Esther Helps was certainly neither a prudent nor a careful young woman. She meant no harm, she would have shuddered at the thought of actual sin, but she was reckless, a little defiant of all authority, even her father's most gentle and loving control, and very discontented with her position in life.
Morning, noon, and night, Esther's dream of dreams, longing of longings, was to be a lady. She had some little foundation for this desire. The mother who had died at her birth had been a poor half-educated little governess, whose mother before her had been a clergyman's daughter. Esther quickly discovered that she was beautiful, and her dream of dreams was to marry a gentleman, and so go back to that station in life where her mother had moved.
Esther had no real instincts of ladyhood. She spoke loudly, her education had been of a very flashy and superficial order. From the time she left the fourth-rate boarding-school where her father alone had the means to place her, she had stayed at home and idled. Idling was very bad for a character like hers; she was naturally active and energetic—she had plenty of ability, and would have made a capital shopwoman or dressmaker. But Esther thought it quite beneath her to work, and her father, who could support her at home, was only too delighted to have her there. He was inordinately proud of her—she was the one sunbeam in his dull, clouded timorous life. He adored her beauty, he found no fault with her Cockney twang, and he gave her in double measure the love which had lain buried for many years with his young wife.
Esther, therefore, when she left school, sat at home, and made her own dresses, and chatted with hercousin Cherry, who was an orphan, and belonged to Helps' side of the house. Cherry was a very capable, matter-of-fact hearty little girl, and Esther thought it an excellent arrangement that she should live with them, and take the drudgery and the cooking, and in short all the household work off her hands. Esther was very fond of Cherry, and Cherry, in her turn, thought there was never anyone quite so grand and magnificent as her tall, stately cousin.
"Well, Cherry," said Esther, as the two were going to bed on the night after Wyndham's visit, "what do you think of him? Oh, I needn't ask, there's but one thing to be thought of him."
"Elegant, I say," interrupted Cherry. She was looking particularly round and dumpy herself, and her broad face with her light grey eyes was all one smile. "An elegant young man, Essie—a sort of chevalier, now, wouldn't you say so?"
"It's just like you, Cherry, you take up all your odd moments with those poetry books. Mr. Wyndham ain't a chevalier—he's just a gentleman, neither more nor less—a real gentleman, oh dear. I call it a cruel disappointment. Cherry," and she heaved a profound sigh.
"What's a disappointment?" asked unsuspicious Cherry, as she tumbled into bed.
"Why, that he's married, my dear. He'd have suited me fine. Well, there's an end of that."
Cherry thought there was sufficiently an end to allow her to drop off to sleep, and Esther, after lying awake for a little, presently followed her example.
The next day she was more restless than ever, once or twice even openly complaining to Cherry of the dullness of her lot, and loudly proclaiming her determination to become a lady in spite of everybody.
"You can't, Essie," said her father, in his meek, though somewhat high-pitched voice, when heoverheard some of her words that evening. "It ain't your lot, child—you warn't born in the genteel line; there's all lines and all grooves, and yours is the narrowing one of the poverty-struck clerk's child."
"I think it's mean of you to talk like that, father," said Esther, her eyes flashing. "It's mean of you, and unkind to my poor mother, who was a lady born."
"I don't know much about that," replied Helps, looking more despondent than ever. "She was the best of little wives, and if she was born a lady, which I ain't going to deny, for I don't know she warn't a lady bred, I mind me she thought it a fine bit of a rise to leave off teaching the baker's children, and come home to me. Poor little Essie—poor, dear little Essie. You don't take much after her, Esther, my girl."
"If she was spiritless, and had no mind for her duties, which were in my opinion to uphold her station in life, I don't want to take after her," answered Esther, and she flounced out of the room.
Helps looked round in an appealing way at Cherry.
"I don't want to part with her," he said, "but it will be a good thing for us all when Essie is wed. I must try and find some decent young fellow who will be likely to take a fancy to her. Her words fret me on account of their ambition. Cherry, child."
"I wouldn't be put out if I was you, uncle," responded Cherry in her even, matter-of-fact voice. "Esther is took up with a whim, and it will pass. It's all on account of the chevalier."
"The what, child?"
"The chevalier. Oh, my sakes alive, there's the milk boiling all over the place, and my hearth done up so beautiful. Here, catch hold of this saucepan, uncle, while I fetch a cloth to wipe up. My word, ain't this provoking. I thought to get time to learn a verse or two out of the poetry book to-night; but no such luck—I'll be brushing and blacking till bed-time."
In the confusion which ensued, Helps forgot to ask Cherry whom she meant by the chevalier.
A few days after this, as Helps was coming home late, he was rather dismayed to find his daughter returning also, accompanied by a young man who was no better dressed than half the young men with whom she walked, but who had a certain air and a certain manner which smote upon the father's heart with a dull sense of apprehension.
"Essie, my girl," he said, when she had bidden her swain good-bye, and had come into the house, with her eyes sparkling and her whole face looking so bright and beautiful, that even Cherry dropped her poetry book to gaze in admiration. "Essie," said Helps, all the tenderness of the love he bore her trembling in his voice, "come here. Kiss your old father. You love him, don't you?"
"Why, dad, what a question. I should rather think I did."
"You wouldn't hurt him now, Essie? You wouldn't break his heart, for instance?"
"I break your heart, dad? Is it likely? Now, what can the old man be driving at?" she said, looking across at Cherry.
"It's this," responded Helps, "I want to know the name of the fellow—yes, the—the fellow, who saw you home just now?"
"Now, father, mightn't he be Mr. Gray, or Mr. Jones, or Mr. Abbott; some of those nice young men you bring up now and then from the city? Why mightn't he be one of them, father?"
"But he wasn't, my dear. The young men you speak of are honest lads, every one of them. I wouldn't have no sort of objection to your walking with them, Esther. It wasn't none of my friends from the city I saw you with to-night. Essie."
"And why shouldn't this be an honest fellow, too?" answered Esther, her eyes sparkling dangerously.
"I don't know, my dear. I didn't like the looks of him. What's his name, Essie, my love?"
"Captain Herriot, of the —— Hussars."
"There! Esther, you're not to walk with Captain Herriot any more. You're not to know him. I won't have it—so now."
"Highty-tighty!" said Esther. "There are two to say a word to that bargain, father. And pray, why may I walk with Mr. Jones and not with Captain Herriot? Captain Herriot's a real gentleman, and Mr. Jones ain't."
"And that's the reason, my child. If Jones walked with you, he'd maybe—yes, I'm sure of it—he'd want all his heart and soul to make you his honest wife some day. Do you suppose Captain Herriot wants to make you his wife. Essie?"
"I don't say. I won't be questioned like that." Her whole pale face was in a flame. "Maybe we never thought of such a thing, but just to be friends, and to have a pleasant time. It's cruel of you to talk like that, father."
"Well, then, I won't, my darling, I won't. Just promise you'll have nothing more to say to the fellow. I'd believe your word against the world, Essie."
"Against the world? Would you really, dad? I wouldn't, though, if I were you. No, I ain't going to make a promise I might break." She went out of the room, she was crying.
A short time after this, indeed the very day after Lilias Wyndham's visit to London, Gerald noticed that Helps followed his every movement as he came rather languidly in and out of the office, with dull imploring eyes. The old clerk was particularly busy that morning, he was kept going here, there, and everywhere. Work of all kinds, work of the most unexpected and unlooked for natureseemed to descend to-day with the force of a sledge hammer on his devoted head.
Gerald saw that he was dying to speak to him, and at the first opportunity he took him aside, and asked him if there was anything he could do for him.
"Oh, yes, Mr. Wyndham, you can, you can. Oh, thank the good Lord for bringing you over to speak to me when no one was looking. You can save Esther for me—that's what you can do, Mr. Wyndham. No one can save her but you. So you will, sir; oh, you will. She's my only child, Mr. Wyndham."
"I will certainly do what I can," responded Wyndham, in his grave, courteous voice.
He was leaning against the window-ledge in a careless attitude; Helps, looking up at him anxiously, noticed how pale and wan his face was.
"Ah," he responded, rising from his seat, and going up to the younger man. "'Tis them as bears burdens knows how to pity. Thank the Lord there's compensation in all things. Now look here, Mr. Wyndham, this is how things are. You have seen my Essie, she's troublesome and spirited—oh, no one more so."
Helps paused.
"Yes," answered Gerald, in a quiet, waiting voice. He was not particularly interested in the discussion of Esther Helps' character.
"And she's beautiful, Mr. Wyndham. Aye, there's her curse. Beautiful and hambitious and not a lady, and dying to be one. You understand, Mr. Wyndham—you must understand."
Wyndham said nothing.
"Well, a month or so ago I found out there was a gentleman—at least a man who called himself a gentleman—walking with her, and filling her head with nonsense. His name was Herriot, a captain in the Hussars. I told her she was to have nought to say to him, but I soon found that she disobeyed me. Then I had to spy on her—you may think how I felt, but it had to be done. I found that she walked with him, and met him at all hours. I made inquiries about his character, and I found he was a scoundrel, a bad fellow out and out. He'd be sure to break my Essie's heart if he did no worse. Then I was in a taking, for the girl kept everything in, and would scarcely brook me so much as to look at her. I was that upsetthat I took Cherry into my confidence. She's a very good girl, is Cherry—the Lord hasn't cursed her with no beauty. Last week she brought me word that Esther was going to the Gaiety with Captain Herriot, that he had taken two stalls and they were to have a fine time. She said Esther was almost out of her mind with delight, as it was always her dream to be seen at the theatre, beautifully dressed, with a real gentleman. She had shown the tickets to Cherry, and Cherry was smart enough to take the numbers and keep them in the back of her head. She told me, and I can tell you, Mr. Wyndham, I was fit to kill someone. I went straight off to the Gaiety office, and by good luck or the grace of God, I found there was a vacant stall next to Esther's—just one, and no more. I paid for that stall, here's the ticket in my pocket."
"Yes," said Wyndham, "and you mean to go with Esther to-night? A very good idea—excellent. But how will she take it?"
"How will she take it, Mr. Wyndham? I feel fit to pull my grey hairs out. How would she have taken it, you mean? For it's all a thing of the past, sir. Oh, I had it all planned fine. I was to wait until she and that fellow had taken their places, and then I'd come in quite natural, and sit down beside her, and answer none of her questions, only never leave her, no, not for a quarter of a minute. And if he spoke up, the ruffian, I had my reply for him. I'd stay quiet enough till we got outside, and then just one blow in the middle of his face—yes, just one, to relieve a father's feelings. Then home with my girl, and I think it's more than likely we wouldn't have been troubled with no more of Captain Herriot's attentions."
Helps paused again.
"You speak in the past tense," said Gerald. "Why cannot you carry out this excellent programme?"
"That's it, sir, that's what about maddens me. I came to the office this morning, and what has happened hasn't happened this three months past. There's business come in of a nature that no one can tackle but myself. Business of a private character, and yet what may mean the loss or gain of thousands. Oh, I can't explain it, Mr. Wyndham, even though you are a partner; there are things that confidential clerks know that are hid from junior partners. I can't leave here till eleven o'clock to-night, Mr. Wyndham, and if you don't help me Esther may be a lost girl. Yes, there's no mincing matters—lost, beyond hope. Will you help me, Mr. Wyndham? I'll go mad if my only girl, my beautiful girl, comes to that."
"I? Can I help you?" asked Wyndham. There was hesitation and distress in his voice. He saw that he was going to be asked to do something unpleasant.
"You can do this, sir. You can make it all right. Bless you, sir, who's there to see? And you go with the best intentions. You go in a noble cause. You can afford to risk that much, Mr. Wyndham. I want you to take my place at the Gaiety to-night; take my ticket and go there. Talk pleasant to Esther: not much, but just a little, nothing to rouse her suspicions. Let her think it was just a coincidence your being there. Then, just at the end, give her this letter from me. I've said a thing in it that will startle her. She'll get a fright and turn to you. Put her into a cab then, and bring her here. You can sit on the box if you like. That's all. Put her into my arms and your task is done. Here's the ticket and the letter. Do it, Mr. Wyndham, and God will bless you. Yes, yes, my poor young sir—He'll bless you."
"Don't talk of God when you speak of me," said Wyndham. "Something has happened which closes the door of religion for me. The door between God and me is closed. I am still open, however, to the call of humanity. You want me to go to the Gaiety to-night to save your daughter. It is very probable that if I went I should save her. I am engaged, however, for to-night. My sister is in town. We are going to make a party to the Haymarket."
"Oh, sir, what of that? Send a telegram to say you have an engagement. Think of Esther. Think what it means if you fail me now."
"I do think of it, Helps. I will do what you want. Give me the letter and the theatre ticket."
Valentine was delighted to have Lilias as her companion. She was in excellent spirits just now, and Lilias and she enjoyed going about together. They had adventures which pleased them both, such simple adventures as come to poorer girls every day—a ride in an omnibus to Kew, an excursion up the river to Battersea in a penny steamer, and many other mild intoxicants of this nature. Sometimes Gerald came with them, but oftener they went alone. They laughed and chatted at these times, and people looked at them, and thought them two particularly merry good-looking school-girls.
Valentine was very fond of going to the theatre, and of course one of the principal treats in store for Lilias was a visit to the play. Valentine decided that they would go to some entertainment of a theatrical character nearly every evening. On the day of Helps' strange request to Wyndham they were to seeCaptain Swiftat the Haymarket. Mr. Paget had taken a box for the occasion, and Valentine's last injunction to her husband was to beg of him to be home in good time so that they might have dinner in peace, and reach the Haymarket before the curtain rose.
Lilias and she trotted about most of the morning, and sat cosily now in the pretty drawing-room in Park-Lane, sipping their tea, examining their purchases, or chatting about dress, and sundry other trivial matters after the fashion of light-hearted girls.
Presently Valentine pulled a tiny watch out of her belt.
"Gerald is late," she said. "He promised faithfully to be into tea, and it is now six o'clock. We dine at half-past. Had we not better go and dress, Lilias?"
Lilias was standing on the hearthrug, she glanced at the clock, then into the ruddy flames, then half-impatiently towards the door.
"Oh, wait a moment or two," she said. "If Gerald promised to come he is safe to be here directly. I never met such a painfully conscientious fellow; he would not break his word even in a trifle like this for all the world. Give him three minutes longer. You surely will not take half-an-hour to dress."
"How solemnly you speak, Lilias," responded Valentine. "If Gerald is late, that could scarcely be considered a breaking of his word. I mean in a promise of that kind one never knows how one may be kept. That is always understood, of course."
There came a pealing ring and a double knock at the door, and a moment after the page entered with a telegram which he handed to his mistress. Valentine tore the yellow envelope open, and read the contents of the pink sheet.
"No answer, Masters," she said to the boy. Then she she turned to Lilias. "Gerald can't go with us to-night. He is engaged. You see, of course, he would not break his word, Lilias. He is unavoidably prevented coming. It is too bad."
Some of the brightness went out of her face, and her spirits went down a very little.
"Well, it can't be helped," she said, "only I am disappointed."
"So am I, awfully disappointed," responded Lilias.
Then the two went slowly upstairs to change their dresses.
When they came down again, Mr. Paget, who was to dine with them, was waiting in the drawing-room. There was a suppressed excitement, a suppressed triumph in his eyes, which, however, only made him look more particularly bright and charming.
When Valentine came in in the pure white which gave her such a girlish and even pathetically innocent air, he went up and kissed her almost fiercely. He put his arm round her waist and drew her close to him, and looked into her eyes with a sense of possession which frightened her. For the first time in all her existence she half shrank from the father whom she idolized. She was scarcely conscious of her own shrinking, of the undefinable something which made her set herself free, and stand on the hearthrug by Lilias' side.
"I don't see your husband, my pet," said Mr. Paget. "He ought to have come home long before now, that is, if he means to come with us to-night."
"But he doesn't, father," said Valentine. "That's just the grief. I had a telegram from him, half-an-hour ago; he is unavoidably detained."
Mr. Paget raised his eyebrows.
"Not at the office," he said, in a markedly grave voice, and with another significant raise of his brows. "That I know, for he left before I did. Ah, well, young men will be young men."
Neither Valentine nor Lilias knew why they both flushed up hotly, and left a wider space between them and Valentine's handsome father.
He did not take the least notice of this movement on both their parts, but went on in a very smooth, cheerful voice.
"Perhaps Gerald does not miss as much as he thought," he said. "Since I saw you this morning, Val, our programme has been completely altered. We go toCaptain Swiftto-morrow night. I went to the office and exchanged the box. To-night we go to the Gaiety. I have been fortunate in securing one of the best boxes in the whole house, andMonte Christo Junioris well worth seeing."
"I don't know that I particularly care for the Gaiety, father," said Valentine. "How very funny of you to change our programme."
"Well, the fact is, some business friends of mine who were just passing through town were particularly anxious to seeCaptain Swift, so as I could oblige them, I did. It is all the better for your husband, Valentine; he won't miss this fine piece of drama."
"No, that is something to be thankful for," responded Valentine. "But I'm sorry you selected the Gaiety as an exchange. I don't think Lilias will care forMonte Christo. However, it can't be helped now, and dinner waits. Shall we go downstairs?"
Mr. Paget and his party were in good time in their places. Valentine took a seat rather far back in the box, but her father presently coaxed her to come to the front, supplied both her and Lilias with opera glasses, and encouraged both girls to look about them, and watch the different people who were gradually filing into their places in the stalls.
Mr. Paget himself neither wore glasses nor aided his vision with an opera glass. His face was slightly flushed, and his eyes, keen and bright, travelled round the house, taking in everything, not passing over a single individual.
Valentine was never particularly curious about her neighbors, and as Lilias knew no one, they both soon leant back in their chairs, and talked softly to one another.
The curtain rose, and each girl bent forward to see and enjoy. The rest of the house was now comparatively dark, but just before the lights were lowered, Mr. Paget might have been heard to give a faint quick sigh of relief.
A tall girl in cream-color and soft furs walked slowly down the length of stalls, and took her place in such a position that Valentine could scarcely look down without seeing her. This girl's beauty was so marked that many eyes were turned in her direction as she appeared. Shewas very regal looking, very quiet and dignified in manner. Her features were classical and pure in outline, and her head, with its wealth of raven black hair, was splendidly set.
She was accompanied by a tall, fairly good-looking man who sat next to her.
When the curtain rose and the lights were lowered the stall at her other side was vacant.
Mr. Paget felt his heart beat a trifle too fast. Would that stall be full or empty when the curtain dropped at the close of the first act? Would his heart's desire, his wicked and treacherous heart's desire be torn from him in the very moment of apparent fruition. Suppose Gerald did not put in an appearance at the Gaiety? Suppose at the eleventh hour he changed his mind and resolved to leave Esther Helps to her fate? Suppose—pshaw!—where was the use of supposing? To leave a girl to her fate would not be his chivalrous fool of a son-in-law's way. No, it was all right; even now he could dimly discern a faint commotion in the neighborhood of Esther Helps—the kind of commotion incident on the arrival of a fresh person, the gentle soft little movement made by the other occupants of the stalls to let the new comer, who was both late and tiresome, take his reserved seat in comfort. Mr. Paget sank back in his seat with a sensation of relief; he had not listened for nothing behind an artfully concealed curtain that morning.
The play proceeded. Much as he had said about it beforehand, it had no interest for Mr. Paget. He scarcely troubled to look at the stage. There was no room in his heart that moment for burlesque: he was too busily engaged over his own terrible life's drama. On the result of this night more or less depended all his future happiness.
"If she turns back to me after what she sees to-night then I can endure," he said to himself. "I can go onto the bitter end—if not—well, there are more expedients than one for a ruined man to throw up the sponge."
The curtain fell, the theatre was in a blaze of light; Valentine and Lilias sank back in their seats and began to fan themselves. They had been pleased and amused. Lilias, indeed, had laughed so heartily that the tears came to her eyes.
"I hate to cry when I laugh," she said, taking out her handkerchief to wipe them away. "It's a tiresome trick we all have in our family, Gerald and all."
She had a habit of bringing in Gerald's name whenever she spoke of her family, as if he were the topmost stone, the crowning pride and delight.
Mr. Paget had his back slightly turned to the girls. Once more he was devouring the stalls with his eager bright eyes. Yes, Gerald Wyndham was in his stall. He was leaning back, not exerting himself much; he looked nonchalant and strikingly handsome. Mr. Paget did not wish him to appear too nonchalant when Valentine first caught sight of him. No—ah, that was better. Esther was turning to speak to him. By Jove, what a face the girl had!
Mr. Paget had often seen Helps' only daughter, for he found it convenient occasionally to call to see Helps at Acadia Villa. But he had never before seen her dress becomingly, and he was positively startled at the pure, high type of her beauty. At this distance her common accent, her poor uneducated words, could not grate. All her gestures were graceful; she looked up at Gerald, said something, smiled, then lowered her heavy black lashes.
It was at that moment, just as Wyndham was bending forward to reply to her remark, and she was leaning slightly away from her other cavalier, so that he scarcely seemed to belong to her party, that Valentine, tired of doing nothing, came close to her father, and allowed her eyes to wander round the house. Suddenly she uttered a surprised exclamation.
"Look, father, look! Is that Gerald? Who is with him? Who is he talking to? How is it that he comes to be here? Yes, it is Gerald! Oh, what a lovely girl he is talking to!"
Valentine's words were emphatic and slightly agitated, for she was simply overpowered with astonishment, but they were spoken in a low key. Lilias did not hear them. She was reading her programme over for the twentieth time, and wondering when the curtain would rise and the play go on.
"Look, father," continued Valentine, clutching her father's arm. "Isn't that Gerald? How strange of him to be here. Who can he be talking to? I don't know her—do you? Do you see him, father? Won't you go down and tell him we are here, and bring him up—and—and—the lady who is with him. Go, please, father, you see where he is, don't you?"
"I do, my child. I have seen him for some time past. Would you like to come home, Valentine?"
"Home! What in the world do you mean? How queer you look! Is there anything wrong? Who is with Gerald? Who is he talking to? How lovely she is. I wish she would look up again."
"That girl is not a lady, Valentine. She is Esther Helps—you have heard of her. Yes, now I understand why your husband could not come with us to the Haymarket to-night. My poor child! Don't look at them again. Valentine, my darling."
Valentine looked full into her father's eyes; full, long, and steadily she gazed. Then slowly, very slowly, a crimson flood of color suffused her whole face; it receded, leaving her deathly pale. She moved away from her father and took a back seat behind Lilias.
The curtain rose again, the play continued. Lilias was excited, and wanted to pull Valentine to the front.
"No," she said. "My head aches; I don't care to look any more."
She sat back in her seat, very white and very calm.
"Would you like to come home?" said her father, bending across to her, and speaking in a voice which almost trembled with the emotion he felt.
"No," she said in reply, and without raising her eyes. "I will sit the play out till the end."
When the curtain fell again she roused herself with an effort and coaxed Lilias to come into the back of the box with her. The only keen anxiety she was conscious of was to protect her husband from Lilias' astonished eyes.
Mr. Paget felt well satisfied. He had managed to convey his meaning to his innocent child's heart; an insinuation, a fall of the voice, a look in the eyes, had opened up a gulf on the brink of which Valentine drew back shuddering.
"I was only beginning to love him; it doesn't so much matter," she said many times to herself. Even now she thought no very bad things of her husband; that is no very bad things according to the world's code. To her, however, they were black. He had deceived her—he had made her a promise and broken it. Why? Because he liked to spend the evening with another girl more beautiful than herself.
"Oh, no, I am not jealous," said Valentine, softly under her breath. "I won't say anything to him either about it, poor fellow. It does not matter to me, not greatly. I was only beginning to love him. Thank God there is always my dear old father."
When the curtain rose for the final act of the play. Valentine moved her chair so that she could slightly lean against Mr. Paget. He took her hand and squeezed it. He felt that he had won the victory.
Gerald had found his task most uncongenial. In the first place he was disappointed at not spending the evening with Valentine and Lilias. In the second the close proximity of such a girl as Esther Helps could not but be repugnant to him. Still she was a woman, a woman in danger, and her father had appealed to him to save her. Had he been ordained for the Church, such work—ah, no, he must not think of what his life would have been then. After all, it was good of the distracted father to trust him, and he must not betray the trust.
He went to the theatre and acquitted himself with extreme tact and diplomacy. When Gerald chose to exert himself his manner had a quieting effect, a compelling, and almost a commanding effect on women. Esther became quiet and gentle; she talked to Captain Herriot, but not noisily; she laughed, her laugh was low and almost musical. Now and then her quick eyes glanced at Wyndham; she felt thirsty for even his faintest approval—he bestowed it by neither word nor movement.
As they were leaving the theatre, however, and the gallant captain, who inwardly cursed that insufferable prig who happened to have a slight acquaintance with his beautiful Esther, grew cheerful under the impression that now his time for enjoyment was come, Gerald said in a low, grave voice:—
"Your father has given me a letter for you. Pray be quiet, don't excite yourself. It is necessary that you should go to your father directly. Allow me to see you into a cab. Your father is waiting for you—it is urgent that you should join him at once."
Scarcely knowing why she did it, Esther obeyed. She murmured some eager agitated words to Captain Herriot; she was subdued, frightened, shaken; as Gerald helped her into a cab he felt her slim fingers tremble in his. He took his seat upon the box beside the driver, and ten minutes later had delivered Esther safely to her father. His task was done, he did not wait to hear a word of Helps' profuse thanks. He drew a sigh of relief as he hurried home. Soon he would be with his wife—the wife whom he idolized—the wife who was beginning to return his love. Suppose her passion went on and deepened? Suppose a day came when to part from him would be a sorer trial than poverty or dishonor! Oh, if such a day came—he might—ah, he must not think in that direction. He pushed his hand through his thick hair, leant back in his cab, and shut his eyes.
When he reached the little house in Park-lane he found that the lights in the drawing-room were out, and the gas turned low in the hall. He was later even than he had intended to be. The other theatre-goers had returned home and gone to bed. He wondered how they had enjoyedCaptain Swift. For himself he had not the least idea of what he had been looking at at the Gaiety.
He let himself in with a latch-key, and ran up at once to his room. He wanted to kiss Valentine, to look into her eyes, which seemed to him to grow sweeter and softer every day. He opened the door eagerly and looked round the cheerful bedroom.
Valentine was not there.
He called her. She was not in the dressing-room.
"She is with Lilias," he said to himself. "How these two young things love to chatter."
He sat down in an easy chair by the fire, content to wait until his wife should return. He was half inclined to tell her what he had been doing; he had a great longing to confide in her in all possible ways, for she had both brains and sense, but he restrained himself. The subject was not one he cared to discuss with his young wife, and, besides, the secret belonged to Esther and to her father.
He made up his mind to say nothing about it. He had no conception then what this silence was to cost him, and how different all his future life might have been had he told his wife the truth that night.
Presently Valentine returned. Her face was flushed, and her eyes had an unquiet troubled expression. She had been to Lilias with a somewhat strange request.
"Lilias, I want you to promise me something, to ask no questions, but just like a kind and truthful sister to make me a faithful promise."
"You look strange, Valentine; what do you want me to promise?"
"Willyou promise it?"
"If I can, I will promise, to please you; but I never make promises in the dark."
"Oh, there's Gerald's step, I must go. Lilias, I've a very particular reason, I cannot explain it to you. I want you not to tell Gerald, now or at any time, that we were at the Gaiety to-night."
"My dear Val, how queer! Why shouldn't poor Gerald know? And you look so strange. You are trembling."
"I am. I'm in desperate earnest. Will you promise?"
"Yes, yes, you silly child, if you set such store on an utterly ridiculous promise you shall have it. Only if I were you, Valentine, I wouldn't begin even to have such tiny little secrets as that from my husband. I wouldn't, Val; it isn't wise—it isn't really."
Valentine neither heard nor heeded these last words. She gave Lilias a hasty, frantic kiss, and rushed back to her own room.
"Now," she said to herself, "now—now—now—if he tells me everything, every single thing, all may be well. I won't ask him a question; but if he tells, tells of his own accord, all may be quite well yet. Oh, how my heart beats! It is good I have not learned to love him anybetter."
Gerald rose up at her entrance and went to meet her eagerly.
"Ah, here's my bright little wife," he said. "Give me a kiss, Valentine."
She gave it, and allowed him to fold her in his arms. She was almost passive, but her heart beat hard—she was so eagerly waiting for him to speak.
"Sit down by the fire, darling. I don't like long evenings spent away from you, Val. How did you enjoyCaptain Swift?"
"We didn't go to the Haymarket; no, we are going to-morrow. Father thought it a pity you should miss such a good play."
"Then where did you go? You and Lil did not stay at home the whole evening?"
"No, father took us to another theatre. I can't tell you the name; don't ask me. I hate theatres—I detest them. I never want to go inside one again as long as I live!"
"How strongly you talk, my dear little Val. Perhaps you found it dull to-night because your husband was not with you."
She moved away with a slight little petulant gesture. When would he begin to speak?
Gerald wondered vaguely what had put his sweet-tempered Valentine out. He stirred the fire, and then stood with his back to it. She looked up at him, his face was very grave, very calm. Her own Gerald—he had a nice face. Surely there was nothing bad behind that face. Why was he silent? Why didn't he begin to tell his story? Well she would—she would—help him a little.
She cleared her throat, she essayed twice to find her voice. When it came out at last it was small and timorous.
"Was it—was it business kept you from coming withme to-night, Gerry?"
"Business? Yes, my darling, certainly."
Her heart went down with a great bound. But she would give him another chance.
"Was it—was it business connected with the office?"
"You speak in quite a queer voice, Valentine. In a measure it was business connected with the office—in a measure it was not. What is it, Valentine? What is it, my dear?"
She had risen from her seat, put her arms round his neck, and laid her soft young head on his shoulder.
"Tell me the business, Gerry, Tell your own Val."
He kissed her many times.
"It doesn't concern you, my dear wife," he said. "I would tell you gladly, were I not betraying a trust. I had some painful work to do to-night, Valentine. Yes, business, certainly. I cannot tell it, dear. Yes, what was that you said?"
For she had murmured "Hypocrite!" under her breath. Very low she had said it, too faintly for him to catch the word. But he felt her loving arms relax. He saw her face grow grave and cold, something seemed to go out of her eyes which had rendered them most lovely. It was the wounded soul going back into solitude, and hiding its grief and shame in an inmost recess of her being.
Would Gerald ever see the soul, the soul of love, in his wife's eyes again?
A few days after the events related in the last chapter Mr. Paget asked his son-in-law to have a few minutes' private conversation with him. Once more the young man found himself in that inner room at the rich merchant's office which represented more or less a torture-chamber to him. Once more Valentine's untroubled girlish innocent eyes looked out of Richmond's beautiful picture of her.
Wyndham hated this room, he almost hated that picture; it had surrounded itself with terrible memories. He turned his head away from it now as he obeyed Mr. Paget's summons.
"It's this, Gerald," said his father-in-law. "When a thing has to be done the sooner the better. I mean nobody cares to make a long operation of the drawing of a tooth for instance!"
"An insufficient metaphor," interrupted Wyndham roughly. "Say, rather, the plucking out of a right eye, or the cutting off a right hand. As you say, these operations had better be got quickly over."
"I think so—I honestly think so. It would convenience me if you sailed in theEsperanceon the 25th of March for Sydney. There is abonâ fidereason for your going. I want you to sample——"
"Hush," interrupted Wyndham. "The technicalities and the gloss and all that kind of humbug can come later. You want me to sail on the 25th of March. That is the main point. When last you spoke of it, I begged of you as a boon to give me an extension of grace, say until May or June. It was understood by us, although there was no sealed bond in the matter, that my wife and I should spend a year together before this—thistemporaryparting took place. I asked you at one time to shorten my season ofgrace, but a few weeks ago I asked you to extend it."
"Precisely, Wyndham, and I told you I would grant your wish, if possible. I asked you to announce to your own relatives that you would probably have to go away in March, for a time; but I said I would do my utmost to defer the evil hour. I am sorry to say that I cannot do so. I have had news from India which obliges me to hasten matters. Such a good opportunity as the business which takes you out in theEsperancewill probably not occur again. It would be madness not to avail ourselves of it. Do not you think so? My dear fellow, do take a chair."
"Thank you, I prefer to stand. This day—what is this day?" He raised his eyes; they rested on the office calendar. "This day is the 24th of February. A spring-like day, isn't it? Wonderful for the time of year. I have, then, one month and one day to live. Are these Valentine's violets? I will help myself to a few. Let me say good-morning, sir."
He bowed courteously—no one could be more courteous than Gerald Wyndham—and left the room.
His astonished father in-law almost gasped when he found himself alone.
"Upon my word," he said to himself, "there's something about that fellow that's positively uncanny. I only trust I'll be preserved from being haunted by his ghost. My God! what a retribution that would be. Wyndham would be awful as a ghost. I suppose I shall have retribution some day. I know I'm a wicked man. Hypocritical, cunning, devilish. Yes, I'm all that. Who'd have thought that soft-looking lad would turn out to be all steel and venom. I hate him—and yet, upon my soul, I admire him. He does more for the woman he loves than I do—than I could do. The womanwe both love. His wife—my child."
"There, I'll get soft myself if I indulge in these thoughts any longer. Now is the time for him to go. Valentinehas turned from him; any fool can see that. Now is the time to get him out of the way. How lucky that I overheard Helps that day. Never was there a more opportune thing."
Mr. Paget went home early that evening. Valentine was dining with him. Lately, within the last few weeks, she often came over alone to spend the evening with her father.
"Where's your husband, my pet?" the old man used to say to her on these occasions.
And she always answered him in a bright though somewhat hard little voice.
"Oh, Gerald is such a book-worm—he is devouring one of those abstruse treatises on music. I left him buried in it," or, "Gerald is going out this evening," or, "Gerald isn't well, and would like to stay quiet, so"—the end was invariably the same—"I thought I'd come and have a cosy chat with you, dad."
"And no one more welcome—no one in all the wide world more welcome," Mortimer Paget would answer, glancing, with apparent pleased unconcern, but with secret anxiety, at his daughter's face.
The glance always satisfied him; she looked bright and well—a little hard, perhaps—well, the blow must affect her in some way. What had taken place at the Gaiety would leave some results even on the most indifferent heart. The main result, however, was well. Valentine's dawning love had changed to indifference. Had she cared for her husband passionately, had her whole heart been given into his keeping, she must have been angry; she must have mourned.
As, evening after evening, Mr. Paget came to this conclusion, he invariably gave vent to a sigh of relief. He never guessed that if he could wear a mask, so also could his child. He never even suspected that beneath Valentine's gay laughter, under the soft shining of her clear eyes, under her smiles, her light easy words, lay a pain, lay an ache, which ceased not to trouble her day and night.
Mr. Paget came home early. Valentine was waiting for him in the drawing-room.
"We shall have a cosy evening, father," she said. "Oh, no, Gerald can't come. He says he has some letters to write. I think he has a headache, too. I'd have stayed with him, only he prefers being quiet. Well, we'll have a jolly evening together. Kiss me, dad."
He did kiss her, then she linked his hand in her arm, and they went downstairs and dined together, as they used to do in the old days before either of them had heard of Gerald Wyndham.
"Let us come into the library to-night," said Valentine. "You know there is no room like the library to me."
"Nor to me," said Mr. Paget brightly. "It reminds me of when you were a child, my darling."
"Ah, well, I'm not a child now, I'm a woman."
She kept back the sigh which rose to her lips.
"I think I like being a child best, only one never can have the old childish time back again."
"Who knows, Val? Perhaps we may. If you have spoiled your teeth enough over those filberts, shall we go into the library? I have something to tell you—a little bit of news."
"All right, you shall tell it sitting in your old armchair."
She flitted on in front, looking quite like the child she more or less still was.
"Now isn't this perfect?" she said, when the door was shut, Mr. Paget established in his armchair, and the two pairs of eyes fixed upon the glowing fire. "Isn't this perfect?"
"Yes, my darling—perfect. Valentine, there is no love in all the world like a father's for his child."
"No greater love has come to me," replied Valentine slowly; and now some of the pain at her heart, notwithstanding all her brave endeavors, did come into her face. "No greater love has come to me, but I can imagine, yes. I can imagine a mightier."
"What do you mean, child?"
"For instance—if you loved your husband perfectly, and he—he loved you, and there was nothing at all between—and the joy of all joys was to be with him, and you were to feel that in thought—in word—in deed—you were one, not two. There, what am I saying? The wildest nonsense. There isn't such a thing as a love of that sort. What's your news, father?"
"My dear child, how intensely you speak!"
"Never mind! Tell me what is your news, father."
Mr. Paget laughed, his laugh was not very comfortable.
"Has Gerald told you anything, Valentine?"
"Gerald? No, nothing special; he had a headache this evening."
"You know, Val—at least we often talked the matter over—that Gerald might have to go away for a time. He is my partner, and partners in such a firm as mine have often to go to the other side of the world to transact important business."
"Yes, you and Gerald have both spoken of it. He's not going soon, is he?"
"That's it, my pet. The necessity has arisen rather suddenly. Gerald has to sail for Sydney in about a month."
Valentine was sitting a little behind her father. He could not see the pallor of her face; her voice was quite clear and quiet.
"Poor old Gerry," she said; "he won't take me, will he, father?"
"Impossible, my dear—absolutely. You surely don't want togo."
"No, not particularly."
Valentine yawned with admirable effect.
"She really can't care for him at all. What a wonderful piece of luck," muttered her father.
"I daresay Gerald will enjoy Sydney," continued his wife. "Is he likely to be long away?"
"Perhaps six months—perhaps not so long. Time is always a matter of some uncertainty in cases of this kind."
"I could come back to you while he is away, couldn't I, dad?"
"Why, of course, my dear one, I always intended that. It would be old times over again—old times over again for you and your father, Valentine."
"Not quite, I think," replied Valentine. "We can't go back really. Things happen, and we can't undo them. Do you know, father, I think Gerald must have infected me with his headache. If you don't mind, I'll go home."
Mr. Paget saw his daughter back to Park-lane, but he did not go into the house. Valentine rang the bell, and when Masters opened the door she asked him where her husband was.
"In the library, ma'am; you can hear him can't you? He's practising of the violin."
Yes, the music of this most soul-speaking, soul-stirring instrument filled the house. Valentine put her finger to her lips to enjoin silence, and went softly along the passage which led to the library. The door was a little ajar—she could look in without being herself seen. Some sheets of music were scattered about on the table, but Wyndham was not playing from any written score. The queer melody which he called Waves was filling the room. Valentine had heard it twice before—she started and clasped her hands as its passion, its unutterable sadness, its despair, reached her. Where were the triumph notes which had come into it six weeks ago?
She turned and fled up to her room, and locking the door, threw herself by her bedside and burst into bitter weeping.
"Oh, Gerald, I love you! I do love you; but I'll never show it. No, never, until you tell me the truth."
"Yes," said Augusta Wyndham, "if there is a young man who suits me all round it's Mr. Carr. Yes," she said, standing very upright in her short skirts, with her hair in a tight pig-tail hanging down her back, and her determined, wide open, bright eyes fixed upon an admiring audience of younger sisters. "He suits me exactly. He's a kind of hail-fellow-well-met; he has no nonsensical languishing airs about him; he preaches nice short sermons, and never bothers you to remember what they are about afterwards; he's not bad at tennis or cricket, and he really can cannon quite decently at billiards; but for all that, ifyouthink, you young 'uns, that he's going to get inside of Gerry, or that he's going to try to pretend to know better than Gerry what I can or can't do, why you're all finely mistaken, so there!"
Augusta turned on her heel, pirouetted a step or two, whistled in a loud, free, unrestrained fashion, and once more faced her audience.
"Gerry said that Icouldgive out the library books. Now is it likely that Mr. Carr knows more of my capacities after six months' study than Gerry found out after fifteen years?"
"But Mr. Carr doesn't studyyou, Gus. It's Lilias he's always looking at," interrupted little Rosie.
"You're not pretty, are you, Gus?" asked Betty. "Your cheeks are too red, aren't they? And nurse says your eyes are as round as an owl's!"
"Pretty!" answered Augusta, in a lofty voice. "Who cares for being pretty? Who cares for being simply pink and white? I'm for intellect. I'm for the march of mind. Gerry believes in me. Hurrah for Gerry! Now, girls, off with your caps, throw them in the air, and shout hurrahfor Gerry three times, as loud as you can!"
"What an extraordinary noise the children are making on the lawn," said Lilias to Marjory. "I hear Gerald's name. What can they be saying about Gerald? One would almost think he was coming down the avenue to see the state of excitement they are in! Do look, Meg, do."
"It's only one of Gussie's storms in a tea-cup," responded Marjory, cheerfully. "I am so glad, Lil, that you found Gerald and Val hitting it off so nicely. You consider them quite a model pair for affection and all that, don't you, pet?"
"Quite," said Lilias. "My mind is absolutely at rest. One night Val puzzled me a little. Oh, nothing to speak of—nothing came of it, I mean. Yes, my mind is absolutely at rest, thank God! What are all the children doing. Maggie? They are flying in a body to the house. What can it mean?"
"We'll know in less than no time," responded Marjory, calmly. And they did.
Four little girls, all out of breath, all dressed alike, all looking alike, dashed into the drawing-room, and in one breath poured out the direful intelligence that Augusta had mutinied.
"Mr. Carr forbade her to give away the library books," they said, "and she has gone up now to the school-room in spite of him. She's off; she said Gerry said she might do it, long ago. Isn't it awful of her? She says beauty's nothing, and she's only going to obey Gerry," continued Betty. "What shall we do? She'll give all the books away wrong, and Mr. Carr will be angry."
They all paused for want of breath. Rosie went up and laid her fat red hand on Lilias' knee.
"I said it was you he stared at," she remarked. "Youwouldn't like him to be vexed, would you?"
The words had scarcely passed her lips before the door was opened, and the object of the children's universal commiseration entered. A deep and awful silence took possession of them. Lilias clutched Rosie's hand, and felt an inane desire to rush from the room with her.
Too late. The terrible infant flew to Adrian Carr, and clasping her arms around his legs, looked up into his face.
"Never mind," she said, "itiswrong of Gussie, but it isn't Lilias' fault. She wouldn't like to vex you, 'cause you stare so at her."
"Nursie says that you admire Lilias; do you?" asked Betty.
"Oh, poor Gussie!" exclaimed the others, their interest in Lilias and Carr being after all but a very secondary matter. "We all do hope you won't do anything dreadful to her. You can, you know. You can excommunicate her, can't you?"
"But what has Augusta done?" exclaimed Carr, turning a somewhat flushed face in the direction not of Lilias, but of Marjory. "What a frightful confusion—and what does it mean?"
Marjory explained as well as she was able. Carr had lately taken upon himself to overhaul the books of the lending library. He believed in literature as a very elevating lever, but he thought that books should not only be carefully selected in the mass, but in lending should be given with a special view to the needs of the individual who borrowed. Before Gerald's marriage Marjory had given away the books, but since then, for various reasons, they had drifted into Augusta's hands, and through their means this rather spirited and daring young lady had been able to inflict a small succession of mild tyrannies. For instance, poor Miss Yates, the weak-eyed and weak-spirited village dressmaker, was dosed with a series of profound and dull theology; and Macallister, the sexton and shoemaker, a canny Scot, who looked upon all fiction as the "work ofthe de'il," was put into a weekly passion with the novels of Charles Reade and Wilkie Collins.
These were extreme cases, but Augusta certainly had the knack of giving the wrong book to the wrong person. Carr heard mutterings and grumbling. The yearly subscriptions of a shilling a piece diminished, and he thought it full time to take the matter in hand. He himself would distribute the village literature every Saturday, at twelve o'clock.
The day and the hour arrived, and behold Miss Augusta Wyndham had forestalled him, and was probably at this very moment putting "The Woman in White" into the enraged Macallister's hand. Carr's temper was not altogether immaculate; he detached the children's clinging hands from his person, and said he would pursue the truant, publicly take the reins of authority from her, and send her home humiliated. He left the rectory, walking fast, and letting his annoyance rather increase than diminish, for few young men care to be placed in a ridiculous situation, and he could not but feel that such was his in the present instance.
The school-house was nearly half a mile from the rectory, along a straight and dusty piece of road; very dusty it was to-day, and a cutting March east wind blew in Carr's face and stung it. He approached the school-house—no, what a relief—the patient aspirants after literature were most of them waiting outside. Augusta, then, could not have gone into the school-room.
"Has Miss Augusta Wyndham gone upstairs?" he asked of a rosy-cheeked girl who adored the "Sunday At Home."
"No, please, sir. Mr. Gerald's come, please, Mr. Carr, sir," raising two eyes which nearly blazed with excitement. "He shook 'ands with me, he did, and with Old Ben, there; and Miss Augusta, she give a sort of a whoop, and she had her arms round his neck, and was a-hugging of him before us all, and they has gone down through the fieldsto the rectory."
"About the books," said Carr; "has Miss Augusta given you the books?"
"Bless your 'eart, sir," here interrupted Old Ben, "we ain't of a mind for books to-day. Mr. Gerald said he'd come up this evening to the Club, and have a chat with us all, and Sue and me, we was waiting here to tell the news. Litteratoor ain't in our line to-day, thank you, sir."
"Here's Mr. Macallister," said Sue. "Mr. Macallister. Mr. Gerald's back. He is, truly. I seen him, and so did Old Ben."
"And he'll be at the Club to-night," said Ben, turning his wrinkled face upwards towards the elongated visage of the canny Scot.
"The Lord be praised for a' His mercies," pronounced Macallister, slowly, with an upward wave of his hand, as if he were returning thanks for a satisfying meal. "Na, na. Mr. Carr, na books the day."
Finding that his services were really useless, Carr went away. The villagers were slowly collecting from different quarters, and all faces were broadening into smiles, and all the somewhat indifferent sleepy tones becoming perceptibly brighter, and Gerald Wyndham's name was passed from lip to lip. Old Miss Bates wiped her tearful eyes, as she hurried home to put on her best cap. Widow Simpkins determined to make up a good fire in her cottage, and not to spare the coals; the festive air was unmistakeable. Carr felt smitten with a kind of envy. What wonders could not Wyndham have effected in this place, he commented, as he walked slowly back to his lodgings. Later in the day he called at the rectory to find the hero surrounded by his adoring family, and bearing his honors gracefully.
Gerald was talking rather more than his wont; for some reason or other his face had more color than usual, his eyes were bright, he smiled, and even laughed. Lilias ceased to watch him anxiously, a sense of jubilation filled the breast of every worshipping sister, and no one thought of parting or sorrow.
Perhaps even Gerald himself forgot the bitterness which lay before him just then; perhaps his efforts were not all efforts, and that he really felt some of the old home peace and rest with its sustaining power.
You can know a thing and yet not always realize it. Gerald knew that he should never spend another Saturday in the old rectory of Jewsbury-on-the-Wold. That Lilias' bright head and Lilias' tender, steadfast earnest eyes would be in future only a memory. He could never hope again to touch that hair, or answer back the smile on that beloved and happy face. The others, too—but Lilias, after his wife, was most dear of all living creatures to Gerald. Well, he must not think; he resolved to take all the sweetness, if possible, out of this Saturday and Sunday. He resolved not to tell any of his people of the coming parting until just before he left.
The small sisters squatted in a semicircle on the floor round their hero; Augusta, as usual, stood behind him, keeping religious guard of the back of his head.
"If there is a thing I simply adore," that vigorous young lady was often heard to say, "it's the back of Gerry's head."
Lilias sat at his feet, her slim hand and arm lying across his knee; Marjory flitted about, too restless and happy to be quiet, and the tall rector stood on the hearthrug with his back to the fire.
"It is good to be home again," said Gerald. Whereupon a sigh of content echoed from all the other throats, and it was at this moment that Carr came into the room.
"Come in, Carr, come in," said the rector. "There's a place for you, too. You're quite like one of thefamily, you know. Oh, of course you are, my dear fellow, of course you are. We have got my son back, unexpectedly. Gerald, you know Carr, don't you."
Gerald stood up, gave Carr's hand a hearty grip, and offered him his chair.
"Oh, not that seat, Gerry," groaned Augusta, "it's the only one in the room I can stand at comfortably. I can't fiddle with your curls if I stand at the back of any other chair."
Gerald patted her cheek.
"Then perhaps, Carr, you'll oblige Augusta by occupying another chair. I am sorry that I am obliged to withhold the most comfortable from you."
Carr was very much at home with the Wyndhams by now. He pulled forward a cane chair, shook his head at Augusta, and glanced almost timidly at Lilias. He feared the eight sharp eyes of the younger children if he did more than look very furtively, but she made such a sweet picture just then that his eyes sought hers by a sort of fascination. For the first time, too, he noticed that she had a look of Gerald. Her face lacked the almost spiritualized expression of his, but undoubtedly there was a likeness.
The voices, interrupted for a moment by the curate's entrance, soon resumed their vigorous flow.
"Why didn't you bring my dear little sister Valentine down, Gerald?" It was Lilias who spoke.
He rewarded her loving speech by a flash, half of pleasure, half of pain in his eyes. Aloud he said:—
"We thought it scarcely worth while for both of us to come. I must go away again on Monday."
A sepulchral groan from Augusta. Rosie, Betty and Joan exclaimed almost in a breath:—
"And we like you much better by yourself."
"Oh, hush, children," said Marjory. "We are all very fond of Val."
"You have brought a great deal of delight into the village. Wyndham," said Carr, and he related the little scene which had taken place around the school-house. "I'd give a good deal to be even half as popular," he said with a sigh.
"You might give all you possessed in all the world, and you wouldn't succeed," snapped Gussie.
"Augusta, you really are too rude," said Lilias with a flush on her face.
"No, I'm not, Lil. Oh, you needn't stare at me. I like him, and he knows it," nodding with her head in the direction of Adrian Carr; "but you have to be born in a place, and taught to walk in it, and you have had to steal apples in it and eggs out of birds' nests, and to get nearly drowned when fishing, and to get some shot in your ankle, and you've got to know every soul in all the country round, and to come back from school to them in the holidays, and for them first to see your moustache coming; and then, beyond and above all that, you've got just to beGerry, to have his way of looking, and his way of walking, and his way of shaking your hand, and to have his voice and his heart, to be loved as well. So howcouldMr. Carr expect it?"
"Bravo, Augusta," said Adrian Carr. "I'd like you for a friend better than any girl I know."
"Please, Gerry, tell us a story," exclaimed the younger children. They did not want Augusta to have all the talking.
"Let it be about a mouse, and a cricket on the hearth, and a white elephant, and a roaring bull, and a grizzly bear."
"And let the ten little nigger-boys come into it," said Betty.
"And Bo-Peep," said Rosie.
"And the Old Man who wouldn't say his prayers," exclaimed Joan.
"And let it last for hours," exclaimed they all.
Gerald begged the rest of the audience to go away, but they refused to budge an inch. So the story began. All the characters appeared in due order; it lasted a long time, and everybody was delighted.