Her resolution not to go on to Paris was formed simply because Lord

Mountclere himself was proceeding in that direction, which might lead to

other unseemly rencounters with him had she, too, persevered in her

journey. She accordingly gave Sol and Dan directions for their guidance

to Paris and back, starting herself with Cornelia the next day to return

again to Knollsea, and to decide finally and for ever what to do in the

vexed question at present agitating her.

Never before in her life had she treated marriage in such a terribly

cool and cynical spirit as she had done that day; she was almost

frightened at herself in thinking of it. How far any known system of

ethics might excuse her on the score of those curious pressures which

had been brought to bear upon her life, or whether it could excuse her

at all, she had no spirit to inquire. English society appeared a gloomy

concretion enough to abide in as she contemplated it on this journey

home; yet, since its gloominess was less an essential quality than an

accident of her point of view, that point of view she had determined to

change.

There lay open to her two directions in which to move. She might annex

herself to the easy-going high by wedding an old nobleman, or she might

join for good and all the easy-going low, by plunging back to the level

of her family, giving up all her ambitions for them, settling as the

wife of a provincial music-master named Julian, with a little shop of

fiddles and flutes, a couple of old pianos, a few sheets of stale music

pinned to a string, and a narrow back parlour, wherein she would wait

for the phenomenon of a customer. And each of these divergent grooves

had its fascinations, till she reflected with regard to the first that,

even though she were a legal and indisputable Lady Mountclere, she might

be despised by my lord's circle, and left lone and lorn. The

intermediate path of accepting Neigh or Ladywell had no more attractions

for her taste than the fact of disappointing them had qualms for her

conscience; and how few these were may be inferred from her opinion,

true or false, that two words about the spigot on her escutcheon would

sweep her lovers' affections to the antipodes. She had now and then

imagined that her previous intermarriage with the Petherwin family might

efface much besides her surname, but experience proved that the having

been wife for a few weeks to a minor who died in his father's lifetime,

did not weave such a tissue of glory about her course as would resist a

speedy undoing by startling confessions on her station before her

marriage, and her environments now.

36. THE HOUSE IN TOWN

Returning by way of Knollsea, where she remained a week or two,

Ethelberta appeared one evening at the end of September before her house

in Exonbury Crescent, accompanied by a pair of cabs with the children

and luggage; but Picotee was left at Knollsea, for reasons which

Ethelberta explained when the family assembled in conclave. Her father

was there, and began telling her of a surprising change in Menlove-an

unasked-for concession to their cause, and a vow of secrecy which he

could not account for, unless any friend of Ethelberta's had bribed her.

'O no-that cannot be,' said she. Any influence of Lord Mountclere to

that effect was the last thing that could enter her thoughts. 'However,

what Menlove does makes little difference to me now.' And she proceeded

to state that she had almost come to a decision which would entirely

alter their way of living.

'I hope it will not be of the sort your last decision was,' said her

mother.

'No; quite the reverse. I shall not live here in state any longer. We

will let the house throughout as lodgings, while it is ours; and you and

the girls must manage it. I will retire from the scene altogether, and

stay for the winter at Knollsea with Picotee. I want to consider my

plans for next year, and I would rather be away from town. Picotee is

left there, and I return in two days with the books and papers I

require.'

'What are your plans to be?'

'I am going to be a schoolmistress-I think I am.'

'A schoolmistress?'

'Yes. And Picotee returns to the same occupation, which she ought never

to have forsaken. We are going to study arithmetic and geography until

Christmas; then I shall send her adrift to finish her term as pupil-

teacher, while I go into a training-school. By the time I have to give

up this house I shall just have got a little country school.'

'But,' said her mother, aghast, 'why not write more poems and sell 'em?'

'Why not be a governess as you were?' said her father.

'Why not go on with your tales at Mayfair Hall?' said Gwendoline.

'I'll answer as well as I can. I have decided to give up romancing

because I cannot think of any more that pleases me. I have been trying

at Knollsea for a fortnight, and it is no use. I will never be a

governess again: I would rather be a servant. If I am a schoolmistress I

shall be entirely free from all contact with the great, which is what I

desire, for I hate them, and am getting almost as revolutionary as Sol.

Father, I cannot endure this kind of existence any longer; I sleep at

night as if I had committed a murder: I start up and see processions of

people, audiences, battalions of lovers obtained under false pretences-

all denouncing me with the finger of ridicule. Mother's suggestion about

my marrying I followed out as far as dogged resolution would carry me,

but during my journey here I have broken down; for I don't want to marry

a second time among people who would regard me as an upstart or

intruder. I am sick of ambition. My only longing now is to fly from

society altogether, and go to any hovel on earth where I could be at

peace.'

'What-has anybody been insulting you?' said Mrs. Chickerel.

'Yes; or rather I sometimes think he may have: that is, if a proposal of

marriage is only removed from being a proposal of a very different kind

by an accident.'

'A proposal of marriage can never be an insult,' her mother returned.

'I think otherwise,' said Ethelberta.

'So do I,' said her father.

'Unless the man was beneath you, and I don't suppose he was that,' added

Mrs. Chickerel.

'You are quite right; he was not that. But we will not talk of this

branch of the subject. By far the most serious concern with me is that I

ought to do some good by marriage, or by heroic performance of some

kind; while going back to give the rudiments of education to remote

hamleteers will do none of you any good whatever.'

'Never you mind us,' said her father; 'mind yourself.'

'I shall hardly be minding myself either, in your opinion, by doing

that,' said Ethelberta dryly. 'But it will be more tolerable than what I

am doing now. Georgina, and Myrtle, and Emmeline, and Joey will not get

the education I intended for them; but that must go, I suppose.'

'How full of vagaries you are,' said her mother. 'Why won't it do to

continue as you are? No sooner have I learnt up your schemes, and got

enough used to 'em to see something in 'em, than you must needs bewilder

me again by starting some fresh one, so that my mind gets no rest at

all.'

Ethelberta too keenly felt the justice of this remark, querulous as it

was, to care to defend herself. It was hopeless to attempt to explain to

her mother that the oscillations of her mind might arise as naturally

from the perfection of its balance, like those of a logan-stone, as from

inherent lightness; and such an explanation, however comforting to its

subject, was little better than none to simple hearts who only could

look to tangible outcrops.

'Really, Ethelberta,' remonstrated her mother, 'this is very odd. Making

yourself miserable in trying to get a position on our account is one

thing, and not necessary; but I think it ridiculous to rush into the

other extreme, and go wilfully down in the scale. You may just as well

exercise your wits in trying to swim as in trying to sink.'

'Yes; that's what I think,' said her father. 'But of course Berta knows

best.'

'I think so too,' said Gwendoline.

'And so do I,' said Cornelia. 'If I had once moved about in large

circles like Ethelberta, I wouldn't go down and be a schoolmistress-not

I.'

'I own it is foolish-suppose it is,' said Ethelberta wearily, and with a

readiness of misgiving that showed how recent and hasty was the scheme.

'Perhaps you are right, mother; anything rather than retreat. I wonder

if you are right! Well, I will think again of it to-night. Do not let us

speak more about it now.'

She did think of it that night, very long and painfully. The arguments

of her relatives seemed ponderous as opposed to her own inconsequent

longing for escape from galling trammels. If she had stood alone, the

sentiment that she had begun to build but was not able to finish, by

whomsoever it might have been entertained, would have had few terrors;

but that the opinion should be held by her nearest of kin, to cause them

pain for life, was a grievous thing. The more she thought of it, the

less easy seemed the justification of her desire for obscurity. From

regarding it as a high instinct she passed into a humour that gave that

desire the appearance of a whim. But could she really set in train

events, which, if not abortive, would take her to the altar with

Viscount Mountclere?

In one determination she never faltered; to commit her sin thoroughly if

she committed it at all. Her relatives believed her choice to lie

between Neigh and Ladywell alone. But once having decided to pass over

Christopher, whom she had loved, there could be no pausing for Ladywell

because she liked him, or for Neigh in that she was influenced by him.

They were both too near her level to be trusted to bear the shock of

receiving her from her father's hands. But it was possible that though

her genesis might tinge with vulgarity a commoner's household,

susceptible of such depreciation, it might show as a picturesque

contrast in the family circle of a peer. Hence it was just as well to go

to the end of her logic, where reasons for tergiversation would be most

pronounced. This thought of the viscount, however, was a secret for her

own breast alone.

Nearly the whole of that night she sat weighing-first, the question

itself of marrying Lord Mountclere; and, at other times, whether, for

safety, she might marry him without previously revealing family

particulars hitherto held necessary to be revealed-a piece of conduct

she had once felt to be indefensible. The ingenious Ethelberta, much

more prone than the majority of women to theorize on conduct, felt the

need of some soothing defence of the actions involved in any ambiguous

course before finally committing herself to it.

She took down a well-known treatise on Utilitarianism which she had

perused once before, and to which she had given her adherence ere any

instance had arisen wherein she might wish to take it as a guide. Here

she desultorily searched for argument, and found it; but the application

of her author's philosophy to the marriage question was an operation of

her own, as unjustifiable as it was likely in the circumstances.

'The ultimate end,' she read, 'with reference to and for the sake of

which all other things are desirable (whether we are considering our own

good or that of other people) is an existence exempt as far as possible

from pain, and as rich as possible in enjoyments, both in point of

quantity and quality. . . . This being, according to the utilitarian

opinion, the end of human action, is necessarily also the standard of

morality.'

It was an open question, so far, whether her own happiness should or

should not be preferred to that of others. But that her personal

interests were not to be considered as paramount appeared further on:-

'The happiness which forms the standard of what is right in conduct is

not the agent's own happiness but that of all concerned. As between his

own happiness and that of others, utilitarianism requires him to be as

strictly impartial as a disinterested and benevolent spectator.'

As to whose happiness was meant by that of 'other people,' 'all

concerned,' and so on, her luminous moralist soon enlightened her:-

'The occasions on which any person (except one in a thousand) has it in

his power to do this on an extended scale-in other words, to be a public

benefactor-are but exceptional; and on these occasions alone is he

called on to consider public utility; in every other case private

utility, the interest or happiness of some few persons, is all he has to

attend to.'

And that these few persons should be those endeared to her by every

domestic tie no argument was needed to prove. That their happiness would

be in proportion to her own well-doing, and power to remove their risks

of indigence, required no proving either to her now.

By a sorry but unconscious misapplication of sound and wide reasoning

did the active mind of Ethelberta thus find itself a solace. At about

the midnight hour she felt more fortified on the expediency of marriage

with Lord Mountclere than she had done at all since musing on it. In

respect of the second query, whether or not, in that event, to conceal

from Lord Mountclere the circumstances of her position till it should be

too late for him to object to them, she found her conscience

inconveniently in the way of her theory, and the oracle before her

afforded no hint. 'Ah-it is a point for a casuist!' she said.

An old treatise on Casuistry lay on the top shelf. She opened it-more

from curiosity than from guidance this time, it must be observed-at a

chapter bearing on her own problem, 'The disciplina arcani, or, the

doctrine of reserve.'

Here she read that there were plenty of apparent instances of this in

Scripture, and that it was formed into a recognized system in the early

Church. With reference to direct acts of deception, it was argued that

since there were confessedly cases where killing is no murder, might

there not be cases where lying is no sin? It could not be right-or,

indeed, anything but most absurd-to say in effect that no doubt

circumstances would occur where every sound man would tell a lie, and

would be a brute or a fool if he did not, and to say at the same time

that it is quite indefensible in principle. Duty was the key to conduct

then, and if in such cases duties appeared to clash they would be found

not to do so on examination. The lesser duty would yield to the greater,

and therefore ceased to be a duty.

This author she found to be not so tolerable; he distracted her. She put

him aside and gave over reading, having decided on this second point,

that she would, at any hazard, represent the truth to Lord Mountclere

before listening to another word from him. 'Well, at last I have done,'

she said, 'and am ready for my r�le.'

In looking back upon her past as she retired to rest, Ethelberta could

almost doubt herself to be the identical woman with her who had entered

on a romantic career a few short years ago. For that doubt she had good

reason. She had begun as a poet of the Satanic school in a sweetened

form; she was ending as a pseudo-utilitarian. Was there ever such a

transmutation effected before by the action of a hard environment? It

was not without a qualm of regret that she discerned how the last

infirmity of a noble mind had at length nearly departed from her. She

wondered if her early notes had had the genuine ring in them, or whether

a poet who could be thrust by realities to a distance beyond recognition

as such was a true poet at all. Yet Ethelberta's gradient had been

regular: emotional poetry, light verse, romance as an object, romance as

a means, thoughts of marriage as an aid to her pursuits, a vow to marry

for the good of her family; in other words, from soft and playful

Romanticism to distorted Benthamism. Was the moral incline upward or

down?

37. KNOLLSEA-AN ORNAMENTAL VILLA

Her energies collected and fermented anew by the results of the vigil,

Ethelberta left town for Knollsea, where she joined Picotee the same

evening. Picotee produced a letter, which had been addressed to her

sister at their London residence, but was not received by her there,

Mrs. Chickerel having forwarded it to Knollsea the day before Ethelberta

arrived in town.

The crinkled writing, in character like the coast-line of Tierra del

Fuego, was becoming familiar by this time. While reading the note she

informed Picotee, between a quick breath and a rustle of frills, that it

was from Lord Mountclere, who wrote on the subject of calling to see

her, suggesting a day in the following week. 'Now, Picotee,' she

continued, 'we shall have to receive him, and make the most of him, for

I have altered my plans since I was last in Knollsea.'

'Altered them again? What are you going to be now-not a poor person

after all?'

'Indeed not. And so I turn and turn. Can you imagine what Lord

Mountclere is coming for? But don't say what you think. Before I reply

to this letter we must go into new lodgings, to give them as our

address. The first business to-morrow morning will be to look for the

gayest house we can find; and Captain Flower and this little cabin of

his must be things we have never known.'

The next day after breakfast they accordingly sallied forth.

Knollsea had recently begun to attract notice in the world. It had this

year undergone visitation from a score of professional gentlemen and

their wives, a minor canon, three marine painters, seven young ladies

with books in their hands, and nine-and-thirty babies. Hence a few

lodging-houses, of a dash and pretentiousness far beyond the mark of the

old cottages which formed the original substance of the village, had

been erected to meet the wants of such as these. To a building of this

class Ethelberta now bent her steps, and the crush of the season having

departed in the persons of three-quarters of the above-named visitors,

who went away by a coach, a van, and a couple of wagonettes one morning,

she found no difficulty in arranging for a red and yellow streaked

villa, which was so bright and glowing that the sun seemed to be shining

upon it even on a cloudy day, and the ruddiest native looked pale when

standing by its walls. It was not without regret that she renounced the

sailor's pretty cottage for this porticoed and balconied dwelling; but

her lines were laid down clearly at last, and thither she removed

forthwith.

From this brand-new house did Ethelberta pen the letter fixing the time

at which she would be pleased to see Lord Mountclere.

When the hour drew nigh enormous force of will was required to keep her

perturbation down. She had not distinctly told Picotee of the object of

the viscount's visit, but Picotee guessed nearly enough. Ethelberta was

upon the whole better pleased that the initiative had again come from

him than if the first step in the new campaign had been her sending the

explanatory letter, as intended and promised. She had thought almost

directly after the interview at Rouen that to enlighten him by writing a

confession in cold blood, according to her first intention, would be

little less awkward for her in the method of telling than in the facts

to be told.

So the last hair was arranged and the last fold adjusted, and she sat

down to await a new page of her history. Picotee sat with her, under

orders to go into the next room when Lord Mountclere should call; and

Ethelberta determined to waste no time, directly he began to make

advances, in clearing up the phenomena of her existence to him; to the

end that no fact which, in the event of his taking her to wife, could be

used against her as an example of concealment, might remain unrelated.

The collapse of his attachment under the test might, however, form the

grand climax of such a play as this.

The day was rather cold for the season, and Ethelberta sat by a fire;

but the windows were open, and Picotee was amusing herself on the

balcony outside. The hour struck: Ethelberta fancied she could hear the

wheels of a carriage creeping up the steep ascent which led to the drive

before the door.

'Is it he?' she said quickly.

'No,' said Picotee, whose indifference contrasted strangely with the

restlessness of her who was usually the coolest. 'It is a man shaking

down apples in the garden over the wall.'

They lingered on till some three or four minutes had gone by. 'Surely

that's a carriage?' said Ethelberta, then.

'I think it is,' said Picotee outside, stretching her neck forward as

far as she could. 'No, it is the men on the beach dragging up their

boats; they expect wind to-night.'

'How wearisome! Picotee, you may as well come inside; if he means to

call he will; but he ought to be here by this time.'

It was only once more, and that some time later that she again said

'Listen!'

'That's not the noise of a carriage; it is the fizz of a rocket. The

coastguardsmen are practising the life-apparatus to-day, to be ready for

the autumn wrecks.'

'Ah!' said Ethelberta, her face clearing up. Hers had not been a

sweetheart's impatience, but her mood had intensified during these

minutes of suspense to a harassing mistrust of her man-compelling power,

which was, if that were possible, more gloomy than disappointed love. 'I

know now where he is. That operation with the cradle-apparatus is very

interesting, and he is stopping to see it. . . . But I shall not wait

indoors much longer, whatever he may be stopping to see. It is very

unaccountable, and vexing, after moving into this new house too. We were

much more comfortable in the old one. In keeping any previous

appointment in which I have been concerned he has been ridiculously

early.'

'Shall I run round?' said Picotee, 'and if he is not watching them we

will go out.'

'Very well,' said her sister.

The time of Picotee's absence seemed an age. Ethelberta heard the roar

of another rocket, and still Picotee did not return. 'What can the girl

be thinking of?' she mused. . . . 'What a half-and-half policy mine has

been! Thinking of marrying for position, and yet not making it my rigid

plan to secure the man the first moment that he made his offer. So I

lose the comfort of having a soul above worldliness, and my compensation

for not having it likewise!' A minute or two more and in came Picotee.

'What has kept you so long-and how excited you look,' said Ethelberta.

'I thought I would stay a little while, as I had never seen a rocket-

apparatus,' said Picotee, faintly and strangely.

'But is he there?' asked her sister impatiently.

'Yes-he was. He's gone now!'

'Lord Mountclere?'

'No. There is no old man there at all. Mr Julian was there.'

A little 'Ah!' came from Ethelberta, like a note from a storm-bird at

night. She turned round and went into the back room. 'Is Mr. Julian

going to call here?' she inquired, coming forward again.

'No-he's gone by the steamboat. He was only passing through on his way

to Sandbourne, where he is gone to settle a small business relating to

his father's affairs. He was not in Knollsea ten minutes, owing to

something which detained him on the way.'

'Did he inquire for me?'

'No. And only think, Ethelberta-such a remarkable thing has happened,

though I nearly forgot to tell you. He says that coming along the road

he was overtaken by a carriage, and when it had just passed him one of

the horses shied, pushed the other down a slope, and overturned the

carriage. One wheel came off and trundled to the bottom of the hill by

itself. Christopher of course ran up, and helped out of the carriage an

old gentleman-now do you know what's likely?'

'It was Lord Mountclere. I am glad that's the cause,' said Ethelberta

involuntarily.

'I imagined you would suppose it to be Lord Mountclere. But Mr. Julian

did not know the gentleman, and said nothing about who he might be.'

'Did he describe him?'

'Not much-just a little.'

'Well?'

'He said he was a sly old dog apparently, to hear how he swore in

whispers. This affair is what made Mr. Julian so late that he had no

time to call here. Lord Mountclere's ankle-if it was Lord Mountclere-was

badly sprained. But the servants were not injured beyond a scratch on

the coachman's face. Then they got another carriage and drove at once

back again. It must be he, or else why is he not come? It is a pity,

too, that Mr. Julian was hindered by this, so that there was no

opportunity for him to bide a bit in Knollsea.'

Ethelberta was not disposed to believe that Christopher would have

called, had time favoured him to the utmost. Between himself and her

there was that kind of division which is more insurmountable than

enmity; for estrangements produced by good judgment will last when those

of feeling break down in smiles. Not the lovers who part in passion, but

the lovers who part in friendship, are those who most frequently part

for ever.

'Did you tell Mr. Julian that the injured gentleman was possibly Lord

Mountclere, and that he was coming here?' said Ethelberta.

'I made no remark at all-I did not think of him till afterwards.'

The inquiry was hardly necessary, for Picotee's words would dry away

like a brook in the sands when she held conversation with Christopher.

As they had anticipated, the sufferer was no other than their intending

visitor. Next morning there was a note explaining the accident, and

expressing its writer's suffering from the cruel delay as greater than

that from the swollen ankle, which was progressing favourably.

Nothing further was heard of Lord Mountclere for more than a week, when

she received another letter, which put an end to her season of

relaxation, and once more braced her to the contest. This epistle was

very courteously written, and in point of correctness, propriety, and

gravity, might have come from the quill of a bishop. Herein the old

nobleman gave a further description of the accident, but the main

business of the communication was to ask her if, since he was not as yet

very active, she would come to Enckworth Court and delight himself and a

small group of friends who were visiting there.

She pondered over the letter as she walked by the shore that day, and

after some hesitation decided to go.

38. ENCKWORTH COURT

It was on a dull, stagnant, noiseless afternoon of autumn that

Ethelberta first crossed the threshold of Enckworth Court. The daylight

was so lowered by the impervious roof of cloud overhead that it scarcely

reached further into Lord Mountclere's entrance-hall than to the splays

of the windows, even but an hour or two after midday; and indoors the

glitter of the fire reflected itself from the very panes, so

inconsiderable were the opposing rays.

Enckworth Court, in its main part, had not been standing more than a

hundred years. At that date the weakened portions of the original

mediaeval structure were pulled down and cleared away, old jambs being

carried off for rick-staddles, and the foliated timbers of the hall roof

making themselves useful as fancy chairs in the summer-houses of rising

inns. A new block of masonry was built up from the ground of such height

and lordliness that the remnant of the old pile left standing became as

a mere cup-bearer and culinary menial beside it. The rooms in this old

fragment, which had in times past been considered sufficiently dignified

for dining-hall, withdrawing-room, and so on, were now reckoned barely

high enough for sculleries, servants' hall, and laundries, the whole of

which were arranged therein.

The modern portion had been planned with such a total disregard of

association, that the very rudeness of the contrast gave an interest to

the mass which it might have wanted had perfect harmony been attempted

between the old nucleus and its adjuncts, a probable result if the

enlargement had taken place later on in time. The issue was that the

hooded windows, simple string-courses, and random masonry of the Gothic

workman, stood elbow to elbow with the equal-spaced ashlar, architraves,

and fasciae of the Classic addition, each telling its distinct tale as

to stage of thought and domestic habit without any of those artifices of

blending or restoration by which the seeker for history in stones will

be utterly hoodwinked in time to come.

To the left of the door and vestibule which Ethelberta passed through

rose the principal staircase, constructed of a freestone so milk-white

and delicately moulded as to be easily conceived in the lamplight as of

biscuit-ware. Who, unacquainted with the secrets of geometrical

construction, could imagine that, hanging so airily there, to all

appearance supported on nothing, were twenty or more tons dead weight of

stone, that would have made a prison for an elephant if so arranged? The

art which produced this illusion was questionable, but its success was

undoubted. 'How lovely!' said Ethelberta, as she looked at the fairy

ascent. 'His staircase alone is worth my hand!'

Passing along by the colonnade, which partly fenced the staircase from

the visitor, the saloon was reached, an apartment forming a double cube.

About the left-hand end of this were grouped the drawing-rooms and

library; while on the right was the dining-hall, with billiard, smoking,

and gun rooms in mysterious remoteness beyond.

Without attempting to trace an analogy between a man and his mansion, it

may be stated that everything here, though so dignified and magnificent,

was not conceived in quite the true and eternal spirit of art. It was a

house in which Pugin would have torn his hair. Those massive blocks of

red-veined marble lining the hall-emulating in their surface-glitter the

Escalier de Marbre at Versailles-were cunning imitations in paint and

plaster by workmen brought from afar for the purpose, at a prodigious

expense, by the present viscount's father, and recently repaired and re-

varnished. The dark green columns and pilasters corresponding were brick

at the core. Nay, the external walls, apparently of massive and solid

freestone, were only veneered with that material, being, like the

pillars, of brick within.

To a stone mask worn by a brick face a story naturally appertained-one

which has since done service in other quarters. When the vast addition

had just been completed King George visited Enckworth. Its owner pointed

out the features of its grand architectural attempt, and waited for

commendation.

'Brick, brick, brick,' said the king.

The Georgian Lord Mountclere blushed faintly, albeit to his very poll,

and said nothing more about his house that day. When the king was gone

he sent frantically for the craftsmen recently dismissed, and soon the

green lawns became again the colour of a Nine-Elms cement wharf. Thin

freestone slabs were affixed to the whole series of fronts by copper

cramps and dowels, each one of substance sufficient to have furnished a

poor boy's pocket with pennies for a month, till not a speck of the

original surface remained, and the edifice shone in all the grandeur of

massive masonry that was not massive at all. But who remembered this

save the builder and his crew? and as long as nobody knew the truth,

pretence looked just as well.

What was honest in Enckworth Court was that portion of the original

edifice which still remained, now degraded to subservient uses. Where

the untitled Mountclere of the White Rose faction had spread his knees

over the brands, when the place was a castle and not a court, the still-

room maid now simmered her preserves; and where Elizabethan mothers and

daughters of that sturdy line had tapestried the love-scenes of Isaac

and Jacob, boots and shoes were now cleaned and coals stowed away.

Lord Mountclere had so far recovered from the sprain as to be nominally

quite well, under pressure of a wish to receive guests. The sprain had

in one sense served him excellently. He had now a reason, apart from

that of years, for walking with his stick, and took care to let the

reason be frequently known. To-day he entertained a larger number of

persons than had been assembled within his walls for a great length of

time.

Until after dinner Ethelberta felt as if she were staying at an hotel.

Few of the people whom she had met at the meeting of the Imperial

Association greeted her here. The viscount's brother was not present,

but Sir Cyril Blandsbury and his wife were there, a lively pair of

persons, entertaining as actors, and friendly as dogs. Beyond these all

the faces and figures were new to her, though they were handsome and

dashing enough to satisfy a court chronicler. Ethelberta, in a dress

sloped about as high over the shoulder as would have drawn approval from

Reynolds, and expostulation from Lely, thawed and thawed each friend who

came near her, and sent him or her away smiling; yet she felt a little

surprise. She had seldom visited at a country-house, and knew little of

the ordinary composition of a group of visitors within its walls; but

the present assemblage seemed to want much of that old-fashioned

stability and quaint monumental dignity she had expected to find under

this historical roof. Nobody of her entertainer's own rank appeared. Not

a single clergyman was there. A tendency to talk Walpolean scandal about

foreign courts was particularly manifest. And although tropical

travellers, Indian officers and their wives, courteous exiles, and

descendants of Irish kings, were infinitely more pleasant than Lord

Mountclere's landed neighbours would probably have been, to such a

cosmopolite as Ethelberta a calm Tory or old Whig company would have

given a greater treat. They would have struck as gratefully upon her

senses as sylvan scenery after crags and cliffs, or silence after the

roar of a cataract.

It was evening, and all these personages at Enckworth Court were merry,

snug, and warm within its walls. Dinner-time had passed, and everything

had gone on well, when Mrs. Tara O'Fanagan, who had a gold-clamped

tooth, which shone every now and then, asked Ethelberta if she would

amuse them by telling a story, since nobody present, except Lord

Mountclere, had ever heard one from her lips.

Seeing that Ethelberta had been working at that art as a profession, it

can hardly be said that the question was conceived with tact, though it

was put with grace. Lord Mountclere evidently thought it objectionable,

for he looked unhappy. To only one person in the brilliant room did the

request appear as a timely accident, and that was to Ethelberta herself.

Her honesty was always making war upon her manoeuvres, and shattering

their delicate meshes, to her great inconvenience and delay. Thus there

arose those devious impulses and tangential flights which spoil the

works of every would-be schemer who instead of being wholly machine is

half heart. One of these now was to show herself as she really was, not

only to Lord Mountclere, but to his friends assembled, whom, in her

ignorance, she respected more than they deserved, and so get rid of that

self-reproach which had by this time reached a morbid pitch, through her

over-sensitiveness to a situation in which a large majority of women and

men would have seen no falseness.

Full of this curious intention, she quietly assented to the request, and

laughingly bade them put themselves in listening order.

'An old story will suit us,' said the lady who had importuned her. 'We

have never heard one.'

'No; it shall be quite new,' she replied. 'One not yet made public;

though it soon will be.'

The narrative began by introducing to their notice a girl of the poorest

and meanest parentage, the daughter of a serving-man, and the fifth of

ten children. She graphically recounted, as if they were her own, the

strange dreams and ambitious longings of this child when young, her

attempts to acquire education, partial failures, partial successes, and

constant struggles; instancing how, on one of these occasions, the girl

concealed herself under a bookcase of the library belonging to the

mansion in which her father served as footman, and having taken with her

there, like a young Fawkes, matches and a halfpenny candle, was going to

sit up all night reading when the family had retired, until her father

discovered and prevented her scheme. Then followed her experiences as

nursery-governess, her evening lessons under self-selected masters, and

her ultimate rise to a higher grade among the teaching sisterhood. Next

came another epoch. To the mansion in which she was engaged returned a

truant son, between whom and the heroine an attachment sprang up. The

master of the house was an ambitious gentleman just knighted, who,

perceiving the state of their hearts, harshly dismissed the homeless

governess, and rated the son, the consequence being that the youthful

pair resolved to marry secretly, and carried their resolution into

effect. The runaway journey came next, and then a moving description of

the death of the young husband, and the terror of the bride.

The guests began to look perplexed, and one or two exchanged whispers.

This was not at all the kind of story that they had expected; it was

quite different from her usual utterances, the nature of which they knew

by report. Ethelberta kept her eye upon Lord Mountclere. Soon, to her

amazement, there was that in his face which told her that he knew the

story and its heroine quite well. When she delivered the sentence ending

with the professedly fictitious words: 'I thus was reduced to great

distress, and vainly cast about me for directions what to do,' Lord

Mountclere's manner became so excited and anxious that it acted

reciprocally upon Ethelberta; her voice trembled, she moved her lips but

uttered nothing. To bring the story up to the date of that very evening

had been her intent, but it was beyond her power. The spell was broken;

she blushed with distress and turned away, for the folly of a disclosure

here was but too apparent.

Though every one saw that she had broken down, none of them appeared to

know the reason why, or to have the clue to her performance. Fortunately

Lord Mountclere came to her aid.

'Let the first part end here,' he said, rising and approaching her. 'We

have been well entertained so far. I could scarcely believe that the

story I was listening to was utterly an invention, so vividly does Mrs.

Petherwin bring the scenes before our eyes. She must now be exhausted;

we will have the remainder to-morrow.'

They all agreed that this was well, and soon after fell into groups, and

dispersed about the rooms. When everybody's attention was thus occupied

Lord Mountclere whispered to Ethelberta tremulously, 'Don't tell more:

you think too much of them: they are no better than you! Will you meet

me in the little winter garden two minutes hence? Pass through that

door, and along the glass passage.' He himself left the room by an

opposite door.

She had not set three steps in the warm snug octagon of glass and plants

when he appeared on the other side.

'You knew it all before!' she said, looking keenly at him. 'Who told

you, and how long have you known it?'

'Before yesterday or last week,' said Lord Mountclere. 'Even before we

met in France. Why are you so surprised?'

Ethelberta had been surprised, and very greatly, to find him, as it

were, secreted in the very rear of her position. That nothing she could

tell was new to him was a good deal to think of, but it was little

beside the recollection that he had actually made his first declaration

in the face of that knowledge of her which she had supposed so fatal to

all her matrimonial ambitions.

'And now only one point remains to be settled,' he said, taking her

hand. 'You promised at Rouen that at our next interview you would honour

me with a decisive reply-one to make me happy for ever.'

'But my father and friends?' said she.

'Are nothing to be concerned about. Modern developments have shaken up

the classes like peas in a hopper. An annuity, and a comfortable

cottage-'

'My brothers are workmen.'

'Manufacture is the single vocation in which a man's prospects may be

said to be illimitable. Hee-hee!-they may buy me up before they die! And

now what stands in the way? It would take fifty alliances with fifty

families so little disreputable as yours, darling, to drag mine down.'

Ethelberta had anticipated the scene, and settled her course; what had

to be said and done here was mere formality; yet she had been unable to

go straight to the assent required. However, after these words of self-

depreciation, which were let fall as much for her own future ease of

conscience as for his present warning, she made no more ado.

'I shall think it a great honour to be your wife,' she said simply.

39. KNOLLSEA-MELCHESTER

The year was now moving on apace, but Ethelberta and Picotee chose to

remain at Knollsea, in the brilliant variegated brick and stone villa to

which they had removed in order to be in keeping with their ascending

fortunes. Autumn had begun to make itself felt and seen in bolder and

less subtle ways than at first. In the morning now, on coming

downstairs, in place of a yellowish-green leaf or two lying in a corner

of the lowest step, which had been the only previous symptoms around the

house, she saw dozens of them playing at corkscrews in the wind,

directly the door was opened. Beyond, towards the sea, the slopes and

scarps that had been muffled with a thick robe of cliff herbage, were

showing their chill grey substance through the withered verdure, like

the background of velvet whence the pile has been fretted away.

Unexpected breezes broomed and rasped the smooth bay in evanescent

patches of stippled shade, and, besides the small boats, the ponderous

lighters used in shipping stone were hauled up the beach in anticipation

of the equinoctial attack.

A few days after Ethelberta's reception at Enckworth, an improved

stanhope, driven by Lord Mountclere himself, climbed up the hill until

it was opposite her door. A few notes from a piano softly played reached

his ear as he descended from his place: on being shown in to his

betrothed, he could perceive that she had just left the instrument.

Moreover, a tear was visible in her eye when she came near him.

They discoursed for several minutes in the manner natural between a

defenceless young widow and an old widower in Lord Mountclere's position

to whom she was plighted-a great deal of formal considerateness making

itself visible on her part, and of extreme tenderness on his. While thus

occupied, he turned to the piano, and casually glanced at a piece of

music lying open upon it. Some words of writing at the top expressed

that it was the composer's original copy, presented by him, Christopher

Julian, to the author of the song. Seeing that he noticed the sheet

somewhat lengthily, Ethelberta remarked that it had been an offering

made to her a long time ago-a melody written to one of her own poems.

'In the writing of the composer,' observed Lord Mountclere, with

interest. 'An offering from the musician himself-very gratifying and

touching. Mr. Christopher Julian is the name I see upon it, I believe? I

knew his father, Dr. Julian, a Sandbourne man, if I recollect.'

'Yes,' said Ethelberta placidly. But it was really with an effort. The

song was the identical one which Christopher sent up to her from

Sandbourne when the fire of her hope burnt high for less material ends;

and the discovery of the sheet among her music that day had started

eddies of emotion for some time checked.

'I am sorry you have been grieved,' said Lord Mountclere, with gloomy

restlessness.

'Grieved?' said Ethelberta.

'Did I not see a tear there? or did my eyes deceive me?'

'You might have seen one.'

'Ah! a tear, and a song. I think-'

'You naturally think that a woman who cries over a man's gift must be in

love with the giver?' Ethelberta looked him serenely in the face.

Lord Mountclere's jealous suspicions were considerably shaken.

'Not at all,' he said hastily, as if ashamed. 'One who cries over a song

is much affected by its sentiment.'

'Do you expect authors to cry over their own words?' she inquired,

merging defence in attack. 'I am afraid they don't often do that.'

'You would make me uneasy.'

'On the contrary, I would reassure you. Are you not still doubting?' she

asked, with a pleasant smile.

'I cannot doubt you!'

'Swear, like a faithful knight.'

'I swear, my fairy, my flower!'

After this the old man appeared to be pondering; indeed, his thoughts

could hardly be said to be present when he uttered the words. For though

the tabernacle was getting shaky by reason of years and merry living, so

that what was going on inside might often be guessed without by the

movement of the hangings, as in a puppet-show with worn canvas, he could

be quiet enough when scheming any plot of particular neatness, which had

less emotion than impishness in it. Such an innocent amusement he was

pondering now.

Before leaving her, he asked if she would accompany him to a morning

instrumental concert at Melchester, which was to take place in the

course of that week for the benefit of some local institution.

'Melchester,' she repeated faintly, and observed him as searchingly as

it was possible to do without exposing herself to a raking fire in

return. Could he know that Christopher was living there, and was this

said in prolongation of his recent suspicion? But Lord Mountclere's face

gave no sign.

'You forget one fatal objection,' said she; 'the secrecy in which it is

imperative that the engagement between us should be kept.'

'I am not known in Melchester without my carriage; nor are you.'

'We may be known by somebody on the road.'

'Then let it be arranged in this way. I will not call here to take you

up, but will meet you at the station at Anglebury; and we can go on

together by train without notice. Surely there can be no objection to

that? It would be mere prudishness to object, since we are to become one

so shortly.' He spoke a little impatiently. It was plain that he

particularly wanted her to go to Melchester.

'I merely meant that there was a chance of discovery in our going out

together. And discovery means no marriage.' She was pale now, and sick

at heart, for it seemed that the viscount must be aware that Christopher

dwelt at that place, and was about to test her concerning him.

'Why does it mean no marriage?' said he.

'My father might, and almost certainly would, object to it. Although he

cannot control me, he might entreat me.'

'Why would he object?' said Lord Mountclere uneasily, and somewhat

haughtily.

'I don't know.'

'But you will be my wife-say again that you will.'

'I will.'

He breathed. 'He will not object-hee-hee!' he said. 'O no-I think you

will be mine now.'

'I have said so. But look to me all the same.'

'You malign yourself, dear one. But you will meet me at Anglebury, as I

wish, and go on to Melchester with me?'

'I shall be pleased to-if my sister may accompany me.'

'Ah-your sister. Yes, of course.'

They settled the time of the journey, and when the visit had been

stretched out as long as it reasonably could be with propriety, Lord

Mountclere took his leave.

When he was again seated on the driving-phaeton which he had brought

that day, Lord Mountclere looked gleeful, and shrewd enough in his own

opinion to outwit Mephistopheles. As soon as they were ascending a hill,

and he could find time to free his hand, he pulled off his glove, and

drawing from his pocket a programme of the Melchester concert referred

to, contemplated therein the name of one of the intended performers. The

name was that of Mr. C. Julian. Replacing it again, he looked ahead, and

some time after murmured with wily mirth, 'An excellent test-a lucky

thought!'

Nothing of importance occurred during the intervening days. At two

o'clock on the appointed afternoon Ethelberta stepped from the train at

Melchester with the viscount, who had met her as proposed; she was

followed behind by Picotee.

The concert was to be held at the Town-hall half-an-hour later. They

entered a fly in waiting, and secure from recognition, were driven

leisurely in that direction, Picotee silent and absorbed with her own

thoughts.

'There's the Cathedral,' said Lord Mountclere humorously, as they caught

a view of one of its towers through a street leading into the Close.

'Yes.'

'It boasts of a very fine organ.'

'Ah.'

'And the organist is a clever young man.'

'Oh.'

Lord Mountclere paused a moment or two. 'By the way, you may remember

that he is the Mr. Julian who set your song to music!'

'I recollect it quite well.' Her heart was horrified and she thought

Lord Mountclere must be developing into an inquisitor, which perhaps he

was. But none of this reached her face.

They turned in the direction of the Hall, were set down, and entered.

The large assembly-room set apart for the concert was upstairs, and it

was possible to enter it in two ways: by the large doorway in front of

the landing, or by turning down a side passage leading to council-rooms

and subsidiary apartments of small size, which were allotted to

performers in any exhibition; thus they could enter from one of these

directly upon the platform, without passing through the audience.

'Will you seat yourselves here?' said Lord Mountclere, who, instead of

entering by the direct door, had brought the young women round into this

green-room, as it may be called. 'You see we have come in privately

enough; when the musicians arrive we can pass through behind them, and

step down to our seats from the front.'

The players could soon be heard tuning in the next room. Then one came

through the passage-room where the three waited, and went in, then

another, then another. Last of all came Julian.

Ethelberta sat facing the door, but Christopher, never in the least

expecting her there, did not recognize her till he was quite inside.

When he had really perceived her to be the one who had troubled his soul

so many times and long, the blood in his face-never very much-passed off

and left it, like the shade of a cloud. Between them stood a table

covered with green baize, which, reflecting upwards a band of sunlight

shining across the chamber, flung upon his already white features the

virescent hues of death. The poor musician, whose person, much to his

own inconvenience, constituted a complete breviary of the gentle

emotions, looked as if he were going to fall down in a faint.

Ethelberta flung at Lord Mountclere a look which clipped him like

pincers: he never forgot it as long as he lived.

'This is your pretty jealous scheme-I see it!' she hissed to him, and

without being able to control herself went across to Julian.

But a slight gasp came from behind the door where Picotee had been

sitting. Ethelberta and Lord Mountclere looked that way: and behold,

Picotee had nearly swooned.

Ethelberta's show of passion went as quickly as it had come, for she

felt that a splendid triumph had been put into her hands. 'Now do you

see the truth?' she whispered to Lord Mountclere without a drachm of

feeling; pointing to Christopher and then to Picotee-as like as two

snowdrops now.

'I do, I do,' murmured the viscount hastily.

They both went forward to help Christopher in restoring the fragile

Picotee: he had set himself to that task as suddenly as he possibly

could to cover his own near approach to the same condition. Not much

help was required, the little girl's indisposition being quite

momentary, and she sat up in the chair again.

'Are you better?' said Ethelberta to Christopher.

'Quite well-quite,' he said, smiling faintly. 'I am glad to see you. I

must, I think, go into the next room now.' He bowed and walked out

awkwardly.

'Are you better, too?' she said to Picotee.

'Quite well,' said Picotee.

'You are quite sure you know between whom the love lies now-eh?'

Ethelberta asked in a sarcastic whisper of Lord Mountclere.

'I am-beyond a doubt,' murmured the anxious nobleman; he feared that

look of hers, which was not less dominant than irresistible.

Some additional moments given to thought on the circumstances rendered

Ethelberta still more indignant and intractable. She went out at the

door by which they had entered, along the passage, and down the stairs.

A shuffling footstep followed, but she did not turn her head. When they

reached the bottom of the stairs the carriage had gone, their exit not

being expected till two hours later. Ethelberta, nothing daunted, swept

along the pavement and down the street in a turbulent prance, Lord

Mountclere trotting behind with a jowl reduced to a mere nothing by his

concern at the discourtesy into which he had been lured by jealous

whisperings.

'My dearest-forgive me; I confess I doubted you-but I was beside

myself,' came to her ears from over her shoulder. But Ethelberta walked

on as before.

Lord Mountclere sighed like a poet over a ledger. 'An old man-who is not

very old-naturally torments himself with fears of losing-no, no-it was

an innocent jest of mine-you will forgive a joke-hee-hee?' he said

again, on getting no reply.

'You had no right to mistrust me!'

'I do not-you did not blench. You should have told me before that it was

your sister and not yourself who was entangled with him.'

'You brought me to Melchester on purpose to confront him!'

'Yes, I did.'

'Are you not ashamed?'

'I am satisfied. It is better to know the truth by any means than to die

of suspense; better for us both-surely you see that?'

They had by this time got to the end of a long street, and into a

deserted side road by which the station could be indirectly reached.

Picotee appeared in the distance as a mere distracted speck of girlhood,

following them because not knowing what else to do in her sickness of

body and mind. Once out of sight here, Ethelberta began to cry.

'Ethelberta,' said Lord Mountclere, in an agony of trouble, 'don't be

vexed! It was an inconsiderate trick-I own it. Do what you will, but do

not desert me now! I could not bear it-you would kill me if you were to

leave me. Anything, but be mine.'

Ethelberta continued her way, and drying her eyes entered the station,

where, on searching the time-tables, she found there would be no train

for Anglebury for the next two hours. Then more slowly she turned

towards the town again, meeting Picotee and keeping in her company.

Lord Mountclere gave up the chase, but as he wished to get into the town

again, he followed in the same direction. When Ethelberta had proceeded

as far as the Red Lion Hotel, she turned towards it with her companion,

and being shown to a room, the two sisters shut themselves in. Lord

Mountclere paused and entered the White Hart, the rival hotel to the Red

Lion, which stood in an adjoining street.

Having secluded himself in an apartment here, walked from window to

window awhile, and made himself generally uncomfortable, he sat down to

the writing materials on the table, and concocted a note:-

'WHITE HART HOTEL.

'MY DEAR MRS. PETHERWIN,-You do not mean to be so cruel as to break your

plighted word to me? Remember, there is no love without much jealousy,

and lovers are ever full of sighs and misgiving. I have owned to as

much contrition as can reasonably be expected. I could not endure the

suspicion that you loved another.-Yours always,

'MOUNTCLERE.'

This he sent, watching from the window its progress along the street. He

awaited anxiously for an answer, and waited long. It was nearly twenty

minutes before he could hear a messenger approaching the door. Yes-she

had actually sent a reply; he prized it as if it had been the first

encouragement he had ever in his life received from woman:-

'MY LORD' (wrote Ethelberta),-'I am not prepared at present to enter

into the question of marriage at all. The incident which has occurred

affords me every excuse for withdrawing my promise, since it was given

under misapprehensions on a point that materially affects my happiness.

'E. PETHERWIN.'

'Ho-ho-ho-Miss Hoity-toity!' said Lord Mountclere, trotting up and down.

But, remembering it was her June against his November, this did not last

long, and he frantically replied:-

'MY DARLING,-I cannot release you-I must do anything to keep my

treasure. Will you not see me for a few minutes, and let bygones go to

the winds?'

Was ever a thrush so safe in a cherry net before!

The messenger came back with the information that Mrs. Petherwin had

taken a walk to the Close, her companion alone remaining at the hotel.

There being nothing else left for the viscount to do, he put on his hat,

and went out on foot in the same direction. He had not walked far when

he saw Ethelberta moving slowly along the High Street before him.

Ethelberta was at this hour wandering without any fixed intention beyond

that of consuming time. She was very wretched, and very indifferent: the

former when thinking of her past, the latter when thinking of the days

to come. While she walked thus unconscious of the streets, and their

groups of other wayfarers, she saw Christopher emerge from a door not

many paces in advance, and close it behind him: he stood for a moment on

the step before descending into the road.

She could not, even had she wished it, easily check her progress without

rendering the chance of his perceiving her still more certain. But she

did not wish any such thing, and it made little difference, for he had

already seen her in taking his survey round, and came down from the door

to her side. It was impossible for anything formal to pass between them

now.

'You are not at the concert, Mr. Julian?' she said. 'I am glad to have a

better opportunity of speaking to you, and of asking for your sister.

Unfortunately there is not time for us to call upon her to-day.'

'Thank you, but it makes no difference,' said Julian, with somewhat sad

reserve. 'I will tell her I have met you; she is away from home just at

present.' And finding that Ethelberta did not rejoin immediately he

observed, 'The chief organist, old Dr. Breeve, has taken my place at the

concert, as it was arranged he should do after the opening part. I am

now going to the Cathedral for the afternoon service. You are going

there too?'

'I thought of looking at the interior for a moment.'

So they went on side by side, saying little; for it was a situation in

which scarcely any appropriate thing could be spoken. Ethelberta was the

less reluctant to walk in his company because of the provocation to

skittishness that Lord Mountclere had given, a provocation which she

still resented. But she was far from wishing to increase his jealousy;

and yet this was what she was doing, Lord Mountclere being a perturbed

witness from behind of all that was passing now.

They turned the corner of the short street of connection which led under

an archway to the Cathedral Close, the old peer dogging them still.

Christopher seemed to warm up a little, and repeated the invitation.

'You will come with your sister to see us before you leave?' he said.

'We have tea at six.'

'We shall have left Melchester before that time. I am now only waiting

for the train.'

'You two have not come all the way from Knollsea alone?'

'Part of the way,' said Ethelberta evasively.

'And going back alone?'

'No. Only for the last five miles. At least that was the arrangement-I

am not quite sure if it holds good.'

'You don't wish me to see you safely in the train?'

'It is not necessary: thank you very much. We are well used to getting

about the world alone, and from Melchester to Knollsea is no serious

journey, late or early. . . . Yet I think I ought, in honesty, to tell

you that we are not entirely by ourselves in Melchester to-day.'

'I remember I saw your friend-relative-in the room at the Town-hall. It

did not occur to my mind for the moment that he was any other than a

stranger standing there.'

'He is not a relative,' she said, with perplexity. 'I hardly know,

Christopher, how to explain to you my position here to-day, because of

some difficulties that have arisen since we have been in the town, which

may alter it entirely. On that account I will be less frank with you

than I should like to be, considering how long we have known each other.

It would be wrong, however, if I were not to tell you that there has

been a possibility of my marriage with him.'

'The elderly gentleman?'

'Yes. And I came here in his company, intending to return with him. But

you shall know all soon. Picotee shall write to Faith.'

'I always think the Cathedral looks better from this point than from the

point usually chosen by artists,' he said, with nervous quickness,

directing her glance upwards to the silent structure, now misty and

unrelieved by either high light or deep shade. 'We get the grouping of

the chapels and choir-aisles more clearly shown-and the whole culminates

to a more perfect pyramid from this spot-do you think so?'

'Yes. I do.'

A little further, and Christopher stopped to enter, when Ethelberta bade

him farewell. 'I thought at one time that our futures might have been

different from what they are apparently becoming,' he said then,

regarding her as a stall-reader regards the brilliant book he cannot

afford to buy. 'But one gets weary of repining about that. I wish

Picotee and yourself could see us oftener; I am as confirmed a bachelor

now as Faith is an old maid. I wonder if-should the event you

contemplate occur-you and he will ever visit us, or we shall ever visit

you!'

Christopher was evidently imagining the elderly gentleman to be some

retired farmer, or professional man already so intermixed with the

metamorphic classes of society as not to be surprised or inconvenienced

by her beginnings; one who wished to secure Ethelberta as an ornament to

his parlour fire in a quiet spirit, and in no intoxicated mood

regardless of issues. She could scarcely reply to his supposition; and

the parting was what might have been predicted from a conversation so

carefully controlled.

Ethelberta, as she had intended, now went on further, and entering the

nave began to inspect the sallow monuments which lined the grizzled

pile. She did not perceive amid the shadows an old gentleman who had

crept into the mouldy place as stealthily as a worm into a skull, and

was keeping himself carefully beyond her observation. She continued to

regard feature after feature till the choristers had filed in from the

south side, and peals broke forth from the organ on the black oaken mass

at the junction of nave and choir, shaking every cobweb in the dusky

vaults, and Ethelberta's heart no less. She knew the fingers that were

pressing out those rolling sounds, and knowing them, became absorbed in

tracing their progress. To go towards the organ-loft was an act of

unconsciousness, and she did not pause till she stood almost beneath it.

Ethelberta was awakened from vague imaginings by the close approach of

the old gentleman alluded to, who spoke with a great deal of agitation.

'I have been trying to meet with you,' said Lord Mountclere. 'Come, let

us be friends again!-Ethelberta, I MUST not lose you! You cannot mean

that the engagement shall be broken off?' He was far too desirous to

possess her at any price now to run a second risk of exasperating her,

and forbore to make any allusion to the recent pantomime between herself

and Christopher that he had beheld, though it might reasonably have

filled him with dread and petulance.

'I do not mean anything beyond this,' said she, 'that I entirely

withdraw from it on the faintest sign that you have not abandoned such

miserable jealous proceedings as those you adopted to-day.'

'I have quite abandoned them. Will you come a little further this way,

and walk in the aisle? You do still agree to be mine?'

'If it gives you any pleasure, I do.'

'Yes, yes. I implore that the marriage may be soon-very soon.' The

viscount spoke hastily, for the notes of the organ which were plunging

into their ears ever and anon from the hands of his young rival seemed

inconveniently and solemnly in the way of his suit.

'Well, Lord Mountclere?'

'Say in a few days?-it is the only thing that will satisfy me.'

'I am absolutely indifferent as to the day. If it pleases you to have it

early I am willing.'

'Dare I ask that it may be this week?' said the delighted old man.

'I could not say that.'

'But you can name the earliest day?'

'I cannot now. We had better be going from here, I think.'

The Cathedral was filling with shadows, and cold breathings came round

the piers, for it was November, when night very soon succeeds noon in

spots where noon is sobered to the pallor of eve. But the service was

not yet over, and before quite leaving the building Ethelberta cast one

other glance towards the organ and thought of him behind it. At this

moment her attention was arrested by the form of her sister Picotee, who

came in at the north door, closed the lobby-wicket softly, and went

lightly forward to the choir. When within a few yards of it she paused

by a pillar, and lingered there looking up at the organ as Ethelberta

had done. No sound was coming from the ponderous mass of tubes just

then; but in a short space a whole crowd of tones spread from the

instrument to accompany the words of a response. Picotee started at the

burst of music as if taken in a dishonest action, and moved on in a

manner intended to efface the lover's loiter of the preceding moments

from her own consciousness no less than from other people's eyes.

'Do you see that?' said Ethelberta. 'That little figure is my dearest

sister. Could you but ensure a marriage between her and him she listens

to, I would do anything you wish!'

'That is indeed a gracious promise,' said Lord Mountclere. 'And would

you agree to what I asked just now?'

'Yes.'

'When?' A gleeful spark accompanied this.

'As you requested.'

'This week? The day after to-morrow?'

'If you will. But remember what lies on your side of the contract. I

fancy I have given you a task beyond your powers.'

'Well, darling, we are at one at last,' said Lord Mountclere, rubbing

his hand against his side. 'And if my task is heavy and I cannot

guarantee the result, I can make it very probable. Marry me on Friday-

the day after to-morrow-and I will do all that money and influence can

effect to bring about their union.'

'You solemnly promise? You will never cease to give me all the aid in

your power until the thing is done?'

'I do solemnly promise-on the conditions named.'

'Very good. You will have ensured my fulfilment of my promise before I

can ensure yours; but I take your word.'

'You will marry me on Friday! Give me your hand upon it.'

She gave him her hand.

'Is it a covenant?' he asked.

'It is,' said she.

Lord Mountclere warmed from surface to centre as if he had drunk of

hippocras, and, after holding her hand for some moments, raised it

gently to his lips.

'Two days and you are mine,' he said.

'That I believe I never shall be.'

'Never shall be? Why, darling?'

'I don't know. Some catastrophe will prevent it. I shall be dead

perhaps.'

'You distress me. Ah,-you meant me-you meant that I should be dead,

because you think I am old! But that is a mistake-I am not very old!'

'I thought only of myself-nothing of you.'

'Yes, I know. Dearest, it is dismal and chilling here-let us go.'

Ethelberta mechanically moved with him, and felt there was no retreating

now. In the meantime the young ladykin whom the solemn vowing concerned

had lingered round the choir screen, as if fearing to enter, yet loth to

go away. The service terminated, the heavy books were closed, doors were

opened, and the feet of the few persons who had attended evensong began

pattering down the paved alleys. Not wishing Picotee to know that the

object of her secret excursion had been discovered, Ethelberta now

stepped out of the west doorway with the viscount before Picotee had

emerged from the other; and they walked along the path together until

she overtook them.

'I fear it becomes necessary for me to stay in Melchester to-night,'

said Lord Mountclere. 'I have a few matters to attend to here, as the

result of our arrangements. But I will first accompany you as far as

Anglebury, and see you safely into a carriage there that shall take you

home. To-morrow I will drive to Knollsea, when we will make the final

preparations.'

Ethelberta would not have him go so far and back again, merely to attend

upon her; hence they parted at the railway, with due and correct

tenderness; and when the train had gone, Lord Mountclere returned into

the town on the special business he had mentioned, for which there

remained only the present evening and the following morning, if he were

to call upon her in the afternoon of the next day-the day before the

wedding-now so recklessly hastened on his part, and so coolly assented

to on hers.

By the time that the two young people had started it was nearly dark.

Some portions of the railway stretched through little copses and

plantations where, the leaf-shedding season being now at its height, red

and golden patches of fallen foliage lay on either side of the rails;

and as the travellers passed, all these death-stricken bodies boiled up

in the whirlwind created by the velocity, and were sent flying right and

left of them in myriads, a clean-fanned track being left behind.

Picotee was called from the observation of these phenomena by a remark

from her sister: 'Picotee, the marriage is to be very early indeed. It

is to be the day after to-morrow-if it can. Nevertheless I don't believe

in the fact-I cannot.'

'Did you arrange it so? Nobody can make you marry so soon.'

'I agreed to the day,' murmured Ethelberta languidly.

'How can it be? The gay dresses and the preparations and the people-how

can they be collected in the time, Berta? And so much more of that will

be required for a lord of the land than for a common man. O, I can't

think it possible for a sister of mine to marry a lord!'

'And yet it has been possible any time this last month or two, strange

as it seems to you. . . . It is to be not only a plain and simple

wedding, without any lofty appliances, but a secret one-as secret as if

I were some under-age heiress to an Indian fortune, and he a young man

of nothing a year.'

'Has Lord Mountclere said it must be so private? I suppose it is on

account of his family.'

'No. I say so; and it is on account of my family. Father might object to

the wedding, I imagine, from what he once said, or he might be much

disturbed about it; so I think it better that he and the rest should

know nothing till all is over. You must dress again as my sister to-

morrow, dear. Lord Mountclere is going to pay us an early visit to

conclude necessary arrangements.'

'O, the life as a lady at Enckworth Court! The flowers, the woods, the

rooms, the pictures, the plate, and the jewels! Horses and carriages

rattling and prancing, seneschals and pages, footmen hopping up and

hopping down. It will be glory then!'

'We might hire our father as one of my retainers, to increase it,' said

Ethelberta drily.

Picotee's countenance fell. 'How shall we manage all about that? 'Tis

terrible, really!'

'The marriage granted, those things will right themselves by time and

weight of circumstances. You take a wrong view in thinking of glories of

that sort. My only hope is that my life will be quite private and

simple, as will best become my inferiority and Lord Mountclere's

staidness. Such a splendid library as there is at Enckworth, Picotee-

quartos, folios, history, verse, Elzevirs, Caxtons-all that has been

done in literature from Moses down to Scott-with such companions I can

do without all other sorts of happiness.'

'And you will not go to town from Easter to Lammastide, as other noble

ladies do?' asked the younger girl, rather disappointed at this aspect

of a viscountess's life.

'I don't know.'

'But you will give dinners, and travel, and go to see his friends, and

have them to see you?'

'I don't know.'

'Will you not be, then, as any other peeress; and shall not I be as any

other peeress's sister?'

'That, too, I do not know. All is mystery. Nor do I even know that the

marriage will take place. I feel that it may not; and perhaps so much

the better, since the man is a stranger to me. I know nothing whatever

of his nature, and he knows nothing of mine.'

40. MELCHESTER (continued)

The commotion wrought in Julian's mind by the abrupt incursion of

Ethelberta into his quiet sphere was thorough and protracted. The

witchery of her presence he had grown strong enough to withstand in

part; but her composed announcement that she had intended to marry

another, and, as far as he could understand, was intending it still,

added a new chill to the old shade of disappointment which custom was

day by day enabling him to endure. During the whole interval in which he

had produced those diapason blasts, heard with such inharmonious

feelings by the three auditors outside the screen, his thoughts had

wandered wider than his notes in conjectures on the character and

position of the gentleman seen in Ethelberta's company. Owing to his

assumption that Lord Mountclere was but a stranger who had accidentally

come in at the side door, Christopher had barely cast a glance upon him,

and the wide difference between the years of the viscount and those of

his betrothed was not so particularly observed as to raise that point to

an item in his objections now. Lord Mountclere was dressed with all the

cunning that could be drawn from the metropolis by money and reiterated

dissatisfaction; he prided himself on his upright carriage; his stick

was so thin that the most malevolent could not insinuate that it was of

any possible use in walking; his teeth had put on all the vigour and

freshness of a second spring. Hence his look was the slowest of possible

clocks in respect of his age, and his manner was equally as much in the

rear of his appearance.

Christopher was now over five-and-twenty. He was getting so well

accustomed to the spectacle of a world passing him by and splashing him

with its wheels that he wondered why he had ever minded it. His habit of

dreaming instead of doing had led him up to a curious discovery. It is

no new thing for a man to fathom profundities by indulging humours: the

active, the rapid, the people of splendid momentum, have been surprised

to behold what results attend the lives of those whose usual plan for

discharging their active labours has been to postpone them indefinitely.

Certainly, the immediate result in the present case was, to all but

himself, small and invisible; but it was of the nature of highest

things. What he had learnt was that a woman who has once made a

permanent impression upon a man cannot altogether deny him her image by

denying him her company, and that by sedulously cultivating the

acquaintance of this Creature of Contemplation she becomes to him almost

a living soul. Hence a sublimated Ethelberta accompanied him everywhere-

one who never teased him, eluded him, or disappointed him: when he

smiled she smiled, when he was sad she sorrowed. He may be said to have

become the literal duplicate of that whimsical unknown rhapsodist who

wrote of his own similar situation-

'By absence this good means I gain, That I can catch her, Where none can

watch her, In some close corner of my brain: There I embrace and kiss

her; And so I both enjoy and miss her.'

This frame of mind naturally induced an amazing abstraction in the

organist, never very vigilant at the best of times. He would stand and

look fixedly at a frog in a shady pool, and never once think of

batrachians, or pause by a green bank to split some tall blade of grass

into filaments without removing it from its stalk, passing on ignorant

that he had made a cat-o'-nine-tails of a graceful slip of vegetation.

He would hear the cathedral clock strike one, and go the next minute to

see what time it was. 'I never seed such a man as Mr. Julian is,' said

the head blower. 'He'll meet me anywhere out-of-doors, and never wink or

nod. You'd hardly expect it. I don't find fault, but you'd hardly expect

it, seeing how I play the same instrument as he do himself, and have

done it for so many years longer than he. How I have indulged that man,

too! If 'tis Pedals for two martel hours of practice I never complain;

and he has plenty of vagaries. When 'tis hot summer weather there's

nothing will do for him but Choir, Great, and Swell altogether, till yer

face is in a vapour; and on a frosty winter night he'll keep me there

while he tweedles upon the Twelfth and Sixteenth till my arms be

scrammed for want of motion. And never speak a word out-of-doors.'

Somebody suggested that perhaps Christopher did not notice his

coadjutor's presence in the street; and time proved to the organ-blower

that the remark was just.

Whenever Christopher caught himself at these vacuous tricks he would be

struck with admiration of Ethelberta's wisdom, foresight, and self-

command in refusing to wed such an incapable man: he felt that he ought

to be thankful that a bright memory of her was not also denied to him,

and resolved to be content with it as a possession, since it was as much

of her as he could decently maintain.

Wrapped thus in a humorous sadness he passed the afternoon under notice,

and in the evening went home to Faith, who still lived with him, and

showed no sign of ever being likely to do otherwise. Their present place

and mode of life suited her well. She revived at Melchester like an

exotic sent home again. The leafy Close, the climbing buttresses, the

pondering ecclesiastics, the great doors, the singular keys, the

whispered talk, echoes of lonely footsteps, the sunset shadow of the

tall steeple, reaching further into the town than the good bishop's

teaching, and the general complexion of a spot where morning had the

stillness of evening and spring some of the tones of autumn, formed a

proper background to a person constituted as Faith, who, like Miss

Hepzibah Pyncheon's chicken, possessed in miniature all the antiquity of

her progenitors.

After tea Christopher went into the streets, as was frequently his

custom, less to see how the world crept on there than to walk up and

down for nothing at all. It had been market-day, and remnants of the

rural population that had visited the town still lingered at corners,

their toes hanging over the edge of the pavement, and their eyes

wandering about the street.

The angle which formed the turning-point of Christopher's promenade was

occupied by a jeweller's shop, of a standing which completely outshone

every other shop in that or any trade throughout the town. Indeed, it

was a staple subject of discussion in Melchester how a shop of such

pretensions could find patronage sufficient to support its existence in

a place which, though well populated, was not fashionable. It had not

long been established there, and was the enterprise of an incoming man

whose whole course of procedure seemed to be dictated by an intention to

astonish the native citizens very considerably before he had done.

Nearly everything was glass in the frontage of this fairy mart, and its

contents glittered like the hammochrysos stone. The panes being of

plate-glass, and the shop having two fronts, a diagonal view could be

had through it from one to the other of the streets to which it formed a

corner.

This evening, as on all evenings, a flood of radiance spread from the

window-lamps into the thick autumn air, so that from a distance that

corner appeared as the glistening nucleus of all the light in the town.

Towards it idle men and women unconsciously bent their steps, and closed

in upon the panes like night-birds upon the lantern of a lighthouse.

When Christopher reached the spot there stood close to the pavement a

plain close carriage, apparently waiting for some person who was

purchasing inside. Christopher would hardly have noticed this had he not

also perceived, pressed against the glass of the shop window, an unusual

number of local noses belonging to overgrown working lads, tosspots, an

idiot, the ham-smoker's assistant with his sleeves rolled up, a scot-

and-lot freeholder, three or four seamstresses, the young woman who

brought home the washing, and so on. The interest of these gazers in

some proceedings within, which by reason of the gaslight were as public

as if carried on in the open air, was very great.

'Yes, that's what he's a buying o'-haw, haw!' said one of the young men,

as the shopman removed from the window a gorgeous blue velvet tray of

wedding-rings, and laid it on the counter.

''Tis what you may come to yerself, sooner or later, God have mercy upon

ye; and as such no scoffing matter,' said an older man. 'Faith, I'd as

lief cry as laugh to see a man in that corner.'

'He's a gent getting up in years too. He must hev been through it a few

times afore, seemingly, to sit down and buy the tools so cool as that.'

'Well, no. See what the shyest will do at such times. You bain't yerself

then; no man living is hisself then.'

'True,' said the ham-smoker's man. ''Tis a thought to look at that a

chap will take all this trouble to get a woman into his house, and a

twelvemonth after would as soon hear it thunder as hear her sing!'

The policeman standing near was a humane man, through having a young

family he could hardly keep, and he hesitated about telling them to move

on. Christopher had before this time perceived that the articles were

laid down before an old gentleman who was seated in the shop, and that

the gentleman was none other than he who had been with Ethelberta in the

concert-room. The discovery was so startling that, constitutionally

indisposed as he was to stand and watch, he became as glued to the spot

as the other idlers. Finding himself now for the first time directly

confronting the preliminaries of Ethelberta's marriage to a stranger, he

was left with far less equanimity than he could have supposed possible

to the situation.

'So near the time!' he said, and looked hard at Lord Mountclere.

Christopher had now a far better opportunity than before for observing

Ethelberta's betrothed. Apart from any bias of jealousy, disappointment,

or mortification, he was led to judge that this was not quite the man to

make Ethelberta happy. He had fancied her companion to be a man under

fifty; he was now visibly sixty or more. And it was not the sort of

sexagenarianism beside which a young woman's happiness can sometimes

contrive to keep itself alive in a quiet sleepy way. Suddenly it

occurred to him that this was the man whom he had helped in the carriage

accident on the way to Knollsea. He looked again.

By no means undignified, the face presented that combination of slyness

and jocundity which we are accustomed to imagine of the canonical jolly-

dogs in mediaeval tales. The gamesome Curate of Meudon might have

supplied some parts of the countenance; cunning Friar Tuck the

remainder. Nothing but the viscount's constant habit of going to church

every Sunday morning when at his country residence kept unholiness out

of his features, for though he lived theologically enough on the

Sabbath, as it became a man in his position to do, he was strikingly

mundane all the rest of the week, always preferring the devil to God in

his oaths. And nothing but antecedent good-humour prevented the short

fits of crossness incident to his passing infirmities from becoming

established. His look was exceptionally jovial now, and the corners of

his mouth twitched as the telegraph-needles of a hundred little erotic

messages from his heart to his brain. Anybody could see that he was a

merry man still, who loved good company, warming drinks, nymph-like

shapes, and pretty words, in spite of the disagreeable suggestions he

received from the pupils of his eyes, and the joints of his lively

limbs, that imps of mischief were busy sapping and mining in those

regions, with the view of tumbling him into a certain cool cellar under

the church aisle.

In general, if a lover can find any ground at all for serenity in the

tide of an elderly rival's success, he finds it in the fact itself of

that ancientness. The other side seems less a rival than a makeshift.

But Christopher no longer felt this, and the significant signs before

his eyes of the imminence of Ethelberta's union with this old hero

filled him with restless dread. True, the gentleman, as he appeared

illuminated by the jeweller's gas-jets, seemed more likely to injure

Ethelberta by indulgence than by severity, while her beauty lasted; but

there was a nameless something in him less tolerable than this.

The purchaser having completed his dealings with the goldsmith, was

conducted to the door by the master of the shop, and into the carriage,

which was at once driven off up the street.

Christopher now much desired to know the name of the man whom a nice

chain of circumstantial evidence taught him to regard as the happy

winner where scores had lost. He was grieved that Ethelberta's confessed

reserve should have extended so far as to limit her to mere indefinite

hints of marriage when they were talking almost on the brink of the

wedding-day. That the ceremony was to be a private one-which it probably

would be because of the disparity of ages-did not in his opinion justify

her secrecy. He had shown himself capable of a transmutation as valuable

as it is rare in men, the change from pestering lover to staunch friend,

and this was all he had got for it. But even an old lover sunk to an

indifferentist might have been tempted to spend an unoccupied half-hour

in discovering particulars now, and Christopher had not lapsed nearly so

far as to absolute unconcern.

That evening, however, nothing came in his way to enlighten him. But the

next day, when skirting the Close on his ordinary duties, he saw the

same carriage standing at a distance, and paused to behold the same old

gentleman come from a well-known office and re-enter the vehicle-Lord

Mountclere, in fact, in earnest pursuit of the business of yesternight,

having just pocketed a document in which romance, rashness, law, and

gospel are so happily made to work together that it may safely be

regarded as the neatest compromise which has ever been invented since

Adam sinned.

This time Julian perceived that the brougham was one belonging to the

White Hart Hotel, which Lord Mountclere was using partly from the

necessities of these hasty proceedings, and also because, by so doing,

he escaped the notice that might have been bestowed upon his own

equipage, or men-servants, the Mountclere hammer-cloths being known in

Melchester. Christopher now walked towards the hotel, leisurely, yet

with anxiety. He inquired of a porter what people were staying there

that day, and was informed that they had only one person in the house,

Lord Mountclere, whom sudden and unexpected business had detained in

Melchester since the previous day.

Christopher lingered to hear no more. He retraced the street much more

quickly than he had come; and he only said, 'Lord Mountclere-it must

never be!'

As soon as he entered the house, Faith perceived that he was greatly

agitated. He at once told her of his discovery, and she exclaimed, 'What

a brilliant match!'

'O Faith,' said Christopher, 'you don't know! You are far from knowing.

It is as gloomy as midnight. Good God, can it be possible?'

Faith bHANDlinked in alarm, without speaking.

'Did you never hear anything of Lord Mountclere when we lived at

Sandbourne?'

'I knew the name-no more.'

'No, no-of course you did not. Well, though I never saw his face, to my

knowledge, till a short time ago, I know enough to say that, if earnest

representations can prevent it, this marriage shall not be. Father knew

him, or about him, very well; and he once told me-what I cannot tell

you. Fancy, I have seen him three times-yesterday, last night, and this

morning-besides helping him on the road some weeks ago, and never once

considered that he might be Lord Mountclere. He is here almost in

disguise, one may say; neither man nor horse is with him; and his object

accounts for his privacy. I see how it is-she is doing this to benefit

her brothers and sisters, if possible; but she ought to know that if she

is miserable they will never be happy. That's the nature of women-they

take the form for the essence, and that's what she is doing now. I

should think her guardian angel must have quitted her when she agreed to

a marriage which may tear her heart out like a claw.'

'You are too warm about it, Kit-it cannot be so bad as that. It is not

the thing, but the sensitiveness to the thing, which is the true measure

of its pain. Perhaps what seems so bad to you falls lightly on her mind.

A campaigner in a heavy rain is not more uncomfortable than we are in a

slight draught; and Ethelberta, fortified by her sapphires and gold cups

and wax candles, will not mind facts which look like spectres to us

outside. A title will turn troubles into romances, and she will shine as

an interesting viscountess in spite of them.'

The discussion with Faith was not continued, Christopher stopping the

argument by saying that he had a good mind to go off at once to

Knollsea, and show her her danger. But till the next morning Ethelberta

was certainly safe; no marriage was possible anywhere before then. He

passed the afternoon in a state of great indecision, constantly

reiterating, 'I will go!'

41. WORKSHOPS-AN INN-THE STREET

On an extensive plot of ground, lying somewhere between the Thames and

the Kensington squares, stood the premises of Messrs. Nockett and Perch,

builders and contractors. The yard with its workshops formed part of one

of those frontier lines between mangy business and garnished domesticity

that occur in what are called improving neighbourhoods. We are

accustomed to regard increase as the chief feature in a great city's

progress, its well-known signs greeting our eyes on every outskirt.

Slush-ponds may be seen turning into basement-kitchens; a broad causeway

of shattered earthenware smothers plots of budding gooseberry-bushes and

vegetable trenches, foundations following so closely upon gardens that

the householder may be expected to find cadaverous sprouts from

overlooked potatoes rising through the chinks of his cellar floor. But

the other great process, that of internal transmutation, is not less

curious than this encroachment of grey upon green. Its first erections

are often only the milk-teeth of a suburb, and as the district rises in

dignity they are dislodged by those which are to endure. Slightness

becomes supplanted by comparative solidity, commonness by novelty,

lowness and irregularity by symmetry and height.

An observer of the precinct which has been named as an instance in point

might have stood under a lamp-post and heard simultaneously the peal of

the visitor's bell from the new terrace on the right hand, and the

stroke of tools from the musty workshops on the left. Waggons laden with

deals came up on this side, and landaus came down on the other-the

former to lumber heavily through the old-established contractors' gates,

the latter to sweep fashionably into the square.

About twelve o'clock on the day following Lord Mountclere's exhibition

of himself to Christopher in the jeweller's shop at Melchester, and

almost at the identical time when the viscount was seen to come from the

office for marriage-licences in the same place, a carriage drove nearly

up to the gates of Messrs. Nockett and Co.'s yard. A gentleman stepped

out and looked around. He was a man whose years would have been

pronounced as five-and-forty by the friendly, fifty by the candid,

fifty-two or three by the grim. He was as handsome a study in grey as

could be seen in town, there being far more of the raven's plumage than

of the gull's in the mixture as yet; and he had a glance of that

practised sort which can measure people, weigh them, repress them,

encourage them to sprout and blossom as a March sun encourages crocuses,

ask them questions, give them answers-in short, a glance that could do

as many things as an American cooking-stove or a multum-in-parvo pocket-

knife. But, as with most men of the world, this was mere mechanism: his

actual emotions were kept so far within his person that they were rarely

heard or seen near his features.

On reading the builders' names over the gateway he entered the yard, and

asked at the office if Solomon Chickerel was engaged on the premises.

The clerk was going to be very attentive, but finding the visitor had

come only to speak to a workman, his tense attitude slackened a little,

and he merely signified the foot of a Flemish ladder on the other side

of the yard, saying, 'You will find him, sir, up there in the joiner's

shop.'

When the man in the black coat reached the top he found himself at the

end of a long apartment as large as a chapel and as low as a malt-room,

across which ran parallel carpenters' benches to the number of twenty or

more, a gangway being left at the side for access throughout. Behind

every bench there stood a man or two, planing, fitting, or chiselling,

as the case might be. The visitor paused for a moment, as if waiting for

some cessation of their violent motions and uproar till he could make

his errand known. He waited ten seconds, he waited twenty; but, beyond

that a quick look had been thrown upon him by every pair of eyes, the

muscular performances were in no way interrupted: every one seemed

oblivious of his presence, and absolutely regardless of his wish. In

truth, the texture of that salmon-coloured skin could be seen to be

aristocratic without a microscope, and the exceptious artizan has an

offhand way when contrasts are made painfully strong by an idler of this

kind coming, gloved and brushed, into the very den where he is sweating

and muddling in his shirt-sleeves.

The gentleman from the carriage then proceeded down the workshop, wading

up to his knees in a sea of shavings, and bruising his ankles against

corners of board and sawn-off blocks, that lay hidden like reefs

beneath. At the ninth bench he made another venture.

'Sol Chickerel?' said the man addressed, as he touched his plane-iron

upon the oilstone. 'He's one of them just behind.'

'Damn it all, can't one of you show me?' the visitor angrily observed,

for he had been used to more attention than this. 'Here, point him out.'

He handed the man a shilling.

'No trouble to do that,' said the workman; and he turned and signified

Sol by a nod without moving from his place.

The stranger entered Sol's division, and, nailing him with his eye, said

at once: 'I want to speak a few words with you in private. Is not a Mrs.

Petherwin your sister?'

Sol started suspiciously. 'Has anything happened to her?' he at length

said hurriedly.

'O no. It is on a business matter that I have called. You need not mind

owning the relationship to me-the secret will be kept. I am the brother

of one whom you may have heard of from her-Lord Mountclere.'

'I have not. But if you will wait a minute, sir-' He went to a little

glazed box at the end of the shop, where the foreman was sitting, and,

after speaking a few words to this person, Sol led Mountclere to the

door, and down the ladder.

'I suppose we cannot very well talk here, after all?' said the

gentleman, when they reached the yard, and found several men moving

about therein.

'Perhaps we had better go to some room-the nearest inn will answer the

purpose, won't it?'

'Excellently.'

'There's the "Green Bushes" over the way. They have a very nice private

room upstairs.'

'Yes, that will do.' And passing out of the yard, the man with the

glance entered the inn with Sol, where they were shown to the parlour as

requested.

While the waiter was gone for some wine, which Mountclere ordered, the

more ingenuous of the two resumed the conversation by saying, awkwardly:

'Yes, Mrs. Petherwin is my sister, as you supposed, sir; but on her

account I do not let it be known.'

'Indeed,' said Mountclere. 'Well, I came to see you in order to speak of

a matter which I thought you might know more about than I do, for it has

taken me quite by surprise. My brother, Lord Mountclere, is, it seems,

to be privately married to Mrs. Petherwin to-morrow.'

'Is that really the fact?' said Sol, becoming quite shaken. 'I had no

thought that such a thing could be possible!'

'It is imminent.'

'Father has told me that she has lately got to know some nobleman; but I

never supposed there could be any meaning in that.'

'You were altogether wrong,' said Mountclere, leaning back in his chair

and looking at Sol steadily. 'Do you feel it to be a matter upon which

you will congratulate her?'

'A very different thing!' said Sol vehemently. 'Though he is your

brother, sir, I must say this, that I would rather she married the

poorest man I know.'

'Why?'

'From what my father has told me of him, he is not-a more desirable

brother-in-law to me than I shall be in all likelihood to him. What

business has a man of that character to marry Berta, I should like to

ask?'

'That's what I say,' returned Mountclere, revealing his satisfaction at

Sol's estimate of his noble brother: it showed that he had calculated

well in coming here. 'My brother is getting old, and he has lived

strangely: your sister is a highly respectable young lady.'

'And he is not respectable, you mean? I know he is not. I worked near

Enckworth once.'

'I cannot say that,' returned Mountclere. Possibly a certain fraternal

feeling repressed a direct assent: and yet this was the only

representation which could be expected to prejudice the young man

against the wedding, if he were such an one as the visitor supposed Sol

to be-a man vulgar in sentiment and ambition, but pure in his anxiety

for his sister's happiness. 'At any rate, we are agreed in thinking that

this would be an unfortunate marriage for both,' added Mountclere.

'About both I don't know. It may be a good thing for him. When do you

say it is to be, sir-to-morrow?'

'Yes.'

'I don't know what to do!' said Sol, walking up and down. 'If half what

I have heard is true, I would lose a winter's work to prevent her

marrying him. What does she want to go mixing in with people who despise

her for? Now look here, Mr. Mountclere, since you have been and called

me out to talk this over, it is only fair that you should tell me the

exact truth about your brother. Is it a lie, or is it true, that he is

not fit to be the husband of a decent woman?'

'That is a curious inquiry,' said Mountclere, whose manner and aspect,

neutral as a winter landscape, had little in common with Sol's warm and

unrestrained bearing. 'There are reasons why I think your sister will

not be happy with him.'

'Then it is true what they say,' said Sol, bringing down his fist upon

the table. 'I know your meaning well enough. What's to be done? If I

could only see her this minute, she might be kept out of it.'

'You think your presence would influence your sister-if you could see

her before the wedding?'

'I think it would. But who's to get at her?'

'I am going, so you had better come on with me-unless it would be best

for your father to come.'

'Perhaps it might,' said the bewildered Sol. 'But he will not be able to

get away; and it's no use for Dan to go. If anybody goes I must! If she

has made up her mind nothing can be done by writing to her.'

'I leave at once to see Lord Mountclere,' the other continued. 'I feel

that as my brother is evidently ignorant of the position of Mrs.

Petherwin's family and connections, it is only fair in me, as his

nearest relative, to make them clear to him before it is too late.'

'You mean that if he knew her friends were working-people he would not

think of her as a wife? 'Tis a reasonable thought. But make your mind

easy: she has told him. I make a great mistake if she has for a moment

thought of concealing that from him.'

'She may not have deliberately done so. But-and I say this with no ill-

feeling-it is a matter known to few, and she may have taken no steps to

undeceive him. I hope to bring him to see the matter clearly.

Unfortunately the thing has been so secret and hurried that there is

barely time. I knew nothing until this morning-never dreamt of such a

preposterous occurrence.'

'Preposterous! If it should come to pass, she would play her part as his

lady as well as any other woman, and better. I wish there was no more

reason for fear on my side than there is on yours! Things have come to a

sore head when she is not considered lady enough for such as he. But

perhaps your meaning is, that if your brother were to have a son, you

would lose your heir-presumptive title to the cor'net of Mountclere?

Well, 'twould be rather hard for ye, now I come to think o't-upon my

life, 'twould.'

'The suggestion is as delicate as the �- atmosphere of this vile room.

But let your ignorance be your excuse, my man. It is hardly worth while

for us to quarrel when we both have the same object in view: do you

think so?'

'That's true-that's true. When do you start, sir?'

'We must leave almost at once,' said Mountclere, looking at his watch.

'If we cannot catch the two o'clock train, there is no getting there to-

night-and to-morrow we could not possibly arrive before one.'

'I wish there was time for me to go and tidy myself a bit,' said Sol,

anxiously looking down at his working clothes. 'I suppose you would not

like me to go with you like this?'

'Confound the clothes! If you cannot start in five minutes, we shall not

be able to go at all.'

'Very well, then-wait while I run across to the shop, then I am ready.

How do we get to the station?'

'My carriage is at the corner waiting. When you come out I will meet you

at the gates.'

Sol then hurried downstairs, and a minute or two later Mr. Mountclere

followed, looking like a man bent on policy at any price. The carriage

was brought round by the time that Sol reappeared from the yard. He

entered and sat down beside Mountclere, not without a sense that he was

spoiling good upholstery; the coachman then allowed the lash of his whip

to alight with the force of a small fly upon the horses, which set them

up in an angry trot. Sol rolled on beside his new acquaintance with the

shamefaced look of a man going to prison in a van, for pedestrians

occasionally gazed at him, full of what seemed to himself to be ironical

surprise.

'I am afraid I ought to have changed my clothes after all,' he said,

writhing under a perception of the contrast between them. 'Not knowing

anything about this, I ain't a bit prepared. If I had got even my

second-best hat, it wouldn't be so bad.'

'It makes no difference,' said Mountclere inanimately.

'Or I might have brought my portmantle, with some things.'

'It really is not important.'

On reaching the station they found there were yet a few minutes to

spare, which Sol made use of in writing a note to his father, to explain

what had occurred.

42. THE DONCASTLES' RESIDENCE, AND OUTSIDE THE SAME

Mrs. Doncastle's dressing-bell had rung, but Menlove, the lady's maid,

having at the same time received a letter by the evening post, paused to

read it before replying to the summons:-

'ENCKWORTH COURT, Wednesday.

DARLING LOUISA,-I can assure you that I am no more likely than yourself

to form another attachment, as you will perceive by what follows.

Before we left town I thought that to be able to see you occasionally

was sufficient for happiness, but down in this lonely place the case is

different. In short, my dear, I ask you to consent to a union with me

as soon as you possibly can. Your prettiness has won my eyes and lips

completely, sweet, and I lie awake at night to think of the golden curls

you allowed to escape from their confinement on those nice times of

private clothes, when we walked in the park and slipped the bonds of

service, which you were never born to any more than I. . . .

'Had not my own feelings been so strong, I should have told you at the

first dash of my pen that what I expected is coming to pass at last-the

old dog is going to be privately married to Mrs. P. Yes, indeed, and

the wedding is coming off to-morrow, secret as the grave. All her

friends will doubtless leave service on account of it. What he does now

makes little difference to me, of course, as I had already given

warning, but I shall stick to him like a Briton in spite of it. He has

to-day made me a present, and a further five pounds for yourself,

expecting you to hold your tongue on every matter connected with Mrs.

P.'s friends, and to say nothing to any of them about this marriage

until it is over. His lordship impressed this upon me very strong, and

familiar as a brother, and of course we obey his instructions to the

letter; for I need hardly say that unless he keeps his promise to help

me in setting up the shop, our nuptials cannot be consumed. His help

depends upon our obedience, as you are aware. . . .'

This, and much more, was from her very last lover, Lord Mountclere's

valet, who had been taken in hand directly she had convinced herself of

Joey's hopeless youthfulness. The missive sent Mrs. Menlove's spirits

soaring like spring larks; she flew upstairs in answer to the bell with

a joyful, triumphant look, which the illuminated figure of Mrs.

Doncastle in her dressing-room could not quite repress. One could almost

forgive Menlove her arts when so modest a result brought such vast

content.

Mrs. Doncastle seemed inclined to make no remark during the dressing,

and at last Menlove could repress herself no longer.

'I should like to name something to you, m'm.'

'Yes.'

'I shall be wishing to leave soon, if it is convenient.'

'Very well, Menlove,' answered Mrs. Doncastle, as she serenely surveyed

her right eyebrow in the glass. 'Am I to take this as a formal notice?'

'If you please; but I could stay a week or two beyond the month if

suitable. I am going to be married-that's what it is, m'm.'

'O! I am glad to hear it, though I am sorry to lose you.'

'It is Lord Mountclere's valet-Mr. Tipman-m'm.'

'Indeed.'

Menlove went on building up Mrs. Doncastle's hair awhile in silence.

'I suppose you heard the other news that arrived in town to-day, m'm?'

she said again. 'Lord Mountclere is going to be married to-morrow.'

'To-morrow? Are you quite sure?'

'O yes, m'm. Mr. Tipman has just told me so in his letter. He is going

to be married to Mrs. Petherwin. It is to be quite a private wedding.'

Mrs. Doncastle made no remark, and she remained in the same still

position as before; but a countenance expressing transcendent surprise

was reflected to Menlove by the glass.

At this sight Menlove's tongue so burned to go further, and unfold the

lady's relations with the butler downstairs, that she would have lost a

month's wages to be at liberty to do it. The disclosure was almost too

magnificent to be repressed. To deny herself so exquisite an indulgence

required an effort which nothing on earth could have sustained save the

one thing that did sustain it-the knowledge that upon her silence hung

the most enormous desideratum in the world, her own marriage. She said

no more, and Mrs. Doncastle went away.

It was an ordinary family dinner that day, but their nephew Neigh

happened to be present. Just as they were sitting down Mrs. Doncastle

said to her husband: 'Why have you not told me of the wedding to-

morrow?-or don't you know anything about it?'

'Wedding?' said Mr. Doncastle.

'Lord Mountclere is to be married to Mrs. Petherwin quite privately.'

'Good God!' said some person.

Mr. Doncastle did not speak the words; they were not spoken by Neigh:

they seemed to float over the room and round the walls, as if

originating in some spiritualistic source. Yet Mrs. Doncastle,

remembering the symptoms of attachment between Ethelberta and her nephew

which had appeared during the summer, looked towards Neigh instantly, as

if she thought the words must have come from him after all; but Neigh's

face was perfectly calm; he, together with her husband, was sitting with

his eyes fixed in the direction of the sideboard; and turning to the

same spot she beheld Chickerel standing pale as death, his lips being

parted as if he did not know where he was.

'Did you speak?' said Mrs. Doncastle, looking with astonishment at the

butler.

'Chickerel, what's the matter-are you ill?' said Mr. Doncastle

simultaneously. 'Was it you who said that?'

'I did, sir,' said Chickerel in a husky voice, scarcely above a whisper.

'I could not help it.'

'Why?'

'She is my daughter, and it shall be known at once!'

'Who is your daughter?'

He paused a few moments nervously. 'Mrs. Petherwin,' he said.

Upon this announcement Neigh looked at poor Chickerel as if he saw

through him into the wall. Mrs. Doncastle uttered a faint exclamation

and leant back in her chair: the bare possibility of the truth of

Chickerel's claims to such paternity shook her to pieces when she viewed

her intimacies with Ethelberta during the past season-the court she had

paid her, the arrangements she had entered into to please her; above

all, the dinner-party which she had contrived and carried out solely to

gratify Lord Mountclere and bring him into personal communication with

the general favourite; thus making herself probably the chief though

unconscious instrument in promoting a match by which her butler was to

become father-in-law to a peer she delighted to honour. The crowd of

perceptions almost took away her life; she closed her eyes in a white

shiver.

'Do you mean to say that the lady who sat here at dinner at the same

time that Lord Mountclere was present, is your daughter?' asked

Doncastle.

'Yes, sir,' said Chickerel respectfully.

'How did she come to be your daughter?'

'I- Well, she is my daughter, sir.'

'Did you educate her?'

'Not altogether, sir. She was a very clever child. Lady Petherwin took a

deal of trouble about her education. They were both left widows about

the same time: the son died, then the father. My daughter was only

seventeen then. But though she's older now, her marriage with Lord

Mountclere means misery. He ought to marry another woman.'

'It is very extraordinary,' Mr. Doncastle murmured. 'If you are ill you

had better go and rest yourself, Chickerel. Send in Thomas.'

Chickerel, who seemed to be much disturbed, then very gladly left the

room, and dinner proceeded. But such was the peculiarity of the case,

that, though there was in it neither murder, robbery, illness, accident,

fire, or any other of the tragic and legitimate shakers of human nerves,

two of the three who were gathered there sat through the meal without

the least consciousness of what viands had composed it. Impressiveness

depends as much upon propinquity as upon magnitude; and to have honoured

unawares the daughter of the vilest Antipodean miscreant and murderer

would have been less discomfiting to Mrs. Doncastle than it was to make

the same blunder with the daughter of a respectable servant who happened

to live in her own house. To Neigh the announcement was as the

catastrophe of a story already begun, rather than as an isolated wonder.

Ethelberta's words had prepared him for something, though the nature of

that thing was unknown.

'Chickerel ought not to have kept us in ignorance of this-of course he

ought not!' said Mrs. Doncastle, as soon as they were left alone.

'I don't see why not,' replied Mr. Doncastle, who took the matter very

coolly, as was his custom.

'Then she herself should have let it be known.'

'Nor does that follow. You didn't tell Mrs. Petherwin that your

grandfather narrowly escaped hanging for shooting his rival in a duel.'

'Of course not. There was no reason why I should give extraneous

information.'

'Nor was there any reason why she should. As for Chickerel, he doubtless

felt how unbecoming it would be to make personal remarks upon one of

your guests-Ha-ha-ha! Well, well-Ha-ha-ha-ha!'

'I know this,' said Mrs. Doncastle, in great anger, 'that if my father

had been in the room, I should not have let the fact pass unnoticed, and

treated him like a stranger!'

'Would you have had her introduce Chickerel to us all round? My dear

Margaret, it was a complicated position for a woman.'

'Then she ought not to have come!'

'There may be something in that, though she was dining out at other

houses as good as ours. Well, I should have done just as she did, for

the joke of the thing. Ha-ha-ha!-it is very good-very. It was a case in

which the appetite for a jest would overpower the sting of conscience in

any well-constituted being-that, my dear, I must maintain.'

'I say she should not have come!' answered Mrs. Doncastle firmly. 'Of

course I shall dismiss Chickerel.'

'Of course you will do no such thing. I have never had a butler in the

house before who suited me so well. It is a great credit to the man to

have such a daughter, and I am not sure that we do not derive some

lustre of a humble kind from his presence in the house. But, seriously,

I wonder at your short-sightedness, when you know the troubles we have

had through getting new men from nobody knows where.'

Neigh, perceiving that the breeze in the atmosphere might ultimately

intensify to a palpable black squall, seemed to think it would be well

to take leave of his uncle and aunt as soon as he conveniently could;

nevertheless, he was much less discomposed by the situation than by the

active cause which had led to it. When Mrs. Doncastle arose, her husband

said he was going to speak to Chickerel for a minute or two, and Neigh

followed his aunt upstairs.

Presently Doncastle joined them. 'I have been talking to Chickerel,' he

said. 'It is a very curious affair-this marriage of his daughter and

Lord Mountclere. The whole situation is the most astounding I have ever

met with. The man is quite ill about the news. He has shown me a letter

which has just reached him from his son on the same subject. Lord

Mountclere's brother and this young man have actually gone off together

to try to prevent the wedding, and Chickerel has asked to be allowed to

go himself, if he can get soon enough to the station to catch the night

mail. Of course he may go if he wishes.'

'What a funny thing!' said the lady, with a wretchedly factitious smile.

'The times have taken a strange turn when the angry parent of the

comedy, who goes post-haste to prevent the undutiful daughter's rash

marriage, is a gentleman from below stairs, and the unworthy lover a

peer of the realm!'

Neigh spoke for almost the first time. 'I don't blame Chickerel in

objecting to Lord Mountclere. I should object to him myself if I had a

daughter. I never liked him.'

'Why?' said Mrs. Doncastle, lifting her eyelids as if the act were a

heavy task.

'For reasons which don't generally appear.'

'Yes,' said Mr. Doncastle, in a low tone. 'Still, we must not believe

all we hear.'

'Is Chickerel going?' said Neigh.

'He leaves in five or ten minutes,' said Doncastle.

After a few further words Neigh mentioned that he was unable to stay

longer that evening, and left them. When he had reached the outside of

the door he walked a little way up the pavement and back again, as if

reluctant to lose sight of the street, finally standing under a lamp-

post whence he could command a view of Mr. Doncastle's front. Presently

a man came out in a great-coat and with a small bag in his hand; Neigh

at once recognizing the person as Chickerel, went up to him.

'Mr. Doncastle tells me you are going on a sudden journey. At what time

does your train leave?' Neigh asked.

'I go by the ten o'clock, sir: I hope it is a third-class,' said

Chickerel; 'though I am afraid it may not be.'

'It is as much as you will do to get to the station,' said Neigh,

turning the face of his watch to the light. 'Here, come into my cab-I am

driving that way.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Chickerel.

Neigh called a cab at the first opportunity, and they entered and drove

along together. Neither spoke during the journey. When they were driving

up to the station entrance Neigh looked again to see the hour.

'You have not a minute to lose,' he said, in repressed anxiety. 'And

your journey will be expensive: instead of walking from Anglebury to

Knollsea, you had better drive-above all, don't lose time. Never mind

what class the train is. Take this from me, since the emergency is

great.' He handed something to Chickerel folded up small.

The butler took it without inquiry, and stepped out hastily.

'I sincerely hope she- Well, good-night, Chickerel,' continued Neigh,

ending his words abruptly. The cab containing him drove again towards

the station-gates, leaving Chickerel standing on the kerb.

He passed through the booking-office, and looked at the paper Neigh had

put into his hand. It was a five-pound note.

Chickerel mused on the circumstance as he took his ticket and got into

the train.

43. THE RAILWAY-THE SEA-THE SHORE BEYOND

By this time Sol and the Honourable Edgar Mountclere had gone far on

their journey into Wessex. Enckworth Court, Mountclere's destination,

though several miles from Knollsea, was most easily accessible by the

same route as that to the village, the latter being the place for which

Sol was bound.

From the few words that passed between them on the way, Mountclere

became more stubborn than ever in a belief that this was a carefully

laid trap of the fair Ethelberta's to ensnare his brother without

revealing to him her family ties, which it therefore behoved him to make

clear, with the utmost force of representation, before the fatal union

had been contracted. Being himself the viscount's only remaining brother

and near relative, the disinterestedness of his motives may be left to

imagination; that there was much real excuse for his conduct must,

however, be borne in mind. Whether his attempt would prevent the union

was another question: he believed that, conjoined with his personal

influence over the viscount, and the importation of Sol as a firebrand

to throw between the betrothed pair, it might do so.

About half-an-hour before sunset the two individuals, HANDlinked by

their differences, reached the point of railway at which the branch to

Sandbourne left the main line. They had taken tickets for Sandbourne,

intending to go thence to Knollsea by the steamer that plied between the

two places during the summer months-making this a short and direct

route. But it occurred to Mountclere on the way that, summer being over,

the steamer might possibly have left off running, the wind might be too

high for a small boat, and no large one might be at hand for hire:

therefore it would be safer to go by train to Anglebury, and the

remaining sixteen miles by driving over the hills, even at a great loss

of time.

Accident, however, determined otherwise. They were in the station at the

junction, inquiring of an official if the Speedwell had ceased to sail,

when a countryman who had just come up from Sandbourne stated that,

though the Speedwell had left off for the year, there was that day

another steamer at Sandbourne. This steamer would of necessity return to

Knollsea that evening, partly because several people from that place had

been on board, and also because the Knollsea folk were waiting for

groceries and draperies from London: there was not an ounce of tea or a

hundredweight of coal in the village, owing to the recent winds, which

had detained the provision parcels at Sandbourne, and kept the colliers

up-channel until the change of weather this day. To introduce

necessaries by a roundabout land journey was not easy when they had been

ordered by the other and habitual route. The boat returned at six

o'clock.

So on they went to Sandbourne, driving off to the pier directly they

reached that place, for it was getting towards night. The steamer was

there, as the man had told them, much to the relief of Sol, who, being

extremely anxious to enter Knollsea before a late hour, had known that

this was the only way in which it could be done.

Some unforeseen incident delayed the boat, and they walked up and down

the pier to wait. The prospect was gloomy enough. The wind was north-

east; the sea along shore was a chalky-green, though comparatively calm,

this part of the coast forming a shelter from wind in its present

quarter. The clouds had different velocities, and some of them shone

with a coppery glare, produced by rays from the west which did not enter

the inferior atmosphere at all. It was reflected on the distant waves in

patches, with an effect as if the waters were at those particular spots

stained with blood. This departed, and what daylight was left to the

earth came from strange and unusual quarters of the heavens. The zenith

would be bright, as if that were the place of the sun; then all overhead

would close, and a whiteness in the east would give the appearance of

morning; while a bank as thick as a wall barricaded the west, which

looked as if it had no acquaintance with sunsets, and would blush red no

more.

'Any other passengers?' shouted the master of the steamboat. 'We must be

off: it may be a dirty night.'

Sol and Mountclere went on board, and the pier receded in the dusk.

'Shall we have any difficulty in getting into Knollsea Bay?' said

Mountclere.

'Not if the wind keeps where it is for another hour or two.'

'I fancy it is shifting to the east'ard,' said Sol.

The captain looked as if he had thought the same thing.

'I hope I shall be able to get home to-night,' said a Knollsea woman.

'My little children be left alone. Your mis'ess is in a bad way, too-

isn't she, skipper?'

'Yes.'

'And you've got the doctor from Sandbourne aboard, to tend her?'

'Yes.'

'Then you'll be sure to put into Knollsea, if you can?'

'Yes. Don't be alarmed, ma'am. We'll do what we can. But no one must

boast.'

The skipper's remark was the result of an observation that the wind had

at last flown to the east, the single point of the compass whence it

could affect Knollsea Bay. The result of this change was soon

perceptible. About midway in their transit the land elbowed out to a

bold chalk promontory; beyond this stretched a vertical wall of the same

cliff, in a line parallel with their course. In fair weather it was

possible and customary to steer close along under this hoary facade for

the distance of a mile, there being six fathoms of water within a few

boats' lengths of the precipice. But it was an ugly spot at the best of

times, landward no less than seaward, the cliff rounding off at the top

in vegetation, like a forehead with low-grown hair, no defined edge

being provided as a warning to unwary pedestrians on the downs above.

As the wind sprung up stronger, white clots could be discerned at the

water level of the cliff, rising and falling against the black band of

shaggy weed that formed a sort of skirting to the base of the wall. They

were the first-fruits of the new east blast, which shaved the face of

the cliff like a razor-gatherings of foam in the shape of heads,

shoulders, and arms of snowy whiteness, apparently struggling to rise

from the deeps, and ever sinking back to their old levels again. They

reminded an observer of a drowning scene in a picture of the Deluge. At

some points the face of rock was hollowed into gaping caverns, and the

water began to thunder into these with a leap that was only topped by

the rebound seaward again. The vessel's head was kept a little further

to sea, but beyond that everything went on as usual.

The precipice was still in view, and before it several huge columns of

rock appeared, detached from the mass behind. Two of these were

particularly noticeable in the grey air-one vertical, stout and square;

the other slender and tapering. They were individualized as husband and

wife by the coast men. The waves leapt up their sides like a pack of

hounds; this, however, though fearful in its boisterousness, was nothing

to the terrible games that sometimes went on round the knees of those

giants in stone. Yet it was sufficient to cause the course of the frail

steamboat to be altered yet a little more-from south-west-by-south to

south-by-west-to give the breakers a still wider berth.

'I wish we had gone by land, sir; 'twould have been surer play,' said

Sol to Mountclere, a cat-and-dog friendship having arisen between them.

'Yes,' said Mountclere. 'Knollsea is an abominable place to get into

with an east wind blowing, they say.'

Another circumstance conspired to make their landing more difficult,

which Mountclere knew nothing of. With the wind easterly, the highest

sea prevailed in Knollsea Bay from the slackening of flood-tide to the

first hour of ebb. At that time the water outside stood without a

current, and ridges and hollows chased each other towards the beach

unchecked. When the tide was setting strong up or down Channel its flow

across the mouth of the bay thrust aside, to some extent, the landward

plunge of the waves.

We glance for a moment at the state of affairs on the land they were

nearing.

This was the time of year to know the truth about the inner nature and

character of Knollsea; for to see Knollsea smiling to the summer sun was

to see a courtier before a king; Knollsea was not to be known by such

simple means. The half-dozen detached villas used as lodging-houses in

the summer, standing aloof from the cots of the permanent race, rose in

the dusk of this gusty evening, empty, silent, damp, and dark as tombs.

The gravel walks leading to them were invaded by leaves and tufts of

grass. As the darkness thickened the wind increased, and each blast

raked the iron railings before the houses till they hummed as if in a

song of derision. Certainly it seemed absurd at this time of year that

human beings should expect comfort in a spot capable of such moods as

these.

However, one of the houses looked cheerful, and that was the dwelling to

which Ethelberta had gone. Its gay external colours might as well have

been black for anything that could be seen of them now, but an unblinded

window revealed inside it a room bright and warm. It was illuminated by

firelight only. Within, Ethelberta appeared against the curtains, close

to the glass. She was watching through a binocular a faint light which

had become visible in the direction of the bluff far away over the bay.

'Here is the Spruce at last, I think,' she said to her sister, who was

by the fire. 'I hope they will be able to land the things I have

ordered. They are on board I know.'

The wind continued to rise till at length something from the lungs of

the gale alighted like a feather upon the pane, and remained there

sticking. Seeing the substance, Ethelberta opened the window to secure

it. The fire roared and the pictures kicked the walls; she closed the

sash, and brought to the light a crisp fragment of foam.

'How suddenly the sea must have risen,' said Picotee.

The servant entered the room. 'Please, mis'ess says she is afraid you

won't have your things to-night, 'm. They say the steamer can't land,

and mis'ess wants to know if she can do anything?'

'It is of no consequence,' said Ethelberta. 'They will come some time,

unless they go to the bottom.'

The girl left the room. 'Shall we go down to the shore and see what the

night is like?' said Ethelberta. 'This is the last opportunity I shall

have.'

'Is it right for us to go, considering you are to be married to-morrow?'

said Picotee, who had small affection for nature in this mood.

Her sister laughed. 'Let us put on our cloaks-nobody will know us. I am

sorry to leave this grim and primitive place, even for Enckworth Court.'

They wrapped themselves up, and descended the hill.

On drawing near the battling line of breakers which marked the meeting

of sea and land they could perceive within the nearly invisible horizon

an equilateral triangle of lights. It was formed of three stars, a red

on the one side, a green on the other, and a white on the summit. This,

composed of mast-head and side lamps, was all that was visible of the

Spruce, which now faced end-on about half-a-mile distant, and was still

nearing the pier. The girls went further, and stood on the foreshore,

listening to the din. Seaward appeared nothing distinct save a black

horizontal band embodying itself out of the grey water, strengthening

its blackness, and enlarging till it looked like a nearing wall. It was

the concave face of a coming wave. On its summit a white edging arose

with the aspect of a lace frill; it broadened, and fell over the front

with a terrible concussion. Then all before them was a sheet of

whiteness, which spread with amazing rapidity, till they found

themselves standing in the midst of it, as in a field of snow. Both felt

an insidious chill encircling their ankles, and they rapidly ran up the

beach.

'You girls, come away there, or you'll be washed off: what need have ye

for going so near?'

Ethelberta recognized the stentorian voice as that of Captain Flower,

who, with a party of boatmen, was discovered to be standing near, under

the shelter of a wall. He did not know them in the gloom, and they took

care that he should not. They retreated further up the beach, when the

hissing fleece of froth slid again down the shingle, dragging the

pebbles under it with a rattle as of a beast gnawing bones.

The spot whereon the men stood was called 'Down-under-wall;' it was a

nook commanding a full view of the bay, and hither the nautical portion

of the village unconsciously gravitated on windy afternoons and nights,

to discuss past disasters in the reticent spirit induced by a sense that

they might at any moment be repeated. The stranger who should walk the

shore on roaring and sobbing November eves when there was not light

sufficient to guide his footsteps, and muse on the absoluteness of the

solitude, would be surprised by a smart 'Good-night' being returned from

this corner in company with the echo of his tread. In summer the six or

eight perennial figures stood on the breezy side of the wall-in winter

and in rain to leeward; but no weather was known to dislodge them.

'I had no sooner come ashore than the wind began to fly round,' said the

previous speaker; 'and it must have been about the time they were off

Old-Harry Point. "She'll put back for certain," I said; and I had no

more thought o' seeing her than John's set-net that was carried round

the point o' Monday.'

'Poor feller: his wife being in such a state makes him anxious to land

if 'a can: that's what 'tis, plain enough.'