T. H.

_June_ 1896.

DAME THE FIRST--THE FIRST COUNTESS OF WESSEX

By the Local Historian

King's-Hintock Court (said the narrator, turning over his memoranda for

reference)--King's-Hintock Court is, as we know, one of the most imposing

of the mansions that overlook our beautiful Blackmoor or Blakemore Vale.

On the particular occasion of which I have to speak this building stood,

as it had often stood before, in the perfect silence of a calm clear

night, lighted only by the cold shine of the stars. The season was

winter, in days long ago, the last century having run but little more

than a third of its length. North, south, and west, not a casement was

unfastened, not a curtain undrawn; eastward, one window on the upper

floor was open, and a girl of twelve or thirteen was leaning over the

sill. That she had not taken up the position for purposes of observation

was apparent at a glance, for she kept her eyes covered with her hands.

The room occupied by the girl was an inner one of a suite, to be reached

only by passing through a large bedchamber adjoining. From this

apartment voices in altercation were audible, everything else in the

building being so still. It was to avoid listening to these voices that

the girl had left her little cot, thrown a cloak round her head and

shoulders, and stretched into the night air.

But she could not escape the conversation, try as she would. The words

reached her in all their painfulness, one sentence in masculine tones,

those of her father, being repeated many times.

'I tell 'ee there shall be no such betrothal! I tell 'ee there sha'n't!

A child like her!'

She knew the subject of dispute to be herself. A cool feminine voice,

her mother's, replied:

'Have done with you, and be wise. He is willing to wait a good five or

six years before the marriage takes place, and there's not a man in the

county to compare with him.'

'It shall not be! He is over thirty. It is wickedness.'

'He is just thirty, and the best and finest man alive--a perfect match

for her.'

'He is poor!'

'But his father and elder brothers are made much of at Court--none so

constantly at the palace as they; and with her fortune, who knows? He

may be able to get a barony.'

'I believe you are in love with en yourself!'

'How can you insult me so, Thomas! And is it not monstrous for you to

talk of my wickedness when you have a like scheme in your own head? You

know you have. Some bumpkin of your own choosing--some petty gentleman

who lives down at that outlandish place of yours, Falls-Park--one of your

pot-companions' sons--'

There was an outburst of imprecation on the part of her husband in lieu

of further argument. As soon as he could utter a connected sentence he

said: 'You crow and you domineer, mistress, because you are

heiress-general here. You are in your own house; you are on your own

land. But let me tell 'ee that if I did come here to you instead of

taking you to me, it was done at the dictates of convenience merely. H---!

I'm no beggar! Ha'n't I a place of my own? Ha'n't I an avenue as

long as thine? Ha'n't I beeches that will more than match thy oaks? I

should have lived in my own quiet house and land, contented, if you had

not called me off with your airs and graces. Faith, I'll go back there;

I'll not stay with thee longer! If it had not been for our Betty I

should have gone long ago!'

After this there were no more words; but presently, hearing the sound of

a door opening and shutting below, the girl again looked from the window.

Footsteps crunched on the gravel-walk, and a shape in a drab greatcoat,

easily distinguishable as her father, withdrew from the house. He moved

to the left, and she watched him diminish down the long east front till

he had turned the corner and vanished. He must have gone round to the

stables.

She closed the window and shrank into bed, where she cried herself to

sleep. This child, their only one, Betty, beloved ambitiously by her

mother, and with uncalculating passionateness by her father, was

frequently made wretched by such episodes as this; though she was too

young to care very deeply, for her own sake, whether her mother betrothed

her to the gentleman discussed or not.

The Squire had often gone out of the house in this manner, declaring that

he would never return, but he had always reappeared in the morning. The

present occasion, however, was different in the issue: next day she was

told that her father had ridden to his estate at Falls-Park early in the

morning on business with his agent, and might not come back for some

days.

* * * * *

Falls-Park was over twenty miles from King's-Hintock Court, and was

altogether a more modest centre-piece to a more modest possession than

the latter. But as Squire Dornell came in view of it that February

morning, he thought that he had been a fool ever to leave it, though it

was for the sake of the greatest heiress in Wessex. Its classic front,

of the period of the second Charles, derived from its regular features a

dignity which the great, battlemented, heterogeneous mansion of his wife

could not eclipse. Altogether he was sick at heart, and the gloom which

the densely-timbered park threw over the scene did not tend to remove the

depression of this rubicund man of eight-and-forty, who sat so heavily

upon his gelding. The child, his darling Betty: there lay the root of

his trouble. He was unhappy when near his wife, he was unhappy when away

from his little girl; and from this dilemma there was no practicable

escape. As a consequence he indulged rather freely in the pleasures of

the table, became what was called a three bottle man, and, in his wife's

estimation, less and less presentable to her polite friends from town.

He was received by the two or three old servants who were in charge of

the lonely place, where a few rooms only were kept habitable for his use

or that of his friends when hunting; and during the morning he was made

more comfortable by the arrival of his faithful servant Tupcombe from

King's-Hintock. But after a day or two spent here in solitude he began

to feel that he had made a mistake in coming. By leaving King's-Hintock

in his anger he had thrown away his best opportunity of counteracting his

wife's preposterous notion of promising his poor little Betty's hand to a

man she had hardly seen. To protect her from such a repugnant bargain he

should have remained on the spot. He felt it almost as a misfortune that

the child would inherit so much wealth. She would be a mark for all the

adventurers in the kingdom. Had she been only the heiress to his own

unassuming little place at Falls, how much better would have been her

chances of happiness!

His wife had divined truly when she insinuated that he himself had a

lover in view for this pet child. The son of a dear deceased friend of

his, who lived not two miles from where the Squire now was, a lad a

couple of years his daughter's senior, seemed in her father's opinion the

one person in the world likely to make her happy. But as to breathing

such a scheme to either of the young people with the indecent haste that

his wife had shown, he would not dream of it; years hence would be soon

enough for that. They had already seen each other, and the Squire

fancied that he noticed a tenderness on the youth's part which promised

well. He was strongly tempted to profit by his wife's example, and

forestall her match-making by throwing the two young people together

there at Falls. The girl, though marriageable in the views of those

days, was too young to be in love, but the lad was fifteen, and already

felt an interest in her.

Still better than keeping watch over her at King's Hintock, where she was

necessarily much under her mother's influence, would it be to get the

child to stay with him at Falls for a time, under his exclusive control.

But how accomplish this without using main force? The only possible

chance was that his wife might, for appearance' sake, as she had done

before, consent to Betty paying him a day's visit, when he might find

means of detaining her till Reynard, the suitor whom his wife favoured,

had gone abroad, which he was expected to do the following week. Squire

Dornell determined to return to King's-Hintock and attempt the

enterprise. If he were refused, it was almost in him to pick up Betty

bodily and carry her off.

The journey back, vague and Quixotic as were his intentions, was

performed with a far lighter heart than his setting forth. He would see

Betty, and talk to her, come what might of his plan.

So he rode along the dead level which stretches between the hills

skirting Falls-Park and those bounding the town of Ivell, trotted through

that borough, and out by the King's-Hintock highway, till, passing the

villages he entered the mile-long drive through the park to the Court.

The drive being open, without an avenue, the Squire could discern the

north front and door of the Court a long way off, and was himself visible

from the windows on that side; for which reason he hoped that Betty might

perceive him coming, as she sometimes did on his return from an outing,

and run to the door or wave her handkerchief.

But there was no sign. He inquired for his wife as soon as he set foot

to earth.

'Mistress is away. She was called to London, sir.'

'And Mistress Betty?' said the Squire blankly.

'Gone likewise, sir, for a little change. Mistress has left a letter for

you.'

The note explained nothing, merely stating that she had posted to London

on her own affairs, and had taken the child to give her a holiday. On

the fly-leaf were some words from Betty herself to the same effect,

evidently written in a state of high jubilation at the idea of her jaunt.

Squire Dornell murmured a few expletives, and submitted to his

disappointment. How long his wife meant to stay in town she did not say;

but on investigation he found that the carriage had been packed with

sufficient luggage for a sojourn of two or three weeks.

King's-Hintock Court was in consequence as gloomy as Falls-Park had been.

He had lost all zest for hunting of late, and had hardly attended a meet

that season. Dornell read and re-read Betty's scrawl, and hunted up some

other such notes of hers to look over, this seeming to be the only

pleasure there was left for him. That they were really in London he

learnt in a few days by another letter from Mrs. Dornell, in which she

explained that they hoped to be home in about a week, and that she had

had no idea he was coming back to King's-Hintock so soon, or she would

not have gone away without telling him.

Squire Dornell wondered if, in going or returning, it had been her plan

to call at the Reynards' place near Melchester, through which city their

journey lay. It was possible that she might do this in furtherance of

her project, and the sense that his own might become the losing game was

harassing.

He did not know how to dispose of himself, till it occurred to him that,

to get rid of his intolerable heaviness, he would invite some friends to

dinner and drown his cares in grog and wine. No sooner was the carouse

decided upon than he put it in hand; those invited being mostly

neighbouring landholders, all smaller men than himself, members of the

hunt; also the doctor from Evershead, and the like--some of them

rollicking blades whose presence his wife would not have countenanced had

she been at home. 'When the cat's away--!' said the Squire.

They arrived, and there were indications in their manner that they meant

to make a night of it. Baxby of Sherton Castle was late, and they waited

a quarter of an hour for him, he being one of the liveliest of Dornell's

friends; without whose presence no such dinner as this would be

considered complete, and, it may be added, with whose presence no dinner

which included both sexes could be conducted with strict propriety. He

had just returned from London, and the Squire was anxious to talk to

him--for no definite reason; but he had lately breathed the atmosphere in

which Betty was.

At length they heard Baxby driving up to the door, whereupon the host and

the rest of his guests crossed over to the dining-room. In a moment

Baxby came hastily in at their heels, apologizing for his lateness.

'I only came back last night, you know,' he said; 'and the truth o't is,

I had as much as I could carry.' He turned to the Squire. 'Well,

Dornell--so cunning Reynard has stolen your little ewe lamb? Ha, ha!'

'What?' said Squire Dornell vacantly, across the dining-table, round

which they were all standing, the cold March sunlight streaming in upon

his full-clean shaven face.

'Surely th'st know what all the town knows?--you've had a letter by this

time?--that Stephen Reynard has married your Betty? Yes, as I'm a living

man. It was a carefully-arranged thing: they parted at once, and are not

to meet for five or six years. But, Lord, you must know!'

A thud on the floor was the only reply of the Squire. They quickly

turned. He had fallen down like a log behind the table, and lay

motionless on the oak boards.

Those at hand hastily bent over him, and the whole group were in

confusion. They found him to be quite unconscious, though puffing and

panting like a blacksmith's bellows. His face was livid, his veins

swollen, and beads of perspiration stood upon his brow.

'What's happened to him?' said several.

'An apoplectic fit,' said the doctor from Evershead, gravely.

He was only called in at the Court for small ailments, as a rule, and

felt the importance of the situation. He lifted the Squire's head,

loosened his cravat and clothing, and rang for the servants, who took the

Squire upstairs.

There he lay as if in a drugged sleep. The surgeon drew a basin-full of

blood from him, but it was nearly six o'clock before he came to himself.

The dinner was completely disorganized, and some had gone home long ago;

but two or three remained.

'Bless my soul,' Baxby kept repeating, 'I didn't know things had come to

this pass between Dornell and his lady! I thought the feast he was

spreading to-day was in honour of the event, though privately kept for

the present! His little maid married without his knowledge!'

As soon as the Squire recovered consciousness he gasped: ''Tis abduction!

'Tis a capital felony! He can be hung! Where is Baxby? I am very well

now. What items have ye heard, Baxby?'

The bearer of the untoward news was extremely unwilling to agitate

Dornell further, and would say little more at first. But an hour after,

when the Squire had partially recovered and was sitting up, Baxby told as

much as he knew, the most important particular being that Betty's mother

was present at the marriage, and showed every mark of approval.

'Everything appeared to have been done so regularly that I, of course,

thought you knew all about it,' he said.

'I knew no more than the underground dead that such a step was in the

wind! A child not yet thirteen! How Sue hath outwitted me! Did Reynard

go up to Lon'on with 'em, d'ye know?'

'I can't say. All I know is that your lady and daughter were walking

along the street, with the footman behind 'em; that they entered a

jeweller's shop, where Reynard was standing; and that there, in the

presence o' the shopkeeper and your man, who was called in on purpose,

your Betty said to Reynard--so the story goes: 'pon my soul I don't vouch

for the truth of it--she said, "Will you marry me?" or, "I want to marry

you: will you have me--now or never?" she said.'

'What she said means nothing,' murmured the Squire, with wet eyes. 'Her

mother put the words into her mouth to avoid the serious consequences

that would attach to any suspicion of force. The words be not the

child's: she didn't dream of marriage--how should she, poor little maid!

Go on.'

'Well, be that as it will, they were all agreed apparently. They bought

the ring on the spot, and the marriage took place at the nearest church

within half-an-hour.'

* * * * *

A day or two later there came a letter from Mrs. Dornell to her husband,

written before she knew of his stroke. She related the circumstances of

the marriage in the gentlest manner, and gave cogent reasons and excuses

for consenting to the premature union, which was now an accomplished fact

indeed. She had no idea, till sudden pressure was put upon her, that the

contract was expected to be carried out so soon, but being taken half

unawares, she had consented, having learned that Stephen Reynard, now

their son-in-law, was becoming a great favourite at Court, and that he

would in all likelihood have a title granted him before long. No harm

could come to their dear daughter by this early marriage-contract, seeing

that her life would be continued under their own eyes, exactly as before,

for some years. In fine, she had felt that no other such fair

opportunity for a good marriage with a shrewd courtier and wise man of

the world, who was at the same time noted for his excellent personal

qualities, was within the range of probability, owing to the rusticated

lives they led at King's-Hintock. Hence she had yielded to Stephen's

solicitation, and hoped her husband would forgive her. She wrote, in

short, like a woman who, having had her way as to the deed, is prepared

to make any concession as to words and subsequent behaviour.

All this Dornell took at its true value, or rather, perhaps, at less than

its true value. As his life depended upon his not getting into a

passion, he controlled his perturbed emotions as well as he was able,

going about the house sadly and utterly unlike his former self. He took

every precaution to prevent his wife knowing of the incidents of his

sudden illness, from a sense of shame at having a heart so tender; a

ridiculous quality, no doubt, in her eyes, now that she had become so

imbued with town ideas. But rumours of his seizure somehow reached her,

and she let him know that she was about to return to nurse him. He

thereupon packed up and went off to his own place at Falls-Park.

Here he lived the life of a recluse for some time. He was still too

unwell to entertain company, or to ride to hounds or elsewhither; but

more than this, his aversion to the faces of strangers and acquaintances,

who knew by that time of the trick his wife had played him, operated to

hold him aloof.

Nothing could influence him to censure Betty for her share in the

exploit. He never once believed that she had acted voluntarily. Anxious

to know how she was getting on, he despatched the trusty servant Tupcombe

to Evershead village, close to King's-Hintock, timing his journey so that

he should reach the place under cover of dark. The emissary arrived

without notice, being out of livery, and took a seat in the

chimney-corner of the Sow-and-Acorn.

The conversation of the droppers-in was always of the nine days'

wonder--the recent marriage. The smoking listener learnt that Mrs.

Dornell and the girl had returned to King's-Hintock for a day or two,

that Reynard had set out for the Continent, and that Betty had since been

packed off to school. She did not realize her position as Reynard's

child-wife--so the story went--and though somewhat awe-stricken at first

by the ceremony, she had soon recovered her spirits on finding that her

freedom was in no way to be interfered with.

After that, formal messages began to pass between Dornell and his wife,

the latter being now as persistently conciliating as she was formerly

masterful. But her rustic, simple, blustering husband still held

personally aloof. Her wish to be reconciled--to win his forgiveness for

her stratagem--moreover, a genuine tenderness and desire to soothe his

sorrow, which welled up in her at times, brought her at last to his door

at Falls-Park one day.

They had not met since that night of altercation, before her departure

for London and his subsequent illness. She was shocked at the change in

him. His face had become expressionless, as blank as that of a puppet,

and what troubled her still more was that she found him living in one

room, and indulging freely in stimulants, in absolute disobedience to the

physician's order. The fact was obvious that he could no longer be

allowed to live thus uncouthly.

So she sympathized, and begged his pardon, and coaxed. But though after

this date there was no longer such a complete estrangement as before,

they only occasionally saw each other, Dornell for the most part making

Falls his headquarters still.

Three or four years passed thus. Then she came one day, with more

animation in her manner, and at once moved him by the simple statement

that Betty's schooling had ended; she had returned, and was grieved

because he was away. She had sent a message to him in these words: 'Ask

father to come home to his dear Betty.'

'Ah! Then she is very unhappy!' said Squire Dornell.

His wife was silent.

''Tis that accursed marriage!' continued the Squire.

Still his wife would not dispute with him. 'She is outside in the

carriage,' said Mrs. Dornell gently.

'What--Betty?'

'Yes.'

'Why didn't you tell me?' Dornell rushed out, and there was the girl

awaiting his forgiveness, for she supposed herself, no less than her

mother, to be under his displeasure.

Yes, Betty had left school, and had returned to King's-Hintock. She was

nearly seventeen, and had developed to quite a young woman. She looked

not less a member of the household for her early marriage-contract, which

she seemed, indeed, to have almost forgotten. It was like a dream to

her; that clear cold March day, the London church, with its gorgeous

pews, and green-baize linings, and the great organ in the west gallery--so

different from their own little church in the shrubbery of King's-Hintock

Court--the man of thirty, to whose face she had looked up with so much

awe, and with a sense that he was rather ugly and formidable; the man

whom, though they corresponded politely, she had never seen since; one to

whose existence she was now so indifferent that if informed of his death,

and that she would never see him more, she would merely have replied,

'Indeed!' Betty's passions as yet still slept.

'Hast heard from thy husband lately?' said Squire Dornell, when they were

indoors, with an ironical laugh of fondness which demanded no answer.

The girl winced, and he noticed that his wife looked appealingly at him.

As the conversation went on, and there were signs that Dornell would

express sentiments that might do harm to a position which they could not

alter, Mrs. Dornell suggested that Betty should leave the room till her

father and herself had finished their private conversation; and this

Betty obediently did.

Dornell renewed his animadversions freely. 'Did you see how the sound of

his name frightened her?' he presently added. 'If you didn't, I did.

Zounds! what a future is in store for that poor little unfortunate wench

o' mine! I tell 'ee, Sue, 'twas not a marriage at all, in morality, and

if I were a woman in such a position, I shouldn't feel it as one. She

might, without a sign of sin, love a man of her choice as well now as if

she were chained up to no other at all. There, that's my mind, and I

can't help it. Ah, Sue, my man was best! He'd ha' suited her.'

'I don't believe it,' she replied incredulously.

'You should see him; then you would. He's growing up a fine fellow, I

can tell 'ee.'

'Hush! not so loud!' she answered, rising from her seat and going to the

door of the next room, whither her daughter had betaken herself. To Mrs.

Dornell's alarm, there sat Betty in a reverie, her round eyes fixed on

vacancy, musing so deeply that she did not perceive her mother's

entrance. She had heard every word, and was digesting the new knowledge.

Her mother felt that Falls-Park was dangerous ground for a young girl of

the susceptible age, and in Betty's peculiar position, while Dornell

talked and reasoned thus. She called Betty to her, and they took leave.

The Squire would not clearly promise to return and make King's-Hintock

Court his permanent abode; but Betty's presence there, as at former

times, was sufficient to make him agree to pay them a visit soon.

All the way home Betty remained preoccupied and silent. It was too plain

to her anxious mother that Squire Dornell's free views had been a sort of

awakening to the girl.

The interval before Dornell redeemed his pledge to come and see them was

unexpectedly short. He arrived one morning about twelve o'clock, driving

his own pair of black-bays in the curricle-phaeton with yellow panels and

red wheels, just as he had used to do, and his faithful old Tupcombe on

horseback behind. A young man sat beside the Squire in the carriage, and

Mrs. Dornell's consternation could scarcely be concealed when, abruptly

entering with his companion, the Squire announced him as his friend

Phelipson of Elm-Cranlynch.

Dornell passed on to Betty in the background and tenderly kissed her.

'Sting your mother's conscience, my maid!' he whispered. 'Sting her

conscience by pretending you are struck with Phelipson, and would ha'

loved him, as your old father's choice, much more than him she has forced

upon 'ee.'

The simple-souled speaker fondly imagined that it as entirely in

obedience to this direction that Betty's eyes stole interested glances at

the frank and impulsive Phelipson that day at dinner, and he laughed

grimly within himself to see how this joke of his, as he imagined it to

be, was disturbing the peace of mind of the lady of the house. 'Now Sue

sees what a mistake she has made!' said he.

Mrs. Dornell was verily greatly alarmed, and as soon as she could speak a

word with him alone she upbraided him. 'You ought not to have brought

him here. Oh Thomas, how could you be so thoughtless! Lord, don't you

see, dear, that what is done cannot be undone, and how all this foolery

jeopardizes her happiness with her husband? Until you interfered, and

spoke in her hearing about this Phelipson, she was as patient and as

willing as a lamb, and looked forward to Mr. Reynard's return with real

pleasure. Since her visit to Falls-Park she has been monstrous close-

mouthed and busy with her own thoughts. What mischief will you do? How

will it end?'

'Own, then, that my man was best suited to her. I only brought him to

convince you.'

'Yes, yes; I do admit it. But oh! do take him back again at once! Don't

keep him here! I fear she is even attracted by him already.'

'Nonsense, Sue. 'Tis only a little trick to tease 'ee!'

Nevertheless her motherly eye was not so likely to be deceived as his,

and if Betty were really only playing at being love-struck that day, she

played at it with the perfection of a Rosalind, and would have deceived

the best professors into a belief that it was no counterfeit. The

Squire, having obtained his victory, was quite ready to take back the too

attractive youth, and early in the afternoon they set out on their return

journey.

A silent figure who rode behind them was as interested as Dornell in that

day's experiment. It was the staunch Tupcombe, who, with his eyes on the

Squire's and young Phelipson's backs, thought how well the latter would

have suited Betty, and how greatly the former had changed for the worse

during these last two or three years. He cursed his mistress as the

cause of the change.

After this memorable visit to prove his point, the lives of the Dornell

couple flowed on quietly enough for the space of a twelvemonth, the

Squire for the most part remaining at Falls, and Betty passing and

repassing between them now and then, once or twice alarming her mother by

not driving home from her father's house till midnight.

* * * * *

The repose of King's-Hintock was broken by the arrival of a special

messenger. Squire Dornell had had an access of gout so violent as to be

serious. He wished to see Betty again: why had she not come for so long?

Mrs. Dornell was extremely reluctant to take Betty in that direction too

frequently; but the girl was so anxious to go, her interests latterly

seeming to be so entirely bound up in Falls-Park and its neighbourhood,

that there was nothing to be done but to let her set out and accompany

her.

Squire Dornell had been impatiently awaiting her arrival. They found him

very ill and irritable. It had been his habit to take powerful medicines

to drive away his enemy, and they had failed in their effect on this

occasion.

The presence of his daughter, as usual, calmed him much, even while, as

usual too, it saddened him; for he could never forget that she had

disposed of herself for life in opposition to his wishes, though she had

secretly assured him that she would never have consented had she been as

old as she was now.

As on a former occasion, his wife wished to speak to him alone about the

girl's future, the time now drawing nigh at which Reynard was expected to

come and claim her. He would have done so already, but he had been put

off by the earnest request of the young woman herself, which accorded

with that of her parents, on the score of her youth. Reynard had

deferentially submitted to their wishes in this respect, the

understanding between them having been that he would not visit her before

she was eighteen, except by the mutual consent of all parties. But this

could not go on much longer, and there was no doubt, from the tenor of

his last letter, that he would soon take possession of her whether or no.

To be out of the sound of this delicate discussion Betty was accordingly

sent downstairs, and they soon saw her walking away into the shrubberies,

looking very pretty in her sweeping green gown, and flapping

broad-brimmed hat overhung with a feather.

On returning to the subject, Mrs. Dornell found her husband's reluctance

to reply in the affirmative to Reynard's letter to be as great as ever.

'She is three months short of eighteen!' he exclaimed. ''Tis too soon. I

won't hear of it! If I have to keep him off sword in hand, he shall not

have her yet.'

'But, my dear Thomas,' she expostulated, 'consider if anything should

happen to you or to me, how much better it would be that she should be

settled in her home with him!'

'I say it is too soon!' he argued, the veins of his forehead beginning to

swell. 'If he gets her this side o' Candlemas I'll challenge en--I'll

take my oath on't! I'll be back to King's-Hintock in two or three days,

and I'll not lose sight of her day or night!'

She feared to agitate him further, and gave way, assuring him, in

obedience to his demand, that if Reynard should write again before he got

back, to fix a time for joining Betty, she would put the letter in her

husband's hands, and he should do as he chose. This was all that

required discussion privately, and Mrs. Dornell went to call in Betty,

hoping that she had not heard her father's loud tones.

She had certainly not done so this time. Mrs. Dornell followed the path

along which she had seen Betty wandering, but went a considerable

distance without perceiving anything of her. The Squire's wife then

turned round to proceed to the other side of the house by a short cut

across the grass, when, to her surprise and consternation, she beheld the

object of her search sitting on the horizontal bough of a cedar, beside

her being a young man, whose arm was round her waist. He moved a little,

and she recognized him as young Phelipson.

Alas, then, she was right. The so-called counterfeit love was real. What

Mrs. Dornell called her husband at that moment, for his folly in

originally throwing the young people together, it is not necessary to

mention. She decided in a moment not to let the lovers know that she had

seen them. She accordingly retreated, reached the front of the house by

another route, and called at the top of her voice from a window, 'Betty!'

For the first time since her strategic marriage of the child, Susan

Dornell doubted the wisdom of that step.

Her husband had, as it were, been assisted by destiny to make his

objection, originally trivial, a valid one. She saw the outlines of

trouble in the future. Why had Dornell interfered? Why had he insisted

upon producing his man? This, then, accounted for Betty's pleading for

postponement whenever the subject of her husband's return was broached;

this accounted for her attachment to Falls-Park. Possibly this very

meeting that she had witnessed had been arranged by letter.

Perhaps the girl's thoughts would never have strayed for a moment if her

father had not filled her head with ideas of repugnance to her early

union, on the ground that she had been coerced into it before she knew

her own mind; and she might have rushed to meet her husband with open

arms on the appointed day.

Betty at length appeared in the distance in answer to the call, and came

up pale, but looking innocent of having seen a living soul. Mrs. Dornell

groaned in spirit at such duplicity in the child of her bosom. This was

the simple creature for whose development into womanhood they had all

been so tenderly waiting--a forward minx, old enough not only to have a

lover, but to conceal his existence as adroitly as any woman of the

world! Bitterly did the Squire's lady regret that Stephen Reynard had

not been allowed to come to claim her at the time he first proposed.

The two sat beside each other almost in silence on their journey back to

King's-Hintock. Such words as were spoken came mainly from Betty, and

their formality indicated how much her mind and heart were occupied with

other things.

Mrs. Dornell was far too astute a mother to openly attack Betty on the

matter. That would be only fanning flame. The indispensable course

seemed to her to be that of keeping the treacherous girl under lock and

key till her husband came to take her off her mother's hands. That he

would disregard Dornell's opposition, and come soon, was her devout wish.

It seemed, therefore, a fortunate coincidence that on her arrival at

King's-Hintock a letter from Reynard was put into Mrs. Dornell's hands.

It was addressed to both her and her husband, and courteously informed

them that the writer had landed at Bristol, and proposed to come on to

King's-Hintock in a few days, at last to meet and carry off his darling

Betty, if she and her parents saw no objection.

Betty had also received a letter of the same tenor. Her mother had only

to look at her face to see how the girl received the information. She

was as pale as a sheet.

'You must do your best to welcome him this time, my dear Betty,' her

mother said gently.

'But--but--I--'

'You are a woman now,' added her mother severely, 'and these

postponements must come to an end.'

'But my father--oh, I am sure he will not allow this! I am not ready. If

he could only wait a year longer--if he could only wait a few months

longer! Oh, I wish--I wish my dear father were here! I will send to him

instantly.' She broke off abruptly, and falling upon her mother's neck,

burst into tears, saying, 'O my mother, have mercy upon me--I do not love

this man, my husband!'

The agonized appeal went too straight to Mrs. Dornell's heart for her to

hear it unmoved. Yet, things having come to this pass, what could she

do? She was distracted, and for a moment was on Betty's side. Her

original thought had been to write an affirmative reply to Reynard, allow

him to come on to King's-Hintock, and keep her husband in ignorance of

the whole proceeding till he should arrive from Falls on some fine day

after his recovery, and find everything settled, and Reynard and Betty

living together in harmony. But the events of the day, and her

daughter's sudden outburst of feeling, had overthrown this intention.

Betty was sure to do as she had threatened, and communicate instantly

with her father, possibly attempt to fly to him. Moreover, Reynard's

letter was addressed to Mr. Dornell and herself conjointly, and she could

not in conscience keep it from her husband.

'I will send the letter on to your father instantly,' she replied

soothingly. 'He shall act entirely as he chooses, and you know that will

not be in opposition to your wishes. He would ruin you rather than

thwart you. I only hope he may be well enough to bear the agitation of

this news. Do you agree to this?'

Poor Betty agreed, on condition that she should actually witness the

despatch of the letter. Her mother had no objection to offer to this;

but as soon as the horseman had cantered down the drive toward the

highway, Mrs. Dornell's sympathy with Betty's recalcitration began to die

out. The girl's secret affection for young Phelipson could not possibly

be condoned. Betty might communicate with him, might even try to reach

him. Ruin lay that way. Stephen Reynard must be speedily installed in

his proper place by Betty's side.

She sat down and penned a private letter to Reynard, which threw light

upon her plan.

* * * * *

'It is Necessary that I should now tell you,' she said, 'what I have

never Mentioned before--indeed I may have signified the Contrary--that

her Father's Objection to your joining her has not as yet been overcome.

As I personally Wish to delay you no longer--am indeed as anxious for

your Arrival as you can be yourself, having the good of my Daughter at

Heart--no course is left open to me but to assist your Cause without my

Husband's Knowledge. He, I am sorry to say, is at present ill at Falls-

Park, but I felt it my Duty to forward him your Letter. He will

therefore be like to reply with a peremptory Command to you to go back

again, for some Months, whence you came, till the Time he originally

stipulated has expir'd. My Advice is, if you get such a Letter, to take

no Notice of it, but to come on hither as you had proposed, letting me

know the Day and Hour (after dark, if possible) at which we may expect

you. Dear Betty is with me, and I warrant ye that she shall be in the

House when you arrive.'

* * * * *

Mrs. Dornell, having sent away this epistle unsuspected of anybody, next

took steps to prevent her daughter leaving the Court, avoiding if

possible to excite the girl's suspicions that she was under restraint.

But, as if by divination, Betty had seemed to read the husband's approach

in the aspect of her mother's face.

'He is coming!' exclaimed the maiden.

'Not for a week,' her mother assured her.

'He is then--for certain?'

'Well, yes.'

Betty hastily retired to her room, and would not be seen.

To lock her up, and hand over the key to Reynard when he should appear in

the hall, was a plan charming in its simplicity, till her mother found,

on trying the door of the girl's chamber softly, that Betty had already

locked and bolted it on the inside, and had given directions to have her

meals served where she was, by leaving them on a dumb-waiter outside the

door.

Thereupon Mrs. Dornell noiselessly sat down in her boudoir, which, as

well as her bed-chamber, was a passage-room to the girl's apartment, and

she resolved not to vacate her post night or day till her daughter's

husband should appear, to which end she too arranged to breakfast, dine,

and sup on the spot. It was impossible now that Betty should escape

without her knowledge, even if she had wished, there being no other door

to the chamber, except one admitting to a small inner dressing-room

inaccessible by any second way.

But it was plain that the young girl had no thought of escape. Her ideas

ran rather in the direction of intrenchment: she was prepared to stand a

siege, but scorned flight. This, at any rate, rendered her secure. As

to how Reynard would contrive a meeting with her coy daughter while in

such a defensive humour, that, thought her mother, must be left to his

own ingenuity to discover.

Betty had looked so wild and pale at the announcement of her husband's

approaching visit, that Mrs. Dornell, somewhat uneasy, could not leave

her to herself. She peeped through the keyhole an hour later. Betty lay

on the sofa, staring listlessly at the ceiling.

'You are looking ill, child,' cried her mother. 'You've not taken the

air lately. Come with me for a drive.'

Betty made no objection. Soon they drove through the park towards the

village, the daughter still in the strained, strung-up silence that had

fallen upon her. They left the park to return by another route, and on

the open road passed a cottage.

Betty's eye fell upon the cottage-window. Within it she saw a young girl

about her own age, whom she knew by sight, sitting in a chair and propped

by a pillow. The girl's face was covered with scales, which glistened in

the sun. She was a convalescent from smallpox--a disease whose

prevalence at that period was a terror of which we at present can hardly

form a conception.

An idea suddenly energized Betty's apathetic features. She glanced at

her mother; Mrs. Dornell had been looking in the opposite direction.

Betty said that she wished to go back to the cottage for a moment to

speak to a girl in whom she took an interest. Mrs. Dornell appeared

suspicious, but observing that the cottage had no back-door, and that

Betty could not escape without being seen, she allowed the carriage to be

stopped. Betty ran back and entered the cottage, emerging again in about

a minute, and resuming her seat in the carriage. As they drove on she

fixed her eyes upon her mother and said, 'There, I have done it now!' Her

pale face was stormy, and her eyes full of waiting tears.

'What have you done?' said Mrs. Dornell.

'Nanny Priddle is sick of the smallpox, and I saw her at the window, and

I went in and kissed her, so that I might take it; and now I shall have

it, and he won't be able to come near me!'

'Wicked girl!' cries her mother. 'Oh, what am I to do! What--bring a

distemper on yourself, and usurp the sacred prerogative of God, because

you can't palate the man you've wedded!'

The alarmed woman gave orders to drive home as rapidly as possible, and

on arriving, Betty, who was by this time also somewhat frightened at her

own enormity, was put into a bath, and fumigated, and treated in every

way that could be thought of to ward off the dreadful malady that in a

rash moment she had tried to acquire.

There was now a double reason for isolating the rebellious daughter and

wife in her own chamber, and there she accordingly remained for the rest

of the day and the days that followed; till no ill results seemed likely

to arise from her wilfulness.

* * * * *

Meanwhile the first letter from Reynard, announcing to Mrs. Dornell and

her husband jointly that he was coming in a few days, had sped on its way

to Falls-Park. It was directed under cover to Tupcombe, the confidential

servant, with instructions not to put it into his master's hands till he

had been refreshed by a good long sleep. Tupcombe much regretted his

commission, letters sent in this way always disturbing the Squire; but

guessing that it would be infinitely worse in the end to withhold the

news than to reveal it, he chose his time, which was early the next

morning, and delivered the missive.

The utmost effect that Mrs. Dornell had anticipated from the message was

a peremptory order from her husband to Reynard to hold aloof a few months

longer. What the Squire really did was to declare that he would go

himself and confront Reynard at Bristol, and have it out with him there

by word of mouth.

'But, master,' said Tupcombe, 'you can't. You cannot get out of bed.'

'You leave the room, Tupcombe, and don't say "can't" before me! Have

Jerry saddled in an hour.'

The long-tried Tupcombe thought his employer demented, so utterly

helpless was his appearance just then, and he went out reluctantly. No

sooner was he gone than the Squire, with great difficulty, stretched

himself over to a cabinet by the bedside, unlocked it, and took out a

small bottle. It contained a gout specific, against whose use he had

been repeatedly warned by his regular physician, but whose warning he now

cast to the winds.

He took a double dose, and waited half an hour. It seemed to produce no

effect. He then poured out a treble dose, swallowed it, leant back upon

his pillow, and waited. The miracle he anticipated had been worked at

last. It seemed as though the second draught had not only operated with

its own strength, but had kindled into power the latent forces of the

first. He put away the bottle, and rang up Tupcombe.

Less than an hour later one of the housemaids, who of course was quite

aware that the Squire's illness was serious, was surprised to hear a bold

and decided step descending the stairs from the direction of Mr.

Dornell's room, accompanied by the humming of a tune. She knew that the

doctor had not paid a visit that morning, and that it was too heavy to be

the valet or any other man-servant. Looking up, she saw Squire Dornell

fully dressed, descending toward her in his drab caped riding-coat and

boots, with the swinging easy movement of his prime. Her face expressed

her amazement.

'What the devil beest looking at?' said the Squire. 'Did you never see a

man walk out of his house before, wench?'

Resuming his humming--which was of a defiant sort--he proceeded to the

library, rang the bell, asked if the horses were ready, and directed them

to be brought round. Ten minutes later he rode away in the direction of

Bristol, Tupcombe behind him, trembling at what these movements might

portend.

They rode on through the pleasant woodlands and the monotonous straight

lanes at an equal pace. The distance traversed might have been about

fifteen miles when Tupcombe could perceive that the Squire was getting

tired--as weary as he would have been after riding three times the

distance ten years before. However, they reached Bristol without any

mishap, and put up at the Squire's accustomed inn. Dornell almost

immediately proceeded on foot to the inn which Reynard had given as his

address, it being now about four o'clock.

Reynard had already dined--for people dined early then--and he was

staying indoors. He had already received Mrs. Dornell's reply to his

letter; but before acting upon her advice and starting for King's-Hintock

he made up his mind to wait another day, that Betty's father might at

least have time to write to him if so minded. The returned traveller

much desired to obtain the Squire's assent, as well as his wife's, to the

proposed visit to his bride, that nothing might seem harsh or forced in

his method of taking his position as one of the family. But though he

anticipated some sort of objection from his father-in-law, in consequence

of Mrs. Dornell's warning, he was surprised at the announcement of the

Squire in person.

Stephen Reynard formed the completest of possible contrasts to Dornell as

they stood confronting each other in the best parlour of the Bristol

tavern. The Squire, hot-tempered, gouty, impulsive, generous, reckless;

the younger man, pale, tall, sedate, self-possessed--a man of the world,

fully bearing out at least one couplet in his epitaph, still extant in

King's-Hintock church, which places in the inventory of his good

qualities

'Engaging Manners, cultivated Mind,

Adorn'd by Letters, and in Courts refin'd.'

He was at this time about five-and-thirty, though careful living and an

even, unemotional temperament caused him to look much younger than his

years.

Squire Dornell plunged into his errand without much ceremony or preface.

'I am your humble servant, sir,' he said. 'I have read your letter writ

to my wife and myself, and considered that the best way to answer it

would be to do so in person.'

'I am vastly honoured by your visit, sir,' said Mr. Stephen Reynard,

bowing.

'Well, what's done can't be undone,' said Dornell, 'though it was mighty

early, and was no doing of mine. She's your wife; and there's an end

on't. But in brief, sir, she's too young for you to claim yet; we

mustn't reckon by years; we must reckon by nature. She's still a girl;

'tis onpolite of 'ee to come yet; next year will be full soon enough for

you to take her to you.'

Now, courteous as Reynard could be, he was a little obstinate when his

resolution had once been formed. She had been promised him by her

eighteenth birthday at latest--sooner if she were in robust health. Her

mother had fixed the time on her own judgment, without a word of

interference on his part. He had been hanging about foreign courts till

he was weary. Betty was now as woman, if she would ever be one, and

there was not, in his mind, the shadow of an excuse for putting him off

longer. Therefore, fortified as he was by the support of her mother, he

blandly but firmly told the Squire that he had been willing to waive his

rights, out of deference to her parents, to any reasonable extent, but

must now, in justice to himself and her insist on maintaining them. He

therefore, since she had not come to meet him, should proceed to King's-

Hintock in a few days to fetch her.

This announcement, in spite of the urbanity with which it was delivered,

set Dornell in a passion.

'Oh dammy, sir; you talk about rights, you do, after stealing her away, a

mere child, against my will and knowledge! If we'd begged and prayed 'ee

to take her, you could say no more.'

'Upon my honour, your charge is quite baseless, sir,' said his son-in-

law. 'You must know by this time--or if you do not, it has been a

monstrous cruel injustice to me that I should have been allowed to remain

in your mind with such a stain upon my character--you must know that I

used no seductiveness or temptation of any kind. Her mother assented;

she assented. I took them at their word. That you was really opposed to

the marriage was not known to me till afterwards.'

Dornell professed to believe not a word of it. 'You sha'n't have her

till she's dree sixes full--no maid ought to be married till she's dree

sixes!--and my daughter sha'n't be treated out of nater!' So he stormed

on till Tupcombe, who had been alarmedly listening in the next room,

entered suddenly, declaring to Reynard that his master's life was in

danger if the interview were prolonged, he being subject to apoplectic

strokes at these crises. Reynard immediately said that he would be the

last to wish to injure Squire Dornell, and left the room, and as soon as

the Squire had recovered breath and equanimity, he went out of the inn,

leaning on the arm of Tupcombe.

Tupcombe was for sleeping in Bristol that night, but Dornell, whose

energy seemed as invincible as it was sudden, insisted upon mounting and

getting back as far as Falls-Park, to continue the journey to

King's-Hintock on the following day. At five they started, and took the

southern road toward the Mendip Hills. The evening was dry and windy,

and, excepting that the sun did not shine, strongly reminded Tupcombe of

the evening of that March month, nearly five years earlier, when news had

been brought to King's-Hintock Court of the child Betty's marriage in

London--news which had produced upon Dornell such a marked effect for the

worse ever since, and indirectly upon the household of which he was the

head. Before that time the winters were lively at Falls-Park, as well as

at King's-Hintock, although the Squire had ceased to make it his regular

residence. Hunting-guests and shooting-guests came and went, and open

house was kept. Tupcombe disliked the clever courtier who had put a stop

to this by taking away from the Squire the only treasure he valued.

It grew darker with their progress along the lanes, and Tupcombe

discovered from Mr. Dornell's manner of riding that his strength was

giving way; and spurring his own horse close alongside, he asked him how

he felt.

'Oh, bad; damn bad, Tupcombe! I can hardly keep my seat. I shall never

be any better, I fear! Have we passed Three-Man-Gibbet yet?'

'Not yet by a long ways, sir.'

'I wish we had. I can hardly hold on.' The Squire could not repress a

groan now and then, and Tupcombe knew he was in great pain. 'I wish I

was underground--that's the place for such fools as I! I'd gladly be

there if it were not for Mistress Betty. He's coming on to

King's-Hintock to-morrow--he won't put it off any longer; he'll set out

and reach there to-morrow night, without stopping at Falls; and he'll

take her unawares, and I want to be there before him.'

'I hope you may be well enough to do it, sir. But really--'

'I _must_, Tupcombe! You don't know what my trouble is; it is not so

much that she is married to this man without my agreeing--for, after all,

there's nothing to say against him, so far as I know; but that she don't

take to him at all, seems to fear him--in fact, cares nothing about him;

and if he comes forcing himself into the house upon her, why, 'twill be

rank cruelty. Would to the Lord something would happen to prevent him!'

How they reached home that night Tupcombe hardly knew. The Squire was in

such pain that he was obliged to recline upon his horse, and Tupcombe was

afraid every moment lest he would fall into the road. But they did reach

home at last, and Mr. Dornell was instantly assisted to bed.

* * * * *

Next morning it was obvious that he could not possibly go to

King's-Hintock for several days at least, and there on the bed he lay,

cursing his inability to proceed on an errand so personal and so delicate

that no emissary could perform it. What he wished to do was to ascertain

from Betty's own lips if her aversion to Reynard was so strong that his

presence would be positively distasteful to her. Were that the case, he

would have borne her away bodily on the saddle behind him.

But all that was hindered now, and he repeated a hundred times in

Tupcombe's hearing, and in that of the nurse and other servants, 'I wish

to God something would happen to him!'

This sentiment, reiterated by the Squire as he tossed in the agony

induced by the powerful drugs of the day before, entered sharply into the

soul of Tupcombe and of all who were attached to the house of Dornell, as

distinct from the house of his wife at King's-Hintock. Tupcombe, who was

an excitable man, was hardly less disquieted by the thought of Reynard's

return than the Squire himself was. As the week drew on, and the

afternoon advanced at which Reynard would in all probability be passing

near Falls on his way to the Court, the Squire's feelings became acuter,

and the responsive Tupcombe could hardly bear to come near him. Having

left him in the hands of the doctor, the former went out upon the lawn,

for he could hardly breathe in the contagion of excitement caught from

the employer who had virtually made him his confidant. He had lived with

the Dornells from his boyhood, had been born under the shadow of their

walls; his whole life was annexed and welded to the life of the family in

a degree which has no counterpart in these latter days.

He was summoned indoors, and learnt that it had been decided to send for

Mrs. Dornell: her husband was in great danger. There were two or three

who could have acted as messenger, but Dornell wished Tupcombe to go, the

reason showing itself when, Tupcombe being ready to start, Squire Dornell

summoned him to his chamber and leaned down so that he could whisper in

his ear:

'Put Peggy along smart, Tupcombe, and get there before him, you

know--before him. This is the day he fixed. He has not passed Falls

cross-roads yet. If you can do that you will be able to get Betty to

come--d'ye see?--after her mother has started; she'll have a reason for

not waiting for him. Bring her by the lower road--he'll go by the upper.

Your business is to make 'em miss each other--d'ye see?--but that's a

thing I couldn't write down.'

Five minutes after, Tupcombe was astride the horse and on his way--the

way he had followed so many times since his master, a florid young

countryman, had first gone wooing to King's-Hintock Court. As soon as he

had crossed the hills in the immediate neighbourhood of the manor, the

road lay over a plain, where it ran in long straight stretches for

several miles. In the best of times, when all had been gay in the united

houses, that part of the road had seemed tedious. It was gloomy in the

extreme now that he pursued it, at night and alone, on such an errand.

He rode and brooded. If the Squire were to die, he, Tupcombe, would be

alone in the world and friendless, for he was no favourite with Mrs.

Dornell; and to find himself baffled, after all, in what he had set his

mind on, would probably kill the Squire. Thinking thus, Tupcombe stopped

his horse every now and then, and listened for the coming husband. The

time was drawing on to the moment when Reynard might be expected to pass

along this very route. He had watched the road well during the

afternoon, and had inquired of the tavern-keepers as he came up to each,

and he was convinced that the premature descent of the stranger-husband

upon his young mistress had not been made by this highway as yet.

Besides the girl's mother, Tupcombe was the only member of the household

who suspected Betty's tender feelings towards young Phelipson, so

unhappily generated on her return from school; and he could therefore

imagine, even better than her fond father, what would be her emotions on

the sudden announcement of Reynard's advent that evening at

King's-Hintock Court.

So he rode and rode, desponding and hopeful by turns. He felt assured

that, unless in the unfortunate event of the almost immediate arrival of

her son-in law at his own heels, Mrs. Dornell would not be able to hinder

Betty's departure for her father's bedside.

It was about nine o'clock that, having put twenty miles of country behind

him, he turned in at the lodge-gate nearest to Ivell and King's-Hintock

village, and pursued the long north drive--itself much like a turnpike

road--which led thence through the park to the Court. Though there were

so many trees in King's-Hintock park, few bordered the carriage roadway;

he could see it stretching ahead in the pale night light like an unrolled

deal shaving. Presently the irregular frontage of the house came in

view, of great extent, but low, except where it rose into the outlines of

a broad square tower.

As Tupcombe approached he rode aside upon the grass, to make sure, if

possible, that he was the first comer, before letting his presence be

known. The Court was dark and sleepy, in no respect as if a bridegroom

were about to arrive.

While pausing he distinctly heard the tread of a horse upon the track

behind him, and for a moment despaired of arriving in time: here, surely,

was Reynard! Pulling up closer to the densest tree at hand he waited,

and found he had retreated nothing too soon, for the second rider avoided

the gravel also, and passed quite close to him. In the profile he

recognized young Phelipson.

Before Tupcombe could think what to do, Phelipson had gone on; but not to

the door of the house. Swerving to the left, he passed round to the east

angle, where, as Tupcombe knew, were situated Betty's apartments.

Dismounting, he left the horse tethered to a hanging bough, and walked on

to the house.

Suddenly his eye caught sight of an object which explained the position

immediately. It was a ladder stretching from beneath the trees, which

there came pretty close to the house, up to a first-floor window--one

which lighted Miss Betty's rooms. Yes, it was Betty's chamber; he knew

every room in the house well.

The young horseman who had passed him, having evidently left his steed

somewhere under the trees also, was perceptible at the top of the ladder,

immediately outside Betty's window. While Tupcombe watched, a cloaked

female figure stepped timidly over the sill, and the two cautiously

descended, one before the other, the young man's arms enclosing the young

woman between his grasp of the ladder, so that she could not fall. As

soon as they reached the bottom, young Phelipson quickly removed the

ladder and hid it under the bushes. The pair disappeared; till, in a few

minutes, Tupcombe could discern a horse emerging from a remoter part of

the umbrage. The horse carried double, the girl being on a pillion

behind her lover.

Tupcombe hardly knew what to do or think; yet, though this was not

exactly the kind of flight that had been intended, she had certainly

escaped. He went back to his own animal, and rode round to the servants'

door, where he delivered the letter for Mrs. Dornell. To leave a verbal

message for Betty was now impossible.

The Court servants desired him to stay over the night, but he would not

do so, desiring to get back to the Squire as soon as possible and tell

what he had seen. Whether he ought not to have intercepted the young

people, and carried off Betty himself to her father, he did not know.

However, it was too late to think of that now, and without wetting his

lips or swallowing a crumb, Tupcombe turned his back upon King's-Hintock

Court.

It was not till he had advanced a considerable distance on his way

homeward that, halting under the lantern of a roadside-inn while the

horse was watered, there came a traveller from the opposite direction in

a hired coach; the lantern lit the stranger's face as he passed along and

dropped into the shade. Tupcombe exulted for the moment, though he could

hardly have justified his exultation. The belated traveller was Reynard;

and another had stepped in before him.

You may now be willing to know of the fortunes of Miss Betty. Left much

to herself through the intervening days, she had ample time to brood over

her desperate attempt at the stratagem of infection--thwarted,

apparently, by her mother's promptitude. In what other way to gain time

she could not think. Thus drew on the day and the hour of the evening on

which her husband was expected to announce himself.

At some period after dark, when she could not tell, a tap at the window,

twice and thrice repeated, became audible. It caused her to start up,

for the only visitant in her mind was the one whose advances she had so

feared as to risk health and life to repel them. She crept to the

window, and heard a whisper without.

'It is I--Charley,' said the voice.

Betty's face fired with excitement. She had latterly begun to doubt her

admirer's staunchness, fancying his love to be going off in mere

attentions which neither committed him nor herself very deeply. She

opened the window, saying in a joyous whisper, 'Oh Charley; I thought you

had deserted me quite!'

He assured her he had not done that, and that he had a horse in waiting,

if she would ride off with him. 'You must come quickly,' he said; 'for

Reynard's on the way!'

To throw a cloak round herself was the work of a moment, and assuring

herself that her door was locked against a surprise, she climbed over the

window-sill and descended with him as we have seen.

Her mother meanwhile, having received Tupcombe's note, found the news of

her husband's illness so serious, as to displace her thoughts of the

coming son-in-law, and she hastened to tell her daughter of the Squire's

dangerous condition, thinking it might be desirable to take her to her

father's bedside. On trying the door of the girl's room, she found it

still locked. Mrs. Dornell called, but there was no answer. Full of

misgivings, she privately fetched the old house-steward and bade him

burst open the door--an order by no means easy to execute, the joinery of

the Court being massively constructed. However, the lock sprang open at

last, and she entered Betty's chamber only to find the window unfastened

and the bird flown.

For a moment Mrs. Dornell was staggered. Then it occurred to her that

Betty might have privately obtained from Tupcombe the news of her

father's serious illness, and, fearing she might be kept back to meet her

husband, have gone off with that obstinate and biassed servitor to Falls-

Park. The more she thought it over the more probable did the supposition

appear; and binding her own head-man to secrecy as to Betty's movements,

whether as she conjectured, or otherwise, Mrs. Dornell herself prepared

to set out.

She had no suspicion how seriously her husband's malady had been

aggravated by his ride to Bristol, and thought more of Betty's affairs

than of her own. That Betty's husband should arrive by some other road

to-night, and find neither wife nor mother-in-law to receive him, and no

explanation of their absence, was possible; but never forgetting chances,

Mrs. Dornell as she journeyed kept her eyes fixed upon the highway on the

off-side, where, before she had reached the town of Ivell, the hired

coach containing Stephen Reynard flashed into the lamplight of her own

carriage.

Mrs. Dornell's coachman pulled up, in obedience to a direction she had

given him at starting; the other coach was hailed, a few words passed,

and Reynard alighted and came to Mrs. Dornell's carriage-window.

'Come inside,' says she. 'I want to speak privately to you. Why are you

so late?'

'One hindrance and another,' says he. 'I meant to be at the Court by

eight at latest. My gratitude for your letter. I hope--'

'You must not try to see Betty yet,' said she. 'There be far other and

newer reasons against your seeing her now than there were when I wrote.'

The circumstances were such that Mrs. Dornell could not possibly conceal

them entirely; nothing short of knowing some of the facts would prevent

his blindly acting in a manner which might be fatal to the future.

Moreover, there are times when deeper intriguers than Mrs. Dornell feel

that they must let out a few truths, if only in self-indulgence. So she

told so much of recent surprises as that Betty's heart had been attracted

by another image than his, and that his insisting on visiting her now

might drive the girl to desperation. 'Betty has, in fact, rushed off to

her father to avoid you,' she said. 'But if you wait she will soon

forget this young man, and you will have nothing to fear.'

As a woman and a mother she could go no further, and Betty's desperate

attempt to infect herself the week before as a means of repelling him,

together with the alarming possibility that, after all, she had not gone

to her father but to her lover, was not revealed.

'Well,' sighed the diplomatist, in a tone unexpectedly quiet, 'such

things have been known before. After all, she may prefer me to him some

day, when she reflects how very differently I might have acted than I am

going to act towards her. But I'll say no more about that now. I can

have a bed at your house for to-night?'

'To-night, certainly. And you leave to-morrow morning early?' She spoke

anxiously, for on no account did she wish him to make further

discoveries. 'My husband is so seriously ill,' she continued, 'that my

absence and Betty's on your arrival is naturally accounted for.'

He promised to leave early, and to write to her soon. 'And when I think

the time is ripe,' he said, 'I'll write to her. I may have something to

tell her that will bring her to graciousness.'

It was about one o'clock in the morning when Mrs. Dornell reached Falls-

Park. A double blow awaited her there. Betty had not arrived; her

flight had been elsewhither; and her stricken mother divined with whom.

She ascended to the bedside of her husband, where to her concern she

found that the physician had given up all hope. The Squire was sinking,

and his extreme weakness had almost changed his character, except in the

particular that his old obstinacy sustained him in a refusal to see a

clergyman. He shed tears at the least word, and sobbed at the sight of

his wife. He asked for Betty, and it was with a heavy heart that Mrs.

Dornell told him that the girl had not accompanied her.

'He is not keeping her away?'

'No, no. He is going back--he is not coming to her for some time.'

'Then what is detaining her--cruel, neglectful maid!'

'No, no, Thomas; she is-- She could not come.'

'How's that?'

Somehow the solemnity of these last moments of his gave him inquisitorial

power, and the too cold wife could not conceal from him the flight which

had taken place from King's-Hintock that night.

To her amazement, the effect upon him was electrical.

'What--Betty--a trump after all? Hurrah! She's her father's own maid!

She's game! She knew he was her father's own choice! She vowed that my

man should win! Well done, Bet!--haw! haw! Hurrah!'

He had raised himself in bed by starts as he spoke, and now fell back

exhausted. He never uttered another word, and died before the dawn.

People said there had not been such an ungenteel death in a good county

family for years.

* * * * *

Now I will go back to the time of Betty's riding off on the pillion

behind her lover. They left the park by an obscure gate to the east, and

presently found themselves in the lonely and solitary length of the old

Roman road now called Long-Ash Lane.

By this time they were rather alarmed at their own performance, for they

were both young and inexperienced. Hence they proceeded almost in

silence till they came to a mean roadside inn which was not yet closed;

when Betty, who had held on to him with much misgiving all this while,

felt dreadfully unwell, and said she thought she would like to get down.

They accordingly dismounted from the jaded animal that had brought them,

and were shown into a small dark parlour, where they stood side by side

awkwardly, like the fugitives they were. A light was brought, and when

they were left alone Betty threw off the cloak which had enveloped her.

No sooner did young Phelipson see her face than he uttered an alarmed

exclamation.

'Why, Lord, Lord, you are sickening for the small-pox!' he cried.

'Oh--I forgot!' faltered Betty. And then she informed him that, on

hearing of her husband's approach the week before, in a desperate attempt

to keep him from her side, she had tried to imbibe the infection--an act

which till this moment she had supposed to have been ineffectual,

imagining her feverishness to be the result of her excitement.

The effect of this discovery upon young Phelipson was overwhelming.

Better-seasoned men than he would not have been proof against it, and he

was only a little over her own age. 'And you've been holding on to me!'

he said. 'And suppose you get worse, and we both have it, what shall we

do? Won't you be a fright in a month or two, poor, poor Betty!'

In his horror he attempted to laugh, but the laugh ended in a weakly

giggle. She was more woman than girl by this time, and realized his

feeling.

'What--in trying to keep off him, I keep off you?' she said miserably.

'Do you hate me because I am going to be ugly and ill?'

'Oh--no, no!' he said soothingly. 'But I--I am thinking if it is quite

right for us to do this. You see, dear Betty, if you was not married it

would be different. You are not in honour married to him we've often

said; still you are his by law, and you can't be mine whilst he's alive.

And with this terrible sickness coming on, perhaps you had better let me

take you back, and--climb in at the window again.'

'Is _this_ your love?' said Betty reproachfully. 'Oh, if you was

sickening for the plague itself, and going to be as ugly as the Ooser in

the church-vestry, I wouldn't--'

'No, no, you mistake, upon my soul!'

But Betty with a swollen heart had rewrapped herself and gone out of the

door. The horse was still standing there. She mounted by the help of

the upping-stock, and when he had followed her she said, 'Do not come

near me, Charley; but please lead the horse, so that if you've not caught

anything already you'll not catch it going back. After all, what keeps

off you may keep off him. Now onward.'

He did not resist her command, and back they went by the way they had

come, Betty shedding bitter tears at the retribution she had already

brought upon herself; for though she had reproached Phelipson, she was

staunch enough not to blame him in her secret heart for showing that his

love was only skin-deep. The horse was stopped in the plantation, and

they walked silently to the lawn, reaching the bushes wherein the ladder

still lay.

'Will you put it up for me?' she asked mournfully.

He re-erected the ladder without a word; but when she approached to

ascend he said, 'Good-bye, Betty!'

'Good-bye!' said she; and involuntarily turned her face towards his. He

hung back from imprinting the expected kiss: at which Betty started as if

she had received a poignant wound. She moved away so suddenly that he

hardly had time to follow her up the ladder to prevent her falling.

'Tell your mother to get the doctor at once!' he said anxiously.

She stepped in without looking behind; he descended, withdrew the ladder,

and went away.

Alone in her chamber, Betty flung herself upon her face on the bed, and

burst into shaking sobs. Yet she would not admit to herself that her

lover's conduct was unreasonable; only that her rash act of the previous

week had been wrong. No one had heard her enter, and she was too worn

out, in body and mind, to think or care about medical aid. In an hour or

so she felt yet more unwell, positively ill; and nobody coming to her at

the usual bedtime, she looked towards the door. Marks of the lock having

been forced were visible, and this made her chary of summoning a servant.

She opened the door cautiously and sallied forth downstairs.

In the dining-parlour, as it was called, the now sick and sorry Betty was

startled to see at that late hour not her mother, but a man sitting,

calmly finishing his supper. There was no servant in the room. He

turned, and she recognized her husband.

'Where's my mamma?' she demanded without preface.

'Gone to your father's. Is that--' He stopped, aghast.

'Yes, sir. This spotted object is your wife! I've done it because I

don't want you to come near me!'

He was sixteen years her senior; old enough to be compassionate. 'My

poor child, you must get to bed directly! Don't be afraid of me--I'll

carry you upstairs, and send for a doctor instantly.'

'Ah, you don't know what I am!' she cried. 'I had a lover once; but now

he's gone! 'Twasn't I who deserted him. He has deserted me; because I

am ill he wouldn't kiss me, though I wanted him to!'

'Wouldn't he? Then he was a very poor slack-twisted sort of fellow.

Betty, _I've_ never kissed you since you stood beside me as my little

wife, twelve years and a half old! May I kiss you now?'

Though Betty by no means desired his kisses, she had enough of the spirit

of Cunigonde in Schiller's ballad to test his daring. 'If you have

courage to venture, yes sir!' said she. 'But you may die for it, mind!'

He came up to her and imprinted a deliberate kiss full upon her mouth,

saying, 'May many others follow!'

She shook her head, and hastily withdrew, though secretly pleased at his

hardihood. The excitement had supported her for the few minutes she had

passed in his presence, and she could hardly drag herself back to her

room. Her husband summoned the servants, and, sending them to her

assistance, went off himself for a doctor.

The next morning Reynard waited at the Court till he had learnt from the

medical man that Betty's attack promised to be a very light one--or, as

it was expressed, 'very fine'; and in taking his leave sent up a note to

her:

'Now I must be Gone. I promised your Mother I would not see You yet, and

she may be anger'd if she finds me here. Promise to see me as Soon as

you are well?'

He was of all men then living one of the best able to cope with such an

untimely situation as this. A contriving, sagacious, gentle-mannered

man, a philosopher who saw that the only constant attribute of life is

change, he held that, as long as she lives, there is nothing finite in

the most impassioned attitude a woman may take up. In twelve months his

girl-wife's recent infatuation might be as distasteful to her mind as it

was now to his own. In a few years her very flesh would change--so said

the scientific;--her spirit, so much more ephemeral, was capable of

changing in one. Betty was his, and it became a mere question of means

how to effect that change.

During the day Mrs. Dornell, having closed her husband's eyes, returned

to the Court. She was truly relieved to find Betty there, even though on

a bed of sickness. The disease ran its course, and in due time Betty

became convalescent, without having suffered deeply for her rashness, one

little speck beneath her ear, and one beneath her chin, being all the

marks she retained.

The Squire's body was not brought back to King's-Hintock. Where he was

born, and where he had lived before wedding his Sue, there he had wished

to be buried. No sooner had she lost him than Mrs. Dornell, like certain

other wives, though she had never shown any great affection for him while

he lived, awoke suddenly to his many virtues, and zealously embraced his

opinion about delaying Betty's union with her husband, which she had

formerly combated strenuously. 'Poor man! how right he was, and how

wrong was I!' Eighteen was certainly the lowest age at which Mr. Reynard

should claim her child--nay, it was too low! Far too low!

So desirous was she of honouring her lamented husband's sentiments in

this respect, that she wrote to her son-in-law suggesting that, partly on

account of Betty's sorrow for her father's loss, and out of consideration

for his known wishes for delay, Betty should not be taken from her till

her nineteenth birthday.

However much or little Stephen Reynard might have been to blame in his

marriage, the patient man now almost deserved to be pitied. First

Betty's skittishness; now her mother's remorseful _volte-face_: it was

enough to exasperate anybody; and he wrote to the widow in a tone which

led to a little coolness between those hitherto firm friends. However,

knowing that he had a wife not to claim but to win, and that young

Phelipson had been packed off to sea by his parents, Stephen was

complaisant to a degree, returning to London, and holding quite aloof

from Betty and her mother, who remained for the present in the country.

In town he had a mild visitation of the distemper he had taken from

Betty, and in writing to her he took care not to dwell upon its mildness.

It was now that Betty began to pity him for what she had inflicted upon

him by the kiss, and her correspondence acquired a distinct flavour of

kindness thenceforward.

Owing to his rebuffs, Reynard had grown to be truly in love with Betty in

his mild, placid, durable way--in that way which perhaps, upon the whole,

tends most generally to the woman's comfort under the institution of

marriage, if not particularly to her ecstasy. Mrs. Dornell's

exaggeration of her husband's wish for delay in their living together was

inconvenient, but he would not openly infringe it. He wrote tenderly to

Betty, and soon announced that he had a little surprise in store for her.

The secret was that the King had been graciously pleased to inform him

privately, through a relation, that His Majesty was about to offer him a

Barony. Would she like the title to be Ivell? Moreover, he had reason

for knowing that in a few years the dignity would be raised to that of an

Earl, for which creation he thought the title of Wessex would be

eminently suitable, considering the position of much of their property.

As Lady Ivell, therefore, and future Countess of Wessex, he should beg

leave to offer her his heart a third time.

He did not add, as he might have added, how greatly the consideration of

the enormous estates at King's-Hintock and elsewhere which Betty would

inherit, and her children after her, had conduced to this desirable

honour.

Whether the impending titles had really any effect upon Betty's regard

for him I cannot state, for she was one of those close characters who

never let their minds be known upon anything. That such honour was

absolutely unexpected by her from such a quarter is, however, certain;

and she could not deny that Stephen had shown her kindness, forbearance,

even magnanimity; had forgiven her for an errant passion which he might

with some reason have denounced, notwithstanding her cruel position as a

child entrapped into marriage ere able to understand its bearings.

Her mother, in her grief and remorse for the loveless life she had led

with her rough, though open-hearted, husband, made now a creed of his

merest whim; and continued to insist that, out of respect to his known

desire, her son-in-law should not reside with Betty till the girl's

father had been dead a year at least, at which time the girl would still

be under nineteen. Letters must suffice for Stephen till then.

'It is rather long for him to wait,' Betty hesitatingly said one day.

'What!' said her mother. 'From _you_? not to respect your dear father--'

'Of course it is quite proper,' said Betty hastily. 'I don't gainsay it.

I was but thinking that--that--'

In the long slow months of the stipulated interval her mother tended and

trained Betty carefully for her duties. Fully awake now to the many

virtues of her dear departed one, she, among other acts of pious devotion

to his memory, rebuilt the church of King's-Hintock village, and

established valuable charities in all the villages of that name, as far

as to Little-Hintock, several miles eastward.

In superintending these works, particularly that of the church-building,

her daughter Betty was her constant companion, and the incidents of their

execution were doubtless not without a soothing effect upon the young

creature's heart. She had sprung from girl to woman by a sudden bound,

and few would have recognized in the thoughtful face of Betty now the

same person who, the year before, had seemed to have absolutely no idea

whatever of responsibility, moral or other. Time passed thus till the

Squire had been nearly a year in his vault; and Mrs. Dornell was duly

asked by letter by the patient Reynard if she were willing for him to

come soon. He did not wish to take Betty away if her mother's sense of

loneliness would be too great, but would willingly live at King's-Hintock

awhile with them.

Before the widow had replied to this communication, she one day happened

to observe Betty walking on the south terrace in the full sunlight,

without hat or mantle, and was struck by her child's figure. Mrs.

Dornell called her in, and said suddenly: 'Have you seen your husband

since the time of your poor father's death?'

'Well--yes, mamma,' says Betty, colouring.

'What--against my wishes and those of your dear father! I am shocked at

your disobedience!'

'But my father said eighteen, ma'am, and you made it much longer--'

'Why, of course--out of consideration for you! When have ye seen him?'

'Well,' stammered Betty, 'in the course of his letters to me he said that

I belonged to him, and if nobody knew that we met it would make no

difference. And that I need not hurt your feelings by telling you.'

'Well?'

'So I went to Casterbridge that time you went to London about five months

ago--'

'And met him there? When did you come back?'

'Dear mamma, it grew very late, and he said it was safer not to go back

till next day, as the roads were bad; and as you were away from home--'

'I don't want to hear any more! This is your respect for your father's

memory,' groaned the widow. 'When did you meet him again?'

'Oh--not for more than a fortnight.'

'A fortnight! How many times have ye seen him altogether?'

'I'm sure, mamma, I've not seen him altogether a dozen times.'

'A dozen! And eighteen and a half years old barely!'

'Twice we met by accident,' pleaded Betty. 'Once at Abbot's-Cernel, and

another time at the Red Lion, Melchester.'

'O thou deceitful girl!' cried Mrs. Dornell. 'An accident took you to

the Red Lion whilst I was staying at the White Hart! I remember--you

came in at twelve o'clock at night and said you'd been to see the

cathedral by the light o' the moon!'

'My ever-honoured mamma, so I had! I only went to the Red Lion with him

afterwards.'

'Oh Betty, Betty! That my child should have deceived me even in my

widowed days!'

'But, my dearest mamma, you made me marry him!' says Betty with spirit,

'and of course I've to obey him more than you now!'

Mrs. Dornell sighed. 'All I have to say is, that you'd better get your

husband to join you as soon as possible,' she remarked. 'To go on

playing the maiden like this--I'm ashamed to see you!'

She wrote instantly to Stephen Reynard: 'I wash my hands of the whole

matter as between you two; though I should advise you to _openly_ join

each other as soon as you can--if you wish to avoid scandal.'

He came, though not till the promised title had been granted, and he

could call Betty archly 'My Lady.'

People said in after years that she and her husband were very happy.

However that may be, they had a numerous family; and she became in due

course first Countess of Wessex, as he had foretold.

The little white frock in which she had been married to him at the tender

age of twelve was carefully preserved among the relics at King's-Hintock

Court, where it may still be seen by the curious--a yellowing, pathetic

testimony to the small count taken of the happiness of an innocent child

in the social strategy of those days, which might have led, but

providentially did not lead, to great unhappiness.

When the Earl died Betty wrote him an epitaph, in which she described him

as the best of husbands, fathers, and friends, and called herself his

disconsolate widow.

Such is woman; or rather (not to give offence by so sweeping an

assertion), such was Betty Dornell.

* * * * *

It was at a meeting of one of the Wessex Field and Antiquarian Clubs that

the foregoing story, partly told, partly read from a manuscript, was made

to do duty for the regulation papers on deformed butterflies, fossil ox-

horns, prehistoric dung-mixens, and such like, that usually occupied the

more serious attention of the members.

This Club was of an inclusive and intersocial character; to a degree,

indeed, remarkable for the part of England in which it had its

being--dear, delightful Wessex, whose statuesque dynasties are even now

only just beginning to feel the shaking of the new and strange spirit

without, like that which entered the lonely valley of Ezekiel's vision

and made the dry bones move: where the honest squires, tradesmen,

parsons, clerks, and people still praise the Lord with one voice for His

best of all possible worlds.

The present meeting, which was to extend over two days, had opened its

proceedings at the museum of the town whose buildings and environs were

to be visited by the members. Lunch had ended, and the afternoon

excursion had been about to be undertaken, when the rain came down in an

obstinate spatter, which revealed no sign of cessation. As the members

waited they grew chilly, although it was only autumn, and a fire was

lighted, which threw a cheerful shine upon the varnished skulls, urns,

penates, tesserae, costumes, coats of mail, weapons, and missals,

animated the fossilized ichthyosaurus and iguanodon; while the dead eyes

of the stuffed birds--those never-absent familiars in such collections,

though murdered to extinction out of doors--flashed as they had flashed

to the rising sun above the neighbouring moors on the fatal morning when

the trigger was pulled which ended their little flight. It was then that

the historian produced his manuscript, which he had prepared, he said,

with a view to publication. His delivery of the story having concluded

as aforesaid, the speaker expressed his hope that the constraint of the

weather, and the paucity of more scientific papers, would excuse any

inappropriateness in his subject.

Several members observed that a storm-bound club could not presume to be

selective, and they were all very much obliged to him for such a curious

chapter from the domestic histories of the county.

The President looked gloomily from the window at the descending rain, and

broke a short silence by saying that though the Club had met, there

seemed little probability of its being able to visit the objects of

interest set down among the _agenda_.

The Treasurer observed that they had at least a roof over their heads;

and they had also a second day before them.

A sentimental member, leaning back in his chair, declared that he was in

no hurry to go out, and that nothing would please him so much as another

county story, with or without manuscript.

The Colonel added that the subject should be a lady, like the former, to

which a gentleman known as the Spark said 'Hear, hear!'

Though these had spoken in jest, a rural dean who was present observed

blandly that there was no lack of materials. Many, indeed, were the

legends and traditions of gentle and noble dames, renowned in times past

in that part of England, whose actions and passions were now, but for

men's memories, buried under the brief inscription on a tomb or an entry

of dates in a dry pedigree.

Another member, an old surgeon, a somewhat grim though sociable

personage, was quite of the speaker's opinion, and felt quite sure that

the memory of the reverend gentleman must abound with such curious tales

of fair dames, of their loves and hates, their joys and their

misfortunes, their beauty and their fate.

The parson, a trifle confused, retorted that their friend the surgeon,

the son of a surgeon, seemed to him, as a man who had seen much and heard

more during the long course of his own and his father's practice, the

member of all others most likely to be acquainted with such lore.

The bookworm, the Colonel, the historian, the Vice-president, the

churchwarden, the two curates, the gentleman-tradesman, the sentimental

member, the crimson maltster, the quiet gentleman, the man of family, the

Spark, and several others, quite agreed, and begged that he would recall

something of the kind. The old surgeon said that, though a meeting of

the Mid-Wessex Field and Antiquarian Club was the last place at which he

should have expected to be called upon in this way, he had no objection;

and the parson said he would come next. The surgeon then reflected, and

decided to relate the history of a lady named Barbara, who lived towards

the end of the last century, apologizing for his tale as being perhaps a

little too professional. The crimson maltster winked to the Spark at

hearing the nature of the apology, and the surgeon began.

DAME THE SECOND--BARBARA OF THE HOUSE OF GREBE

By the Old Surgeon

It was apparently an idea, rather than a passion, that inspired Lord

Uplandtowers' resolve to win her. Nobody ever knew when he formed it, or

whence he got his assurance of success in the face of her manifest

dislike of him. Possibly not until after that first important act of her

life which I shall presently mention. His matured and cynical doggedness

at the age of nineteen, when impulse mostly rules calculation, was

remarkable, and might have owed its existence as much to his succession

to the earldom and its accompanying local honours in childhood, as to the

family character; an elevation which jerked him into maturity, so to

speak, without his having known adolescence. He had only reached his

twelfth year when his father, the fourth Earl, died, after a course of

the Bath waters.

Nevertheless, the family character had a great deal to do with it.

Determination was hereditary in the bearers of that escutcheon; sometimes

for good, sometimes for evil.

The seats of the two families were about ten miles apart, the way between

them lying along the now old, then new, turnpike-road connecting

Havenpool and Warborne with the city of Melchester: a road which, though

only a branch from what was known as the Great Western Highway, is

probably, even at present, as it has been for the last hundred years, one

of the finest examples of a macadamized turnpike-track that can be found

in England.

The mansion of the Earl, as well as that of his neighbour, Barbara's

father, stood back about a mile from the highway, with which each was

connected by an ordinary drive and lodge. It was along this particular

highway that the young Earl drove on a certain evening at Christmastide

some twenty years before the end of the last century, to attend a ball at

Chene Manor, the home of Barbara, and her parents Sir John and Lady

Grebe. Sir John's was a baronetcy created a few years before the

breaking out of the Civil War, and his lands were even more extensive

than those of Lord Uplandtowers himself; comprising this Manor of Chene,

another on the coast near, half the Hundred of Cockdene, and

well-enclosed lands in several other parishes, notably Warborne and those

contiguous. At this time Barbara was barely seventeen, and the ball is

the first occasion on which we have any tradition of Lord Uplandtowers

attempting tender relations with her; it was early enough, God knows.

An intimate friend--one of the Drenkhards--is said to have dined with him

that day, and Lord Uplandtowers had, for a wonder, communicated to his

guest the secret design of his heart.

'You'll never get her--sure; you'll never get her!' this friend had said

at parting. 'She's not drawn to your lordship by love: and as for

thought of a good match, why, there's no more calculation in her than in

a bird.'

'We'll see,' said Lord Uplandtowers impassively.

He no doubt thought of his friend's forecast as he travelled along the

highway in his chariot; but the sculptural repose of his profile against

the vanishing daylight on his right hand would have shown his friend that

the Earl's equanimity was undisturbed. He reached the solitary wayside

tavern called Lornton Inn--the rendezvous of many a daring poacher for

operations in the adjoining forest; and he might have observed, if he had

taken the trouble, a strange post-chaise standing in the halting-space

before the inn. He duly sped past it, and half-an-hour after through the

little town of Warborne. Onward, a mile farther, was the house of his

entertainer.

At this date it was an imposing edifice--or, rather, congeries of

edifices--as extensive as the residence of the Earl himself; though far

less regular. One wing showed extreme antiquity, having huge chimneys,

whose substructures projected from the external walls like towers; and a

kitchen of vast dimensions, in which (it was said) breakfasts had been

cooked for John of Gaunt. Whilst he was yet in the forecourt he could

hear the rhythm of French horns and clarionets, the favourite instruments

of those days at such entertainments.

Entering the long parlour, in which the dance had just been opened by

Lady Grebe with a minuet--it being now seven o'clock, according to the

tradition--he was received with a welcome befitting his rank, and looked

round for Barbara. She was not dancing, and seemed to be

preoccupied--almost, indeed, as though she had been waiting for him.

Barbara at this time was a good and pretty girl, who never spoke ill of

any one, and hated other pretty women the very least possible. She did

not refuse him for the country-dance which followed, and soon after was

his partner in a second.

The evening wore on, and the horns and clarionets tootled merrily.

Barbara evinced towards her lover neither distinct preference nor

aversion; but old eyes would have seen that she pondered something.

However, after supper she pleaded a headache, and disappeared. To pass

the time of her absence, Lord Uplandtowers went into a little room

adjoining the long gallery, where some elderly ones were sitting by the

fire--for he had a phlegmatic dislike of dancing for its own sake,--and,

lifting the window-curtains, he looked out of the window into the park

and wood, dark now as a cavern. Some of the guests appeared to be

leaving even so soon as this, two lights showing themselves as turning

away from the door and sinking to nothing in the distance.

His hostess put her head into the room to look for partners for the

ladies, and Lord Uplandtowers came out. Lady Grebe informed him that

Barbara had not returned to the ball-room: she had gone to bed in sheer

necessity.

'She has been so excited over the ball all day,' her mother continued,

'that I feared she would be worn out early . . . But sure, Lord

Uplandtowers, you won't be leaving yet?'

He said that it was near twelve o'clock, and that some had already left.

'I protest nobody has gone yet,' said Lady Grebe.

To humour her he stayed till midnight, and then set out. He had made no

progress in his suit; but he had assured himself that Barbara gave no

other guest the preference, and nearly everybody in the neighbourhood was

there.

''Tis only a matter of time,' said the calm young philosopher.

The next morning he lay till near ten o'clock, and he had only just come

out upon the head of the staircase when he heard hoofs upon the gravel

without; in a few moments the door had been opened, and Sir John Grebe

met him in the hall, as he set foot on the lowest stair.

'My lord--where's Barbara--my daughter?'

Even the Earl of Uplandtowers could not repress amazement. 'What's the

matter, my dear Sir John,' says he.

The news was startling, indeed. From the Baronet's disjointed

explanation Lord Uplandtowers gathered that after his own and the other

guests' departure Sir John and Lady Grebe had gone to rest without seeing

any more of Barbara; it being understood by them that she had retired to

bed when she sent word to say that she could not join the dancers again.

Before then she had told her maid that she would dispense with her

services for this night; and there was evidence to show that the young

lady had never lain down at all, the bed remaining unpressed.

Circumstances seemed to prove that the deceitful girl had feigned

indisposition to get an excuse for leaving the ball-room, and that she

had left the house within ten minutes, presumably during the first dance

after supper.

'I saw her go,' said Lord Uplandtowers.

'The devil you did!' says Sir John.

'Yes.' And he mentioned the retreating carriage-lights, and how he was

assured by Lady Grebe that no guest had departed.

'Surely that was it!' said the father. 'But she's not gone alone, d'ye

know!'

'Ah--who is the young man?'

'I can on'y guess. My worst fear is my most likely guess. I'll say no

more. I thought--yet I would not believe--it possible that you was the

sinner. Would that you had been! But 'tis t'other, 'tis t'other, by G---!

I must e'en up, and after 'em!'

'Whom do you suspect?'

Sir John would not give a name, and, stultified rather than agitated,

Lord Uplandtowers accompanied him back to Chene. He again asked upon

whom were the Baronet's suspicions directed; and the impulsive Sir John

was no match for the insistence of Uplandtowers.