CHAPTER XXV.

MADGIN JUNIOR'S FIRST REPORT.

Mr. Madgin senior lost no time after his arrival at home before

hastening up to Deepley Walls to see Lady Chillington. He had a brief

conference with Mirpah while discussing his modest chop and glass of

bitter ale; and he found time to read a letter which had arrived for him

some days previously from the London diamond merchant whom he had

employed to make inquiries as to whether any such gem as the Great Hara

had been offered for sale at any of the great European marts during the

past twenty years. The letter was an assurance that no such stone had

been in the market, nor was any such known to be in the hands of any

private individual.

Mr. Madgin took the letter with him to Deepley Walls. In her grim way

Lady Chillington seemed greatly pleased to see him. She was all

impatience to hear what news he had to tell her. But Mr. Madgin had his

reservations; he did not deem it advisable to detail to her ladyship

step by step all that he had done. Her sense of honour might revolt at

certain things he had found it necessary to do in furtherance of the

great object he had in view. He told her of his inquiries among the

London diamond merchants, and read to her the letter he had received

from one of them. Then he went on to describe Bon Repos and its owner

from the glimpses he had had of both. For all such details her ladyship

betrayed a curiosity that seemed as if it would never be satisfied. He

next went on to inform her that he had succeeded in placing his son as

footman at Bon Repos, and that everything now depended on the

discoveries James might succeed in making. But nothing was said as to

the false pretences and the changed name under which Madgin junior had

entered M. Platzoff's household. Those were details which Mr. Madgin

kept judiciously to himself. Her ladyship was perfectly satisfied with

his report; she was more than satisfied--she was pleased. She was very

sanguine as to the existence of the diamond, and also as to its

retention by M. Platzoff; far more so, in fact, than Mr. Madgin himself

was. But the latter was too shrewd a man of business to parade his

doubts of success before a client who paid so liberally, so long as her

hobby was ridden after her own fashion. Mr. Madgin's chief aim in life

was to ride other people's hobbies, and be well paid for his jockeyship.

"I am highly gratified, Mr. Madgin," said her ladyship, "by the style,

_plein de finesse_, in which you have so far conducted this delicate

investigation. I will not ask you what your next step is to be. You know

far better than I can tell you what ought to be done. I leave the matter

with confidence in your hands."

"Your ladyship is very kind," observed Mr. Madgin, deferentially. "I

will do my best to deserve a continuance of your good opinion."

"As week after week goes by, Mr. Madgin," resumed Lady Chillington, "the

conviction seems to take deeper root within me that that man--that

villain--M. Platzoff, has my son's diamond still in his possession. I

have a sort of spiritual consciousness that such is the case. My waking

intuitions, my dreams by night, all point to the same end. You, with

your cold, worldly sense, may laugh at such things; we women, with our

finer organisation, know how often the truth comes to us on mystic

wings. The diamond will yet be mine!"

"What nonsense women sometimes talk," said Mr. Madgin contemptuously to

himself as he walked back through the park. "Who would believe that my

lady, so sensible on most things, could talk such utter rubbish. But

women have a way of leaping to results, and ignoring processes, that is

simply astounding to men of common sense. The diamond hers, indeed!

Although I have been so successful so far, there is as much difference

between what I have done and what has yet to be done as there is between

the simple alphabet and a mathematical theorem. To-morrow's post ought

to bring me a letter from Bon Repos."

To-morrow's post did bring Mr. Madgin a letter from Bon Repos. The

writer of it was not his son, but Cleon. It was addressed, as a matter

of course, to Deepley Walls, of which place the mulatto had been led to

believe Mr. Madgin was the proprietor. The note, which was couched in

tolerable English, was simply a request to be furnished with a

testimonial as to the character and abilities of James Jasmin, late

footman at Deepley Walls. Mr. Madgin replied by return of post as

under:--

"Deepley Walls, July 27th.

"SIR,--In reply to your favour of the 25th inst, inquiring

as to the character and respectability of James Jasmin, late a

footman in my employ, I beg to say that I can strongly recommend

him, and have much pleasure in so doing, for any similar

employment under you. Jasmin was with me for several years; during

the whole time I found him to be trustworthy, sober and intelligent

in an eminent degree. Had I not been reducing my establishment

previous to a lengthened residence in the south of Europe, I should

certainly have retained Jasmin in the position which he has

occupied for so long a time with credit to himself and with

satisfaction to me.

"I have the honour, sir, to remain,

"Your obedient servant,

"SOLOMON MADGIN.

"---- CLEON, Esq.,

"Bon Repos, Windermere."

After writing and despatching the above epistle, over the composition of

which he chuckled to himself several times, Mr. Madgin was obliged to

wait, with what contentment was possible to him, the receipt of a

communication from his son. But one day passed after another without

bringing news from Bon Repos, till Mr. Madgin grew fearful that some

disaster had befallen both James and his scheme. At length he made up

his mind to wait two days longer, and should no letter come within that

time, to start at once for Windermere. Fortunately his anxiety was

relieved and the journey rendered unnecessary by the receipt, next day,

of a long letter from his son. It was Mirpah who took it from the

postman's hand, and Mirpah took it to her father in high glee. She knew

the writing and deciphered the post-mark. For once in his life Mr.

Madgin was too agitated to read. He put his hand to his side, and

motioned Mirpah to open the letter.

"Read it," he said in a husky voice, as she was about to hand it to him.

So Mirpah sat down near her father and read what follows:--

"Bon Repos, July

"(some date, but I'll be hanged if I know what).

"MY DEAR DAD,--In some rustic nook reclining, silken

tresses softly twining, Far-off bells so faintly ringing, While we

list the blackbird singing, Merrily his roundelay. There! I

composed those lines this morning during the process of shaving. I

don't think they are very bad. I put them at the beginning of my

letter so as to make sure that you will read them, a process of

which I might reasonably be doubtful had I left them for the fag

end of my communication. Learn, sir, that you have a son who is a

born poet!!!

"But now to business.

"Don't hurry over my letter, dear dad; don't run away with the idea

that I have any grand discovery to lay before you. My epistle will

be merely a record of trifles and commonplaces, and that simply

from the fact that I have nothing better to write about. To me, at

least, they seem nothing but trifles. For you they may possess an

occult significance of which I know nothing.

"In the first place. On the day following that of your departure

from Windermere, I was duly inducted by Cleon into my new duties.

They are few in number, and by no means difficult. So far I have

contrived to get through them without any desperate blunder.

Another thing I have done of which you will be pleased to hear: I

have contrived to ingratiate myself with the mulatto, and am in

high favour with him. You were right in your remarks; he is worth

cultivation, in so far that he is all-powerful in our little

establishment. M. Platzoff never interferes in the management of

Bon Repos. Everything is left to Cleon; and whatever the mulatto

may be in other respects, so far as I can judge he is quite worthy

of the trust reposed in him. I believe him to be thoroughly

attached to his master.

"Of M. Platzoff I have very little to tell you. Even in his own

house and among his own people he is a recluse. He has his own

special rooms, and three-fourths of his time is spent in them.

Above all things he dislikes to see strange faces about him, and I

have been instructed by Cleon to keep out of his way as much as

possible. Even the old servants, people who have been under his

roof for years, let themselves be seen by him as seldom as need be.

In person he is a little, withered-up, yellow-skinned man, as dry

as a last year's pippin, but very keen, bright and vivacious. He

speaks such excellent English that he must have lived in this

country for many years. One thing I have discovered about him, that

he is a great smoker. He has a room set specially apart for the

practice of the sacred rite to which he retires every day as soon

as dinner is over, and from which he seldom emerges again till it

is time to retire for the night. Cleon alone is privileged to enter

this room. I have never yet been inside it. Equally forbidden

ground is M. Platzoff's bedroom, and a small study beyond, all _en

suite_.

"Those who keep servants keep spies under their roof. It has been

part of my purpose to make myself agreeable to the older domestics

at Bon Repos, and from them I have picked up several little facts

which all Mr. Cleon's shrewdness has not been able entirely to

conceal. In this way I have learned that M. Platzoff is a confirmed

opium-smoker. That once, or sometimes twice, a week he shuts

himself up in his room and smokes himself into a sort of trance, in

which he remains unconscious for hours. That at such times Cleon

has to look after him as though he were a child; and that it

depends entirely on the mulatto as to whether he ever emerges from

his state of coma, or stops in it till he dies. The accuracy of

this latter statement, however, I must beg leave to doubt.

"Further gossip has informed me, whether truly or falsely I am not

in a position to judge, that M. Platzoff is a refugee from his own

country. That were he to set foot on the soil of Russia, a

life-long banishment to Siberia would be the mildest fate that he

could expect; and that neither in France nor in Austria would he be

safe from arrest. The people who come as guests to Bon Repos are,

so I am informed, in nearly every instance foreigners, and, as a

natural consequence, they are all set down by the servants' gossip

as red-hot republicans, thirsting for the blood of kings and

aristocrats, and willing to put a firebrand under every throne in

Europe. In fact, there cannot be a popular outbreak against bad

government in any part of Europe without M. Platzoff and his

friends being credited with having at least a finger in the pie.

"All these statements and suppositions you will of course accept

_cum grano salis_. They may have their value as serving to give you

a rude and exaggerated idea as to what manner of man is the owner

of Bon Repos; and it is quite possible that some elements of truth

may be hidden in them. To me, M. Platzoff seems nothing more than a

mild old gentleman; a little eccentric, it may be, as differing

from our English notions in many things. Not a smiling fiend in

patent boots and white cravat, whose secret soul is bent on murder

and rapine; but a shy valetudinarian, whose only firebrand is a

harmless fusee wherewith to light a pipe of fragrant cavendish.

"One permanent guest we have at Bon Repos--a guest who was here

before my arrival, and of whose departure no signs are yet visible.

That is why I call him permanent. His name is Ducie, and he is an

ex-captain in the English army. He is a tall, handsome man of four

or five and forty, and is a thorough gentleman both in manners and

appearance. I like him much, and he has taken quite a fancy to me.

One thing I can see quite plainly; that he and Cleon are quietly at

daggers drawn. Why they should be so I cannot tell, unless it is

that Cleon is jealous of Captain Ducie's influence over Platzoff;

although the difference in social position of the two men ought to

preclude any feeling of that kind. Captain Ducie might be M.

Platzoff's very good friend without infringing in the slightest

degree on the privileges of Cleon as his master's favourite

servant. On one point I am certain: that the mulatto suspects Ducie

of some purpose or covert scheme in making so long a stay at Bon

Repos. He has asked me to act as a sort of spy on the Captain's

movements; to watch his comings and goings, his hours of getting up

and going to bed, and to report to him, Cleon, anything that I may

see in the slightest degree out of the common way.

"It was not without a certain inward qualm that I accepted the

position thrust upon me by Cleon. In accepting it, I flatter myself

that I took a common-sense view of the case. In the _petit_ drama

of real life in which I am now acting an uneventful part, I look

upon myself as a 'general utility' man, bound to enact any and

every character which my manager may think proper to entrust into

my hands. Now, you are my manager, and if it seem to me conducive

to your interests (you being absent) that, in addition to my

present character, I should be a 'cast' for that of spy or amateur

detective, I see no good reason why I should refuse it. So far,

however, all my Fouché-like devices have resulted in nothing. The

Captain's comings and goings--in fact, all his movements--are of a

commonplace and uninteresting kind. But I have this advantage, that

the character I have undertaken enables me to assume, with Cleon's

consent, certain privileges such as under other circumstances would

never have been granted me. Further, should I succeed in

discovering anything of importance, it by no means follows that I

should consider myself bound to reveal the same to Cleon. It might

be greatly more to my interest to retain any such facts for my own

use. Meanwhile, I wait and watch.

"Thus you will perceive, my dear dad, that an element of

interest--a dramatic element--is being slowly evolved out of the

commonplace duties of my position. This nucleus of interest may

grow and develop into something startling; or it may die slowly out

and expire for lack of material to feed itself upon. In any case,

dear dad, you may expect a frequent feuilleton from

"Your affectionate Son,

"J.M. (otherwise JAMES JASMIN).

"P.S.--I should not like to be a real flunkey all my life. Such a

position is not without its advantages to a man of a lazy turn, but

it is terribly soul-subduing. Not a sign yet of the G.H.D."

"There is nothing much in all this to tell her ladyship," said Mr.

Madgin, as he took off his spectacles and refolded the letter. "Still, I

do not think it by any means a discouraging report. If James's patience

only equal his shrewdness and audacity, and if there be really anything

to worm out, he will be sure to make himself master of it in the course

of time. Ah! if he had only my patience, now--the patience of an old man

who has won half his battles by playing a waiting game."

"Is it not possible that Lady Chillington may want you to read the

letter?"

"It is quite possible. But James's irreverent style is hardly suited in

parts for her ladyship's ears. You, dear child, must make an improved

copy of the letter. Your own good taste will tell you which sentences

require to be altered or expunged. Here and there you may work in a neat

compliment to your father; as coming direct from James, her ladyship

will not deem it out of place--it will not sound fulsome in her ears,

and will serve to remind her of what she too often forgets--that in

Solomon Madgin she has a faithful steward, who ought to be better

rewarded than he is. Write out the copy at once, my child, and I will

take it up to Deepley Walls the first thing to-morrow morning."

(_To be continued_.)

ABOUT THE WEATHER.

Why is it that we in England talk so much about the weather? One reason,

I suppose, is because we are shy and awkward in the presence of

strangers, and the weather is a safe subject far removed from

personalities of any kind. Then the variableness of our climate

furnishes an opportunity for comment which does not exist in countries

where for months there is not a cloud in the sky, and you can tell long

before what kind of weather there will be on any particular day.

Whatever else may be said of our English climate, it cannot be accused

of monotony. You are not sure of seeing the same sky every morning you

arise, than which there is no greater source of ennui. Those of us who

have lived long abroad know how tired we got of a cloudless blue sky. We

can sympathise with the sailor who, on returning to London from the

Mediterranean, joyfully exclaimed--"Here's a jolly old fog, and no more

of your confounded blue skies!" Certainly we could do with a little more

sunshine in England than we get. It is not true that while we have much

weather we have no sunshine, but we have not as much of it as many of us

would like. Still England is not as bad as some places; for instance,

Halifax, Nova Scotia, where they have nine months' winter and three

months' bad weather. Indeed, the English takes rather a good place

amongst the climates of the world. It is free from extremes, and allows

us to go out every day and at all hours.

However, judging from the way we grumble, it would seem that we are

anything but satisfied with our climate.

_Scene_--Drawing-room at Scarborough. Melissa (writing): "Aunty,

darling, how do you spell damnable?" "Good gracious, darling, never use

such a word. I am surprised." "Well, but, auntie, I am writing to papa,

to tell him about the weather." "Oh, well, my darling, I suppose I may

tell you. D-a-m-n-a-b-l-e; but remember that you must not use the word

except to describe the weather."

I suppose the clerk of the weather office has long ago ceased trying to

satisfy us in this matter. What seems wretched weather to one person

makes another happy. Cold, that the young enjoy because it makes them

feel their vitality to the tips of their fingers, is death to the old.

Those who are fond of skating look out of the windows of their bedrooms,

hoping to see a good hard frost. The man who has three or four hunters

"eating their heads off" in the stable wishes for open weather, so that

he and they may have a run. The farmer says that frost is good for his

land; the sportsman, who has hired an expensive shooting, does not like

it. A young lady enjoys her walk and looks her best on a fine frosty

morning; but she should not forget that the weather which is so

pleasant to her puts thousands of people out of work.

Idle people feel changes of weather most. A man who lives a busy life in

a hot climate once said to me: "I do not know why people growl about the

heat; for my part, I have no time to be hot." And if the energetic feel

heat less than do the indolent, they certainly feel cold less. They are

too active to be cold; and perhaps it is easier to make oneself warm in

a cold climate than cool in a hot one.

A man who had been complaining because it had not rained for a good

while, when the rain did come then grumbled because it did not come

sooner. The rich, however, rather than the poor, talk of the "wretched

weather," because they have fewer real sorrows to grumble at. Indeed,

the poor often set an example of cheerfulness and resignation in this

matter which is very praiseworthy. "What wretched weather we are

having!" said a man to an old woman of his acquaintance whom he passed

on the road. "Well, sir," she replied, "any weather is better than

none." Fuller tells us of a gentleman travelling on a misty morning who

asked a shepherd--such men being generally skilled in the physiognomy of

the heavens--what weather it would be. "It will be," said the shepherd,

"what weather shall please me." Being asked to explain his meaning, he

said, "Sir, it shall be what weather pleaseth God; and what weather

pleaseth God, pleaseth me."

The people who are most satisfied with their climate are the Australians

and New Zealanders. I never met one of them who did not, in five

minutes, begin to abuse the English climate and glorify his own. They

will not admit that it has a single fault, though we have all heard of

the hot winds that make the Australian summer terribly oppressive. The

fact is that every country has a bad wind, or some other kind of

supposed drawback, which is very trying to strangers, but which, whether

they know it or not, suits the inhabitants. God knows better than we do

the sort of weather that each country should have.

What are we to say about the winter we have lately been enduring? Well,

it was very "trying" for us all, and an even stronger word might be used

by the poor, the aged, and the delicate. Still, let us remember that

without omniscience it is impossible to say whether any given season is

good or bad. So infinitely complex are the relations of things that we

are very bad judges as to what is best for us. How do we know that our

past winter of discontent may not be followed by a glorious summer, and

that the two may not be merely antecedent and consequent, but in some

degree cause and effect?

On no other subject are people so prone to become panegyrists of the

past as in this matter of the weather. "Ah," they say, "we never now

have the lovely summers we used to have." Reading the other day

Walpole's Letters, I discovered that so far from the summers in his day

being "lovely," they were not uniformly better than the winters: "The

way to ensure summer in England," he writes, "is to have it framed and

glazed in a comfortable room." This remark was made of the summer of

1773; that of 1784 was not more balmy, judging from the same writer's

comment: "The month of June, according to custom immemorial, is as cold

as Christmas. I had a fire last night, and all my rosebuds, I believe,

would have been very glad to sit by it."

Here is another weather grumble from the same quaint letter-writer: "The

deluge began here but on Monday last, and then rained nearly

eight-and-forty hours without intermission. My poor bag has not a dry

thread to its back. In short, every summer one lives in a state of

mutiny and murmur, and I have found the reason: it is because we will

affect to have a summer, and have no title to any such thing."

This reminds us of Quin, who, being asked if he had ever seen so bad a

winter, replied: "Yes, just such an one last summer." If people could be

satisfied about the weather, this sort of summer ought to have pleased

the Irishman who, as he warmed his hands at a fire remarked: "What a

pity it is that we can't have the cold weather in the summer."

SERENADE.

"Come out! the moon is white, and on the river

The white mist lies;

The twilight deepens, and the stars grow brighter

In the pure, perfect skies;

The dewy woods with silent voices call you;

Come out, heart of my heart, light of my eyes!

"Come out, for where you are not, beauty is not;

Come out, my Dear!

See how the fairies will adorn the meadows

The moment you draw near;

And the world wear that robe and crown of glory

It never wears except when you are here."

In vain!--a little light among the jasmine

Her lattice gleams,

Her white hand at the closing of it lingers

A moment--so it seems--

To drop an unseen rose down to her lover:

White rose--whose scent will sanctify his dreams!

E. NESBIT

A PHILANTHROPIST.

BY ANGUS GREY.

I.

"And when I had your own bottle finished, Doctor, an ould man that was

passing by to the fair of Kinvarra told me that there was nothin' in the

world so good for a stiff arm as goose's grease or crane's lard,

rendered, rubbed in, and, says he, in a few days your arm will be as

limber as limber. So I went to the keeper at Inchguile, and he shot a

crane for me; but there wasn't so much lard in it as I thought there'd

be, because it was just after rearing a chitch."

"Well, we must try and get you a better one next time," said the Doctor,

nodding farewell to his loquacious patient, one of those non-paying ones

who look on a "dispensary ticket" as conveying an unlimited right of

discourse on the one hand and attention on the other. But the Doctor was

just now in a position of vantage, being seated on his car, on which he

slowly jogged out of sight, leaving the victim of rheumatism who had

stopped him still experimentally rubbing the joints of his arm.

It was the first of June by the calendar, but the outward signs of the

season were but slightly visible in that grey West Country, where stones

lay as the chief crop in the fields and innumerable walls took the place

of hedges, and a drizzling mist from the Atlantic hid all distant

outlines.

The Doctor had been all day face to face with such cheerless

surroundings, and was on his way homewards. But presently he stopped at

the entrance of a little "boreen," where a wrinkled, red-skirted dame

was standing sentry, leaning on a stout blackthorn stick. "Is it me

you're looking out for, Mrs. Capel?" he asked. "I hope Mary is no worse

to-day."

"She's the one way always," was the reply; "and it wasn't of you I was

thinking, Doctor, but standing I was to watch that ruffian of a pig of

Mr. Rourke's that had me grand cabbages eat last night, and me in Cloon

buying a pound of madder to colour a petticoat. Ah, then, look at him

now standing there by the wall watching me out of the corner of his

eye!" and flourishing her stick the energetic old lady trotted off to

the attack.

"I may as well go in and see Mary," muttered the Doctor, tying the reins

to an isolated gate-post, and walking up the narrow lane to the thatched

cottage it led to.

"God save all here," he said, putting his head in over the half-door.

"God save you kindly," was the reply from an old man in corduroy

knee-breeches and a tall hat, who sat smoking a short pipe in the deep

chimney-corner, and watching with interest the assault of various hens

and geese upon the heap of potato-skins remaining in a basket-lid which

had done duty as a dinner-table.

The Doctor passed through to a little room beyond, whitewashed and

containing a large four-post bed. The invalid, a gentle,

consumptive-looking girl, lay on the pillows and smiled a greeting to

the Doctor.

His eye, however, passed her, and rested with startled curiosity on a

visitor who was sitting by her side, and who rose and bowed slightly.

The stranger was a lady, young and slight, with dark eyes and hair and a

small, graceful head. He guessed at once she must be Miss Eden, the new

Resident Magistrate's sister, of whose ministrations to the poor he had

heard much since his return from his late holiday.

He stopped awkwardly, rather confused at so unexpected a meeting; but

the stranger held out her hand, and looking up at him said: "I am so

glad you have come back; we have wanted you so much."

The Doctor did not answer. The sweet, low voice, with no touch of Irish

accent, was a new sound to him, the little hand that she gave him was

fairer and smaller and more dainty than any he had ever touched. To say

the truth, his early farm-house life and his hospital training and

dispensary practice had not brought him into contact with much

refinement, and this girl with her slight, childlike figure and soft,

earnest eyes seemed to him to have stepped from some unreal world. Then,

finding he still held the little hand, he blushed and let it go.

"How are you getting on, Mary?" he asked, turning to his patient.

"Middling, sir, thank you," said the girl. "I do have the cough very bad

some nights, but more nights it's better; and the lady, may God enable

her, has me well cared."

"I could not do much," said the lady, with an appealing glance, "and you

must not be angry with me for meddling with your patients. But now that

you have come I am sure Mary will be better."

"Don't be troubling yourself about me," said the sick girl, gently.

"I'll never be better till I see Laurence again."

"Oh, don't be giving yourself up like that," said the Doctor, cheerily;

"we won't let you die yet awhile."

"I won't die," she answered, gravely, "till the same day that Laurence

died: the 13th of September. There's no fear of me till then."

She looked tired, and her visitors left, the Doctor telling his new

acquaintance as they walked down the lane what a strong, bright girl

this had been till a year ago, when her brother had died of consumption.

From that day her health had begun to fail, the winter had brought a

cough, and Easter had found her kept to her bed. It was a hopeless case,

he thought, though she might linger for a time.

"Indeed, and she's a loss to us," put in old Mrs. Capel, who had now

joined them, having returned from her pursuit of the predatory pig. "She

was a great one for slavin', and as strong as any girl on the estate,

but she did be frettin' greatly after her brother, and then she got cold

out of her little boots that let in the water, and there she's lying

now, and couldn't get up if all Ireland was thrusting for it."

The mist had now turned to definite rain, and Louise Eden accepted "a

lift" on the Doctor's car, as he had to pass her gate in going home. His

shyness soon wore off as the girl talked to him with complete ease and

simplicity, first of some of his poor patients, then of herself and her

interest in them.

She was half-Irish, she said, her mother having come from this very West

Country, but she had lost both her parents early and been brought up at

school and with English relatives. Lately her brother, or rather

step-brother, having been made an R.M. and appointed to the Cloon

district, had asked her to live with him, and this she was but too happy

to do. She had always longed to give her life to the poor and especially

the Irish poor, of whose wants she had heard so much. She had even

thought of becoming a deaconess, but her friends would not hear of it,

and she had been obliged to submit herself to their conventional

suburban life. "But here at last," she said, "I find my hands full and

my heart also. These people welcome me so warmly and need so much, the

whole day is filled with work for them; and now that you have come, Dr.

Quin," she added, smiling at him, "I can do so much more, for you will

tell me how to work under you and to nurse your patients back to health

again."

It was almost dark when they came to the gate of Inagh, the house

usually tenanted by the Resident Magistrate of the day, and here Louise

Eden took leave of her new acquaintance, again giving him her hand in

its little wet glove. The Doctor watched her as she ran lightly towards

the house. She wore a grey hat and cloak, and the rough madder-dyed

skirt of the peasant women of the district. None of the "young ladies"

he had hitherto met would have deigned to appear in one of these fleecy

crimson garments, so becoming to its present wearer. She turned and

waved her hand at the corner of the drive, and the Doctor having gazed a

moment longer into the grey mist that shrouded her, went on his journey

home.

His little house on the outskirts of Cloon had not many outward charms,

being built in the inverted box style so usual in Ireland. A few bushes

of aucuba and fuchsia scarcely claimed for the oblong space enclosed in

front the name of a garden. But within he found a cheerful turf fire,

and his old housekeeper soon put a substantial meal on the table.

"Any callers to-day, Mamie?" he asked as he sat down.

"Not a one, sir, only two," was the reply. "The first was a neighbouring

man from Killeen that was after giving himself a great cut with a

reaping-hook where he was cutting a few thorns out of the hedge for to

stop a gap where the cows did be coming into his oatfield. Sure I told

him you wouldn't be in this long time, and he went to Cloran to bandage

him up."

"And who was the other, Mamie?"

"The second first, sir, was a decent woman, Mrs. Cloherty, from Cranagh,

with a sore eye she has where she was cuttin' potatoes and a bit flew up

and hot it, and she's after going to the Friars at Loughrea to get a rub

off the blessed cross, but it did no good after."

The old woman rambled on, but the Doctor gave her but a divided

attention. He laughed and blushed a little presently to find himself

gazing in the small round mirror that hung against the wall, his

altitude of six feet just bringing his head to its level. The face that

laughed and blushed back at him was a pleasant one: frank, blue eyes and

a square brow surmounted by wavy fair hair were reflected, and the glad

healthfulness of four-and-twenty years. He had been looked on as a

"well-looking" man in his small social circle of Galway and Dublin, and

had laughed and joked and danced with the girls he had met at merry

gatherings, but without ever having given a preference in thought to one

above another. Certainly no eyes had ever followed him into his solitude

as the dark ones first seen to-day were doing.

He went out presently, the rain having ceased, and sauntered down the

unattractive "Main Street" of Cloon.

The shops were shut, save those frequent ones which added the sale of

liquor to that of more innocent commodities. In one a smart-looking

schoolboy was reading the _Weekly Freeman_ aloud to a group of

frieze-coated hearers. At the door of another a ballad-singer was

plaintively piping the "Mother's Farewell," with its practical

refrain:--

"Then write to me often, _and send me all you can_,

And don't forget where'er you are that you're an Irishman."

The Doctor might at another time have joined and enlivened one of the

listless groups standing about, but, after a moment or two of

hesitation, he turned his back to them and walked in the direction of

the gate of Inagh. "There's Mrs. Connell down there, that I ought to go

and see; she's always complaining," he said to himself, in self-excuse.

But having arrived at her cottage, he saw by a glance at the unshuttered

window that his visit would be a work of supererogation, as she was

busily engaged in carding wool by the fireside, the clear light of the

paraffin lamp, which without any intervening stage of candles had

superseded her rushlight, showing her comely face to be hale and hearty.

Half unconsciously the young man passed on, crossed a stile and walked

up a narrow, laurel-bordered path towards the light of another window

which was drawing him, moth-like, by its gleam. It also, though in the

"Removable's" house, was unshuttered, testifying to the peaceful state

of the district. He could see a cheerful sitting-room, gay with flowers

and chintzes, the light of a shaded lamp falling on Louise Eden's fair

head, bent over a heavy volume on the table, an intrusive white kitten

disputing her attention with it. He drew back, with a sudden sense of

shame at having ventured so far, and hurried homewards to dream of the

fair vision the day had brought him.

It was the beginning of an enchanted summer for the young Doctor. Day

after day he met Miss Eden, at first by so-called accident; but soon

their visits were pre-arranged to fall together at some poor cottage,

where she told him he could bring healing or he told her she could bring

help.

She had thrown herself with devotion into the tending of the poor. "I

have wasted so many years at school," she would say, "just on learning

accomplishments for myself alone; but now I have at last the chance of

helping others I must make the most of it, especially as it is in my own

dear Ireland."

"The lady" was soon well known amongst the neglected tenants of an

estate in Chancery. Her self-imposed duties increased from day to day.

The old dying man would take no food but from her hands. The Doctor

found her at his house one evening. She had cut herself badly in trying

to open a bottle for him, and was deadly pale. "I can't bear the sight

of blood," she confessed, and fainted on the earthen floor. It was with

gentle reverence that he carried her out and laid her on the cushions of

his car, spread by the roadside; but the sweet consciousness of having

for that one moment held her in his arms never left him when alone. In

her presence her frank friendliness drove away all idle dreams and

visions.

It was on a Sunday afternoon of September that Dr. Quin and Louise Eden

met again sadly at the house where they had first seen each ocher, that

of the Capels. They were called there by a sudden message that the poor

girl Mary was dying, and before they could obey the summons she had

passed away.

The little room was brighter now; a large-paned window, the gift of her

ministering friend, let the light fall upon the closed eyes. At the foot

of the bed hung a beautiful engraving of the Magdalen at the Saviour's

feet, while a bunch of tea-roses in a glass still gave out their

delicate fragrance. Neighbours were beginning to throng in, but gave

place to "the lady." The old father silently greeted her and wrung her

offered hand, but moved away without speaking. The mother, staying her

loud weeping, was less reserved.

"It's well you earned her indeed, miss," she said; "and she did be

thinking of you always. The poor child, she was ill for near ten months,

but I wouldn't begrudge minding her if it was for seven year. Sure I got

her the best I could, the drop of new milk and a bit o' white bread and

a grain o' tea in a while, and meself and the old man eatin' nothin' but

stirabout, and on Christmas night we had but a herrin' for our dinner,

not like some of the neighbours that do be scattering. Sure we never

thought she was goin' till this morning, when she bid us send for the

priest. And when she saw the old man crying, 'Father,' says she, 'don't

fret. I'll soon be in Heaven praying for you with me own Laurence.' Sure

she always said she'd die on the same day as him, and she didn't

after--it was of a Saturday he died and this is a Sunday."

Louise and the Doctor looked up suddenly at each other. This was indeed

the 13th of September, the day on which Laurence Capel had last year

passed away.

They presently left the house of mourning, soon to become, by sad

incongruity, a house of feasting, Louise leaving a little money for "the

wake" in the old woman's hands. They walked towards home together, the

Doctor leading his horse.

"I hope there is nothing wrong, Miss Eden," he asked after a little,

noticing how abstracted and depressed she seemed.

"Yes," she answered; "I have had news that troubles me. My brother has

written to tell me that he is going to marry the lady at whose house he

has been staying in Yorkshire; and that, as she has a large property

there, he will give up his Irish appointment. They offer me a home, and

I am sure they would be very kind. But what troubles me is the thought

of leaving Cloon, where I have learned to help the people and to love

them. I can never settle into a dull, selfish, luxurious life again."

Her eyes filled with tears as she spoke.

The young man's heart beat fast. Might he--might he dare to lay himself

at her feet? He nervously played with the horse's mane and said

tremulously, "We can never do without you now, Miss Eden. We should all

be lost without you."

He paused and looked at her. She was gazing sadly at the distant blue

outline of the Clare hills, and the sun sinking behind them flashed upon

her tearful eyes. She was on the other side of the horse and a little in

advance, and he could not, had he dared, have touched her hand. The

words came out suddenly:

"We can never do without you here: I can never do without you. Will you

stay with me? I haven't much to offer you: two hundred pounds a-year is

all I am earning now, and I may soon get the hospital. I can't give you

what you are used to; but if I had the whole world and its riches, it's

to you I would bring them."

She had stopped now and listened to him, startled. Then she turned

again, looked at the tranquil hills and the far-stretching woods of

Inchguile, and the smoke curling from many a poor hearthstone. A vision

flashed across her mind of a life spent here in the country she had

learned to love, amongst the people she longed to succour, with for a

helper the strong, skilful man who had stood with her by so many beds of

sickness. Then she thought of what her future would be in a luxurious

English household. She could see the well-regulated property, the tidy

cottages, where squire and parson would permit her help, but not need

it. An old woman looked from her doorway as they passed and said: "God

speed ye! God bring ye safe home and to heaven!"

They had come to the high road now, and as they stopped to let a drove

of cattle pass, she turned and met the Doctor's wistful eyes with a

flash of enthusiasm in hers.

"I will stay," she said. "I will give my life to Cloon and its poor!"

Then, as they reached the stile which led into Inagh, she crossed it

lightly and walked up the narrow path, scarcely remembering to look back

before she was out of sight and wave her hand in farewell to her happy

lover.

Happy was not, perhaps, the word to describe him by. A sudden rapture

had swept over him, blinding his vision, when she had said, "I will

stay." Yet now that she was out of sight without having deigned him one

touch of her hand, one soft word, he felt as if all had been a dream;

and was also conscious of a feeling, too subtle to be formed into a

thought, that there was something wanting in this supreme moment which

surely is not wanting when two hearts for the first time know themselves

to be beating for each other. But she had always been such an object of

worship to him, as one beyond his sphere, that he remembered how far

away she had been from him but yesterday, and that doubtless the

ordinary rules of love must be put aside when one so high stooped to

crown the life of so unworthy a worshipper.

II.

Colonel Eden returned that evening, and for some days Louise was

constantly occupied with his affairs, driving and walking with him and

listening to his plans and projects, and thus giving up her own solitary

expeditions and visits.

She was glad of the excuse to do this. The moment of exaltation in which

she had resolved to devote her life to these poor Galway peasants had

passed away, and though she kept pictures before her mind of a redeemed

district, and children brought up in health and cleanliness instead of

disease and dirt, and home industries taking the place of the idleness

that followed spasmodic labour, misgivings entered with them as she saw

herself no longer "the lady" who stooped from a high level, but a mere

doctor's wife (she would not admit even to her thoughts the undesirable

title of "Mrs. Quin"), living in that small staring house at the

entrance of the town. Of one thing she was certain, she could not

possibly suggest such an idea to her brother. She could imagine too well

his raised eyebrows and sarcastic words. She must wait until he had

broken all ties with the neighbourhood, and then she could come back

without consulting him. Her affianced husband's personality she kept as

much as possible in the background. He was to be her fellow in good

works, her superior in the skill and knowledge of a healer. She had only

seen him during her ministrations to the poor, only talked with him of

their needs and his own aspirations, had hardly looked on him as a being

in whom she could take a personal interest, until that moment in the

sunset when she had in the impulse of a moment linked her life to his.

A dread began to creep over her of seeing him again. How should she meet

him? Could she still keep him at a fitting distance? Would he not feel

that he had some claim upon her even now?

One morning, hearing wheels, she looked up from her half-hearted study

of an Irish grammar and saw the well-known car and the bony grey horse

appearing. To fly out by the back door, catching up her hat on the way

was the work of a second. She ran down the laurel walk, crossed the

stile, and was soon safely on her way to the Inchguile woods.

She was overtaken presently by a frieze-coated man, Martin Regan, who,

though an Inchguile tenant and out of her usual beat, she had met once

or twice, his bedridden father having sent to beg a visit from her.

Their holding was a poor one enough, but by constant hard work the son

had managed to keep things going. She knew the old woman who ruled in

the house was his stepmother, but had not noticed any want of harmony in

the family. Rumours, however, had reached her lately that the old man

had been making a will, by which he left the farm and all his

possessions to his wife, who had already written to recall her own son

from America to share the expected legacy with her.

These rumours came back to the mind of Louise Eden as she noticed the

trouble in Martin Regan's face.

"I was just going up to speak to your honour, miss," he said, "when I

seen you going through the gate, so I followed you to tell of the

trouble I'm in."

"Is what I have heard true, then?" asked Louise. "Surely your father

could not be so unjust as to leave the farm you have worked on so hard

away from you?"

"It's true indeed, miss," said Martin. "And I'm after going to the agent

about it, for Sir Richard is away, and if he could hear of it--he's a

good landlord and would never see me wronged. But he says all the power

is gone from the landlord now, and that if the old man was to leave the

land to Parnell or another and away from all his own blood the law

couldn't stop him. So God help us! I dunno at all what'll I do."

"Had you any quarrel with your father that led to this?" asked Louise,

with sympathy that won the confidence of her companion, who had walked

on with her to the woods, where their path was brilliantly bordered by

the opaque red berries of the mountain ash, and the transparent hues of

the guelder-rose.

"None at all," was the answer. "They made the will unknownst to me, and

they have the little farm and the little stock, and all there is left to

themselves, and for me nothing but the outside of the door and the

workhouse."

"Do you think they threatened him or used force?" suggested the girl.

"Did they force him to do it, is it? They did not. But it's too much

whisky and raisin cakes they had, and me coming into the house after

selling a sick pig. I never heard word or sound about it till a

neighbouring man told me they were gathered in the house with the

priest, and looking for a witness, and I went in, and Peter Kane was in

the house preparing to sign his name, and I took him by the neck and

threw him out of the door, and the stepmother she took me by the skin of

the shirt, and gave me a slap across the face with the flat of her hand,

and I called Peter Kane to witness that she struck me, and he said he

never saw it. And why? Because he had a cup of whisky given him before,

and believe me, when he turned about, it smelled good! After that, no

decent man could be found to sign his name, till they got two paid men.

Sure there's schemers about that 'ud hang you up for half a glass of

whisky."

"And who drew up the will?" inquired Miss Eden.

"The curate, Father Sheehy that did it. Sure our own priest would never

have done it, but it was a strange curate from the County Mayo. And I

asked him did he know there was such a one as me in the world, and he

said he never did. Then yourself'll need forgiveness in heaven, Father,

says I, as well as that silly old man."

"Could you not speak quietly to your father about it?" suggested Louise.

"Sure I never see the old man but when I go into the room in the morning

to wipe my face with the little towel after washing it, and he don't

speak to me himself, but to himself he do be speaking. And the old woman

says to me, 'Go down now to your landlord and see what he can do for

you;' and I said I will go, for if he was at home, there was never a

bishop or a priest or a friar spoke better and honester words to me than

his honour's self."

Martin Regan paused to take breath and wipe his mouth with his coat

sleeve, and after a moment's abstracted gaze at the vista of tall fir

trees before him, burst out again:

"And now it's whisky and tea for the old woman, and trimmings at two

shillings the yard for the sister's dress, and what for Martin? what for

the boy that worked for them the twelve months long? Me that used to go

a mile beyond Cloon every morning to break stones, and to deal for two

stone o' meal every Saturday to feed the childer when there was nothing

in the field. And it's trying to drive me from the house now they are,

and me to wet my own tea and to dress my own bed, and me after wringing

my shirt twice, with respects to ye, after working all the day in the

potato ridges."

"Could no one influence your stepmother; has she no friends here?" asked

Louise, much moved.

Martin Regan laughed bitterly.

"Sure she never belonged to the estate at all," he said, "but came in

the middle of the night on me and the little sister sitting by the

little fire of bushes, and me with a little white coat on me. And we

never knew where she came from, and never brought a penny nor a blanket

nor a stitch of clothes with her, and our own mother brought seventy

pounds and two feather beds. And now she's stiffer than a woman that

would have a hundred pounds. And now the old man's like to die, and

maybe he won't pass the night, and where'll I be? Sure if he would keep

him living a little longer he might get repentance."

"Had you not better ask the Doctor to see him?" said Louise. "He might

bring him round for a time, and then we must do our best for you."

"I was thinking that myself," said Regan; "and I believe I'd best go

look for him now; I might chance to find him at home. I heard the old

woman had the priest sent for; but, sure, he's wore out anointing

him--he threatened to die so often. But he's worse now than ever I saw

him." And taking off his hat with many expressions of gratitude, he left

Louise to finish her walk alone.

An hour or two later she returned, her hands full of sprays and berries

as an excuse for her wanderings. The Colonel was smoking contentedly on

the bench outside the door.

"Ah, Louise," he said, "you have missed your friend the Doctor you were

so full of when you wrote to me. He seemed to want to see you--I suppose

to have a crack about some of your patients; so I asked him to come and

dine this evening."

No escape now! Louise bit her lip, and proceeded to arrange her berries.

"He seems an intelligent young man," the Colonel went on; "rather

good-looking, if he had a drill-sergeant to teach him to hold himself

up; and I hear he doesn't drink, which can't often be said of these

dispensary doctors."

The red deepened in the girl's face. How could she ever say, "This is

the man I have promised to marry?" With much uneasiness she looked

forward to dinner-time. Dr. Quin sent no apology; nay, was worse than

punctual. He came in rather shyly, looking awkward in a new and

ill-fitting evening suit, for which he had put aside his usual rough

homespun. Louise, furious with herself for having blushed as he

appeared, gave him a cold and formal reception.

Dinner began uncomfortably for all three, as the Colonel, who had

trusted to his sister to entertain their guest, found himself obliged to

exert his own powers of conversation. The Doctor's discomfort was

intensified by what seemed to one of his simple habits the unusual

variety of courses and dishes. His fish-knife embarrassed him; he waited

to use fork or spoon until he had watched to see which implement was

preferred by his host. He chose "sherry wine" as a beverage; and left a

portion of each viand on his plate, in the groundless fear that if he

finished it he would be pressed to take a further supply. When dessert

was at last on the table, he felt more at ease; his host's genial manner

gave him confidence; and he was led on to talk of his work and prospects

at Cloon, of the long drives over the "mountainy roads," and the often

imaginary ailments of the patients who demanded his attendance, and

their proneness when really ill to take the advice of priest or

passer-by on sanitary matters rather than his own. "But I'll get out of

it, I hope, some day," he said, looking at Louise; "when I get a few

more paying patients and the infirmary, I can give up the dispensary."

Louise listened, dismayed. It was the thought of succouring the poor and

destitute that had led her to make the resolve of marrying their

physician; and he now dreamed of giving up his mission amongst them! He,

poor lad, only thought for the moment of how he might best secure a home

for his fair bride not too much out of harmony with her present

surroundings.

"And are you pretty sure of the infirmary?" asked the Colonel with an

appearance of warm interest.

"Well, I'm not rightly sure," was the answer. "I have a good deal of

promises and everybody knows me, and the other man, Cloran, is no doctor

at all--only took to it lately. Sure his shop in Cloon isn't for

medicine at all, but for carrot-seed and turnip-seed and every

description of article. But there's bribery begun already; and

yesterday, Mr. Stratton asked one of the Guardians to keep his vote for

me, and says he, 'how can I when I have the other man's money in my

pocket?'"

"And where did you learn doctoring?" asked the Colonel.

"Well, I walked St. James' Hospital in Dublin three years; and before

that I was in the Queen's College, Galway, where I went after leaving

the National School in Killymer."

"Were you well taught there?" inquired his host.

"I was indeed. I learned a great deal of geography and arithmetic.

There's no history taught at all though, nor grammar. But you'll wonder

how good the master was at mathematics, and he nothing to look at at

all. His name was Shee," went on the Doctor, now quite over his shyness;

"and he was terrible fond of roast potatoes. I remember he used to put

them in the grate to roast and take them out with two sticks, for in

those days there were no tongs; and one day I brought four round stones

in my pocket and put them in the grate as if they were potatoes to roast

for myself. By-and-by, he went over and took the stick and raked out one

of them, and took it up in his hand and rubbed it on his trousers (so)

to clean it, and not a tint of skin was left on his hand. And I out of

the door and he after me, and I never dared go to the school again till

my grandfather went before me to make peace."

The Colonel laughed heartily and was proceeding further to draw out his

ingenuous guest, but Louise, visibly impatient, rose to leave the room.

She was chafing with shame and mortification. Had she ever thought of

becoming the wife of that man with his awkward manners and Connaught

brogue? Certainly she had never realised what it meant. She could never

look her brother in the face again if the idea of the engagement should

dawn on him. How could she escape it? Carry it out she could not. All

her enthusiastic wish to spend her life in making this poor district

better was now overshadowed by the unendurable thought of what her

promise entailed.

Presently the Doctor came in alone, Colonel Eden having gone to write a

letter he wished to send by late post. He came forward at first gladly,

then timidly, repelled by the girl's cold expression as she stood by the

fire in her long white dress. She felt that her only chance of avoiding

dangerous topics was in plunging into the subject of their mutual

patients.

"Did Regan find you in time to bring you to his father?" she asked.

"He found me," said the Doctor; "but I told him I couldn't come before

to-morrow as I was to dine here. I thought there was no occasion for

hurry."

"But did he tell you how much depends on his father's life?" said

Louise, unconsciously glad to find something definite at which she might

show displeasure. "Do you not know of the unjust will he has made, and

that if he dies now his son will be disinherited?"

"He was telling me about it, but there's no danger of his dying yet

awhile," answered the Doctor, unaware of the gathering storm. "That old

man has a habit of dying; he was often like that before."

"I thought it was your duty to go at once when you are told there is

urgent necessity," said Louise, with heightened colour; "and until now I

thought it was your pleasure also."

"I'd have gone quick enough, Miss Eden, if I'd known _you_ were so

anxious about it," was the rather unfortunate reply; "and I'll go now

this minute if you wish me to."

"My wishes are not in question," said the girl, yielding to the

irritation she felt against herself and against him; "but if you neglect

the call of the dying on such a trivial plea as a dinner invitation, I

do not think you are justified in holding the position you do."

Colonel Eden at this moment came in, and the Doctor, feeling he had

given offence, but rather puzzled as to the cause, asked at once that

his car might be ordered, as he had to go and see a patient some way

off.

"So late, and on such a dark night!" said the Colonel, good-naturedly;

"surely he could wait till to-morrow. Don't you think so, Louise?"

"I have no opinion to give on the matter," said his sister, coldly.

She was now really vexed by the young man's quick obedience to what he

interpreted to be her wish. He had no sooner taken leave than she went

to her room and burst into sobs of mortified pride and real perplexity.

A day or two passed by during which she stayed in the house and garden.

The Colonel was away, doing duty for some fellow "Removable" absent on

leave. On his return he told his sister that he had found a letter

awaiting him calling for his immediate return to Yorkshire on business

connected with settlements.

"I must go the day after to-morrow," he said; "and would it not be a

good plan, Louise, for you to come with me and make friends with Agnes?"

A light flashed in the girl's eyes. Was not this a way of escape for

her? Oh, that she might leave Cloon while no one knew of the momentary

folly that now she blushed to remember!

She quickly assented, and next morning began to make her preparations.

She knew, though she would not confess to the knowledge, that she was

saying good-bye for ever to Inagh, the bright little home where she had

been so happy; but a thought of changing her resolution never crossed

her mind. She still nervously dreaded a visit from the man she was

conscious she was about to wound cruelly, and in the afternoon, hearing

wheels, was relieved to see only her brother driving up. He had called

for a cup of tea, having to drive on and wind up some business at

another village in his jurisdiction.

"I was sorry to hear of Dr. Quin's accident," he said as he waited. "I

hope it is not so serious as they say."

"What accident?" asked Louise, startled.

"Oh, did you not hear that the night he dined here he went on up that

narrow road to Ranahasey to see some old man, and in the dark he was

thrown off his car and the wheel went over him? They brought him back to

Cloon on the car; which was a mistake, and must have caused him agony.

Dr. Cloran, his rival, is looking after him, and seems rather puzzled

about the case, and says if he is not better to-morrow he will send to

Limerick for further advice. I am very sorry, for he seemed an

intelligent, good-hearted young fellow."

Louise remained alone, sick at heart. What had she done? Had she

brought upon this poor lad, in return for his worship of her, actual

bodily injury even before the keener pain that was to follow?

The dignified letter of dismissal and farewell she had been meditating

all day became suddenly inadequate. She must ask his pardon and break to

him very gently the hard sentence of renunciation and separation. Keen

remorse took hold of her as she remembered his gentle ways with the sick

and suffering, his strength and wisdom, when fighting against disease

and death. Oh that she had never come across his path, or that she had

had a mother or friend to warn her of the dangerous precipice to which

she was unconsciously leading him. What could she do now? She could not

write to him, not knowing into what hands the letter might fall. She

could not leave him to hear by chance next day of her departure. It was

growing dark, and there was no time to lose. She would go to his house,

and at all events leave a message for him. It was hardly a mile away,

and she was not likely to meet anyone on the road.

The low terraced hills looked bleak and dreary, a watery sky above them.

The pale sunset gleams were reflected in the pools of water on the

roadside, not yet absorbed into the light limestone soil. The straggling

one-sided street forming the entrance to Cloon looked more squalid than

usual, the houses more wretched under their grass-grown thatch, the

gleam and ring from the smithy the only touch of light and sound that

relieved their gloom.

Louise Eden walked up the little path to the Doctor's house, and,

knocking at the door, asked the old woman who appeared for news of her

master.

"Indeed, he's the one way always," was the reply; "no better and no

worse since they brought him and laid him on the bed. You'd pity him to

see him lying there, me fine boy."

"Will you give him a message from me?" asked Louise. "Will you say I

have come to ask how he is, and to say good-bye, as I am going back to

England?"

"He'll be sorry for that, indeed," said the old woman. "Sure, you'd best

go up and see him yourself."

"Oh, no," said Louise, shrinking back, "unless--his life is not in

danger, I hope?"

"Danger, is it," echoed old Mamie, indignantly, though not without a

momentary glance of uneasiness. "Why would he be in danger? Sure he

wasn't so much hurted as that. He bled hardly at all only for a little

cut on the head, and sure he has all he wants, and a nurse coming from

Dublin and one of the nuns sitting with him now. It'd be a bad job if he

was in danger, only twenty-four year old, and having such a nice way of

living, and, indeed, he has the prayers of the poor. Go up the stairs

and see him--here's his reverence coming, and might want me," she

continued, as a car stopped at the gate.

Reluctantly, yet not knowing how to draw back, and unwilling to meet

the priest, whom she knew slightly, Louise went up the narrow staircase.

She knocked at a door standing ajar, and hearing a low "come in,"

entered. It was a small bare room enough, no carpet save one narrow

strip, whitened walls, and a great fire smouldering under the

chimney-board of black painted wood. Even at that first glance she

noticed that the only attempt at ornament was a vase containing a bunch

of the red-seeded wild iris; she remembered having gathered and given it

to the Doctor a little time before as a "yerb" sometimes in request

amongst his patients.

The fading light fell on the low iron bed upon which the young man lay,

propped up with pillows. His face was much altered by these two or three

days of suffering. The fair hair was covered by a bandage and the blue

eyes looked larger for the black shades beneath them. But as he saw who

his visitor was, a smile, very sweet and radiant, lighted them up, and a

little colour came into the pallid cheeks. A nun, dressed in black and

with a heavily-veiled bonnet half concealing her face, sat by his

bedside, and looked with curiosity at the girl as she came in and gave

her hand to the patient.

"I have come to ask how you are," she said, "and to tell you how very

sorry I am--we are--for your accident. I am doubly grieved because--"

and she stopped, embarrassed at having to speak before a third person.

The Doctor's eyes were fixed on her face with the same glad smile.

"_I_ wanted to see you," he said gently, "but I never thought you would

come to this poor place. I wanted to tell you I had seen old Regan

before I was hurt, and I did my best for him, and I think he won't die

yet awhile."

"I am sorry," began Louise again, and then hesitated. How could she

explain for how much she was sorry? How could she at this moment make

any explanation at all? "I am going away," she went on--"I am going to

England with my brother to-morrow. I have come to say good-bye."

The eyes that rested on her lost none of their glad look of content; she

was not sure if her words had been understood, and went on talking

rather hurriedly of her brother's arrangements, and who was to take his

place, and of the long journey to Yorkshire.

"And now I must go," she concluded, "for I have a good deal to do at

home."

The hand which lay on the counterpane sought a little packet beside the

pillow.

"This was for you," he said, handing it to her.

She said good-bye again, and went slowly away; but, turning at the door,

she was filled once more with keen remorse at the sight of the strong

frame laid low, and the glance that followed her was so full of

wistfulness that she felt that she would have stooped and, in asking

forgiveness, have kissed the white-bandaged brow, if it had not been for

the nun's silent presence.

It was not until late at night that she remembered and opened the little

packet. It contained a massive marriage ring, such as were used by the

fisher-folk on the Galway coast. She was troubled at seeing it. The

strong-clasped hands and golden heart were an emblem that vexed her. She

felt that while she kept it she could not be free from the promise she

had given, and that her farewell could not have been understood as a

final one. She determined to leave it at the Doctor's house as she

passed to-morrow, and wrote, to enclose with it, a letter, penitent,

humble, begging forgiveness for the wrong she had thoughtlessly done to

so good and loyal a friend. She did not care now if others read it; she

must confess her desertion and implore pardon. The letter was blotted

with tears as she folded it round the heavy ring.

But that ring of betrothal was never returned. In the morning, as

Colonel Eden and his sister drove for the last time into Cloon, they saw

groups of frieze-coated men and blue-cloaked women whispering together

with sad faces, and a shutter being closed over each little shop window.

And when they came to the Doctor's house they saw that the blinds were

all drawn down.

SONNET.

Our life is one long poem. In our youth

We rise and sing a noble epic song,

A trumpet note of sound both clear and strong,

With idyls now and then too sweet for truth.

A lyric of lament, it swells along

The tide of years, a protest 'gainst the wrong

Of life, an unavailing cry for ruth,

A wish to know the end--the end forsooth!

'Tis not on earth. The end which makes or mars

The song of life, we who sing seldom know.

That end is where, beyond the pale fair stars

Which have looked down so calmly on our woe,

Eternal music will set right the jars

Of all that sounds so harsh and sad below.

JULIA KAVANAGH.

THE BRETONS AT HOME.

BY CHARLES W. WOOD, F.R.G.S., AUTHOR OF "IN SUNNY CLIMES," "LETTERS

FROM MAJORCA," ETC. ETC.

We were very sorry to leave Morlaix. The old town had gained upon our

affections. We had found the Hôtel d'Europe very comfortable, and Mr.

and Mrs. Hellard kind and attentive beyond praise. The indiscretions of

that fatal night were more than effaced and forgotten. Morlaix, at the

time of the Fair, was a Pandemonium: at the Regatta, if not exactly

Paradise, it was at least very lively and amusing; whilst, when neither

Fair nor Regatta was in question, Morlaix was full of the charm of

repose; a sleepy atmosphere that accorded well with its old-world

outlines.

[Illustration: FISHWOMEN, BRITTANY.]

Not least was our regret at saying good-bye to Catherine. She was an

original character, who had much amused and entertained us. There was a

vein of humour in her composition which the slightest touch brought to

the surface. The solemnity of her features never relaxed, and whilst she

made others laugh, and laugh again, her own face would invariably be

grave as a judge's. It was also a pleasure--in these days of

incapacity--to meet with a woman who managed the affairs of her little

world with all the discretion of a Prime Minister.

"Ces messieurs are going to Quimper," she exclaimed that last morning.

We were alone in the dining-room, taking an early breakfast. Our small

side-table faced the end window, and we looked upon the old square, and

the canal, where a long row of women were already washing, beating,

rinsing their linen, their white caps conspicuous, their voices raised

in laughter that rippled down the troubled waters. It was a lively

scene; very picturesque; very suited to the old town.

"Ces messieurs are going to Quimper," said Catherine, speaking the name

in the very italics of scorn. "They would do much better to remain in

Morlaix, where at least there is a good hotel, and a Catherine who is

ready to serve them night and day. But human nature is curious and must

see everything. One house is like another; one street like another; the

sea coast is the same everywhere; the same water, the same air, the same

sky; but just because one shore is a bay and the other a point, because

one coast is flat and the other has cliffs, mankind must rush about and

call it seeing the world."

"Would you have us stay here for ever?" we asked, amused at Catherine's

idea of life and travel.

"Well, no," she acknowledged; "I suppose not. It would hardly do.

Morlaix, after all, is not exciting. Only I am sorry you are going, and

it makes me unjust to the rest of the world," she acknowledged. "We

shall have a quiet time all this week, and I could have served you

better than I did last. But I don't like Quimper. There is not a decent

hotel in the place, and I wouldn't live there for a hundred francs a

week. I cannot breathe there; I grow limp. It has a dreadful river right

in front of the hotels--you will have benefit. I have heard that there

are seventy-two separate smells in Cologne--in Quimper the seventy-two

are concentrated into one."

This was not encouraging; but we knew that as Catherine's strong nature

saw things in extremes, so her opinions had to be taken cum grano salis.

In spite of what she said, we departed with much hope and expectation.

Everyone assisted in seeing us off the premises. They declared it to be

a melancholy pleasure, a statement hard to reconcile with their beaming

faces. Catherine alone was grave and immovable as the Man with the Iron

Mask. Yet she actually presented us--this downright, determined,

apparently unromantic woman--with buttonholes of small white roses tied

up with white ribbon: ribbon that in our grandmothers' days, I believe,

was called _love_ ribbon.

"We shall look quite bridal," we said, as she placed them in the

destined receptacle next our hearts. "Catherine, why have you never

married?"

Catherine laughed. "Thereby hangs a tale," she replied, actually

blushing. "It has not been for want of offers, you may be sure; I might

have married twenty times over had I so wished." And so we gathered that

Catherine, too, had had her little romance. Perhaps it had helped to

form her character, and develop her capacities. "And now, be sure that

some day you come back to Morlaix," she added, as she finally

accomplished her delicate task to her satisfaction.

"Shall we find you here?" we asked. "You may have married and gone

away."

"To toil and slave like Madame Mirmiton!" cried Catherine. "I would not

marry if it was the President of the Republic, or even the Marquis de

Carabas. Besides, who would have me at my age? No? no! I know when I am

well off. Men, do you see, are not angels; they are much nearer allied

to the opposite, sauf votre respect! Of course, _gentlemen_, I admit,

_are_ angels--sometimes. But then, no gentleman would have me. No; I am

a fixture, here, every bit as much as the doors and the windows.

Monsieur and Madame and the hotel would go to ruin without me."

And, although Monsieur and Madame assisted at this conference,

Catherine's statement went uncontradicted. She was certainly their right

hand, and added no little to the popularity of the establishment.

Finally we were off. The omnibus took our traps, whilst we walked up

Jacob's Ladder. We let our gaze linger and rest upon all the old

familiar points; the quaint gables, the dormer windows in the red, red

roofs; the latticed panes, behind which life must seem less sad and

sorrowful than it really is; the antiquarian and his old curiosities. He

knew we were leaving, and was on the look-out for us. The pale,

spiritual face stood out conspicuously amidst its surroundings: the

spiritual strangely contrasting with the material. The eyes looked into

ours with their sad, dreamy, far-away gaze, so full of the pain and

suffering of life. Behind him stood his Adonis of a son, the flush of

genius making the countenance yet more beautiful. Perched on his

shoulder was the cherub. He held out his arms as soon as he saw us, and

seemed quite ready to go forth with us and, as Catherine would have

said, see the world. Some of the old Louis Quatorze furniture had been

transferred from the seclusion of the monastery to the glitter of the

outer world, and here found a temporary repose.

"You are leaving," said the old antiquarian sadly--but his tones were

always sad. "I am sorry. I am always sorry when anyone leaves who

possesses the true artistic temperament. The town feels more deserted.

There are so many things around us that appeal only to the few. But you

have made quite a long stay amongst us; people generally come one day

and depart the next. And now you are bound for Quimper?"

"Yes. What shall we find there?"

"Much that is interesting; the loveliest church in Brittany; many quaint

and curious houses and perspectives; some things that are better than

Morlaix, but nothing better than our Grande Rue. Brittany has nothing

better than that in its way; nothing so good. Du reste, comparisons

should never be made. But you will find few antiquities in Quimper--and

no old antiquarian," he added with a quiet smile.

"I am under the impression," said H.C., a sensitive flush mantling to

his poetical and expressive eyes, "that some of these good people are

mistaking us for dealers in curiosities, and fancy that this is our

object in travelling."

[Illustration: QUIMPER.]

"What would your aunt, Lady Maria, say to her nephew's being so

degraded?" we asked.

"She would diminish her supply of crystallised violets," he returned.

"You know she lives by weight--Apothecaries' Weight--and measures

everything she takes. She would put a few grains less into the balance,

and incense her rooms."

All the same, I thought him mistaken, and asked the old antiquarian the

plain question. He smiled; the nearest approach we ever saw him give to

a laugh.

"No, sirs," he replied; "I have not so far erred. We do not make those

mistakes. Besides, you have too much love and veneration for the

beautiful. Indeed we know with whom we have to deal, and in our little

way possess a knowledge of the world."

But time and tide wait for no man. Our hour was up; the omnibus had

rumbled past us, and we had to depart. We reluctantly turned away from

this interesting group. The rift within the lute was probably busy with

household matters above, and no discordant element marred our farewell.

But we were sad, for we felt that somehow here was being lost and wasted

a great deal of that true talent which is so rare in the world.

The train rolled away from Morlaix. We had a long journey before us; a

journey right through the heart of Finistère. The first portion of it as

far as Landerneau had already been taken; the remainder was new ground.

The trains are slow and lingering in Brittany; this goes without saying,

and has already been said; but patience was an easy virtue. In spite of

Catherine, new ground must always be interesting.

The guard had put us into a compartment at Morlaix containing two

people; a young bride and bridegroom or an engaged couple; we could not

be quite sure at which stage they had arrived. The train was almost in

motion and we had no time to change. The gentleman glared at us, and we

felt very uncomfortably in the way. At the next station we left and went

into the next compartment, which contained nothing but a priest reading

his breviary; a dignified ecclesiastic; proving once more that there is

only one step from the ridiculous to the sublime. We carefully removed

all our small traps, including H.C.'s numerous antique parcels. But he

forgot his umbrella, which he had placed up in the rack. A dreadful

umbrella, which had been a martyrdom to me ever since we had left

England. An umbrella that was only fit for a poet or a Mrs. Gamp; huge,

bulky, tied round like a lettuce, with half a yard of stick above the

material, and a crane's head for a handle with a perpetual grin upon it

that was terribly irritating. H.C. called it one of his antiquities, and

was proud of it. When he had first bought it he had offered it to his

aunt, Lady Maria, for a carriage sunshade, who straightway went off into

one of her fainting fits, and very nearly disinherited him. At Quimper I

could stand it no longer, and when his back was turned, I quietly put

it up the chimney. There it no doubt still remains, unless it has

suffered martyrdom in the flames, in return for the martyrdom it had

inflicted upon others. But I am dating forward.

This horrible apparition he left in the rack of the first compartment. I

saw the omission, and was delighted to think that we had at last got rid

of the encumbrance. Had I only remembered the tale of the Eastern

Slippers I might have taken warning. The train went off; he took a

sketch of the priest, and then hastily looked round.

"My umbrella!" he exclaimed in an agony. "Where is it? You have not

thrown it out of window?"

My will had been good to do it many a time, as the familiar saying runs;

but he carried a stick as well as an umbrella, and he was five times as

strong as I.

"You may have left it at Morlaix," I suggested. "Now I come to think of

it--"

"The next compartment," he interrupted. "I distinctly remember putting

it up in the rack, and thinking how quaint and pretty the crane's head

looked as it gaped through the netting."

It is always so. The fateful crossness of events pursues us through the

world. The only time when he should have been absent-minded and

oblivious, his memory served him well. At the next station he got out

for his umbrella, and returned after quite a long interval, not looking

exactly triumphant; rather flushed and uncomfortable; but in proud

possession of the horror.

"I had quite a difficulty in getting it back," he said. "They had

actually put it up and were sitting under its shade. He complained of

the glare of the sunshine. You see, although these are first-class

compartments, there are no blinds to the windows. So very public."

"But the morning is grey," I observed. "There is no sunshine."

H.C. looked out; he had not observed the absence of sunlight.

"Oh, well," he returned, doubtfully, "perhaps it was the draught they

complained of. You know I am rather dull at French, and have to make a

shot at a good deal that's said. Any way," he added, with a frank look

of innocence, "I am sure they are only an engaged couple, not married.

Married people wouldn't sit in a railway carriage under one umbrella.

She's very pretty--I wonder whether she's very fond of him? It looks

like it. One compartment--one umbrella. It was _my_ umbrella--then _I_

ought to have had his place," he added dreamily, as if in some way or

other he felt that something was wrong and the world was a little out of

joint.

The priest looked up from his breviary. I should have thought he

understood English, only that his expression was rather comical than

reproving. I changed the subject and asked him a question. He

immediately closed his book and disposed himself for conversation We

found him an extremely intellectual and entertaining companion He

intimately knew both Brittany and the Breton character.

"I am not a Breton," he said in reply to a remark, "but I have lived

amongst them for thirty years. My early days were passed in Paris, and

to live in Paris up to the age of twenty-one is alone an education. My

father was X----, the great minister of his time. My grandfather went

through all the horrors of the French Revolution. He saw the beautiful

head of Marie Antoinette roll into the sawdust; heard the last footfall

of Charlotte Corday as she ascended the scaffold. He always said that

she was one of our most heroic martyrs, and as she walked patiently and

full of courage to her doom, the expression of a saint upon her

features. She was a saint, more worthy of canonisation than some who are

found in the calendar. He was a young man in those days, but its horrors

turned his hair white. Later on he was of great assistance to Napoleon,

although we have always been Royalists. But he held that it was well to

sacrifice private opinion for the good of one's country. It is of no use

fighting against the stream. Life is short, the present only is ours;

therefore why waste the present in vainly wishing for what is not?"

"And you have chosen neither sword nor portfolio?" we observed.

"'The lot is cast into the lap,'" he quoted. "I was to have been a

soldier, but just at that moment my sight failed. I was threatened with

blindness. Fortunately it passed off with time, and I now see better

than I did at twenty. But my career as a soldier was ended. I had no

taste for politics--the world is not sufficiently honest. It seems to me

a constant struggling for party and power rather than an earnest union

of hearts and minds to do one's very best for King and country, avienne

que pourra. And as extremes meet in human nature just as they sometimes

meet in the physical world, so I, throwing aside the sword, took to the

cowl. Yes; I withdrew from the world; I entered a monastery; the severe

order of the Trappists. But I made a mistake--I did not know myself. A

life of seclusion, of inactivity, could never be mine. I should have

become demoralised. Half the men who enter monasteries make the same

mistake, but they have not the courage to withdraw. I went back into the

world before my novitiate was six months over. Not to forsake religion,

but to enter the Church."

"We have heard of you as a great preacher," we remarked.

"I believe that it is my vocation," he returned with a smile which quite

illumined his face. "Heaven has bestowed upon me the gift of sympathy; I

have influence with my fellow mortals--Heaven grant that I use it well.

I first touch their hearts, then I have gained their minds. This is

especially necessary with the good Breton folk. They are fervently

religious, but not intellectual. They are sterling, but narrow-minded

and superstitious. Nor did I choose my sphere of action; it was placed

before me and I accepted it. I would rather have preached to Parisian

congregations, the refined and cultivated of the earth; but I should

probably not have done more good--if I have done good at all--and it

might have been a snare to me. I might have grown worldly;

intellectually proud; too fond of the good things of this life at the

tables of the rich and great. All that is not possible in Brittany. With

us, more or less, it is Lent all the year round, intellectually as well

as physically. We need very few indulgences from his Holiness."

There was something extremely winning about him. It must have been the

charm of character, for he had long passed the charm of youth. His hair,

worn long, was white as snow; he must have been verging upon sixty. His

face was pale and very pure in expression; his eyes were large, dark,

and singularly soft and luminous, without a trace of age about them, or

of their early weakness. He was tall and powerfully made, and a tendency

to embonpoint only added to his dignity and importance. He had a fund of

quiet humour about him also, which made him an excellent companion.

[Illustration: OLD MILL, LANDERNEAU.]

"We should much like to hear you preach," we said. "Is there no chance

of our doing so?"

"I am bound for Quimper," he returned; "so are you. Next Sunday I shall

preach in the cathedral, and if you are still there your wish may easily

be gratified."

"We are Protestant," I remarked. "You will look upon us as a heretic."

"Indeed, no," he returned quickly. "I am not so narrow-minded as some of

my cloth. One is of Paul, another of Cephas. I would not even try to

convert you, though I am aware that my Church demands it. But to a

certain extent man must be a free agent and judge for himself. I do not

hold with my Church in all things. We are all bound for the same goal,

just as two rivers flowing from opposite directions may empty themselves

into one sea. All roads lead to Rome--it would be sad if only one road

led to Heaven."

Thus the hours passed swiftly and pleasantly. The country on either side

was diversified and interesting. Occasionally a river, flowing to the

sea, reflected the sky and clouds above, giving poetry to the landscape.

Now hills and gently sloping undulations, here rocky and barren, there

fringed with trees whose graceful curves and branches were traced

against the pale background of sky. Again there were long stretches of

plain, dreary and monotonous, sad and sombre, like the Breton character.

The peasantry, indeed, are much influenced by their climate, by the sad

aspect of the long reaches of field and plain that so often meet their

gaze, unbroken perhaps by any other object than a cross or calvary

erected under religious influence in days gone by. And these very

crosses, beautiful in themselves, have a saddening tendency, reminding

them constantly of the fact that here they have "no continuing city."

These wide reaches, artistically, are full of tone and beauty, but here

again they are at fault. They know nothing of "tone," of "greys and

greens;" they only know that the general influence is melancholy; that

the sun shines too seldom in their skies, and that those skies too often

weep. They cannot argue and analyse; cannot tell why the tendency of

their nature, individually and collectively, is grave and sombre;

reasoning is beyond them, and if they think of it at all, they arrive at

the truth by instinct. For instinct takes the place of reason, and

gradually dies out as the higher powers of the intellect are developed.

They stood out here and there in the fields, few and far between, very

picturesque objects; something sad and patient in their very attitudes.

But it was not the time for ploughing and seed-sowing, when they are

seen to greatest advantage; for what is more picturesque than a peasant

following a plough drawn by the patient oxen, who are never, like so

many of the men and women of the world, "unequally yoked together." Here

and there a woman would be kneeling in the fields, her favourite

attitude when minding cattle; kneeling and knitting; there they stay

from sunrise to sunset, their mind a blank; vegetating; expecting

nothing better from life; untroubled by the mysterious problems that

disturb and perplex so many of us; in very many ways so much to be

envied; escaping the heritage of those more richly endowed: the mental

and spiritual pain and oppression of existence.

The day passed on and we approached Quimper. We thought of Catherine and

wondered what we should find awaiting us. Much, according to her, that

would be better avoided. But as we drew near to the ancient town and

saw, rising heavenwards, the beautiful spires of her cathedral, standing

out in the romantic gloaming as an architectural dream against the

background of sky, we felt that here would be our reward, come what else

might. The train steamed into the station; our day's journey was over.

We must now part from our pleasant travelling companion.