family, that saw our interests divided. I mentioned him as an authority for the sort of life Mr Frederick Walcheren lives, but, far from setting me against you, he has stood up for your good sense and filial obedience all through the discussion of this unfortunate affair. It is I alone—your father—who has come to the conclusion to cut Mr Walcheren’s acquaintance, and now I demand your obedience to my commands. Once and for all, your implicit obedience. Do you promise it me?’

‘I have no alternative!’ said Jenny.

‘All the same, I must have your promise given here, before your mother and your aunt.’

‘Very well, then, I promise!’ replied the girl after a pause.

‘That is all I require,’ said the old man; ‘and now, I suppose, I can go about my business. But remember! if I ever catch you trying to outwit me by any d—d subterfuges, I will take you away from Hampstead, and you shall never see it again whilst that man is in it.’

He turned then, as if to leave the room, but, perceiving that both his wife and her sister were in tears, he thought he might have spoken too harshly to this child whom he so dearly loved, and came back again for a moment.

‘Kiss me, Jenny,’ he said; ‘I’m not angry with you, my girl, though I may have seemed so, but it’s your happiness I have at heart and not my own. There! there!’ with a sounding kiss on her cheek, ‘you won’t fret about the matter, will you? and we’ll ride over together to Winchers’ to-morrow and secure the little mare you’ve set your heart on. God bless you, my dear!’ and, with another kiss, he left them to themselves.

Jenny stood for a minute silent and motionless, then walked quickly towards the door, as if to return to her own room.

‘Jenny, my darling,’ pleaded her mother, ‘you see the force of your dear father’s argument, don’t you?’

She went towards the girl as she spoke, and would have wound her arms about her, but Jenny pushed her impatiently aside.

‘Don’t bother me, mamma,’ she said, ‘you know how I hate a fuss. All this worry is mostly your fault, you might have prevented it if you had chosen.’

‘Oh! Jenny, my dear, how?’

‘Why, do you suppose I don’t know it has come of some repetition of yours or Aunt Clem’s? How should papa, who is all day in the city, and never goes with us anywhere in the evenings, have heard that I danced more with Fred Walcheren than any other man, unless you had told him? And I think it is beastly mean of you, too! Why can’t I have my pleasure the same as other girls? I conclude you and papa made love enough to each other when you were young, and yet you grudge me a choice in the matter. I’m only to dance, and talk, and be agreeable with such people as you select for me. It’s bitterly unfair.’

‘Oh, no, darling, don’t say that! Your dear father is only desirous of one thing, to promote your welfare. And Mr Walcheren is very wild, Jenny. He would not make you a good husband. Everybody says so.’

‘And so my happiness is to be sacrificed because “everybody” chooses to tell lies of the man I like, and papa and you choose to believe them. Well! I sha’n’t forget it in a hurry, I can tell you, mamma. And now, please let me go to my room in peace. I suppose I may claim a right to so much indulgence of my own wishes.’

‘My dear girl, when have any of your wishes been ungratified, unless they were likely to prove hurtful to yourself. We should take a knife away from a baby, my darling, however much it cried for it, for fear it should cut itself.’

‘Thank you for comparing me to a baby, mamma, but I think you will find I am not quite such a child as you imagine. Anyway, I am woman enough to wish to be left alone to think over this matter by myself.’

And, without waiting for an answer, Jenny ran up the staircase, and locked herself into her bedroom.

The two ladies downstairs were left in a very uncomfortable condition.

‘I hope,’ remarked Mrs Crampton to her sister, ‘I hope dear papa did not go too far in what he said. Jenny is so high-spirited and quick-tempered, that she might be tempted to do something wilful just because she was crossed. And if she dances with Mr Walcheren at the Bouchers’ to-night, I don’t know what her papa will say.’

‘Oh, she would never dare to do so, surely,’ replied Aunt Clem; ‘she would never fly in John’s face in that manner! She is a little fond of her own way sometimes, I admit, but she has a good heart, poor darling, and says far more than she means. And John is right, Emma. Mr Walcheren is a very wild young man, and it would never do for our Jenny to marry him.’

‘Of course, John is right,’ acquiesced the wife; ‘but I wish Jenny could see it in the same light. However, I will take care not to let her out of my sight this evening, and then it will be impossible for Mr Walcheren to get speech of her, without my overhearing what he may say.’

Meanwhile, Jenny, having reached the sanctuary of her own room, drank off her chocolate hastily, and dismissed her maid who was in attendance.

‘Is my bath ready, Ellen?’ she inquired; ‘that is right. Well! you can go now and I will ring when I am ready to dress. Tell Brunell that I will have the Ralli cart at one.’

‘Before luncheon, miss?’ said the maid.

‘At one o’clock, sharp! And don’t go out of the way; I shall want you in ten minutes.’

She turned the key of her door on the inside as the maid disappeared, and, sitting down before her writing-table, drew out pen and paper, and commenced to write a letter, which ran as follows:—

‘Darling,—There has been a row here this morning, and papa has forbidden me ever to speak to you again. What are we to do? I shall be at the Bouchers’ to-night, without fail. I must not dance with you, but, if you will be in the picture gallery after the fourth dance, I will contrive to speak to you. Oh, Fred, where is all this going to end? They shall never make me give you up, if you remain of the same mind, but open communication with you seems almost impossible. I can’t write any more, my head and my heart are both in a whirl. Ever your loving

Jenny.’

She sealed this letter, and directed it to Frederick Walcheren, Esq., 308 Nevern Mansions, Earl’s Court, London, and placed it on one side. Her next concern was to see in what condition this unpleasant excitement had left her. But she found no reason to complain.

The exercise of her temper had made her cheeks rosier, and lent an extra brightness to her eyes. She was glad of this—glad that she had not given way to the weakness of tears, and swelled up her eyelids and made her face look puffy. She might meet Frederick during her drive. He spent most of his spare time in wandering about Hampstead in the hopes of meeting her. But she seldom drove out until the afternoon. Still, there was just the chance of a rencontre with her lover, and for that chance Jenny would have taken more trouble than this.

When she came downstairs again, an hour later, dressed in a tailor-made suit of light fawn tweed, with her jaunty little felt hat on her head, and her hands in white doeskin driving-gloves, holding a handsome ivory-handled whip, few people would have guessed the state of excitement she was still in, she looked so fresh and lovely and smiling. In the hall she encountered her mother, who had heard the wheels of the Ralli cart draw up to the door.

‘Out so early, my darling?’ Mrs Crampton said, kindly; ‘where are you going to?’

‘For a drive,’ answered the girl curtly.

‘But doesn’t it look a little like rain,’ continued her mother timidly, for she was half afraid of her idol, particularly when the idol was put out.

‘I don’t care if it does,’ replied Jenny, in the same tone; ‘I’m not made of sugar.’

‘But take an umbrella, darling,’ said her mother, anxiously, ‘and let Brunell hold it over you, if it should be wet.’

But Miss Crampton rejected all her suggestions with scorn.

‘If it thunders and lightens, and I get wet through and go into a consumption, so much the better,’ she exclaimed impatiently. ‘You and papa between you have contrived to make me so supremely miserable, that I don’t care what happens to me! In fact, the sooner I’m dead the better; and I’ve a good mind to take a dose of prussic acid and end it at once.’

This is a very usual threat of selfish and ill-tempered people, particularly if they have loving and anxious hearts to deal with. To Mrs Crampton, to whom the girl was everything in the world, Jenny’s words seem full of bitter portent.

‘Oh! my darling! my darling!’ she exclaimed, in a voice of the deepest concern, ‘don’t say such terrible things, even in jest, for Heaven’s sake! You will break my heart, Jenny, and your poor father would go mad if he heard you speak in such an awful way. Why! we would cut off our right hands to save you a moment’s trouble.’

‘Yes! it looks like it, doesn’t it?’ said the young lady, sarcastically.

‘My dearest, don’t discuss the subject again. Wait a little and you will see it perhaps in a different light. My head aches so, Jenny, I am not fit to argue it with you, and you have been upset as well. Go for a nice drive, and the fresh air will make your head clearer. But be careful, my love, and don’t do anything rash! I’m half afraid of those cobs, Jenny, they’re so fresh and spirited.’

‘Oh! you’re afraid of everything,’ replied her daughter in a tone of contempt; ‘and as for Aunt Clem, she’s alarmed at her own shadow.’

‘I was never brought up to horses and dogs, as you have been, dear,’ said Miss Bostock, who was standing near.

‘No; nor to anything, I should think,’ replied her niece, as she prepared to get into her Ralli cart. ‘I often think you and mamma must have been born and reared on a desert island, you seem so utterly ignorant of the things most people do.’

With which Miss Crampton gently touched her steeds with the lash of her whip, and they went prancing down the drive as if they intended to bolt, whilst her mother and aunt held their breath with anxiety, lest the wilful driver should come to any harm.

Jenny drove at a smart pace through the principal ways of Hampstead, whilst the pedestrians whom she passed said to each other ‘There goes the beautiful Miss Crampton,’ and she overheard some of their remarks and flushed with pleasure at the notice she excited. For this young lady’s besetting sin was an inordinate vanity of her personal attractions, which she had cultivated to the exclusion of all the Christian graces. She was a specimen of that most odious of all modern innovations, the fast girl of the nineteenth century, and she was vulgar in consequence, for all fast women are vulgar, and obnoxious in the eyes of everybody but their male admirers. For when will men be ever sensible enough to separate the value of personal beauty and mental charm? Not while they have eyes to see. Once touch their senses, and, for the time their infatuation lasts, you cannot convince them but that the mind and soul of their goddess equal her body in charm. Frederick Walcheren was infatuated with the beauty of this girl, and he believed her disposition to be all that was good and lovable as well. It appeared so to him, for, whenever they met, Jenny was in her best temper, and ready to be pleased with everything. Had he even seen her, as she had been on the present occasion, rude and impertinent to her parents, cruelly sarcastic to her meek and unoffending aunt, and obstinately resolved upon having her own way, he would still have taken her part, declared her to be a suffering angel, and her father and mother most unjust and tyrannical towards her. Shakespeare never wrote a greater truism than when he made Rosalind declare that ‘Love is a madness,’ a madness that blinds our vision, distorts our judgment, and makes all things, not only apparently, but actually, different from what they are; when the rose-coloured spectacles have been torn by circumstance from our eyes, and we wonder we could ever have been such egregious fools as to think that they were otherwise.

Miss Crampton, then, with her heart on fire and her soul up in arms, stopped at the first pillar-box she passed, and bade Brunell post the letter which she gave him, the letter she had written in her bedroom and which she knew would reach town before Mr Walcheren left it to meet her at the house of their mutual friends, the Bouchers.

And as she flew over the highway, one sentence kept revolving itself over and over in her mind, and the burden of it was, ‘I will never give him up, I will never give him up.’

CHAPTER III.

When Miss Crampton’s letter reached the hands of Mr Frederick Walcheren, it was by the four o’clock post, and that gentleman was lying on a couch in his apartments in Nevern Mansions. He was a handsome man of about thirty, with dark eyes and hair, and classical features, set in a pale, clear complexion. He was clean shorn, except for a small, soft moustache, and the possessor of a tall, lithe figure. He had an ample fortune, having inherited about two thousand a year from an old Catholic godfather, who died when Frederick was quite an infant, and who had expressed a wish in his will that his godson and heir should enter the church, or, at all events, benefit the church by founding some religious institution at his own death, with the fortune he left in his charge. But the old gentleman could hardly have chosen a worse guardian of his property. No embargo had been laid on the young man spending his money as he chose, and his choice was to spend it on himself and the companions whom he delighted to honour. His little flat in Earl’s Court was only a pied à terre. His home may have been said to exist at Epsom, Goodwood, Newmarket, or any one of the other race-courses in England. He was also to be met periodically at Monte Carlo or Paris. Occasionally he would take a fancy to run over to New York or San Francisco, but, wherever he pitched his tent, one might be sure there were plenty of opportunities for gambling and speculation. Not but what Frederick Walcheren was a perfectly honourable man; but he could not live (or he thought he could not live) without excitement of some sort, and he loved the uncertainty and risk of betting and play.

His money and his good looks had rendered him an easy prey to the harpies of the other sex, and had landed him into one or two scrapes with more respectable women. His cousin, Philip, had often had to be the go-between and peacemaker with sundry fair damsels, who were violently bent on a breach of promise case, or a horse-whipping through means of their next friend.

Mr Philip Walcheren was quite a different sort of character from his cousin. Married, and the father of a family, a staunch Catholic, steady and prosperous in his business as a solicitor, he was almost a pattern man, and Frederick’s goings-on were a marvel and a misery to him. He and his director, Father Tasker, were constantly talking over the other man, and wondering by what means they could dissuade him from his follies, and induce him to lead a more sober life. But, as yet, their exhortations and entreaties had been of no avail. Frederick laughed at their cautions, and pooh-poohed their predictions of a repentant future. He meant to live his life, he told them, and asked for no one’s pity or advice. He was in reality, what Mr Crampton and Henry Hindes had called him, a dissolute and irreclaimable spendthrift, and not fit to be the husband of any girl.

Still, he was pleasant and fascinating, and the beau sexe spoilt him, to a woman. As he lay indolently on his couch this afternoon, turning Jenny’s letter over and over in his hands, his thoughts were much the same as hers had been, for of all the femininities he had ever met, and trifled with, she was the only one who had seriously touched his heart. Women as handsome as Jenny, and far more amiable, had been ready, before now, to throw themselves at his feet, but they had had no power to move him. But for this petulant, spoilt, and rather underbred, girl, he would have laid down his life. Who can account for anomalies? Is love—such love as has its origin in admiration—a spiritual passion, or is it the force of two magnetisms that attract each to each, beyond the power of the individual to oppose? From the strange choices we see made in this world, it would seem so. Anyway, this is how Frederick Walcheren felt for Jenny Crampton—that he would die sooner than give her up. She seemed, in the short time they had known each other, to have grown into his life—to have become part of it, indeed—so that he could no longer imagine living without her. He kept saying to himself all the while, just as she had done,—‘I will not give her up for any man or woman upon earth. What do I care about the old wool-stapler raving? Let him rave. I will carry her off before his very eyes. But she shall be mine; in fact, she is mine in heart and soul, and I defy the whole world to separate us.’

And, just at that moment, there sounded a double knock on his outer door, and his man appeared to usher in his cousin, Philip Walcheren and Father Tasker.

Frederick sprung to his feet. The instincts of a born Catholic were still strong in him, and, though he never went to confession or mass, he always showed a proper deference for the clergy. Added to which, Father Tasker was an old friend of his family.

‘How are you, Father,’ he said, ‘I’m glad to see you. Pray take the arm-chair. Well, Philip! all right at home?’

‘Quite right, thank you, Frederick,’ replied his cousin; ‘I was on my way to have a talk with you when I met Father Tasker, so we came together.’

‘I’m delighted to see you both,’ said Frederick, ‘what can I give you? I know that it is no use my offering the father a brandy-and-soda, but, if you will not take one, Philip, my man shall get some tea ready in half a minute.’

‘I don’t think we have time for either,’ replied Philip Walcheren. ‘I have only about ten minutes to spare, and the Father honours me with his company at dinner to-night, so I think Marion will be disappointed if I deprive her of her five-o’clock tea gossip with him. She is, doubtless, anxiously awaiting us now. But I felt I could not pass another night without asking you, Frederick, if a rumour which I have heard concerning you is true.’

‘What’s up now?’ demanded his cousin.

‘I met young Fellows in the city this afternoon, Mrs Bouchers’ brother, you know, and he told me that it is commonly said in Hampstead that you are engaged, or about to be engaged, to Miss Crampton.’

‘What of it?’ said Frederick carelessly.

‘Surely it is not true! Surely, with your antecedents, Frederick, you are not thinking of marrying any respectable woman!’

‘Would you prefer my marrying a disreputable one, then, Philip?’

‘Most certainly not! What I mean is, that, under the circumstances, you have no right to marry at all. How can you go up to God’s holy altar with any woman, whilst that unfortunate girl down at Luton is even now expiating the awful sin you led her into?’

‘Of course, it is quite impossible that it was she who led me instead of the other way?’ said Frederick, interrogatively.

‘Whosoever fault it may have been in the first instance, you know that you are responsible now.’

‘And I am quite ready to meet my responsibilities. Do you want me to marry the straw-plaiter down at Luton?’

‘No, no! I want you to do nothing but alter your mode of living, Frederick, and try and be a decent member of society. It is terrible to think how you go on, without care for yourself or others, without a thought of God, or the future that lies before you. If poor Sir Frederick Ascher had only foreseen the uses his money would have been put to, he would have thought twice before he left it to you.’

‘Yes! but, luckily for me, he didn’t foresee, so I can do as I like about it. Has Father Tasker a lecture in store for me as well?’ inquired Frederick, turning to the priest.

‘No! my son, we are not in the confessional, where I could wish we met oftener; but I would like to remind you that, although your late godfather made no actual conditions regarding the expenditure of the fortune he left you, yet his wishes, that it should be devoted to the church, were so strongly expressed, as almost to amount to a demand, and I cannot believe that any blessing will follow a different disposition of it.’

‘I have confessed to no intention of marrying, remember, but should I ever do so, my wife will be my church, and I shall settle my money upon her.’

But this was a blasphemy that neither Philip Walcheren nor the priest could pass over in silence.

‘Be careful, my son, be careful,’ cried the one, ‘lest the curse of Heaven, and the church you despise, are both provoked against you.’

‘I cannot believe, Frederick, that you seriously mean what you say,’ exclaimed his cousin. ‘The money is only yours for your lifetime, and, if you do not dedicate it to the holy church at your death, some fearful calamity will surely overtake you, or those to whom you wrongfully give it.’

‘Nonsense!’ replied Frederick; ‘I suppose you both mean well, but I would rather you understood me at once. As matters stand at present, I have not the slightest intention of leaving my money to the church. My godfather—peace to his ashes!—left it to me, and I recognise but one authority in the matter, and that is the law, which is on my side. I wonder, by the way, Philip, that you stick up so badly for the stability of the profession by which you live!’

‘Every consideration must give way to the claims of the church, Frederick!’

‘Well, I don’t agree with you. I think Mother Church has feathered her own nest pretty well, considering her claims to humility and poverty. In my idea, my own nest will have the prior claim on my indulgence!’

‘So you are really contemplating matrimony, Frederick,’ said Philip. ‘I wonder you can dare to enter a church under the circumstances, lest the walls and roof should fall in upon you.’

‘Perhaps I shall be married in a registrar’s office,’ responded Frederick lightly; but the jest was so ill-timed that neither of his hearers commented upon it.

‘With the fact of that misguided female down at Luton, you are about to commit a great sacrilege, my son, in taking the sacrament of matrimony on yourself!’ remarked Father Tasker.

‘Well, really, Father, I must say you and Philip are both rather hard on me! You have been reproaching me for my loose style of living for years past, and begging me to reform, and now, when you hear a rumour—merely a rumour, remember—that I’m about to forsake the devil and all his ways, and become a steady married man, like my good cousin here, you attack me as if I had just formed a fresh liaison instead. Why shouldn’t I marry like a good boy, as well as Philip, who is, I know, a pattern of propriety. Why shouldn’t I walk to mass every Sunday morning, with a little boy by one hand and a little girl by the other? It doesn’t seem as if I could please you anyway.’

‘You mistake both me and your cousin, my son,’ replied the priest. ‘It is not that we are not most anxious to see you turn over a new leaf and lead a pure life, but marriage is assuredly a condition of great temptation for a man situated as you are. It will bring cares and expenses with it, and your mind will be filled with the thought of providing for the future of your family. You have been brought up to no profession, for your sainted mother had no idea that you would be anything but a priest, and that your godfather’s fortune would go as he wished it should do, to our holy church. But since you elected otherwise, there is but one honest course for you to pursue, and that is, to remain single, and preserve your money intact for the purpose for which your godfather left it to you. Marriage will interfere with this, therefore marriage is not for you!’

At this juncture Frederick’s temper got the better of his judgment.

‘Then I’m d—d if the church shall have the money,’ he exclaimed loudly; ‘all your advice, and precepts, and exhortations to a purer life count for nothing; they are only made so you may hear yourselves talk, and plume yourselves with the idea of how much better men you are than myself. But this matter is in my own jurisdiction, thank goodness, and I shall do exactly as I choose about it. I shall marry, or remain single, as pleases me, but, whatever I may do, the church doesn’t get my money, so you may put that thought out of your heads at once. I’ll leave it to the Salvation Army, or the Home for Lost Dogs, first.’

He had thrown himself into a passion by this time, and he walked quickly up and down his little room in order to cool his temper. Philip Walcheren looked as if he expected the heavens to open and strike his cousin dead for the utterance of such blasphemy, and the priest rose and prepared to shake the dust of those apartments off his feet.

‘Mark my words,’ he said solemnly, as he turned to leave the room, ‘God will not be mocked, Frederick Walcheren. He knows all our hearts, and He will avenge himself. Good-morning.’

And with that Father Tasker disappeared.

‘For shame!’ cried Philip, as he prepared to follow him, ‘for shame, Frederick. You may have law on your side, but you have neither right nor conscience. You have not told me whether the rumour I mentioned is true or false, but, if it is true, and you have any such intention in your head, pause, I beseech you, before you carry it into effect, or some fearful calamity will follow it. You have defied our holy church, and God will defend her rights. I shall not come again until you send for me.’

And in another moment the room was clear.

‘Here, Watson,’ called Frederick to his man, ‘bring me a whisky-and-soda. I declare,’ he continued to himself, ‘if their twaddle has not made me quite uncomfortable. What on earth did that old fool, my godfather, mean by not making his will decisive one way or the other? I a priest, indeed! No. I mean to live a rather jollier life than that comes to. And there is only one other decent alternative, to marry the girl I love, and rear a family for the benefit of the State. And how can I do that without money? It is ridiculous to think of.’

Still, with the superstitious ideas which the Catholic religion infuses in all her followers, with the childish inbred fear of the priestly power to save or damn, with the fear of purgatory and a fiery hell, and becoming an outcast from salvation for ever, Frederick Walcheren did not feel quite comfortable, though he tried to laugh the feeling off, and was as resolute as before, that no power in heaven or earth should separate him from Jenny Crampton.

‘They are against us on every side,’ he thought, ‘but that fact will only make me the more determined to have her. My beautiful darling! The most beautiful woman, in my eyes, that I have ever met. Why, Father Tasker himself couldn’t resist her, if she stood on one side and hell on the other. What time is it, Watson? Six-thirty? By Jove! if I don’t hurry up I shall get no dinner before I start for the Bouchers’.’

‘Going to Hampstead again to-night, sir?’ asked Watson, as he laid out his master’s dress clothes upon the bed.

How well our servants know where we go, and who we go to see, and what we do it for.

‘Yes,’ replied Frederick, ‘to Mrs Bouchers’ dance. You needn’t sit up for me, Watson, for I shall be very late. Order the brougham to call for me at Simpson’s at nine o’clock. I shall go on straight from there.’

He hurried into his dress clothes, for he was determined that nothing should make him late that night, for fear he should miss the interview in the picture gallery after the fourth dance.

The picture gallery at the Bouchers’ was very seldom entered by any of their dancing guests, being some way removed from the ballroom, but both Jenny and Mr Walcheren, being intimate friends at the house, knew it well.

Frederick thought rightly that, since a prohibition had gone forth against his dancing with the girl of his heart, it would be more prudent if he did not put in an appearance to the ballroom till after he had held the interview with Jenny. So, when he presented himself at the house, between nine and ten o’clock, and had divested himself of his crush hat and overcoat, he peeped into the dancing room to see how far the evening had advanced. The number two had just been placed above the bandstand, so he concluded he had at least half an hour to wait before Jenny could join him, and turned away again to seek the solitude of the picture gallery until the time of meeting had arrived.

But he reckoned without his host. Henry Hindes, who had been one of the earliest arrivals, and on the express look-out for Walcheren, spied him as soon as he looked into the room, and, rising quietly, followed him out. So, as soon as Frederick had reached the picture gallery, he heard a step in his rear, and, turning with annoyance to see who had discovered the retreat besides himself, met the outstretched hand and smiling glance of Mr Hindes. Mr Walcheren could not fail to return his civilities, but he was infinitely vexed. Of all the people he knew, he would rather have encountered anyone than Mr Hindes.

Not only because he was so intimately connected with the Cramptons, and, undoubtedly, knew most of the family secrets, but also because Frederick had conceived an unaccountable aversion for him. He did not know why himself. Henry Hindes had always been courteous and polite to him, far more so, indeed, than Mr Crampton, who invariably treated a Roman Catholic as if his religion were his own fault, and he was sinning every day that he didn’t change it. Hindes, on the contrary, had no scruples on the score of difference of faith, and no right to object to the young man because he courted Jenny Crampton. He had always spoken and behaved to him as one gentleman should to another, and yet Walcheren hated him. Now, as he accepted his hand and asked after his well-doing, he would have liked to strike him across his smooth, smiling face instead. Mr Hindes, having no idea that the young man was waiting to see Miss Crampton, had thought this would be an excellent opportunity for him to fulfil the promise made to his partner, and let Mr Walcheren know how utterly hopeless his suit was.

‘How are you, Walcheren?’ he said, cordially, as he came up with him. ‘You don’t mean to tell me you are going to eschew dancing to-night, when there are so many pretty girls doing “wallflowers”? I saw you look into the ballroom and disappear again, and wondered if you had found your way to a buffet and a whisky-and-soda. I shouldn’t mind following you if you have, for the night is very warm and I am very thirsty.’

‘No, I had no such intention,’ answered Walcheren, in a tone of annoyance. ‘I fancy it is rather too early for that game. I came in here because I have a slight headache, and thought the cool and quiet might charm it away before I encountered the heat and glare of the ballroom.’

‘To be sure, and I daresay it will. This is a charming place, though one cannot see much of the pictures by night. It is in semi-darkness. I do not suppose the Bouchers intend their guests to use it on such an occasion as this, or they would have it better lighted.’

‘Perhaps not,’ replied Walcheren. ‘But I am an old friend of the family, and consider myself privileged to do as I like.’

‘Oh! I am not finding fault with your decision, my dear fellow; on the contrary, I am very glad of the opportunity of a few words in private with you. It is not often that my wife can drag me out to a dance, and, to tell you the honest truth, I came here this evening expressly to see you.’

‘To see me?’ echoed Walcheren in astonishment. ‘Why, what on earth can you have to say to me?’

‘Nothing on my account, my dear friend, unless it were to tell you (what I hope you know) that I have always been pleased to welcome you to my house, and always shall be. But I am, as I think you are aware, a very intimate friend of Mr and Mrs Crampton, who were, indeed, the intimate friends also of my father before me, and who have known me almost from a child.’

‘I know it,’ replied Frederick. ‘What of it?’

‘Mr Crampton sent for me before ten o’clock this morning, and I found him in the greatest distress. His wife had intercepted a letter from you to Miss Crampton, and the contents had terribly upset him.’

‘Passing over the fact that I consider it a breach of honour to pry into the private correspondence of anybody, I am not aware that there was anything in the letter alluded to that was calculated to upset Mr Crampton,’ said Frederick.

‘I don’t sanction the proceeding, my dear Walcheren; I am only telling you the facts. The old gentleman was more than upset; he was terribly angry, and he made his daughter give him a solemn promise not to see (of her own free will), or speak, or write to you again.’

‘And pray, may I ask,’ cried Frederick Walcheren in a sudden fury, ‘what business it is of yours, Mr Hindes, to mention the subject to me?’

‘None at all, but I owe it to the entreaty of my friends. Both Mr and Mrs Crampton have begged me to convey their wishes to you. They have derived so much pleasure from your society as an acquaintance, and think so highly of your intentions with regard to their daughter, that they dreaded the task of telling you personally, that they can never give their sanction to a marriage between you.’

‘Perhaps, as they told you so much, they were good enough to add their reasons for so extraordinary a decision,’ exclaimed Walcheren, in a tone of sarcasm.

‘Certainly they did, and it is one with which you cannot find serious fault. The objection is your religion. Mr Crampton will never allow his daughter to inter-marry with a Catholic, and his decision is irrevocable. Since your feelings for Miss Crampton cannot have gone beyond admiration, considering the short time you have known her, he thought it best you should hear his decision at once, before any mischief is done on either side.’

‘And Miss Crampton’s feelings? Are they not to be taken into consideration also?’

‘Most certainly! There is nothing on earth Mr Crampton cares for so much as his only child! She is his heiress, as doubtless you know, but he will leave her nothing if she marries against his wishes. He is very obstinate when thwarted, and very unrelenting. And Miss Crampton would hardly be so foolish as to give up her fortune, as well as her parents, at one blow. Under these circumstances, I hope you will not take offence, my dear Walcheren, if I ask you, in his name, to relinquish your acquaintanceship with Miss Crampton, and to leave off visiting at the house. It is an unpleasant task my friends have set me, but I have done it for their sakes, and without any ulterior feeling against yourself. I have not a daughter old enough to aspire to your hand,’ said Henry Hindes, smiling, ‘but if I had, I am not sure that I should deliver such a message to you on my own account!’

But Frederick Walcheren took no notice of this little sop for Cerberus.

‘Have the Cramptons any other objection to me besides that of my religion?’ he asked presently.

‘Well! my dear fellow,’ replied Henry Hindes, dubiously, ‘rumours have been conveyed to them of your life having been a little fast, not more than that of other men of the world, I daresay, but these old people do not regard such matters with the same eyes that you and I should do. They have only mixed in a certain society, you see, and know little of the sayings and doings of fashionable men and women. They have very strict notions concerning propriety, and you cannot shake their opinions on the subject. But the real objection is to your religion. That is insurmountable! They will never overlook it.’

‘It is most unfair,’ exclaimed Frederick; ‘how is a man to help what his parents chose to make him? Besides, I have no religion at all! I believe in nothing, not a God, nor a Hereafter, nor a Heaven, nor a Hell! Will that suit them better?’

Mr Hindes laughed heartily at the idea.

‘Pray don’t hint at such a thing, Walcheren,’ he said, ‘or they would think you were the old gentleman himself! But we must really talk seriously about this matter. Mr Crampton is obdurate, and will remain so. He declares that unless you will give your promise not to interfere with his daughter for the future, he will take her away from Hampstead and out of your reach, and keep her there until one of you is married. I am sure you are too much a gentleman and man of honour to upset a whole family in that way, in order to gratify your spite against them. For it will not lead to your being readmitted to the house, and Miss Crampton will be strictly watched for the future.’

Frederick Walcheren was thinking very deeply on the matter, and his thoughts ran thus, ‘I must overcome these people by diplomacy. If I refuse to give this promise, I shall be watched so closely that I shall never get speech of Jenny again; whereas, if I pretend to give in to their demands, I shall throw them off their guard. And the first thing I must do is to get rid of this fellow!’ Aloud he said,—

‘I am deeply grieved to hear of Mr Crampton’s decision, but I see the wisdom of it. Naturally, I admire Miss Crampton very much, I wonder who doesn’t, but, to tell truth, I anticipated a great deal of opposition from my own family, if it ever came to anything serious. They are as staunch for the old faith as ever Mr Crampton can be for his. Mixed marriages are, after all, a mistake. I am glad, therefore, that you have spoken so frankly and openly to me, and I thank you for it. Will you tell Mr Crampton that I acquiesce in his decision, and willingly give my promise not to intrude upon his daughter, or himself, again. You have been a true friend to both of us, Hindes. Accept my hand on it. And now I think I will just go home without running the risk of encountering la belle Jenny. It will please Mr Crampton if he hears that I have done so. And my headache really unfits me for any violent exercise. Good-night. Are you going back to the ballroom? If so, we will walk to the front of the house together.’

‘Yes; I must go back to wait for my wife, who is enjoying herself just like a girl. I shall not say a word to Miss Crampton of having seen you. It will be better to let her think you have been prevented attending the party.’

‘Most certainly, and assure Mr Crampton that he has nothing to fear from me. Good-night again,’ and the two men parted at the hall door, with a shake of the hand.

Frederick Walcheren went forth into the darkness, whilst Henry Hindes, congratulating himself on the diplomatic manner in which he had executed his embassage, and the easy victory he had gained over the enemy, re-entered the ballroom, and took his seat there, with the most perfect assurance that all danger was over.

CHAPTER IV.

But he did not quite know Frederick Walcheren. Perhaps, also, he did not how know cunning Love makes a man. The younger man had assumed his overcoat and hat, and gone forth at the hall door, as if he had but one intention—to seek the railway station, since his brougham had returned to town. But, once clear of the scrutiny of the servants, he skirted the house on the left side, and passed from the front garden to the back, which is easily done in most suburban houses. This brought him on to a large lawn, from which the interior of the lighted ballroom might be easily seen through the open windows. Also, by turning the other corner of the mansion, he could, by pressing his face against the glass, see if the picture gallery was occupied or not, though he remained himself unseen. The windows of this room were also thrown open, and Frederick waited at one of them until he saw the white-robed figure of Jenny Crampton steal in, and glance furtively around as if in search of him.

‘Jenny, Jenny,’ he called softly, lest she should be followed by the friend of the family, ‘Jenny, my love, come here, to this window.’

‘What is this?’ cried the girl as she perceived him; ‘why are you here? Is anything wrong?’

‘Nothing is wrong whilst you love me,’ said Frederick, ‘but we are watched, darling, so I have pretended to go home again. Have you the pluck to join me in the garden? There are any number of arbours here where we can talk undisturbed.’

‘Pluck,’ cried Jenny, jumping on the window sill, ‘of course I have. Pluck enough to follow you over a precipice, if you wish me to do so.’

‘You angel. I will ask you to take no more dangerous leap than into my arms. But were you seen? Did anyone follow you? We must not have an open row.’

‘No, no one even saw me leave the ballroom, for I was at the buffet with Captain Rawson, when number five dance struck up, so I told him to go and find his partner and leave mine to seek me out. And as soon as his back was turned I slipped out here.’

‘You dear girl! Give me your hand, then, and jump out; there is a lovely seat under that acacia tree—but what will you say if your mother asks where you have been?’

‘That I have been strolling in the garden with my partner. She will think it was Captain Rawson; but she will not ask. She is used to my vagaries, and lets me do just as I choose.’

‘But, darling, they won’t let you do that any longer, I’m afraid. I’ve had a lecture as well as you, Jenny. Mr Hindes followed me to the picture gallery just now, by your father’s request, and made me promise I would give up all pretensions to your hand, and leave off visiting at your house.’

‘And do you mean to keep your promise?’ inquired the girl, pouting.

‘Not unless you tell me to do so, Jenny; I love you too much for that. I only did it to prevent a row, for if Mr Crampton carried his threat of taking you away from Hampstead into execution, I might find it very difficult to have any communication with you again.’

‘But what is the good of my staying here if I am never to see you, Fred?’ asked Jenny.

‘That depends upon yourself, my darling; you can’t do it from your father’s house, that’s certain.’

‘Who’s from, then?’ said Jenny.

‘From mine, sweetheart! Don’t think me very bold, but, if you love me as you say, you will marry me whether your parents give their consent or not.’

‘So I will, if you will only tell me how, Fred.’

‘We must elope together, dearest; heaps of husbands and wives have done it before us, and been none the worse. Your father says that if you marry without his consent, he will leave you none of his money; that is a thing you must take into serious consideration, before you give me your answer. I have enough for both of us, still, you would be a richer woman if you remained your father’s heiress; his fortune cannot be less than ten thousand a year, whilst mine is only two thousand.’

‘What do I care for money in comparison with you, Fred?’ whispered Jenny.

‘That’s my own true girl,’ he answered, folding her closely to him, ‘and once you have made up your mind to marry me without your father’s consent, the rest is easy enough. Tell me to get a licence, and to give notice at the nearest registrar’s office to my place, and you have only to arrange how you can join me, so as to give us a few hours’ start of Mr Crampton, and I will have you out of his reach and power before the day is over.’

‘To join you, dearest, is easily managed,’ replied the girl. ‘I must take a few things with me, you know, Fred! To run away in the clothes I stand up in, would be altogether too romantic for the nineteenth century. But I can send a box to my dressmaker’s, under pretence of wanting some dresses altered—no one interferes with my dress at home—and then, when you let me know which day I am to be in town, I will drive myself over, as if to go shopping; tell Brunell to put the cobs up for a few hours, and call for me at Madame Costello’s at 5 o’clock, and apres ça, le deluge!’

‘A deluge of love, my darling—a life of happiness, during which I shall have but one thought—one aspiration—how I can best repay my darling angel for the sacrifice she has made for me. And, perhaps, after a time, your parents will come round. I cannot believe but that they will forgive our temerity in the end, and all will be merry as a marriage bell.’

‘Oh! poor mamma has nothing to do with it, Fred. I honestly believe she would let me marry a crossing-sweeper if I had set my heart upon it. I never remember her saying “No” to me since I was a baby. It is papa who is making all the fuss, and he is as obstinate as a pig. He thinks it is a sign of his own religion, to kick up such a dust about your being a Catholic, but I say he only proves he is no Christian by it. What can it signify if one is a Protestant or a Catholic? I am sure, for my own part, I would as soon be one as the other, and preferably neither. If you wish me to become a Catholic, Fred, I will to please you, but I hope you won’t expect me to go to church and hear sermons, for if there is one thing beyond another for which I long to get married, it is to have my liberty in such matters. Papa and mamma have sickened me of church-going. Aunt Clem, too, who is so very pious, has a face long enough to turn the milk sour. It is not encouraging to a girl to go and do likewise.’

Frederick Walcheren laughed as he kissed the speaker.

‘My darling!’ he answered, ‘I daresay your people have warned you that I am not a particularly good young man, but I can boast of one merit—I have never pretended to be better than I am. My cousin, Philip, and his great friend, Father Tasker, consider me a lost soul, but they cannot say that I am a dishonest one. They have heard some rumour—how, Heaven only knows—that I am very épris in a certain quarter, and put in an appearance at my rooms this afternoon to learn if it was true that I contemplated matrimony. You may take your oath that I did not gratify their curiosity. They want to get me into the church, so that they may grab my money. They’ve been trying it on for years, but this fish won’t bite!’

‘But, Fred, darling, would anything on earth ever make you go into the church?’ inquired Jenny, rather anxiously.

‘Nothing on earth,’ he replied, quickly; but, after a slight pause, he added, ‘at least only one thing, and that is too dreadful to contemplate. If you were taken from me, my treasure—if anything happened to you and I were left alone—I should be mad enough for anything—even to go into a monastery, and sacrifice every farthing I possess. What good would money be to me without my love?’

He pressed her closely to him as he spoke, and the two young faces were laid against each other, and the two young forms seemed to melt for a moment into one. But in another moment Jenny had sprung up to a standing position.

‘I must go, dear Fred,’ she exclaimed, ‘or they will miss me, and Mr Hindes may be sent to find out where I am. Good-bye, good-bye, my darling. How soon do you think I shall have your letter?’

‘The day after to-morrow, love! To-morrow morning I shall be in Doctors’ Commons for the licence, and will wire you simply, “All right, Costello.” Then, should the telegram fall into other hands, it will be thought to come from the dressmaker. On receipt of this, you must drive over on the following day to Madame Costello’s, and leave your box there, and as soon as you have dismissed Brunell and the trap, I will take you to the registrar’s office, and, when the knot is securely tied, we will pick up the box and be off to Dover. Will that suit your ladyship? Brunell will call for you at Costello’s at five o’clock, and, after waiting about for a considerable time, will return to Hampstead and give the alarm. By which time my wife and I will be enjoying our dinner at the Castle Warden, and laughing over the adventures of our wedding-day.’

‘Oh, Fred, it seems too good to come true,’ said the girl, with a slight shiver.

‘Nonsense, my dearest. It will come true, sure enough. But you are cold, my pretty Jenny. I have been a selfish brute to keep you out here so long. Let me take you back to the picture gallery. Or is it wiser you should go alone? Good-night, then, and God bless you. Give me one kiss, and don’t forget to meet me the day after you receive that wire!’

‘As if I could forget,’ replied the girl reproachfully, as she raised her face for her lover’s embrace, and, with his assistance, re-entered the picture gallery, and walked slowly back to the ballroom, to tell her mother she had such a terrible fit of neuralgia, she would rather return home at once.

Mr and Mrs Hindes, who were seated near Mrs Crampton, were all solicitude for her assumed indisposition, and Mr Hindes suggested taking her for a turn in the fresh air to see if the change from the heated ballroom would relieve her. Mrs Hindes, a tall, slight woman, with dark eyes and hair, and a graceful figure, who was really attached to Jenny, inquired with whom she had been dancing the last set, as she had looked for her in vain.

‘I have not been dancing at all,’ replied Jenny, boldly; ‘I have been sitting in the picture gallery with Lord Craven, but my head gets worse instead of better. Come along, mother, the carriage must be waiting for us by this time, and I am tired to death. I want to get to bed.’

‘Certainly, my love,’ replied Mrs Crampton, with her usual lamb-like acquiescence to all her daughter’s demands; ‘perhaps Mr Hindes will be good enough to see us to the carriage.’

And Henry Hindes, who was convinced that Miss Crampton’s neuralgia was due to Mr Walcheren’s defalcation, smiled inwardly, and conducted the ladies to their barouche, with much satisfaction that he had conducted the business he had taken on himself so successfully.

When Jenny Crampton reached home and found herself in the seclusion of her bedroom, she did not give way to any access of nervous agitation, or feel any trepidation at the thoughts of the important step which she had taken on herself. That might be all very well for a damsel of romance of a hundred years ago, but it is not the way the young women of the present day manage their affairs. They are too strong-minded, to cry and shake and faint over the deeds they have put their sign and seal to. Jenny had made an appeal to become the wife of Mr Walcheren in a fair way, and her request had been denied her, for what she considered a frivolous objection. She knew there was no chance of altering her father’s decision, and having always been given her own way since a child, she determined to take it now. She regretted having to be married privately, but she saw no wrong in it. Her parents might be sorry when they heard of it, but they had brought it on themselves. She was not going to keep Frederick waiting for an indefinite period, and perhaps lose him altogether, because her father did not like Roman Catholics as well as he did Protestants. She didn’t object to his religion, and she was the principal party concerned, so the young lady looked out the dresses she wished to take with her, and made her maid Ellen pack them in the box to take to the dressmaker’s, and, when the key was in her own hands, she unlocked it again and added the articles of linen and jewellery that she needed, and managed the whole affair as coolly as if she had been preparing for elopements all her life. On the Friday—it was on a Thursday that she received the wire to tell her all was right, and it was on a Friday that her ill-regulated marriage took place—she dressed herself in her most becoming tailor-made costume, and drove gaily off to town, with a wave of her hand and a crack of her whip as a last adieu to the mother and aunt who loved her devotedly. She had promised them privately that she would be back to luncheon, unless her cousins, the Burtons, were at home again (which she did not anticipate), and pressed her to stay the afternoon.

‘But, Jenny, love!’ expostulated her mother, ‘don’t stay later than two, even if they do! Pray be home before papa comes back from the city. Remember how very particular he is about your driving in town by yourself, and I’m afraid he may blame me, if he finds I have let you go with only Brunell.’

‘My dear mother, as if Brunell were not a better protection for me than fifty fat old men like papa. Now, don’t worry, there’s a good creature, for I shall be back long before dinner time, but you know what Costello is, and how difficult it is to get away from her. And perhaps I sha’n’t go to the Burtons at all. So keep up your pecker, and don’t expect me till you see me. Good-bye,’ and with a flourish she was off.

She drove rapidly to Kensington, and, on arrival, directed her groom to put up the cobs and get himself some dinner, and call for her at Mrs Burton’s house in Cromwell Road at five o’clock. The man touched his hat, the box was lifted out, and Miss Jenny entered the dressmaker’s abode.

‘Madame Costello,’ she commenced, ‘this is a box of things belonging to my cousin, Miss Burton, which I am just going to take to her in Cromwell Road. I have brought it here first that you may take out the canvas dress you made for me, and which is just a trifle tight under the arms. No, I have no time to have it fitted on, thank you. Tell the dressmaker to let it out half an inch under both sleeves. That will be quite sufficient.’

And, unlocking the box, the little diplomatist took out an old dress, which she had laid at the top, and locked the rest of its contents up again. Frederick Walcheren was waiting for her round the corner, she had spied him as she drove up to the door.

‘My cousin is waiting to take me on to Cromwell Road,’ she said to Madame Costello, as she beckoned him to advance. ‘Ah, Fred,’ she continued, ‘you must call a cab for me, for I have been obliged to send the trap on to pick up papa, who wishes to join us. Have you one ready? That’s right. Good-morning, Madame Costello. You needn’t hurry with the alterations, for I shall not want that dress again just yet.’

And with that Miss Crampton entered the cab and was soon whirling away to the registrar’s office.

‘I never saw anything more neatly managed in my life,’ was her first remark. ‘Mamma has reason not to expect me home till five or six. I told Brunell not to call for me at Cromwell Road till five, so he can’t be back in Hampstead till six or seven, and by that time—’

‘By that time you will be Mrs Frederick Walcheren past all recall,’ said her lover, joyfully.

But at that the girl seemed suddenly to lose her self-possession for the first time.

‘Oh! Fred,’ she cried, ‘what am I doing? Oh! do stop and let me out before it is too late! I was mad to come! It is too wicked! My people will never forgive me,’ and she struggled to loose herself from his detaining clasp.

‘Jenny, my dearest,’ he exclaimed, ‘be reasonable, for my sake, do! It is too late to go back now. I have made every arrangement for our staying at the Castle Warden Hotel. Besides, would you disappoint me in so terrible a manner, after having passed your plighted word to be my wife? I am sure you won’t! What should I do without you, Jenny? What would you do without me? If we part now, it must be for ever! Don’t make both our lives unhappy for a little want of courage.’

‘No, no, I must go on, I feel it! I cannot live without you, Fred. I love you too dearly! Do just as you will with me!’

‘I had a little difficulty with the licence business yesterday,’ he whispered, as they travelled onwards; ‘they wanted to have the written consent of your guardians, or my assurance that you were of age, so I swore you were. It was the only way out of it, my darling, and quite justifiable, in my eyes, under the circumstances; but I thought I would put you on your guard in case the registrar put any awkward questions to you concerning it.’

‘It doesn’t signify,’ replied the girl in a dejected tone. Now that the goal of her desires was so nearly reached, her high spirits seemed all to have evaporated, and she was trembling and nervous. ‘I have had to tell so many lies to manage the business, that one more or less cannot make much difference.’

‘Jenny, my own girl, what has come over you?’ asked Walcheren in some alarm. ‘Are you not well? Do you not love me as much as you thought you did? Your mood is not complimentary, dearest, to the coming ceremony. If you really repent the step you have taken, say so, and at all costs, if it breaks my heart, I will get out of the cab and you shall return to Madame Costello’s. Jenny, do you no longer wish to be my wife?’

But, at that awful alternative, Jenny’s sudden weakness evaporated and she clung to her lover, as if all her hopes in this world and the next centred in him.

‘Yes! yes! yes!’ she exclaimed eagerly, ‘you are my life—my all. I cannot live without you, or away from you. It is only a sudden fear of the consequences of this step we are taking which terrified me. It is gone now, dear Frederick, indeed it has. What fear could I have in becoming your wife. You, whom I love beyond all other things. Only, my poor parents, my poor, good mother, Fred. How I wish she had said, “God bless you, Jenny,” as we parted. She has been such a kind mother to me, and she will miss me so. She will have nothing to occupy her thoughts, or her hands, poor mother, now I am gone. Do you think I shall ever see them again, Fred?—my parents, and poor old Aunt Clem. Do you think my father will keep them from me all my life?’

She spoke so rapidly and excitedly, and she clung to him so tightly, that Frederick Walcheren feared she was what the lower orders call ‘going off her head,’ and said all he could think of to soothe her.

‘No! no! my darling girl, what can you be thinking of, to ask me such a silly question? Of course, your father will come round in time. The old gentleman is too fond and proud of you himself to hold out very long. It is I on whom he will pour out the vials of his wrath. Come, let me dry those tears. We are almost at the registrar’s office now, and he will think I am inveigling you into a marriage against your will if he sees you crying. Perhaps he will take it for a case of abduction, and order me to be locked up, until he has found out where you come from, and if I have carried you off by force. And then there will be the old gentleman to pay, and no pitch hot.’

Jenny laughed at the expression and let Frederick kiss away her tears, and in another half hour, they walked out of the registrar’s office together man and wife.

CHAPTER V.

Henry Hindes’ house was the most remarkable in Hampstead. It was called ‘The Old Hall,’ and was supposed to have been built more than two hundred years before. It was situated within ten minutes’ walk of Mr Crampton’s place, ‘The Cedars,’ but the two mansions belonged to different eras of the world’s history. ‘The Cedars’ was fitted in the most luxurious style. Everything that money could possibly buy, or build up, had been added to it, to increase its convenience and comfort. It revelled in glass houses, expensive out-buildings, swimming and other baths, and all the luxuries of the prevailing season. But everything about it was painfully new. Mr Crampton had purchased a freehold of the ground, and built ‘The Cedars’ for himself, or rather for the daughter who was to come after him. Often had he said to his wife that when their Jenny married, they would find a smaller place for themselves, and make ‘The Cedars’ part of her marriage portion. Consequently, he had lavished money upon it, letting the builders and upholsterers have their own way in everything, because it was only so much more for Jenny, when she came, like a young queen, into the property her father’s love had prepared for her.

But ‘The Old Hall’ was a very different sort of dwelling-place. Henry Hindes was a man of refined tastes and culture, a man who, before he had come into his father’s business, had travelled much and seen the world of art and science, and cultivated his mind, and raised his ideas of beauty and workmanship. He hated business and all its details, and, had it not been for his children’s sake, and the loss it would prove to them, would have sold his share of it for whatever it might fetch, and given up his life to the pursuit of his fancy. As it was, he refreshed himself, in the intervals of less congenial work, by making his home as beautiful as he could, but in a very different fashion from that of the Cramptons.

‘The Old Hall’ had low-roofed rooms, wainscotted with black oak, into which he would not permit the innovation of gas, and ghostly corridors that ran the whole length of the building, and stained glass windows which let in very little light, and made the house dark and gloomy in the eyes of such Philistines as could not appreciate medieval customs, and the relics of barbarism which made the delight of its owner’s heart.

He was the possessor, too, of an admirable collection of paintings, mostly of grim and melancholy subjects, but valuable in their way, and well in accordance with the mummies, sarcophagæ, curious gems and stones, and other curiosities which he had gathered on his travels and stored up in remembrance of them. His was a charming household, and his collection of odds and ends were the only gloomy things in it. His wife, Hannah Hindes, was a cultured and intelligent gentlewoman, eminently fond of him, and regarding his powerful brain and capacity for business with an admiration which bordered on reverence; and he was the father of three handsome and healthy children, all of whom he loved, and one of whom he idolised—to wit, Master Walter Hindes, his only son, an infant of some two years old.

To see Henry Hindes with this child in his fine old garden was to see him at his best—he was so partial to floriculture, and such a student of botany; though in this, as in other things, he would not allow fashion to trample sweetness and commonsense under foot. In the large, shady garden of ‘The Old Hall’ were to be found all sorts of flowers, growing together in the same bed. No ribbon borders or collections of prize begonias, or pelargoniums, of giant blossoms, or dwarfed bushes, transformed it into the semblance of a nurseryman’s plot of ground; but sweet-smelling herbs grew amongst the choicer plants, and high and low bloomed side by side, as they used to do in the long ago.

In the summer weather, Henry Hindes spent almost all his spare time in his garden with his children, and was apparently quite happy with his own thoughts and them. Hannah Hindes was a woman who never grated on her husband’s finer sensibilities. She was loving, tender and conscientious; but she seldom obtruded herself or her opinions on him, and never in opposition to his own. She was always there when needed, calm and intelligent, ready to give advice but not eager to thrust it down one’s throat; a restful sort of woman for a man to come home to after a hard and perhaps harassing day’s work.

And she had in her turn an admirable husband, for Mr Hindes was mild-tempered and indulgent; never found fault with anything his wife did, or wished to do, and was always quick to think of her comfort and that of her children.