CHAPTER XXVI.

Never his worldly lot, or worldly state torments him:

Less he would like, if less his God had sent him.

FLETCHER.

Winthrop had taken no little charge upon himself in the charge

of his little sister. In many ways. He had a scanty purse, and

it better bore the demands of one than of two; but that was

only a single item. Winnie was not a charge upon his purse

alone, but upon his heart and his head and his time. The

demands were all met, to the full.

As much as it was possible, in the nature of Winthrop's

business, his sister had him with her; and when he could not

be there, his influence and power. It was trying enough for

the poor child to be left alone as much as she was, for she

could not always find solace in Mrs. Nettley, and sometimes

could not endure her presence. Against this evil Winthrop

provided as far as he might by giving Winnie little jobs to do

for him while he was gone, and by setting her about what

courses of self-improvement her delicate system of mind and

body was able to bear. He managed it so that all was for him;

not more the patching and knitting and bits of writing which

were strictly in his line, than the pages of history, the sums

in arithmetic, and the little lesson of Latin, which were for

Winnie's own self. He knew that affection, in every one of

them, would steady the nerves and fortify the will to go

patiently on to the end. And the variety of occupation he left

her was so great that without tiring herself in any one thing,

Winnie generally found the lonely hours of her day pretty well

filled up. Mrs. Nettley was a great help, when Winnie was in

the mood for her company; that was not always.

His little sister's bodily and mental health was another care

upon Winthrop's mind, and on his time. Disease now constantly

ruffled the sweet flow of spirits which once was habitual with

her. Nothing ruffled his; and his soothing hand could always

quiet her, could almost always make her happy, when it was

practicable for him to spare time. Very often when he had no

time to give beyond what a word or a look would take from his

business. But those times were comparatively few. He was apt

to give her what she needed, and make up for it afterwards at

the cost of rest and sleep when Winnie was abed. Through the

warm summer days he took her daily and twice daily walks, down

to the Green where the sea air could blow in her face fresh

from its own quarter, where she and he too could turn their

backs upon brickwork and pavement and look on at least one

face of nature unspotted and unspoiled. At home he read to

her, and with her, the times when he used to read the

classics; and many other times; he talked to her and he played

with her, having bought a second-hand backgammon board for the

very purpose; he heard her and set her her lessons; and he

amused her with all the details of his daily business and

experience that he could make amusing.

If these things were a charge, it was one for which he was

abundantly rewarded, every night and every morning, and knew

it. But the other part of the burden, the drain upon his

purse, was not so easily to be met withal. There was no

helping it. Winnie's state of health made her simple wants,

simple as they were, far more costly than his own had been;

and he would and did supply them. He could bear to starve

himself and lie hard; but Winnie would very soon starve to

death; and the time when she could sleep softly on a hard bed

had once been, but would never be again, literally or

figuratively. Winthrop never shewed her how it was with him;

not the less it was almost the ebb; and whence the flow was to

come, was a point he saw not. He was not yet admitted to

practise law; his slender means were almost all gathered from

teaching; and he could not teach any more than he did. And

this consciousness he carried about with him, to the office,

to market, and to his little sister's presence. For her his

face was always the same; and while she had it Winnie thought

little was wanting to her life.

One morning when she had it not, she was lying wearily

stretched out on the couch which was hers by day and

Winthrop's by night. It was early June; the sun was paying his

first instalment of summer heat, and doing it as if he were

behind-hand with pay-day. Winnie's attic roof gave her a full

share of his benefits. The hours of the morning had worn away,

when towards noon a slow step was heard ascending the stairs.

It was her hostess, come up to look after her.

"All alone?" said Mrs. Nettley.

"Oh yes! --" came with most fervent breath from Winnie. Her

head uneasily turned the other cheek to the pillow.

"Poor child!" said Mrs. Nettley; and every line of her careful

and sympathetic face said it over again. "Poor child! -- And

Mr. Winthrop's been away all the morning!"

"I don't know why you call me _poor_," said Winnie, whose nerves

could not bear even that slight touch, if it happened to touch

the wrong way; -- "Of course he's been away all the morning --

he always is."

"And you're tired. I didn't mean _poor_, dear, in the way that I

am poor myself; -- not that poor, -- I only meant, -- because you

were so much here all alone without your brother."

"I know what you meant," said Winnie.

"It's hot up here, isn't it," said Mrs. Nettley going to the

window. "Dreadful. It's hot down stairs too. Can't we let a

little air in?" --

"Don't! It's hotter with it."

Mrs. Nettley left the window and came and stood by Winnie's

couch, her face again saying what her voice did not dare to

say, -- "Poor child!" --

"Mrs. Nettley --"

"What, my love?"

"I'm very cross --"

"No you aren't, my love! you're only tired."

"I'm very cross -- I don't know what makes me so -- but

sometimes I feel so it seems as if I couldn't help it. I'm

cross even to Winthrop. I'm very much obliged to you, but you

must think I aint."

"I don't think the least thing of the kind, dearest -- I know

it's miserable and suffocating up here, and you _can't_ feel -- I

wish I could make it better for you!"

"O it'll be better by and by -- when Governor gets home and it

grows cool."

"Come down and take a bit of dinner with me."

"O no, thank you, Mrs. Nettley," said Winnie brightening up, --

"I don't want anything; and Governor'll be home by and by and

then we'll have our dinner. I'm going to broil the chicken and

get everything ready."

"Well, that'll be sweeter than anything I've got," said the

good lady. -- "Why, who's there? --"

Somebody there was, knocking at the door; and when the door

was opened, who was there shewed herself in the shape of a

young lady, very bright looking and well dressed. She glanced

at Mrs. Nettley with a slight word of inquiry and passing her

made her way on up to the couch.

"Is this Winifred?" she said, looking, it might be, a little

shocked and a little sorrowful at the pale and mind-worn face

that used to be so round and rosy; and about which the soft

fair hair still clustered as abundantly as ever.

"Yes ma'am," Winifred said, half rising.

"Don't get up, -- don't you know me?"

Winnie's eye keenly scanned the bright fresh face that bent

over her, but she shook her head and said 'no'.

"Can't you remember my being at your house -- some time ago? --

me and" she stopped. "Don't you remember? We spent a good

while there -- one summer -- it was when you were a little

girl."

"O!" -- said Winnie, -- "are you --"

"Yes."

"I remember. But you were not so large then, either."

"I am not very large now," said her visiter, taking a chair

beside Winnie's couch.

"No. But I didn't know you."

"How do you do, dear?"

"I don't know," said Winnie. "I am not very well now-a-days."

"And Mannahatta is hot and dusty and disagreeable -- more than

any place you ever were in before in your life, isn't it?"

"I don't care," said Winnie. "I'd rather be with Winthrop."

"And can he make up for dust and heat and bad air and all?"

The smile that broke upon Winnie's face Elizabeth remembered

was like that of old time; there was a sparkle in the eyes

that looked up at her, the lips had their childish play, and

the thin cheek even shewed its dimple again. As she met the

look, Elizabeth's own face grew grave and her brow fell; and

it was half a minute before she spoke.

"But he cannot be with you a great deal of the time."

"O yes he is," said Winnie; -- "he is here in the morning, and

at breakfast and dinner and tea, and all the evening. And all

Sundays."

"That's the best day of the week then, I suppose."

"It's always that," said Winnie. "And he takes a great many

walks with me -- every day almost, when it gets cool -- we go

down on the Green and stay there as long as it's pleasant."

Elizabeth was silent again.

"But doesn't he have studying or writing to do in the

evenings? I thought he had."

"O yes," said Winnie, "but then it don't hinder him from

talking to me."

"And is he good enough to make you like this place better than

your beautiful country home?"

"I would rather be here," said Winnie. But she turned her face

a little from her questioner, and though it remained perfectly

calm, the eyes filled to overflowing. Elizabeth again paused,

and then bending over her where she still lay on her couch,

she pressed her own full red lips to Winnie's forehead. The

salute was instantly returned upon one of her little kid

gloves which Winnie laid hold of.

"You don't know how rich you are, Winifred, to have such a

good brother."

"Yes I do," said Winifred. "_You_ don't."

If there was not a rush to Elizabeth's eyes, it was because

she fought for it.

"Perhaps I don't," she said quietly; -- "for I never had any

one. Will you go and ride with me to-morrow, Winifred?"

"Ride?" said Winifred.

"Yes. In my carriage. We'll go out of town."

"O yes! O thank you! I should like it very much."

"You don't look very strong," said Elizabeth. "How is it that

you can take such long walks?"

"O Winthrop don't let me get tired you know."

"But how does he manage to help it?" said Elizabeth smiling.

"Can he do everything?"

"I don't know," said Winnie. "He don't let me stand too long,

and he doesn't let me walk too fast; and his arm is strong,

you know; --he can almost hold me up if I do get tired."

"I have -- or my father has," -- said Elizabeth, "some very old,

very good wine. -- I shall send you some. Will you try it? I

think it would make you stronger."

"I don't know whether Winthrop would let me drink it."

"Why not?"

"O he don't like me to drink anything but water and milk -- he

don't let me have tea or coffee -- and I don't know whether

he'd like wine; -- but I'll ask him."

"Don't let you have tea or coffee!"

"No; we drink milk, and water."

"But don't he let you do whatever you have a mind?"

"No," said Winnie; "and I don't want to, either."

"Don't want to do what?"

"Why -- anything that he don't like."

"Do you love him well enough for that -- not to _wish_ to do what

he don't like, Winifred?"

"Yes!" said Winifred. "I think I do. I may wish it at first,

of course; but I don't want to do it if he wishes me not."

"How did he ever get such power over you!"

"Power!" said Winnie, raising herself up on her elbow, -- "why

I don't know what you mean! I should think everybody would do

what Winthrop likes -- it isn't _power_."

"I wonder what is, then!" said Elizabeth significantly.

"Why it's -- it's -- goodness!" said Winnie, shutting her eyes,

but not before they had filled again. Elizabeth bit her lips

to keep her own from following company; not with much success.

"That's what it is," said Winnie, without opening her eyes; --

"he always was just so. No he wasn't either, -- though it

almost seems as if he was, -- but now he's a Christian."

If outward signs had kept inward feelings company, Elizabeth

would have started. She sat still; but the lines of her face

wore a look of something very like startled gravity. There was

a silence of more than one minute. Winnie opened her eyes and

directed them upon her still companion.

"Is he any better than he used to be?" she forced herself to

say.

"Why yes," said Winnie, -- "of course -- he must be. He used to

be as good as he could be, except that; -- and now he's that

too."

"What difference does 'that' make, Winifred?"

Winnie looked keenly once more at the face of her questioner.

"Don't you know what it is to be a Christian, Miss Haye?"

Elizabeth shook her head.

"You must ask Winthrop," said Winnie. "He can tell you better

than I can."

"I want you to tell me. What difference, for instance, has it

made in your brother?"

Winnie looked grave and somewhat puzzled.

"He don't seem much different to _me_," she said, -- "and yet he

_is_ different. -- The difference is, Miss Haye, that before, he

loved _us_ -- and now he loves God and keeps his commandments."

"Don't he love you now?"

"Better than ever!" said Winnie with her eyes opening; -- "why

what makes you ask that?"

"Didn't he keep the commandments of the Bible before?"

"No, --not as he does now. Some of them he did, because he

never was bad as some people are; -- but he didn't keep them as

he does now. He didn't keep the first commandment of all."

"Which is that?" said Elizabeth.

Winnie gave her another earnest look before she answered.

"Don't you know?"

"No."

"'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and

with all thy mind, and with all thy soul, and with all thy

strength.'"

If Winifred's face was grave, Elizabeth's took a double shade

of gravity -- it was even dark for a minute, as if with some

thought that troubled her. Winnie's eyes seemed to take note

of it, and Elizabeth roused herself. Yet at first it was not

to speak.

"When -- How long ago, do you suppose," she said, "your brother

was changed in this way?"

"Since -- since the time I came here; -- since mother died,"

Winnie said softly.

There was again a few minutes of absolute silence; and then

Elizabeth rose to go.

"Shall I send you the wine?" she said smiling.

"I don't believe Winthrop will let me take it," Winifred said.

"Because he is good, are you bound not to get strong?"

Elizabeth said with an air of slight vexation.

"No," -- said Winnie, "but because he is good I must do what he

says."

"I wish I liked anybody so well as that!" said Elizabeth

kissing her. "Good bye, dear, -- I'll come for you to-morrow.

There's no objection to that, I suppose?"

"No," Winnie said laughing; and they parted.

Five minutes Winnie was alone, thinking over her visit and

visiter. They were a great novelty, and very interesting.

Winnie's thoughts roved with an odd mixture of admiration and

pity over the beautiful dress, and fine face, and elastic

step; they were bewitching; but Winnie had seen a shadow on

the face, and she knew that the best brightness had never

lighted it. Five minutes were all she had to think about it;

then she heard a very different step on the stairs.

"I heard her go," said Mrs. Nettley, coming in, "and I had a

little more time to spare; so I thought I would spend it with

you; -- unless you've got enough with such a gay visiter and

don't want me."

"O no indeed, Mrs. Nettley, I want you just as much. Have you

done dinner?"

"George isn't ready yet;" and Mrs. Nettley took Miss Haye's

chair and set her knitting-needles a going. "Has she tired you

with talking?"

"No -- talking doesn't tire me, --and she wasn't a gay visiter,

either, Mrs. Nettley -- what do you mean by 'gay'?"

"O, she was handsome, and young, and 'fine feathers make fine

birds' I'm sure," said Mrs. Nettley; -- "wasn't she smartly

dressed?"

"Yes," said Winnie, she had handsome things on; but that

didn't make her _gay_."

"Well that was what I meant. How do you like that young lady?"

"I don't know," said Winnie. "I think I like her."

"This isn't the first of your seeing her, dear!"

"O no -- she was at our house once. I've seen her before, but

that was a great while ago. I didn't know her again at first."

"Then she remembered you best."

"O --" said Winnie, considering, -- "she has seen Rufus and

Winthrop since then."

"She's a handsome young lady, don't you think so?"

"I don't know --" said Winnie.

"Ask your brother if he don't think so."

"Why?"

"See if he don't think so."

"Which brother?"

"Your brother that's here -- your brother Winthrop."

"Does he think she is?"

"Ask him," repeated Mrs. Nettley.

"I don't know why I should ask him," said Winnie turning over

uneasily on her couch; -- "I don't care if she is or no."

"Ay, but you might care."

"I don't know why," said Winnie.

"How would you like to have a new sister one of these days? --

by and by?"

"A sister?"

Mrs. Nettley nodded.

"A sister!" said Winnie. "How should I have a sister?"

"Why such a thing might be," said Mrs. Nettley. "Did you never

think of one of your brothers getting married?"

"Winthrop won't!" said Winnie, -- "and I don't care what Rufus

does."

"What makes you think Winthrop won't?"

"He won't!" said Winnie with flushing cheeks.

"Wouldn't you be glad? You would like anything that would make

him happy."

"Happy!" said Winnie. -- "Glad! -- I do wish, Mrs. Nettley, you

would go down stairs and leave me alone!"

Mrs. Nettley went away, in some astonishment. And before her

astonishment had cooled off in her own kitchen, down came

Winnie, with flushed cheeks still, and watery eyes, and a

distressed face, to beg Mrs. Nettley's forgiveness. It was

granted with her whole heart, and a burden of apologies

besides; but Winnie's face remained a distressed face still.

The chicken, broiled on Mrs. Nettley's fire, was salted with

some tears; and all the simple and careful preparations for

Winthrop's dinner were made more carefully than usual; but

when Winthrop came home, his little sister was as far from

being herself as ever.

It happened that Winthrop was very busy that day and had no

time to talk, except the disjointed bits of talk that could

come between the joints of the chicken; and pleasant as those

bits were, they could not reach the want of poor Winnie's

heart. Immediately after dinner Winthrop went out again; and

she was left to get through the afternoon without help of

anybody.

It had worn on, and the long summer day was drawing to its

close, when Winthrop was at last set free from his business

engagements and turned his face and his footsteps towards

home. The day had been sultry and his toil very engrossing;

but that was not the reason his footsteps flagged. They

flagged rarely, but they did it now. It needed not that he

should have noticed his little sister's face at dinner; his

ordinary burdens of care were quite enough and one of them

just now pressing. In a sort of brown study he was slowly

pacing up one of the emptying business streets, when his hand

was seized by some one, and Winthrop's startled look up met

the round jocund well-to-do face of the German professor.

"Wint'rop! -- Where are you going?"

"Home, sir," -- said Winthrop returning the grasp of his

friend's hand.

"How is all wiz you?"

"As usual, sir."

"Wint'rop -- what is de matter wiz you?"

"Nothing! --" said Winthrop.

"I know better!" said the naturalist, -- "and I know what it

is, too. Here -- I will give you some work to do one of these

days and then I will pay you the rest."

And shaking Winthrop's hand again, the philosopher dashed on.

But Winthrop's hand was not empty when his friend's had

quitted it; to his astonishment he found a roll of bills left

in it, and to his unbounded astonishment found they were bills

to the amount of three hundred dollars.

If he was in any sort of a study as he paced the rest of his

way home, it was not a brown study; and if his steps were

slow, it was not that they flagged any more. It had come in

time; it was just what was needed; and it was enough to keep

him on, till he should be admitted to the bar and might edge

off his craft from her moorings to feel the wind and tide

'that lead on to fortune.' Winthrop never doubted of catching

both; as little did he doubt now of being able some time to

pay back principal and interest to his kind friend. He went

home with a lighter heart. But he had never let Winnie know of

his troubles, and could not for the same reason talk to her of

this strange relief.

Thinking so, he went up the stairs and opened the door of his

and her sitting-room. The sun was down by that time, and the

evening light was failing. The table stood ready for tea;

Winnie had all the windows open to let in the freshening air

from the sea, which was beginning to make head against the

heats and steams of the city; herself sat on the couch, away

from the windows, and perhaps her attitude might say, away

from everything pleasant. Winthrop came silently up and put a

little basket in her hand.

"Oh! --" Winnie sprang forward with an accent of joy, --

"Strawberries! -- Beautiful! and so sweet! O Winthrop, aren't

they sweet! -- how good they will be."

"I hope so," said he. "How are you?"

"O -- I'm well," said Winnie. "How big they are -- and fresh.

They do smell so sweet, don't they, Governor?"

Winthrop thought they were not so fresh nor so sweet as those

which grew in the Bright Spot under Wut-a-qut-o; but he didn't

remind Winnie of that. He smiled at her, as she was picking

over her basket of strawberries with an eager hand. Yet when

Winnie had got to the bottom of the basket and looked up at

him his face was very grave indeed.

"There's plenty for you and me, Governor," she said.

"No," said her brother.

"There is plenty, Winthrop!"

"There is only just enough for you, and you must prove that by

eating them all."

"Why didn't you get some for yourself, Governor!"

He answered that by spreading for her a particularly nice

piece of bread and butter and laying it on her plate alongside

of the strawberries. Winnie took it in the same pleasant mood

and began upon both with great zeal; but before she had got

half through the strawberries something seemed to come over

her recollection; and the latter part of the meal her face

grew more shadowy than the growing evening. When it was over,

Winthrop placed her gently on the couch, and himself put away

the dishes and glasses and eatables from the table. Then he

came and sat down beside her and drew her head to lean upon

him. It was darkening by that time, and the air coming in more

and more fresh at the windows.

"Have you been very tired to-day?"

"No -- I don't know --" said Winnie doubtfully.

"We couldn't have our walk this evening -- I am sorry for that

-- but I was kept so long with Bob Satterthwaite. He is in a

great feaze about some property that he thinks is owing to him

somewhere, and he has been giving me a long detail of matters

and things connected with the business. -- I believe that if I

were in practice he would commission me to get his rights for

him. And an old classmate and friend of mine, Bob Cool, was in

town to-day and came to see me. _He_ was expressing a very

earnest wish that I were working on my own hook."

"Oh I wish you were!" -- said Winnie.

"Patience. I shall be in a little while more, if all goes

well. Mr. Cool promises I shall have all his business."

"Is that much?"

"I don't know. It seems so."

"But isn't Mr. Satterthwaite rich?"

"Yes -- very."

"Then what is he in a feaze about money for?"

"He is not so rich he mightn't be richer, I suppose, Winnie.

And besides, nobody likes to be cheated."

"Is Mr. Haye rich?"

"Yes! What made you think of him?"

Winnie hesitated. "She was here to-day."

"She! Who? -- Clam?"

"No, not Clam."

"Who then?"

"Why -- Miss Haye."

"Was _she_ here?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"This morning. She staid a good while with me."

"It was kind of her," said Winthrop after a little pause.

There was a pause then of some length.

"Has Miss Haye's being here and talking to you, tired you,

Winnie?" said her brother, the arm that was round her drawing

her more near.

"No --" Winnie said; but by no means as if Miss Haye's visit

had had a sprightly effect.

"Staid here a good while talking? What did she talk about?"

"O -- I don't know, --" said Winnie, -- "about my drinking wine,

and going to ride with her."

"She is very kind. And what did you tell her?"

"I said I didn't know whether you would let me drink it. I

said I would go to ride."

"I am very much obliged to Miss Haye, and very glad for you,

Winnie. It will do you good."

"Would you let me drink wine, if she should send it to me?"

"Did she speak of doing that?"

"Yes."

There was a little silence.

"Would you let me take it, Winthrop?"

"I suppose I should."

"I hope she won't send it," said Winnie; "and I wish I wasn't

going to ride, either."

"Why?"

"O -- I'd rather stay here."

They sat a little while without speaking another word; and

then Winthrop withdrawing his arm proposed to have 'some light

on the subject.' Winifred sprang to get it, but he held her

back, and himself got the candle and lit it and placed it on

the table. The light shewed Winnie's face flushed and

unresting, and of doubtful signification about the eyes.

Winthrop came and took his former place and position by her

side.

"How has the day been with you, Winnie?"

The tone was most gentle and kindly. Winnie hesitated and then

said,

"It hasn't been good."

"What's the matter?"

"_I_ haven't been good."

"That isn't such a new thing that you need be surprised at it,

-- is it?" he said gently.

"No" -- under breath.

"And it isn't so strange a thing that I love you a bit the

less for it."

"But it's very uncomfortable," said poor Winnie, whose voice

bore her witness.

"I find it so often."

"You, Governor! -- you _never_ do!" said Winnie energetically.

"Never do what?"

"Never feel like me."

"No, Winnie -- I am strong and you are weak -- you are sick and I

am well. I have no excuse -- you have, a little."

"It don't make it a bit better," said poor Winnie. "I don't

want to make any excuse. I got so cross with Mrs. Nettley to-

day."

"What about?"

"O I couldn't bear to hear her talk, and I almost told her

so."

"I dare say you did what you could to mend it afterwards,

Winnie."

"O yes; -- and she didn't think anything of it at all; but I am

always doing so, Winthrop."

"You never do it to me," said her brother soothingly.

"To you! -- But O Winthrop! -- if I loved God enough, I never

should do anything to displease him!"

She had thrown herself further into her brother's arms and at

this was weeping with all her heart.

"He said once himself," said Winthrop, "'Blessed are they

that mourn now, for they shall be comforted.'"

Winnie clung faster to him, with a grateful clasp, and her

tears came more gently.

"We sha'n't be quit of it till we get to heaven, Winnie; -- and

'the people that dwell therein,' you know, 'shall be forgiven

their iniquity.' And more than that, 'white robes are given

unto every one of them.' 'And they shall see the King's face,

and his name shall be in their foreheads.'"

"I wish it was in mine now!" said Winnie.

"Stop, Winnie. -- I hope it is there, -- only not so bright as

it will be by and by."

"But it ought to be bright now," said Winnie raising herself.

"Let it be brighter every day then," said her brother.

"I do try, Governor," said poor Winnie, -- "but sometimes I

think I don't get ahead at all!"

It was with great tenderness that again he put his arm round

her, and drew down her head upon him, and pressed her close to

his side.

"Rest! --" said he, -- "and trust what is written, that 'they

shall praise the Lord that seek him.' 'Wait on the Lord; be of

good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart; wait, I

say, on the Lord.'"

"How much better I feel already," said poor Winnie presently.

There was a long silence. Winnie lay there still, and Winthrop

was softly playing with one of her hands and striking it and

stroking it against his own. The air came in fresh and cool

from the sea and put the candle flame out of all propriety of

behaviour; it flared and smoked, and melted the candle

sideways, and threatened every now and then to go out

entirely; but Winnie lay looking at Winthrop's hand which the

moonlight shone upon, and Winthrop -- nobody knows what he was

looking at; but neither of them saw the candle. Winnie was the

one to break the silence.

"What sort of a person is she, Winthrop?"

"Who?" said her brother.

"What? -- O, I mean -- I meant -- I meant, who was here to-day, --

Miss Haye."

"You have seen her, Winnie," he said after a moment's

hesitation.

"Yes, but you know her. Do you think she is a person I would

like?"

"I do not know."

"You don't know! --"

"But _you_ know her, Winthrop," said Winnie a little timidly,

when she found he added nothing to his former words.

"Yes."

"Don't _you_ like her?"

"Yes."

"Then why don't you know?"

"You don't like everything that I like," said her brother.

"Why yes I do! -- Don't I?"

"Not everything."

"What don't I?"

"Euripides -- and Plato."

"Ah but I don't understand those," said Winnie.

Winthrop was silent. Was that what he meant? -- was Winnie's

instant thought. Very disagreeable. And his 'yes's' were so

quiet -- they told nothing. Winnie looked at her brother's hand

again, or rather at Miss Haye in her brother's hand; and

Winthrop pursued his own meditations.

"Governor," said Winnie after a while, "is Miss Haye a

Christian?"

"No."

Winnie asked no more; partly because she did not dare, and

partly because the last answer had given her so much to think

of. She did not know why, either, and she would have given a

great deal to hear it over again. In that little word and the

manner of it, there had been so much to quiet and to disquiet

her. Undoubtedly Winnie would have done anything in the world,

that she could, to make Miss Haye a Christian; and yet, there

was a strange sort of relief in hearing Winthrop say that

word; and at the same time a something in the way he said it

that told her her relief had uncertain foundation. The 'no'

had not been spoken like the 'yes' -- it came out half under

breath; what meaning lurked about it Winnie could not make

out; she puzzled herself to think; but though she could not

wish it had been a willing 'no,' she wished it had been any

other than it had. She could not ask any more; and Winthrop's

face when he went to his reading was precisely what it was

other evenings. But Winnie's was not; and she went to bed and

got up with a sore spot in her heart, and a resolution that

_she_ would not like Miss Haye, for she would not know her well

enough to make sure that she could.

END OF VOL. I.

PRINTED BY BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ.

COLLECTION

OF

BRITISH AUTHORS

VOL. CCCLII.

THE HILLS OF THE SHATEMUC

BY

ELIZABETH WETHERELL.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

THE

HILLS OF THE SHATEMUC

BY

ELIZABETH WETHERELL,

AUTHOR OF "THE WIDE WIDE WORLD."

_AUTHOR'S EDITION_.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

LEIPZIG

BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ

1856.

THE HILLS OF THE SHATEMUC.

VOL. II.

CHAPTER I.

Ha, ha! what a fool honesty is! and trust, his sworn brother,

a very simple gentleman!

WINTER'S TALE.

Poor Winnie held to her resolution, though half unconsciously

and quite involuntarily. She did not enjoy her ride, and

therefore did not seem to enjoy it; for it was not in her

nature to seem other than she was. Neither did she take or

shew any but a very qualified pleasure in Miss Haye's company;

and for this reason or for others Miss Haye made her visits

few.

But this did not a bit help the main question; and in the want

of data and the absence of all opportunity for making

observations, Winnie had full chance to weary herself with

fancies and fears. She could not get courage enough to say

anything about Miss Haye again to her brother; and he never

spoke of her. There was no change in him; he was always as

careful of his little sister; always bestowed his time upon

her in the same way; was always at home in the evenings.

Unless when, very rarely, he made an arrangement that she

should spend one with Mrs. Nettley and Mr. Inchbald. These

times were seldom; and Winnie generally knew where he was

going and that it was not to Mr. Haye's. But she was not sure

of the integrity of her possession of him; and that want of

security opened the sluice-gates to a flood-tide of wearisome

possibilities; and Winnie's nervous and morbid sensibilities

made the most of them. It was intolerable, to think that

Winthrop should love anybody as he did her; that he should

love anybody _better_, happily for Winnie, never entered her

imaginings. She could not endure to think that those lips,

which were to her the sweetest of earthly things, should touch

any other cheek or mouth but her own. They were _hers_. It was

bitter as wormwood to think that his strong arm could ever

hold and guide another as it held and guided his little

sister. "But _guide?_ -- _she'd_ never let him guide her!" -- said

Winnie in a great fit of sisterly indignation. And her

thoughts would tumble and toss the matter about, till her

cheek was in a flush; she was generally too eager to cry. It

wore upon her; she grew thinner and more haggard; but nobody

knew the cause and no one could reach the remedy.

With all this the end of summer came, and Rufus. He came to

establish himself under Mr. Haye's direction. "For the time,"

-- as Winthrop told Winnie, when she asked him if Rufus was

going to turn merchant. And when she asked him further "what

for?" -- he answered that Rufus was a spice merchant and dealt

in variety. With the end of autumn came Winthrop's admission

to the bar.

And Winnie drew a mental long breath. Winthrop was a lawyer

himself, and no longer in a lawyer's office. Winthrop had an

office of his own. The bark was shoved from the shore, with

her sails set; and Winnie, no more than her brother, doubted

not that the gales of prosperity would soon fill them. Rufus

was greatly amused with her.

"_You_ think it's a great thing to be a lawyer, don't you?" said

he one night.

"I think it's a great thing to be such a lawyer as Governor

will be," said Winnie.

At which Rufus laughed prodigiously.

"_I_ think it's a great thing to be such a governor as this

lawyer will be," he said when he had recovered himself.

"Nothing less, Governor! You have your title beforehand."

"'Once a judge always a judge,'" said Winthrop. "I am afraid

if you reverse the terms, so you will the conclusion."

"Terms!" said Rufus. "You will be governor of this state, and

I shall be your financial secretary -- on any terms you please.

By the way -- what keeps you from Haye's now-a-days? Not this

girl?"

"No," said Winthrop.

It was that same 'no' over again. Winnie knew it, and her

heart throbbed.

"What then? I haven't seen you there since I've been in town."

"How often are you there yourself?"

"O! -- every evening almost. What keeps you?"

"Duty --" said Winthrop.

"But what sort of duty! What on earth can hinder your coming

there as you used to do, to spend a rational hour now and

then?"

"My dear sir, it is enough for any man to know his own duty;

it is not always possible for him to know that of another

man."

"And therefore I ask you!" said Rufus.

"What?"

"Why! -- what's your reason for keeping away."

"In brief -- my engagements."

"You've nothing to do with briefs yet," said Rufus; "have the

goodness to enlarge a little. You've not been more busy lately

than you were a while ago."

"Yes I have."

"Yes, I suppose you have," -- said Rufus meditatively. "But not

so much more as to make that a reason?"

"If my reasons were not only 'as plenty' but as precious, as

blackberries," said his brother, "you could not shew more

eagerness for them."

"I am afraid the blackberries would be the more savoury," said

Rufus laughing a little. "But you didn't use to make such a

hermit of yourself, Winthrop."

"I don't intend to be a hermit always. But as I told you, duty

and inclination have combined to make me one lately."

Winnie could not make much of this conversation. The words

might seem to mean something, but Winthrop's manner had been

so perfectly cool and at ease that she was at a loss to know

whether they meant anything.

Winthrop's first cause was not a very dignified one -- it was

something about a man's horse. Winnie did not think much of

it; except that it was his first cause, and it was gained; but

that she was sure beforehand it would be. However, more

dignified pieces of business did follow, and came fast; and at

every new one Winnie's eyes sparkled and glistened, and her

nervous troubles for the moment laid themselves down beneath

joy, and pride in her brother, and thankfulness for his

success. Before many months had passed away, something offered

that in better measure answered her wishes for his

opportunity.

Their attic room had one evening a very unwonted visiter in

the shape of Mr. Herder. Beside Mr. Inchbald and his sister,

Rufus was the sole one that ever made a third in the little

company. Winthrop's friends, for many reasons, had not the

entrance there. But this evening, near the beginning of the

new year, there came a knock at the door, and Mr. Herder's

round face walked in rounder than ever.

"Good evening! -- How is all wiz you, Wint'rop? -- and you? -- I

would not let no one come up wiz me -- I knew I should find

you."

"How did you know that, Mr. Herder?"

"O! -- I have not looked so long for strange things on the

earth -- and _in_ the earth -- that I cannot find a friend -- de

most strange thing of all."

"Is that your conclusion, Mr. Herder? I didn't know you had

quite so desperate an opinion of mankind."

"It is not despairate," said the naturalist; -- "I do not

despair of nobody. Dere is much good among de world -- dere

might be more -- a good deal. I hope all will be good one day --

it will be -- then we shall have no more trouble. How is it wiz

you, Wint'rop?"

"Nothing to complain of, Mr. Herder."

"Does he never have nozing to complain of?" said the

naturalist turning to Winnie.

"He never thinks he has," said Winnie. She had answered the

naturalist's quick eye with a quick smile, and then turned on

Winthrop a look that spoke of many a thing he must have passed

over to make her words good. Mr. Herder's eye followed hers.

"How is everything with _you_, Mr. Herder?"

"It is well enough," said the naturalist, -- "like the common.

I do not complain, neizer. I never have found time to

complain. Wint'rop, I am come to give you some work."

"What do you want me to do, sir?"

"I do not know," said the naturalist; -- "I do not know nozing

about what is to be done; but I want you to do something."

"I hope you will give me something more to go to work upon,

sir. What is the matter?"

"It is not my matter," said the naturalist; -- "I did never get

in such a quarrel but one, and I will never again in anozer --

it is my brother, or the man who married my sister -- his name

is Jean Lansing."

"What is the matter with him?"

"Dere is too many things the matter wiz him," said Mr. Herder,

"for he is sick abed -- that is why I am here. I am come to

tell you his business and to get you to do it."

"I shall think I am working for you, Mr. Herder," Winthrop

said, as he tied up a bundle of papers which had been lying

loose about the table.

"Have you got plenty to do?" said the naturalist, giving them

a good-humoured eye.

"Can't have too much, sir. Now what is your brother's affair?"

"I do not know as I can tell you," said the other, his bright

jovial face looking uncommonly mystified, -- "it seems to me he

does not know very well himself. He does not know that anybody

has done nozing, but he is not _satisfied_."

"And my business is to satisfy him?"

"If you can do that -- you shall be satisfied too!" said the

naturalist. "He does not know that any one has wronged him:

but he thinks one has."

"Who?"

"Ryle -- John Ryle. He was Mr. Lansing's partner in business

for years -- I do not know how many."

"Here?"

"In Mannahatta -- here -- they were partners; and Ryle had

brothers in England, and he was the foreign partner and

Lansing was here, for the American part of the business. Well,

they were working togezer for years; -- and at the end of them,

when they break up the business, it is found that Ryle has

made himself money, and that my brother has not made none! So

he is poor, and my sister, and Ryle is rich."

"How is that?"

"It is that way as I tell you; and Ryle has plenty, and

Lansing and Therésa they have not."

"But has Mr. Lansing no notion how this may have come about?"

"He knows nozing!" said the naturalist, -- "no more than you

know -- except he knows he is left wizout nozing, and Ryle has

not left himself so. Dat is all he knows."

"Can I see Mr. Lansing?"

"He is too sick. And he could tell you nozing. But he is not

satisfied."

"Is John Ryle of this city?"

"He is of this city. He is not doing business no more, but he

lives here."

"Well, we can try, Mr. Herder," said Winthrop, tapping his

bundle of papers on the table, in a quiet wise that was a

strong contrast to the ardent face and gestures of the

philosopher. It was the action, too, of a man who knew how to

try and was in no doubt as to his own power. The naturalist

felt it.

"What will you do, Wint'rop?"

"You wish me to set about it?"

"I do. I put it in your hands."

"I will try, Mr. Herder, what can be done."

"What will you do first?" said the naturalist.

"File a bill in equity," said Winthrop smiling.

"A bill? -- what is that?"

"A paper setting forth certain charges, made on supposition

and suspicion only, to which charges they must answer on

oath."

"_Who_ will answer?"

"Ryle and his brothers."

"Dere is but one of them alive."

"Well, Ryle and his brother, then."

"But what charges will you make? We do not know nozing to

charge."

"Our charges will be merely on supposition and suspicion --

it's not needful to swear to them."

"And they must swear how it is?"

"They must swear to their answers,"

"That will do!" said the naturalist, looking 'satisfied'

already. "That will do. We will see what they will say. -- Do

you do nozing but write bills all night, every night, and tie

up papers? -- you do not come to my room no more since a long

time."

"Not for want of will, Mr. Herder. I have not been able to

go."

"Bring your little sister and let her look at my things some

time -- while you and me we look at each other. It is good to

look at one's friend sometime."

"I have often found it so, Mr. Herder. I will certainly bring

Winnie if I can."

"Do you not go nowhere?" said the naturalist as if a thought

had struck him. "What is de reason that I do not meet you at

Mr. Haye's no more?"

"I go almost nowhere, sir."

"You are wrong," said the naturalist. "You are not right. Dere

is more will miss you than me; and there is somebody there who

wants you to take care of her."

"I hope you are mistaken, sir."

"She wants somebody to take care of her," said Mr. Herder;

"and I do not know nobody so good as you. I am serious. She is

just as afraid as ever one should take care of her, and poor

thing she wants it all the more. She will not let your brother

do it neizer."

"Do you think he is trying, Mr. Herder?" Winthrop said coolly.

"I believe he would be too glad! he looks at her so hard as he

can; but she will not look at the tops of his fingers. She

does not know what she shall do wiz herself, she is so mad wiz

her father's new wife."

"What has she been doing?" Winthrop asked.

"Who, Rose? -- she has not done nozing, but to marry Elisabet's

father, and for that she never will forgive her. I am sorry --

he was foolish man. -- Wint'rop, you must not shut yourself up

here -- you will be directly rich -- you must find yourself a

wife next thing."

"Why should a lawyer have a wife any more than a philosopher?"

said Winthrop.

"A philosopher," said Mr. Herder, with the slightest comical

expression upon his broad face, -- "has enough for him to do to

take care of truth -- he has not time to take care of his wife

too. While I was hunting after de truth, my wife would forget

me."

"Does it take you so long for a hunt?"

"I am doing it all de time," said the naturalist; "it is what

I spend my life for. I live for that."

The last words were spoken with a quiet deliberation which

told their truth. And if the grave mouth of the other might

have said 'I live for truth' too, it would not have belied his

thoughts. But it was truth of another kind.

Winnie watched the course of this piece of business of Mr.

Herder's with the most eager anxiety. That is, what there was

to watch, for proceedings were slow. The very folio pages of

that 'Bill,' that she saw Winthrop writing, were scrolls of

interest and mysterious charm to Winnie's eyes, like nothing

surely that other eyes could find in them. Certainly not the

eyes of Mr. Ryle and his lawyer. Winnie watched the bill

folded up and superscribed, standing over her brother with her

hand on his shoulder.

"What is that about, now, Governor? -- what is it to do?"

"It charges Mr. Ryle and his brother with malpractices, Winnie

-- with dealing unfairly by Mr. Lansing."

"But you don't know that they have done anything?"

"They can shew it, in that case; and the object of this bill

is to make them shew one thing or the other, by their answer."

"And, dear Governor, how soon will they answer?"

"In forty days, Winnie, they must."

Winnie drew a breath of patience and impatience, and went back

to her seat.

But before the forty days were gone by, Winthrop came home one

night and told Winnie he had got the answer; and smiled at her

face of eagerness and pleasure. Winnie thought his smiles were

not very often, and welcomed every one.

"But it is not likely this answer will settle the question,

Winnie," he remarked.

"O no, I suppose not; but I want to know what they say."

So they had supper; and after supper she watched while he sat

reading it; as leaf after leaf was turned over, from the

close-written and close-lying package in Winthrop's hand to

the array of pages that had already been turned back and lay

loose piled on the table; while Winthrop's pencil now and then

made an admonitory note in the margin. How his sister admired

him! -- and at last forgot the bill in studying the face of the

bill-reader. It was very little changed from its old wont; and

what difference there might be, was not the effect of a

business life. The cool and invariable self-possession and

self-command of the character had kept and promised to keep

him _himself_, in the midst of these and any other concerns,

however entangling or engrossing. The change, if any, was

traceable to somewhat else; or to somewhat else Winnie laid

it, -- though she would not have called it a change, but only

an added touch of perfection. She could not tell, as she

looked, what that touch had done; if told, perhaps it might

be, that it had added sweetness to the gravity and gravity to

the sweetness that was there before. How Winnie loved that

broad brow, and the very hand it rested on! All the well-known

lines of calmness and strength about the face her eye went

over and over again; she had quite forgotten Mr. Ryle; and she

saw Winthrop folding up the voluminous "answer," and she

hardly cared to ask what was in it. She watched the hands that

were doing it. _They_ seemed to speak his character, too; she

thought they did; calmness and decision were in the very

fingers. Before her curiosity had recovered itself enough to

speak, Mr. Herder came in.

They talked for awhile about other things; and then Winthrop

told him of the answer.

"You have it!" cried the naturalist. "And what do they say?"

'Nothing, fully and honestly."

"Ah ha! -- And do they grant -- do they allow anything of your

charges, that you made in your bill?"

"Yes -- in a vague and unsatisfactory way, they do."

"Vague --?" said the naturalist.

"Not open and clear. But the other day in the street I was

stopped by Mr. Brick --"

"Who is Brick?" said Mr. Herder.

"He is Ryle's lawyer. He stopped me a few days ago and told me

there was one matter in the answer with which perhaps I would

not be satisfied -- which perhaps I should not think

sufficiently full; but he said, he, who had drawn the answer,

_knew_, personally, all about it; and he assured me that the

answer in this matter granted all, and more, than I could gain

in any other way; and that if I carried the proceedings

further, in hopes to gain more for my client, the effect would

only be an endless delay."

"Do they offer to give him _something?_" said the naturalist.

"The answer does make disclosures, which though, as I said,

vague and imperfect, still promise to give him something."

"And you think it might be more?"

"Brick assures me, on his own knowledge, that by going on with

the matter we shall only gain an endless lawsuit."

"What do you think, Wint'rop?"

"I want you to give this paper to Mr. Lansing, and ask him

what _he_ thinks. Ask him to read it, and tell him what Brick

says; and then let him make up his mind whether we had better

go on or not."

"I do not care for nobody's mind but yours," said the

naturalist.

"Let us have Mr. Lansing's first."

So Mr. Herder carried away the answer to Mr. Lansing, and in a

few days came back to report progress.

"He has read it," said Mr. Herder, "and he says he do not make

anything of it at all. He leaves the whole thing wiz you."

"Does he understand what is hinted at by these half

disclosures?"

"He says he does not understand nozing of it -- he knows not

what they mean -- he does not know whether to go on, whether to

stop here. He says, and I say, you judge and do what you

please."

"I confess, Mr. Herder, that Mr. Brick's kind warning has made

me suspicious of his and his principal's good faith; and my

will would be to go on."

"Go on, then!" said the naturalist -- "I say so too -- go on! I

do not trust that Brick no more than you do; and Mr. Ryle, _him_

I do not trust. Now what will you do next?"

"Take exceptions to the answer, where it seems to be

insufficient, and make them answer again."

"Exception --?" said the naturalist.

In answer to which Winthrop went into explanations at some

length; from which at least this much was clearly made out by

Mr. Herder and Winnie, -- that the cause would come to a

hearing probably in May, before Chancellor Justice; when

Winthrop and Mr. Brick would stand openly pitted against each

other and have an opportunity of trying their mutual strength,

or the strength of their principles; when also it would,

according to the issue of said conflict, be decided whether

the Ryles must or not reply to Winthrop's further demands upon

them.

"And this Chancellor Justice -- is he good man?" said Mr.

Herder.

"As good a man as I want to argue before," said Winthrop. "I

ask no better. All is safe in that quarter."

That all was safe in another quarter, both Mr. Herder and

Winnie felt sure; and both looked eagerly forward to May; both

too with very much the same feeling of pride and interest in

their champion.

Winnie's heart jumped again at hearing a few days after, that

Mr. Satterthwaite had put his affairs into Winthrop's hands;

partly, Winthrop said he supposed, out of friendship for him,

and partly out of confidence in him. It was rather a mark of

the former, that he insisted upon paying a handsome retaining

fee.

"Now where's Mr. Cool and his affairs?" said Winnie.

"I suppose Mr. Cool is at Coldstream, where he keeps 'cool'

all the year round, I understand."

"But he promised to put _his_ affairs into your hands."

"Then he'll do it. Perhaps they keep cool too."

"I wish May would be here," said Winnie.

Winthrop was at the table one evening, -- while it still wanted

some weeks of the May term, -- writing, as usual, with heaps of

folio papers scattered all about him; writing fast; and Winnie

was either reading or looking at him, who was the book she

loved best to study; when Rufus came in. Both looked up and

welcomed him smilingly; but then Winthrop went on with his

writing; while Winnie's book was laid down. She had enough

else now to do. Rufus took a seat by the fire and did as she

often did, -- looked at Winthrop.

"Are you always writing?" said he somewhat gloomily.

"Not always," said Winthrop. "I sometimes read, for variety."

"Law papers?"

"Law papers -- when I can't read anything else."

"That's pretty much all the time, isn't it?"

"O no," said Winnie; -- "he reads a great deal to me -- we were

reading a while ago, before you came in -- we read every

evening."

Rufus brought his attention round upon her, not, as it seemed,

with perfect complacency.

"What time does this girl go to bed?"

How Winnie's face changed. Winthrop answered without stopping

his pen. --

"When she is tired of sitting up -- not until then."

"She ought to have a regular hour -- and an early one."

"You are an adviser upon theory, you see," said Winthrop going

on with his writing; -- "I have the advantage of practice."

"I fancy any adviser would tell you the same in this case,"

said the elder brother somewhat stiffly.

"I can go now," Winifred said rising, and speaking with a

trembling lip and a tremulous voice, -- "if you want to talk

about anything."

She lit a candle and had got to the door, when her other

brother said,

"Winnie! --"

Winnie stopped and turned with the door in her hand. Winthrop

was busy clearing some books and papers from a chair by his

side. He did not speak again; when he had done he looked up

and towards her; and obeying the wish of his face, as she

would have done had it been any other conceivable thing,

Winnie shut the door, set her candle down, and came and took

the chair beside him. But then, when she felt his arm put

round her, she threw her head down upon him and burst into a

fit of nervously passionate tears. _That_ was not his wish, she

knew, but she could not help it.

"Mr. Landholm," said Winthrop, "may I trouble you to put out

that candle. We are not so extravagant here as to burn

bedlights till we want them. -- Hush, Winnie, --" softly said

his voice in her ear and his arm at the same time.

"Absurd!" said Rufus, getting up to do as he was bid.

"What?" said his brother.

"Why I really want to talk to you."

"I am really very willing to listen."

"But I do not want to talk to anybody beside you."

"Winnie hears everything that is said here, Will," said the

younger brother gravely, at the same time restraining with his

arm the motion he felt Winnie made to go.

"It don't signify!" said Rufus, getting up and beginning to

walk up and down the room gloomily.

"What doesn't signify?"

"Anything! --"

The steps were quicker and heavier, with concealed feeling.

Winthrop looked at him and was silent; while Rufus seemed to

be combating some unseen grievance, by the set of his lip and

nostril.

"What do you think Haye has done?" -- he broke out, like a

horse that is champing the bit.

"What?" said Winthrop.

"He has sued me."

"Sued you!" exclaimed Winthrop, while even Winnie forgot her

tears and started up. Rufus walked.

"What do you mean, Will?"

"I mean he has sued me!" -- said Rufus stopping short and

facing them with eyes that for the moment had established a

natural pyrotechny of their own.

"How, and what for?"

"How? -- by the usual means! What for? -- I will tell you!"

Which he sat down to do; Winthrop and Winnie both his most

earnest auditors.

"You know it was Haye's own proposition, urged by himself,

that I should go into business with him. Nobody asked him -- it

was his own doing; it was his declared purpose and wish,

unsolicited by me or my father or by anybody, to set me

forward in his own line and put me in the way of making my

fortune! -- as he said."

Winthrop knew it, and had never liked it. He did not tell

Rufus so now; he gave him nothing but the attention of his

calm face; into which Rufus looked while he talked, as if it

were the safe, due, and appointed treasury in which to bestow

all his grievances and passionate sense of them.

"Well! -- you know he offered, a year ago or more, that by way

of making a beginning, I should take off his hands some cotton

which he had lying in storage, and ship it to Liverpool on my

own account; and as I had no money, I was to pay him by

drawing bills in his favour upon the consignees."

"I remember very well," said Winthrop.

"Well sir! -- the cotton reached Liverpool and was found good

for nothing!"

"Literally?"

"Literally, sir! -- wasn't worth near the amount of my bills,

which of course were returned -- and Haye has sued me for the

rest!"

Rufus's face looked as if a spark from it might easily have

burnt up the whole consignment of cotton, if it had happened

to be in the neighbourhood.

"How was the cotton? -- damaged?"

"Damaged? -- of course! -- kept in vaults here till it was

spoiled; and he knew it!"

"For what amount has he sued you?" said Winthrop when Rufus

had fed his fire silently for a couple of minutes.

"For more than I can pay -- or will! --"

"How much does that stand for, in present circumstances?"

"How much? A matter of several hundreds!"

"How many?"

"So many, as I should leave myself penniless to pay, and then

not pay. You know I lost money down there."

"I know," said his brother.

Winifred brought her eyes round to Winthrop; and Winthrop

looked grave; and Rufus, as before, fiery; and there was a

silence this time of more than two minutes.

"My dependence is on you, Governor," Rufus said at last.

"I wish I could help you, Will."

"How can I get out of this scrape?"

"You have no defence in law."

"But there must be a defence somewhere!" said Rufus drawing

himself up, with the whole spirit of the common law apparently

within him, energizing the movement.

"The only hope of relief would be in the equity courts."

"How there?" said Rufus.

Winthrop hesitated.

"A plea of fraud -- alleging that Mr. Haye has overreached you,

putting off upon you goods which he _knew_ to be worthless."

"To be sure he did!" said Rufus. "Knew it as well as he does

now. It was nothing but a fraud. An outrageous fraud!"

Winthrop made no answer, and the brothers paused again, each

in his meditations. Winnie, passing her eyes from one to the

other, thought Winthrop looked as if his were very grave.

"I depend upon you, Governor," the elder brother said more

quietly.

"To do what?"

"Why! --" said Rufus firing again, -- "to do whatever is

necessary to relieve me! Who should do it?"

"I wish you could get somebody else, Will," said the other.

"I am sorry I cannot!" said Rufus. "If I had the money I would

pay it and submit to be trodden upon -- I would rather take it

some ways than some others -- but unhappily necessity is laid

upon me. I _cannot_ pay, and I am unwilling to go to jail, and I

_must_ ask you to help me, painful as it is."

Winthrop was silent, grave and calm as usual; but Winnie's

heart ached to see _how_ grave his eye was. Did she read it

right? He was silent still; and so was Rufus, though watching

for him to speak.

"Well!" said Rufus at last getting up with a start, "I will

relieve you! I am sorry I troubled you needlessly -- I shall

know better than to do it again! --"

He was rushing off, but before he reached the door Winthrop

had planted himself in front of it.

"Stand out of my way."

"I am not in it. Go back, Will."

"I won't, if you please. -- I'll thank you to let me open the

door."

"I will not. Go back to your seat, Rufus -- I want to speak to

you."

"I was under the impression you did _not_," said Rufus, standing

still. "I waited for you to speak."

"It is safe to conclude that when a man makes you wait, he has

something to say."

"You are more certain of it when he lets you know what it is,"

said Rufus.

"Provided he knows first himself."

"How long does it take _you_ to find out what you have to say?"

said Rufus, returning to his ordinary manner and his seat at

once. The fire seemed to have thrown itself off in that last

jet of flame.

"I sometimes find I have too much; and then there is apt to be

a little delay of choice."

"A delay to choose? -- or a choice of delay?" said Rufus.

"Sometimes one and sometimes the other."

One or the other seemed still in force with Winthrop's present

matter of speech, for he came before the fire and stood

mending it, and said nothing.

"Winthrop," said Rufus gravely, "have you any _particular_

reason to decline doing this business for me?"

Winthrop hesitated slightly, and then came forth one of those

same "no's," that Winnie knew by heart.

"Have you any particular reason to dislike it?"

"Yes. They were my friends once."

"But is your friendship for them stronger than for anybody

else?"

"It does not stand in the way of my duty to you, Will."

"Your _duty_ to me, --" said the other.

"Yes. I cannot in this instance call it pleasure."

It was the turn of Rufus to hesitate; for the face of his

brother expressed an absence of pleasure that to him, in the

circumstances, was remarkable.

"Then you do not refuse to undertake this job for me?"

"I will do what I can," said Winthrop, working at a large

forestick on the fire. How Winnie wished he would let it

alone, and place himself so that she could see him.

"And don't you think there is good prospect of our

succeeding?"

"If Chancery don't give it you, I'll take it to the Court of

Errors," said Winthrop, arranging the log to his satisfaction,

and then putting the rest of the fire in order.

"I'm sorry to give you trouble, Governor," his brother said

thoughtfully.

"I'm sorry you've got it to give, Will."

But Rufus went on looking into the fire, and seeming to get

deeper into the depths of something less bright as he looked.

"After all I am much the most to be pitied," he began. "I

thought to-day, Governor -- I did not know what would become of

me!"

"I can tell you that beforehand," said his brother. "You will

become, exactly, what you choose to make yourself."

"That is what you always say," returned Rufus a little

cynically.

"That is what I have found in my own practice," said Winthrop.

He put up the tongs and took his old seat by Winnie. Rufus

looked still into the fire.

"I am thrown out of this employment now," he said; -- "I am

disgusted with it -- and if I were not, there is no way for me

to follow it with advantage."

"I am not sorry for that, Will. I never liked it for you, nor

you for it."

"I have nothing to do. -- I am a loose pin in the Mosaic of

society -- the pattern is all made up without me."

"What pin has got your place?" said Winthrop.

"What do you mean?"

"Simply, that as in the nature of things there cannot be too

many pins, a pin that is out of place must be such by a

derelict of duty."

"What is my place?"

"If my word would set you in it, I would tell you."

"Tell me, and perhaps it will."

"I should bid you return to your engineer's work and serve God

in it."

"Very poor chance for serving God or man, in that work," said

Rufus. "Or myself."

"And no chance at all so long as you are doing nothing."

"I cannot bear to compare myself with you," -- Rufus went on

moodily.

"Compare yourself with yourself, Will, -- the actual with the

possible, -- and then go forward."

"What is possible in an engineer's life!" said Rufus.

"Everything is possible, in any place where Providence has put

you, for the future at least. And the firm purpose of serving

God in it, will dignify for the present any life.

"'A man that looks on glass

"'On it may stay his eye;

"'Or, if he pleaseth, through it pass,

"'And then the heaven espy!'"

Rufus met the grave slight smile on his brother's face, and

his eye watered.

"You are better than I am," he said with one of very different

meaning.

"If that be true to-day, Will, don't let it be true to-

morrow."

They wrung each other's hands, and the elder brother went

soberly away.

CHAPTER II.

An't be any way, it must be with valour; for Policy I hate: I

had as lief be a Brownist as a politician.

TWELFTH NIGHT.

The family at No. 11 on the Parade, were seated at breakfast

one morning towards the latter end of May; the old trio, only

with Elizabeth and Rose in each other's places.

"What is the reason Winthrop Landholm don't come here any

more?" said the latter lady.

"I don't know," said Mr. Haye, when the silence had threatened

the failure of any answer at all.

"What's the reason, Lizzie?"

"I don't know! -- how should I?"

"I am sure I can't tell," said Rose, "but I didn't know but

you did. I wish you'd ask him to come again, Mr. Haye -- do you

know how he is getting up in the world?"

"I know how cotton is falling," said Mr. Haye, swallowing his

tea and the newspaper apparently both at the same time.

"Cotton! --" said Rose. "Now Mr. Haye, just put down that paper

and listen to me; -- do you know how Winthrop Landholm is

holding his head up?"

"No," said Mr. Haye, looking at the pretty little head which

was holding itself up, over against him.

"Well, he is. You didn't hear what Mr. Satterthwaite was

saying about him last night, did you?"

"I didn't hear Mr. Satterthwaite say anything."

"Well he says he's had quite a great cause come on, now, just

a few days ago --"

"Who has? Mr. Satterthwaite?"

"Why no, Mr. Haye! -- of course! -- I mean Mr. Landholm has -- a

cause that he was to argue, you know -- that's what I mean --

before Chancellor Justice -- and Mr. Satterthwaite says he did

it splendidly! -- he said everybody stood and looked; -- and the

Chancellor gave him everything he asked for -- made all his

exceptions, he said, whatever that means --"

"_Allowed_ his exceptions," said Elizabeth.

"O you could listen when Mr. Satterthwaite was speaking of

Winthrop Landholm!"

"Mr. Satterthwaite don't often have so good a subject. I

listened certainly, and was very much interested; -- the only

time I ever remember Mr. Satterthwaite's saying anything I

cared to hear."

"Well, now, Mr. Haye, why isn't it just as well to say '_made_

an exception,' as '_allowed_ an exception'? I don't think

'allowed an exception' is good English."

"It is good law English, I suppose, Rose."

"Well, I don't care -- at any rate, he said the Chancellor

allowed every one of Mr. Landholm's exceptions, -- suppose _you_

understand it; -- and wouldn't allow a single thing to Mr.

Brick; and Mr. Brick was the lawyer on the other side; and Mr.

Satterthwaite said it was a great triumph for Mr. Landholm."

"Dustus O. Brick?" said Mr. Haye.

"Yes," said Elizabeth.

"I don't know," said Rose; "he said Mr. Brick, -- or the noted

Mr. Brick -- I suppose that's the man."

"Dustus O. Brick!" said Mr. Haye -- "he's one of the best men

in the bar, and a very clever man too; a distinguished lawyer;

there's no one more thought of."

"That's what Mr. Satterthwaite said, -- he said so, -- he said

it was a great triumph for Mr. Landholm; -- and now Mr. Haye,

_won't_ you ask him to come here again as he used to?"

"Who?"

"Winthrop Landholm."

"What for?"

"Why I want to _see_ him -- and so do you, Mr. Haye. Now Mr.

Haye, won't you? -- Though I don't know but Elizabeth would be

the best one to ask him."

"Why?" dryly said the master of the house.

"I guess he'd be more likely to come."

"If I thought so, and it were my part to do it, I certainly

should ask him," said Elizabeth. "There isn't any person so

pleasant as he to take his place, among all that come here."

"You were glad of what Mr. Satterthwaite told us last night

weren't you?" said Rose with a sinister smile.

"Very glad!"

"Did you ever hear Mr. Satterthwaite go on so about anybody?

One would have thought Mr. Landholm was his own brother. I

wonder if that was for your sake, Lizzie?"

"I presume it was for his own sake," said Elizabeth. "I should

think anybody who had the privilege of being Mr. Landholm's

friend, would know how to value it."

"_You_ would value it, for instance, I suppose?"

"I have no doubt I should."

"It seems to me you are a little too sure of valuing it," said

Mr. Haye, -- "for a young lady who has _not_ that privilege."

Elizabeth's cheeks burned on the instant, but her eye was

steady, and it looked full on her father while she asked him,

"Why, sir?"

"It is not worth while for you to like other people faster

than they like you?"

"Why not?" -- said Elizabeth, her cheek and eye both deepening

in their fire, but her look as steady and full, -- "Why not? --

if it should happen that I am less likeable than they?"

"Pshaw!" said Mr. Haye.

"If I were to gauge the respect and esteem I give others, by

the respect and esteem they might be able to give me, -- I

should cut off maybe the best pleasures of my life."

"Are respect and esteem the best pleasures of your life?" said

Rose satirically.

"I have never known any superior to them," said Elizabeth. But

she brought, as she spoke, her eye of fire to bear upon her

cousin, who gave way before it and was mum.

"And what may respect and esteem lead to?" said Mr. Haye.

"I don't know," said Elizabeth. "And I don't care -- even to

ask."

"Suppose they are not returned?"

"I have supposed that in the first place," she answered.

"At that rate you might be over head and ears in your regard

for several people at once, none of whom cared a straw for

you," said Mr. Haye.

"When I find _several_, men or women, that deserve the sort of

respect and esteem I am talking of," said Elizabeth -- "I am

not talking of a common kind, that you can give common people

-- I shall be in a new world!"

"And have you this sort of 'respect and esteem' for Mr.

Winthrop Landholm?" said her father.

"That's another question," said Elizabeth, for the first time

dropping her eye and speaking more quietly; -- "I was talking

of the general principle."

"And I am asking of the particular instance. Have you this

respect and esteem for this particular person of your

acquaintance?"

"I never gave it to many people in my life," said Elizabeth,

colouring again somewhat. "He has as fair a share of it as

most have."

"A little more?" said Mr. Haye smiling.

This time the answer she flashed at him was of proud and

indignant bar to any further questioning -- with her eyes only;

her lips did not move.

"Does he know it, Elizabeth?"

"Know what, sir?"

"This favour you have expressed for him."

"I have expressed nothing but what I would express for any one

to whom I thought it due."

"But I ask, does he know it?"

"I feel injured, father, by your asking me such questions! -- I

presume he does not know, since he has not had the honour of

being told!"

The air with which this was given was regal.

"I wouldn't tell him, Lizzie," said her father quietly.

But at the insinuation conveyed in these words, Elizabeth's

mood took another turn.

"I will tell whomsoever it may concern to know, at any time

when I see occasion," she answered. "It is not a thing to be

ashamed of; and I will neither do nor think anything I am

unwilling to own."

"You had better reform public opinion in the first place,"

said Mr. Haye dryly.

"Why?" she said with startling quickness.

"It is apt to hold rather light of young ladies who tell their

minds without being asked."

"How can you speak so, father! -- I said, _when I saw occasion_ --

it seems I have very much misjudged in the present instance."

"And as that might happen again," said Mr. Haye, "it is just

as safe, on the whole, that the person in question does not

come here any more. I am glad that I have advertised his place

for sale."

"_What!_" exclaimed Elizabeth and Rose both at once.

"Hush -- don't fire at a man in that way. His father's place, I

should say."

"_What_ have you done to it?" said Elizabeth.

"Advertised it for sale. You don't hear me as well as you do

Mr. Satterthwaite, it seems."

"How come you to have it to sell?"

"Because it was mortgaged to me -- years ago -- and I can't get

either principal or interest; so I am taking the best way I

can to secure my rights."

"But Mr. Landholm was your friend?"

"Certainly -- but I am a better friend to myself. Can't do

business with your friends on different principles from those

you go upon with other people, Lizzie."

Elizabeth looked at him, with eyes that would have annihilated

a large portion of Mr. Haye's principles, if they had been

sentient things. Rose began a running fire of entreaties that

_he_ would have nothing to do with Shahweetah, for that she

could not bear the place. Elizabeth brought her eyes back to

her plate, but probably she still saw Mr. Haye there, for the

expression of them did not change.

"_I'm_ not going to have anything to do with the place, Rose,"

said Mr. Haye -- "further than to get it off my hands. I don't

want to live there any more than you do. All I want to do is

to pay myself."

"Father," said Elizabeth looking up quietly, "_I'll_ buy it of

you."

"_You!_" said Mr. Haye, -- while Rose went off into a succession

of soft laughs.

"Do you care who does it, so that you get the money?"

"No, -- but what will you do with it?"

"Find a way, in time, of conveying it back to its right

owners," said Rose. "Don't you see, Mr. Haye?"

Elizabeth favoured her with a look which effectually spiked

that little gun, for the time, and turned her attention again

to her father.

"Do you care who buys it of you, so that you get the money?"

"Why, no -- but you don't want such a piece of property,

Lizzie."

"I want just such a piece of property."

"But my child, you can't manage it. It would be an absurd

spending of _your_ money. There's a farm of two or three hundred

acres -- more, -- besides woodland. What could you do with it?"

"Trust me to take care of my own. May I have it, father?"

"Mr. Haye! --" Rose put in, pouting and whimpering, -- "I wish

you'd tell Lizzie she's not to look at me so! --"

"Will you sell it to me?" pursued Elizabeth.

"If you'll promise it shall not go back to the original owners

in any such way as Rose hinted."

"Are those your terms of sale?" said Elizabeth. "Because,

though I may not choose to submit myself to them, I can find

you another purchaser."

"What do you want of a great piece of land like that?"

"Nothing; I want the land itself."

"You can't do anything with it."

"It don't signify, if it all grows up to nettles!" said

Elizabeth. "Will you take the money of me and let me take the

land of you?"

"Hum --" said Mr. Haye, -- "I think you have enlightened me too

much this morning. No -- I'll find a more disinterested

purchaser; and let it teach you to take care of your eyes as

well as your tongue."

Rose bridled. Mr. Haye got up leisurely from the breakfast-

table and was proceeding slowly to the door, when his path was

crossed by his daughter. She stood still before him.

He might well tell her to take care of her eyes. They glowed

in their sockets as she confronted him, while her cheek was as

blanched as a fire at the heart could leave it. Mr. Haye was

absolutely startled and stood as still as she.

"Father," she said, "take care how you drive me too far! You

have had some place in my heart, but I warn you it is in

danger. -- If you care for it, I warn you! -- "

She was gone, like a flash; and Mr. Haye after casting a sort

of scared look behind him at his wife, went off too; probably

thinking he had got enough for one morning.

No doubt Elizabeth felt so for her part. She had gone to her

own room, where she put herself on a low seat by the window

and sat with labouring breath and heaving bosom, and the fire

in her heart and in her eyes glowing still, though she looked

now as if it were more likely to consume herself than anybody

else. If herself was not present to her thoughts, they were

busy with nothing then present; but the fire burned.

While she sat there, Clam came in, now one of the smartest of

gay-turbaned handmaidens, and began an elaborate dusting of

the apartment. She began at the door, and by the time she had

worked round to Elizabeth at the window, she had made by many

times a more careful survey of her mistress than of any piece

of furniture in the room. Elizabeth's head had drooped; and

her eyes were looking, not vacantly, but with no object in

view, out of the window.

"I guess you want my friend here just now, Miss 'Lizabeth,"

said Clam, her lips parting just enough to show the line of

white between them.

"Whom do you mean by your friend?"

"O -- Governor Landholm, to be sure -- he used to fix everybody

straight whenever he come home to Wuttle Quttle."

Elizabeth passed over the implication that she wanted

'fixing,' and asked, "How? --"

"_I_ don' know. He used to put 'em all in order, in less'n no

time," said Clam, going over and over the dressing-table with

her duster, as that piece of furniture kept her near her

mistress. "Mis' Landholm used to get her face straight the

minute his two feet sounded outside the house, and she'd keep

it up as long as he stayed; and Winifred stopped to be queer

and behaved like a Christian; and nobody else in the house

hadn't a chance to take airs but himself."

"What sort of airs did _he_ take?" said Elizabeth.

"O I don' know," said Clam; -- "_his_ sort; -- they wa'n't like

nobody else's sort."

"But what do you mean by airs?"

"Can't tell," said Clam, -- "nothin' like yours, Miss

'Lizabeth, -- I take a notion to wish he was here, once in a

while -- it wouldn't do some folks no harm."

"Didn't his coming put you in order too?"

Clam gave a little toss of her head, infinitely knowing and

satisfied at the same time, and once more and more broadly

shewed the white ivory between her not unpretty parted teeth.

"I think you want putting in order now," said her mistress.

"Always did," said Clam with a slight arch of her eyebrows, --

"always shall. Best get him to manage it, Miss 'Lizabeth -- he

can do it quicker'n anybody else -- for me, -- and I dare say he

would for you."

"I don't believe you ever were put in order," said Elizabeth,

-- "to stay."

"I didn't use to do a wrong thing as long as he was in the

house!" said Clam. "Didn't want to. -- You wouldn't neither, if

you was in the house with him."

"What do you mean by Mrs. Landholm's getting her face straight

when he came? -- was'nt it always so?"

"'Twa'n't always _so_," said Clam, -- "for when he come, half

the wrinkles went away, and the grey hairs all turned black

again."

There came such a pang to Elizabeth's heart, such a gush to

her eyes, that she hid her face on her knees and heard nothing

of what her handmaid said for a long time after. If Clam

talked, she had the talk all to herself; and when Elizabeth at

last raised her head, her handmaiden was standing on the other

side of the fireplace looking at her, and probably making up

her mind that she wanted 'fixing' very much. There was no

further discussion of the subject, however; for Miss Haye

immediately called for her bonnet and veil, wrapped herself in

a light scarf and went out. The door had hardly closed upon

her when the bell rang again, and she came running up-stairs

to her room.

"Clam, get me the newspaper."

"What news, Miss 'Lizabeth?"

"All the newspapers -- every one you can find; -- yesterday's

and to-day's, or the day before."

Much wondering, Clam hunted the house and brought the fruits

of her search; and much more wondering, she saw her mistress

spend one hour in closely poring over the columns of page

after page; she who never took five minutes a day to read the

papers. At last a little bit was carefully cut from one of

those Clam had brought up, and Elizabeth again prepared

herself to go forth.

"If it had been Mr. Winthrop, now, who was doing that," said

Clam, "he'd have took off his hat most likely, and sat down to

it. How you do look, Miss 'Lizabeth!"

"Mr. Winthrop and I are two different people," said Elizabeth,

hurriedly putting on the one glove she had drawn off.

"Must grow a little more like before you'll be one and the

same," observed Clam.

Elizabeth let down her veil over her face and went out again.

With a quick nervous step she went, though the day was warm,

making no delay and suffering no interruption; till she

reached the University where Professor Herder made his daily

and nightly abode. The professor was attending one of his

classes. Elizabeth asked to be shewn to his room.

She felt as if she was on a queer errand, as she followed her

conductor up the wide stone stairs and along the broad

corridors, where the marks were evidently of only man's use

and habitation, and now and then a man's whistle or footstep

echoed from the distance through the halls. But she went on

swiftly, from one corridor to another, till the guide opened a

door and she stepped out from the public haunts of life to a

bit of quite seclusion.

It was a pleasant enough place that Mr. Herder called home. A

large, airy, light, high-ceiled apartment, where plainly even

to a stranger's eye, the naturalist had grouped and bestowed

around him all the things he best liked to live among.

Enormous glass cases, filled with the illustrations of

science, and not less of the philosopher's investigating

patience, lined all the room; except where dark-filled shelves

of books ran up between them from the floor to the ceiling. A

pleasant cloth-covered table, with books and philosophical

instruments, stood towards one side of the room, a little

table with a lamp at the other; and scattered about, all over,

were big stout comfortable well-worn leather arm-chairs, that

said study and learning sat easy there and often received

visits of pleasure in that room. Elizabeth felt herself as

little akin to pleasure as to learning or study, just then.

She put herself in one of the great leather chairs, with a

sense of being out of her element -- a little piece of busy,

bustling, practical life, within the very palings of science

and wisdom.

She sat and waited. But that pulse of busy life beat never the

cooler for all the cool aspect of the place and the grave

shade of wisdom that lingered there; nay, it throbbed faster

and more flutteringly. She got up to try the power of

distraction the glass cases might hold; but her eye roved

restlessly and carelessly over object and object of interest

that withheld its interest from her; and weariedly she went

back to her arm-chair and covered her face with her hands,

that her mind might be at least uninterruptedly busy in its

own way.

It must have been very busy, or the quick little step of the

German professor must have been very soft withal; for he had

come within a few feet of her before he knew who she was or

she knew that he was there.

"Miss Elisabet'!" he exclaimed with a most good-humoured face

of wonderment, -- "I never was so honoured before! How did you

get in my arm-chair?"

Elizabeth jumped up and shook hands with him, laughing in very

relief to see him come.

"How did I get here? -- I came up through the sun, Mr. Herder."

"I have asked you to come in better time," said the

naturalist, -- "that is, better for you -- dis is very good time

for me. I have nozing to do, and I will give you lesson in

whatever you want."

"No sir, -- I am come to give _you_ a lesson, Mr. Herder."

"_Me?_ Well, I will take it," said the naturalist, who began at

the same time to run about his room and open closet doors and

jingle glasses together, apparently on his own business, -- "I

like always to take lessons, -- it is not often that I have

such a teacher. I will learn the best I can -- after I have got

you some lemonade. I have two lemons here, -- somevere, -- ah! -- "

"I don't want it, Mr. Herder."

"I cannot learn nozing till you have had it," said Mr. Herder

bringing his lemons and glasses to the table; -- "that sun is

beating my head what was beating yours, and it cannot think of

nozing till I have had something to cool him off. --"

Elizabeth sat still, and looked, and thought, with her heart

beating.

"I did not know what was in my room when I see you in my chair

wiz your head down -- you must be study more hard than me, Miss

Elisabet' -- I never put my head down, for nozing."

"Nor your heart either, I wonder?" thought Elizabeth.

"I _was_ studying, Mr. Herder, -- pretty hard."

"Is that what you are going to give me to study?" said the

naturalist.

"Not exactly -- it was something about it. I want you to do

something for me, Mr. Herder, -- if I may ask you, -- and if you

will be so very kind as to take some trouble for me."

"I do not like trouble," said the naturalist shaking his head

good-humouredly over a squeeze of his lemon; -- "dere is no use

in having trouble -- I get out of it so soon as I can -- but I

will get in it wiz pleasure for you, Miss Elisabet' -- what you

tell me -- if you will tell me if that is too much sucker."

"To take trouble, and to be _in_ trouble, are not quite the same

thing, Mr. Herder," said Elizabeth, having at the moment a

vivid realization of the difference.

"I thought trouble was trouble," said the naturalist,

finishing the preparing his own glass of lemonade. "If you

will lesson me to find trouble is no trouble -- Miss Elisabet'

-- I will thank you much for that."

Elizabeth heartily wished anybody could teach her that

particular lesson. She sipped her lemonade, slowly and

abstractedly, busy yet with the study which Mr. Herder had

broken off; while he talked benignly and kindly, to ears that

did not hear. But the last of Elizabeth's glass was swallowed

hastily and the glass set down.

"Mr. Herder, I have come to ask you to do something for me."

"I am honoured, Miss Elisabet'," said the philosopher bowing.

"Will you not speak of it to anybody?"

"Not speak of it!" said the naturalist. "Then it is a secret?"

The quick energetic little bend of Elizabeth's head said

before her lips spoke the word, "Yes!"

"It is more honour yet," he said. "What am I to do, Miss

Elisabet'?"

"Nothing, if it will be any real trouble to you, Mr. Herder.

Promise me that first."

"Promise? -- what shall I promise?" said Mr. Herder.

"Promise me that if what I am going to ask would be any real

trouble to you or to your business, you will tell me so."

"I do not love to be troubled," said the naturalist. "It shall

not be no trouble to me."

"But promise me that you will tell me, Mr. Herder."

"Suppose you was to tell me first. I cannot tell nozing till I

know."

"You will not speak of it to anybody, Mr. Herder?"

"I will not speak of nozing, Miss Elisabet'."

"Mr. Herder, there is a piece of land which I want to buy; and

I have come to ask you, if you can, and if you will, to buy it

for me."

"Miss Elisabet'," said the naturalist looking a little

surprised at his fair questioner, -- "I will tell you the truth

-- I have no money."

"I have, Mr. Herder. But I cannot go into the market and buy

for myself."

"Cer-tain-ly, you cannot do that," said Mr. Herder. "But what

is it you wish to buy?"

"It is a farm, --" said Elizabeth, feeling glad that her back

was to the light; -- "it is a piece of land in the country -- up

on the Shatemuc river. I think you have been there, Mr.

Herder, -- it is the place where the Landholms' father lives.

Wut-a-qut-o, they call it -- or Shahweetah; -- Wut-a-qut-o is

the mountain opposite."

"Landholm!" cried the naturalist. "Is it Winthrop's place?"

Elizabeth bowed her head and answered, "His father's."

"Winthrop's place! Is _that_ what you want, Miss Elisabet'?"

Elizabeth bowed her head again, this time without answering.

"Suppose they might not want to sell it?" said the naturalist.

"They do not -- but they can't help themselves. It must be sold

-- they can't pay money that is owing upon it."

"Money!" -- said the naturalist; -- "that is de trouble of all

that is in the world. I wish there was no such thing as money!

It makes all the mischief."

"Or the want of it," said Elizabeth.

"No!" said the naturalist, -- "it is not that! I have want

money all my life, Miss Elisabet', and I have never got into

no trouble at all."

"Except when you fought the duels, Mr. Herder."

"_Dat_ was not no trouble!" said the philosopher. "There was

nozing about money there; and it was not no trouble, -- neizer

before, neizer after."

"I have had money all my life; and it never made me any

trouble."

"Ah, you have not come to the time," said Mr. Herder. "Wait,

you will find it. Now you are in trouble because you want to

buy this ground, and you could not do it wizout money."

"I can't do it with, unless you will help me, Mr. Herder -- you

or somebody."

"I could get somebody," said Mr. Herder; -- "I know somebody

what I could get."

"I don't know anybody who would be as good as you, sir."

"I do," said the naturalist. "Where is Mr. Haye? -- is he

sick?"

"No sir, -- I don't wish him to know anything about it, Mr.

Herder. -- He is the person making the sale."

"Your father? -- do you mean that Mr. Haye is the man what is

selling the ground of Mr. Landholm?"

"Yes sir. And I wish to buy it."

"Then Miss Elisabet', what for do you not ask my friend

Winthrop to buy it for you? He knows all business. He will do

it."

"I cannot -- I have not the liberty -- He is not enough a friend

of mine, for me to ask him such a favour."

"But Miss Elisabet', what will you do wiz all that large

ground and water?"

"Buy it, -- first, sir; and then I will see. I want it."

"I see you do," said the naturalist. "Well, then I shall get

it for you -- if I can -- I hope your money will not get _me_ in

trouble."

"If you are at all afraid of that, Mr. Herder, I will find

some other way --"

"I never was afraid of nozing in my life, Miss Elisabet' --

only I do not know neizer how to get money, neizer how to

spend it -- in this way. What will Mr. Haye say to me when I go

to buy all this great land of him? He will say --"

"You're not to buy it of him, Mr. Herder."

"No?" said the naturalist. "Of who, then? I thought you said

he was going to sell it."

"Yes, he is -- but he has somebody else to do it for him. Here,

Mr. Herder, -- here is the advertisement; -- see -- don't read

the first part, -- all _that_ has nothing to do with it, -- here

is the place. 'At the Merchant's Exchange, in the city of

Mannahatta, on the first day of September, 1821, at 12 o'clock

noon of that day' -- and then comes the description of the

place. It is to be sold at public auction."

"Auc-sion? --" said the naturalist.

"It's to be sold in public, to whoever offers to give most for

it."

"O, I know that," said Mr. Herder.

"And dear Mr. Herder, all I ask of you is to be there, at 12

o'clock the first of September, and buy it for me; and let

nobody know. Can you do it?"

"I can do so much," said the naturalist. "I think I can. But

suppose somebody will give more than you."

"Do not suppose that, sir. I will give more than anybody."

"Are you sure you will?" said the naturalist. "Maybe you do

not know."

"I do know, sir, and am sure."

"Well," said the naturalist, shaking his head, -- "I do not

know much about buying grounds -- I do know a leetle of some

things -- but I do not know what sort of a lesson is this, Miss

Elisabet'. But I will see if I can do it. Who is going to live

up there wiz you?"

"Don't you suppose I can live alone, Mr. Herder."

"No, not there," said the naturalist. "You want some one to

take care of you -- de engineer, Miss Elisabet'," said he

smiling.

Elizabeth made no answer; she had risen up to go; and he

guided her through the halls and down the staircases, till she

was in the open street again. Then, after a farewell squeeze

of his hand and nod of her little head, she pulled her veil

down and went homeward, more slowly than she had come.

"_Do_ I want somebody to take care of me?" she thought. "I

believe I do! An engineer? -- I do not think the engine _is_

under very good guidance -- it _is_ too strong for me -- How could

he know that? Oh what earthly thing would I give, for a hand

wise and strong enough to lead me, and good enough that I

could submit myself to!"

The wish was so deep drawn that her breast heaved with it, and

starting tears made her draw her veil thicker before them. She

bit her lip, and once more quickened her steps towards home.

CHAPTER III.

Then think I of deep shadows on the grass, --

Of meadows where in sun the cattle graze,

Where, as the breezes pass,

The gleaming rushes lean a thousand ways, --

Of leaves that slumber in a cloudy mass,

Or whiten in the wind, -- of waters blue

That from the distance sparkle through

Some woodland gap, -- and of a sky above,

Where one white cloud like a stray lamb doth move.

LOWELL.

Finding that the old farm must pass out of his hands, Mr.

Landholm made up his mind not to spend another summer of

labour and of life upon it; but at once with his son Asahel to

move off to the West. He stayed but to reap the standing crops

of winter grain, dispose of stock, and gather up all the loose

ends of business; and left the hills of the Shatemuc, to seek

better fortunes on a Western level.

They passed through Mannahatta on their way, that they might

have a short sight of Winthrop and Winifred and say good-bye

to them. It was not so joyful a visit that anybody wished it

to be a long one.

"It's pretty hard," said the farmer, "to start life anew again

at my time of day; -- but these arms are not worn out yet; I

guess they'll do something -- more or less -- on a new field."

"Asahel's got strong arms, father," said Winifred, who was

fain to put in a word of comfort when she could.

"Ay, and a strong heart too," said his father. "He's a fine

fellow. He'll do, I guess, in the long run, -- at the West or

somewhere; and at the West _if_ anywhere, they say. I'm not

concerned much about him."

"There's no need, I think," said Winthrop.

"Where's Will? -- and what's he doing?"

"Will has just set off for Charleston -- on some agency

business."

"Charleston in South Carolina?"

"Yes."

"Then he is not engineering now?"

"No."

"How long does he expect to be gone?"

"Some months -- more or less; -- I don't know."

"Is it a good business for him?"

"He has chosen it, -- not I."

"I would sooner trust your choice," said the father. "There's

one thing Rufus wants; and that is, judgment."

"He'll do yet," said Winthrop. "And I shall not leave you long

at the West, father. You will come when I send for you?"

"No, my boy," said the farmer looking gratified; -- "I'll live

by my own hands as long as I have hands to live by; and as I

said, mine haven't given out yet! No -- if the Lord prospers

us, we'll have a visit from you and Winnie out there, I expect

-- by and by, when we get things in order; -- you and Winnie,

and anybody else you've a mind to bring along!"

It was spoken heartily, but with a tear in the eye; and nobody

answered; unless it were answer, the long breath which Winnie

drew at the very idea of such a visit.

Winthrop heard it; but through the long weeks of summer he

could give her nothing more of country refreshment than the

old walks on the Green and an occasional ride or walk on the

opposite shore of one or the other of the rivers that bordered

the city. Business held him fast, with a grip that he must not

loosen; though he saw and knew that his little sister's face

grew daily more thin and pale, and that her slight frame was

slighter and slighter. His arm had less and less to do, even

though her need called for more. He felt as if she was

slipping away from him. August came.

"Winnie," said he one evening, when he came home and found her

lying on her couch as usual, -- "how would you like to go up

and pay Karen a visit?"