I.

What I am going to tell of took place before my time. But we shall get

down to that by-and-by, for I had a good deal to do with the upshot when

it came.

About a mile from the Manor, on the way to the Court (which at that time

belonged to my father) stood a very old house built of grey stone, and

called Sandstone Torr: "Torr," as every one knew, being a corruption of

Tower. It was in a rather wild and solitary spot, much shut in by trees.

A narrow lane led to it from the highway, the only road by which a

carriage could get up to it: but in taking the field way between the

Court and Dyke Manor, over stiles and across a running rivulet or two,

you had to pass it close. Sandstone Torr was a rambling, high, and ugly

old building, once belonging to the Druids, or some ancient race of that

kind, and said to have been mighty and important in its day. The points

chiefly remarkable about it now were its age, its lonesome grey walls,

covered with lichen, and an amazingly lofty tower, that rose up from the

middle of the house and went tapering off at the top like an aspiring

sugar loaf.

Sandstone Torr belonged to the Radcliffes. Its occupier was Paul

Radcliffe, who had inherited it from his father. He was a rather

unsociable man, and seemed to find his sole occupation in farming what

little land lay around the Torr and belonged to it. He might have

mixed with the gentry of the county, as far as descent went, for the

Radcliffes could trace themselves back for ages--up to the Druids, I

think, the same as the house: but he did not appear to care about it.

Who his wife had been no one knew. He brought her home one day from

London, and she kept herself as close as he did, or closer. She was dead

now, and old Radcliffe lived in the Torr with his only son, and a man

and maid servant.

Well, in those days there came to stay at Dyke Manor a clergyman, named

Elliot, with his daughter Selina. Squire Todhetley was a youngish man

then, and he and his mother lived at the Manor together. Mr. Elliot was

out of health. He had been overworked for the past twenty years in the

poor London parish of which he was curate; and old Mrs. Todhetley asked

them to come down for a bit of a change. Change indeed it brought to Mr.

Elliot. He died there. His illness, whatever it was, took a sudden and

rapid stride onwards, and before he had been at Dyke Manor three weeks

he was dead.

Selina Elliot--we have heard the Squire say it many a time--was the

sweetest-looking girl that ever the sun shone on. She was homeless now.

The best prospect before her was that of going out as governess. The

Elliots were of good descent, and Selina had been thoroughly well

educated; but of money she had just none. Old Mrs. Todhetley bid her not

be in any hurry; she was welcome to stay as long as she liked at Dyke

Manor. So Selina stayed. It was summer weather then, and she was out and

about in the open air all day long: a slight girl, in deep mourning,

with a shrinking air that was natural to her.

One afternoon she came in, her bright face all aglow, and her shy eyes

eager. Soft brown eyes they were, that had always a sadness in them.

I--a little shaver--can remember that, when I knew her in later years.

As she sat down on the stool at Mrs. Todhetley's feet, she took off her

black straw hat, and began to play nervously with its crape ends.

"My dear, you seem to be in a heat," said Mrs. Todhetley; a stout old

lady, who sat all day long in her easy-chair.

"Yes, I ran home fast," said Selina.

"Home from whence? Where have you been?"

"I was--near the Torr," replied Selina, with hesitation.

"Near the Torr, child! That's a long way for you to go strolling alone."

"The wild roses in the hedges there are so lovely," pleaded Selina.

"That's why I took to go there at first."

"Took to go there!" repeated the old lady, thinking it an odd phrase.

"Do you see anything of the Torr people? I hope you've not been making

intimate with young Stephen Radcliffe," she added, a thought darting

into her mind.

"Stephen? that's the son. No, I never saw him. I think he is away from

home."

"That's well. He is by all accounts but a churlish lout of a fellow."

Selina Elliot bent her timid face over the hat, smoothing its ribbons

with her restless fingers. She was evidently ill at ease. Glancing up

presently, she saw the old lady was shutting her eyes for a doze: and

that hastened her communication.

"I--I want to tell you something, please, ma'am. But--I don't like to

begin." And, with that, Selina burst into unexpected tears, and the

alarmed old lady looked up.

"Why, what ails you, child? Are you hurt? Has a wasp been at you?"

"Oh no," said Selina, brushing the tears away with fingers that trembled

all over. "I--if you please--I think I am going to live at the Torr."

The old lady wondered whether Selina was dreaming. "At the Torr!" said

she. "There are no children at the Torr. They don't want a governess at

the Torr."

"I am going there to be with Mr. Radcliffe," spoke Selina, in her

throat, as if she meant to choke.

"To be with old Radcliffe! Why, the child's gone cranky! Paul Radcliffe

don't need a governess."

"He wants to marry me."

"Mercy upon us!" cried the old lady, lifting both hands in her

amazement. And Selina burst into tears again.

Yes, it was true. Paul Radcliffe, who was fifty years of age, if a day,

and had a son over twenty, had been proposing marriage to that bright

young girl! They had met in the fields often, it turned out, and Mr.

Radcliffe had been making his hay while the sun shone. Every one went on

at her.

"It would be better to go into a prison than into that gloomy Sandstone

Torr--a young girl like you, Selina," said Mrs. Todhetley. "It would be

sheer madness."

"Why, you'd never go and sacrifice yourself to that old man!" cried the

Squire, who was just as outspoken and impulsive and good-hearted then as

in these latter years. "He ought to be ashamed of himself. It would be

like June and December."

But all they said was of no use in the end. It was not that Selina, poor

girl, was in love with Mr. Radcliffe--one could as well have fancied

her in love with the grizzly old bear, just then exhibiting himself at

Church Dykely in a travelling caravan. But it was her position. Without

money, without a home, without a resource of any kind for the future,

save that of teaching for her bread, the prospect of becoming mistress

of Sandstone Torr was something fascinating.

"I do so dislike the thought of spending my whole life in teaching!"

she pleaded in apology, the bitter tears streaming down her face. "You

cannot tell what it is to feel dependent."

"I'd rather sweep chimneys than marry Paul Radcliffe if I were a pretty

young girl like you," stormed the old lady.

"Since papa died you don't know what the feeling has been," sobbed

Selina. "Many a night have I lain awake with the misery of knowing that

I had no claim to a place in the wide world."

"I am sure you are welcome to stay here," said the Squire.

"Yes; as long as I am here myself," added his mother. "After that--well,

I suppose it wouldn't be proper for you to stay."

"You are all kindness; I shall never meet with such friends again; and I

know that I am welcome to stay as long as I like," she answered in the

saddest of tones. "But the time of my departure must come sometime; and

though the world lies before me, there is no refuge for me in it. It is

very good of Mr. Radcliffe to offer to make me his wife and to give me

a home at the Torr."

"Oh, is it, though!" retorted the Squire. "Trust him for knowing on

which side his bread's buttered."

"He is of good descent; he has a large income----"

"Six hundred a-year," interrupted the Squire, slightingly.

"Yes, I am aware that it cannot appear much to you," she meekly said;

"but to me it seems unbounded. And that is apart from the house and

land."

"The house and land must both go to Stephen."

"Mr. Radcliffe told me that."

"As to the land, it's only a few acres; nothing to speak of," went on

the Squire. "I'd as soon boast of my gooseberry bushes. And he can leave

all his money to Stephen if he likes. In my opinion, the chances are

that he will."

"He says he shall always behave fairly by me," spoke poor Selina.

"Why, you'd have a step-son older than yourself, Selina!" put in the old

lady. "And I don't like him--that Stephen Radcliffe. He's no better than

he should be. I saw him one day whipping a poor calf almost to death."

Well, they said all they could against it; ten thousand times more than

is written down here. Selina wavered: she was not an obstinate girl, but

tractable as you please. Only--she had no homestead on the face of the

earth, and Mr. Radcliffe offered her one. He did not possess youth,

it is true; he had never been handsome: but he was of irreproachable

descent--and Selina had a little corner of ambition in her heart; and,

above all, he had a fairly good income.

It was rather curious that the dread of this girl's life, the one dread

above all other dreads, was that of _poverty_. In the earlier days of

her parents, when she was a little girl and her mother was alive, and

the parson's pay was just seventy pounds a-year, they had had such a

terrible struggle with poverty that a horror of it was implanted in the

child's mind for ever. Her mother died of it. She had become weaker and

weaker, and perished slowly away for the want of those comforts that

money alone could have bought. Mr. Elliot's stipend was increased later:

but the fear of poverty never left Selina: and now, by his death, she

was again brought face to face with it. That swayed her; and her choice

was made.

Old Mrs. Todhetley and the Squire protested that they washed their hands

of the marriage. But they could only wash them gingerly, and, so to say,

in private. For, after all, excepting that Paul Radcliffe was more than

old enough to be Selina's father, and had grizzly hair and a grown-up

son, there was not so much to be said against it. She would be Mrs.

Radcliffe of Sandstone Torr, and might take her standing in the county.

* * * * *

Sandstone Torr, dull and gloomy, and buried amidst its trees, was enough

to put a lively man in mind of a prison. You entered it by a sort of

closed-in porch, the outer door of which was always chained back in the

daytime. The inner door opened into a long, narrow passage, and that

again to a circular stone hall with a heavy ceiling, just like a large

dark watch-box. Four or five doors led off from it to different passages

and rooms. This same kind of round place was on all the landings,

shut in just as the hall was, and with no light, except what might be

afforded from the doors of the passages or rooms leading to it. It was

the foundation of the tower, and the house was built round it. All the

walls were of immense thickness: the rooms were low, and had beams

running across most of them. But the rooms were many in number, and

the place altogether had a massive, grand air, telling of its past

importance. It had one senseless point in it--there was no entrance to

the tower. The tower had neither staircase nor door of access. People

said what a grand view might be obtained if you could only get to the

top of it, or even get up to look through the small slits of windows in

its walls. But the builder had forgotten the staircase, and there it

ended.

Mr. Radcliffe took his wife straight home from the church-door. Selina

had never before been inside the Torr, and the gloominess of its aspect

struck upon her unpleasantly. Leading her down the long passage into the

circular hall, he opened one of its doors, and she found herself in a

sitting-room. The furniture was good but heavy; the Turkey carpet was

nearly colourless with age, but soft to the feet; the window looked out

only upon trees. A man-servant, who had admitted them, followed them in,

asking his master if he had any orders.

"Send Holt here," said Mr. Radcliffe. "This is the parlour, Selina."

A thin, respectable woman of middle age made her appearance. She looked

with curiosity at the young lady her master had brought in: at her

wedding-dress of grey silk, at the pretty face blushing under the white

straw bonnet.

"Mrs. Radcliffe, Holt. Show your mistress her rooms."

The woman curtsied, and led the way through another passage to the

stairs; and into a bedroom and sitting-room above, that opened into one

another.

"I've aired 'em well, ma'am," were the first words she said. "They've

never been used since the late mistress's time, for master has slept in

a little chamber near Master Stephen's. But he's coming back here now."

"Is this the drawing-room?" asked Selina, observing that the furniture,

though faded, was prettier and lighter than that in the room downstairs.

"Dear no, ma'am! The drawing-room is below and on t'other side of the

house entirely. It's never gone into from one month's end to another.

Master and Mr. Stephen uses nothing but the parlour. We call this the

Pine Room."

"The Pine Room!" echoed Selina. "Why?"

"Because it looks out on them pines, I suppose," replied Holt.

Selina looked from the window, and saw a row of dark pines waving

before the higher trees behind them. The view beyond was completely shut

in by these trees; they were very close to the house: it almost seemed

as though a long arm might have touched them from where she stood.

Anything more dull than this aspect could not well be found. Selina

leaned from the window to look below: and saw a gravel-path with some

grass on either side it, but no flowers.

It was a week later. Mr. Radcliffe sat in the parlour, busily examining

some samples of new wheat, when there came a loud ring at the outer

bell, and presently Stephen Radcliffe walked in. The father and son

resembled each other. Both were tall and strongly built, and had the

same rugged cast of features: men of few words and ungenial manners. But

while Mr. Radcliffe's face was not an unpleasing one, Stephen's had a

most sullen--some might have said evil--expression. In his eyes there

was a slight cast, and his dull brown hair was never tidy. Some time

before this, when the father and son had a quarrel, Stephen had gone off

into Cornwall to stay with his mother's relations. This was his first

appearance back again.

"Is it you, Stephen!" cried Mr. Radcliffe, without offering to shake

hands: for the house was never given to ceremony.

"Yes, it's me," replied Stephen, who generally talked more like a boor

than a gentleman, particularly in his angry moods. "It's about time I

came home, I think, when such a notice as this appears in the public

papers."

He took a newspaper from his pocket, and laid it before his father,

pointing with his fore-finger to an announcement. It was that of Mr.

Radcliffe's marriage.

"Well?" said Mr. Radcliffe.

"Is that true or a hoax?"

"True."

Stephen caught the paper up again, tore it in two, and flung it across

the room.

"What the devil made you go and do such a thing as that?"

"Softly, Ste. Keep a civil tongue in your head. I am my own master."

"At your age!" growled Stephen. "There's no fool like an old fool."

"If you don't like it, you can go back to where you came from," said Mr.

Radcliffe quietly, turning the wheat from one of the sample-bags out on

the table.

Stephen went to the window, and stood there looking at that agreeable

prospect beyond--the trees--his hands in his pockets, his back to his

father, and swearing to himself awfully. It would not do to quarrel

implacably with the old man, for his money was at his own disposal: and,

if incensed too greatly, he might possibly take the extreme step of

leaving it away from him. But Stephen Radcliffe's heart was good to turn

his father out of doors there and then, and appropriate the money to

himself at once, if he only had the power. "No fool like an old fool!"

he again muttered. "Where _is_ the cat?"

"Where's who?" cried Mr. Radcliffe, looking up from his wheat.

"The woman you've gone and made yourself a world's spectacle with."

"Ste, my lad, this won't do. Keep a fair tongue in your head, as I

bid you; or go where you may make it a foul one. For by Heaven!"--and

Mr. Radcliffe's passion broke out and he rose from his seat

menacingly--"I'll not tolerate this."

Stephen hardly ever remembered his father to have shown passion before.

He did not like it. They had gone on so very quietly together, until

that quarrel just spoken of, and Stephen had had his own way, and ruled,

so to say, in all things, for his father was easy, that this outbreak

was something new. It might not do to give further provocation then.

He was standing as before in sullen silence, his hands in his trousers'

pockets and the skirts of his short brown velveteen coat thrown back,

and Mr. Radcliffe had sat down to the bags again, when the door opened,

and some one came in. Stephen turned. He saw a pretty young girl in

black, with some books in her delicate hands. Just for an instant he

wondered who the young girl could be: and then the thought flashed

over him that "the woman" his father had married might have a grown-up

daughter. Selina had been unpacking her trunks upstairs, and arranging

her things in the drawers and closets. She hesitated on her way to the

book-case when she saw the stranger.

"My son Stephen, Selina. Ste, Mrs. Radcliffe."

Stephen Radcliffe for a moment forgot his sullenness and his temper.

He did nothing but stare. Was his father playing a joke on him? He had

pictured the new wife (though he knew not why) as a woman of mature

age: this was a child. As she timidly held out the only hand she could

extricate from the load of books, he saw the wedding-ring on her

finger. Meeting her hand ungraciously and speaking never a word, he

turned to the window again. Selina put the books down, to be disposed

in their shelves later, and quitted the room.

"This is even worse folly than I dreamed of," began Stephen, facing his

father. "She's nothing but a child."

"She is close upon twenty."

"Why, there may be children!" broadly roared out Stephen. "You must have

been mad when you did such a deed as this."

"Mad or sane, it's done, Stephen. And I should do it again to-morrow

without asking your leave. Understand that."

Yes, it was done. Rattling the silver in his pockets, Stephen Radcliffe

felt that, and that there was no undoing it. Here was this young

step-mother planted down at the Torr; and if he and she could not hit

it off together, it was he who would have to walk out of the house.

For full five minutes Stephen mentally rehearsed all the oaths he

remembered. Presently he spoke.

"It was a fair trick, wasn't it, that you should forbid my marrying,

and go and do the same thing yourself!"

"I did not object to your marrying, Ste: I objected to the girl.

Gibbon's daughter is not one to match with you. You are a Radcliffe."

Stephen scoffed. Nobody had ever been able to beat into him any sense

of self-importance. Pride of birth, pride in his family were elements

unknown to Stephen's nature. He had a great love of money to make up

for it.

"What's good for the goose is good for the gander," he retorted,

plunging into a communication he had resolved to make. "You have been

taking a wife on your score, and I have taken one on mine."

Mr. Radcliffe looked keenly at Stephen. "You have married Gibbon's

girl?"

"I have."

"When? Where?"

"In Cornwall. She followed me there."

The elder man felt himself in a dilemma. He did care for his son, and

he resented this alliance bitterly for Stephen's sake. Gibbon was

gamekeeper to Sir Peter Chanasse, and had formerly been outdoor servant

at the Torr; and this daughter of his, Rebecca--or Becca, as she was

commonly called--was a girl quite beneath Stephen. Neither was she a

lovable young woman in herself; but hard, and sly, and bony. How it was

that Stephen had fancied her, Mr. Radcliffe could not understand. But

having stolen a march on Stephen himself, in regard to his own marriage,

he did not feel much at liberty to resent Stephen's. It was done,

too--as he had just observed of his own--and it could not be undone.

"Well, Stephen, I am more vexed for your sake than I care to say. It

strikes me you will live to repent it."

"That's my look out," replied Stephen. "I am going to bring her home."

"Home! Where?"

"Here."

Mr. Radcliffe was silent; perhaps the assertion startled him.

"I don't want Gibbon's daughter here, Stephen. There's no room for her."

"Plenty of room, and to spare."

So there was; for the old house was large. But Mr. Radcliffe had not

been thinking of space.

"I can't have her. There! You may make your home where you like."

"This is my home," said Stephen.

"And it may be still, if you like. But it's not hers. Two women in a

house, each wanting to be mistress, wouldn't do. Now no noise, Ste,

_I won't have Gibbon's girl here_. I've not been used to consort with

people who have been my servants."

* * * * *

It is one thing to make a resolution, and another to keep it. Before

twelve months had gone by, Mr. Radcliffe's firmly spoken words had

come to naught; and Stephen had brought his wife into the Torr and two

babies--for Mrs. Stephen had presented him with two at once. Selina was

upstairs then with an infant of her own, and very ill. The world thought

she was going to die.

The opportunity was a grand one for Madam Becca, and she seized upon it.

When Selina came about again, after months spent in confinement, she

found, so to say, no place for her. Becca was in her place; mistress,

and ruler, and all. Stephen behaved to her like the lout he was; Becca,

a formidable woman of towering height, alternately snapped at, and

ignored her. Old Radcliffe did not interfere: he seemed not to see that

anything was amiss. Poor Selina could only sit up in that apartment

that Holt had called the Pine Room, and let her tears fall on her

baby-boy, and whisper all her griefs into his unconscious ear. She was

refined and timid and shrinking: but once she spoke to her husband.

"Treat you with contempt?--don't let you have any will of your

own?--thwart you in all ways?" he repeated. "Who says it, Selina?"

"Oh, it is so; you may see that it is, if you only will notice," she

said, looking up at him imploringly through her tears.

"I'll speak to Stephen. I knew there'd be a fuss if that Becca came

here. But you are not as strong to bustle about as she is, Selina: let

her take the brunt of the management off you. What does it matter?"

What did it matter?--that was Mr. Radcliffe's chief opinion on the

point: and had it been only a question of management it would not have

mattered. He spoke to Stephen, telling him that he and his wife must

make things pleasanter for Mrs. Radcliffe, than, as it seemed, they were

doing. The consequence was, that Stephen and Becca took a convenient

occasion of attacking Selina; calling her a sneak, a tell-tale, and a

wolf in sheep's clothing, and pretty nearly frightening her into another

spell of illness.

From that time Selina had no spirit to retaliate. She took all that

was put upon her--and it was a great deal--and bore it in silence and

patience. She saw that her marriage, taking one thing with another, had

turned out to be the mistake her friends had foretold that it would be.

Mr. Radcliffe, growing by degrees into a state of apathy as he got

older, was completely under the dominion of Stephen. He did not mean to

be unkind to his wife: he just perceived nothing; he was indifferent to

all that passed around him: had they set fire to Selina's petticoats

before his eyes, he'd hardly have seen the blaze. Now and again Selina

would try to make friends with Holt: but Holt, though never uncivil,

had a way of throwing her off. And so, she lived on, a cowed,

broken-spirited woman, eating away her heart in silence. Selina

Radcliffe had found out that there were worse evils in the world than

poverty.

She might have died then but for her boy. You never saw a nicer little

fellow than he--that Francis Radcliffe. A bright, tractable, loving boy;

with laughing blue eyes, and fair curls falling back from his pretty

face. Mr. and Mrs. Stephen hated him. Their children, Tom and Lizzy,

pinched and throttled him: but the lad took it all in good part, and

had the sweetest temper imaginable. He loved his mother beyond telling,

and she made him as gentle and nearly as patient as she was. Virtually

driven from the parlour, except at meal-times, their refuge was the Pine

Room. There they were unmolested. There Selina educated and trained him,

doing her best to show him the way to the next world, as well as to fit

him for this.

One day when he was about nine years old, Selina was up aloft, in the

little room where he slept; which had a better view than some of the

rooms had, and looked out into the open country. It was snowy weather,

and she caught sight of the two boys in the yard below, snowballing each

other. Opening the window to call Francis in--for he always got into the

wars when with Tom, and she had learnt to dread his being with him--she

saw Stephen Radcliffe crossing from the barn. Suddenly a snowball

took Stephen in the face. It came from Tom; she saw that; Francis was

stooping down at the time, collecting material for a fresh missive.

"Who flung that at me?" roared out Stephen, in a rage.

Tom disclaimed all knowledge of it; and Stephen Radcliffe seized upon

Francis, beating him shamefully.

"It was not Francis," called out Selina from the window, shivering at

the sight; for Stephen in his violence might some time, as she knew,

lame the lad. "Its touching you was an accident; I could see that; but

it was not Francis who threw it."

The cold, rarefied air carried her words distinctly to the ear of

Stephen. Holding Francis by one hand to prevent his escape, he told Mrs.

Radcliffe that she was a liar, adding other polite epithets and a few

oaths. And then he began pummelling the lad again.

"Come in, Francis! Let him come in!" implored the mother, clasping her

hands in her bitter agony. "Oh, is there no refuge for him and for me?"

She ran down to their sanctum, the Pine Room. Francis came up, sore all

over, and his face bleeding. He was a brave little lad, and he strove

to make light of it, and keep his tears down. She held him to her, and

burst into sobs while trying to comfort him. That upset him at once.

"Oh, my darling, try and bear! My poor boy, there's nothing left for

us both but to bear. The world is full of wrongs and tribulation:

but, Francis, it will all be made right when we get to heaven."

"Don't cry, mamma. It didn't hurt me much. But, indeed, the snowball

was not mine."

At ten years old the boys were sent to school. Young Tom, allowed to

have his own way, grew beyond every one's control, even his father's;

and Stephen packed him off to school. Selina besought her husband to

send Francis also. Why not, replied Mr. Radcliffe; the boy must be

educated. And, in spite of Stephen's opposition, Francis was despatched.

It was frightfully lonely and unpleasant for Selina after that, and she

grew to have a pitiful look on her face.

The school was a sharp one, and Francis got on well; he seemed to

possess his grandfather Elliot's aptitude for learning. Tom hated it.

After each of the half-yearly holidays, it took Stephen himself to get

him to school again: and before he was fourteen he capped it all by

appearing at home uncalled for, a red-hot fugitive, and announcing an

intention of going to sea.

Tom carried his point. After some feats of skirmishing between him

and his father, he was shipped off as "midshipman" on board a fine

merchantman bound for Hong Kong. Stephen Radcliffe might never have

given a consent, but for the certainty that if he did not give it, Tom

would decamp from the Torr, as he did from school, and go off as a

common seaman before the mast. It was strange, with his crabbed nature,

how much he cared for those two children!

"You'll have that other one home now," said sullen Stephen to his

father. "No good to be paying for him there."

And most likely it would have been so; but fate, or fortune, intervened.

Francis had a wind-fall. A clergyman, who had known Mr. Elliot, died,

and left Francis a thousand pounds. Selina decided that it should be

spent, or at least a portion of it, in completing his education in a

more advanced manner--though, no doubt, Stephen would have liked to get

hold of the money. Francis was sent up to King's College in London,

and to board at the house of one of the masters. In this way a few more

years passed on. Francis chose the Bar as a profession, and began to

study law.

"The Bar!" sneered Stephen. "A penniless beggar like Francis Radcliffe!

Put a pig to learn to spell!"

A bleak day in winter. The wind was howling and crying round Sandstone

Torr, tearing through the branches of the almost leafless trees,

whirling the weather-cock atop of the lofty tower, playing madly on the

window-panes. If there was one spot in the county that the wind seemed

to favour above all other spots, it was the Torr. It would go shrieking

in the air round about there like so many unquiet spirits.

In the dusk of evening, on a sofa beside the fire in the Pine Room lay

Mrs. Radcliffe, with a white, worn face and hollow eyes. She was slowly

dying. Until to-day she had not thought there was any immediate danger:

but she knew it all now, and that the end was at hand.

So it was not that knowledge which had caused her, a day or two ago, to

write to London for Francis. Some news brought in by Stephen Radcliffe

had unhinged and shocked her beyond expression. Francis was leading a

loose, bad life, drinking and gambling, and going to the deuce headlong,

ran the tales, and Stephen repeated them indoors.

That same night she wrote for Francis. She could not rest day or night

until she could see him face to face, and say--Is this true, or untrue?

He might have reached the Torr the previous day; but he did not. She was

lying listening for him now in the twilight gloom amidst the blasts of

that shrieking wind.

"If God had but taken my child in infancy!" came the chief thought of

her troubled heart. "If I could only know that I should meet him on the

everlasting shores!"

"Mother!"

She started up with a yearning cry. It was Francis. He had arrived, and

come upstairs, and his opening of the door had been drowned by the wind.

A tall, slender, bright-faced young fellow of twenty, with the same

sunny hair as in his childhood, and a genial heart.

Francis halted, and stood in startled consternation. The firelight

played on her wasted face, and he saw--what was there. In manners he was

still almost a boy; his disposition open, his nature transparent.

She made room for him on the sofa; sitting beside him, and laying her

weary head for a moment on his shoulder. Francis took a few deep breaths

while getting over the shock.

"How long have you been like this, mother? What has brought it about?"

"Nothing in particular; nothing fresh," she answered. "I have been

getting nearer and nearer to it for years and years."

"Is there no hope?"

"None. And oh, my darling, but for you I should be so glad to die.

Sitting here in my loneliness for ever, with only heaven to look forward

to, it seems that I have learnt to see a little already of what its rest

will be."

Francis pushed his hair from his brow, and left his hand there. He had

loved his mother intensely, and the blow was cruel.

Quietly, holding his other hand in hers, she spoke of what Stephen

Radcliffe had heard. Francis's face turned to scarlet as he listened.

But in that solemn hour he could not and would not tell a lie.

Yes, it was true; partly true, he said. He was not always so steady as

he ought to be. Some of his acquaintances, young men studying law like

himself, or medicine, or what not, were rather wild, and he had been the

same. Drink?--well, yes; at times they did take more than might be quite

needful. But they were not given to gambling: that was false.

"Francis," she said, her heart beating wildly with its pain, "the worst

of all is the drink. If once you suffer yourself to acquire a love for

it, you may never leave it off. It is so insidious----"

"But I don't love it, mother; I don't care for it--and I am sure you

must know that I would tell you nothing but truth now," he interrupted.

"I have only done as the others do. I'll leave it off."

"Will you promise me that?"

"Yes, I will. I do promise it."

She carried his hand to her lips and kissed it. Francis had always kept

his promises.

"It is so difficult for young fellows without a home to keep straight in

London," he acknowledged. "There's no good influence over us; there's no

pleasant family circle where we can spend our evenings: and we go out,

and get drawn into this and that. It all comes of thoughtlessness,

mother."

"You have promised me, Francis."

"Oh yes. And I will perform."

"How long will it be before you are called to the Bar?" she asked, after

a pause.

"Two years."

"So much as that?"

"I think so. How the wind howls!"

Mrs. Radcliffe sighed; Francis's future seemed not to be very clear.

Unless he could get on pretty quickly, and make a living for himself--

"When I am gone, Francis," she said aloud, interrupting her own

thoughts, "this will not be any home for you."

"It has not been one for me for some years now, mother."

"But if you do not get into work soon, and your own funds come to an

end, you will have no home but this to turn to."

"If I attempted to turn to it, Stephen would soon make it too hot for

me, I expect."

"That might not be all; not the worst," she quickly answered, dropping

her voice to a tone of fear, and glancing around as one in a fever.

Francis looked round too. He supposed she was seeking something.

"It is always scaring me, Francis," she whispered. "There are times when

I fancy I am going to see it enacted before my eyes. It puts me into a

state of nervous dread not to be described."

"See what enacted?" he asked.

"I was sitting here about ten days ago, Francis, thinking of

you, thinking of the future, when all at once a most startling

prevision--yes, I call it so--a prevision came upon me of some dreadful

ill in store for you; ill wrought by Stephen. I--I am not sure but

it was--that--that he took your life," she added, scarcely above her

breath, and in tones that made Francis shiver.

"Why, what do you mean, mother?"

"Every day, every day since, every night and nearly all night, that

strange conviction has lain upon me. I know it will be fulfilled: when

the hand of death is closing on us, these previsions are an instinct. As

surely as that I am now disclosing this to you, Francis, so surely will

you fall in some way under the iron hand of Stephen."

"Perhaps you were dreaming, mother dear," suggested Francis: for he had

his share of common sense.

"It will be in this house; the Torr," she went on, paying no attention

to him; "for it is always these rooms and the dreary trees outside

that seem to lie before me. For that reason, I would not have you live

here----"

"But don't you think you may have been dreaming?" repeated Francis,

interrupting the rest.

"I was as wide awake as I am now, Francis, but I was deep in thought.

It stole upon me, this impression, without any sort of warning, or any

train of ideas that could have led to it; and it lies within me, a sure

and settled conviction. _Beware of Stephen._ But oh, Francis! even

while I give you this caution I know that you will not escape the

evil--whatever it may turn out to be."

"I hope I shall," he said, rather lightly. "I'll try, at any rate."

"Well, I have warned you, Francis. Be always upon your guard. And keep

away from the Torr, if you can."

Holt, quite an aged woman now, came in with some tea for her mistress.

Francis took the opportunity to go down and see his father. Mr.

Radcliffe, in a shabby old coat, was sitting in his arm-chair at the

parlour fire. He looked pleased to see Francis, and kept his hand for

a minute after he had shaken it.

"My mother is very ill, sir," said Francis.

"Ay," replied the old man, dreamily. "Been so for some time now."

"Can nothing be done to--to--keep her with us a little longer, father?"

"I suppose not. Ask Duffham."

"What the devil!--is it you! What brings _you_ here?"

The coarse salutation came from Stephen. Francis turned to see him enter

and bang the door after him. His shoes were dirty, his beaver gaiters

splashed, and his hair was like a tangled mop.

"I came down to see my father and mother," answered Francis, as he held

out his hand. But Stephen did not choose to see it.

Mrs. Stephen, in a straight-down blue cloth gown and black cap garnished

with red flowers, looking more angular and hard than of yore, came in

with the tea-tray. She did as much work in the house as a servant. Lizzy

had been married the year before, and lived in Birmingham with her

husband, who was curate at one of the churches there.

"You'll have to sleep on the sofa to-night, young man," was Mrs.

Stephen's snappish salutation to Francis. "There's not a bed in the

house that's aired."

"The sofa will do," he answered.

"Let his bed be aired to-morrow, Becca," interposed the old man. And

they stared in astonishment to hear him say it.

Francis sat down to the tea-table with Stephen and his wife; but neither

of them spoke a word to him. Mr. Radcliffe had his tea in his arm-chair

at the fire, as usual. Afterwards, Francis took his hat and went out. He

was going to question the doctor; and the wind came rushing and howling

about him as he bore onwards down the lane towards Church Dykely.

In about an hour's time he came back again with red eyes. He said it was

the wind, but his subdued voice sounded as though he had been crying.

His father, with bent head, was smoking a long pipe; Stephen sat at the

table, reading the sensational police reports in a low weekly newspaper.

"Been out for a stroll, lad?" asked old Radcliffe--and it was the first

voluntary question he had put for months. Stephen, listening, could not

think what was coming to him.

"I have been to Duffham's," answered Francis. "He--he--" with a stopping

of the breath, "says that nothing can be done for my mother; that a few

days now will see the end of it."

"Ay," quietly responded the old man. "Our turns must all come."

"_Her_ turn ought not to have come yet," said Francis, nearly breaking

down.

"No?"

"I have been looking forward at odd moments to a time when I should be

in work, and able to give her a happy home with me, father. It is very

hard to come here and find _this_."

Old Radcliffe took a long whiff; and, opening his mouth, let the smoke

curl upwards. "Have a pipe, Francis?"

"No, thank you, sir. I am going up to my mother."

As he left the room, Stephen, having finished the police reports, was

turning the paper to see what it said about the markets, when his father

put down his pipe and began to speak.

"Only a few days, he says, Ste!"

"What?" demanded Stephen in his surly and ungracious tones.

"She's been ailing always; and has sat up there away from us, Ste. But

we shall miss her."

"Miss her!" retorted Ste, leaving the paper, and walking to the fire.

"Why, what good has she been? _Miss_ her? The house'll have a good

riddance of her," he added, under his breath.

"It'll be my turn next, Ste. And not long first, either."

Stephen took a keen look at his father from beneath his overhanging,

bushy eyebrows, that were beginning to turn grey. All this sounded very

odd.

"When you and me and Becca's left alone here by ourselves, we shall be

as easy as can be," he said.

"What month is it, Ste?"

"November."

"Ay. You'll have seen the last o' me before Christmas."

"Think so?" was Stephen's equable remark. The old man nodded; and there

came a pause.

"And you and Becca'll be glad to get us out, Ste."

Stephen did not take the trouble to gainsay it. He was turning about in

his thoughts something that he had a mind to speak of.

"They've been nothing but interlopers from the first--she and him. I

expect you to do what's right by me, father."

"Ay, I shall do what's right," answered the old man.

"About the money, I mean. It must _all_ come to me, father. I was heir

to it before you ever set eyes on her; and her brat must not be let

stand in my way. Do you hear?"

"Yes, I hear. It'll be all right, Ste."

"Take only a fraction from the income, and how would the Torr be kept

up?" pursued Stephen, plucking up his spirits at the last answer. "He

has got his fine profession, and he can make a living for himself out of

it: some o' them counsellors make their thousands a-year. But he must

not be let rob _me_."

"He shan't rob you, Ste. It will be all right."

And covetous Stephen, thus reassured and put at ease, strolled into

the kitchen, and ordered Becca to provide his favourite dish, toasted

cheese, for supper.

The "few days" spoken of by Mr. Duffham, were slowly passing. There was

not much difference to be observed in Selina; except that her voice grew

weaker. She could only use it at intervals. But her face had a beautiful

look of peace upon it, just as though she were three parts in heaven. I

have heard Duffham say so many a time since; I, Johnny Ludlow.

On the fifth day she was so much better that it seemed little short of

a miracle. They found her in the Pine Room early, up and dressed: when

Holt went in to light the fire, she was looking over the two books

that lay on the round table. One of them was the Bible; the other was

a translation of the German tale "Sintram," which Francis had brought

her when he came down the last summer. The story had taken hold of her

imagination, and she knew it nearly by heart.

Down went Holt, and told them that the mistress (for, contradictory

though it may seem, Selina had been always accorded that title) had

taken a "new lease of life," and was getting well. Becca, astonished,

went stalking up: perhaps she was afraid it might be true. Selina had

"Sintram" in her hand as she sat: her eyes looked bright, her cheeks

pink, her voice was improved.

"Oh," said Becca. "What have you left your bed for at this early hour?"

"I feel so well," Selina answered with a smile, letting the book lie

open on the table. "Won't you shake hands with me?--and--and kiss me?"

Now Becca had never kissed her in all the years they had lived together,

and she did not seem to care about beginning now. "I'll go down and beat

you up an egg and a spoonful of wine," said she, just touching the tips

of Selina's fingers, in response to the held-out hand: and, with that,

went away.

Stephen was the only one who did not pay the Pine Room a visit that day.

He heard of the surprising change while he was feeding the pigs: for

Becca went out and told him. Stephen splashed some wash over the side

of the trough, and gave a little pig a smack with the bucket, and that

was all his answer. Old Radcliffe sat an hour in the room; but he never

spoke all the time: so his company could not be considered as much.

Selina crept as far as the window, and looked out on the bare pines and

the other dreary trees. Most trees are dreary in November. Francis saw a

shiver take her as she stood, leaning on the window-frame; and he went

to give her his arm and bring her back again. They were by themselves

then.

"A week, or so, of this improvement, mother, and you will be as you used

to be," said he cheerfully, seating her on the sofa and stirring up the

fire. "We shall have our home together yet."

She turned her face full on his, as he sat down by her; a

half-questioning, half-wondering look in her eyes.

"Not in this world, Francis. Surely _you_ are not deceived!" and his

over-sanguine heart went down like lead.

"It is but the flickering of the spirit before it finally quits the

weary frame; just as you may have seen the flame shoot up from an

expiring candle," she continued. "The end is very near now."

A spasm of pain rose in his throat. She took his hands between her own

feeble ones.

"Don't grieve, Francis; don't grieve for me! Remember what my life has

been."

He did remember it. He remembered also the answer Duffham gave when

he had inquired what malady it was his mother was dying of. "A broken

heart."

"Don't forget, Francis--never forget--that it is a journey we must enter

on, sooner or later."

"An uncertain and unknown journey at the best!" he said. "You have no

fear of it?"

"Fear! No, but I had once."

She spoke the words in a low, sweet tone, and pointed with a smile to

the book that still lay open on the table. Francis's eyes fell on the

page.

"When death is drawing near,

And thy heart shrinks with fear,

And thy limbs fail,

Then raise thy hands and pray

To Him who cheers the way

Through the dark vale.

"Seest thou the eastern dawn?

Hears't thou, in the red morn,

The angel's song?

Oh! lift thy drooping head,

Thou who in gloom and dread

Hast lain so long.

"Death comes to set thee free;

Oh! meet him cheerily,

As thy true friend;

And all thy fears shall cease,

And in eternal peace

Thy penance end."

Francis sat very still, struggling a little with that lump in his

throat. She leaned forward, and let her head rest upon him, just as she

had done the other day when he first came in. His emotion broke loose

then.

"Oh, mother, what shall I do without you?"

"You will have God," she whispered.

Still all the morning she kept up well; talking of this and that, saying

how much of late the verses, just quoted, had floated in her mind and

become a reality to her; showing Holt a slit that had appeared in the

table-cover and needed darning: telling Francis his pocket-handkerchiefs

looked yellow and should be bleached. It might have been thought she was

only going out to tea at Church Dykely, instead of entering on the other

journey she had told of.

"Have you been giving her anything?" demanded Stephen, casting his surly

eyes on Francis as they sat opposite to each other at dinner in the

parlour. "Dying people can't spurt up in this manner without drugs to

make 'em."

Francis did not deign to answer. Stephen projected his fork, and took a

potato out of the dish. Frank went upstairs when the meal was over. He

had left his mother sitting on the sofa, comparatively well. He found

her lying on the bed in the next room, grappling with death. She lifted

her feeble arms to welcome him, and a ray of joyous light shone on her

face. Francis made hardly one step of it to the bed.

"Oh, my darling, it will be all right!" she breathed. "I have prayed for

you, and I know--I know I have been heard. You will be helped to put

away that evil habit; temptation may assail, but it will not finally

overcome you. And, Francis, when----" Her voice failed.

"I no longer hear what you say, mother," cried Francis in an agony.

"Yes, yes," she repeated, as if in answer to something he had said.

"Beware of Stephen."

The hands and face alike fell. Francis rang the bell violently, and Holt

came up. All was over.

* * * * *

Stephen attended the funeral with the others. Grumbling wofully at

having to do it, because it involved a new suit of black clothes.

"They'll be ready for the old man, though," was his consoling

reflection: "he won't be long."

He was even quicker than Stephen thought. On the very day week that they

had come in from leaving Selina in the grave, Mr. Radcliffe was lying

as lifeless as she was. A seizure carried him off. Francis was summoned

again from London before he had well got back to it. Stephen could not,

at such a season, completely ignore him.

He did not foresee the blow that was to come thundering down. When Mr.

Radcliffe's will came to be opened, it was found that his property was

equally divided between the two sons, half and half: Stephen of course

inheriting the Torr; and Squire Todhetley being appointed trustee for

Francis. "And I earnestly beg of him to accept the trust," ran the

words, "for the sake of Selina's son."

Francis caught the glare of Stephen as they were read out. It was of

course Stephen himself, but it looked more like a savage wild-cat. That

warning of his mother's came into Francis's mind with a rush.