CHAPTER XIX.

‘I DREAMT I DWELT IN MARBLE HALLS.’

Castle Hill, the Spenceley mansion, was a large, new, imposing

residence of red brick, with massive stone facings. It had been the

dwelling of Mr. Spenceley and his family for some six or seven years,

and it was within these walls that Helena sat in captivity, and groaned

alternately over the selfishness of men and the mean-spiritedness of

women.

On the appointed evening, Mrs. Mallory, her son, and Hugo, were driven

to this mansion, and ushered into the drawing-room. It was an apartment

vast in dimensions, lofty, dazzling, perfectly square, perfectly

gorgeous, and more than perfectly uncomfortable.

Some ten or twelve persons were collected somewhere amidst the mass of

gorgeous carpet, hangings, furniture, and dazzling crystal drops which

seemed to blend and combine in a determined and successful effort to

crush and annihilate the human portion of the scene. Sebastian and Hugo

saw Mrs. Mallory sail up to a massive-looking lady in purple satin,

and white lace, and unlimited jewellery of florid design and great

brilliance. This lady she greeted almost affectionately. Was she not

Helena’s mother? and did not Mrs. Mallory herself regard Helena almost

as a daughter? Having introduced Sebastian and Hugo, Mrs. Mallory

turned to Mr. Spenceley, while the young men bowed themselves before

the mistress of the house.

She said she was very glad to see them. Then she told Sebastian that

she had heard a great deal about him, and then she looked hurriedly

around for ‘Mr. Spenceley.’

That gentleman, who had been exchanging courtesies in a loud and

blatant voice with Mrs. Mallory, now began to welcome Sebastian to his

native place, also in a loud and blatant manner.

‘Well, sir, I’m glad to see you. Come home just in the nick of time,

you have. You’ve a grand opportunity for making your fortune now. Gad!

But it’s providential, this American business! We shall get rid of some

of our surplus stock now. It’ll give us a pull over our work-people

too, at last; and not before we need it. The fellows were getting

beyond everything, eh!’

Sebastian, his calm and serious eyes quietly scanning the strong, if

coarse, under-bred face of the man before him, merely said that he was

quite new to this kind of thing. He had not considered the subject in

that light at all.

‘Well, I should advise you to do so as soon as possible then, or you’ll

lose your chance,’ shouted Mr. Spenceley, whose voice was elevated so

as to drown entirely those of the rest of the company, while his wife

timidly looked on, her florid face set gravely, and her eyes round and

staring with a sort of anxious attentiveness.

Sebastian foresaw that he would have to take her in to dinner, and he

glanced at her now and then, wondering what he should say to her--how

keep up some kind of a conversation. She was a tall, stout, matronly

woman; once she must have been an extremely handsome lass. Her black

hair was still abundant, and had something of the waviness of Helena’s:

her eyes, too, were dark. She was as tall as her daughter, but more

lymphatic in temperament.

Helena probably inherited her beauty from her mother, and her

vehemence from her father. Mrs. Spenceley was accustomed to roll in her

carriage through Bridgehouse and Lower Place, suburbs of Thanshope,

and to look from her elevation upon the extensive matrons who stood

at their cottage doors, exchanged gossip, and scolded their ingenuous

offspring, sporting in the road before them; but her nature was the

same as theirs. Denude her of her silks and satins, attire her in a

cotton or linsey gown, with bare arms and a large apron, her hair

twisted up into a knot behind, and her head capless; a cottage full

of cares and unruly children, a rough ‘measter’ to make and mend and

‘do’ for, and she would have been indistinguishable from those other

matrons. She would have fallen back into the old ways quite genially

and naturally; she would have been what she certainly was not under

existing arrangements--happy.

For Mrs. Spenceley was unhappy in her riches and greatness; she

could remember quite distinctly the days when Spenceley had been

overlooker at one of the great Thanshope factories, and she had done

the work of the house, and brought up the children single-handed,

and been happy--and not genteel. She remembered the sudden leap into

prosperity, the gradually increasing establishment, Helena dismissed

to a fashionable boarding-school, and Fred to a private and select

academy, where he was to learn how to become a gentleman--that short,

easy, and every-day process, where, as a matter of fact, he had drunk

in one lesson, and one only, namely, that a fellow whose father has

money, and who will one day have money himself, need not know, or do,

or be anything--except rich. Mrs. Spenceley remembered how servants,

of whom she stood in awe, had accumulated around her; how she had had

to leave her kitchen to their tender mercies; how she had found that

she must not handle a duster, or have an opinion as to the merits of

the heave-shoulder or the wave-breast any longer; until she had got a

magnificent housekeeper, in black silk and a lace cap, who was fully

conscious of the primordial fact that large and wealthy establishments

only existed in order that she might domineer over one of them. How

Helena was returned upon her hands, a ‘finished’ young lady, ignorant,

as it seemed to Mrs. Spenceley in her own ignorance, of the very

elements of a womanly education--unable to keep house, to cook, to

sew, even to distinguish ribs of beef from sirloin. She had ventured,

mildly, to utter some of her woe to the father, who had said, ‘Pooh!

Let the lass alone. She’ll never need to know such things. She shall

marry a lord! Only don’t let her cross me and she’ll do.’ And Helena

had been suffered to trample upon the domestic arts, and to throw

herself, with all the energy of one who has nothing to do with herself,

into all sorts of questions about which her active brain made her

curious, while her unfinished education left her profoundly ignorant of

their practical bearings. She had no female friends except Mrs. Mallory

and Miss Mereweather, a conspicuous friend and upholder of ‘the cause.’

She loved Mrs. Mallory, because that lady was kind to her, and was by

no means a nonentity; and she adored Miss Mereweather because of her

talents, or what seemed to Helena her talents.

Friends at home the girl had none. Fred had one of those hopelessly

dense natures which may be called the complacently brutal--nothing

in the way of friendship or sympathy was to be had from him. Her

father--Helena, in her intercourse at school with girls of good

family and social surroundings, had learnt to know that her father’s

manners and language were to be abhorred, while, had he been a Sir

Charles Grandison in the matter of deportment, his coarse bullying

and ferocious bantering of her mother would alone have made the

hot-spirited girl almost hate him.

And Fred--his mother stood in profound awe of him; his talk, his slang,

his ways in general; and she was the one soul on earth, except himself,

who was firmly convinced of the fact that Frederick Spenceley was at

once a finished gentleman and a consummate man of the world.

As Sebastian sat watching his hostess, and partly divining some of

these facts, a voice at his elbow roused him.

‘Good evening, Mr. Mallory. You look as if you were dreaming.’

Looking quickly round, he saw Helena standing close beside him, smiling

as frankly as if no misunderstanding had ever existed between them,

as if they had not quarrelled violently within two hours of first

seeing each other. How lovely she was! None but a very lovely woman

could have stood the dull ivory satin dress she wore, fitting tight in

the waist, without a fold or a crease; and, in an age of voluminous,

portentous crinolines, trailing straight and long behind her. She wore

a black lace fichu, and elbow sleeves with black lace ruffles falling

from them. The fichu was fastened with a golden brooch; beyond that was

not a ribbon, not a frill, not a jewel or a flower about her. And her

beauty came triumphant through the ordeal.

They had parted on decidedly evil terms, and he was surprised now to

find that she welcomed him cordially, and smiled as she took the chair

beside him.

‘I am afraid I was very cross the other night,’ said she, with a sunny

smile. ‘But I thought you had treated me badly, and I am going to have

my revenge to-night, and show you that I am in earnest. My greatest

friend, Laura Mereweather, has most fortunately been able to come just

when I invited her. Wasn’t that wonderful?’

‘I am prepared to say that it was; but I don’t yet know why.’

‘You know Miss Mereweather; by name, at least?’

‘To my shame I must confess that I never even heard of her before.’

‘What an extraordinary thing! She has a European reputation.’

‘You astonish me! For what?’

‘As being the most advanced female thinker, and the greatest benefactor

to her sex, of her time.’

Sebastian’s face fell, as he looked round the room.

‘These very intellectual women have often nothing remarkable in their

personal appearance,’ said he. ‘Would you believe that, of the several

young ladies I see seated about the room, I could not say which I

should suppose to be Miss Mereweather.

‘_That_,’ said Helena impressively, ‘that slight girl, all intellect,

and mind, and spirit, talking to my brother--that is Laura!’

‘Is it really?’ he said, his eyes falling upon the ethereal-looking

being described by Helena.

He saw a thin, nervous-looking girl--a girl with not a bad face, if

it could not be called absolutely handsome. She too was dressed,

like Helena, in a tightly fitting robe with undistended skirts, but

her dress was black. She wore an eyeglass, looked restlessly around,

and had a deep contralto voice. There was nothing alarming in her

appearance; she looked, thought Sebastian, as if she would have made an

excellent head-mistress of a large school, the matron of an hospital,

or some authority of that description.

‘She is a woman of powerful individuality, I should say,’ he remarked.

‘Is she not? After dinner she shall talk to you.’

‘Oh, you are very kind! I wouldn’t trouble her for the world.’

‘It is no trouble. Nothing done for the cause would be a trouble to

Laura; and then you must be enlightened. You must learn that ours is

not a cause to be treated with levity. You must be punished for what

you did and said the other night,’ said Helena.

‘I submit; but--I am sure you could talk just as well,’ said Sebastian,

resignedly.

‘Ah, if I could!’ said Helena, gazing with admiring devotion towards

her friend.

‘Is there not an immensity of power and force about her?’ she said

enthusiastically. ‘Laura has several times been mistaken for a man--by

persons who have heard her voice, and her remarks, without seeing her.’

‘Has she? How excessively annoying for her!’ said Sebastian, with

feeling.

‘Annoying! It pleases her, as a testimony to her power, and as a proof

that there is no real disparity in the respective capacities of men and

women. Of course, when it is known that books or pictures have been

written or painted by women, all hope of fair and impartial criticism

is over.’

‘Is it?--Well, I was looking at the question from another point of

view. I thought that if Miss Mereweather disapproves so strongly of men

in general, it would annoy her to be mistaken for one of that odious

and inferior sex; and, moreover, would only be a sign of how very

different she must be from most women.’

‘She is very superior to most women; if that is what you mean, I

concede the point willingly.’

‘Well, if such a superior woman is often mistaken for a man, is not

that a piece of negative evidence of the inferiority of women in

general?’ he asked politely.

Helena’s face had flushed again.

‘As I said, Laura shall talk to you. She will argue much better than I

can. I do not pretend to her abilities. And there is Parsons announcing

dinner,’ added Helena hastily, her colour mounting still higher as she

caught Sebastian’s eyes fixed with a grave yet not unkindly expression

upon her face.

He rose to offer Mrs. Spenceley his arm, and stood with her, watching

the couples as they filed out of the room. Yes, Helena was lovely, and

not all her wild talk, not even her enthusiastic admiration for Miss

Mereweather, could make her otherwise.

He looked absently on, as first his mother and Mr. Spenceley went by;

next a gorgeous dowager, whose tribal name and standing were unknown to

him, but whom he distinctly heard saying something about ‘the ’oist at

the Lang’um ’otel,’ as she swept past on the arm of a flaccid-faced,

red-haired, meek-looking man, pertaining to the goodly company of

cotton-spinners. The wife of the said cotton-spinner followed next,

with a gentle-looking incumbent--he who ministered to the spiritual

needs of Mr. Spenceley and his family. More couples followed. Fred

Spenceley with Miss Mereweather--more gorgeous dowagers and resplendent

spinsters, and more of the native young men, leading the same to the

banquet, and, at last, Helena, in her creamy robes, with Hugo.

‘The lucky young dog!’ thought Sebastian, resignedly, as Hugo’s

eyes met his, and the lad smiled rather triumphantly, in the full

consciousness that he was leading out the prettiest woman in the room.

Was she talking women’s rights now? Sebastian wondered, as he silently

brought up the rear with the equally silent Mrs. Spenceley. No! She was

laughing with Hugo, like any other pleasant, well-conditioned girl, and

asking him to tell her exactly how he spelt his name, and if it had any

particular meaning.

‘For I know nothing about German, you know, except a translation of the

“Sorrows of Werther,” which I thought very funny.’

‘And I do not know much about English,’ said Hugo, much delighted

with his own good fortune, ‘but I can understand yours, _sehr gut_, I

mean, very well. You speak so clearly--it is different from the London

people.’

‘Not bad for a first attempt, old boy!’ thought Sebastian, smiling

as they entered the celebrated dining-room of Castle Hill, with its

pictures and bronzes, and statuary, all of the very best, and ‘bought

by people who understood such things,’ as Mr. Spenceley was wont

modestly to say, when any one praised any of his artistic treasures.

Mrs. Spenceley did not look like a person who would have exactly a

discriminating taste in the matter of genre-paintings, or landscape,

but Sebastian broke the silence between them by remarking on a little

picture hanging opposite to him.

‘Yes; it’s by a person called Ansdell, I believe,’ said Mrs. Spenceley.

‘They say it’s very good; but for my part I’m no judge of such things.’

Sebastian bowed, and then, thinking that perhaps local topics might

prove more successful than artistic ones, said he feared that distress

was already beginning amongst the work-people.

Mrs. Spenceley turned with some vivacity to her guest.

‘You’re right, Mr. Mallory. If it goes on as it is doing, it’ll break

some ’earts before all’s over.’

‘Do you visit much amongst them?’

‘Not so much as I could wish. There’s some of the poor creatures will

soon be fair clemming--starving, I mean.’ Mrs. Spenceley sank her

voice, and every now and then her eye turned with a little nervous,

wavering glance towards her lord at the other end of the table. ‘You

see I shouldn’t like to go amongst them so much without I could keep

them a bit. I _should_ like to have a soup-kitchen!’ she added with

feeling; ‘but Spenceley doesn’t quite approve of it. He says that many

of them have money laid by, and he’s of opinion that we must let them

help themselves a bit before we begin to help them.’

‘From a politico-economical point of view Mr. Spenceley is perhaps

right,’ said Sebastian, glancing down the table at the red-faced,

coarse-featured man, with a heavy jaw not devoid of cruelty; and noting

that same jaw reproduced even more obtrusively and unpleasantly in the

son; scarcely at all in the daughter, or at least only in a manner

which gave an expression of decision to the charming mouth.

‘I know nothing about politics,’ said Mrs. Spenceley; ‘and you may mark

my words--those that’s starving will want bread--not politics.’

‘Certainly they will. Unfortunately you often cannot give them the one

without a good deal of the other.’

‘I dare say. But if the war doesn’t stop soon we shall have to do

something, if it was only to try and teach the poor women to make the

most of their bits of stuff. Most of them are no housekeepers to speak

of. They can spin and weave, but they can’t make home comfortable,

and after all, that’s the chief thing. But,’ she added, suddenly

remembering different reports she had heard of Sebastian, and Helena’s

contemptuous announcement that he was a fop, who thought the world was

made for his amusement, and that there was nothing in life worth the

trouble of being earnest about, ‘you won’t be much interested in these

kind of things, Mr. Mallory.’

‘On the contrary, I am much interested in it. Your idea makes me wonder

if something could not be done. If some schools, or something of that

kind, could be established,[2] if some of the ladies of the town would

take it up--my mother and you, for example, Mrs. Spenceley--and make

it unnecessary for those poor girls to be wandering about, laughing

and making fun of people in the streets as I saw them the other day.

And your daughter--I should think Miss Spenceley would find the work

congenial.’

‘Helena!’ echoed the mother, shaking her head. ‘It’s of no use talking

about her, Mr. Mallory. She has always some fresh craze in her head,

and never a useful one. That horrid Miss Mereweather has been the ruin

of her.’

Sebastian repressed a smile.

‘If she only would turn to something useful!’ lamented Mrs. Spenceley,

‘but with these ridiculous ideas about women being better than men, and

all that--and she can’t even make a shirt for her father or a pudding

for her brother. Oh, but I beg your pardon--only I do often tell her

that she would never make a good wife with these ideas--not if she had

millions of pounds and was the prettiest girl in England.’

Though Mrs. Spenceley threw back her head and spoke in a tone of

annoyance, yet Sebastian clearly distinguished an accent of pride in

her voice. The homely mother then was not altogether displeased with

her wilful, brilliant girl.

‘And what does she say to that?’ he asked, looking at Hugo and Helena,

who seemed to be greatly enjoying some remarkably good joke; and he

thought: ‘The prettiest girl in England! At least she might hold her

own amongst a dozen of the prettiest.’

‘Oh, she says she never will be married, and that nonsense. I tell

her to wait until Mr. Right comes, and then we shall hear a different

song. I wish he would, I’m sure,’ she added fervently, ‘before she gets

spoiled. She has a right good heart, has Helena, if only a giddy head.’

Sebastian did not answer. He was still looking towards Hugo and Helena,

and felt intensely conscious of the ripple of laughter which scarcely

ceased between them. It was impossible that women’s rights, or any

such bristly, hateful topic could be causing that delighted look on

Hugo’s dark, artist face; could call that gracious curve to Helena’s

red lips. Hugo threw himself with passion into the joy of the moment,

as Sebastian knew; Helena seemed to have something of his eager,

inflammable temperament. At least they appeared to be very happy

together.

* * * * *

Dinner over; a group of four congregated in a corner. Helena on a sofa,

with Hugo beside her; Sebastian and Miss Mereweather facing one another

in chairs, and the cross-examination about to begin. Helena had wished

to leave Sebastian and Miss Mereweather to fight it out alone, but he

had meekly suggested that it was not fair to make him confront the most

remarkable woman of her age entirely without support; and Hugo adding

his petition, Helena had consented to be present at the discussion.

Helena seated herself, opened her fan, and said,

‘Now, Laura dear, Mr. Mallory would like to know your views on the

Woman Question.’

She avoided meeting the look of sorrowful amazement and reproach with

which Sebastian heard this decidedly exaggerated announcement, and

Laura replied,

‘I should first wish to know Mr. Mallory’s own views upon that

subject--_the_ subject, I may say, of the present age.’

‘They are soon stated,’ said Sebastian. ‘I have none.’

‘Then there is some hope for you,’ said Miss Mereweather, with rather a

pitying smile.

‘I am glad of that. At the same time, I should like to know in which

direction the hope shows itself.’

‘Your frank acknowledgment of your utter ignorance of the question is

a great point in your favour. As you have no views at all upon it,

you are the more likely to be able to receive just ones when they are

offered to you.’

‘I have some preconceived ideas upon the matter of logic and

reasonableness, common sense, and all that kind of thing. Will that be

against me in this case, do you think?’

‘I dislike flippancy,’ said Laura.

‘I did not mean to be flippant. I merely wished for information.’

‘We will take the suffrage first,’ said Miss Mereweather, raising

her voice somewhat, as if to scatter such irrelevant remarks to the

winds. ‘Are you in favour of extending the franchise to women--I mean

women-householders and ratepayers?’

‘On what grounds?’

‘On the only grounds on which they can claim it; on the grounds that

they are mentally, morally, and, in the practical affairs of the world,

the equal of man; and that, as they bear equal burdens for the State,

so they should have equal privileges.’

‘I could never grant them the suffrage on those grounds.’

‘_What!_’ exclaimed both ladies, while Helena started forward, and

dropped her fan, her eyes flashing, and her face flushing.

‘Because it would take too long to prove your case. What is more, if

you fight the question on that ground, I doubt whether you will ever

win it. You cannot be said to have proved a case to your opponent

until you have got him to agree with you, and you will never, in your

lifetime at least, get more than a number to agree with you on that

point; it may be an influential number, and a select one, but it will

not be at all a majority.’

‘Your argument is not logical, it is a quibble,’ said Miss Mereweather

disdainfully. ‘Your real opinion is that women ought not to have the

franchise.’

‘I never said so. If they think it a privilege, and if they would be

pleased to have it, why not?’

Miss Mereweather, unaccustomed to this style, neither agreement nor

opposition, was silent a moment. Then a shade of pique crossed her brow.

‘You do not think women worth discussing anything seriously with?’ said

she.

‘Excuse my saying that you are quite mistaken.’

‘Then why don’t you discuss this question seriously?’ was the decidedly

feeble reply of the most remarkable woman of her time.

‘But I do. I say, why not give them the franchise if they would like to

have it? I suppose that by degrees they would get educated up to it.’

‘Mr. Mallory! you are absolutely insulting,’ cried Helena, angrily, and

Sebastian merely answered with a grave look, and the remark,

‘I am sorry if I have offended you.’

Helena’s lips, opened to utter further reproach, suddenly closed; with

a look of embarrassment she became silent, and Miss Mereweather, in a

business-like tone, said,

‘Mr. Mallory is not so dark as he seems to you, my dear, I have good

hopes for him. We will turn to another branch of the subject. What is

your opinion, Mr. Mallory, of the relative status before the law of

husband and wife? What do you think of the laws about married women’s

property?’

‘I think they are bad,’ said Sebastian, stifling a yawn, and glancing

at Hugo, who was fanning himself with Helena’s fan, while she leaned

eagerly forward.

‘Ah!’ said Laura, ‘an opinion at last! You agree with us that there, in

that most important of all relations, the woman is a slave.’

‘I don’t think I said so. I suppose the woman might be a slave if every

husband were as bad as the law would allow him to be. Men are not all

tyrants, nor women all slaves! so I suppose that is why the law has not

been changed.’

‘That is sophistry,’ said Laura.

‘Will you deny that it is fact?’ he inquired politely.

‘Then you would allow the law to be altered?’

‘Certainly.’

‘It is an important subject for you, my dear child,’ said Miss

Mereweather to Helena. ‘I only hope your resolution will remain firm,

and that you will resist temptation and specious promises. In your case

you will have plenty of both.’

‘Of course I shall resist,’ said Helena, a little crossly. ‘I am not

quite imbecile, Laura, and know how to take care of myself. My mind is

quite made up on that subject.’

‘In what direction?’ inquired Sebastian.

‘I have told you already. I know I shall have property,’ said Helena,

trying to speak with lofty indifference, but all the same, not unaware

that the young man’s eyes were fixed upon her face, and with her own

wavering as she went on with the speech which she had uttered many a

time before, and which now struck her for the first time as falling

somewhat flat, and not being quite equal to the occasion. Other young

men had looked at her, and said they were sure she didn’t mean it,

and it was too cruel of her, and other ‘vacant chaff’ of the same

description. Sebastian only looked at her gravely, calmly, as it seemed

to her, almost pityingly, and in perfect silence.

The glance stung and galled her. She would not be deterred by that

look. What was Sebastian Mallory but a man--a thoughtless young man,

who had dared to laugh at her views?

‘And property entails responsibilities,’ she continued.

‘It certainly does.’

‘I shall therefore never marry,’ said Helena, courageously, though her

face burned, and she wished intensely that she had never insisted upon

the discussion. ‘I shall look after my own affairs, and arrange them

according to my own judgment. I will be free, and nobody’s servant.’

‘A very wise resolution; provided, first, that you keep it; and second,

that you feel equal to disposing judiciously of a large property.’

‘I have no doubt about _that_,’ said she, with a lofty smile, still not

raising her eyes, and very angry with herself for not being able to do

so.

Sebastian smiled, and the smile made Helena feel hot and uncomfortable.

‘I hope,’ said he, with extreme politeness, ‘that you will feel the

satisfaction which should be the reward of such high motives.’

Helena flushed again. She had argued the point more than once with

different people, and without this feeling of embarrassment. Why was

she embarrassed now? What would that ‘nicest girl’ he ever knew think,

if she were here? Had she money? He had said she had been brought up

in the school of adversity. That reminded Helena of another point in

the argument, which she ought to have advanced long ago. She was dimly

conscious of a kind of bathos as she said, ‘I don’t believe in useless

fine ladies, you know, all the same. I think women ought to be able to

earn their own living, if necessary. They ought to be able to be quite

independent of men, if they choose.’

‘Do you think they ever would choose?’ he asked with a suppressed smile.

‘I know this, that I would rather earn fourpence a day as a

needle-woman, than depend upon any man!’ said Helena, hotly and

indignantly. ‘And I could always do that.’

‘In that case I congratulate you,’ he retorted ironically. ‘You are

superior to all calamities and misfortunes. I wish I could feel myself

equally secure.’

‘You have not argued a single point,’ said Helena with passion. ‘I

shall never be at the trouble to talk seriously to you again.’

‘If you will only talk to me at all, I shall be delighted.’

She had risen, and whirled herself away to the other end of the room,

where she busied herself in setting two young ladies to screech duets,

while she conversed (seriously or otherwise) with the clergyman.

Sebastian turned with a half-smile to Miss Mereweather. He found an

unaccountable pleasure in goading Helena into a passion. He had a dim,

vague idea that if he tried, he could not only irritate her into fury,

but soothe her back into calmness; but he was quite sure he never would

try. Rages, he thought, were not in his line. He liked better, as a

permanency, the perfect temper and calm self-possession of another

character. No one would want to tease Adrienne.

His mind half given to such thoughts, he conversed with Miss

Mereweather, and his opinion of Helena’s discrimination was gradually

raised. Miss Mereweather was not at all bitter about her defeat--if

defeat it were. She was clever, sensible, accomplished. She owned

that she did think a great deal about the advancement of women and

their improvement, and she was an ardent advocate for giving them the

franchise; but, she added, she could not go to the lengths Helena

did, and very soon they left that subject and turned to others. Their

conversation was perfectly amicable and agreeable, and Helena watched

them from afar, with a darkling, somewhat resentful glance. Dear

Laura’s one fault, she thought, was that she was too facile--that she

compromised too easily.

As the Mallorys drove home, Mrs. Mallory, completely deceived by

the long conversation which had taken place, was in a disastrously,

unsuspiciously amiable frame of mind, and was correspondingly

dejected when Sebastian, summing up his description of the evening’s

entertainment, said that Miss Spenceley had adopted the strictly

feminine line of argument, ‘Agree with all I say, or I will quarrel

with you!’

‘As I did not agree with all she said, she quarrelled with me. _Violà

tout!_ Did she talk women’s rights to you, Hugo?’

‘To me--no!’

‘Why _I_ should be selected as the victim, I can’t imagine,’ pursued

Sebastian. ‘It is a pity she does it, for she could be nice, I am sure;

and as it is, she makes herself simply a bore.’

Mrs. Mallory was silent, mentally heaping opprobrium upon Helena’s

crazes.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] An apology is herewith offered to the Manchester Central

Committee, for thus putting into the mouth of a fictitious individual

their excellent proposals for the schools which were of so much benefit

in most of the distressed districts.

BOOK II.

THE STORM.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER I.

THE FIRST OF THE STORM

The year 1861 had closed in thick clouds and a great darkness, with

the mutter of war in the far west, and with the threatening of famine

at home. The year 1862 dawned, but with a dawn so dark as scarce to be

distinguishable from profoundest midnight.

‘Earth turned in her sleep for pain.’

January, February, dragged slowly by, and times only grew worse. Few

chimneys smoked, no workers tramped through the streets; faces were

pinched, fires burnt low and meagre in the bitter weather; money was

not forthcoming, clothes were few, pleasures were at an end. Men paused

and waited, as it were, while the thunder growled and the first heavy

drops of the storm began to fall, slowly and deliberately, and then

faster and ever faster, till none could escape the universal drenching.

One bitter morning, in the beginning of March, Myles and Mary Heywood

turned out to their daily work. A furious, stinging wind, and a

driving, scourging rain, saluted them as they entered the long sloping

street leading to the factory. Myles pulled his collar up about his

ears, and Mary folded her shawl more tightly round her, pulling it also

farther over her face. They walked in silence, and did not look at

each other. In truth, both their hearts were sad as sad could be. They

were entirely changed from the well-to-do, untroubled, noble-looking

brother and sister who, six or seven months ago, had walked home

together in the heat of the August afternoon. What a hot, plentiful

blaze of sunlight then! what cold, what wet, what inclemency of

elements now! The contrast was pointed and searching, and went home to

both.

For months now, Myles’s heart had been growing bitterer and harder, and

more rebellious; ever since that evening on which Sebastian Mallory

had come and interrupted his talk with Adrienne. He had not seen her

often since then, or rather had not visited her often since then; but

on the few occasions when he had done so, she was changed. He had seen

the change distinctly, had seen how her eye wavered and her colour

changed under his piercing glance, for he could look at her steadily

enough now, without bashfulness, and with a gaze of desperate, hopeless

inquiry, which, he thought, must burn her secret from her heart. With

each visit, each conversation with her, he had grown more hopeless,

more despairingly certain that what little part or lot he had ever

had in her life, had now vanished--was done with for ever more. Once,

strolling aimlessly along, he had seen her come out of a shop, and

had been going to speak to her, when Sebastian Mallory had come up,

smiling, and lifting his hat, and fixing his eyes upon her face.

The sight had been quite enough for Myles, who had plunged his hands

into his pockets, and turned away with bitterness in his heart. Once or

twice--he did not know how often--he had purposely and pointedly spoken

to her of Sebastian, and had even asked her a question or two about her

former acquaintance with him, and had watched cruelly and unflinchingly

to see how she took it. And she had taken it just as he had expected,

with downcast eyes, a heightened colour, and a sudden confused silence.

He had been satisfied with his experiment; now he had given over going

to Mr. Blisset’s house, saying to himself,

‘If she cares for us, and is worth anything, she will come--she will

come, if it is only to see Mary. By this I shall know her. If she comes

I’ll keep quiet, and try to be satisfied with her--friendship. And if

she does not come--I’ll hate her; no, I’ll think no more of her--I’ll

forget her, and rid myself of this plague that has been with me ever

since I knew her.’

Adrienne did not come; days and weeks went by, and she came not,

and Myles did not hate her; he did not cease to think of her. His

‘plague’ tormented him more grievously than ever, and his life was

miserable. His days were long; there was only half the usual work to

fill them. The weary afternoons and evenings were unutterably long.

He sat at home with his books open before him, or he took his way to

the reading-room, and sat with more books open before him, and stared

at them, and knew nothing about what was in them, while the chimes

played ‘Life let us cherish!’ and Myles thought of the hundreds, now

daily augmenting, dwelling in the houses beneath those chimes, to whom,

in their destitution, the tune must have seemed a sort of melodious

mockery. ‘Life let us cherish!’ while the men across the Atlantic

were locked in the deadly grip of war, and the cotton manufacture in

England was coming steadily, surely to a stand-still. A few more throbs

of its mighty pulse--a few more desperate struggles to break through

the paralysis that was creeping over it, and then the iron lungs, the

great throbbing heart of it, its huge limbs, its vast arteries, would

be quiescent--for who should venture to say how long? It was a deadly

prospect.

With these various causes of distress gnawing perseveringly at his

heart, the young man might well be silent, as he set his teeth against

the wind, and stooped his head to shield his face from the rain.

While Mary, on her side, had cause enough and to spare of unhappiness.

The poor girl’s heart was full to bursting of a dread fear that she had

had for many weeks now, and concerning which she had not breathed a

word to any one.

‘That it should ha’ begun just now!’ she thought to herself; ‘just when

times is hard, and work is short, and I can none get him all he should

have.’

She kept up a brave face; worked out her daily task at her looms, and

her much harder, heart-breaking task at home; had caresses, and smiles,

and tender words for Edmund, and a good face to turn to poor Myles, in

his gloom, which oppressed her faithful heart like a chill hand laid

upon it. She had her meed of consolation for Harry Ashworth, who said

he was growing deafer and deafer. She had her own private astonishment

at Adrienne’s long absence, but no thought that Adrienne meant any

slight or ill-will to her or hers.

Still, her secret cares had thinned her cheeks, and taught her lips

to assume a sadder curve; had placed a line or two upon her frank,

calm brow, and lent a quiet pensiveness to her dark-brown eyes. It

had always been a good face--now it had the dignity and pathos of

well-borne sorrow.

They entered the great gas-lighted room. Myles went off to his part of

the mill and Mary to hers. How hot and overpowering it felt, after the

bitter rawness of the outside air! She cast aside her shawl, and set

her looms going, and in a few minutes the old accustomed roar of the

machinery had somewhat soothed her; and her monotonous, weary pondering

over ways and means, and sharp, stinging fears as to some dread event

hovering in the near future, had been somewhat dissipated by attention

to her work and the chat of a fellow factory-worker.

‘I reckon we’st soon have to shut up shop here, Mary,’ said the latter.

‘I yeard Wilson say as how we couldn’t hold out mich longer.’

‘Eh, what?’ said Mary, with a start--‘eh, I hope not, lass. What mun we

do, if we’ve no work?’

The other girl shrugged her shoulders.

‘I’ve yeard say, too, as if we do have any work, it’ll be wi’ Surats,

and I mun say I’d rayther have none at all. I conno’ work yon stuff.’

‘I care nowt at all, whether it’s Surats, or what it is, so as I’ve

summat to do, and summat to earn,’ said Mary.

‘Thou may work twelve hours a day at Surats, and not earn above

six shillin’ a week,’ said her companion cynically; and then the

conversation ceased, and Mary was left to her reflections.

At eight they went home to breakfast, and at half-past they were at

their work again, and continued at it until half-past twelve, when

Wilson put his head into the room, and called out,

‘All the hands in this here room will please wait a few minutes in the

big yard. I’ve got something to say to you.’

The same announcement had been made in the different rooms, and the

result was, all the hands were assembled and waiting, some curiously,

some apathetically, for the communication that was coming.

Wilson jumped upon a lorrie which stood in the yard, and in a clear,

distinct voice, read out from a paper he held in his hand this

announcement:--

‘I hereby give notice that on and after Friday, March the --th,

this factory will be closed, owing to the present condition of the

cotton trade, in consequence of the American war. At the same time,

as I am anxious to keep my hands together, and to save them as much

as possible from distress, I undertake, for the present at least,

and until other circumstances should make a change desirable, to

furnish them with the means of subsistence, and such of them as are

my tenants will not be pressed for rent until the times improve. Each

head of a family is requested to attend in the warehouse of this

mill on the afternoon of Monday next, at three o’clock, when the

conditions of relief will be made known, and the names and addresses

of all in receipt thereof taken down. I request you earnestly, and

with perfect confidence, to try, all of you, during this present

trouble, to act together, and assist me in the preservation of order

and the relief of distress.

‘SEBASTIAN MALLORY.’

There was a short silence; then murmurs; then, from some lips, an

attempt at a cheer. Some girls and women were wiping their eyes with

their aprons, and one or two men waved their hats: exclamations

and murmurs arose all around. ‘Eh, but that’s reet-down kind, that

is!’ ‘Th’ chap is a good sort!’ ‘Well, we needna fear to clem just

yet!’ and so on. The gratitude was very real, if expressed with true

Lancashire reticence and absence of effusion. But almost greater than

the gratitude was the gloom--the sense of shame and degradation--the

feeling that this was a draught too bitter for any amount of sugaring

to sweeten, and that they had done nothing to deserve to have to

swallow it. Sebastian had done wisely in committing to Wilson the

delivery of the message. Wilson seemed to the work-people almost as

one of themselves; he, too, must suffer somewhat from this calamity.

The humiliation would have been too intense had Sebastian read the

announcement himself. He, like hundreds of other masters, was making

money--netting large profits at this stage of the crisis. His piled-up

warehouses would be emptied at profitable prices of the accumulated

results of last year’s over-production, while the impossibility of

getting at the stores of cotton which were undoubtedly reposing in

large quantities in Manchester and Liverpool warehouses, relieved

him from the immediate expense of working, and of paying wages.

That part of the ‘panic,’ as it was and is always called by the

work-people, was one of unmitigated severity for the poor man--for the

worker--capital added hugely to her stores. Yet every employer of any

foresight was troubled to know what was to become of his work-people

during the great distress--such skilful, practised, deft-handed,

soft-fingered work-people as no other corner of the world could supply

to him--work-people who, if they once got scattered, or emigrated, or

separated from their labour, could not be replaced--the choicest of

craftsmen and craftswomen. This was a hard subject during all the years

of the cotton famine--how keep the operatives together, provide for

them, prevent them from becoming demoralised by the enforced idleness,

combined with the living on money not earned by themselves? It was a

problem which, all must confess, was nobly solved.

At this precise time, though the distress was daily augmenting in an

appalling manner, though each week saw a greater number of factories

closed entirely, yet the organised system of relief--that gigantic

machinery whose equal the world had never before seen--was not yet in

existence.

Sebastian, after long consultations with Mr. Sutcliffe, had come to the

conclusion, for the present at least, to support his own work-people,

and the result of that resolution was the paper just now read out by

Wilson.

Slowly the hands dispersed. Mary Heywood, seeing her brother near the

big gate, joined him there, and glanced rather doubtfully up into his

face. Doubt rapidly changed to dismay: he was white as death; his lips

tight-set; his great dark eyes absolutely scintillating with passion.

The words she had been about to speak to him died upon her lips.

‘Thou go home, lass! I’ve a little business to do before I come after

thee, but I’ll not be long,’ said he, so quietly and calmly that her

heart beat a little less rapidly, and without a word she obeyed,

leaving him there in the yard, he conscious only of one purpose, and of

a burning restlessness until that purpose should be accomplished.

He waited by the gates, looking at no one, speaking to no one, until he

saw that all the hands had filed out, and that Wilson was left alone in

the office, locking things up. A few swift, striding steps brought him

inside the little room. Wilson looked up.

‘Hey, Myles! Is that you? Do you want something?’

‘Yes. I just want to tell you to take my name--and my sister’s too--off

the books. We shall not work here any more.’

‘Oh! but you will. This here is only a temporary stoppage, you know.

Times must mend, though they look bad enough now, and Mallory’s won’t

go to smash so easily.’

‘I shall never work here again, I tell you, nor Mary either. Take our

names off the books, if you please; and look you, Wilson, if anybody

comes round to my house offering me relief in’--a spasm twitched his

pain-set lips--‘the master’s name, I’ll kick him out--so you’re warned.’

‘My certy, Myles! You’re mad to talk i’ that way. You’ve ne’er thought

about it. How are you to live without relief? And when such a handsome

arrangement has been made----’

‘That’s nothing to the point. Please to do as I ask, and remember, I’ll

keep my word.’

He turned on his heel and left the yard. Wilson looked after him,

watching the proud, elastic figure, haunted by the remembrance of the

deadly paleness of the face, and the sombre, despairing gloom of the

eyes.

Wilson acted as became a wary man, who did not choose to commit

himself--shook his head, and murmured,

‘Ay, ay, my good chap, but you’ll have to eat humble-pie sooner or

later--and why not sooner?’

Evidently, the characters of Myles and his easy-going old friend were

fundamentally unlike.

Meantime Myles, breathing rather more freely, and with a faint return

of colour to his cheek, took his way home, feeling that now, if he met

Sebastian Mallory, he could look him in the face as defiantly as he

chose. There was something almost exquisite in the sense that, though

only a few pounds stood between him and destitution, yet he was no

longer in any way dependent upon Mallory.

Arrived at home, he found the kitchen empty; the dinner half ready

(not such an abundant dinner, even now, as it once had been), the

table spread. He sat down moodily, and waited; and presently Mary came

down looking very sad indeed. She had not been crying, but there was

something in her eyes speaking of a grief and fear beyond tears.

‘Well, my lass, where’s Edmund?’

‘Edmund’s in bed, Myles.’

‘In bed!’ he echoed, looking up in some surprise; ‘why, what ails him?’

‘The same thing as has been ailin’ him this six-week. I dunnot know

what it may be. Th’ doctor calls it low fever.’

‘The doctor!’ he echoed again, more astonished still. ‘What’s the

meaning of this, Molly?’

‘Eh, Myles, if thou’d none been so wrapped up in summat all this time,

thou might ha’ seen as the lad were fair pinin’ away.’

She could hardly finish her words, but sat down upon the rocking-chair,

and covered her face with her hands for a moment, while he looked at

her with a haggard gaze. A hundred trifles came into his mind now,

crowding quickly forward--Mary’s pre-occupation--Edmund’s passive

silence and flushed face--and he had never seen it. Brute that he was!

‘And to-day he’s that weak, he can’t sit up no longer,’ continued Mary,

raising her face from her hands and looking sadly before her; ‘and I’m

sore fleyed he’ll ne’er be strong again, that I am.’

Then she rose, and began to finish the few preparations for dinner,

though, sooth to say, no two people ever made ready for a meal with

less appetite. She began to talk, as she thought cheerfully.

‘When I heard Wilson read out as factory would stop o’ Friday, my heart

fair sank within me, when I thowt o’ yon lad, and us wi’out a penny

to earn, but, eh! I could ha’ cried wi’ joy afore he’d done. Yon Mr.

Mallory mun be a reet good-hearted chap, and our Edmund winnot clem

now.’

‘Mary!’ he exclaimed, starting up, and speaking in so strange a voice

that she looked at him involuntarily, and saw again the look--the

pale face, the scintillating eyes--which had so terrified her an hour

before, at the mill-gate. He stepped across the room to her, and

grasped her arm. ‘Never thou name such a thing again. I told Wilson to

take my name, and thy name, off the books, and to send anybody round

here, poking into my affairs, if he dared. I’d die like a dog before

I’d take bit or sup from _him_, or let any of those that belonged to me

do it.’

‘Why, whatever----’ she began, but he went on, forcibly moderating his

voice,

‘Molly, I never could have thought to hear such a word from thee. Hast

thought what it means? It means that we--seven hundred and more of

us--shall go like beggars every day, and take that man’s money, and eat

his bread, and do nothing for it. Thou’rt mazed with thy trouble,’ he

added soothingly, ‘or thou’d never have dreamt of it.’

‘But how mun we live?’ she asked, seeing only that they were Mr.

Mallory’s work-people, and that he prized their services, and like a

generous master desired to help them until better times came round

again. ‘Thou wert always so set against th’ master, lad; but when we’re

like to starve, what mun we do?’

Neither Mary nor Myles, it may have been observed, made any mention

of their mother, or spoke as if she could relieve them. Later in the

distress Mary went to her mother, and represented their situation. Mrs.

Hoyle replied sententiously that her money was sunk in her husband’s

business, and she had no longer any control over it, which was indeed

true: she had put it entirely in his power immediately after marrying

him, and it remained there, for towards the close of 1863 Mrs. Hoyle,

who had believed that she was doing well for herself in her marriage,

died of a rapid, sudden illness, and her money passed away from her

children, and into her husband’s hands, for ever.

‘We’re not like to starve yet,’ replied Myles, to his sister’s last

remark. ‘I’ve got over ten pounds put by--it ought to have been more,

but I wasn’t as careful as I should have been; and you’ve something of

your own, I know. It’s true, we’d meant to keep it, but in these times

we’ll most of us have to use up what we put by.’

‘Eh, lad!’ answered Mary, with sorrowful embarrassment, ‘mine were such

a bit! And I’ve drawn it all out, for to buy yon lad his bits of things

as he must have. Doctor ordered them, and I saw as thou were moithered

wi’ summat, so I didn’t ax thee, but just used up my own bit o’ brass.

It’s all gone--all but a few shillin’s.’

He dropped her arm, and turned aside. This then was the prospect--a

sick brother to cherish, himself and his sister to support; the rent

to pay; and a little over ten pounds between them and destitution.

Undaunted though his spirit was, it was fain to stand appalled before

these facts, until at last, turning round, he said,

‘I’ll think about what can be done, Mary. Ten pounds will last a good

while, and thou’rt so clever at managing, and all that.’

Mary was silent. She knew how quickly ten pounds would vanish, where

there was an invalid to be cared for; and the regular weekly sum which

Myles had haughtily refused, seemed, now that it was out of her reach,

to assume the proportions of absolute wealth.

‘Myles,’ she said, ‘I know thou mun have some reason for what thou’rt

doing, but _I’ve_ no grudge against the master. I don’t see why I

shouldn’t take the relief and help Ned a bit ... thou needna know nowt

about it.’

‘Mary!’ He paused, choked back some passionate emotion, and looked at

her. There rushed over his mind, as by an inspiration, the conviction

that what he had said, what he had proposed to do, was a mean,

tyrannical way of making others suffer for his own private grudge.

Mary’s mind was to be kept on the rack as to ways and means; Edmund’s

comforts were to be stinted, or stopped, because he, Myles, hated

Sebastian Mallory, and, knowing his sister would obey him, despotically

said, ‘You will take no help from him.’

Certainly, to know that Mary and Edmund were subsisting upon Mr.

Mallory’s bounty, while he was idle, would be anguish almost as keen

as to sit down and subsist upon that bounty himself; but anguish, it

seemed, prevailed a good deal in the world. It had to be borne by some

people--what right had he to shift his portion upon the shoulders

of a loving woman and a cripple boy? He cried shame upon himself.

His cheek flushed, and he hesitated no longer. He had begun to speak

passionately; he finished calmly.

‘I had not thought of that. You are right, Molly. You’d better do so.

It will be bad for me to bear’ (how bad, his pale face and drawn lips

foretold), ‘but it’s best so. This is a great trouble that has come

upon us, and we must be as great as we can to meet it, I suppose. I

shall look out and see if I can find anything to do--perhaps away from

here. I’m sure it’s the best thing I could do. It’s a great mistake my

being here at all.’

This speech, with the misery and bitterness underlying its acquiescence

in her wish, seemed to freeze Mary’s heart within her. She could not

understand it, yet it seemed to forebode evil and misery and woe to

her. She looked at Myles, in whose whole attitude was something alien

and strange. For a moment a fearful weight and foreboding oppressed

her; then, breaking suddenly loose from it, she ran up to him with a

cry of love, flung her arms around his neck, and kissed him eagerly.

‘Eh, Myles, hush, hush! Thou munnot talk like that. I’d clem sooner nor

take a penny from any one thou didn’t like. It were only that I were

quite disheartened, like, wi’ wondering what I were to do in these hard

times, now yon lad is so poorly. But for thee to go away and leave

us--the best brother’--a hug--‘ay, the vary best, ever a lass had--my

certy, don’t say nowt about it again.’

She was half laughing, half crying. As for Myles, the clasp of her

warm arms about his neck seemed to unstiffen it; the pressure of her

face upon his breast appeared to loosen a load of pent-up feeling. He

put his arm round her waist, and kissed her soft brown hair again and

again, and once more the feeling rushed over him that this was true

hearty love, and that he was a fool to distress himself for that other

love, which would never be his.

‘Don’t take on so, there’s a dear lass. Do just as you like about the

relief. Say nothing to me about it, and I shall know nothing about

it. There’s a reason why I can take neither bit nor sup from young

Mallory--a reason I can’t tell you, and that will never be removed. A

crumb of his bread would choke me.’

‘Why, has he done thee any wrong?’

‘None at all, and means me no wrong; it’s what they call circumstances,

Molly. They come rather hard upon a fellow sometimes, that’s all. Come!

the dinner must be well-nigh cold. Let’s have it, and then I’ll go up

and sit wi’ poor Ned a bit.’

It was a dark prospect which opened before them; yet, after this

conversation, they both felt lighter of heart, and better prepared to

meet it.

CHAPTER II.

‘RATHE SCHLAGEN.’

Sebastian Mallory, Mr. Sutcliffe, and Wilson, holding a council of

war together, late in the afternoon of that eventful day, discussed

the means to be taken for the preservation of order, and the best

distribution of relief.

Sebastian, in the course of the debate, asked how many exactly there

were to be relieved.

Wilson ran his eye over some long lists of names and addresses.

‘The number of hands is seven hundred and thirty, sir, all in all; but

it’s with the heads of families we shall have to deal. About a dozen

won’t require relief, and four have taken their names off the books

altogether.’

‘Which are they?’ asked Sebastian.

‘Frank Mitchell, weaver; he’s got a brother in Canada, who offered to

pay his passage out if he’ll go and help him on his farm; so, as soon

as he heard work was stopped, he decided to go. That’s one. Myles and

Mary Heywood----’

‘What! Any reasons given for their leaving?’ asked Sebastian, quickly.

‘Well, sir, relief would be a hard nut for Myles Heywood to crack, at

the best of times. He’s uncommon proud, and he came up to me, after I’d

read your notice, and told me very stiff indeed to take his name and

his sister’s off the books. I did hexpostulate with him, but he were

quite determined.’

‘Did he give any reasons?’

‘No, sir. He doesn’t generally give his reasons for what he does,

leastways not to me; but I’m not his master.’

‘Is he one of my tenants?’

‘No, sir. He lives on the Townfield, at Number 16.’

‘Oh, very well!’ said Sebastian, and the business went on for some time

uninterruptedly.

In the evening Sebastian, calling at Stonegate, and asking if Miss

Blisset could see him, was admitted, and taken to the drawing-room,

where he found Adrienne alone, seated at her piano. She rose, coming

forward to greet him, and he saw that her face was pale, and her eyes

sad and heavy.

‘I hope you are in a good-natured and self-sacrificing mood,’ said he,

‘for I am come to ask a very great favour.’

‘I shall be delighted if I can help you in any way.’

‘Did you know we cease to work at all after Friday?’

‘Cease to work at all! What will become--oh, I am very sorry--what will

the work-people do?’

‘I thought,’ began Sebastian, and bit his lips.

He was afraid of appearing to parade his intentions before her, and

altered the form of his announcement.

‘I have consulted with Sutcliffe, my manager, you know, and we have

come to the conclusion that it will be the best and wisest plan for me

to relieve my work-people myself, for the present at any rate, and----’

‘All of them! To keep them, do you mean?’ asked Adrienne, quickly.

‘It is really the best, and it will be the cheapest way in the end,’

said he, half apologetically; ‘and what I wished to ask you was----’

‘It is right--it is a generous thing to do. I am glad you are going to

do it,’ she interrupted him, her eyes beaming, and suppressed warmth in

her tone.

And she looked at him more fully and steadily than she had done for

many weeks past. Yet there was something not perfectly pleased in her

expression.

Sebastian, a young man who was not usually given to losing his

self-possession or presence of mind, coloured, half with embarrassment,

half with pleasure.

‘I am glad you approve,’ was all he could find to say.

‘I do. It will be such an excellent example.’

‘An example--ah, yes! But now to ask my favour. Sutcliffe thinks it

will not do to let them be idle all the time, so we have decided to

open some schools--one for the men and boys, and another for the women

and girls. Both of them will require some one with brains and a head on

their shoulders to look after them. I want to know if you will take the

management of the women’s school?’

‘But Mrs. Mallory--will she not wish to----’

‘No. She will have nothing to do with it beyond giving me a

subscription. I believe she does not altogether approve of the course

I have taken, and has decided to hold herself aloof. You can do it, if

you will, and if Mr. Blisset will spare you. I know you are not afraid

of yourself, and that is why I asked you.’

‘If my uncle can spare me, I will undertake it,’ said Adrienne,

speaking as she now usually did speak to him--rather briefly and drily.

Sebastian could wring no sign from her--nothing but a rapid, guarded

glance, and a brief, unemotional speech. It was unsatisfactory, he

felt. He was not making way. She tormented his thoughts sometimes in

a way that was harassing; he carried in his mind almost incessantly

the calm, sweet face, pale and clear; the rapid glance which was,

he felt, not so much destitute of expression as full of something

veiled--something which she would not allow to beam fully out upon him.

‘It will not be play,’ he proceeded, after a silent pause, during which

his eyes interrogated hers, which made no answer. ‘It will be downright

hard, arduous work. If it should prove to be too much for you....’

‘It will not be too much for me,’ she said quickly, and then her eyes

did suddenly fill with some expression--what he could not tell. ‘I

want some work like that--work which will be hard and absorbing,’ said

Adrienne, clasping her hands with an involuntary movement. ‘What must I

do? Have you got a room for the school, and some teachers?’

‘I think of dividing part of my warehouse, and filling it with

benches. It can soon be done. As for teachers, I thought some of the

better-educated amongst the young women themselves, or I could find a

mistress, and--do you know Miss Spenceley?’

‘No, I do not,’ said Adrienne, steadily, her colour rising.

‘She is a young lady who professes to need active work and to love it,

and I really think, if she had the opportunity, she would throw herself

heart and soul into such a scheme. But perhaps you would rather not

make her acquaintance?’

Adrienne paused again. Was she to extend the scorn and contempt she

felt for Frederick Spenceley to his whole connections, and to make

difficulties and quibbles about her co-workers in a scheme in which it

was essential chiefly to have workers as soon as possible?

‘No,’ said she; ‘if you think Miss Spenceley would help, I shall be

very happy to work with her.’

‘Of course you will be the head,’ said Sebastian. ‘I will take care

that is understood, and then there will be no difficulty.’

‘If you will send me a list of names and addresses,’ said Adrienne, ‘I

will go myself and see after them. I dare say Mary Heywood could tell

me something about a good many of them.’

‘That reminds me that Myles Heywood, for some reason or other, has seen

fit to decline all assistance. He has ordered his own name and his

sister’s to be taken off my books, and withdraws in dignified silence.’

He looked intently at Adrienne as he spoke. She was silent, crimsoned

for a moment as she met his glance; then she started from her chair and

walked to the fireplace, stooped over the fire-irons, and began to mend

the fire.

‘Allow me!’ said Sebastian, politely, coming to her assistance in

time to see her disturbed face. ‘Is it not foolish of him?’ he added,

remorselessly. ‘He is too young to have been able to save anything

almost, and there is not the least prospect of work at present.’

‘He was quite right,’ said Adrienne, clearly, as she fixed her eyes

upon Sebastian.

‘Quite right?’ he echoed, holding the poker suspended in his hand, and

looking at her in his turn.

‘Perfectly right. I am thankful to hear it. If he had stooped tamely

to accept charity from you--I mean from any one--as soon as it was

offered, I--I would never have forgiven him.’

Sebastian gently replaced the poker in the fender.

‘Perhaps he knew that,’ he remarked in his softest tone.

‘He could not,’ was Adrienne’s quick retort. ‘I have not spoken to him

for weeks. And if I had--if he had known it....’

‘He might know it perfectly well, all the same,’ insisted Sebastian.

‘Have you thought seriously about it, Miss Blisset? I know Heywood is a

friend of yours....’

‘Yes, he is--a great friend of mine,’ she answered firmly, and not one

sign was lost upon Sebastian’s cool, observant eyes; the head a little

thrown back, eyes bright, the pale cheek flushed, as if she braced

herself to meet some peril. He saw and noted it all.

‘You should be cautious how you influence him,’ said he.

‘I do not influence him. He is far too strong and decided to be

influenced by--by a girl like me.’

Sebastian smiled politely but derisively.

‘Pardon me, but I don’t think you are quite right there. I am convinced

you do influence him, and if so, don’t you think it is unkind to

prejudice him against his real interests?’

‘His real interest is not to take charity. Mr. Mallory, the bare idea

of Myles Heywood coming up to receive charity is dreadful. It makes me

miserable to think of it--only I can’t imagine his doing such a thing.

He never will. Poor fellow! I am sorry for him!’

‘Sooner or later it will come to that--it must,’ said Sebastian. ‘And

I--you speak as if I had tried to thrust alms upon him ostentatiously,

like a rich man relieving a beggar, and then appealing to every one

to notice his generosity. Can you suppose I intended anything so

revolting?’

The usually placid and unruffled Sebastian spoke in a tone of deep

vexation and chagrin.

‘No, of course I did not suppose any such thing,’ replied Adrienne,

her face still flushed. ‘I did not do you so much injustice. But I’m

glad he refused--so glad. I hope he will find something else. I even

hope that this present trouble may turn out to be a means of improving

his position, for I think he may turn his thoughts to some higher

employment than mere drudgery in a factory--even though it is your

factory,’ she added, with a slight smile.

‘He is certainly fit for a higher post. You would be glad to know him

in such a situation, would you not?’

‘Indeed I should.’

‘Even though it took him away from his friends and native town?’ went

on Sebastian, somewhat ironically.

‘Y--yes. Even in that case.’

‘Well--who knows! It may turn out to be as you say.’

The conversation had been a far from satisfactory one to Sebastian.

He had had no idea, a month ago, that Myles Heywood’s image would

take such an important place in his concerns. He turned the subject,

and made arrangements with Adrienne about the school; but it seemed

to him that since their passage of arms--for it had been a passage

of arms--her eyes had brightened, and her voice had been more full

and decided. He left her at last, firmly convinced that Myles was his

formidable rival, and the conviction gave him a strange sensation, such

as he had never known before. All his life he had been accustomed to

quietly make up his mind, and then as quietly carry out his decision.

Now, to his own astonishment, he found himself strangely wavering

between certainty and uncertainty; and as he walked from Mr. Blisset’s

house to his own, he pondered over the history of his own love for

Adrienne, and, almost for the first time, began to wonder what would be

the end of that history.

It was three years now since he had first met her. There had been a

chamber concert, in Coblenz, of classical music. Adrian Blisset had

played violin and his daughter piano, and Sebastian had been one of

the not very numerous audience; for the taste of the Coblenzers for

music was not of the severe sort. Perhaps the small audience was the

more appreciative--at least Sebastian Mallory sat a long two hours and

a half, without a thought of being weary or any wish to go. When the

music was over he had penetrated to the little room whither Adrian and

his daughter had retired; and knocked, and been bidden _herein_.

Apologising for the intrusion, he had introduced himself, and said

he imagined that certain pieces that had been played that evening,

and which stood on the programme without any composer’s name, were

the production of the musician himself. He was right, and as these

compositions had appeared to him to possess a certain wild, weird

beauty of their own, there had ensued a long conversation upon the

subject, during which Sebastian’s discrimination and real, earnest love

for the art he professed had won over even Mr. Blisset’s reserved and

moody disposition.

Thus the acquaintance began. The musician had been kinder and more open

than he usually was, not only to strangers, but to any one at all.

Sebastian had been allowed to visit him and his daughter. Adrienne had

played for him; she had talked with him, and he had found her charming.

From Coblenz they had gone to Wetzlar, in the vain and illusory hope

that there they might find an audience, and receive remuneration. The

projected concert never took place, but certain other things did.

They spent altogether a week in the sleepy old town. They floated in

a little boat up the river, between the rows of poplars and the level

meads; they sat under the shadow of the grim old _Heidenthurm_ of the

cathedral, and looked over all the landscape below. Adrienne sat upon

the wall above Goethe’s _Brunnen_, and looked at the girls coming to

fill their pitchers, and said to Sebastian, who was standing beside

her, and looking earnestly down at her,

‘I wonder if it was to such a well that Hermann came and helped

Dorothea? I could almost fancy so. Could not you?’

‘I think I could,’ Sebastian had answered, looking, not at the well,

but at her.

With each day that he saw her, his admiration for her grew greater. She

was a fair jewel in a poor setting. Her gentleness, her dignity under

trouble and sorrow, her

‘Festen Muth in schweren Leiden,’

impressed him, delighted him. Her flashes of quaint humour, which

showed him how gay the spirit she owned might be, if only the sun would

shine a little upon its dwelling-place; her grace, her intellect,

attracted him irresistibly; and he loved, too, the quiet independence

with which she met him; the calm dignity with which she ignored his

wealth, his position, his advantages, and treated him as her equal--no

more, no less.

Amongst the list of events which made, as it were, a gaily coloured,

kaleidoscopic pattern in his memory, that week at Wetzlar stood out

from the rest, like a little patch of pure gold, like the lucent

background on which stands out, pure and clear, some mediæval Madonna.

One morning, when he went to call upon them, he found Adrienne in sore

distress, which she tried in vain to conceal. She was alone, and he

had succeeded at last in getting her to confess what troubled her. A

creditor of her father’s pressed hard for a certain sum of money, due

long ago. That fact was in itself painful enough, but it alone would

not have been sufficient to break down Adrienne’s calm and steadfast

courage. It was her father’s manner of accepting, or not accepting, his

position, which alarmed and made her wretched. More than once he had

uttered dark and oracular hints as to the wisdom of leaving a world

which was full of nothing but misery and contradictions. At that time

he was in his room, and had refused to see her or speak to her. She

did not know what would happen, what he might or might not do; and

Sebastian saw the young girl’s courage fail for the first time, for the

first time saw her fold her hands, and, with tear-stained eyes, ask

piteously,

‘What am I to do?’

‘Leave it to me, Miss Blisset. Of course something must be done, and I

will do it. For your sake I will do it gladly,’ he had said, taking her

hands, looking into her troubled eyes with a glance that made them more

troubled still, and going straight to her father’s room.

The ‘something to be done’ naturally resolved itself into pecuniary

assistance. The matter was perfectly simple. Notes for three hundred

thalers settled it. Sebastian insisted upon becoming Mr. Blisset’s

banker, and Mr. Blisset said that he could not refuse the possibility

of being under obligations to a gentleman, who would understand

the feelings of another gentleman, rather than to a coarse-minded

tradesman, who could not by any possibility understand such fine

sensibilities. The money was a loan. They both called it a loan; and

Sebastian came out and told Adrienne that it was all right.

She had burst into tears; then recovering, had said,

‘There is nothing that I would not do for you.’

To which he had replied,

‘Then come and have a row on the river.’

Upon which they had straightway had a very delightful row on the river,

the Lahn; and delicacy alone had prevented Sebastian from then and

there saying to Adrienne that he loved her, and asking her to be his

wife. He deferred the question--he hoped, not for long--only until he

had spoken to her father; and that he decided he would do the following

day.

In pursuance of this resolution, he had called during the forenoon at

the musician’s lodgings, and had asked to see him.

‘_Ja!_’ the hostess told him, with a shrug of the shoulders, ‘the

_Herrschaften_ had left by the first train that morning. Last night the

gentleman had spoken very sternly to the Fräulein; she had heard him.

The Fräulein had expostulated, and cried, and said, “How unthankful

it will seem!” To which her _Herr Papa_ had replied that he could not

endure such a burden; he must leave the place. After which he had

desired his _Fräulein Tochter_ to pack up, and they were gone.’

‘Where?’ asked Sebastian.

‘_Na!_ How should I know, _mein Herr_? Apparently to Frankfort, since

the first train in the morning goes direct there; but from Frankfort,

I have heard, one may go out anywhere over the whole world, even to

Africa, if one chooses. What do I know?’

Sebastian had retired, quite convinced that it was not Adrienne but

the morbid pride and vanity of her father, which had caused this

_contretemps_. That pride could not endure to live in the presence of

the man who had placed him under an obligation. He had gone to hide

himself, and Sebastian tried in vain to find any further trace of

Adrian Blisset and his daughter.

He had so much the less forgotten her. The feelings of warm admiration,

chivalrous respect, and tender affection which he had hitherto felt

for her, suddenly leaped up in a quicker flame--he loved her. From

feeling convinced that to have her as his wife would be a good and a

happy thing for him, he had become determined that one day she should

be his wife; she and no other. From that time she had remained for him

as a sort of standard, an ideal of womanhood; gentle-spirited, true,

and pure, wise and prudent, sweet and modest. He had judged all other

women by this standard, and had never felt anything more than a certain

admiration for any woman since his parting from Adrienne.

Then had ensued his return home, his not very satisfactory relations

with his mother, the distress amongst his people, the necessity for

prompt action and hard work, his introduction to Helena Spenceley, his

sudden, unexpected meeting with Adrienne, and the eager conviction that

now she soon must, should be his. Beside Helena’s brilliant beauty, the

delicate grace of Adrienne was as the beauty of a white violet compared

with a crimson rose. Helena was dazzlingly beautiful, but she was the

exact opposite of all which he had been for three years praising and

exalting to himself as best and sweetest and most desirable in woman.

He thought a good deal of Helena. She was younger than Adrienne,

wilder, less educated, prejudiced, hot-headed, violent, and bewitching.

‘Yes, she must be bewitching,’ argued Sebastian, with exquisite

_naïveté_, within himself. ‘Look at Hugo. The lad was enraptured with

her.’ That was to be expected. Hugo was young too; he had not loved

Adrienne Blisset for three years. Sebastian had the steady purpose

and intention of asking Adrienne to marry him, to honour him and

make him happy by becoming his wife. When? As soon as he could find

the opportunity, he said to himself. But it never did come. He could

not understand how it was, that, though he saw Adrienne repeatedly

and alone, though she was amiable, cordial, pleasant, yet he could

never get that question asked. Adrienne’s behaviour puzzled him. He

could have sworn that once she loved him. When he was with her, Myles

Heywood’s handsome olive-hued face, with its scornful lips and defiant

eyes, seemed always to be hovering there between her and him. And yet,

on the one occasion on which he had seen them together, Myles had

looked and behaved as if he were as far as possible from being anything

like a favoured lover, thought Sebastian, with an odd sensation of

jealousy and pain. No; it was only opportunity for which he waited,

an opportunity which seemed as if it would never come. Certainly it

had not been there that evening. He walked home lost in profound

speculations, thinking of Adrienne’s lifted head and flashing eyes, and

of how Myles Heywood had been ‘very stiff indeed’ with poor old Wilson

that morning.

CHAPTER III.

‘Kannst du des Herzens Flammentrieb nicht dämpfen,

So fordre, Tugend, dieses Opfer nicht.’

Towards eight o’clock on the following evening, Mary Heywood and Edmund

were the only occupants of the kitchen. The lad was somewhat better and

less feverish, and Myles had carried him downstairs and laid him upon

his old resting-place, the chintz-covered sofa under the window.

There he lay, with a shawl thrown across him; his thin face wasted to

sharpness--a waxen pallor on his cheeks and lips; dark rings under his

great bright eyes. His almost transparent hands were stretched out upon

the couch before him, and his unread book lay open across his knees.

Mary had made things as cheerful as she could, so as not to let Edmund

know how bitterly they were pinched in order to give him the things he

needed. True, the fire was smaller than their kitchen fires were wont

to be; and behind the cupboard-doors there was not very much to bring

forth for supper; but the place was exquisitely clean and tidy, and so

was the girl herself, in her faded gown, and with her pale, pathetic

face.

‘Mary,’ said Edmund, breaking a silence, ‘does Miss Blisset never come

here now?’

‘Well, it’s a good while, like, since hoo were here; likely hoo’s had

summat to do as has kept her away,’ said Mary, as confidently as she

could.

‘I canno’ think why hoo ne’er comes. I could like to see her ...

where’s Myles to-neet?’

‘Gone to the reading-room, he said. I’m some and glad he does go there.

Some o’ these chaps is hanging about the livelong day, fair as if they

didn’t know what to do with theirsels. I reckon some on ’em will do

summat as they shouldn’t before long.’

‘Has Harry Ashworth been lately?’ pursued Edmund, his thoughts turning

towards his friends, now that he felt himself somewhat more free from

pain and weariness.

‘Ay--he’s been more than once,’ replied Mary, and her cheeks flushed,

and she gave a great jump, as a knock resounded at that very moment

through the house. The coincidence was too remarkable.

In a moment, however, she realised that the knock was at the front,

not the back, door, therefore it could not be Harry Ashworth who

knocked; and secondly, it was not at all like his knock when he did

come. Wondering who the visitor could be, and casting a critical glance

around, to see if the kitchen were as neat as it should be, she stepped

out through the passage, and went through the ceremony of unlocking and

opening the door.

Outside it was dark. Coming from the light of the kitchen she could not

see who stood there, but a voice which she had already heard once, and

thought pleasant, inquired,

‘Does Myles Heywood live here?’

‘Ay, he does; but he’s out.’

‘Oh, is he? I’m sorry. I felt sure he would be in in the evening.’

The visitor still lingered on the doorstep, and inquired again,

‘Do you know how long he will be?’

Mary’s sense of hospitality was stronger than even her dread of Myles’s

displeasure.

‘Won’t you step in a minute, and see if he comes? It’s Mr. Mallory,

isn’t it?’

‘Yes. I did want to see him very particularly.’

‘’Appen, if you were to sit you down a bit, he might coom back soon,’

suggested Mary, fervently trusting that he would do nothing of the

kind; and that Mr. Mallory would get tired of waiting, as she knew

Myles himself did.

With a word of thanks Mr. Mallory accepted the invitation, and

entered the house. A proper attention to established etiquette would

have led Mary to usher him into the highly coloured parlour, but

the recollection that there was no fire there, and that some of the

furniture was wanting, overcame conventional rules, and he was taken

forward into the kitchen.

‘I hope I am not intruding,’ he began, so courteously that all Mary’s

innate politeness was roused to action, and his welcome was more

effusive than it might otherwise have been.

‘Eh, dear no! Please take a seat!’ said Mary, pulling up her own

rocking-chair. ‘Me and Edmund was quite alone, and not doin’ nowt at

all, except talk a bit. Ned, here’s Mr. Mallory. You’ve ne’er seen him

afore.’

Edmund had never been aware of Myles’s deep antipathy to the young

master; he only knew that his brother had a sort of contempt for his

employer, as a useless, highly finished piece of humanity, not good

for much in such a rough place as Thanshope. He himself was intensely

sensitive to refinement and beauty, in every shape and form, and as

Sebastian was handsome, polished, and refined in an eminent degree,

Edmund’s eyes rested upon him with a sense of satisfaction and soothed

pleasure and delight, and he smiled pleasantly as he took the hand

which their visitor extended, saying kindly,

‘I fear you are a great invalid.’

‘I’m none so strong,’ said Edmund. ‘I’ve been ill, but now I’m better.’

‘I suppose you are Myles Heywood’s brother and sister?’ continued

Sebastian.

‘Ay,’ said the others, and they smiled--that smile of mingled pride and

affection which speaks well for the absent one, and which Sebastian

noted directly.

He took a chair by Edmund’s sofa, and, turning to Mary, said,

‘I suppose you know your brother has had his name and yours taken off

my books.’

‘Ay,’ responded Mary, colouring with some embarrassment, while Edmund

looked rather anxiously from the one to the other, this being the first

he had heard of the circumstance.

‘Was it your wish, too, to leave my employment so suddenly?’ he asked

slowly.

‘I didn’t know--Myles did it. He thought it would be for the best, I

suppose, sir,’ stammered the girl.

‘But you,’ he persisted gently--‘have you such an intense objection to

receiving a little assistance in such a time of distress, from a--you

don’t say master here, I notice--from an employer whom you have served

so long and so well as I hear you have done? I should not have thought

so. You know it is not an ordinary case. It is not as if you or I, or

any of us here, could have prevented it. There can be no shame----’

‘I never thought there was,’ said Mary, wondering in her distress what

could be the grudge that Myles had against such a master as this. ‘I

fair cried wi’ joy when I heard what you was going to do; but when

Myles came in and told me----’

‘But you do not mean that he has forbidden you--that he prevents--it

is----’

‘No!’ said Mary, suddenly. ‘Our Myles is not one of that sort, I can

tell you, Mr. Mallory. He won’t take a penny himself--why, I don’t

know. And I saw as it would go near to break his heart to see me and

yon lad eating another man’s bread, and him standing by idle. But he

said to me, “Thou’ll do what thou’s a mind to, Molly; it’s a great

distress, and we m--mun--be g--great to meet it.” Oh! it were same as

if he’d said, “There’s nowt for’t but to cut off my right hand; give me

th’ chopper, and let me do it!”--that it were!’

She sobbed vehemently once or twice, and Sebastian read the passionate

love and devotion she felt for that brother, whom, he began to think,

he never could conquer.

‘Ah! that is more like him!’ he said warmly. ‘I thought I was mistaken.

And will nothing persuade you to accept this help? It is such a small

thing to refuse; and I do not think it right in you to refuse it. You

must think of this brother of yours. He cannot stand the hardships of

this time as Myles, and even you, can; and----’

‘You are very good--reet-down kind, you are!’ said Mary, looking at him

with gratitude. ‘I’ll say this. We’ll hold out as long as we can. We

mun do that, if we want to think well of ourselves. But I’ll come to

you when it gets too much. You’re reet: I can’t see nowt to be ashamed

of in it.’

‘You promise?’

‘Ay, I promise.’

‘That is well. Now, if your brother would come in, I could say what I

have to say to him, and----’

Mary lifted her head. She heard footsteps along the flags of the back,

and the tune being whistled which no one but Myles ever did whistle.

She started forward as the back door was opened, and exclaimed,

‘Here’s Myles; he’s coming now.’

‘Ah, I’m glad of that,’ said Sebastian, though he was fully conscious

of Mary’s discomfited looks. ‘Now I can speak to him myself.’

The back door was closed again; the quick steps grew leisurely;

presently the kitchen-door also was opened, and the voice of Myles was

heard, saying, as he entered,

‘I say, Molly, thou must----’

He came in, and looked round with a smile, which flashed out of his

face as he saw who was there. His first impulse was to ask fiercely,

‘What brings _you_ to my house?’ but Myles had very strongly developed

the proverbial Lancashire sense of hospitality, and accordingly he

suppressed his question, and remained silent, until Sebastian offered

him his hand, saying courteously,

‘I hope you will not think I am intruding. I particularly wished to see

you, and your sister was so kind as to ask me to wait a few minutes, in

the hope that you would return.’

Sebastian had spoken just in time. Myles was assailed on the side of

hospitality, politeness to a guest, and other similar feelings. He

realised quickly that Sebastian had not acted as most masters would

have done--sent for him to come and see him--but had come himself to

seek him out, and now apologised for intruding in the most handsome

and ample manner. There was nothing there that even his sore heart

could construe into a slight. Moreover, the man was there, under his

roof--had been invited there; and, if Molly might have been wiser,

the thing was done, and he must act accordingly. He could not look

cordial--the sense of the advantages which the other had over him

was too heavily and oppressively present for that--but he could be

civil, he could speak words something like welcome. He could even,

under the circumstances, accept the hand which Mallory held out--or

rather, circumstances did not allow him to refuse it. Accordingly, he

took the hand, standing very erect, and looking very proud and solemn,

while Mary knitted more quickly, as she observed, from her seat in the

background, how each man looked straight and steadily into the other’s

eyes.

‘Won’t you take a seat?’ said Myles, handing a chair to Sebastian, and

taking one himself. ‘It’s a cold night, and you’ve had a longish walk.’

‘Thank you. It was on a small matter of business that I called--about

your having taken your name from my books.’

‘Yes,’ said Myles, his eyebrows setting suddenly in a straight line

across his brow, and his lips in one nearly as straight beneath his

moustache.

‘It was this. I do hope you will not think that I come out of any

officiousness or curiosity, because it is not so. Mr. Sutcliffe told

me you had left my employment. I asked him if he thought you had any

other occupation; and he said that, so far as he knew, you had not.

I concluded, whether rightly or not, that your reason for leaving

was that the factory was closed, and you would not accept assistance

without working for it. Was I right?’

‘Yes,’ said Myles, concisely.

‘I know that employment, especially remunerative employment, is

not easy to find in these bad times, and that you might not soon

find anything to do; so I merely called to say that I know of two

situations, for either of which you would be suited, and if you would

like me to use my influence to get you either of them, I shall be glad

to do so. You must not think that I meant anything else.’

‘You are very kind,’ said Myles, in the same constrained and colourless

voice, which belied his contracted brows and the fiery flash of his

eyes beneath them, ‘very kind; but I do not require any assistance,

thank you!’

The manner and the tone were such that Sebastian felt he could not,

after what he had said, urge his offer any farther. But the desire

which he constantly felt when with Myles, to gain his esteem and win

his confidence, rushed more strongly over him than ever before. He saw

in the young man so much that was noble, so much that was good, so much

that he, in his quiet, reserved way, intensely prized. Sebastian had a

strong, though secret, desire to be much loved, to greatly influence

certain individuals. He felt very strongly that where Myles Heywood

loved or admired, it would be with a passionate whole-hearted devotion,

which would go all lengths; and he desired greatly to see some other

expression light those sombre, moody eyes, when they looked at him;

to compel that right hand to stretch itself towards him in a genial,

spontaneous clasp of friendship and regard.

Was it possible that he who before now had won hearts, both of men and

of women; he who had inspired that fitful, capricious artist-Hugo with

a passionate love and devotion; he who had seen Adrienne Blisset’s

quiet eyes well over with something more than gratitude; he who felt

within him the potentiality to subdue that fiery-hearted Helena, did

he but choose to give his mind to the task, and to bring her to his

feet with a devotion as intense as her present half-assumed scorn--was

it possible that he was to be baffled by a young, uncultivated,

untutored, unsophisticated artisan, who could continue to resist,

defy, and scorn him, in spite of all his efforts to the contrary? Was

it possible that this plain-spoken Myles Heywood, with nothing on his

side but his prejudices, his pride, and his love, could continue to

hold Sebastian Mallory at arm’s length, when he really set his whole

battery of persuasion to work upon him? The idea was a galling one.

He did not like effusiveness, but he did like devotion very much. He

hated a display of power; but the power itself he loved dearly. Myles,

in his present attitude, represented a defiant obstacle which must be

overcome. But how?

Mary here afforded him unconsciously a little assistance, by saying in

a tearful voice, ‘Eh, Myles, think about it! Remember how badly off

we are. It’s not for mysel’, it’s for Edmund and thee. I canna bear

to think o’ thee bein’ so pulled down and troubled wi’ such things.

Thou’rt too good for it.’

‘Molly, lass, don’t make it worse for me!’ said Myles, with a

reproachful look; and Mary was silenced, as Sebastian saw.

She sat down in a rocking-chair, and cried quietly, wiping her eyes at

intervals, but she said no more. Myles turned his back upon her, not

wishing to see her distress. Sebastian had also stood up. The man’s

pride was stiffer than even he had supposed, and his desire to bend it

became proportionately greater.

‘I am very sorry you will not let me do anything,’ he said. ‘You are

quite mistaken in thinking there could be any degradation in it.’

‘I never said I did think so,’ interposed Myles.

‘You are not without ambition,’ pursued Sebastian, fixing his eyes upon

Myles with conviction, and noting the answering flush in his face,

though his eyes remained downcast. ‘No man who is worth anything is

without ambition. If you would let me, I could put you into the way

of furthering your ambition. Of course it would be a struggle; but

then you are one of the right kind to struggle--you like it. A few

years’ absence from England, a few years’ hard work in a post for which

you would be well suited, and you might return here, if you liked, a

different man, in a different position, able to do and get pretty much

what you liked. Remember, to a man of courage, who has made a mark,

_most things that he wishes for stand open_. Is this nothing to you? Do

you prefer remaining shut up in Thanshope, with your own prospects, and

the prospects of your fellow-workmen no better than they are? I cannot

believe it of you.’

Almost unconsciously, Sebastian had half-cast aside the mask of

indifference, and was speaking nearly as eagerly as he felt. He had

stepped up to Myles, and laid his hand upon his arm. Their eyes met.

Myles’s very soul had been stirred by the words he had heard.

They had touched the very well-spring of his present wishes and

desires, the longing which had grown and intensified with his love

and his sense of its utter hopelessness. To leave this place--go away

to some other spot, where there would be scope for hard work, mental

and bodily--work that would absorb his energies. There was nothing

he desired more than such work. His enforced idleness was absolutely

hideous to him. Out of England, he might advance, rise; Sebastian, he

knew, was not wont to speak rashly or unadvisedly on such matters,

but was given to measuring his words. He might return an altered

man, well off, perhaps, or at least with the means of becoming well

off; why, he might (it all seemed to flash in a second through his

mind)--he might go at last, and seek Adrienne--and find her gone, hear

that she was Sebastian Mallory’s wife. And _then_ the acceptance of

Sebastian Mallory’s assistance would have caused his last state to be

worse than his first. He would have stooped, not to conquer, but to

be forestalled, defeated, humiliated, and all the riches, and all the

position that the world could give, would not restore his hopes and his

lost self-respect. With a short sardonic, miserable laugh, he jerked

his arm from Sebastian’s hand, and said almost angrily,

‘It is of no use. You will never persuade me to that. It is wasted

breath to try it.’

Sebastian felt an absolute thrill of vexation and mortification; a

thrill so strong as to surprise himself.

‘What makes you so obstinate?’ he unwarily exclaimed. ‘Is it some

personal reason?’

‘Yes,’ answered Myles, looking him directly in the eyes; ‘it is!’

Sebastian’s lips were parted to speak, but he could not utter the words

he intended to say. He was silent with a disagreeable, discomfiting

sense that he was baffled and defeated. They were all silent till

Sebastian said,

‘Well, since you will not, you will not. But I think you are mistaken

in your course, and what is more, I think you will repent it before

long. If you do, if you should come to change your mind, let me know. I

have no wish to take my word back, but shall always be ready to abide

by it.’

Myles smiled, almost scornfully, as he bowed his head slightly and said,

‘Thank you.’

In his inmost heart he was thinking that he would rather die than place

himself under obligations to his rival, whose full formidableness he

only realised to-night. There was, he confessed it, fully and frankly

to himself, something extremely attractive about the grace and courtesy

of Sebastian, but the most dangerous quality was the power which soon

became distinctly visible beneath the polish; a power which forced the

observer, however reluctantly, to respect as well as to admire. If

he, the unwilling and prejudiced, felt these things so strongly, how

much more must others, already prejudiced in his favour, experience

it? So much the more reason why he, the plain and unadorned, should

keep himself to himself, follow his own path, and not ape qualities

so different from his own. But he had ceased to bear any ill-will to

Sebastian. The latter did not know how far he had advanced in the very

moment in which he seemed to have receded.

‘I will not intrude upon you any longer,’ said he. ‘You bear no

resentment, I trust, but understand my motives?’

‘I bear no resentment at all,’ said poor Myles, putting his hand

without hesitation into that held out to him. ‘If I have been rather

rough, I beg your pardon. It is my way. I meant no incivility.’

‘I am sure of it. Good night,’ he added, turning to Edmund. ‘Good

night, Miss Heywood.’

‘Good night, sir,’ said Mary, looking tearfully up, as Sebastian

followed Myles from the room. She heard the door open and shut, and the

steps of the unwonted visitor going away. Then Myles returned to the

kitchen.

Edmund was tired. Myles helped him upstairs, and came down again. They

scarcely spoke. Mary uttered no reproach, and he offered no apology;

but when she got up to go to bed, he kissed her tenderly, saying,

‘Don’t think too hardly of me, Molly. I can’t do otherwise and be an

honest man at the same time.’

‘I’m none thinking of blaming thee, lad,’ said Mary, escaping from him,

and going upstairs.

He remained there a long time, brooding over the embers of the fire,

and thinking, if only things had been different! And as he thought, a

vision rose before him of that Sunday afternoon when he had so nearly

betrayed himself, and he remembered Adrienne’s words:

‘If I loved that man, and he loved me, and asked me to be his wife, I

would say yes; and I would love him and serve him as long as I lived.’

‘Ay, my darling!’ his heart cried within him, in a kind of anguish,

‘but you don’t love me; and if you did, I should not be worthy of you,

if I did what was wrong to win you.’

No doubt he took a wild, fantastic, mistaken view of things, but to him

it was much more real than if the most accomplished logician had argued

it out for him, and proved it to be founded on the purest and most

solidly reasonable basis.

CHAPTER IV.

COMBINATION _V._ STARVATION.

For the space of some six weeks--that is, from early March to the

middle of April, Adrienne, Helena, Mr. Sutcliffe, Hugo, Sebastian,

and others who worked with them or under them, had toiled hard at the

schools of both kinds which Mr. Mallory had opened in connection with

his relief system. At first considerable difficulties were naturally

experienced; some of the work-people grumbled bitterly at being obliged

to ‘go to school again,’ as the condition of receiving a sum, which

appeared to them small indeed, after the abundant wages they had for

years been earning; but the tact and kindness of the three principals,

Sebastian, Adrienne, and good little Mr. Sutcliffe, and the hearty

manner in which they were backed up by their subordinates, soon worked

wonders. Ere long the work-people themselves discovered how much better

off they were than those of their friends whose masters had not seen

fit to provide for them; and who were just then groaning under the

obnoxious ‘labour test,’ as it was called, which roused so much gall

and bitterness before the sewing and educational schools were fairly

started. Learning to make clothes, or reading, writing, and arithmetic,

were felt to be decidedly more distinguished and elevating employments

than stone-breaking, or road-making, and were, moreover, much better

adapted to the lissom fingers, and to the physique, accustomed to

sedentary labour in a high temperature, of the operatives. By degrees

they fell into their places. They felt that they were known, and

expected, and missed if they did not come at the appointed time. The

great warehouse was warmed and lighted, and threw open its doors

hospitably wide to receive them. ‘Mallory’s schools’ were known all

over the town, and those who attended them were envied by those who did

not.

For the principals the task was, as Sebastian had told Adrienne, no

joke. It was continuous, dry drudgery. The routine was monotonous, and

the discipline strict; but the master and head of it all was the first

to adhere unswervingly to every rule laid down, and his coadjutors

followed with unhesitating obedience. Mr. Blisset received more

kisses and thanks from his niece just now than she had ever bestowed

before--kisses and thanks for what she called his goodness in sparing

her to help the poor people in their great distress. She was with him

much less than usual, and perhaps did not therefore notice so much his

pallor and weakness, and the strength which was failing in every way.

He, for some reason, withheld the truth from her, and did not tell her

that he felt almost at the end of his weary, dismal pilgrimage. It was

only to Sebastian that he spoke about that--Sebastian, who had become

the trusted friend of the poor, lonely man.

Adrienne and Helena worked heartily, hand in hand. That was no time

for petty bickerings and jealousies. Even sectarians forgot their

differences in the imperative necessity for administering to the great

need and woe of the people. In working-hours Adrienne forgot entirely

who Helena was; and knew her only as a hearty helper, a quick, bright,

kind-hearted girl, to whom no trouble was too great, and no task too

hard. It was not quite the same with Helena. She had divined, by some

subtle means--herself scarce knew how--that Adrienne was no other than

‘the nicest girl I ever knew,’ and Miss Spenceley’s eyes grew intensely

critical. Every word, every gesture and action of her coadjutor, was

weighed in a nice balance, and, so far, had not been found wanting.

Helena herself was, without knowing it, changing rapidly. Despite a

certain vague disquietude of heart, she was happier than she had ever

been in her life before. She threw herself into her new work with

her characteristic passionate energy and vehemence, and her contact

with life, and some of its sternest lessons, was rubbing down her

preconceived extravagances of opinion, though she still, in word and

theory, cherished them as fondly as ever. But it was impossible that

one of her intensely sensitive and receptive mind could behold what

she daily did, of sorrow and pain, of ignorance and helplessness, and

remain the same. She saw into depths in this our life of which she had

never dreamed, and which Laura Mereweather’s philosophy passed over

entirely.

It has been acknowledged on all sides that the benefits, at that time

were not only on one side. It was not only the rough factory-girls

who came to learn, but also the delicate ladies who gave up time

and comfort and their best energies to teach, who profited by the

intercourse. In the sad and degrading spectacle of the spring of 1878,

the sweet lessons learned and taught in that bitter season of 1862

seem almost to have been forgotten and obliterated. Many a benighted

girl--many an uneducated, ignorant matron, roused to her toil at

half-past five in the morning, and prevented by its long monotony from

acquiring any domestic grace, learnt almost her first notions of making

home happy and comfortable in the schools that were set up in the

‘panic.’

Then, in the woe of the poor, and the sympathy of the rich, it almost

seemed as if the great black frowning barriers of caste had been

overthrown; but the division of classes, the opposition between master

and man, is a plant of sturdy growth, and strikes its roots deep and

far under the earth. Now, sixteen years later, comes a strike almost

without parallel for bitterness and unyielding stubbornness on either

side--a strike accompanied by rioting and mob-rule, broken windows,

houses sacked, men assaulted, women and children threatened; and the

necessity for a strong military force to preserve even the outward

semblance of order; and this, on the identical ground where, during

the cotton famine, the sore distress was most nobly borne and most

generously relieved. These things make a riddle hard to read.

Adrienne and Helena found both their mental and physical energies

taxed to the utmost by the work they had undertaken, but neither had

any thought of giving up. With Adrienne it was a labour of calm,

affectionate duty; she went to it with an enlightened sense of her

own responsibilities, and a full comprehension of the gravity of the

crisis. With Helena it was something quite different; she worked

eagerly, till she was wearied, and scarcely knew why she did it. Of

course she was sorry for the poor people, and pitied them in their

present condition, and was anxious to help them, strained every nerve

to do her work; but she thought more about Adrienne Blisset and

Sebastian Mallory than about all the poor people in Thanshope.

She was changing rapidly, without knowing it. In the presence of

this great urgent need, and of her own deeper emotions, all the

flimsy theories of the past were being utterly undermined, though

outwardly towering as high and as fair as ever. She was no happier

in her home-relations than before. Sebastian’s conduct was condemned

there by her father and brother. She knew that it was only because of

Sebastian’s wealth and Mrs. Mallory’s high position in the town, that

she was allowed to participate in what was called the ‘madness’ of

Mr. Mallory. Fool and madman were the mildest words in the vocabulary

of the Spenceley men, by which to describe Sebastian’s course. It was

wrong and iniquitous in him, they said, to set such an example, as if

every mill-owner in Thanshope could be expected to support his hands

while this confounded war lasted.

‘Every mill-owner--no!’ said Helena, with flashing eyes. ‘So many of

them are too poor. They have not the means; but if all those who could

afford it did so, it would only be their duty--their bare duty, and

there would not be so many begging letters in the papers, asking for

help for the richest county in the richest country in the world.’

She was informed that she knew nothing about it, and that it was only

to keep her out of some other mischief that she was allowed to have

anything to do with such folly.

(‘And,’ she thought to herself, with a hard smile, ‘because Sebastian

Mallory is rich and influential, and I see him every day, there.’)

The conversation turned to Helena’s coming birthday, when she would

attain her majority, and great festivities would be the order of the

day. With tears in her eyes, she took the opportunity to implore her

father to give up the ball which would cost so much money, and to give

her half, nay, a quarter of the sum he intended to spend upon it, that

she might give it to Miss Blisset or Mr. Mallory, and have it used for

relief purposes; but the request was peremptorily refused, and she was

told, in oracular language, that she did not know what was good either

for herself or the work-people. Moreover, she was informed, it was

all very well for a pretty girl to play at women’s rights; but that a

daughter was expected to obey her father; and the regal Fred remarked

that a fool and her money were soon parted, and he would back Helena

for making ducks and drakes of any property she might ever have, if it

were not pretty tightly tied up.

‘I suppose it is only finished gentlemen like yourself who know how to

make proper use of their money and their time,’ said Helena, turning

upon him bitterly. ‘I can tell you the whole town will cry shame on

both of you--the richest men in it, and you have scarcely subscribed

five pounds to keep your own work-people from starving.’

‘I didn’t become the richest man in Thanshope by pouring my money into

my work-people’s pockets,’ said Mr. Spenceley, grimly.

And Helena, with a passionate ‘Psha!’ rushed from the room, drawing on

her gloves as she went, to go forth to her afternoon labours at the

school.

This was in the middle of March, and as she came up the cindery path

leading to the little anteroom, which Sebastian and his staff were in

the habit of using as an office, he and Miss Blisset sat at the window

watching her approach.

‘What a lovely, graceful creature she is!’ said Adrienne, admiringly,

as the tall supple figure of the girl came swiftly up the walk. ‘I

often wonder how she can be the child of such parents.’

‘There is some southern impetuousness in her nature,’ he replied,

‘and a capacity for southern rages, too,’ he added, watching her and

smiling. ‘Look at her now, Miss Blisset; do you see that frown, and how

her eyes are flashing, and her lips set?’

‘Yes, I do; but that is a very unusual expression with her. I wonder

what is the matter with her?’

Here Helena came in, somewhat in the whirlwind style, her tall figure

erect--her silken skirts angrily sweeping about her.

‘You look annoyed, Miss Spenceley,’ said Adrienne, looking up from

where she sat, composed and cool.

‘Annoyed!’ repeated Helena, whose anger and mortification had been

augmenting all the time since she had left home, and whose voice

vibrated; ‘they tell me on all sides that my father is the richest man

in Thanshope, and that I shall have more money than I know what to do

with--some time. Some time, indeed! And I cannot get five pounds now

to help people with. I’ve given away all my money. I have just half a

crown in the world, and I can’t get any more for a month. Do you call

_that_ the proper way to treat a woman who will be responsible for five

thousand a year--_some time_? My father said I should. Do you call that

the right means to accustom her to the duties of her position?’

She had turned suddenly, and almost fiercely, to Sebastian.

‘Not at all,’ said he at once; perceiving that her lips quivered, and

that she was divided between tears of mortification and flames of

anger. ‘Not at all; but, my dear Miss Spenceley, so long as we have

your services, the money which you do or do not contribute is not of

the very least consequence.’

‘Don’t say that to me!’ she exclaimed, excitedly. ‘What is the use? My

services are nothing; I can do nothing.’

‘Indeed, I don’t know what I should do without you,’ said Adrienne.

‘You can influence those girls and women sometimes, when I can make

nothing of them. You can make them laugh heartily, when all my efforts

can only extort a solemn stare from them.’

‘You must not talk of going,’ chimed in Sebastian. ‘It is your

countenance alone which reconciles my mother to the undertaking. And if

you did not come,’ he added, smiling, ‘I don’t believe Hugo would have

anything to say to it; and he is invaluable to me amongst the boys. For

heaven’s sake, don’t desert us!’

Helena, with downcast eyes, was taking off her gloves. Her cheek was

flushed, and she smiled a little triumphantly.

‘Girls can do something then, after all?’ said she.

‘Have I not two living and bright proofs of the fact before me now?’ he

replied, looking from the one to the other.

‘Ah, yes!’ said Helena, coolly, while the flush died from her cheek,

and the smile faded from her lips. ‘Would you mind helping me off with

my mantle? Thanks. There comes Hugo von Birkenau, and there is our

first batch of girls, Miss Blisset. What is the programme for this

afternoon?’

She was all business now; had tied on a great holland apron, studded

with baggy-looking pockets, and slung a huge pair of scissors by a

string round her slim waist. Adrienne was accoutred in a similar

manner. Helena stopped some of the girls who were coming in, to make

them carry a pile of calico to the workroom. Raising his hat, Sebastian

left them to their labours, and joined Hugo outside.

Half of the great warehouse had been temporarily cleared, and

accommodated with benches and half a dozen huge deal tables. This

afternoon was to be a ‘cutting-out’ lesson--a lesson which, sooth to

say, Helena had had to learn herself for the occasion, from her mother.

The two young ladies, with some half-dozen others, who rapidly followed

on Helena’s steps, each took a class, and began their instructions;

the women and girls standing round, and many a dozen of them receiving

their first impressions as to the practical construction of the clothes

they wore. The directions were clear and simple enough; care was

taken, by questionings and cross-questionings, that the pupils should

thoroughly understand what was being explained to them.

When the ‘cutting out’ was over, they were shown how to fix the

things, and as they all sat doing this, each one bringing up her

performance when it was complete, for approval or correction, there

was much talking, and some singing, chiefly of hymns, in very high,

and generally in minor keys. It was very fatiguing work: the long

standing, the continuous talking, explaining, expounding, arranging and

rearranging for the stiff, unaccustomed fingers, formed no light task.

After more than two hours and a half of such labour, it was time to

go. The work was folded up, piled in heaps, laid on one side, and the

pupils prepared to leave.

Adrienne and Helena, both very tired, stood at the door, counting them

as they filed out.

‘Three hundred and five,’ they exclaimed together, as the last one

departed, and they smiled, and turned inside the room again, to divest

themselves of their aprons and shears.

‘Miss Blisset, will you not come home with me, and have some tea?’

asked Helena, who had given the invitation several times before, and

always received the same answer as on this occasion.

‘Thank you very much. I am sorry to say I cannot come.’

‘You always say that,’ said Helena, looking earnestly at her. ‘I have

tried in vain to get a little conversation with you, and to know you

better. I never see you, except at this dingy schoolroom, where I am

sure the incentives to cheerful intercourse are not strong.’

Adrienne smiled rather faintly as she replied,

‘I am sorry; it looks rude, I know, but I must go home to my uncle. He

is not very well at present; and I am obliged to leave him so much. You

must excuse me!’

‘If I must, I must, I suppose, but I don’t all the same,’ said Helena,

turning away in some dissatisfaction, and at that moment Sebastian and

Hugo entered, arm in arm.

‘Miss Spenceley!’ said Hugo, eagerly going up to her; ‘it is getting

dark. May I accompany you home?’

‘Oh yes, if you like,’ said Helena, absently, while she attentively

listened to what was passing between their fellow-workers.

‘Miss Blisset,’ she heard Sebastian say, ‘your uncle particularly asked

me to call this afternoon. I will walk with you to Stonegate, if you

will allow me.’

‘I shall be very glad,’ said she. ‘I am sure he will be pleased to see

you. Do you know, sometimes I am afraid he will not live long.’

‘His is hardly likely to be a long life,’ said Sebastian, evasively.

‘Oh, but it may be. Invalids--when they are taken such care of as I

take of him--sometimes live a long time. And he is not old, and it is

not as if he had a complaint in which there was danger of his dying

suddenly.’

‘Do you dread his death so much?’ asked Sebastian, folding her shawl

around her.

‘I do; and I fear for selfish reasons. Without him I should be

perfectly alone in the world.’

‘You alone? not unless you wished it,’ said he, almost reproachfully,

whilst Helena, assisted by the proud and happy Hugo, was wrapping

herself in her fur-lined mantle with the sable border; the mantle which

set off her dark, piquant beauty to the utmost advantage; for she was

one of those truly English beauties who look almost lovelier in their

outdoor dress, and with the flush of exercise upon their cheeks, than

in the airy fabrics of the ball-room. But there was no flush upon

Helena’s cheeks now. She turned to the boy who had been, or wished

to be since he first saw her, her particular page in attendance (he

aspired to nothing more in his own mind, and, despite all unfavourable

circumstances, he had always seen Helena the wife of his worshipped

friend), and said, in a voice that had sunk and grown tired,

‘Come, Hugo, I have no time to spare. We will leave the others to lock

up. I must go.’

‘I am ready, and waiting your pleasure, _mein gnädiges Fräulein_.’

‘Don’t speak foreign tongues to me. Do you forget what Gretchen said to

Faust when he called her Fräulein?’

‘“Thank you, sir, I can walk home by myself.” That would be shocking,

and I will not do it again.’

‘Good afternoon!’ suddenly said Helena, in a loud, clear voice, as she

looked carelessly over her shoulder at the other two, who started, as

if suddenly recalled to a sense of what was going on around them.

Hugo and his companion left the mill-yard, and paced down the street in

the bitter cold of the March twilight, now rapidly becoming darkness.

The lamps were being lighted; some shops were open; the passengers

along the streets were not many; the great factories were silent, there

was no cloud of smoke to obscure the frostily twinkling stars.

Helena suddenly began to speak, in a voice bitter, though it strove to

be careless, and with a short laugh that was not a merry one.

‘How affecting--truly affecting it is, to see two such congenial

spirits together as Mr. Sebastian Mallory and Miss Adrienne Blisset.

He likes a rose-watery kind of woman, who looks up to him and

thinks he is better than she is herself, and wiser; and she likes a

dreamy, unpractical kind of man, full of sweet compliments and vague

generalities--like a sugar-plum that breaks in your mouth, and then

you find it has been full of a weak, diluted kind of essence--like

Sebastian Mallory.’

‘What a comparison!’ exclaimed Hugo, in a tone, almost of offence.

‘You are very harsh, sometimes, Miss Spenceley. Sebastian dreamy and

unpractical! _Jawohl!_ I used to think so once; but I have found out

that there is an iron hand under the silken glove. Once I fancied he

was all art, all----’

‘All art!’ said Helena, perversely twisting his imperfect English to

suit her own purposes; ‘perhaps you were not so far wrong there, Hugo.’

‘What has occurred to vex you, _mein Fräulein_?’ asked her companion

innocently.

‘To vex me? I am not vexed. I am tired, and it is so cold. Well, go on!

I don’t think very highly of Mr. Mallory, as you may be aware; and I

should like to hear what you can find to say in his favour. What other

good points has he?’

‘_Herrgott!_ He is all good.’

‘Ha! ha!’

‘Miss Spenceley----’

‘A good, bigoted Tory and Conservative, despite his professed

radicalism. Mrs. Mallory need not have been distressed. He may call

himself what he likes, but he hates progress.’

‘I don’t understand about Radicals and Conservatives,’ said Hugo,

good-humouredly. ‘I am densely ignorant about politics. In Prussia

there are Liberals and Conservatives, and Communists, but I don’t know

what any of them want. I don’t think the _Reichstag_ is the sphere for

me--do you?’

‘Good gracious! how should I know? I was not talking about Communists

or the _Reichstag_. If you don’t know anything about them, you know

something else, Hugo,’ she said, softening her voice confidentially.

‘I know that you are charming--so kind to me,’ said he, with a

vibration in his voice--and indeed Helena had been very kind to the

boy; ‘and I know that you sing “Since first I saw your face” like an

angel.’

‘You know perfectly well that Mr. Mallory and Miss Blisset are

desperately in love with one another--deny it if you can.’

Hugo was silent.

‘You cannot,’ said Helena, triumphantly.

‘I am not in their confidence,’ he said slowly.

‘All the world is in the confidence of people who are so far gone

as they are. If you mean to say that they did not each take you

separately aside, and tell you in so many words--well, I can say the

same. He that hath eyes to see, let him observe.’

Hugo was not yet master enough of the English language to be able to

turn off her remark. Helena began to hum a little song to herself, and

then suddenly sank into silence and gravity, until it began to snow,

and grew quite dark, when she shivered, putting up her umbrella, and

saying pettishly,

‘My mantle will be ruined. Why didn’t I bring a cloak? I declare,

another day, when the weather is so bad, I won’t take this horrid long

walk.’

‘You will rather drive?’ suggested Hugo, with apparently the most

childlike innocence of her meaning.

‘How ridiculous you are! How far is it, Hugo, from the mill to

Stonegate?’

‘About as far as from the mill to Castle Hill, only in exactly the

opposite direction.’

‘Oh! I don’t know that end of the town at all. We, at any rate, have

had time for a delightful conversation, haven’t we? Come in, and have

some tea, and play me something.’

Nothing loth, Hugo followed her, and they vanished within the portals

of Castle Hill.

CHAPTER V.

‘Death, with most grim and grisly visage seene,

Yet is he nought but parting of the breath;

Ne ought to see, but like a shade to weene,

Unbodièd, unsoul’d, unheard, unseene.’

Adrienne and Sebastian were walking ‘just the opposite way,’ with very

little more satisfaction to themselves than Hugo and Helena had found.

Helena was constantly picturing Sebastian to herself as engaged in

half-intellectual, half-amorous discourse with the ‘nicest of girls;’

his mind elevated by her spiritual observations, and his languid but

ever-present sense of superiority (this was Helena’s hypothesis)

gratified by her deference to his superior wisdom. It was a comical

theory--one worthy of Helena’s vivid imagination and hopelessly

impractical ideas; and was, moreover, as far removed from the truth

as she herself could possibly have wished. Yes, wished; for while the

delusive vision kept dangling before her mental eyes, and while she

professed to sneer and scoff at it, it was in reality an ever-present,

dull pain, none the less real because not clearly comprehended for what

it was.

On this especial evening Adrienne was tired more than usual, and

mentally as well as physically weary. An undefined pain and distress

had troubled her mind for some weeks--to-day the cloud was very

dark. She had seen Sebastian Mallory growing more and more intimate

with her uncle, and progressing with great rapidity in the favour of

that most fastidious individual; she had seen--how could she help

seeing?--Sebastian’s attentions to herself; how, when he was with her,

his eyes constantly turned towards her, and how a light flashed into

their quietness when they met hers; how his voice, in speaking to her,

took a deeper sound. He was good, rich, handsome, clever, kind. She

knew all his good qualities, and thoroughly valued them. She approved

of him; she liked his presence; it was pleasant to her. She remembered

with deep, earnest gratitude his delicate kindness and attention to

her in those days gone by, when her troubles with her father, and her

terrible struggle against their adverse circumstances had threatened

to overwhelm her. ‘I would do anything for you,’ she had said, and had

meant it. And yet, now! How painfully, unaccountably, unexpectedly

things changed! Thus meditating, her step dragged, and her head drooped

a little, as they paced the dreary length of Blake Street together.

She did not understand why that load of oppression and longing--that

_Sehnsucht_--should just now lie so heavily upon her heart. Sebastian

paused at the gate, and laid his hand upon it, and then Adrienne seemed

to see, in a flash of sunlight, Myles Heywood’s tall figure and earnest

face; as he, in the same attitude, almost a year ago, had laid his hand

upon that wicket, and had opened it for her to pass in. Her heart

throbbed--something rose in her throat as she entered.

‘Myles has not been near us for weeks,’ said she to herself. ‘I will go

and call there some day, very soon,’ she added valiantly, ‘and ask the

reason of it, and if I have done anything to offend them.’

Mr. Blisset, his servant said, was not at all well. He felt very weak,

and had gone to bed, and he had left word that if Mr. Mallory called,

he particularly wished to see him.

Sebastian followed the man upstairs. Adrienne went into the

drawing-room, and mechanically sat down, without even turning up the

shaded lamp, and her hands clasped themselves before her upon her knees.

Sebastian sat a long time beside Mr. Blisset’s bed, for their

conversation was prolonged. At last Mr. Blisset said,

‘And I have made you one of my executors. I hope you don’t mind. I have

so few friends.’

‘I am honoured in being chosen, and will gladly undertake it.’

‘Thank you. Of course, I have left everything to Adrienne. She will

be placed above all money troubles; for she is like me, she has no

extravagant desires. But I should wish the child to have a staunch

friend, and you are different from other young men, or I would not have

asked it. Will you be her friend?’

‘It is my most earnest wish. But since we have spoken of this, I may

as well tell you the whole truth. I have loved your niece for a long

time--for years. When I find an opportunity, I intend asking her to

become my wife. Have you anything against it?’

Mr. Blisset pressed the young man’s hand with a clasp which had grown

feeble.

‘You make me very happy. I would rather know her safe in your hands

than in those of any other man.’

‘I wish you could know it,’ said Sebastian, with a somewhat melancholy

smile. ‘I assure you I am far from feeling confident myself, but I hope

for the best.’

‘I think you may be quite confident,’ said Mr. Blisset. ‘Poor child!

now she need not be alone, and has a fair chance of a safe, untroubled

future, such as a woman ought to enjoy.’

Shortly after this Sebastian left him, and went away without seeing

Adrienne. Later, she went upstairs to sit with her uncle, and ask if

she should read to him.

‘No, thank you, my child. I shall need no more reading now, Adrienne.

Your wearisome, monotonous task is almost at an end.’

‘Dear uncle, what do you mean?’

‘I am what men call dying, my dear. Whether it is the end of all things

for each one of us, or whether it is but the beginning of an endless

succession of advancing lives, very soon I shall know--or I shall not

know.’

She kissed his hand.

‘You must not talk in that way. You have been very good to me, and I

cannot spare you. I love you, uncle--you must not leave me.’