As Mark Cheveril was stepping out of the railway carriage in the Madras station, a hand was laid upon his shoulder.
"The very man I was anxious to meet this morning," said Mr. Morpeth, fixing his deep grey eyes on his young friend. "In fact, it was my anxiety about all of you at Puranapore that brought me here at this hour. I heard rumours yesterday of an impending riot in the town. Then I had a bad dream! I haven't actually visited the place for years, but I saw you all with a furious mob round you, and big champing horses riding over you. I feared you and Mr. Worsley might be in trouble. But I'm glad to see you're all safe, anyhow, Cheveril. But you do look a bit jaded. Has the rioting been serious? Come and tell me all about it."
The old man put his arm through Mark's, and walked down the platform with him.
"Serious enough," answered Mark. "But a company of soldiers from the Fort soon settled the rioters. It's an unexpected event connected with the riot that has brought me here this morning. You'll be sorry to hear, Morpeth, that our friend, Mrs. Rayner's husband, has been killed—literally trampled to death by a savage Mahomedan on horseback."
"Alfred dead!" gasped Mr. Morpeth, with a look of grief and terror in his eyes. He stumbled in his walk, and but for Mark's strong arm would have fallen forward.
His companion regarded him with astonishment.
"Yes, Rayner's gone, poor fellow! It's very sad! This sudden bad news will be terrible for his wife. I didn't think you knew him though?" added Mark interrogatively. "I'm just on my way to break the news to her if I can muster up courage. I've been watching by him all night—he passed away at dawn."
"God bless you for that," murmured Mr. Morpeth, his face quivering. "Cheveril, there's no need to keep the secret any longer. I was wrong to keep it at all. It was the ruin of him. He was my only son—Alfred." Then in reply to Mark's silent start, he added, "Yes, that was his mother's portrait you and his wife came on that afternoon. The incident struck me at the time. I would I had spoken even then."
"Rayner—your son? It's hardly believable," stammered Mark, suddenly recalling the incident of his first evening in Madras, when Rayner in the mail-phaeton had, it seemed to him, almost deliberately set himself to trample down the old man on whose cheek the tears were now running down in sorrow for his loss. "He did not know this, of course—he never knew it?" burst forth Mark, in an almost pleading tone.
"Yes, Alfred did know he was my son—but not in time—not till lately," the father acknowledged in a faltering voice. "I should like to tell you all about it, Cheveril. And from you, who have stood by his dying bed, there is much I want to hear."
Mark assented, and tightening his arm on Mr. Morpeth's, he led him to a quiet comer of the big station, where they could carry on a conversation without interruption. He would fain have suggested that he should take the old man to the peace of his own library, but he felt his first duty was to her who had been the beloved and sheltered one of Pinkthorpe Rectory, and who was now alone and forlorn in this alien land.
In broken words David Morpeth told his tale of many-sided pain. Mark Cheveril's sympathetic heart read its import even more completely than the speaker guessed, though his words were few. After a little silence, he glanced at the clock, saying:
"I was on my way to Clive's Road to tell her. Do you think——"
"Ah, yes, it is for me to take that duty," said Mr. Morpeth, starting up from the bench where they were sitting. "I've shirked my responsibilities too long. I see it now when it is too late. I shall go to that sweet child whom I have loved for her own sake as my daughter."
The proposal was eagerly hailed by Mark, who now began to consider whether he would share Zynool's communication with the stricken father, but decided that before doing so he would seek fuller information, and arranged to meet Mr. Morpeth at his house an hour or two later. He was desirous of returning to Puranapore as soon as possible, not only on account of his arrears of work, but also that he might through Zynool even in prison ascertain the charge that was brought against Rayner, which, on his own acknowledgment, had made him a fugitive in disguise.
After seeing Mr. Morpeth into his little victoria, Mark drove to the Club, having much food for thought as he pondered over the tragical story to which he had listened; and which, as he linked on certain incidents which sprang to his memory with painful vividness, obliged him to acknowledge the utter baseness of Hester's husband.
When Mr. Morpeth alighted from his carriage at Clive's Road and walked up the broad steps, he caught sight of Hester seated in the verandah, looking like a ghost of her former self.
"The poor child must have heard already," he said to himself, as he went forward. Even the sound of the carriage wheels seemed to have struck terror into Hester's heart. She clung to the arms of her chair as she essayed to rise, and looked at her visitor with scared, questioning eyes.
"You know already, then?" murmured Mr. Morpeth, taking her hand and gazing pitifully into her face.
"Oh, have they caught him? Is he in prison?" she cried, the blood rushing into her pale cheeks. "Oh, I can't bear it!"
"In prison, my dear? What do you mean?" asked Mr. Morpeth in a bewildered tone. "No, Hester, death is not prison! Pray that in spite of all it may be the Gate of Life."
"'Death'! Have you come to tell me that my husband is dead?" she asked with startled air.
Mr. Morpeth briefly narrated to her the events of which Mark Cheveril had put him in possession at the station. Hester listened, dry-eyed, as one spell-bound.
"And Hester," he added slowly, "I prayed that I might bring this news to you because I am Alfred's father——"
"You are? Then itwastrue!" cried Hester, as if awakening from a dream. "But oh, why did not poor Alfred have all the good a father like you might have been to him? I thought these women who told me were only gossiping, but I even wished that itweretrue. Why did you ever lose hold of your son?" asked Hester, looking reproachfully on the worn, grey face.
So it happened, that for the second time that morning, David Morpeth, with aching heart, had to take up the tangled skein of the past. And Hester, as she listened, with her quick perception easily filled up the gaps in the narration.
"Oh, the loss to him!" she murmured. "If he had been brought up by one good and true like you he might have been different, instead of being embittered, reckless, mad."
In her turn, she had to unfold to the father the story of his son's crime and the fear of its consequences, which had driven him from his home, a fugitive from justice.
The father's grey head was bowed in grief. He sat in silence for some time, then looking up with a sob he said:
"If he had only come to me—even that night. I was his father—but he would have none of me."
"But how could he go to you—he did not know," faltered Hester.
"Ah, child, that is the worst sorrow of all—Alfred did know," said the truth-loving man, looking at Hester with his earnest eyes.
"Not that evening on the beach when he was so rude—so cruel? Oh, say he did not know then?"
Hester's eyes as well as her tone pleaded for an assurance that at least she could exonerate her husband from the terrible stain such knowledge must shed on his conduct that evening.
"How can I tell her," he thought. "Listen, my child! When Alfred was in Calcutta he learnt that David Morpeth, the old East Indian, was his father. He disowned me and scornfully refused my allowance to him from that day forward. As I have explained to you, it was my own fault for weakly consenting to a foolish promise—for allowing my child to pass from me as I did. The fact is my own will inclined to it. I had always been too sensitively conscious of the disabilities of Eurasians—perhaps unduly dominated by the aristocracy of colour in the white man. Mr. Cheveril, now, has turned those very disabilities which were my weakness into strength, but I bent my head before the prejudice, having suffered in many-sided ways from my youth up. To shield my son against it seemed in my mistaken judgment worthy of the sacrifice I had to make. I desired to save him from the cup that had been so bitter to my taste, forgetting that the cup Our Father offers is the only safe one for us. I dreamt too of his having a very different training in England, idealising everything there, as I did in those days. I thought no sacrifice too great to bring about this end; but my wife's sister thwarted my purposes and even deceived me for long. Ignorant as I was of English ways save through literature, I shrank from going there to arrange matters for my son until it was too late. I have long known, however, that it was not only my foolish promise to the dead mother that bound me—it was my own pride and self-will. Long ago, of course, I saw the fatal mistake I had made. But we have to reap as we sow. My reaping time is sore indeed. Oh, the bitterness to think of his being a forger and a felon."
With a groan the old man bent his head and covered his face with his hands. Hester's pity, even at this her own dark hour, was stirred for the forlorn man. She rose and laid her hand on his grey head.
"Try to forgive him," she murmured. "It is terrible to think of, but Alfred is dead. We must try not to judge him hardly any more."
The pathetic ring in her voice caused the old man to look up at her.
"You have suffered too, my child," he said, taking her hand. "Have I not been a silent witness of your trials—haunted by the thought of them even when I went about my daily work? How I longed to spare you, to protect you. Now, at last, in that matter I can have my wish," he added, with a touch of his old energy coming into his face. "As Alfred's father, it is my right to do all I can to help and protect you at this terrible time. The responsibility will be my greatest comfort now. First, may I go and ask your good friend Mrs. Fellowes to come and be with you?"
"No, no, just for to-day let me be alone. There is such a thing as getting acquainted with grief, you know," returned Hester, with a sad smile.
"As you will, my dear! Then, I should like to tell you that all the offices for the dead will be my care. You will let me have my son just once in his father's house?" he asked, in a pleading tone. "It is my purpose to take him to Calcutta and lay him beside his young mother. And you, Hester, will want to return to your happy home? You have youth and hope still with you. It is no doubt your wish to go back to England?"
"Oh, yes, I shall go home. He needs me no more. I did try to help him—but——" She broke off with a sob.
"Didn't I see you did? Ah, how my heart yearned for you as well as for my poor wayward son! But I was powerless to help either the one or the other. That was my punishment. But now you must allow me to atone for it by giving you all the help I can."
"When he is with you on the sea, I shall go on my voyage too. I cannot stay in this house longer—or anywhere else in this place."
"Nor need you. All can be arranged. Can you be ready to start in a couple of days?"
"Easily. Everything here must be left to pay the debts we owe—that money he took too. I can only give up everything I have. It's not much, I fear, but it's all I can do just now. When I get home, my father——"
"Not a word about that matter," interrupted Mr. Morpeth, rising. "These burdens are all my right now. I must go, but I shall look in again this evening, since you prefer to be alone to-day. Go and lie down, my child, you are overwrought," he added, glancing at Hester's worn face.
Beckoning to the butler, he briefly told him of his master's death, and charged him to see well to his mistress, who would soon have to cross "the black water" again. Then, with his habitual calm taking possession of him once more, Mr. Morpeth hurried away to face a more difficult and trying day than Hester had any idea of.
She too had her hours of storm and stress as the long, hot hours wore on. The terrible tension arising from the suspense was now at an end. Her weak, erring husband had gone to another Bar than the earthly one she had so dreaded for him. Her brief married life lay in ruins, and though love was dead, its spectre haunted her at every turn. Now it was the beautiful face, the impassioned eyes of the almost unknown suitor in the Woodglade arbour that rose before her. Again, it was one incident after another disclosing his disordered heart; scenes before which she had learnt to quail in fear—not for herself, she soon learnt to outlive that—but for the restless, unhappy one to whom she had pledged her wedded troth. Sometimes it was the recollection of that morning on which he had spoken such insulting words to his own father that sprang into her mind. And as she vividly recalled the scene, she began to wonder if, all along, Alfred could have had some subconscious glimmering of the close relationship between him and the noble-hearted man he was spurning which goaded him to a sense of desperation. Then the memory of her happy morning ride with Mark Cheveril came to her mind. How kind, how comforting, how high-toned and self-restrained he had ever proved, and yet, for her sake, he had to endure taunts which, had they been flung at him by any other than her husband, she felt sure would have been dealt with very differently. Yet it had been that friend who had smoothed the dying pillow of her disgraced husband!
Deeply grateful as she was to Mark Cheveril for all that he had been to her, she felt no desire to meet him on this dark day, and was thankful that Mr. Morpeth, and not he, had been the messenger of the evil tidings. Perhaps Mark and she would never meet again in this world; yet between them she felt there would ever be the bond forged during these eventful months when faith and honour and fealty had called her to turn from the true man to him whom she had too late awakened to find deeply false, although he was the husband of her youth.
Even the thought of the home-going—that thought so thrilling to the hearts of Anglo-Indians—brought no lightening to Hester's load of pain that day, nor for many a succeeding one.
Mr. Morpeth returned to Clive's Road in the evening as he had promised, to tell Hester all he thought needful for her to hear, withholding much which might have added to her pain. He had already secured a passage for her on the first homeward bound steamer, and for her ayah, who he insisted should accompany her. He had also arranged his own sad journey to Calcutta for the same morning.
On the following days, Mrs. Fellowes proved invaluable in all preparations for the departure from Clive's Road. She observed with much concern that Hester seemed in a sort of stupor and forbore to obtrude her sympathy. She had as yet exchanged but few words with her friend, and when she had occasion to ask some needful question Hester would reply mechanically.
She sat now at the evening hour by her friend's side in the verandah, glancing anxiously at the listless, folded hands, the wan face, and the dry, despairing eyes gazing up at the dark blue star-strewn sky as if seeing strange visions. Happening to meet Mrs. Fellowes' inquiring glance, Hester stretched out her hand to clasp hers.
"How good you have been to me!" she murmured, "and so patient!" Then she added, as if in explanation. "I can't speak of it yet. I don't seem able even to feel. My heart seems shrivelled up. I am like something ayah showed me this morning. She was asking me which of her possessions she must take across the black water, and I could only think of one at the moment—a gay-coloured new leathern bottle she had once showed to me with pride. She went and fetched it from her godown and said: 'See, missus, what that bottle done come to!' and she held up a black, shrunken thing that had been hanging in the smoke of her godown since I came to Madras. I think that bottle and my heart have had the same history these last months. Both have been shrivelled in the smoke of scorching fires!"
"Why, there's a verse in the Psalms like that," said Mrs. Fellowes briskly, glad that the silence had been broken. She took her little old Bible from her bag. "Here it is, in the longest Psalm, and a very graphic description the Psalmist gives of himself. 'I am become like a bottle in the smoke.' He must have felt like that too, dear child, but if we read further we'll find how he turned to the Healer—the Restorer, till he was able to say, 'It is good for me that I have been afflicted.'"
Hester did not speak at once. "Thank you, dear friend," she said at length, and Mrs. Fellowes could see that the torpid air had passed, that life and thought had come back. "You have done me good! I think I see a little through the smoke now. I shall go and give Rosie a last lesson after all," she added, rising. "It is so good of you to promise to take care of the little maid till ayah comes back again. No more Mrs. Harbottles," she added, with something of her old bright smile.
"Yes, the smoke will rub off by degrees," thought Mrs. Fellowes, as she looked after Hester's retreating figure. "This terrible experience must leave its mark. 'A bottle in the smoke' she has been truly all her days here! Thank God the process has not been soiling! What life must have been with such a husband it passes me to understand! He hadn't a single redeeming point—except his good looks; and the Colonel even questions them. But poor Rayner had a beautiful face there is no doubt."
In the early dawn next morning Hester took farewell of her wedded home, bestowing a kindly smile on the sad-faced company of servants who were grouped round the verandah to make their last salaams to the sweet English lady whose husband had come by such an evil fate.
Many kindly notes of condolence had reached her those last days from her numerous acquaintances of varying degrees of intimacy, for Mrs. Rayner had been an esteemed member of the little Anglo-Indian society of the past season—even by some who were inclined to look askance on her husband. Now the place that had known her those short months of her wedded life would know her no more. Her memory would pass in the changing society of the Indian town like the passage of a swift flying bird through a lighted chamber. Even as she gazed at the familiar scene, the stately buildings, the towering Fort of St. George that skirted the shore while she was being carried over the waves by the stalwart brown rowers of the Massulah boat, she felt as if her life on that strand was already beginning to recede dream-like from her vision.
The surf was crossed now, and Hester and her little party, consisting of Colonel and Mrs. Fellowes, were safely landed on the deck of theEl Dorado. Mr. Morpeth had been inventive in all kindly arrangements for the young widow, and their parting was memorable to both. His grey eyes had gazed with unutterable sorrow and tenderness into her face as he held her hands.
"This land of ours will call you again, I feel sure, my daughter; whether I am here to see it or not. One day you will return to work for our people once more."
Hester had pleaded for a promise that he should come on a visit to Pinkthorpe, knowing well that her father and mother would honour the noble Eurasian gentleman; but Mr. Morpeth shook his head, smiling sadly. "No, my child, my visit to England would be thirty years too late now." But still Hester would not hear of being robbed of all hope that it might still be one of the happy events which the future had in store for her. Colonel and Mrs. Fellowes were to be home for good the following year, so that the strong link forged with these friends was not long to be severed.
There was one true friend whose hand Hester would fain have grasped, one pair of frank eyes into which she would have wished to look once more before she finally left this place of mingled memories; but Mark Cheveril had made no sign. He evidently did not desire to meet Alfred Rayner's wife again after all that had come and gone. She did not wonder that he felt so, but the knowledge of his kind offices to her dead husband would always be graven on her heart, and she had wished just once to put her hand in his and whisper her thanks.
A few minutes before the last bell rang her wish was realised, for she caught sight of her trusty comrade coming up the ladder. He came forward to greet her with grave earnest courtesy. There was not time for many words. The last bell was about to ring, and all, except intending passengers, were ordered to leave the ship. Colonel and Mrs. Fellowes made their farewells with looks of encompassing affection. Then Hester turned to Mark, who stood pale and repressed, a sad smile on his lips.
"I only wish I were going to Pinkthorpe too," he said. "But we shall meet there some day, I hope," he added, gazing at her wan face.
"So you will come, even after all?" she murmured. "Till then, Mark, I will keep my thanks for all your kindness, and for all your loving care of him—I have heard—Mr. Morpeth told me," she whispered, laying her hand in his.
In another moment he was gone, and was hurrying down the ladder to join the Massulah boat.
Hester stood watching the rocking craft which carried her friends across the surf. The newly risen sun was shedding its golden light on the great rolling waters of the Bay of Bengal, and on the noble buildings skirting the shore which were glittering like fabled marble palaces under its bright rays. Beyond stretched vistas of stately trees all tinged by the glow, intersected by many a winding road and leafy compound where the scattered denizens of Madras camped during their exile. Many spots were dear and familiar to Hester. Now the vision of the desolate house in Clive's Road rose before her; the early days which seemed to promise as bright and fair as the golden dawn. Then the shattered hopes, the wrecked life, all passed in procession before her dimmed eyes as the familiar shores receded from her view, like the vanishing wake of the great steamer's track as it ploughed its way through the glistening waters.
Two years after the eventful morning of her departure from Madras, Hester was seated one afternoon in her favourite nook in the Rectory garden. The painful past had not failed to leave its traces on the deep-hearted girl. The gaiety, the "laughing light" of youth was changed to soberer hues. But the unnatural reserve which at first seemed to paralyze her had been replaced by a quiet shining peace of heart, a rare power of sympathy for others, and an inventiveness in ministering to those in sorrow. This spiritual beauty seemed reflected in face and form. There was a perfection of unconscious grace about every movement, and though the English roses on her cheeks, of which her husband had been so proud, had faded, the tender bloom of health was not lacking in her soft colouring and clear, earnest eyes. The black clinging dress which she still wore suited well her fair wavy hair she sat bending over her book.
After the first year of mourning, to her parents' satisfaction, Hester was not unwilling to take part in the social life round her. Visitors had come and gone who had been dearly welcome to her in a way that none can understand who have not been part of "an alien land on a foreign strand," knit together by many common memories. The coming of Colonel and Mrs. Fellowes had been a great joy to her; while, to her mother, it had proved an opportunity of hearing some pages from that short year of wedded life which had hitherto been folded away even from the eyes of those nearest to the young widow.
Hester had taken up all her daughterly duties with quiet faithfulness, proving a cheerful companion to her younger brothers in their holidays, though Charlie was conscious of a change. More than once, for instance, when he had tried to elicit some news of his friend, Mark Cheveril, Hester seemed to grow dreamy and preoccupied, changing the topic as soon as possible. He decided that there must have been a coldness between these two friends.
"I don't wonder," he remarked to his mother. "If Rayner was half what old Colonel Fellowes told me of him, Cheveril couldn't have stood him; so naturally there was a rift between Hester and him."
Mrs. Bellairs, whatever her thoughts were, proved almost as reticent as her daughter. More than one suitor had sought the hand of the young widow, but Hester's quick, firm decision had always been adverse to their hopes. "She will never marry again," acquaintances agreed. Only her mother, though she gave no opinion, thought she knew some one who might one day be able to persuade her daughter to allow him to replace the house of sand which had crumbled away, by a fair house founded on a rock of true love. But she kept her own counsel.
As the days went on nothing transpired which gave any clue to what the future might bring. No letter from Mark Cheveril ever reached the Rectory now; but Hester had still one link with her short wedded life which she clung to. Many a thin blue page crossed the sea, dated from an address unknown to the fashionable residents in Madras. And these letters were responded to by gracious, loving words which gladdened the heart of the lonely man, and not only his, they were often shared with one whom long since Mr. Morpeth had come to regard as a son.
"Mr. Cheveril is the most be-fathered man I know," declared little Mrs. Samptor. "He is the well-beloved boy of our surly Collector and the precious son of David Morpeth, and Samptor has a softer side to him than he has ever showed to any other young man."
Mr. Morpeth had often paid visits to Mark in his bungalow, and there was no more honoured guest at the Collector's table than the old Eurasian, and no more popular man in the little station of Puranapore. Through him, Mark was kept much more in touch with Hester than from Charlie's brief epistles from his London chambers. Often indeed all mention of his sister's name was purposely omitted. So when on Mark's first furlough home he desired to reach her, it was not to Charlie he turned, but decided on more direct methods.
When Hester heard footsteps approaching the walnut tree under which she sat, reading the brown volume of poems which had reached her one afternoon at Clive's Road, when she sorely needed its ministry, she took them to be her brother's.
"Come here, young man," she called, "sit at my feet and learn wisdom from Browning!"
"Nothing will please me better, Hester," answered a familiar voice that was not Charlie's.
"Mark—you! I never even knew you had left Madras," exclaimed Hester. "Why ever did Mr. Morpeth not give me that bit of news? Have you just arrived?"
"I went to Shropshire first to see my old uncle who has been ailing. He lives—or rather vegetates—in an ancient black-timbered mansion all his lone; but he is a very independent old fellow. I was kept there longer than I reckoned on, owing to something unexpected turning up. Then I had to go to London about some business. I looked up Charlie at his chambers, but he wasn't to be found——"
"Oh, Charlie will be overjoyed to see you! He and Cecil are out shooting rabbits just now. I do hope he'll be back soon."
Mark did not re-echo that hope. In fact he prayed it might be some time before the walnut grove was invaded by any. His eyes were resting eagerly on Hester. He perceived with joy that the healing process had been at work, binding up the old wounds and restoring serenity to the once sorely troubled life.
"I must tell you, Hester," he said with a frank smile, "that I don't feel a stranger to any of your doings. Dear old Morpeth preserves your letters in lavender and gives me a share of them."
For a moment Hester was startled, remembering that she had shared many of her most intimate thoughts with the wise saint with whom she felt a close bond; then she answered with a smile as frank as his own.
"No, I don't mind. You know so much of those past days, Mark. You could understand much that was only meant for the dear old man."
There was something natural and spontaneous in Hester's tone which had the effect of banishing Mark's fears concerning this first meeting with one who, every day since they parted, had become more enshrined in his thoughts.
"But how can I have been so many minutes without asking for your beloved Collector?" she said; and though the topic was congenial, Mark grudged the digression from more personal matters. "Mr. Worsley is quite a family friend here now, you know. He spent a week of his furlough with us and took everybody by storm. Father and mother were so happy with him, and he with them. He seemed like a delightful balm; and yet I remember when I wouldn't listen to your praise of him and felt sure he must be the surly bear people said he was! But, Mark, I must tell you, he made some rather sceptical remarks about your being a Eurasian. I think father was rather shocked at his levity. He said it was only a hallucination of yours—though an excellent one—seeing the Eurasians needed friends so much."
"Then I suspect the Collector will have a crow over me now!" said Mark, with a laugh. "What do you think, Hester? I discovered a box of papers in a lumber room at Cheveril. It had never been opened seemingly since it was sent home from the East after my father's death. He was Uncle Mark's younger brother, you know, a lieutenant in the Indian Army; and I find that my mother who was always believed to be an Indian—and a princess to boot—was after all an English girl, lost at the time of the Mutiny, though she had a happier fate than some, for she was adopted by a good Ranee. She was only seventeen when my father married her, and she died at my birth. My father died soon after, and I was sent home to my grandparents at Cheveril; very likely the old cedar-wood box was part of my baggage! I've always understood from Uncle Mark that owing to my father's hasty marriage there was a coldness between my grandparents and him, and that letters ceased between them, though his early death was said to be a great blow. Probably they heard misleading rumours of the choice of a girl from the Ranee's palace. It was a romantic affair, of course, and would be sure to set tongues wagging. Anyhow, the truth has been disclosed at last by this old chest which looks so Indian that I expect it was part of my mother's providing by the Ranee. My mother, by the way, was a daughter of a General Worsley. I can't help thinking and hoping that she must have been of the same family as the Collector; but that will all be cleared up by and by."
"And are you glad or sorry, Mark?" asked Hester, with a wistful look in her eyes.
"Well, to know the truth is always best, don't you think?" said Mark simply. "But I'll tell you who is jolly glad—my uncle! He says he rejoices there has been no 'blot on the scutcheon' after all! He is in great excitement, and has had his lawyer down to examine the old papers which he might have discovered long ago."
"But then you mightn't have been the cordial succourer of so many Eurasians. Indeed, I feel sure you will prove no less their friend in days to come, though there is no blood-tie; but I must say, Mark, for many reasons, I'm grateful to the old cedar-wood box for holding its secret so long! Even Alfred, in his heart of hearts, admired your courage, and it was all on the side of good for him," said Hester, wondering why it was so much more easy to speak that name to this friend than to any of her home people.
Mark went on to tell her that his return to India would no longer be to the familiar Puranapore. Since the Collector was about to retire, he acknowledged, he was nothing loth to have a change, especially since an attractive post had been offered to him in the North, though it would necessitate a speedy return to the East.
He now bent forward suddenly, saying:
"Hester, would you risk the black water again and go with me? You have all my love and my worship—will you be my wife? I once banished my love as a forbidden thing and tried to be your loyal friend——"
"You did, Mark," murmured Hester, with bowed head. "Right loyally you did——"
"But now—the present is ours, Hester, the present and the future. You will make it golden for me if you will grant me this. Hester, didn't you invite me to come and learn wisdom at your feet as I came under this tree?" asked Mark, with a glowing mien, flinging himself on the ground and looking up into her drooping face.
"No, it was Charlie I invited."
"My answer, Hester! I have waited long," he pleaded, looking at her with all his soul in his eyes. "I know now too well that I loved you before—before that other ever saw you."
Hester felt as if she knew it too. And she also knew that as the first man who had wooed and won her was false, this one was wholly true. Stretching out both her hands to him, she said:
"Yes, Mark, I will venture the black water again with you! Where you go I will go. My love and trust are wholly yours—and have been since—since that morning we stood together on the deck of theEl Dorado."
Jarrold & Sons, Ltd., Printers, The Empire Press, Norwich.