CHAPTER XIII

FATHER BENWELL’S CORRESPONDENCE.

I.

_Arthur Penrose to Father Benwell._

REVEREND AND DEAR FATHER--When I last had the honor of seeing you,

I received your instructions to report, by letter, the result of my

conversations on religion with Mr. Romayne.

As events have turned out, it is needless to occupy your time by

dwelling at any length on this subject, in writing. Mr. Romayne has been

strongly impressed by the excellent books which I have introduced to his

notice. He raises certain objections, which I have done my best to meet;

and he promises to consider my arguments with his closest attention,

in the time to come. I am happier in the hope of restoring his

mental tranquillity--in other and worthier words, of effecting his

conversion--than I can tell you in any words of mine. I respect and

admire, I may almost say I love, Mr. Romayne.

The details which are wanting in this brief report of progress I shall

have the privilege of personally relating to you. Mr. Romayne no longer

desires to conceal himself from his friends. He received a letter

this morning which has changed all his plans, and has decided him on

immediately returning to London. I am not acquainted with the contents

of the letter, or with the name of the writer; but I am pleased, for Mr.

Romayne’s sake, to see that the reading of it has made him happy.

By to-morrow evening I hope to present my respects to you.

II.

_Mr. Bitrake to Father Benwell._

SIR--The inquiries which I have instituted at your request have proved

successful in one respect.

I am in a position to tell you that events in Mr. Winterfield’s life

have unquestionably connected him with the young lady named Miss Stella

Eyrecourt.

The attendant circumstances, however, are not so easy to discover.

Judging by the careful report of the person whom I employ, there must

have been serious reasons, in this case, for keeping facts secret and

witnesses out of the way. I mention this, not to discourage you, but to

prepare you for delays that may occur on our way to discovery.

Be pleased to preserve your confidence in me, and to give me time--and I

answer for the result.

BOOK THE SECOND.

CHAPTER I.

THE SANDWICH DANCE.

A FINE spring, after a winter of unusual severity, promised well for the

prospects of the London season.

Among the social entertainments of the time, general curiosity was

excited, in the little sphere which absurdly describes itself under the

big name of Society, by the announcement of a party to be given by Lady

Loring, bearing the quaint title of a Sandwich Dance. The invitations

were issued at an unusually early hour; and it was understood that

nothing so solid and so commonplace as the customary supper was to be

offered to the guests. In a word, Lady Loring’s ball was designed as a

bold protest against late hours and heavy midnight meals. The younger

people were all in favor of the proposed reform. Their elders declined

to give an opinion beforehand.

In the small inner circle of Lady Loring’s most intimate friends, it

was whispered that an innovation in the matter of refreshments was

contemplated, which would put the tolerant principles of the guests to

a severe test. Miss Notman, the housekeeper, politely threatening

retirement on a small annuity, since the memorable affair of the

oyster-omelet, decided on carrying out her design when she heard that

there was to be no supper. “My attachment to the family can bear a

great deal,” she said. “But when Lady Loring deliberately gives a ball,

without a supper, I must hide my head somewhere--and it had better be

out of the house!” Taking Miss Notman as representative of a class,

the reception of the coming experiment looked, to say the least of it,

doubtful.

On the appointed evening, the guests made one agreeable discovery when

they entered the reception rooms. They were left perfectly free to amuse

themselves as they liked.

The drawing-rooms were given up to dancing; the picture gallery was

devoted to chamber music. Chess-players and card-players found remote

and quiet rooms especially prepared for them. People who cared for

nothing but talking were accommodated to perfection in a sphere of

their own. And lovers (in earnest or not in earnest) discovered, in a

dimly-lighted conservatory with many recesses, that ideal of discreet

retirement which combines solitude and society under one roof.

But the ordering of the refreshments failed, as had been foreseen, to

share in the approval conferred on the arrangement of the rooms. The

first impression was unfavorable. Lady Loring, however, knew enough of

human nature to leave results to two potent allies--experience and time.

Excepting the conservatory, the astonished guests could go nowhere

without discovering tables prettily decorated with flowers, and bearing

hundreds of little pure white china plates, loaded with nothing but

sandwiches. All varieties of opinion were consulted. People of

ordinary tastes, who liked to know what they were eating, could choose

conventional beef or ham, encased in thin slices of bread of a delicate

flavor quite new to them. Other persons, less easily pleased,

were tempted by sandwiches of _pate de fois gras_ and by exquisite

combinations of chicken and truffles, reduced to a creamy pulp which

clung to the bread like butter. Foreigners, making experiments, and not

averse to garlic, discovered the finest sausages of Germany and Italy

transformed into English sandwiches. Anchovies and sardines appealed,

in the same unexpected way, to men who desired to create an artificial

thirst--after having first ascertained that the champagne was something

to be fondly remembered and regretted, at other parties, to the end

of the season. The hospitable profusion of the refreshments was

all-pervading and inexhaustible. Wherever the guests might be, or

however they were amusing themselves, there were the pretty little

white plates perpetually tempting them. People eat as they had never eat

before, and even the inveterate English prejudice against anything new

was conquered at last. Universal opinion declared the Sandwich Dance to

be an admirable idea, perfectly carried out.

Many of the guests paid their hostess the compliment of arriving at the

early hour mentioned in the invitations. One of them was Major Hynd.

Lady Loring took her first opportunity of speaking to him apart.

“I hear you were a little angry,” she said, “when you were told that

Miss Eyrecourt had taken your inquiries out of your hands.”

“I thought it rather a bold proceeding, Lady Loring,” the Major replied.

“But as the General’s widow turned out to be a lady, in the best sense

of the word, Miss Eyrecourt’s romantic adventure has justified itself. I

wouldn’t recommend her to run the same risk a second time.”

“I suppose you know what Romayne thinks of it?”

“Not yet. I have been too busy to call on him since I have been in

town. Pardon me, Lady Loring, who is that beautiful creature in the pale

yellow dress? Surely I have seen her somewhere before?”

“That beautiful creature, Major, is the bold young lady of whose conduct

you don’t approve.”

“Miss Eyrecourt?”

“Yes.”

“I retract everything I said!” cried the Major, quite shamelessly. “Such

a woman as that may do anything. She is looking this way. Pray introduce

me.”

The Major was introduced, and Lady Loring returned to her guests.

“I think we have met before, Major Hynd,” said Stella.

Her voice supplied the missing link in the Major’s memory of events.

Remembering how she had looked at Romayne on the deck of the steamboat,

he began dimly to understand Miss Eyrecourt’s otherwise incomprehensible

anxiety to be of use to the General’s family. “I remember perfectly,”

he answered. “It was on the passage from Boulogne to Folkestone--and my

friend was with me. You and he have no doubt met since that time?” He

put the question as a mere formality. The unexpressed thought in him

was, “Another of them in love with Romayne! and nothing, as usual,

likely to come of it.”

“I hope you have forgiven me for going to Camp’s Hill in your place,”

said Stella.

“I ought to be grateful to you,” the Major rejoined. “No time has been

lost in relieving these poor people--and your powers of persuasion have

succeeded, where mine might have failed. Has Romayne been to see them

himself since his return to London?”

“No. He desires to remain unknown; and he is kindly content, for the

present, to be represented by me.”

“For the present.” Major Hynd repeated.

A faint flush passed over her delicate complexion. “I have succeeded,”

she resumed, “in inducing Madame Marillac to accept the help

offered through me to her son. The poor creature is safe, under kind

superintendence, in a private asylum. So far, I can do no more.”

“Will the mother accept nothing?”

“Nothing, either for herself or her daughter, so long as they can work.

I cannot tell you how patiently and beautifully she speaks of her hard

lot. But her health may give way--and it is possible, before long, that

I may leave London.” She paused; the flush deepened on her face. “The

failure of the mother’s health may happen in my absence,” she continued;

“and Mr. Romayne will ask you to look after the family, from time to

time, while I am away.”

“I will do it with pleasure, Miss Eyrecourt. Is Romayne likely to be

here to-night?”

She smiled brightly, and looked away. The Major’s curiosity was

excited--he looked in the same direction. There was Romayne, entering

the room, to answer for himself.

What was the attraction which drew the unsocial student to an evening

party? Major Hynd’s eyes were on the watch. When Romayne and Stella

shook hands, the attraction stood self-revealed to him, in Miss

Eyrecourt. Recalling the momentary confusion which she had betrayed,

when she spoke of possibly leaving London, and of Romayne’s plans for

supplying her place as his almoner, the Major, with military impatience

of delays, jumped to a conclusion. “I was wrong,” he thought; “my

impenetrable friend is touched in the right place at last. When the

splendid creature in yellow leaves London, the name on her luggage will

be Mrs. Romayne.”

“You are looking quite another man, Romayne!” he said mischievously,

“since we met last.”

Stella gently moved away, leaving them to talk freely. Romayne took no

advantage of the circumstance to admit his old friend to his confidence.

Whatever relations might really exist between Miss Eyrecourt and himself

were evidently kept secret thus far. “My health has been a little better

lately,” was the only reply he made.

The Major dropped his voice to a whisper.

“Have you not had any return--?” he began.

Romayne stopped him there. “I don’t want my infirmities made public,” he

whispered back irritably. “Look at the people all round us! When I tell

you I have been better lately, _you_ ought to know what it means.”

“Any discoverable reason for the improvement?” persisted the

Major, still bent on getting evidence in support of his own private

conclusions.

“None!” Romayne answered sharply.

But Major Hynd was not to be discouraged by sharp replies. “Miss

Eyrecourt and I have been recalling our first meeting on board the

steamboat,” he went on. “Do you remember how indifferent you were to

that beautiful person when I asked you if you knew her? I’m glad to see

that you show better taste to-night. I wish I knew her well enough to

shake hands as you did.”

“Hynd! When a young man talks nonsense, his youth is his excuse. At your

time of life, you have passed the excusable age--even in the estimation

of your friends.”

With those words Romayne turned away. The incorrigible Major instantly

met the reproof inflicted on him with a smart answer. “Remember,” he

said, “that I was the first of your friends to wish you happiness!” He,

too, turned away--in the direction of the champagne and the sandwiches.

Meanwhile, Stella had discovered Penrose, lost in the brilliant

assemblage of guests, standing alone in a corner. It was enough for her

that Romayne’s secretary was also Romayne’s friend. Passing by titled

and celebrated personages, all anxious to speak to her, she joined the

shy, nervous, sad-looking little man, and did all she could to set him

at his ease.

“I am afraid, Mr. Penrose, this is not a very attractive scene to you.”

Having said those kind words, she paused. Penrose was looking at her

confusedly, but with an expression of interest which was new to her

experience of him. “Has Romayne told him?” she wondered inwardly.

“It is a very beautiful scene, Miss Eyrecourt,” he said, in his low

quiet tones.

“Did you come here with Mr. Romayne?” she asked.

“Yes. It was by his advice that I accepted the invitation with which

Lady Loring has honored me. I am sadly out of place in such an assembly

as this--but I would make far greater sacrifices to please Mr. Romayne.”

She smiled kindly. Attachment so artlessly devoted to the man she loved,

pleased and touched her. In her anxiety to discover a subject which

might interest him, she overcame her antipathy to the spiritual director

of the household. “Is Father Benwell coming to us to-night?” she

inquired.

“He will certainly be here, Miss Eyrecourt, if he can get back to London

in time.”

“Has he been long away?”

“Nearly a week.”

Not knowing what else to say, she still paid Penrose the compliment of

feigning an interest in Father Benwell.

“Has he a long journey to make in returning to London?” she asked.

“Yes--all the way from Devonshire.”

“From South Devonshire?”

“No. North Devonshire--Clovelly.”

The smile suddenly left her face. She put another question--without

quite concealing the effort that it cost her, or the anxiety with which

she waited for the reply.

“I know something of the neighborhood of Clovelly,” she said. “I wonder

whether Father Benwell is visiting any friends of mine there?”

“I am not able to say, Miss Eyrecourt. The reverend Father’s letters are

forwarded to the hotel--I know no more than that.”

With a gentle inclination of her head, she turned toward other

guests--looked back--and with a last little courteous attention offered

to him, said, “If you like music, Mr. Penrose, I advise you to go to the

picture gallery. They are going to play a Quartet by Mozart.”

Penrose thanked her, noticing that her voice and manner had become

strangely subdued. She made her way back to the room in which the

hostess received her guests. Lady Loring was, for the moment, alone,

resting on a sofa. Stella stooped over her, and spoke in cautiously

lowered tones.

“If Father Benwell comes here to-night,” she said, “try to find out what

he has been doing at Clovelly.”

“Clovelly?” Lady Loring repeated. “Is that the village near

Winterfield’s house?”

“Yes.”

CHAPTER II.

THE QUESTION OF MARRIAGE.

As Stella answered Lady Loring, she was smartly tapped on the shoulder

by an eager guest with a fan.

The guest was a very little woman, with twinkling eyes and a perpetual

smile. Nature, corrected by powder and paint, was liberally displayed

in her arms, her bosom, and the upper part of her back. Such clothes

as she wore, defective perhaps in quantity, were in quality absolutely

perfect. More adorable color, shape, and workmanship never appeared,

even in a milliner’s picture-book. Her light hair was dressed with a

fringe and ringlets, on the pattern which the portraits of the time of

Charles the Second have made familiar to us. There was nothing exactly

young or exactly old about her except her voice, which betrayed a faint

hoarseness, attributable possibly to exhaustion produced by untold years

of incessant talking. It might be added that she was as active as a

squirrel and as playful as a kitten. But the lady must be treated with

a certain forbearance of tone, for this good reason--she was Stella’s

mother.

Stella turned quickly at the tap of the fan. “Mamma!” she exclaimed,

“how you startle me!”

“My dear child,” said Mrs. Eyrecourt, “you are constitutionally

indolent, and you want startling. Go into the next room directly. Mr.

Romayne is looking for you.”

Stella drew back a step, and eyed her mother in blank surprise. “Is it

possible that you know him?” she asked.

“Mr. Romayne doesn’t go into Society, or we should have met long since,”

Mrs. Eyrecourt replied. “He is a striking person--and I noticed him

when he shook hands with you. That was quite enough for me. I have just

introduced myself to him as your mother. He was a little stately and

stiff, but most charming when he knew who I was. I volunteered to find

you. He was quite astonished. I think he took me for your elder sister.

Not the least like each other--are we, Lady Loring? She takes after her

poor dear father. _He_ was constitutionally indolent. My sweet child,

rouse yourself. You have drawn a prize in the great lottery at last. If

ever a man was in love, Mr. Romayne is that man. I am a physiognomist,

Lady Loring, and I see the passions in the face. Oh, Stella, what a

property! Vange Abbey. I once drove that way when I was visiting in the

neighborhood. Superb! And another fortune (twelve thousand a year and a

villa at Highgate) since the death of his aunt. And my daughter may

be mistress of this if she only plays her cards properly. What

a compensation after all that we suffered through that monster,

Winterfield!”

“Mamma! Pray don’t--!”

“Stella, I will _not_ be interrupted, when I am speaking to you for your

own good. I don’t know a more provoking person, Lady Loring, than my

daughter--on certain occasions. And yet I love her. I would go through

fire and water for my beautiful child. Only last week I was at a

wedding, and I thought of Stella. The church was crammed to the doors!

A hundred at the wedding breakfast! The bride’s lace--there; no language

can describe it. Ten bridesmaids, in blue and silver. Reminded me of

the ten virgins. Only the proportion of foolish ones, this time, was

certainly more than five. However, they looked well. The Archbishop

proposed the health of the bride and bridegroom; so sweetly pathetic.

Some of us cried. I thought of my daughter. Oh, if I could live to see

Stella the central attraction, so to speak, of such a wedding as that.

Only I would have twelve bridesmaids at least, and beat the blue and

silver with green and gold. Trying to the complexion, you will say. But

there are artificial improvements. At least, I am told so. What a house

this would be--a broad hint, isn’t it, dear Lady Loring?--what a house

for a wedding, with the drawing-room to assemble in and the picture

gallery for the breakfast. I know the Archbishop. My darling, he

shall marry you. Why _don’t_ you go into the next room? Ah, that

constitutional indolence. If you only had my energy, as I used to say to

your poor father. _Will_ you go? Yes, dear Lady Loring, I should like a

glass of champagne, and another of those delicious chicken sandwiches.

If you don’t go, Stella, I shall forget every consideration of

propriety, and, big as you are, I shall push you out.”

Stella yielded to necessity. “Keep her quiet, if you can,” she whispered

to Lady Loring, in the moment of silence that followed. Even Mrs.

Eyrecourt was not able to talk while she was drinking champagne.

In the next room Stella found Romayne. He looked careworn and irritable,

but brightened directly when she approached him.

“My mother has been speaking to you,” she said. “I am afraid--”

He stopped her there. “She _is_ your mother,” he interposed, kindly.

“Don’t think that I am ungrateful enough to forget that.”

She took his arm, and looked at him with all her heart in her eyes.

“Come into a quieter room,” she whispered.

Romayne led her away. Neither of them noticed Penrose as they left the

room.

He had not moved since Stella had spoken to him. There he remained in

his corner, absorbed in thought--and not in happy thought, as his face

would have plainly betrayed to any one who had cared to look at him.

His eyes sadly followed the retiring figures of Stella and Romayne. The

color rose on his haggard cheeks. Like most men who are accustomed to

live alone, he had the habit, when he was strongly excited, of speaking

to himself. “No,” he said, as the unacknowledged lovers disappeared

through the door, “it is an insult to ask me to do it!” He turned the

other way, escaped Lady Loring’s notice in the reception-room, and left

the house.

Romayne and Stella passed through the card-room and the chess-room,

turned into a corridor, and entered the conservatory.

For the first time the place was a solitude. The air of a newly-invented

dance, faintly audible through the open windows of the ballroom above,

had proved an irresistible temptation. Those who knew the dance were

eager to exhibit themselves. Those who had only heard of it were

equally anxious to look on and learn. Even toward the latter end of the

nineteenth century the youths and maidens of Society can still be in

earnest--when the object in view is a new dance.

What would Major Hynd have said if he had seen Romayne turn into one of

the recesses of the conservatory, in which there was a seat which just

held two? But the Major had forgotten his years and his family, and he

too was one of the spectators in the ballroom.

“I wonder,” said Stella, “whether you know how I feel those kind words

of yours when you spoke of my mother. Shall I tell you?”

She put her arm round his neck and kissed him. He was a man new to love,

in the nobler sense of the word. The exquisite softness in the touch of

her lips, the delicious fragrance of her breath, intoxicated him.

Again and again he returned the kiss. She drew back; she recovered her

self-possession with a suddenness and a certainty incomprehensible to

a man. From the depths of tenderness she passed to the shallows of

frivolity. In her own defense she was almost as superficial as her

mother, in less than a moment.

“What would Mr. Penrose say if he saw you?” she whispered.

“Why do you speak of Penrose? Have you seen him to-night?”

“Yes--looking sadly out of his element, poor man. I did my best to set

him at his ease--because I know _you_ like him.”

“Dear Stella!”

“No, not again! I am speaking seriously now. Mr. Penrose looked at me

with a strange kind of interest--I can’t describe it. Have you taken him

into our confidence?”

“He is so devoted--he has such a true interest in me,” said Romayne--“I

really felt ashamed to treat him like a stranger. On our journey to

London I did own that it was your charming letter which had decided

me on returning. I did say, ‘I must tell her myself how well she has

understood me, and how deeply I feel her kindness.’ Penrose took my

hand, in his gentle, considerate way. ‘I understand you, too,’ he

said--and that was all that passed between us.”

“Nothing more, since that time?”

“Nothing.”

“Not a word of what we said to each other when we were alone last week

in the picture gallery?”

“Not a word. I am self-tormentor enough to distrust myself, even now.

God knows I have concealed nothing from you; and yet--Am I not selfishly

thinking of my own happiness, Stella, when I ought to be thinking only

of you? You know, my angel, with what a life you must associate yourself

if you marry me. Are you really sure that you have love enough and

courage enough to be my wife?”

She rested her head caressingly on his shoulder, and looked up at him

with her charming smile.

“How many times must I say it,” she asked, “before you will believe me?

Once more--I have love enough and courage enough to be your wife; and I

knew it, Lewis, the first time I saw you! Will _that_ confession satisfy

your scruples? And will you promise never again to doubt yourself or

me?”

Romayne promised, and sealed the promise--unresisted this time--with a

kiss. “When are we to be married?” he whispered.

She lifted her head from his shoulder with a sigh. “If I am to answer

you honestly,” she replied, “I must speak of my mother, before I speak

of myself.”

Romayne submitted to the duties of his new position, as well as he

understood them. “Do you mean that you have told your mother of our

engagement?” he said. “In that case, is it my duty or yours--I am very

ignorant in these matters--to consult her wishes? My own idea is, that

I ought to ask her if she approves of me as her son-in-law, and that you

might then speak to her of the marriage.”

Stella thought of Romayne’s tastes, all in favor of modest retirement,

and of her mother’s tastes, all in favor of ostentation and display.

She frankly owned the result produced in her own mind. “I am afraid to

consult my mother about our marriage,” she said.

Romayne looked astonished. “Do you think Mrs. Eyrecourt will disapprove

of it?” he asked.

Stella was equally astonished on her side. “Disapprove of it?” she

repeated. “I know for certain that my mother will be delighted.”

“Then where is the difficulty?”

There was but one way of definitely answering that question. Stella

boldly described her mother’s idea of a wedding--including the

Archbishop, the twelve bridesmaids in green and gold, and the hundred

guests at breakfast in Lord Loring’s picture gallery. Romayne’s

consternation literally deprived him, for the moment, of the power of

speech. To say that he looked at Stella, as a prisoner in “the condemned

cell” might have looked at the sheriff, announcing the morning of his

execution, would be to do injustice to the prisoner. He receives _his_

shock without flinching; and, in proof of his composure, celebrates

his wedding with the gallows by a breakfast which he will not live to

digest.

“If you think as your mother does,” Romayne began, as soon as he had

recovered his self-possession, “no opinion of mine shall stand in the

way--” He could get no further. His vivid imagination saw the Archbishop

and the bridesmaids, heard the hundred guests and their dreadful

speeches: his voice faltered, in spite of himself.

Stella eagerly relieved him. “My darling, I don’t think as my mother

does,” she interposed, tenderly. “I am sorry to say we have very few

sympathies in common. Marriages, as I think, ought to be celebrated as

privately as possible--the near and dear relations present, and no

one else. If there must be rejoicings and banquets, and hundreds of

invitations, let them come when the wedded pair are at home after the

honeymoon, beginning life in earnest. These are odd ideas for a woman to

have--but they _are_ my ideas, for all that.”

Romayne’s face brightened. “How few women possess your fine sense and

your delicacy of feeling!” he exclaimed “Surely your mother must give

way, when she hears we are both of one mind about our marriage.”

Stella knew her mother too well to share the opinion thus expressed.

Mrs. Eyrecourt’s capacity for holding to her own little ideas, and for

persisting (where her social interests were concerned) in trying to

insinuate those ideas into the minds of other persons, was a capacity

which no resistance, short of absolute brutality, could overcome. She

was perfectly capable of worrying Romayne (as well as her daughter) to

the utmost limits of human endurance, in the firm conviction that she

was bound to convert all heretics, of their way of thinking, to the

orthodox faith in the matter of weddings. Putting this view of the case

with all possible delicacy, in speaking of her mother, Stella expressed

herself plainly enough, nevertheless, to enlighten Romayne.

He made another suggestion. “Can we marry privately,” he said, “and tell

Mrs. Eyrecourt of it afterward?”

This essentially masculine solution of the difficulty was at once

rejected. Stella was too good a daughter to suffer her mother to be

treated with even the appearance of disrespect. “Oh,” she said, “think

how mortified and distressed my mother would be! She _must_ be present

at my marriage.”

An idea of a compromise occurred to Romayne. “What do you say,” he

proposed, “to arranging for the marriage privately--and then telling

Mrs. Eyrecourt only a day or two beforehand, when it would be too late

to send out invitations? If your mother would be disappointed--”

“She would be angry,” Stella interposed.

“Very well--lay all the blame on me. Besides, there might be two other

persons present, whom I am sure Mrs. Eyrecourt is always glad to meet.

You don’t object to Lord and Lady Loring?”

“Object? They are my dearest friends, as well as yours!”

“Any one else, Stella?”

“Any one, Lewis, whom _you_ like.

“Then I say--no one else. My own love, when may it be? My lawyers can

get the settlements ready in a fortnight, or less. Will you say in a

fortnight?”

His arm was round her waist; his lips were touching her lovely neck. She

was not a woman to take refuge in the commonplace coquetries of the sex.

“Yes,” she said, softly, “if you wish it.” She rose and withdrew herself

from him. “For my sake, we must not be here together any longer, Lewis.”

As she spoke, the music in the ballroom ceased. Stella ran out of the

conservatory.

The first person she encountered, on returning to the reception-room,

was Father Benwell.

CHAPTER III.

THE END OF THE BALL.

THE priest’s long journey did not appear to have fatigued him. He was

as cheerful and as polite as ever--and so paternally attentive to Stella

that it was quite impossible for her to pass him with a formal bow.

“I have come all the way from Devonshire,” he said. “The train has been

behind time as usual, and I am one of the late arrivals in consequence.

I miss some familiar faces at this delightful party. Mr. Romayne, for

instance. Perhaps he is not one of the guests?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Has he gone away?”

“Not that I know of.”

The tone of her replies warned Father Benwell to let Romayne be. He

tried another name.

“And Arthur Penrose?” he inquired next.

“I think Mr. Penrose has left us.”

As she answered she looked toward Lady Loring. The hostess was the

center of a circle of ladies and gentlemen. Before she was at liberty,

Father Benwell might take his departure. Stella resolved to make the

attempt for herself which she had asked Lady Loring to make for her. It

was better to try, and to be defeated, than not to try at all.

“I asked Mr. Penrose what part of Devonshire you were visiting,” she

resumed, assuming her more gracious manner. “I know something myself of

the north coast, especially the neighborhood of Clovelly.”

Not the faintest change passed over the priest’s face; his fatherly

smile had never been in a better state of preservation.

“Isn’t it a charming place?” he said with enthusiasm. “Clovelly is the

most remarkable and most beautiful village in England. I have so enjoyed

my little holiday--excursions by sea and excursions by land--you know I

feel quite young again?”

He lifted his eyebrows playfully, and rubbed his plump hands one over

the other with such an intolerably innocent air of enjoyment that Stella

positively hated him. She felt her capacity for self-restraint failing

her. Under the influence of strong emotion her thoughts lost their

customary discipline. In attempting to fathom Father Benwell, she was

conscious of having undertaken a task which required more pliable moral

qualities than she possessed. To her own unutterable annoyance, she was

at a loss what to say next.

At that critical moment her mother appeared--eager for news of the

conquest of Romayne.

“My dear child, how pale you look!” said Mrs. Eyrecourt. “Come with me

directly--you must have a glass of wine.”

This dexterous device for entrapping Stella into a private conversation

failed. “Not now, mamma, thank you,” she said.

Father Benwell, on the point of discreetly withdrawing, stopped, and

looked at Mrs. Eyrecourt with an appearance of respectful interest. As

things were, it might not have been worth his while to take the trouble

of discovering her. But when she actually placed herself in his way, the

chance of turning Mrs. Eyrecourt to useful account was not a chance to

be neglected. “Your mother?” he said to Stella. “I should feel honored

if you will introduce me.”

Having (not very willingly) performed the ceremony of presentation,

Stella drew back a little. She had no desire to take any part in the

conversation that might follow--but she had her own reasons for waiting

near enough to hear it.

In the meanwhile, Mrs. Eyrecourt turned on her inexhaustible flow

of small-talk with her customary facility. No distinction of persons

troubled her; no convictions of any sort stood in her way. She was

equally ready (provided she met him in good society) to make herself

agreeable to a Puritan or a Papist.

“Delighted to make your acquaintance, Father Benwell. Surely I met you

at that delightful evening at the Duke’s? I mean when we welcomed the

Cardinal back from Rome. Dear old man--if one may speak so familiarly

of a Prince of the Church. How charmingly he bears his new honors.

Such patriarchal simplicity, as every one remarked. Have you seen him

lately?”

The idea of the Order to which he belonged feeling any special interest

in a Cardinal (except when they made him of some use to them) privately

amused Father Benwell. “How wise the Church was,” he thought, “in

inventing a spiritual aristocracy. Even this fool of a woman is

impressed by it.” His spoken reply was true to his assumed character as

one of the inferior clergy. “Poor priests like me, madam, see but little

of Princes of the Church in the houses of Dukes.” Saying this with

the most becoming humility, he turned the talk in a more productive

direction, before Mrs. Eyrecourt could proceed with her recollections of

“the evening at the Duke’s.”

“Your charming daughter and I have been talking about Clovelly,”

he continued. “I have just been spending a little holiday in that

delightful place. It was a surprise to me, Mrs. Eyrecourt, to see

so many really beautiful country seats in the neighborhood. I was

particularly struck--you know it, of course?--by Beaupark House.”

Mrs. Eyrecourt’s little twinging eyes suddenly became still and steady.

It was only for a moment. But that trifling change boded ill for the

purpose which the priest had in view. Even the wits of a fool can be

quickened by contact with the world. For many years Mrs. Eyrecourt had

held her place in society, acting under an intensely selfish sense of

her own interests, fortified by those cunning instincts which grow best

in a barren intellect. Perfectly unworthy of being trusted with secrets

which only concerned other people, this frivolous creature could be the

unassailable guardian of secrets which concerned herself. The instant

the priest referred indirectly to Winterfield, by speaking of Beaupark

House, her instincts warned her, as if in words:--Be careful for

Stella’s sake!

“Oh, yes,” said Mrs. Eyrecourt. “I know Beaupark House; but--may I make

a confession?” she added, with her sweetest smile.

Father Benwell caught her tone, with his customary tact. “A confession

at a ball is a novelty, even in my experience,” he answered with _his_

sweetest smile.

“How good of you to encourage me!” proceeded Mrs. Eyrecourt. “No, thank

you, I don’t want to sit down. My confession won’t take long--and I

really must give that poor pale daughter of mine a glass of wine. A

student of human nature like you--they say all priests are students of

human nature; accustomed of course to be consulted in difficulties,

and to hear _real_ confessions--must know that we poor women are sadly

subject to whims and caprices. We can’t resist them as men do; and the

dear good men generally make allowances for us. Well, do you know that

place of Mr. Winterfield’s is one of my caprices? Oh, dear, I speak

carelessly; I ought to have said the place represents one of my

caprices. In short. Father Benwell, Beaupark House is perfectly odious

to me, and I think Clovelly the most overrated place in the world. I

haven’t the least reason to give, but so it is. Excessively foolish of

me. It’s like hysterics, I can’t help it; I’m sure you will forgive me.

There isn’t a place on the habitable globe that I am not ready to feel

interested in, except detestable Devonshire. I am so sorry you went

there. The next time you have a holiday, take my advice. Try the

Continent.”

“I should like it of all things,” said Father Benwell. “Only I don’t

speak French. Allow me to get Miss Eyrecourt a glass of wine.”

He spoke with the most perfect temper and tranquillity. Having paid his

little attention to Stella, and having relieved her of the empty glass,

he took his leave, with a parting request thoroughly characteristic of

the man.

“Are you staying in town, Mrs. Eyrecourt?” he asked.

“Oh, of course, at the height of the season!”

“May I have the honor of calling on you--and talking a little more about

the Continent?”

If he had said it in so many words he could hardly have informed Mrs.

Eyrecourt more plainly that he thoroughly understood her, and that he

meant to try again. Strong in the worldly training of half a lifetime,

she at once informed him of her address, with the complimentary phrases

proper to the occasion. “Five o’clock tea on Wednesdays, Father Benwell.

Don’t forget!”

The moment he was gone, she drew her daughter into a quiet corner.

“Don’t be frightened, Stella. That sly old person has some interest in

trying to find out about Winterfield. Do you know why?”

“Indeed I don’t, mamma. I hate him!”

“Oh, hush! hush! Hate him as much as you like; but always be civil to

him. Tell me--have you been in the conservatory with Romayne?”

“Yes.”

“All going on well?”

“Yes.”

“My sweet child! Dear, dear me, the wine has done you no good; you’re as

pale as ever. Is it that priest? Oh, pooh, pooh, leave Father Benwell to

me.”

CHAPTER IV.

IN THE SMALL HOURS.

WHEN Stella left the conservatory, the attraction of the ball for

Romayne was at an end. He went back to his rooms at the hotel.

Penrose was waiting to speak to him. Romayne noticed signs of suppressed

agitation in his secretary’s face. “Has anything happened?” he inquired.

“Nothing of any importance,” Penrose answered, in sad subdued tones. “I

only wanted to ask you for leave of absence.”

“Certainly. Is it for a long time?”

Penrose hesitated. “You have a new life opening before you,” he said.

“If your experience of that life is--as I hope and pray it may be--a

happy one, you will need me no longer; we may not meet again.” His voice

began to tremble; he could say no more.

“Not meet again?” Romayne repeated. “My dear Penrose, if _you_ forget

how many happy days I owe to your companionship, _my_ memory is to be

trusted. Do you really know what my new life is to be? Shall I tell you

what I have said to Stella to-night?”

Penrose lifted his hand with a gesture of entreaty.

“Not a word!” he said, eagerly. “Do me one more kindness--leave me to be

prepared (as I am prepared) for the change that is to come, without

any confidence on your part to enlighten me further. Don’t think me

ungrateful. I have reasons for saying what I have just said--I cannot

mention what they are--I can only tell you they are serious reasons.

You have spoken of my devotion to you. If you wish to reward me a

hundred-fold more than I deserve, bear in mind our conversations on

religion, and keep the books I asked you to read as gifts from a friend

who loves you with his whole heart. No new duties that you can undertake

are incompatible with the higher interests of your soul. Think of me

sometimes. When I leave you I go back to a lonely life. My poor heart is

full of your brotherly kindness at this last moment when I may be saying

good-by forever. And what is my one consolation? What helps me to bear

my hard lot? The Faith that I hold! Remember that, Romayne. If there

comes a time of sorrow in the future, remember that.”

Romayne was more than surprised, he was shocked. “Why must you leave

me?” he asked.

“It is best for you and for _her,_” said Penrose, “that I should

withdraw myself from your new life.”

He held out his hand. Romayne refused to let him go. “Penrose!” he said,

“I can’t match your resignation. Give me something to look forward to. I

must and will see you again.”

Penrose smiled sadly. “You know that my career in life depends wholly

on my superiors,” he answered. “But if I am still in England--and if you

have sorrows in the future that I can share and alleviate--only let me

know it. There is nothing within the compass of my power which I will

not do for your sake. God bless and prosper you! Good-by!”

In spite of his fortitude, the tears rose in his eyes. He hurried out of

the room.

Romayne sat down at his writing-table, and hid his face in his hands.

He had entered the room with the bright image of Stella in his mind.

The image had faded from it now--the grief that was in him not even the

beloved woman could share. His thoughts were wholly with the brave

and patient Christian who had left him--the true man, whose spotless

integrity no evil influence could corrupt. By what inscrutable fatality

do some men find their way into spheres that are unworthy of them? Oh,

Penrose, if the priests of your Order were all like you, how easily I

should be converted! These were Romayne’s thoughts, in the stillness of

the first hours of the morning. The books of which his lost friend had

spoken were close by him on the table. He opened one of them, and turned

to a page marked by pencil lines. His sensitive nature was troubled to

its inmost depths. The confession of that Faith which had upheld Penrose

was before him in words. The impulse was strong in him to read those

words, and think over them again.

He trimmed his lamp, and bent his mind on his book. While he was still

reading, the ball at Lord Loring’s house came to its end. Stella and

Lady Loring were alone together, talking of him, before they retired to

their rooms.

“Forgive me for owning it plainly,” said Lady Loring--“I think you and

your mother are a little too ready to suspect Father Benwell without

any discoverable cause. Thousands of people go to Clovelly, and Beaupark

House is one of the show-places in the neighborhood. Is there a little

Protestant prejudice in this new idea of yours?”

Stella made no reply; she seemed to be lost in her own thoughts.

Lady Loring went on.

“I am open to conviction, my dear. If you will only tell me what

interest Father Benwell can have in knowing about you and Winterfield--”

Stella suddenly looked up. “Let us speak of another person,” she said;

“I own I don’t like Father Benwell. As you know, Romayne has concealed

nothing from me. Ought I to have any concealments from _him?_ Ought I

not to tell him about Winterfield?”

Lady Loring started. “You astonish me,” she said. “What right has

Romayne to know it?”

“What right have I to keep it a secret from him?”

“My dear Stella! if you had been in any way to blame in that miserable

matter, I should be the last person in the world to advise you to keep

it a secret. But you are innocent of all blame. No man--not even the

man who is soon to be your husband--has a right to know what you have

so unjustly suffered. Think of the humiliation of even speaking of it to

Romayne!”

“I daren’t think of it,” cried Stella passionately. “But if it is my

duty--”

“It is your duty to consider the consequences,” Lady Loring interposed.

“You don’t know how such things sometimes rankle in a man’s mind. He may

be perfectly willing to do you justice--and yet, there may be moments

when he would doubt if you had told him the whole truth. I speak with

the experience of a married woman. Don’t place yourself in _that_

position toward your husband, if you wish for a happy married life.”

Stella was not quite convinced yet. “Suppose Romayne finds it out?” she

said.

“He can’t possibly find it out. I detest Winterfield, but let us do him

justice. He is no fool. He has his position in the world to keep up--and

that is enough of itself to close his lips. And as for others, there are

only three people now in England who _could_ betray you. I suppose you

can trust your mother, and Lord Loring, and me?”

It was needless to answer such a question as that. Before Stella could

speak again, Lord Loring’s voice was audible outside the door. “What!

talking still,” he exclaimed. “Not in bed yet?”

“Come in!” cried his wife. “Let us hear what my husband thinks,” she

said to Stella.

Lord Loring listened with the closest attention while the subject under

discussion was communicated to him. When the time came to give his

opinion, he sided unhesitatingly with his wife.

“If the fault was yours, even in the slightest degree,” he said to

Stella, “Romayne would have a right to be taken into your confidence.

But, my dear child, we, who know the truth, know you to be a pure and

innocent woman. You go to Romayne in every way worthy of him, and you

know that he loves you. If you did tell him that miserable story, he

could only pity you. Do you want to be pitied?”

Those last unanswerable words brought the debate to an end. From that

moment the subject was dropped.

There was still one other person among the guests at the ball who

was waking in the small hours of the morning. Father Benwell,

wrapped comfortably in his dressing gown, was too hard at work on his

correspondence to think of his bed. With one exception, all the letters

that he had written thus far were closed, directed and stamped for the

post. The letter that he kept open he was now engaged in reconsidering

and correcting. It was addressed as usual to the Secretary of the Order

at Rome; and, when it had undergone the final revision, it contained

these lines:

My last letter informed you of Romayne’s return to London and to Miss

Eyrecourt. Let me entreat our reverend brethren to preserve perfect

tranquillity of mind, in spite of this circumstance. The owner of Vange

Abbey is not married yet. If patience and perseverance on my part win

their fair reward, Miss Eyrecourt shall never be his wife.

But let me not conceal the truth. In the uncertain future that lies

before us, I have no one to depend on but myself. Penrose is no longer

to be trusted; and the exertions of the agent to whom I committed my

inquiries are exertions that have failed.

I will dispose of the case of Penrose first.

The zeal with which this young man has undertaken the work of conversion

intrusted to him has, I regret to say, not been fired by devotion to

the interests of the Church, but by a dog-like affection for Romayne.

Without waiting for my permission, Penrose has revealed himself in his

true character as a priest. And, more than this, he has not only

refused to observe the proceedings of Romayne and Miss Eyrecourt--he has

deliberately closed his ears to the confidence which Romayne wished to

repose in him, on the ground that I might have ordered him to repeat

that confidence to me.

To what use can we put this poor fellow’s ungovernable sense of honor

and gratitude? Under present circumstances, he is clearly of little use

to us. I have therefore given him time to think. That is to say, I have

not opposed his leaving London, to assist in the spiritual care of a

country district. It will be a question for the future, whether we may

not turn his enthusiasm to good account in a foreign mission. However,

as it is always possible that his influence may still be of use to us,

I venture to suggest keeping him within our reach until Romayne’s

conversion has actually taken place. Don’t suppose that the present

separation between them is final; I will answer for their meeting again.

I may now proceed to the failure of my agent, and to the course of

action that I have adopted in consequence.

The investigations appear to have definitely broken down at the seaside

village of Clovelly, in the neighborhood of Mr. Winterfield’s country

seat. Knowing that I could depend upon the information which associated

this gentleman with Miss Eyrecourt, under compromising circumstances of

some sort, I decided on seeing Mr. Winterfield, and judging for myself.

The agent’s report informed me that the person who had finally baffled

his inquiries was an aged Catholic priest, long resident at Clovelly.

His name is Newbliss, and he is much respected among the Catholic gentry

in that part of Devonshire. After due consideration, I obtained a

letter of introduction to my reverend colleague, and traveled to

Clovelly--telling my friends here that I was taking a little holiday, in

the interests of my health.

I found Father Newbliss a venerable and reticent son of the Church--with

one weak point, however, to work on, which was entirely beyond the reach

of the otherwise astute person charged with my inquiries. My reverend

friend is a scholar, and is inordinately proud of his learning. I am a

scholar too. In that capacity I first found my way to his sympathies,

and then gently encouraged his pride. The result will appear in certain

discoveries, which I number as follows:

1. The events which connect Mr. Winterfield with Miss Eyrecourt happened

about two years since, and had their beginning at Beaupark House.

2. At this period, Miss Eyrecourt and her mother were staying at

Beaupark House. The general impression in the neighborhood was that Mr.

Winterfield and Miss Eyrecourt were engaged to be married.

3. Not long afterward, Miss Eyrecourt and her mother surprised the

neighborhood by suddenly leaving Beaupark House. Their destination was

supposed to be London.

4. Mr. Winterfield himself next left his country seat for the Continent.

His exact destination was not mentioned to any one. The steward, soon

afterward, dismissed all the servants, and the house was left empty for

more than a year.

5. At the end of that time Mr. Winterfield returned alone to Beaupark

House, and told nobody how, or where, he had passed the long interval of

his absence.

6. Mr. Winterfield remains, to the present day, an unmarried man.

Having arrived at these preliminary discoveries, it was time to try what

I could make of Mr. Winterfield next.

Among the other good things which this gentleman has inherited is a

magnificent library collected by his father. That one learned man

should take another learned man to see the books was a perfectly natural

proceeding. My introduction to the master of the house followed my

introduction to the library almost as a matter of course.

I am about to surprise you, as I was myself surprised. In all my long

experience, Mr. Winterfield is, I think, the most fascinating person

I ever met with. Genial, unassuming manners, a prepossessing personal

appearance, a sweet temper, a quaint humor delightfully accompanied by

natural refinement--such are the characteristic qualities of the man

from whom I myself saw Miss Eyrecourt (accidentally meeting him in

public) recoil with dismay and disgust! It is absolutely impossible to

look at him, and to believe him to be capable of a cruel or dishonorable

action. I never was so puzzled in my life.

You may be inclined to think that I am misled by a false impression,

derived from the gratifying welcome that I received as a friend of

Father Newbliss. I will not appeal to my knowledge of human nature--I

will refer to the unanswerable evidence of Mr. Winterfield’s poorer

neighbors. Wherever I went, in the village or out of it, if I mentioned

his name, I produced a universal outburst of admiration and gratitude.

“There never was such a friend to poor people, and there never can

be such another to the end of the world.” Such was a fisherman’s

description of him; and the one cry of all the men and women near us

answered, “That’s the truth!”

And yet there is something wrong--for this plain reason, that there is

something to be concealed in the past lives of Mr. Winterfield and Miss

Eyrecourt.

Under these perplexing circumstances, what use have I made of my

opportunities? I am going to surprise you again--I have mentioned

Romayne’s name to Mr. Winterfield; and I have ascertained that they are,

so far, perfect strangers to one another--and that is all.

The little incident of mentioning Romayne arose out of my examination of

the library. I discovered certain old volumes, which may one day be

of use to him, if he continues his contemplated work on the Origin of

Religions. Hearing me express myself to this effect, Mr. Winterfield

replied with the readiest kindness:

“I can’t compare myself to my excellent father,” he said; “but I have

at least inherited his respect for the writers of books. My library is a

treasure which I hold in trust for the interests of literature. Pray say

so, from me, to your friend Mr. Romayne.”

And what does this amount to?--you will ask. My reverend friend,

it offers me an opportunity, in the future, of bringing Romayne and

Winterfield together. Do you see the complications which may ensue? If

I can put no other difficulty in Miss Eyrecourt’s way, I think there

is fruitful promise of a scandal of some kind arising out of the

introduction to each other of those two men. You will agree with me that

a scandal may prove a valuable obstacle in the way of a marriage.

Mr. Winterfield has kindly invited me to call on him when he is next in

London. I may then have opportunities of putting questions which I could

not venture to ask on a short acquaintance.

In the meantime, I have obtained another introduction since my return to

town. I have been presented to Miss Eyrecourt’s mother, and I am invited

to drink tea with her on Wednesday. My next letter may tell you--what

Penrose ought to have discovered--whether Romayne has been already

entrapped into a marriage engagement or not.

Farewell for the present. Remind the Reverend Fathers, with my respects,

that I possess one of the valuable qualities of an Englishman--I never

know when I am beaten.

BOOK THE THIRD.

CHAPTER I.

THE HONEYMOON.

MORE than six weeks had passed. The wedded lovers were still enjoying

their honeymoon at Vange Abbey.

Some offense had been given, not only to Mrs. Eyrecourt, but to friends

of her way of thinking, by the strictly private manner in which the

marriage had been celebrated. The event took everybody by surprise when

the customary advertisement appeared in the newspapers. Foreseeing the

unfavorable impression that might be produced in some quarters, Stella

had pleaded for a timely retreat to the seclusion of Romayne’s country

house. The will of the bride being, as usual, the bridegroom’s law, to

Vange they retired accordingly.

On one lovely moonlight night, early in July, Mrs. Romayne left her

husband on the Belvidere, described in Major Hynd’s narrative, to give

the housekeeper certain instructions relating to the affairs of the

household. Half an hour later, as she was about to ascend again to the

top of the house, one of the servants informed her that “the master had

just left the Belvidere, and had gone into his study.”

Crossing the inner hall, on her way to the study, Stella noticed an

unopened letter, addressed to Romayne, lying on a table in a corner. He

had probably laid it aside and forgotten it. She entered his room with

the letter in her hand.

The only light was a reading lamp, with the shade so lowered that the

corners of the study were left in obscurity. In one of these corners

Romayne was dimly visible, sitting with his head sunk on his breast. He

never moved when Stella opened the door. At first she thought he might

be asleep.

“Do I disturb you, Lewis?” she asked softly.

“No, my dear.”

There was a change in the tone of his voice, which his wife’s quick ear

detected. “I am afraid you are not well,” she said anxiously.

“I am a little tired after our long ride to-day. Do you want to go back

to the Belvidere?”

“Not without you. Shall I leave you to rest here?”

He seemed not to hear the question. There he sat, with his head hanging

down, the shadowy counterfeit of an old man. In her anxiety, Stella

approached him, and put her hand caressingly on his head. It was burning

hot. “O!” she cried, “you _are_ ill, and you are trying to hide it from

me.”

He put his arm round her waist and made her sit on his knee. “Nothing is

the matter with me,” he said, with an uneasy laugh. “What have you got

in your hand? A letter?”

“Yes. Addressed to you and not opened yet.” He took it out of her hand,

and threw it carelessly on a sofa near him. “Never mind that now! Let

us talk.” He paused, and kissed her, before he went on. “My darling, I

think you must be getting tired of Vange?”

“Oh, no! I can be happy anywhere with you--and especially at Vange.

You don’t how this noble old house interests me, and how I admire the

glorious country all round it.”

He was not convinced. “Vange is very dull,” he said, obstinately; “and

your friends will be wanting to see you. Have you heard from your mother

lately?”

“No. I am surprised she has not written.”

“She has not forgiven us for getting married so quietly,” he went on.

“We had better go back to London and make our peace with her. Don’t you

want to see the house my aunt left me at Highgate?”

Stella sighed. The society of the man she loved was society enough

for her. Was he getting tired of his wife already? “I will go with you

wherever you like.” She said those words in tones of sad submission, and

gently got up from his knee.

He rose also, and took from the sofa the letter which he had thrown on

it. “Let us see what our friends say,” he resumed. “The address is in

Loring’s handwriting.”

As he approached the table on which the lamp was burning, she noticed

that he moved with a languor that was new in her experience of him. He

sat down and opened the letter. She watched him with an anxiety which

had now become intensified to suspicion. The shade of the lamp still

prevented her from seeing his face plainly. “Just what I told you,” he

said; “the Lorings want to know when they are to see us in London; and

your mother says she ‘feels like that character in Shakespeare who was

cut by his own daughters.’ Read it.”

He handed her the letter. In taking it, she contrived to touch the lamp

shade, as if by accident, and tilted it so that the full flow of the

light fell on him. He started back--but not before she had seen the

ghastly pallor on his face. She had not only heard it from Lady Loring,

she knew from his own unreserved confession to her what that startling

change really meant. In an instant she was on her knees at his feet.

“Oh, my darling,” she cried, “it was cruel to keep _that_ secret from

your wife! You have heard it again!”

She was too irresistibly beautiful, at that moment, to be reproved. He

gently raised her from the floor--and owned the truth.

“Yes,” he said; “I heard it after you left me on the Belvidere--just as

I heard it on another moonlight night, when Major Hynd was here with me.

Our return to this house is perhaps the cause. I don’t complain; I have

had a long release.”

She threw her arms round his neck. “We will leave Vange to-morrow,” she

said.

It was firmly spoken. But her heart sank as the words passed her lips.

Vange Abbey had been the scene of the most unalloyed happiness in her

life. What destiny was waiting for her when she returned to London?

CHAPTER II.

EVENTS AT TEN ACRES.

THERE was no obstacle to the speedy departure of Romayne and his wife

from Vange Abbey. The villa at Highgate--called Ten Acres Lodge, in

allusion to the measurement of the grounds surrounding the house--had

been kept in perfect order by the servants of the late Lady Berrick, now

in the employment of her nephew.

On the morning after their arrival at the villa, Stella sent a note to

her mother. The same afternoon, Mrs. Eyrecourt arrived at Ten Acres--on

her way to a garden-party. Finding the house, to her great relief, a

modern building, supplied with all the newest comforts and luxuries, she

at once began to plan a grand party, in celebration of the return of the

bride and bridegroom.

“I don’t wish to praise myself,” Mrs. Eyrecourt said; “but if ever there

was a forgiving woman, I am that person. We will say no more, Stella,

about your truly contemptible wedding--five people altogether, including

ourselves and the Lorings. A grand ball will set you right with society,

and that is the one thing needful. Tea and coffee, my dear Romayne,

in your study; Coote’s quadrille band; the supper from Gunter’s, the

grounds illuminated with colored lamps; Tyrolese singers among the

trees, relieved by military music--and, if there _are_ any African or

other savages now in London, there is room enough in these charming

grounds for encampments, dances, squaws, scalps, and all the rest of it,

to end in a blaze of fireworks.”

A sudden fit of coughing seized her, and stopped the further enumeration

of attractions at the contemplated ball. Stella had observed that her

mother looked unusually worn and haggard, through the disguises of paint

and powder. This was not an uncommon result of Mrs. Eyrecourt’s devotion

to the demands of society; but the cough was something new, as a symptom

of exhaustion.

“I am afraid, mamma, you have been overexerting yourself,” said Stella.

“You go to too many parties.”

“Nothing of the sort, my dear; I am as strong as a horse. The other

night, I was waiting for the carriage in a draught (one of the most

perfect private concerts of the season, ending with a delightfully

naughty little French play)--and I caught a slight cold. A glass of

water is all I want. Thank you. Romayne, you are looking shockingly

serious and severe; our ball will cheer you. If you would only make a

bonfire of all those horrid books, you don’t know how it would improve

your spirits. Dearest Stella, I will come and lunch here to-morrow--you

are within such a nice easy drive from town--and I’ll bring my

visiting-book, and settle about the invitations and the day. Oh, dear

me, how late it is. I have nearly an hour’s drive before I get to my

garden party. Good-by, my turtle doves good-by.”

She was stopped, on the way to her carriage, by another fit of coughing.

But she still persisted in making light of it. “I’m as strong as a

horse,” she repeated, as soon as she could speak--and skipped into the

carriage like a young girl.

“Your mother is killing herself,” said Romayne.

“If I could persuade her to stay with us a little while,” Stella

suggested, “the rest and quiet might do wonders for her. Would you

object to it, Lewis?”

“My darling, I object to nothing--except giving a ball and burning

my books. If your mother will yield on these two points, my house is

entirely at her disposal.”

He spoke playfully--he looked his best, since he had separated himself

from the painful associations that were now connected with Vange Abbey.

Had “the torment of the Voice” been left far away in Yorkshire? Stella

shrank from approaching the subject in her husband’s presence, knowing

that it must remind him of the fatal duel. To her surprise, Romayne

himself referred to the General’s family.

“I have written to Hynd,” he began. “Do you mind his dining with us

to-day?”

“Of course not!”

“I want to hear if he has anything to tell me--about those French

ladies. He undertook to see them, in your absence, and to ascertain--”

He was unable to overcome his reluctance to pronounce the next words.

Stella was quick to understand what he meant. She finished the sentence

for him.

“Yes,” he said, “I wanted to hear how the boy is getting on, and if

there is any hope of curing him. Is it--” he trembled as he put the

question--“Is it hereditary madness?”

Feeling the serious importance of concealing the truth, Stella only

replied that she had hesitated to ask if there was a taint of madness in

the family. “I suppose,” she added, “you would not like to see the boy,

and judge of his chances of recovery for yourself?”

“You suppose?” he burst out, with sudden anger. “You might be sure. The

bare idea of seeing him turns me cold. Oh, when shall I forget!

when shall I forget! Who spoke of him first?” he said, with renewed

irritability, after a moment of silence. “You or I?”

“It was my fault, love--he is so harmless and so gentle, and he has such

a sweet face--I thought it might soothe you to see him. Forgive me; we

will never speak of him again. Have you any notes for me to copy? You

know, Lewis, I am your secretary now.”

So she led Romayne away to his study and his books. When Major Hynd

arrived, she contrived to be the first to see him. “Say as little as

possible about the General’s widow and her son,” she whispered.

The Major understood her. “Don’t be uneasy, Mrs. Romayne,” he answered.

“I know your husband well enough to know what you mean. Besides, the

news I bring is good news.”

Romayne came in before he could speak more particularly. When the

servants had left the room, after dinner, the Major made his report.

“I am going to agreeably surprise you,” he began. “All responsibility

toward the General’s family is taken off our hands. The ladies are on

their way back to France.”

Stella was instantly reminded of one of the melancholy incidents

associated with her visit to Camp’s Hill. “Madame Marillac spoke of

a brother of hers who disapproved of the marriage,” she said. “Has he

forgiven her?”

“That is exactly what he has done, Mrs. Romayne. Naturally enough, he

felt the disgrace of his sister’s marriage to such a man as the General.

Only the other day he heard for the first time that she was a widow--and

he at once traveled to England. I bade them good-by yesterday--most

happily reunited--on their journey home again. Ah, I thought you would

be glad, Mrs. Romayne, to hear that the poor widow’s troubles are over.

Her brother is rich enough to place them all in easy circumstances--he

is as good a fellow as ever lived.”

“Have you seen him?” Stella asked, eagerly.

“I have been with him to the asylum.”

“Does the boy go back to France?”

“No. We took the place by surprise, and saw for ourselves how well

conducted it was. The boy has taken a strong liking to the proprietor--a

bright, cheerful old man, who is teaching him some of our English games,

and has given him a pony to ride on. He burst out crying, poor creature,

at the idea of going away--and his mother burst out crying at the idea

of leaving him. It was a melancholy scene You know what a good mother

is--no sacrifice is too great for her. The boy stays at the asylum, on

the chance that his healthier and happier life there may help to cure

him. By-the-way, Romayne, his uncle desires me to thank you--”

“Hynd! you didn’t tell the uncle my name?”

“Don’t alarm yourself. He is a gentleman, and when I told him I was

pledged to secrecy, he made but one inquiry--he asked if you were a rich

man. I told him you had eighteen thousand a year.”

“Well?”

“Well, he set that matter right between us with perfect taste. He

said: ‘I cannot presume to offer repayment to a person so wealthy. We

gratefully accept our obligation to our kind unknown friend. For the

future, however, my nephew’s expenses must be paid from my purse.’ Of

course I could only agree to that. From time to time the mother is

to hear, and I am to hear, how the boy goes on. Or, if you like,

Romayne--now that the General’s family has left England--I don’t see why

the proprietor might not make his report directly to yourself.”

“No!” Romayne rejoined, positively. “Let things remain as they are.”

“Very well. I can send you any letters that I may receive from the

asylum. Will you give us some music, Mrs. Romayne? Not to-night? Then

let us go to the billiard-room; and as I am the worst of bad players, I

will ask you to help me to beat your accomplished husband.”

On the afternoon of the next day, Mrs. Eyrecourt’s maid arrived at Ten

Acres with a note from her mistress.

“Dearest Stella--Matilda must bring you my excuses for to-day. I don’t

in the least understand it, but I seem to have turned lazy. It is most

ridiculous--I really cannot get out of bed. Perhaps I did do just a

little too much yesterday. The opera after the garden party, and a ball

after the opera, and this tiresome cough all night after the ball. Quite

a series, isn’t it? Make my apologies to our dear dismal Romayne--and

if you drive out this afternoon, come and have a chat with me. Your

affectionate mother, Emily Eyrecourt. P. S.--You know what a fidget

Matilda is. If she talks about me, don’t believe a word she says to

you.”

Stella turned to the maid with a sinking heart.

“Is my mother very ill?” she asked.

“So ill, ma’am, that I begged and prayed her to let me send for a

doctor. You know what my mistress is. If you would please to use your

influence--”

“I will order the carriage instantly, and take you back with me.”

Before she dressed to go out, Stella showed the letter to her husband.

He spoke with perfect kindness and sympathy, but he did not conceal that

he shared his wife’s apprehensions. “Go at once,” were his last words to

her; “and, if I can be of any use, send for me.”

It was late in the evening before Stella returned. She brought sad news.

The physician consulted told her plainly that the neglected cough,

and the constant fatigue, had together made the case a serious one.

He declined to say that there was any absolute danger as yet, or any

necessity for her remaining with her mother at night. The experience

of the next twenty-four hours, at most, would enable him to speak

positively. In the meantime, the patient insisted that Stella should

return to her husband. Even under the influence of opiates, Mrs.

Eyrecourt was still drowsily equal to herself. “You are a fidget, my

dear, and Matilda is a fidget--I can’t have two of you at my bedside.

Good-night.” Stella stooped over her and kissed her. She whispered:

“Three weeks notice, remember, for the party!”

By the next evening the malady had assumed so formidable an aspect that

the doctor had his doubts of the patient’s chance of recovery. With her

husband’s full approval, Stella remained night and day at her mother’s

bedside.

Thus, in a little more than a month from the day of his marriage,

Romayne was, for the time, a lonely man again.

The illness of Mrs. Eyrecourt was unexpectedly prolonged. There were

intervals during which her vigorous constitution rallied and resisted

the progress of the disease. On these occasions, Stella was able to

return to her husband for a few hours--subject always to a message which

recalled her to her mother when the chances of life or death appeared

to be equally balanced. Romayne’s one resource was in his books and

his pen. For the first time since his union with Stella he opened the

portfolios in which Penrose had collected the first introductory

chapters of his historical work. Almost at every page the familiar

handwriting of his secretary and friend met his view. It was a new trial

to his resolution to be working alone; never had he felt the absence

of Penrose as he felt it now. He missed the familiar face, the quiet

pleasant voice, and, more than both, the ever-welcome sympathy with his

work. Stella had done all that a wife could do to fill the vacant place;

and her husband’s fondness had accepted the effort as adding another

charm to the lovely creature who had opened a new life to him. But

where is the woman who can intimately associate herself with the hard

brain-work of a man devoted to an absorbing intellectual pursuit? She

can love him, admire him, serve him, believe in him beyond all other

men--but (in spite of exceptions which only prove the rule) she is out

of her place when she enters the study while the pen is in his hand.

More than once, when he was at work, Romayne closed the page bitterly;

the sad thought came to him, “Oh, if I only had Penrose here!” Even

other friends were not available as a resource in the solitary evening

hours. Lord Loring was absorbed in social and political engagements. And

Major Hynd--true to the principle of getting away as often as possible

from his disagreeable wife and his ugly children--had once more left

London.

One day, while Mrs. Eyrecourt still lay between life and death, Romayne

found his historical labors suspended by the want of a certain volume

which it was absolutely necessary to consult. He had mislaid the

references written for him by Penrose, and he was at a loss to remember

whether the book was in the British Museum, in the Bodleian Library, or

in the Bibliotheque at Paris. In this emergency a letter to his former

secretary would furnish him with the information that he required. But

he was ignorant of Penrose’s present address. The Lorings might possibly

know it--so to the Lorings he resolved to apply.

CHAPTER III.

FATHER BENWELL AND THE BOOK.

ROMAYNE’S first errand in London was to see his wife, and to make

inquiries at Mrs. Eyrecourt’s house. The report was more favorable than

usual. Stella whispered, as she kissed him, “I shall soon come back to

you, I hope!”

Leaving the horses to rest for a while, he proceeded to Lord Loring’s

residence on foot. As he crossed a street in the neighborhood, he was

nearly run over by a cab, carrying a gentleman and his luggage. The

gentleman was Mr. Winterfield, on his way to Derwent’s Hotel.

Lady Loring very kindly searched her card-basket, as the readiest means

of assisting Romayne. Penrose had left his card, on his departure from

London, but no address was written on it. Lord Loring, unable himself to

give the required information, suggested the right person to consult.

“Father Benwell will be here later in the day,” he said. “If you will

write to Penrose at once, he will add the address. Are you sure, before

the letter goes, that the book you want is not in my library?”

“I think not,” Romayne answered; “but I will write down the title, and

leave it here with my letter.”

The same evening he received a polite note from Father Benwell,

informing him that the letter was forwarded, and that the book he wanted

was not in Lord Loring’s library. “If there should be any delay or

difficulty in obtaining this rare volume,” the priest added, “I only

wait the expression of your wishes, to borrow it from the library of a

friend of mine, residing in the country.”

By return of post the answer, affectionately and gratefully written,

arrived from Penrose. He regretted that he was not able to assist

Romayne personally. But it was out of his power (in plain words, he

had been expressly forbidden by Father Benwell) to leave the service on

which he was then engaged. In reference to the book that was wanted, it

was quite likely that a search in the catalogues of the British Museum

might discover it. He had only met with it himself in the National

Library at Paris.

This information led Romayne to London again, immediately. For the first

time he called at Father Benwell’s lodgings. The priest was at home,

expecting the visit. His welcome was the perfection of unassuming

politeness. He asked for the last news of “poor Mrs. Eyrecourt’s

health,” with the sympathy of a true friend.

“I had the honor of drinking tea with Mrs. Eyrecourt, some little time

since,” he said. “Her flow of conversation was never more delightful--it

seemed impossible to associate the idea of illness with so bright

a creature. And how well she kept the secret of your contemplated

marriage! May I offer my humble congratulations and good wishes?”

Romayne thought it needless to say that Mrs. Eyrecourt had not been

trusted with the secret until the wedding day was close at hand. “My

wife and I agreed in wishing to be married as quietly as possible,” he

answered, after making the customary acknowledgments.

“And Mrs. Romayne?” pursued Father Benwell. “This is a sad trial for

her. She is in attendance on her mother, I suppose?”

“In constant attendance; I am quite alone now. To change the subject,

may I ask you to look at the reply which I have received from Penrose?

It is my excuse for troubling you with this visit.”

Father Benwell read the letter with the closest attention. In spite of

his habitual self-control, his vigilant eyes brightened as he handed it

back.

Thus far, the priest’s well-planned scheme, (like Mr. Bitrake’s clever

inquiries) had failed. He had not even entrapped Mrs. Eyrecourt into

revealing the marriage engagement. Her unconquerable small-talk had

foiled him at every point. Even when he had deliberately kept his seat

after the other guests at the tea-table had taken their departure,

she rose with the most imperturbable coolness, and left him. “I have a

dinner and two parties to-night, and this is just the time when I take

my little restorative nap. Forgive me--and do come again!” When he sent

the fatal announcement of the marriage to Rome, he had been obliged to

confess that he was indebted for the discovery to the newspaper. He had

accepted the humiliation; he had accepted the defeat--but he was not

beaten yet. “I counted on Romayne’s weakness; and Miss Eyrecourt counted

on Romayne’s weakness; and Miss Eyrecourt has won. So let it be. My turn

will come.” In that manner he had reconciled himself to his position.

And now--he knew it when he handed back the letter to Romayne--his turn

_had_ come!

“You can hardly go to Paris to consult the book,” he said, “in the

present state of Mrs. Eyrecourt’s health?”

“Certainly not!”

“Perhaps you will send somebody to search the catalogue at the British

Museum?”

“I should have done that already, Father Benwell, but for the very kind

allusion in your note to your friend in the country. Even if the book is

in the Museum Library, I shall be obliged to go to the Reading Room to

get my information. It would be far more convenient to me to have the

volume at home to consult, if you think your friend will trust me with

it.”

“I am certain he will trust you with it. My friend is Mr. Winterfield,

of Beaupark House, North Devon. Perhaps you may have heard of him?”

“No; the name is quite new to me.”

“Then come and see the man himself. He is now in London--and I am

entirely at your service.”

In half an hour more, Romayne was presented to a well-bred, amiable

gentleman in the prime of life, smoking, and reading the newspaper. The

bowl of his long pipe rested on the floor, on one side of him, and a

handsome red and white spaniel reposed on the other. Before his visitors

had been two minutes in the room, he understood the motive which had

brought them to consult him, and sent for a telegraphic form.

“My steward will find the book and forward it to your address by

passenger train this afternoon,” he said. “I will tell him to put my

printed catalogue of the library into the parcel, in case I have any

other books which may be of use to you.”

With those words, he dispatched the telegram to the office. Romayne

attempted to make his acknowledgments. Mr. Winterfield would hear no

acknowledgments.

“My dear sir,” he said, with a smile that brightened his whole face,

“you are engaged in writing a great historical work; and I am an obscure

country gentleman, who is lucky enough to associate himself with the

production of a new book. How do you know that I am not looking forward

to a complimentary line in the preface? I am the obliged person, not

you. Pray consider me as a handy little boy who runs on errands for the

Muse of History. Do you smoke?”

Not even tobacco would soothe Romayne’s wasted and irritable nerves.

Father Benwell--“all things to all men”--cheerfully accepted a cigar

from the box on the table.

“Father Benwell possesses all the social virtues,” Mr. Winterfield ran

on. “He shall have his coffee, and the largest sugar-basin that the

hotel can produce. I can quite understand that your literary labors have

tried your nerves,” he said to Romayne, when he had ordered the coffee.

“The mere title of your work overwhelms an idle man like me. ‘The Origin

of Religions’--what an immense subject! How far must we look back

to find out the first worshipers of the human family?--Where are the

hieroglyphics, Mr. Romayne, that will give you the earliest information?

In the unknown center of Africa, or among the ruined cities of Yucatan?

My own idea, as an ignorant man, is that the first of all forms of

worship must have been the worship of the sun. Don’t be shocked, Father

Benwell--I confess I have a certain sympathy with sun-worship. In the

East especially, the rising of the sun is surely the grandest of all

objects--the visible symbol of a beneficent Deity, who gives life,

warmth and light to the world of his creation.”

“Very grand, no doubt,” remarked Father Benwell, sweetening his coffee.

“But not to be compared with the noble sight at Rome, when the Pope

blesses the Christian world from the balcony of St. Peter’s.”

“So much for professional feeling!” said Mr. Winterfield. “But, surely,

something depends on what sort of man the Pope is. If we had lived in

the time of Alexander the Sixth, would you have called _him_ a part of

that noble sight?”

“Certainly--at a proper distance,” Father Benwell briskly replied. “Ah,

you heretics only know the worst side of that most unhappy pontiff! Mr.

Winterfield, we have every reason to believe that he felt (privately)

the truest remorse.”

“I should require very good evidence to persuade me of it.”

This touched Romayne on a sad side of his own personal experience.

“Perhaps,” he said, “you don’t believe in remorse?”

“Pardon me,” Mr. Winterfield rejoined, “I only distinguish between false

remorse and true remorse. We will say no more of Alexander the Sixth,

Father Benwell. If we want an illustration, I will supply it, and

give no offense. True remorse depends, to my mind, on a man’s accurate

knowledge of his own motives--far from a common knowledge, in my

experience. Say, for instance, that I have committed some serious

offense--”

Romayne could not resist interrupting him. “Say you have killed one of

your fellow-creatures,” he suggested.

“Very well. If I know that I really meant to kill him, for some vile

purpose of my own; and if (which by no means always follows) I am really

capable of feeling the enormity of my own crime--that is, as I think,

true remorse. Murderer as I am, I have, in that case, some moral worth

still left in me. But if I did _not_ mean to kill the man--if his death

was my misfortune as well as his--and if (as frequently happens) I

am nevertheless troubled by remorse, the true cause lies in my own

inability fairly to realize my own motives--before I look to results. I

am the ignorant victim of false remorse; and if I will only ask myself

boldly what has blinded me to the true state of the case, I shall find

the mischief due to that misdirected appreciation of my own importance

which is nothing but egotism in disguise.”

“I entirely agree with you,” said Father Benwell; “I have had occasion

to say the same thing in the confessional.”

Mr. Winterfield looked at his dog, and changed the subject. “Do you like

dogs, Mr. Romayne?” he asked. “I see my spaniel’s eyes saying that he

likes you, and his tail begging you to take some notice of him.”

Romayne caressed the dog rather absently.

His new friend had unconsciously presented to him a new view of the

darker aspect of his own life. Winterfield’s refined, pleasant manners,

his generous readiness in placing the treasures of his library at a

stranger’s disposal, had already appealed irresistibly to Romayne’s

sensitive nature. The favorable impression was now greatly strengthened

by the briefly bold treatment which he had just heard of a subject in

which he was seriously interested. “I must see more of this man,” was

his thought, as he patted the companionable spaniel.

Father Benwell’s trained observation followed the vivid changes of

expression on Romayne’s face, and marked the eager look in his eyes as

he lifted his head from the dog to the dog’s master. The priest saw his

opportunity and took it.

“Do you remain long at Ten Acres Lodge?” he said to Romayne.

“I hardly know as yet. We have no other plans at present.”

“You inherit the place, I think, from your late aunt, Lady Berrick?”

“Yes.”

The tone of the reply was not encouraging; Romayne felt no interest in

talking of Ten Acres Lodge. Father Benwell persisted.

“I was told by Mrs. Eyrecourt,” he went on “that Lady Berrick had some

fine pictures. Are they still at the Lodge?”

“Certainly. I couldn’t live in a house without pictures.”

Father Benwell looked at Winterfield. “Another taste in common between

you and Mr. Romayne,” he said, “besides your liking for dogs.”

This at once produced the desired result. Romayne eagerly invited

Winterfield to see his pictures. “There are not many of them,” he said.

“But they are really worth looking at. When will you come?”

“The sooner the better,” Winterfield answered, cordially. “Will

to-morrow do--by the noonday light?”

“Whenever you please. Your time is mine.”

Among his other accomplishments, Father Benwell was a chess-player. If

his thoughts at that moment had been expressed in language, they would

have said, “Check to the queen.”

CHAPTER IV.

THE END OF THE HONEYMOON.

ON the next morning, Winterfield arrived alone at Romayne’s house.

Having been included, as a matter of course, in the invitation to see

the pictures, Father Benwell had made an excuse, and had asked leave to

defer the proposed visit. From his point of view, he had nothing further

to gain by being present at a second meeting between the two men--in the

absence of Stella. He had it on Romayne’s own authority that she was

in constant attendance on her mother, and that her husband was alone.

“Either Mrs. Eyrecourt will get better, or she will die,” Father Benwell

reasoned. “I shall make constant inquiries after her health, and, in

either case, I shall know when Mrs. Romayne returns to Ten Acres Lodge.

After that domestic event, the next time Mr. Winterfield visits Mr.

Romayne, I shall go and see the pictures.”

It is one of the defects of a super-subtle intellect to trust too

implicitly to calculation, and to leave nothing to chance. Once or twice

already Father Benwell had been (in the popular phrase) a little too

clever--and chance had thrown him out. As events happened, chance was

destined to throw him out once more.

Of the most modest pretensions, in regard to numbers and size, the

pictures collected by the late Lady Berrick were masterly works of

modern art. With few exceptions, they had been produced by the matchless

English landscape painters of half a century since. There was no formal

gallery here. The pictures were so few that they could be hung in

excellent lights in the different living-rooms of the villa. Turner,

Constable, Collins, Danby, Callcott, Linnell--the master of Beaupark

House passed from one to the other with the enjoyment of a man who

thoroughly appreciated the truest and finest landscape art that the

world has yet seen.

“You had better not have asked me here,” he said to Romayne, in his

quaintly good-humored way. “I can’t part with those pictures when I say

good-by to-day. You will find me calling here again and again, till

you are perfectly sick of me. Look at this sea piece. Who thinks of

the brushes and palette of _that_ painter? There, truth to Nature and

poetical feeling go hand in hand together. It is absolutely lovely--I

could kiss that picture.”

They were in Romayne’s study when this odd outburst of enthusiasm

escaped Winterfield. He happened to look toward the writing-table next.

Some pages of manuscript, blotted and interlined with corrections, at

once attracted his attention.

“Is that the forthcoming history?” he asked. “You are not one of the

authors who perform the process of correction mentally--you revise and

improve with the pen in your hand.”

Romayne looked at him in surprise. “I suspect, Mr. Winterfield, you have

used your pen for other purposes than writing letters.”

“No, indeed; you pay me an undeserved compliment. When you come to see

me in Devonshire, I can show you some manuscripts, and corrected proofs,

left by our great writers, collected by my father. My knowledge of

the secrets of the craft has been gained by examining those literary

treasures. If the public only knew that every writer worthy of the name

is the severest critic of his own book before it ever gets into the

hands of the reviewers, how surprised they would be! The man who has

worked in the full fervor of composition yesterday is the same man who

sits in severe and merciless judgment to-day on what he has himself

produced. What a fascination there must be in the Art which exacts and

receives such double labor as this?”

Romayne thought--not unkindly--of his wife. Stella had once asked him

how long a time he was usually occupied in writing one page. The reply

had filled her with pity and wonder. “Why do you take all that trouble?”

she had gently remonstrated. “It would be just the same to the people,

darling, if you did it in half the time.”

By way of changing the topic, Romayne led his visitor into another room.

“I have a picture here,” he said, “which belongs to a newer school of

painting. You have been talking of hard work in one Art; there it is in

another.”

“Yes,” said Winterfield, “there it is--the misdirected hard work, which

has been guided by no critical faculty, and which doesn’t know where to

stop. I try to admire it; and I end in pitying the poor artist. Look at

that leafless felled tree in the middle distance. Every little twig, on

the smallest branch, is conscientiously painted--and the result is

like a colored photograph. You don’t look at a landscape as a series

of separate parts; you don’t discover every twig on a tree; you see the

whole in Nature, and you want to see the whole in a picture. That canvas

presents a triumph of patience and pains, produced exactly as a piece

of embroidery is produced, all in little separate bits, worked with the

same mechanically complete care. I turn away from it to your shrubbery

there, with an ungrateful sense of relief.”

He walked to the window as he spoke. It looked out on the grounds in

front of the house. At the same moment the noise of rolling wheels

became audible on the drive. An open carriage appeared at the turn in

the road. Winterfield called Romayne to the window. “A visitor,” he

began--and suddenly drew back, without saying a word more.

Romayne looked out, and recognized his wife.

“Excuse me for one moment,” he said, “it is Mrs. Romayne.”

On that morning an improvement in the fluctuating state of Mrs.

Eyrecourt’s health had given Stella another of those opportunities of

passing an hour or two with her husband, which she so highly prized.

Romayne withdrew, to meet her at the door--too hurriedly to notice

Winterfield standing, in the corner to which he had retreated, like a

man petrified.

Stella had got out of the carriage when her husband reached the porch.

She ascended the few steps that led to the hall as slowly and painfully

as if she had been an infirm old woman. The delicately tinted color in

her face had faded to an ashy white. She had seen Winterfield at the

window.

For the moment, Romayne looked at her in speechless consternation. He

led her into the nearest room that opened out of the hall, and took her

in his arms. “My love, this nursing of your mother has completely broken

you down!” he said, with the tenderest pity for her. “If you won’t think

of yourself, you must think of me. For my sake remain here, and take the

rest that you need. I will be a tyrant, Stella, for the first time; I

won’t let you go back.”

She roused herself, and tried to smile--and hid the sad result from him

in a kiss. “I do feel the anxiety and fatigue,” she said. “But my mother

is really improving; and, if it only continues, the blessed sense

of relief will make me strong again.” She paused, and roused all

her courage, in anticipation of the next words--so trivial and so

terrible--that must, sooner or later, be pronounced. “You have a

visitor?” she said.

“Did you see him at the window? A really delightful man--I know you will

like him. Under any other circumstances, I should have introduced him.

You are not well enough to see strangers today.”

She was too determined to prevent Winterfield from ever entering the

house again to shrink from the meeting. “I am not so ill as you think,

Lewis,” she said, bravely. “When you go to your new friend, I will go

with you. I am a little tired--that’s all.”

Romayne looked at her anxiously. “Let me get you a glass of wine,” he

said.

She consented--she really felt the need of it. As he turned away to

ring the bell, she put the question which had been in her mind from the

moment when she had seen Winterfield.

“How did you become acquainted with this gentleman?”

“Through Father Benwell.”

She was not surprised by the answer--her suspicion of the priest had

remained in her mind from the night of Lady Loring’s ball. The future of

her married life depended on her capacity to check the growing intimacy

between the two men. In that conviction she found the courage to face

Winterfield.

How should she meet him? The impulse of the moment pointed to the

shortest way out of the dreadful position in which she was placed--it

was to treat him like a stranger. She drank her glass of wine, and took

Romayne’s arm. “We mustn’t keep your friend waiting any longer,” she

resumed. “Come!”

As they crossed the hall, she looked suspiciously toward the house door.

Had he taken the opportunity of leaving the villa? At any other time she

would have remembered that the plainest laws of good breeding compelled

him to wait for Romayne’s return. His own knowledge of the world would

tell him that an act of gross rudeness, committed by a well-bred man,

would inevitably excite suspicion of some unworthy motive--and might,

perhaps, connect that motive with her unexpected appearance at the

house. Romayne opened the door, and they entered the room together.

“Mr. Winterfield, let me introduce you to Mrs. Romayne.” They bowed

to each other; they spoke the conventional words proper to the

occasion--but the effort that it cost them showed itself. Romayne

perceived an unusual formality in his wife’s manner, and a strange

disappearance of Winterfield’s easy grace of address. Was he one of the

few men, in these days, who are shy in the presence of women? And was

the change in Stella attributable, perhaps, to the state of her health?

The explanation might, in either case, be the right one. He tried to set

them at their ease.

“Mr. Winterfield is so pleased with the pictures, that he means to come

and see them again,” he said to his wife. “And one of his favorites

happens to be your favorite, too.”

She tried to look at Winterfield, but her eyes sank. She could turn

toward him, and that was all. “Is it the sea-piece in the study?” she

said to him faintly.

“Yes,” he answered, with formal politeness; “it seems to me to be one of

the painter’s finest works.”

Romayne looked at him in unconcealed wonder. To what flat commonplace

Winterfield’s lively enthusiasm had sunk in Stella’s presence! She

perceived that some unfavorable impression had been produced on her

husband, and interposed with a timely suggestion. Her motive was not

only to divert Romayne’s attention from Winterfield, but to give him a

reason for leaving the room.

“The little water-color drawing in my bedroom is by the same artist,”

she said. “Mr. Winterfield might like to see it. If you will ring the

bell, Lewis, I will send my maid for it.”

Romayne had never allowed the servants to touch his works of art, since

the day when a zealous housemaid had tried to wash one of his plaster

casts. He made the reply which his wife had anticipated.

“No! no!” he said. “I will fetch the drawing myself.” He turned gayly to

Winterfield. “Prepare yourself for another work that you would like to

kiss.” He smiled, and left the room.

The instant the door was closed, Stella approached Winterfield. Her

beautiful face became distorted by a mingled expression of rage and

contempt. She spoke to him in a fierce peremptory whisper.

“Have you any consideration for me left?” His look at her, as she put

that question, revealed the most complete contrast between his face

and hers. Compassionate sorrow was in his eyes, tender forbearance and

respect spoke in his tones, as he answered her.

“I have more than consideration for you, Stella--”