CHAPTER XXIV.

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THE PILLARS OF THE HOUSE;

Or,

Under Wode, Under Rode.

by

CHARLOTTE M. YONGE

Author of 'The Heir of Redclyffe,' etc.

In Two Volumes.

VOL II.

London:

Macmillan and Co.

1875.

CONTENTS TO VOL II.

XXIV. FAMILY GHOOLS

XXV. DON GIOVANNI

XXVI. TRANSMUTATION

XXVII. DON OR MYNHEER

XXVIII. STARS GRATIS

XXIX. BRYNHILD

XXX. THE SCULPTOR

XXXI. THE BARBE BLONDE

XXXII. THE NID D'AVIS

XXXIII. A BOOTLESS BENE

XXXIV. THE VICAR OF VALE LESTON

XXXV. THE OLD SQUIRE AND THE NEW

XXXVI. POSSESSION

XXXVII. INVASIONS

XXXVIII. K.T.

XXXIX. FOUR YEARS

XL. A K T STROPHE

XLI. CHESTS AND HEARTS

XLII. A HALCYON DAY

XLIII. PRINCESS FAIR-STAR

XLIV. THE FIDDLER'S RANCH

XLV. THE MYRTLE SPRAY

XLVI. SOUR GRAPES

XLVII. THE TASK OVER

XLVIII. SHATTERED PILLARS

XLIX. THE RIVAL OWLS

CONCLUSION

THE PILLARS OF THE HOUSE;

OR,

UNDER WODE, UNDER RODE.

CHAPTER XXIV.

FAMILY GHOOLS.

'Know ye that Love is a careless child,

And forgets promise past?

He is blind--he is deaf where he list,

And in faith never fast.'

_Raleigh_.

Captain Harewood was gone. There was a good deal of truth in Wilmet's

plea that much pain might have been saved if she had been allowed to

abide by her first answer; but by this time she would not have saved it.

She was a brave woman, and never sought indulgence; and all she

accepted was the spending his last Saturday and Sunday at his home with

him; and even on this she durst not venture without taking Alda, and

exposing the dear untidy household to her disdain; but that October

Sunday walk by the river was worth it all--worth infinitely more than

the July walk; and they both declared it gave them strength.

Wilmet returned in time for Monday's school, nor did she give in all

the week; but she looked whiter and whiter, and on Saturday morning

turned so faint while dressing, that Alda in a great fright called in

Sibby; and the unprecedented event occurred of her spending two whole

days in bed. She only begged to be let alone; and after this space of

quiet came down again fully recovered, only, as Geraldine daily felt,

softer, gentler, tenderer, less severely strict, and moreover a less

hard mistress to her own beauty.

Meantime Alda grew increasingly restless and drooping as the autumn

advanced. The confined rooms and monotonous life really affected

health accustomed to variety, change, and luxury; nor could idleness,

disappointment, or ill-humour be wholesome diet. Listless and weary,

she dropped all semblance of occupation, except novel reading; and

there she perversely set her mind on whatever Froggatt and Underwood

wished to keep out of their library. If Ferdinand did come down for a

Sunday, they both looked at the end of it as if they had been worrying

one another to death; if he did not come down, she was affronted and

miserable. Her restlessness was increased by the fact that people were

returning to their winter-quarters in London, and it was to be inferred

that the Thomas Underwoods might soon be there; but Marilda had not

the art of letter-writing, and though she had several times sent a few

warm-hearted lines, encouraging Alda's correspondence, this had dropped

soon after the yearly migration to Spa; and no more was known of the

family movements till there was a letter from Edgar to Cherry. He was

a very uncertain correspondent--always delightful, affectionate, and

amusing, when he did write, but often not doing so for weeks together;

and nothing had been heard of him since he had as usual gone abroad in

the middle of the summer.

He now wrote from Spa, in amazement at the accumulation of family

events which Marilda had poured upon him, and especially desirous to

know how _any_ captain of any service had ventured upon accosting W.W.

He could not recover the loss it had been not to witness the siege and

the surrender! For himself, Cherry gathered that he had begun, as he

had led her to suppose he would, with the Channel Isles; but whether

he had seen Alice she could not make out; and he had then made his

way, wandering and sketching in old Continental towns, as he had done

last year. He always declared that it answered; he could dispose of

his sketches when he came home, and could likewise write clever bright

descriptions, that could usually command tolerable remuneration. This

time, however, he had been nearly reduced to the condition of George

Primrose, and had made his way to join the family caravan at Spa, by

way of getting helped home.

There he was hailed with delight, for Mr. Underwood was very unwell

and irritable, prejudiced against German doctors, yet not choosing

to have advice from England, and not fit for a journey without some

effective person to rule him and his wife; for resolute as Marilda

could be, the passionateness of one parent, and the fat flabby

helplessness of the other, had overcome her powers of management at

such a distance from home. It was Edgar's private belief that 'the

poor old boy had had some kind of stroke;' but he had recommended

the homeward journey, and under his escort it was to be immediately

undertaken. A few days more, and tidings came that it had been

successfully accomplished. Mr. Underwood had grown better at every

stage, and now scouted the notion of a doctor; Alda's letters of

inquiry were joyously answered and her spirits sank.

One afternoon, however, a moon face beamed upon Felix, and a hearty

voice exclaimed, 'How d'ye do? This is a surprise, ain't it? My father

is come down on business, so I made him bring me. I don't like Alda's

account of herself.'

'I'll take you to her,' said Felix, who decidedly disapproved of

private greetings in the present locality; so as soon as she had dealt

with her fly, he conducted her upstairs. Her father had gone to Mr.

Bruce, and would come for her. Alda was alone in the drawing-room,

but she sprang to her feet in ecstacy; and the two cousins were soon

clinging together, and devouring one another with kisses. Felix asked

where Cherry was.

'Oh! for pity's sake, Felix, do let us have a little time to

ourselves!' said Alda; 'I'll call Cherry by the time she has done with

Stella.'

Felix had come to trust nothing concerning Geraldine to Alda; so he

shut the door, and found Cherry in her own room, overlooking Stella's

copy to the sound of Theodore's accordion, all three in warm jackets.

Six months ago he would have made an authoritative remonstrance. Now

he had learnt that cold and exile were more tolerable than Alda's

displeasure.

Stella leapt up, connecting Cousin Marilda's name with the choicest

presents; but Cherry was quite willing to withhold herself. It was

eight years since she had seen Marilda, and she was conscious of more

repulsion than attraction. She was still debating between civility and

consideration for the _tête-à-tête_, when Wilmet, for whom Felix had

sent, came for her, with cheeks glowing from Marilda's energetic kisses

and congratulations.

There certainly was a treading on the delicate tips of the feelings.

'O Geraldine, I am glad to see you getting about so well! You are a

courageous girl.' Then to Stella: 'You little darling duck! Here is a

box of goodies for you and the other poor little dear.--Where is he?

You'll let me see him.--What, Lance! I've not seen you since I found

you up a tree!'

The cousinly cordiality was pleasant, and her patronage was not coarse,

like her mother's; but there was a certain excess of frankness that

made them feel like sensitive-plants, when she examined Wilmet how

often she heard from India, and how the Harewoods treated her--when

she wanted to know exactly how matters stood between the Pursuivant

and Tribune, whether Mr. Smith were to blame, why Lance had gone into

the business, and--worse than all--what was the measure of Theodore's

intellect.

It was all meant in kindness and sympathy, but it was very trying to

each victim in turn; and the lookers-on found it as impossible to lead

it away as to divert the rush from a pump. When Felix was about to

return to his work, Marilda jumped up, exclaiming, 'Felix, I must speak

to you;' and when she had him alone in the drawing-room, she began,

'Felix, I must take Alda home. We can't get on without her; and she

looks very poorly, and all that nonsense is blown over.'

'You know she is still engaged.'

'Oh yes; but no one will think of that unless it is brought forward,

and that she promises not to do.'

'I believe it will be best,' he answered. 'Our life is not suited to

her, and she is neither well nor happy; but it is very kind of you.'

'Kind to ourselves. If Wilmet had married at once we should never have

got her back at all, and we want her sadly. I can help my father in

some ways, but I can't amuse him as she can. You don't mind?'

'Certainly not, if Mr. and Mrs. Underwood wish it,' said Felix,

wondering how Alda made herself either amusing or useful; 'I suppose it

is all right, and that they know how it stands.'

'Of course they do. They will only be too glad to have her; and though

it is better to say nothing about it just yet, very likely it may end

in his coming into our house, and being what Edgar might have been. How

well he has behaved!'

'So has some one else,' thought Felix, as he saw her glistening eye;

but he only answered, 'He is an excellent fellow.'

'Another thing, Felix. This engagement of Edgar's--is it in earnest?'

'Yes!' emphatically said Felix; 'I trust so.'

'You! I should have thought nothing could be more foolish. Is she such

a nice girl, then?'

He had had time to recollect himself, and answered in his set manner,

'She is all that could be wished; and though of course there is a

certain imprudence in the engagement, I can only wish to see Edgar

persevere honourably in what he has undertaken.'

'But wouldn't it be great misery?'

'It might be,' said Felix; 'but it is not going to happen yet. Of

course, no one could have wished it to begin; but having begun, he

ought to go on.'

'Of course! I hate shilly-shally. My father would not believe there

was anything in it. But you are right, Felix; it has done Edgar good.

Somehow there's more purpose in him; and I believe he has worked more

steadily this season. I am so glad you say she is a nice girl.'

And Felix went down to his work happier than he had been for nearly a

year. What loss to himself equalled the gain of such a report of Edgar?

Marilda insisted on being shown every corner of the house, and was

evidently full of enjoyment, like a child let loose from school,

talking at random, so as to draw on herself more than one remonstrance

from Alda, who had perfectly recovered her good-humour, and was

absolutely gracious to Cherry.

About four o'clock came Thomas Underwood, embracing Alda like another

daughter. 'My poor child, you are not looking well.'

'Not at all, papa,' said Marilda. 'We will take her home, and set her

up again.'

'Ay, we will!' said her father. 'It has been a pretty muddle

altogether; but there--we'll say no more about it. You'll come home,

and be a wise girl.'

'O Uncle, how kind you are!' cried Alda.

Wilmet and Cherry looked at each other in amaze. What might this mean?

How could Alda bear to be received back on such terms? But they could

say nothing; indeed, they were scarcely seen till the greeting to Alda

was over. Then, however, he made up for it by hearty kisses, for which

they were not prepared; and Wilmet coloured crimson as she was again

congratulated and rallied on her slyness in making the most of her time

at Minsterham.

The illness at Spa had told upon Thomas Underwood. He was still under

fifty, but an elderly look and manner had come on him; he walked

feebly, and seemed to look to his daughter to help him out with

purposes and recollections; while towards Alda there was an almost

imploring tenderness, as if she had carried away with her a good deal

of the enjoyment of his life, which he hoped to bring back again with

her. He did not even seem to like leaving her for the evening to pack

up, but wanted her to come out to Centry Park, and caught eagerly at

Marilda's proposal that Felix should come and spend the evening there.

It was as if they were both afraid of their own dullness in the great

uninhabited house; and no doubt they would have caught at an invitation

to share the family meal. Alda and Wilmet, for different reasons, sat

in dread of Felix, in the reckless hospitality of the male heart,

making such an offer; and in very truth, he was only withheld by

certain authoritatively deprecating glances from those housewifely eyes.

And let it be observed that Wilmet was right. She could not have fed

Mr. Underwood as would have suited him on such short notice, without

a great deal more expense and personal exertion than would have been

becoming; and to his eyes, their ordinary fare would have seemed

ostentation of neediness.

Needy was exactly what the Underwoods had never been. It was not merely

the effect of conscience and of resolution, but of Wilmet's more than

ordinary power of method and adjustment, which had kept them from ever

being behindhand, or in difficulties requiring external aid; and it was

this that had won them already respect that hardly belonged to their

years.

Thomas Underwood really respected Felix, as one who had never asked

assistance from him, yet who had not declined what was offered in

a friendly kinsman-like manner; and besides, had more than once

asserted--modestly indeed, but still asserted--an independent will

and way of his own, and shown that he was capable of carrying it out.

It was five years since Mr. Underwood's prediction that he would find

the attempt keeping house for such a family an utter failure, and would

have to fall back on help he had not deserved: and here he was, without

having made one demand, a partner in the business, and with so small a

fraction of the family apparent, that there was no air of oppression,

no complaint, even though Thomas himself had returned on his hands both

those of whom he had meant to relieve him.

No wonder, then, that without intending it, his manner to Felix was

not that of patron, but of equal--of kinsman to kinsman, not of rich

man to struggling youth. And Felix, as he sat in the great handsome

dining-room, could not help being amused at all the state that had

followed one man and his daughter for one dinner in their own house:

the courses, and the silver, and the perplexing family of wine-glasses

beside every plate, and all with the Underwood rood and its motto

shining on him--whether on the servant's buttons, on the panels of the

oak-wainscotted hall, and the very china from which he ate his dinner.

Nothing interested Mr. Underwood more than the account of the visit to

Vale Leston; and warming up under the influence of dinner, he talked

much of the old times there, and with much disparagement of the two

present Fulberts; but Felix was startled to find that he regarded

himself as next in the succession.

'If you could only have gone into the Church, Felix, I could have given

you the Vicarage. Or is not one of your brothers to be a parson?'

'Yes, Sir--Clement,' said Felix, smiling, but feeling a sense of injury

that revealed to him how much more he must be reckoning on the chances

than he had supposed himself to be doing. As Alda said, wealth flowed

to wealth; and a little attention from Thomas to his cousins would

easily turn the scale.

At any rate, poverty did not suit Alda. She was a different creature

now that her exile was coming to an end.

'It had been like Portsmouth to Fanny Price,' said Geraldine, not

greatly flattered by the overflow of benevolence, which Wilmet accepted

as the token of real affection.

What would she do about Ferdinand? Wilmet ventured to ask.

'He certainly must not call,' said Alda; 'that would never do; but with

Edgar's help it will be manageable enough. It will do the gentleman no

harm to have a few difficulties in his way. I don't want him to feel

his coming such a favour.'

So Alda went; and must it be owned, if there was more peace in

the house, there was also a certain flatness after the incessant

excitements of the former part of the year. At least so Geraldine

felt, and hated herself for feeling, when the numbers had come down to

'the peace establishment,' and she had no companions but Stella and

Theodore through the greater part of the day. She had been recommended

to walk, when the weather permitted, for half an hour every day; and

whenever it was possible, Felix contrived that he or Lance should be

her companion; but as the days shortened, and it became less easy to

contrive this, the constitutional turns up and down the narrow garden

were more dispiriting than sitting occupied upstairs, especially when

she viewed this distaste as frightful unthankfulness; and even when

one of the brothers took her out in the street, or to the 'People's

Park,' though she was happy with them, the wearisome sameness and

dull ugliness of the town oppressed and wearied her; and to be taken

out by Wilmet on a Saturday was more wearing still. Each brother was

her devoted cavalier; but Wilmet, though kind and considerate, made

airing Cherry a secondary object; and to be set upon a high chair in

a shop, to see Wilmet bargain, was what she did not love. She might

have admired to see Wilmet's perfect knowledge of articles and their

value, and the manifest esteem in which that experience was held by

the respectable tradesmen, who did not scruple to tell her that they

had thought 'this will just suit Miss Underwood;' while her scorn and

indignation at an encounter with a Cheap Jack were something rich. But

though Cherry could describe such an expedition with humour that threw

Felix and Lance into a convulsion of merriment, it was very wearisome

to her; and the more she knew it ought to be instructive, the more

it depressed her, and made her feel, as never before, the straitness

of the family means. She longed wearily at times for the sight of

something beautiful. Edgar's descriptions came back on her with an

almost sick longing. She had made much progress in drawing, but the

want of criticism, instruction, or models, made her feel baffled; and

when her brothers and sisters admired most, she was most dissatisfied.

Edgar's criticism alone was worth anything to her æsthetic sense, and

gave her real assistance; and his not coming home was a great loss to

her art, as well as to her affection and intellect. Those windows that

he opened to her of all lovely scenes and forms in nature or art, his

brilliant stories of artist society and foreign manners, could not

but be greatly missed as she lived her monotonous life, not without

intellectual interest, for that came to her through the help she was

able to render to Felix in his newspaper work, and the books she

reviewed or discussed with him; but it was not the living interest of

actual communication at secondhand with that outer world, which looked

so full of beauty, and of all that was bright and charming; and then

poor little Cherry applied to herself all the warnings about not loving

the world.

Her aspiring compositions and her studies in drawing she almost laid

aside in a fit of hopeless disgust, and she applied herself to what was

less improving, but more immediately profitable. She and Lance took to

the manufacture of Christmas cards, she taking the sentiment and he

the comedy; and what they produced by their joint efforts were pretty

and clever enough to bring in an amount of pocket-money that was very

agreeable to those who otherwise would have had no claim to any.

The chief outer interest was, as usual, parish affairs. Mr. Bevan was

too ill to come home; but Mr. Mowbray Smith's resignation was accepted,

and he was to go at the beginning of the new year, while his successor

was reported to be elderly and wise.

Another interest, that was not at all bad for Cherry, was stirred up

by her brothers. There was an interminable family belonging to one of

the printers, who died, leaving them in circumstances that somewhat

parodied those of the Underwoods themselves; and in which the example

as well as the counsel of the young master was no doubt a great

incentive and assistance to the pillars of the still humbler house.

There was a perennial supply of 'little Lightfoots,' to fill the office

elegantly termed printer's devil; and the existing imp being taken

young from school, Felix had his education on his conscience, and asked

Cherry to give him lessons after hours. She was at first desperately

afraid of the boy, and only accepted the work when she found that if

she did not, Felix would impose it on himself; but by-and-by she became

enough interested, and enjoyed enough devotion from her pupil, to make

the time she daily expended upon him not far from one of the pleasures

of her life.

So came on a winter of unusual bitterness; and the holidays filled

the house, bringing Bernard back under an entirely new phase. At

Stoneborough he had discovered that it was some distinction to be an

Underwood of Vale Leston, and his accession of dignity was enormous. He

regarded the Nareses from a monstrous elevation; and thus infinitely

scandalized Angela, who had a great hatred of pretension, and whose

laughter threatened to dissolve their mutual alliance, offensive and

defensive. Their janglings were a novelty, and not a pleasant one; and

one bitter afternoon, when a sore throat had made Felix come up early

from the shop, Cherry quite rejoiced that Bernard was reported to be

reading downstairs.

And there sat Felix by the fire, with Theodore at his feet, humming in

rivalry of the big kettle, which had just been brought in, and was soon

followed by Lance, whistling as he came upstairs.

'Look here!' and Angela, who, for her bane at Brompton, had her full

share of the family talent for caricature, showed him a likeness of

Bernard strutting down the High Street, turning his back on certain

figures in the distance; and beneath was written--

'There was a young Bear of Stoneborough,

Who thought his gentility thorough;

To his townsfolk he said,

"Snobs! I'll cut them all dead,"

This high-bred young Bear of Stoneborough.'

'Capital, Angel!' said Lance; 'but don't show it to him; he's a horrid

Bear to poke fun at.'

'Oh, but he does get into such jolly rages!'

'It is beyond being jolly,' said Lance. 'I did this once too often last

holidays; and I don't think he has got over it yet, though I promised

never to do it again.'

'The more reason I should,' said Angela, laughing saucily in his face,

though both spoke under their breath.

'No,' said Lance. 'Consider! He is absurdly stuck up; but anything to

disgust him with the Nareses is good.'

'I see no harm in Jem Nares,' said democratic Angela. 'I'll not have

him cut! give me my picture.'

'No, I promised he should not be done again.'

'Promise for yourself another time.'

She snatched, and there was a sparring match. Lance held off with one

hand, and with the other dashed her drawing into the fire, where it

fell on the top of some black coals; and as he relaxed his grasp, she

sprang to rescue it. Felix looked up in time to see the kettle toppling

over. He flung Theodore out of the way of the boiling stream that

rushed from lid and spout as the whole descended on the hearth, amid

cries from Angela and Theodore that brought all the others together;

nor could the little one be pacified, even though Wilmet ascertained

that he had only been touched by one boiling drop.

'But Felix!' exclaimed Lance; and they all turned.

'Never mind,' he said, but with more of a contraction of the lips than

a smile; 'only my neck and arm. Here, Lance, help me;' presenting the

end of his sleeve, and setting his teeth.

The hasty vigorous pull, made in ignorance on both sides, removed

the coat; but Felix gave something between a gasp and a cry, tried

to totter to a chair, and was caught by Clement as he fainted away;

so much to the terror of Lance, that in three minutes' space he had

broken in on Mr. Rugg's dinner with a peremptory summons. By the time

he crept into the room behind the doctor, he saw Felix on the sofa,

white as a sheet, with closed eyes and drawn brow, Clement standing

ready with a roll of wadding, and Wilmet, having more gently removed

the shirtsleeve, regarding the injury with some perplexity, increased

by the tearful Sibby's voluble counsels.

She welcomed the arrival with the anxious inquiry, 'O Mr. Rugg! I am so

glad! Should the cotton touch where the skin is broken?--Here--inside

his elbow and hand.'

'Broken! You have been tearing off the clothes, instead of cutting

them! I thought you knew better, Miss Underwood.'

'It was my own doing,' murmured Felix, so faintly, that Mr. Rugg, with

his usual roughness, scolded at his not having had some brandy at

once, and then at there being none nearer than the Fortinbras Arms,

whence Clement brought some in about the time that a grand butler would

have taken to produce it. Felix choked at it like a child, but it

brought back his strength; and Wilmet and Clement were assistants too

handy to give much occasion for scolding. The shoulder and chest had

suffered likewise, though partly protected by the flannel shirt.

On the patient asking how soon he might hope for the use of his arm,

the gruff answer was, 'Not so soon as if you had not begun by tearing

it to pieces. I can't tell. Depends on general health. May be three

weeks, may be six, may be three months, before you get these places

healed, if you trifle with them. Now I'll stay and see you in bed, with

this arm properly settled.'

This was real kindness for a man in the middle of his dinner; and

Felix stood up, finding himself more shaken than he had expected, and

commanded by acclamation to betake himself to Mr. Froggatt's bedroom.

He chose, however, first to go into the next room, where Cherry had

sunk down, trembling and overcome, and so hysterical that her utmost

powers had been taxed to prevent herself from disturbing those who

could be useful.

'Here I am, all alive!' he said in a cheerful tone, that somehow had no

solidity in it, and which she could hardly bear. 'Why, Cherry, you poor

little thing! you have come by the worst of it!'

'Don't, Felix! Isn't it dreadful pain?'

'Not now; I scarcely feel it. Never mind, Cherry; I'm all right now,

only you will have to write those little fingers nearly off.'

'Oh! Felix, if Wilmet had been gone!'

'She wouldn't be looking Gorgons at me now. Where's Angel?'

Angel had been seized by Robina, and forcibly withheld from flying out

after the doctor; and when assured that Lance was gone, she had dashed

upstairs, and hidden herself in bed, so that Felix was obliged to go to

sleep without seeing her. Remonstrate as he would, he was not allowed

to get up the next morning. Mr. Rugg, who came very early, assured him

that the speed of his recovery greatly depended on perfect stillness at

first, and told him that he would feel the injury if he tried to move;

and Wilmet would not do anything but rejoice that he was compelled to

submit to discipline that was so good for the cold, a much more real

subject of anxiety.

'I must not grumble,' he sighed, as the doctor shut the door; 'but I

did not reckon on such a stupid disaster when I got two boys to look

after everything.'

'People will not mind for a few days.'

'I hope not. Tell Lance to send Lamb up to me as soon as he comes in.

And would Clem walk over to Marshlands? or the Froggery will be in

great commotion.'

'Perhaps Robina will go too; and they always like to have her.'

'And Angel? Poor child! I wish she would come.'

'I'll send her. I want you to talk to her. She is such a perplexity.'

'_This_ was no fault of hers!' exclaimed Felix.

'I don't know that. Lance takes it on himself, and says it was just a

squabble; but that is sure to have been her fault.'

'I shall not go into that,' said Felix.

'It does seem a chance of making an impression, if you would try,' said

Wilmet. 'Sibby says she was crying half the night, (you know she has to

sleep in the nursery,) and you might get at her now. I don't know what

to do with her.'

He looked up, astonished at this avowal, from her who had hitherto

queened it so easily.

'Look at this letter,' she proceeded. 'I have been keeping it till you

had time to think about it.'

He sighed, feeling, like many another head of the house, that time was

swept away from home responsibilities, and indeed, that great girls

needed a more experienced guide. The letter was the school character,

speaking most highly of Robina, who had quite reconquered esteem. If

she had not so much of any one talent as some of the others, she had

excellent capacity, and studied in a business-like way, as one learning

a profession; so that she had won her promotion into the first ranks,

among elder girls.

But Angela was one of those who will not or cannot do anything

tolerably except what they like; and she had only two tastes--for

music and fun--except perhaps for churches. She was a puzzle to every

one, by her eagerness for devout observances, and the very little good

they seemed to do her, even by outrageous irreverence when the spirit

of mischief was roused. Teachers detested her, but she was the idol of

half the school. All unclaimed misdeeds were laid to her share; and in

recklessness or generosity, she never troubled herself to disavow them,

even when not her own. She was popularly believed to learn nothing

but music, and even in that to use talent to save pains; and she had

a lead-like affinity to the bottom of her class, yet in the final

examination she had surpassed far more diligent girls.

Felix read, and puzzled himself, and did not refuse obedience when

Wilmet insisted that he should 'talk to Angela;' though he was only too

well aware that reproof was that paternal duty to which he was least

adequate. First, however, he had time to despatch Robina and Clement on

their mission to his partner, whose winter rheumatics had set in--to

receive young Lamb, laden with a pile of letters and papers, and

lastly, to be cooed over and stroked by Theodore, who curled himself up

at his feet in that perfect serenity that his presence always infused.

At last Angela came in on tip-toe, looking immensely tall and lank,

with Clement's propensity for longitudinal growth, and the same

infantine smallness of feature, and much less brilliant colouring than

the others; but while his hair was as closely cropped as if he were

just out of a cell, hers was as long and as unmanageable as herself;

and she had moreover the beautiful large-pupilled, darkly-lashed,

mischievous blue eyes that belonged to Edgar, only now their lids

were swollen, and all the colour in her face centred in two great red

patches beneath them--a scarlet garibaldi over a very old brown skirt,

half-way up a long pair of grey legs, seeming to make the whole object

more deplorable.

'You poor Angel!' exclaimed Felix, his heart more than ever melted;

'you look as if you had been crying all night. Why don't you come and

give me a kiss?'

'I'll--I'll do anything you please, Felix, but I had rather not.'

'But I do please! I want you,' said he, holding out his hand; so that

she was forced to come, touch his cheek with her lips, and submit to

a far heartier kiss. 'You are as cold as ice,' he added, trying to

capture the blue, chilly, long, sausage-like fingers, and warm them in

his grasp.

'No, don't! it will only make my chilblains rage. Let me go, now you've

forgiven me for your own comfort.'

'Forgiven you for my own comfort! I don't want to forgive you--'

'Oh--h!' and the eyes disappeared, and the face puckered in unutterable

woe.

'I haven't anything to forgive you, Angel.'

'Oh, that's worse! when I've hurt you so terribly!'

'_You_ didn't; you never meant it. Of course I never blamed you.'

'Then,' said Angel, trying to get away her other hand, 'why did you

send for me to row me, for I don't call that forgiving.'

'I heard you were unhappy.'

'And did you think it would make me any happier to see you lying there

frowning with pain?' broke out Angela, with an angry sob.

'If I frowned, it was not with pain, but because I don't know what to

make of you.'

'I don't want to be made anything of!' she said pettishly. 'Wilmet told

me you wanted to talk to me. I suppose that meant she ordered you! So

now you've done it, let me go.'

'My dear Angel, don't you see that I am just as anxious about you as

Wilmet can be? and when there is plainly something amiss--'

'Oh, it's old Ful and Fen's character of me, then?'

'It is, Angela. Perhaps it does seem taking an unfair advantage of you

to catch you now; but you see I so seldom get a chance of a talk with

any one; and I must do the best I can for you, you poor little ones,

who, I'm afraid, haven't even the faintest recollection of our father

and mother to help you.'

'I remember mamma, but after she was ill,' said Angela, probably trying

not to be softened. 'But I don't think that has much to do with it. You

and Wilmet mind us as much, or more, than most people's born parents.

Yes, Wilmet worrits twice as much as any rational mother does.'

'That's the very thing, Angel; parents can do the thing without

worrying.'

'No, I didn't say you did,' said Angela; 'you never did till this

minute, and now you are _druv_ to it;' and she regarded him with a

certain fellow-feeling so comical, that she nearly made him laugh,

though he felt sad enough.

'Have I neglected you then, Angel?'

'Oh no; I think you do just as well as most fathers. You keep us all

going,' said Angela, considering; 'and you look after us and set us a

good example, as people say; and isn't that all that fathers have to

do?'

'My poor little sister! you just show that I cannot be really like a

father to you.'

'Would a father _do_ all the scolding?' asked Angela in an odd voice.

'If we still had our own, you would be coming to him to help you, and

telling him freely what it is that makes things go wrong with you.'

'I'm sure,' answered the girl, 'I'd just as soon tell you, Felix, if

I only knew; but there's only one thing that would do me any good, I

believe.'

'And that?'

'If I could only be a Trappist.'

'A what?'

'A Trappist, or one of those _Sepolte_ nuns, that never see anybody,

and can't talk to their relations. Oh! I wish I was old enough to turn

Roman Catholic! and then wouldn't I go and cut off this horrible hair,

that is the plague and torment of my life, and never be naughty again!'

'Which do you want to be rid of most--your hair or your relations?'

asked Felix, half diverted, half dismayed and wholly at a loss.

But Angela had passed the boundary of earnest now, and went on more

from the heart. 'If I could but be in a real strict nunnery, it would

be so nice! It would always be church. Oh! if church could but last

always!'

He was more puzzled than ever at the intent yearning look that had

changed the face. 'You could not keep up. It would lose effect,' he

said.

'I don't know. Lots of girls much better than I--Bobbie herself--don't

like long services, and get tired, but I don't. I'm safe then; I'm

happy altogether. I seem to get wings inside--I could go on singing for

ever. I don't want to be bad; but the instant I go out, I can't live

without fun; and so they think me a horrid false hypocrite--but I'm

not! Only unless I get shut up somewhere, I don't know what will become

of me.'

'You must try to make your life out of church suit your life in

church,' said Felix, much puzzled how to answer.

'I would, only I can't be half-and-half, and wishy-washy.'

'I don't understand.'

'Don't you? Why, if I have fun, I like to have it real fun. I can't

be always drawing it mild! It is no real fun if one is to be always

thinking about who will be vexed, and what's lady-like, and all that

stuff!'

'But that's what life in this world is made of.'

'I know it is; so I hate life in this world, unless one could just

have no conscience at all;' then, as she caught his anxious eye, she

went on, trying to rattle, but with tears in her voice, and submitting

to let him warm her hands all the time, 'Felix, you'd better let me

go into a Sisterhood. It is the only chance for me! Thinking about

being a horrid governess makes me wicked. When I'm good I do long for

a Sisterhood; and when I'm bad I want to get some great rich duke to

marry me, and let me have no end of horses, and go to the races and

the opera--and I don't suppose he will ever come. And I sup_pose_ you

are all too dull and tiresome to let me get to be a public singer! No,

don't tell me to put it out of my head, for it is what I should like

best--best of all!'

'Better than the duke?'

'Oh yes! for I think he would be in the way--Felix! _do_ let me be a

Sister! You see it is the only chance.'

'I can't, Angel; they would not accept a Sister at your age.'

'Then let me think about it _really_, Felix. Promise that I may be when

I am old enough.'

'It is impossible to promise that; but I do not think I am likely to

hinder you, if you then wish it, and it seems right.'

'I wish you would promise me. Look here, Felix,' and the eyes assumed

a deep yearning expression; 'I always did think that if I had a

dedication, like Clement, I could be as good as he is. But I don't

think anything else would put the duke or the opera out of my head.'

'My dear Angel,' and Felix's eyes grew soft too, 'I could not wish

anything better for you than to be such another as Sister Constance,

but I do not know how you could be dedicated. Even Clement is not; he

could change his mind before he is three-and-twenty. It all depends on

how he goes on.'

'And if I go on well, will you let me look to it?'

'As far as may be right.'

'Only then what is the use of my going to this school, if I am not to

turn governess? It only makes me worse.'

'No, Angela. It would not be right to stop your education. You must

have the means of maintaining yourself. It would be against my duty to

hinder that. And remember--some Sisterhoods require an endowment. You

would not wish to be a burthen. You may have to work to raise means

for admission; and if you are set to teach, you will need all you are

learning now.'

'May I think I am preparing?'

'Yes.'

'I will, I will--I mean, I will try,' said Angela. 'O Felix! I do like

you now I find you don't want me to be respectable. No, don't say

something grave and prosy, for I _do_ like you now; and never mind

about not being one's father, for I don't believe anybody could be

better to me.' And she put her face down to his and kissed him as she

used when she was a baby girl; then ran away on thinking she heard some

one coming.

'So,' thought Felix, as he raised himself on his sound elbow, 'the

upshot of it is that I don't want her to be respectable! I hope to

goodness she won't take to being like Tina--though I don't know why I

should either! Poor child! I'll write to Audley about her when I can.

And here comes the dear little Cherry for her hard day's work.'

With his dictation and superintendence, Geraldine was quite equal to

the Pursuivant's Friday requirements; and altogether this day of rest

and leisure was welcome. The sisters were much less anxious about the

sore throat than if it had been in the shop! and indeed it was nearly

well, and no obstacle to his being talked to and amused, to the

general enjoyment, in the rare pleasure of having him at their mercy.

In the afternoon came a message--'The Miss Pearsons' love, and if she

could leave Mr. Underwood, would Miss Underwood step up?' Such messages

were not infrequent, and this was supposed to spring from a desire to

know the particulars of the accident; so that on her return Wilmet was

greeted with the inquiry whether she was considered responsible for the

tea-kettle's misbehaviour, since she had been kept in so long.

'No,' said Wilmet, gravely. 'Run away, little ones!'

Stella alone accepted the epithet; but Wilmet was too much absorbed in

her tidings to look about in the fire-lit twilight for further victims.

'The Miss Pearsons are very much troubled by their letters from St

Heliers,' she said. 'Alice Knevett is actually married.'

'To Edgar?' Angela sprang up with a bound. 'Oh, what fun!'

'No, indeed,' Wilmet replied in her most repressive tone. 'It is to a

Frenchman of the name of Tanneguy, in the wine trade.'

'The abominable girl!' cried Angela at the top of her indignant voice.

'A Frenchman! I'll never believe in any one again.'

'Yes, Angela,' said Wilmet; 'it is a lesson, indeed, of what tricks and

subterfuges--'

'Never mind that, Mettie,' disrespectfully broke in Cherry, who had

quietly moved a curtain so as to cast a shade over Felix's face. 'Tell

us about it. Who writes?'

Wilmet told that Major Knevett, in a storm of fury, had written to

the aunts that the whole affair had been so secretly conducted, that

neither he nor his wife had guessed at it until his daughter's sudden

disappearance, only sending home a letter to announce her marriage to

M. Achille Tanneguy, with whom she had embarked for Havre, and given an

address at Pau, where her husband was concerned in a wine agency. Major

Knevett had then found out that she had been in the constant habit of

meeting this Tanneguy in the garden of their next neighbour, which

joined to their own; and that she had entirely eluded the vigilance of

'her second mother,' who had, however, never ceased to warn and watch

her; but nothing had been capable of curing her of the coquetry and

intrigue, with which in his passion he accused Bexley of inspiring her.

'Too true.' The words were breathed on the back of a sigh suppressed

with difficulty.

'Nonsense, Felix,' said Wilmet; 'It was in her before, or she could not

have so carried it on here. I am sure it had gone on at her horrible

school!'

'What has she done about Edgar?' asked Clement.

'The aunts doubt whether she has done anything.--Children, you ought to

be getting ready for tea;' then when Robin and Angel had obeyed this

very broad hint--'I would not say so before them, but they believe that

there is a sort of excuse in the unhappiness of her home.'

'Of course,' said an almost grateful voice from the pillow.

'Ever since Edgar was there in the summer,' said Wilmet, 'she has been

doubly watched and teased and scolded. Nothing she could do was right.

The aunts heard from her last a fortnight ago, very miserable, and

entreating them to believe that whatever might happen, she was driven

to it by the unbearable wretchedness of home.'

'Do you call that an excuse, Wilmet?' exclaimed Clement. 'Is the

privilege of suffering to be made an excuse for treachery?'

'Much Clement knows of the privilege of suffering,' said Felix, low

and quietly; but Geraldine detected so much of that privilege in his

voice, that she longed to clear the room for him; but though she rose

to set the example, and laid her hand on Clement's arm, there was no

preventing his testimony from being delivered.

'Personally I do not know it; but I do not understand Wilmet's lowering

her standard to excuse disobedience and unfaithfulness.'

'Come along, Clem,' entreated Geraldine; 'it is all most sad and

grievous, but the more we say about it the worse we make it;' and she

succeeded in dragging him out without a defensive reply from Wilmet.

Presently she was sought out by Wilmet herself, to say, 'Cherry, do you

know, there's Felix looking as pale as when he fainted yesterday.'

She could believe it; but she only ventured to ask, 'Did he say

anything?'

'No, only to answer "No," when I asked if I hurt him as I was _doing_

his arm. Cherry, can you tell me, or do you know--does this touch him

for himself?'

Cherry could only look up with eyes swimming.

'How blind I have been! Oh! if I had not come and told it so abruptly,

before every one!'

'Perhaps he liked the unconsciousness better!'

'Were you in his confidence, or is it guess?'

'Guessing at first; but we had a very few words about it when he came

home from consulting Dr. Lee last summer.'

'Then it was that wretched child that hurt his health?'

'So we thought. Dr. Lee asked him if there was not something on his

mind.'

'The little wretch! Oh! if I had never asked her here! she has done

more harm than she is worth!'

'He had got quite well,' said Cherry; 'and now he has his cough back

again. O Mettie!'

'No,' said Wilmet, 'it is not _that_ cough. It is only a chance cold;

it is nearly gone. Besides, it cannot be the same as her first treason

to him must have been.'

'That's true,' said Cherry, mournfully.

'After all,' said Wilmet, 'it _is_ a happy escape for both our boys, if

they can but feel it, poor fellows--but oh! to have been so deceived.

And how ignorant one is--even living in the same house!' And Wilmet had

a hearty fit of crying.

'And Edgar!' sighed Cherry.

'You must write. They all come to you, Cherry,' she added wistfully.

'You shall sit with dear Felix this evening, and I will keep the others

away.'

This ordinance was carried out, but with no result as to conversation;

for Felix's distress took the form of great tenderness as to the manner

in which the blow was to fall upon Edgar. Nothing would satisfy him

but Geraldine's writing immediately, under his own eye. Of course

he ascribed all his own feelings to his brother; and though Cherry

doubted, and could have written much better as from herself, she could

but patiently write and re-write, when poor Felix found--as he did

with everything that cost him consideration--that he was falling into

his leading-article style; while all the time she saw him becoming more

excited and flushed, till at last Wilmet came in, put an end to it, and

sent her to bed, almost brokenhearted for both brothers, and struggling

against her own hatred to the mischievous little witch who had played

with their hearts.

She took care that the letter should go by the earliest post, partly to

ensure Edgar's getting it without the Sunday's delay, but still more

that it might not be within Felix's power to recall for two whole days.

He just inquired after it, and finding it was gone, said no more. He

was not so anxious to get up as the day before; his arm had come to a

more painful stage, and he had had a feverish sleepless night; so that

he looked so worn and depressed, that Mr. Rugg concluded that he had

been imprudent, and scolded him accordingly.

When Geraldine came in to put the finishing strokes to the Pursuivant,

she found him so silent and dreamy, that she did nearly the whole on

her own responsibility; till at last he suddenly roused himself, begged

her pardon, and gave his whole mind to the dictation of the political

summary; then became dreamy again, and presently fell into a long sound

sleep, after which he looked, even to the anxious eyes of his sisters,

much better, and began to talk of getting up for the evening.

At about five o'clock, just as Wilmet was laying his things ready for

him, the door was opened, and there entered first a perfume of tobacco,

the next a lively voice--'What, Blunderbore, lying in state in Froggy's

four-poster! Whom have you been getting into hot water with? Is there

much the matter?' he added in a lower tone, as Wilmet kissed him.

'Not much,' said Felix; 'it is nothing but a scald in a disabling place

on my arm.'

'The tea-kettle ought to know its friends better. I met Jem Bruce and

heard of it, so I ran down to see how much of you was boiled. I looked

into the shop, but Master Lance was too important to vouchsafe me a

word. Are you sure it is only your arm, old fellow? you look baddish.'

'I'm well enough,' said Felix, shifting his head into the shadow of

the curtain; and Wilmet, perceiving that he wished to have it out at

once, left them together. 'Edgar, do you know?' said Felix, earnestly.

'I scent a crisis in the air, and am doubting whether the Pursuivant is

up a tree, or Wilmet's engineer turned out no go.'

'You have not had Cherry's letter?'

'No. Don't torment yourself to beat about the bush. I'd stand anything

rather than see you look like that.'

'Have you heard from Jersey?'

'Oh! It is that, is it? I believe it has lasted twelve calendar months,

and that is as much as is reasonable to expect. Little humbugging puss!

What has she taken up with?'

'Had you no idea that she had fallen in with--with a Frenchman?'

'The beggar! How far has it gone? or is it only a report from the old

cats of aunts?'

'It is too certain.'

'Well, what is it? I suppose she hardly commissioned you to give me my

_congé?_'

'I fear that she commissioned no one. Harsh treatment seems to have

driven her to desperation. She was married privately, and has written

from France to announce it.'

Edgar gave a long whistle, then turned round and laid his hand on his

brother's, saying with a short laugh, 'Cool and easy! Well, it was

pretty sport; and this conclusion is unique for simplicity and saving

of trouble. Dear old Fee, here's that pulse of yours going like a young

lady's in a field with a mad bull. Have you been working yourself up

all day to expect me to hang myself, or shoot the frog-eater? Didn't I

always tell you that only the ancient chivalry of the Pursuivant could

take the affair _au grand sérieux?_'

'Very well,' said Felix in a somewhat smothered voice, 'it is your

affair, and I must accept modern customs. I am glad you understood one

another so well.'

'Spoken with grave irony worthy of the heavy father, your laudable

model. Dear old chap, you'll be better now.'

There was something strange in the half-reverent, half-pitying tone of

the tall powerful young man, as, with a sneer on his curling lip, but

a tear in his softened eye, he stooped, pushed back the fair hair, and

kissed the face which in its wistfulness looked younger than his own

(having moreover the hirsuteness of only two days instead of two years).

Felix fulfilled his intention of getting up, though he went no farther

than his own fire-side, where soon after tea he was joined by Clement,

looking very serious, and armed with Bible, Prayer-book, and copy-book.

He was to take Felix's Sunday class the next day; but whereas he had

done so for the two months of the Ewmouth visit in the summer, there

seemed no special necessity for a consultation, which in fact proved

to be a rehearsal of the morrow's lesson, with various instructions to

Felix himself, on what Clement called 'Church Teaching,' in oblivion

that the simple truths of religion are as much Church teaching as the

distinctive doctrines of his own set.

As vehement laughter pealed across the passage, Felix ventured to

suggest that something was going on there.

'Yes,' said Clement; 'they were beginning some game, but I distrust

Edgar's wit.'

'I don't think holding aloof always good.'

'When one's presence is a stimulus to irreverence?'

'Because you present yourself as a butt, instead of laughing with him,

and giving things a turn.'

'Impossible, where one feels deeply.'

Felix believed it was impossible in the present case, and resigned

himself, though pricking up his ears at the ripples of mirth and the

shrieks of ecstatic uncontrollable laughter that reached his ear; until

at last Lance burst in, laughing so that he could hardly stand upright,

and bringing a paper in his hand for Felix's benefit.

It had been the game of adjectives, and Edgar, the conductor, had

audaciously made its framework the Pursuivant's report of the

valedictory sermon that Mr. Mowbray Smith was to preach on the morrow.

It was a most comical combination, so well had Edgar's outline hit off

the editor's desire to make the best of it, coupled with personalities

that neither Mr. Smith would have preached nor he reported unless they

had been in the palace of truth; the whole rendered the more grotesque

by the hap-hazard adjectives that seasoned the discourse, sometimes

deliciously inapposite, sometimes fantastically appropriate. An

audience had stolen behind Lance to taste its sweets a second time; and

the drollery, the _vraisemblance_, and touches of malice, quite choked

him as he read, and overpowered Felix with mirth, all the more at the

shocked countenance that Clement preserved throughout, while in the

background there was a renewed chuckling, roaring, and rolling, at the

more brilliant sallies.

The whole family had been viewing Edgar with more or less of awe, pity,

and curiosity, as an injured hero, but had been beguiled into the

maddest mirth, though as much disgusted with themselves for giggling

as with him for making them giggle. Wilmet herself had succumbed, and

Cherry had been in an almost hysterical transport of laughter, till her

jaws ached, and her eyes were weak; and she was so exhausted that she

could hardly crawl into Felix's room to wish him good-night, and then

scarcely durst speak to him lest she should burst into tears; while

as to the younger ones, it was altogether delightful to them at the

moment, and they regarded the transactions of February as a dream.

When they met the next morning, Edgar professed that he could not

venture on sitting under Mr. Smith's actual sermon, but should go to

Minsterham, to pay his respects to Wilmet's future relations, if there

were a feasible train.

'Yes,' said Clement, 'there's one in twenty minutes, which brings one

in time for the Cathedral.'

'Dr. Wilmet is engrossed with a distinguished patient. Eh? Come along

then, Lance; I must have some one to present me.'

Lance gave a joyful leap; but Wilmet interposed, 'Indeed, Lance, it is

hardly safe. Remember how bad your head was after Christmas Day.'

'It's my own head, and I may do as I like with it!'

'That's just what you can't now. If you were knocked up to-morrow--as

you certainly would be, between the railroad and the organ--'

'That would be what you _may_ call a fix,' observed Edgar. 'Knocked up

between a railway and an organ! What a position!'

'It is quite true, Edgar,' said Wilmet, the more severely for the

laughter of Lance and Angel. 'Lance knows very well that one of his

headaches perfectly disables him. Felix would not be content to leave

Mr. Lamb alone in the shop; and all the good of these three days would

be undone.'

'Oh--h! it was a pillar of the state I was asking?' said Edgar. 'Is

your head really so ticklish, Lance?' as the boy made a gesture of

disgust.

'Don't persuade him, Edgar. He ought not to do it,' said Wilmet, in her

blunt authoritative way.

Lance kicked the heel of his boot against the floor, and said, 'Don't I

pity Jack Harewood, that's all!'

'Well, a couple of ducks instead of a goose--Bob and Angel, you've no

heads.--Come! I'm too modest to face the Librarian alone, much less the

red-headed daughters.'

The two girls eagerly looked at their sister.

'"Gorgons and hydras and chimæras dire!"' ejaculated Edgar. 'If I were

you, W.W., I'd get up a little more charitably disposed towards my

brother on a Sunday morning!'

'It is Angela's wildness that I am afraid of,' said Wilmet.

'She sha'n't go near a tea-kettle,' said Edgar. 'Put on your hats,

chick-a-biddies, if you wish to catch the Cathedral.'

'May we? O Wilmet, pray!' entreated Robina.

'I will see what Felix says.'

'A graceful form of shifting the obloquy of the negative,' muttered

Edgar, as Wilmet disappeared.

'Felix will decide as he thinks good,' said Robina with dignity.

'As _she_ thinks good, you mean,' said Edgar. 'Well, I wonder how you

all contrive to stand it. I couldn't, I know, even for a quiet life.'

'You've not been broken in, you see,' said Lance, trying to answer with

nonchalance.

'No, I only see a specimen occasionally. What has she been doing to you

this morning, that has spoilt your appetite, and brought you under her

thumb?'

'Don't, Edgar!' burst out Lance, starting up and running away.

'No, Edgar,' said Geraldine; 'it is not kind. It _is_ hard enough for

him as it is, and it is all for Felix's sake.'

Luckily, Clement had the wisdom not to speak, and therefore Cherry

obtained a more reasonable answer.

'Well, that is a plea, Cherry; but it does rile me to see a fellow

like that dragooned over, and thrown away, to bolster up a wretched

little business such as this. It's a mistake, depend upon it, to let

the demon of present necessity engulf another of the best of us. My

squibs are conscientious, I assure you.'

'I don't care for her!' exclaimed Bernard: 'I'll go with you whenever

you please, Edgar!'

'Well, Wilmet, under what decent mask do you veil your stony heart?'

asked Edgar, as she re-entered.

'Felix sees no reason against their going,' said Wilmet, rather

gloomily. 'Only, Edgar, pray don't encourage Angela to get into one of

her states. You don't know what they are.'

For Felix had decided it against her. 'Yes, let them go. I don't

believe he can bear to face any one in the town, and the charge of them

will be a safe-guard.'

'But Angela?'

'My dear, the worst that can happen with her is that she should be a

little boisterous with the Harewoods;' and as Wilmet showed that the

prospect was unpleasing, 'that is better than what he could do alone,

or with Lance.'

'Yes, I was resolved to stop Lance. I don't know whether to tell you,

but I think you ought to know.'

'What?' asked Felix anxiously,

'Last night at half-past eleven--just when I had finished your hand--I

smelt smoke. So I went down to see what was on fire and--'

'You found Edgar smoking in the kitchen.'

'If it had been only Edgar, I should not have minded, but it was Lance

too. I do think you ought to give him a warning, Felix, for they would

do nothing but laugh at me. Edgar would only go into transports about

my hair, and say how long it was. I don't think I was ever so nearly in

a passion in my life! If he is teaching Lance those ways--'

'He is not Lance's first instructor in smoke,' said Felix; 'I believe

your own Harewoods were that, Mettie.'

'Now you are laughing too, Felix! I don't know how you can. It seems to

me that it is all up with us if Edgar is to lead away Lance; and Lance

was not up this morning for Church--the first time I have known him

miss.'

'Well,' said Felix, rather hastily, 'it is of no use pulling reins too

tight. Don't keep those poor children waiting, or you'll make them all

too late.'

Wilmet had to obey, with the fretted sense that she had not been met

as she expected, and that her alarms were injudiciously made light of;

and Geraldine meantime tried to explain Edgar's bitter mischief as pain

of heart; but it grieved her, whatever it was, and her spirits sank

the more for the physical exhaustion of yesterday's violent laughter.

But Edgar, looking in to see whether the little girls were ready, and

finding her alone, leaning against the window disconsolately, came up,

and putting his arm round her, said, 'So I scandalize you, Gerald? I

can't give my carcase to be battened on by the ghools, were they the

best family ghools in the world.'

'Edgar!'

'Besides, you know all this was diligently fostered by old

Blunderbore's duteous intermeddling; and as it was not my fault that I

furnished a spectacle for gods and men _then_, I _will_ not now.'

'Only, Edgar, if you _do_ care for Felix, do not, pray do not spoil his

comfort in Lance!'

'If I don't, nature will, Cherry. That boy is not the stuff to make a

journeyman stationer, at Wilmet's orders. Oh! if you could but have

seen her, when she surprised us with our pipes last night! I couldn't

get her to stand still, or she would have been a perfect study for

Antigone. She is a magnificent creature with her hair down!--Ha! little

kids, we must scamper for it for the train!'

And off he went, leaving Geraldine not much less unhappy for his

apology. The long day alone with Felix was a better consolation. She

could not leave the house in such cold as the present; and Felix was

dressed as soon as breakfast was over, and came into the drawing-room,

where after their home service, and when he had proved his freedom from

cough by reading a grand sermon of Newman's, his reserve gave way in

the Sunday calm, and he asked, 'Did Edgar say anything to you, Chérie?'

She repeated the saying about the ghools, as it was evidently meant for

circulation among those respectable parties.

Felix smiled, and said, 'I thought so,' and told in return Edgar's

defiant reception of the tidings.

'I don't think,' said Cherry, 'that I was ever more uncomfortable than

through his fun. It felt like laughing-gas; it forced one on, and yet

it was so unreal. He wants to treat it on the hawk-gone-down-the-wind

principle.'

'It is the gallant and the wise one, Cherry. So you ought to admire it

more than you seem to do.'

'It cannot be wise if it be not true. That is, if it ever went deep

with him.'

'He never meant it to go deep,' said Felix; 'but the very extravagance

of his defiance makes me afraid it took stronger hold than he knew, and

that the shock may be very bad for him.'

'But she--' and Cherry stopped, afraid to vex him by speaking of

Alice's incapacity to raise a character.

He calmly finished. 'She was not all we thought her. True, poor child;

but an attachment worthily and steadily maintained, as for all his

nonsense this has been, must be well for a man; and a disruption of

this kind must be a breaking-up--whether he treat it lightly or no--of

foundations such as one who seems to have little besides can ill afford

to stand.'

It was the first time that the secret anxiety had been openly named,

and Cherry clasped her hands.

'That is my chief anxiety,' resumed Felix. 'Otherwise the end of this

matter is of course an advantage.'

'If she could use him so, she was not worth constancy,' said Cherry.

'No!' It was a decided No, though it was followed by 'As they had made

her. Poor child! She was full of sweet womanly gifts, and might have

been made everything excellent; but Edgar estimated her more truly

than I did. There was always a certain spirit of intrigue, and want of

substance, or she could never have so treated him.'

'Entirely unfeeling.'

'Or rather, too light to appreciate feeling otherwise than as a tribute

to herself, or to dwell on the absent,' said Felix sadly. 'I now

believe that she was conscious of--of my liking. Indeed, I am sure of

it; I only tried to hope otherwise, though it was easy to forgive her

preference for one so much more attractive. There was no harm in that.

But as things stood with him, to throw him over without a word shows

an essential want of comprehension of what was due to others.'

'She might at least have written through her aunts.'

'With a right sense of honour she would; but I believe she had no

education in such things. Poor little thing! I hope the Frenchman will

do well by her.'

'Felix dear, may I ask you--this is not the pain that it was before?'

'No' said Felix, looking steadily at her, with his chin on his hand.

'No, certainly not. I was greatly shocked and upset at first, but

not personally; though of course I must always feel towards her as

I never can for any other woman;' then, at Cherry's start, 'I mean

that the woman who fills one's life with a certain glory and radiance

of--possibility, never can be the same as others to one, even though it

lasted ever so short a time, and was ever so great a mistake. But that

does not mean wishing to begin it over again.'

'Not with her.'

'It is absurd to make auguries or protests,' said Felix quietly; 'but

from a boy I knew well that that sort of thing could hardly be for me,

and I am content to have returned to that conviction. Even ending, as

it has done, the year of--of--perhaps fools' paradise was well worth

having, but I hope it will serve me for life. If I can keep faithful to

what I once thought Alice, it will be best for all of us. So don't be

anxious about me, my Whiteheart. The trouble of last winter was over

long ago, and the zest and spirit of life came back with strength and

work. I am quite as happy now as I was before--happier, I think.'

'Then this need not make you ill,' breathed Cherry, aware that she was

saying something foolish. Indeed, Felix laughed a little.

'Hardly,' he said playfully. 'Remember, Cherry, what a predicament I

was in--obliged to act the heavy father, as Edgar calls it, when I was

so much concerned myself, and with him telling me I was a fool for my

pains, as I believe I was. Besides, it was a good honest cold I caught

at Brompton, in a very sharp east wind. If you insist on going any

further, you will become a family ghool, Cherry.' She was obliged to

laugh; and he continued, 'No, don't be anxious. This was an opportune

scald. I should have found the day's work severe, if I had not had

time to face this thoroughly. Such a quiet day last spring would have

been worth a quart of cod-liver oil later.'

Therewith the pattering of many feet resounded on the frost-bound

street; and the church-goers returned, averring that Mr. Smith's

sermon had been like enough to Edgar's to render it difficult to keep

their countenances, and to make them rejoice in Angela's absence. Of

this Felix might judge for himself, for not long after the preacher

himself arrived, offering the MS. for an abstract for the paper, all

unconscious of the second-sight that had reported it already.

There he lingered, trying to talk, as if he wanted to say something

that would not come out; and at last he was only driven from the field

by the return of Edgar and the girls, who came in open-mouthed and

eager out of the cold.

Edgar had had a great deal of fun with Mrs. Harewood, and had on his

side fascinated all the family; so that Robina confided to Lance that

she thought Grace Harewood ought to be warned, for Edgar went on with

her like 'You know what.'

'Make yourself easy,' said Lance; 'Grace and Lucy know all about that

better than any girl in Minsterham. What did old Bill say? and what

anthem did you have?'

Felix and Geraldine spent the Evening Service hour in very different

fashion from the morning; for Edgar was their companion, and took the

opportunity of making the remonstrance he had threatened about Lance

and his prospects. He had never been _fine_ in Alda's way, and had

not her feelings about losing caste; but whereas his politics were

diametrically opposed to those of the Pursuivant, he thought Felix

ranging himself, according to his essential Blunderbore nature, on the

side of the old giants destined to destruction, and wasting talent and

substance on a hopeless and thankless cause; but he knew his brother to

be past remonstrance, and to be perfectly well aware that this was the

losing side. Only Edgar entered a strong protest against Lance being,

as he said, sacrificed just to make Wilmet's pot boil, and bolster up

the old Pursuivant a little longer.

'You can't be more averse to it than I,' said Felix. 'If he could only

go back to his work, he might yet get to the University.'

'Pshaw! that's not what I meant. He is not the stuff; you were the only

one of us that had the making of a scholar. Now Lance has got just the

taste and the talent that were baulked in my case by old Tom's sticking

me down to hides and tallow, when I ought to have been cultivating

them.'

'There's this difference,' said Geraldine; 'Cousin Thomas stuck you,

but Lance sticks himself.'

'Under moral compulsion, eh?'

'The compulsion was on me,' said Felix. 'I was really afraid to deny

him; the idleness, and the fretting over it, were doing his head so

much harm.'

'That's all very well. No harm done; but to let him go on here in the

stodge is a bit of short-sightedness I can't understand. He'll never be

happy in it; and you'd better let him go before it is too late.'

'Go? but how, and where? His health is not fit for study, and his voice

ought to rest for another year.'

Then Edgar explained his own plan. Lance had already considerable

musical knowledge, and ability such that his way in the musical world

would be secure. Amateur as he was himself, Edgar had such a footing

there that he could secure an introduction for his brother, who while

learning would be able to maintain himself; and either by violin or

voice, if not by original composition, win name, fame, and fortune, in

a few years. A manager of high reputation Edgar mentioned as likely to

accept and train the boy; and he added that for his own part he would

watch over the little fellow; and he added, with a look in his eyes

that went to Felix's heart, 'And nothing would do me so much good _now_

as the charge of him.'

'That I _do_ believe, Edgar,' said Felix warmly; 'but it would be

throwing the helve after the hatchet in a way you can't expect of a

heavy father.'

'Exactly what I knew you would say. You veil it a little more; but we

poor Bohemians don't meet with much more charity from you than from our

stately sister. Reprobates all--eh?'

'Living a life of temptation enough to make me choose no one to be

drawn into it that I can prevent. Have you been talking to Lance about

it?'

'Well, it rose out of last night's talk to him. Not that he gave in to

it. He's loyal to you to the back-bone, and all importance too with the

charge of the shop. Besides, that cathedral--it's a sort of mother's

milk to him, not out of his mouth.'

'That's a good hearing!' said Felix, with a rather defiant smile.

'But it won't last,' said Edgar; 'the drudgery and sameness will tell;

and you'd better give in with a good grace in time, Blunderbore.'

'You've been persuading him,' said Cherry reproachfully.

'Well, Cherry, I'm not in the habit of confounding virtue with dulness;

and when the little chap talked to me of the musical doings I had been

after, I felt the sin and shame of getting a nightingale to make a

barn-door fowl of.'

'I can only tell you,' said Felix, with more annoyance than he usually

betrayed, 'that if you took your nightingale to the din of London, and

the excitement of a concert, you'd have him with inflammation on the

brain before the week was out. Why, I sent him over to see his doctor

at Minsterham, and he says it would be murder to send him back to his

books and the choir for this next quarter at least; and if cathedral

music will not do for him, judge if London concerts would!'

'And did you think I wanted to carry off your deputy right hand while

your own is hung up in a bag, you jealous old giant? Why, I proposed to

devote myself to the Pursuivant to-morrow!'

'Thank you; I am afraid it would be taken for the Tribune.'

'As if I couldn't hit off the complacent, gentlemanly, stick-in-the-mud

style for squiredom! I'll write you a leader--on what shall it be,

municipalities, or the smut in wheat?--that you shall not know from

your own.'

To wish Edgar away was impossible, and yet how feel willing that Lance

should be under such influence? Withal there was the difficulty of

showing Wilmet that to fret Lance with restrictions was a dangerous

thing at such a moment. She would yield to Felix's desire that she

would not interfere with that orgie over the kitchen fire--which he

regarded all the time with as much dread as herself--but she thought

his concession weak: and Lance himself was perilously like Edgar in all

his bright pleasant qualities, talents, and tastes, so that the two had

an enjoyment in one another's company that it was painful to regard

with anxiety.