Part 1, Chapter XV.

Part 1, Chapter XV.The Prodigal Sons.To look at the red-brick gabled rectory, with its rose and wistaria-covered trellis-work, the latter at its season one mass of lovely pendent lavender racemes, and the former in some form or other brightening the house with blossoms all the year round, it might have been thought that it was the home of peace and constant content. The surrounding gardens were a model of beauty, the Rector sparing no expense to make them perfect in their way; but he had long enough before found that beauty of garden and choicest interior surroundings would not bring him peace.His first great trouble had been the illness of his wife, who, after the birth of Cynthia, had for years and years been taken to this famous specialist, to that celebrated physician, and from both to springs all over the Continent, till, finding no relief, Mr Mallow had yielded to the suffering woman’s prayer.“It is hopeless, dear,” she had said, with a calm look of resignation in her pensive eyes. “Let us go home, and I will pray for strength to bear my lot.”They returned then, and it was for her sake that the garden was made to bloom with flowers, and the hothouses to produce the most delicious fruits. Their income was large from private resources, while the Lawford living was good, so that all that money could bring to alleviate the suffering woman’s trouble was there, and the Rector was almost constantly at her side.But Fate, as has been said, who had endowed the Rev. Eli Mallow with wealth, a handsome presence, and with good intellect, had not been chary in the matter of what commercial people term set-offs. Trouble besides his wife’s sickness came upon him thickly, principally in the persons of his handsome, manly-looking sons.Frank had been a difficulty from childhood. He had not been more spoilt than most boys are, though certainly his invalid mother had been most indulgent; but there was a moral bias by nature in his disposition, which somehow seemed to make him, just as he was apparently going straight for a certain goal, turn right off in a very unpleasantly-rounded curve.Quite early in his youth he had to be recalled, to save expulsion from a certain school, on account of his heading a series of raids upon various orchards, and in defiance of divers corrections on the principal’s part.He had to return home from his two next schools for various offences against their rules, and finally his college career came to an end with rustication.Frank laughed, and said that he did not know how it was. One thing, he said, was evident: he was not cut out for the church, and he would not go back to college when the term of his rustication was at an end.A clerkship was obtained for him then, through great interest, in the Treasury, and here for three or four years he got along pretty well, the confinement not being great, and the number of friends he met with being of a character to suit his taste.There were bounds, though, even in those days, to the limits accorded to a gentlemanly clerk of good birth, and when Frank took to absenting himself from the office for a week at a time, matters became serious.For the first time or two the plea of illness was accepted, but when another absence occurred, also from illness, and Mr Frank Mallow was seen by his superiors riding a showy-looking hack in the park, and was known to have given a bachelors’ party in the same week, to which several fellow-clerks were invited, it became necessary to hint to the peccant youth that the next time he was unwell, a certificate to that effect would be necessary from some well-known medical man.Frank was ill again, so he sent in word to the office, and stayed away for another week, after which, on presenting himself, he received a warning—one which he bore in mind for a couple of months, and then his head must have once more been very bad, for there was a fresh absence, and this endured so long that Frank’s seat in the Treasury knew him no more.“Well, it don’t matter, mother,” he said. “It was a wretched set-out, and I was sick of the eternal copying.”“But it was such a pity, dear,” his mother said, in a tone of remonstrance.“Pity? Stuff! Eighty pounds a year, and a rise of ten pounds annually! Not bricklayer’s wages, and all the time people think it’s such a tremendous thing to be a Treasury clerk.”“Poor papa is so vexed and grieved, for he took such pains to get you the appointment.”“Then poor papa must get pleased again,” said the young man, petulantly. “I cannot, and I will not, stand a clerk’s desk. I’d sooner enlist.”“Frank!” cried his mother, reproachfully.“Well, I declare I would, mother,” he said, thrusting his hands into his pockets, and walking up and down the room.“To find freedom?” said his mother, with a smile.“Oh! I dare say there would be discipline to attend to, and officers to obey; but there would be some change. I should not have to be tied down to a wretched writing-table, copy, copy, copy, the whole day long.”“Change?” said Mrs Mallow, and she gazed wistfully in her son’s face.“Yes, of course; one must have some excitement.”He stood gazing out of the window, and did not notice the strange despairing look in his mother’s eyes, one which seemed to tell of her own weary hours—weary years, passed upon that couch, with no hope of change save that of some day sinking into the eternal rest. It was evident that she was contrasting the selfishness of her son and his position with her own, and she sighed as she closed her eyes and lay there in silence for a time, uttering no reproach.Then came the day when the Rector was goaded almost to madness by the young man’s follies, and the reports constantly reaching his ears of Frank’s exploits at the principal hotel in billiard-playing and various unsavoury pursuits with one or other of the young farmers round. Reports these that lost nothing doubtless in the telling, and which never failed to reach the Rector in a way that seemed to suggest that he was answerable for his son’s misdoings.Then followed other troubles, culminating in an affray with the keepers, an affair which, from the family friendship with old Lord Artingale, could easily have been hushed up; but the Rector jumped at the opportunity he found in his son’s dread and evident anxiety to get away from the neighbourhood, so quite in a hurry Frank was shipped off to New Zealand.And there was peace at the Rectory? Nothing of the kind. There was the misery of hearing endless little stories of Frank’s “carryings on,” as they were termed; some bill was constantly being brought to the house, with a request that the Rector would pay it, and, to hide his son’s disgrace, this he sometimes did. But the annoyance was none the less, and the Rector used to declare plaintively to his wife that if it were not for Julia and Cynthia he would run right away.“And for me, Eli,” said the suffering woman, with a smile.“And for you, dear,” he said, tenderly, and there was peace until some new peccadillo of the eldest son was discovered.Then to the Rector’s dismay he found that Cyril—his mother’s darling—seemed to have taken a leaf out of his brother’s book. If the younger brother’s career had been to run upon a tram-line laid down by his elder brother, he could not have followed in the course more truly, and just as the Rector was beginning to feel calmed down and happy in the society of his two pretty daughters, troubles concerning Cyril kept cropping up.“Nice chaps for a parson’s sons,” said Jabez Fullerton, the principal draper at Lawford, who could afford to speak out, as Mrs Mallow and her daughters sent to Swan and Edgar’s for everything. And he did speak out; for, as deacon at his chapel and occasional preacher, he never lost an opportunity of saying a few words by way of practice.“Nice chaps for a parson’s sons! This is the sort of stuff they send to college, and then send back to teach us, in their surplices which we have to pay for the washing of, though we never go to church. Nice fellows they’ll be to preach sermons—out of books too—read ’em. We at chapel never read our sermons, eh?”There was a murmur of acquiescence here, and Mr Jabez Fullerton felt happy.Not that the Rev. Eli Mallow had thought of making his sons clergymen after testing them for a short time. Cyril had, like his brother, been to college, and with a view to his succeeding to the living of Lawford, but, as in the case of Frank, the Rector soon gave him up in despair.Matters grew worse; then worse still. Expostulation, prayer, anger, all were tried in vain, and, having to bear the trouble to a great extent in silence, so as to hide it from the sick mother, who idolised Cyril, the Rector was at times almost beside himself.At last there came a crash, and the Rector determined to get this son away before something worse should result.Emigration was being much talked of just then, and plenty of young men were going out to the various colonies to commence life as squatters both in the far east and west. A couple of the young farmers of the neighbourhood of Lawford were about to start, and, after a stormy scene with his father, Cyril came one day to propose that he should be furnished with a little capital and an outfit, so that he could go and try his luck in Australia.For a few moments the Rev. Eli Mallow was aghast at the idea. He wished Cyril to leave the town, but not to go abroad.“I don’t care where I go,” said Cyril; “I’ll either try Australia, or go and hunt out Frank and chum with him.”“But we don’t know where he is,” said the Rector.“New Zealand.”“Yes, but New Zealand is large.”“Not so large but what a fellow might find out Frank. Everyone would know him.”The Rector sighed, and wished his sons were not so popular with a certain class, and then he thought over the position, and shrank from giving his consent. Knowing the mother’s intense love for her son, he felt that the parting would nearly break her heart, and after a few moments’ pause he said so.“Oh, you need not fidget about that,” said the young man. “I’ve talked to her about it for days past.”“And what does she say?”“Well, it upset her a bit at first, but she soon came round, and she thinks it would be the best thing I could do.”It was then with a sense of relief that made him feel ashamed, that the father, after a liberal endowment of money, saw his son sent from Liverpool, after the heartiest promises on the part of the young man to do battle with life and make himself a name and a position in the colony.“If not for my sake, Cyril, for your mother’s,” the father had said, as he held his son’s hand upon the deck of the Great Central liner.“Depend upon me this time, father,” was the earnest reply, and Cyril went his way across the sea, fully believing in himself that his wild oats were sown, and that now he was about to make a position of substantial basis for himself.It was a strange thing, and as if a curious kind of clairvoyance made him prophetic, for the Rev. Eli Mallow went home, and that evening busied himself over his next Sunday’s sermon, involuntarily choosing the parable of the Prodigal Son, and not waking up to the fact of what he had done till he sat there in his study reading the manuscript over by the light of his shaded lamp.“Give me the portion of goods that falleth to me,” he muttered in a low voice, as, with the manuscript in his hand, he sat gazing straight before him into the darker part of the room, and then became silent.“And took his journey into a far country,” he muttered again, in the same dreamy abstracted manner, and then there was a longer pause, followed by a deep sigh.The Rev. Eli Mallow rose slowly from his seat, and, with an agonised look in his face, walked up and down the room for some time before sinking back into his chair.“And there wasted his substance with riotous living.”It did not seem to be his voice that spoke in the silence of that room; but he knew it was his that exclaimed piteously as the king of old—“Ah, Cyril, my son, my son!” Again there was absolute silence in that room, till, quoting once more from the parable which he had made the subject of his discourse, the Rector said softly—“Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.”“Yes, and I should forgive him,” he continued, after a pause. “I do try to practise as I preach. Poor Cyril! poor wilful boy. I pray heaven that my thoughts have been doing thee wrong.”There was a gentle smile upon his lips then as he took the manuscript of his sermon and tore it up into very small pieces before consigning it to the waste-paper basket.“No,” he said, “I must not preach a sermon such as that: it is too prophetic of my own position with my sons;” and as we know this prodigal did return penniless, having worked his way back in a merchant brig, to present himself one day at the rectory in tarry canvas trousers, with blackened horny hands and a reckless defiant look in his eyes that startled the quiet people of the place.He made no reference as to his having wasted his substance; he talked not of sin, and he alluded in nowise to forgiveness, to being made as one of his father’s hired servants, but took his place coolly enough once more in the house, and if no fatted calf was killed, and no rejoicings held, he was heartily welcomed and forgiven once again.He was his mother’s favourite, and truly, in spite of all, there was forgiveness ready in the father’s heart. As there was also for Frank, who after some years’ silence had suddenly walked in at the rectory gates, rough-looking and boisterous, but not in such a condition as his brother, who had quite scandalised the men-servants, neatly clad in the liveries, of which a new supply had come from London, greatly to the disgust of Smithson in the market-place, who literally scowled at every seam.

To look at the red-brick gabled rectory, with its rose and wistaria-covered trellis-work, the latter at its season one mass of lovely pendent lavender racemes, and the former in some form or other brightening the house with blossoms all the year round, it might have been thought that it was the home of peace and constant content. The surrounding gardens were a model of beauty, the Rector sparing no expense to make them perfect in their way; but he had long enough before found that beauty of garden and choicest interior surroundings would not bring him peace.

His first great trouble had been the illness of his wife, who, after the birth of Cynthia, had for years and years been taken to this famous specialist, to that celebrated physician, and from both to springs all over the Continent, till, finding no relief, Mr Mallow had yielded to the suffering woman’s prayer.

“It is hopeless, dear,” she had said, with a calm look of resignation in her pensive eyes. “Let us go home, and I will pray for strength to bear my lot.”

They returned then, and it was for her sake that the garden was made to bloom with flowers, and the hothouses to produce the most delicious fruits. Their income was large from private resources, while the Lawford living was good, so that all that money could bring to alleviate the suffering woman’s trouble was there, and the Rector was almost constantly at her side.

But Fate, as has been said, who had endowed the Rev. Eli Mallow with wealth, a handsome presence, and with good intellect, had not been chary in the matter of what commercial people term set-offs. Trouble besides his wife’s sickness came upon him thickly, principally in the persons of his handsome, manly-looking sons.

Frank had been a difficulty from childhood. He had not been more spoilt than most boys are, though certainly his invalid mother had been most indulgent; but there was a moral bias by nature in his disposition, which somehow seemed to make him, just as he was apparently going straight for a certain goal, turn right off in a very unpleasantly-rounded curve.

Quite early in his youth he had to be recalled, to save expulsion from a certain school, on account of his heading a series of raids upon various orchards, and in defiance of divers corrections on the principal’s part.

He had to return home from his two next schools for various offences against their rules, and finally his college career came to an end with rustication.

Frank laughed, and said that he did not know how it was. One thing, he said, was evident: he was not cut out for the church, and he would not go back to college when the term of his rustication was at an end.

A clerkship was obtained for him then, through great interest, in the Treasury, and here for three or four years he got along pretty well, the confinement not being great, and the number of friends he met with being of a character to suit his taste.

There were bounds, though, even in those days, to the limits accorded to a gentlemanly clerk of good birth, and when Frank took to absenting himself from the office for a week at a time, matters became serious.

For the first time or two the plea of illness was accepted, but when another absence occurred, also from illness, and Mr Frank Mallow was seen by his superiors riding a showy-looking hack in the park, and was known to have given a bachelors’ party in the same week, to which several fellow-clerks were invited, it became necessary to hint to the peccant youth that the next time he was unwell, a certificate to that effect would be necessary from some well-known medical man.

Frank was ill again, so he sent in word to the office, and stayed away for another week, after which, on presenting himself, he received a warning—one which he bore in mind for a couple of months, and then his head must have once more been very bad, for there was a fresh absence, and this endured so long that Frank’s seat in the Treasury knew him no more.

“Well, it don’t matter, mother,” he said. “It was a wretched set-out, and I was sick of the eternal copying.”

“But it was such a pity, dear,” his mother said, in a tone of remonstrance.

“Pity? Stuff! Eighty pounds a year, and a rise of ten pounds annually! Not bricklayer’s wages, and all the time people think it’s such a tremendous thing to be a Treasury clerk.”

“Poor papa is so vexed and grieved, for he took such pains to get you the appointment.”

“Then poor papa must get pleased again,” said the young man, petulantly. “I cannot, and I will not, stand a clerk’s desk. I’d sooner enlist.”

“Frank!” cried his mother, reproachfully.

“Well, I declare I would, mother,” he said, thrusting his hands into his pockets, and walking up and down the room.

“To find freedom?” said his mother, with a smile.

“Oh! I dare say there would be discipline to attend to, and officers to obey; but there would be some change. I should not have to be tied down to a wretched writing-table, copy, copy, copy, the whole day long.”

“Change?” said Mrs Mallow, and she gazed wistfully in her son’s face.

“Yes, of course; one must have some excitement.”

He stood gazing out of the window, and did not notice the strange despairing look in his mother’s eyes, one which seemed to tell of her own weary hours—weary years, passed upon that couch, with no hope of change save that of some day sinking into the eternal rest. It was evident that she was contrasting the selfishness of her son and his position with her own, and she sighed as she closed her eyes and lay there in silence for a time, uttering no reproach.

Then came the day when the Rector was goaded almost to madness by the young man’s follies, and the reports constantly reaching his ears of Frank’s exploits at the principal hotel in billiard-playing and various unsavoury pursuits with one or other of the young farmers round. Reports these that lost nothing doubtless in the telling, and which never failed to reach the Rector in a way that seemed to suggest that he was answerable for his son’s misdoings.

Then followed other troubles, culminating in an affray with the keepers, an affair which, from the family friendship with old Lord Artingale, could easily have been hushed up; but the Rector jumped at the opportunity he found in his son’s dread and evident anxiety to get away from the neighbourhood, so quite in a hurry Frank was shipped off to New Zealand.

And there was peace at the Rectory? Nothing of the kind. There was the misery of hearing endless little stories of Frank’s “carryings on,” as they were termed; some bill was constantly being brought to the house, with a request that the Rector would pay it, and, to hide his son’s disgrace, this he sometimes did. But the annoyance was none the less, and the Rector used to declare plaintively to his wife that if it were not for Julia and Cynthia he would run right away.

“And for me, Eli,” said the suffering woman, with a smile.

“And for you, dear,” he said, tenderly, and there was peace until some new peccadillo of the eldest son was discovered.

Then to the Rector’s dismay he found that Cyril—his mother’s darling—seemed to have taken a leaf out of his brother’s book. If the younger brother’s career had been to run upon a tram-line laid down by his elder brother, he could not have followed in the course more truly, and just as the Rector was beginning to feel calmed down and happy in the society of his two pretty daughters, troubles concerning Cyril kept cropping up.

“Nice chaps for a parson’s sons,” said Jabez Fullerton, the principal draper at Lawford, who could afford to speak out, as Mrs Mallow and her daughters sent to Swan and Edgar’s for everything. And he did speak out; for, as deacon at his chapel and occasional preacher, he never lost an opportunity of saying a few words by way of practice.

“Nice chaps for a parson’s sons! This is the sort of stuff they send to college, and then send back to teach us, in their surplices which we have to pay for the washing of, though we never go to church. Nice fellows they’ll be to preach sermons—out of books too—read ’em. We at chapel never read our sermons, eh?”

There was a murmur of acquiescence here, and Mr Jabez Fullerton felt happy.

Not that the Rev. Eli Mallow had thought of making his sons clergymen after testing them for a short time. Cyril had, like his brother, been to college, and with a view to his succeeding to the living of Lawford, but, as in the case of Frank, the Rector soon gave him up in despair.

Matters grew worse; then worse still. Expostulation, prayer, anger, all were tried in vain, and, having to bear the trouble to a great extent in silence, so as to hide it from the sick mother, who idolised Cyril, the Rector was at times almost beside himself.

At last there came a crash, and the Rector determined to get this son away before something worse should result.

Emigration was being much talked of just then, and plenty of young men were going out to the various colonies to commence life as squatters both in the far east and west. A couple of the young farmers of the neighbourhood of Lawford were about to start, and, after a stormy scene with his father, Cyril came one day to propose that he should be furnished with a little capital and an outfit, so that he could go and try his luck in Australia.

For a few moments the Rev. Eli Mallow was aghast at the idea. He wished Cyril to leave the town, but not to go abroad.

“I don’t care where I go,” said Cyril; “I’ll either try Australia, or go and hunt out Frank and chum with him.”

“But we don’t know where he is,” said the Rector.

“New Zealand.”

“Yes, but New Zealand is large.”

“Not so large but what a fellow might find out Frank. Everyone would know him.”

The Rector sighed, and wished his sons were not so popular with a certain class, and then he thought over the position, and shrank from giving his consent. Knowing the mother’s intense love for her son, he felt that the parting would nearly break her heart, and after a few moments’ pause he said so.

“Oh, you need not fidget about that,” said the young man. “I’ve talked to her about it for days past.”

“And what does she say?”

“Well, it upset her a bit at first, but she soon came round, and she thinks it would be the best thing I could do.”

It was then with a sense of relief that made him feel ashamed, that the father, after a liberal endowment of money, saw his son sent from Liverpool, after the heartiest promises on the part of the young man to do battle with life and make himself a name and a position in the colony.

“If not for my sake, Cyril, for your mother’s,” the father had said, as he held his son’s hand upon the deck of the Great Central liner.

“Depend upon me this time, father,” was the earnest reply, and Cyril went his way across the sea, fully believing in himself that his wild oats were sown, and that now he was about to make a position of substantial basis for himself.

It was a strange thing, and as if a curious kind of clairvoyance made him prophetic, for the Rev. Eli Mallow went home, and that evening busied himself over his next Sunday’s sermon, involuntarily choosing the parable of the Prodigal Son, and not waking up to the fact of what he had done till he sat there in his study reading the manuscript over by the light of his shaded lamp.

“Give me the portion of goods that falleth to me,” he muttered in a low voice, as, with the manuscript in his hand, he sat gazing straight before him into the darker part of the room, and then became silent.

“And took his journey into a far country,” he muttered again, in the same dreamy abstracted manner, and then there was a longer pause, followed by a deep sigh.

The Rev. Eli Mallow rose slowly from his seat, and, with an agonised look in his face, walked up and down the room for some time before sinking back into his chair.

“And there wasted his substance with riotous living.”

It did not seem to be his voice that spoke in the silence of that room; but he knew it was his that exclaimed piteously as the king of old—“Ah, Cyril, my son, my son!” Again there was absolute silence in that room, till, quoting once more from the parable which he had made the subject of his discourse, the Rector said softly—

“Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.”

“Yes, and I should forgive him,” he continued, after a pause. “I do try to practise as I preach. Poor Cyril! poor wilful boy. I pray heaven that my thoughts have been doing thee wrong.”

There was a gentle smile upon his lips then as he took the manuscript of his sermon and tore it up into very small pieces before consigning it to the waste-paper basket.

“No,” he said, “I must not preach a sermon such as that: it is too prophetic of my own position with my sons;” and as we know this prodigal did return penniless, having worked his way back in a merchant brig, to present himself one day at the rectory in tarry canvas trousers, with blackened horny hands and a reckless defiant look in his eyes that startled the quiet people of the place.

He made no reference as to his having wasted his substance; he talked not of sin, and he alluded in nowise to forgiveness, to being made as one of his father’s hired servants, but took his place coolly enough once more in the house, and if no fatted calf was killed, and no rejoicings held, he was heartily welcomed and forgiven once again.

He was his mother’s favourite, and truly, in spite of all, there was forgiveness ready in the father’s heart. As there was also for Frank, who after some years’ silence had suddenly walked in at the rectory gates, rough-looking and boisterous, but not in such a condition as his brother, who had quite scandalised the men-servants, neatly clad in the liveries, of which a new supply had come from London, greatly to the disgust of Smithson in the market-place, who literally scowled at every seam.

Part 1, Chapter XVI.At the King’s Head.“What I say is this,” exclaimed Jabez Fullerton. “Justice is justice, and right is right.”“Hear, hear!” murmured several voices, as Mr Fullerton glanced round the room, and drew himself up with the pride of a man who believed that he had said something original.“I hope I’m too good a Christian to oppose the parson,” he continued, “and I wouldn’t if it had been Mr Paulby, but it’s time we stopped somewhere, gentlemen.”“Hear, hear!” again; and several of the gentlemen addressed took their long pipes from their mouths to say it, and then, replacing them, continued to smoke.“Ever since parson has been back he has been meddling and interfering. First he kills poor old Sammy Warmoth. Broke his heart, he did. Then he makes Joe Biggins saxon, a man most unfitted for the post, gentlemen. I say a man most unfitted for the post.”“Hear, hear!”“Chap as is always looking at you as if he wanted to measure you for a coffin,” said Smithson, the tailor.“Natural enough,” said the Churchwarden, chuckling; “you always look at our clothes, Smithson, eh?”“Ay, I do, Master Portlock, sir; but I don’t want you to die for it. I want you to live and grow stout, and want new suits, not a last one.”“Stiff, hard suit o’ mourning, eh, Smithson, made o’ wood?”“Yes, sir, well seasoned; ellum, eh?”There was a general laugh at this lugubrious joking, and Fullerton tapped impatiently with his pipe-bowl upon the table.“I say, gentlemen, a most unsuitable man,” he continued.“Who would you have had then?” said Churchwarden Portlock.“Why Thomas Morrison, the wheelwright,” said Fullerton, “if you must have a churchman.”“Yes, a good man,” was murmured in assent.“Then he must be pulling the church all to pieces, and quarrelling with the curate, and refusing to bury his dead. We wouldn’t have refused to bury our dead at chapel, gentlemen.”“Not you,” chuckled Portlock. “You’d like to bury the lot of us, parson and all.”“Gentlemen, this is begging the question,” said Fullerton, with plump dignity, and he settled his neck in his white cravat. “What I say is, that I have no enmity against the parson, nayther have you.”“Nay, nay,” said Warton, the saddler, who had the rectory pair horse harness on his mind, the new double set, that he saw, by the name on the packing-case, came from Peak’s; “we only pity him. He has plenty of trouble wi’ those two boys of his. I hear the Bad Shilling’s come back now.”“Ay, he’s back,” said Smithson. “I’ve got a pair of his trousers to mend. One never gets anything to make. Up at thy place last night, wasn’t he, Master Portlock?”The Churchwarden nodded.“Nice boys!” said Smithson. “Dessay the father was like ’em, for the girls really are nice, like their mother.”“Then he was twice as hard as he need be on Jock Morrison,” continued Fullerton, who would finish. “Fancy sending a man to gaol for three months just when his brother’s got a death in the house.”“Fair play,” cried Portlock. “The bairn died afterwards.”“Well, maybe it did,” said Fullerton, “but he needn’t have been so hard on the poor bairn’s uncle. Why not give him another chance? He’s no worse in his way than the parson’s boys are in theirs.”“Boys will be boys,” said Smithson, who wondered whether that pair of trousers to mend might result in an order for a suit.Fullerton was impatient, and cut in almost before the tailor had finished.“Clergymen’s all very well in their way, gentlemen, but the dismissing of old schoolmasters and appointing of new ones don’t seem to me to be in their way, especially where there’s governors to a school.”“Parson’s a governor too,” said Warton, the saddler.“Ex officio?” said Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who kept the bank.“Of course, of course,” acquiesced Fullerton, who had not the least idea of whatex officiomeant; “but I said it before, and I said it to parson’s own face, just the same as I’m saying it here behind his back, and any man who likes can tell him what I said,” and he looked round defiantly as he spoke; “what I say is, that, whatever Humphrey Bone’s faults may be, he’s as good a land measurer as ever stepped.”“Yes, heisthat,” said a broad farmer-looking man. “Joseph Portlock, you said the very same thing to me yesternight.”“He’s a first-class penman.”“Capital,” said Tomlinson.“And if you know a man with a clearer head for figures,” continued Fullerton, “I should be glad to see him.”“Capital man at ciphering,” said Smithson, the tailor, whose yearly accounts Humphrey Bone always made up.“Then, what do you want?” said Fullerton, angrily. “We’ve all got our faults, and if Humphrey Bone does take a little too much sometimes, hasn’t he been master of Lawford school these thirty years?”The latter part of Jabez Fullerton’s argument was not very clear to his fellow-townsmen assembled at their weekly social meeting at the King’s Head; but they all granted that they had their faults, and Jabez Fullerton waved the spoon with which he had been stirring his brandy-and-water in a very statesmanlike way.“Look here,” he said, “I never go to church, for chapel’s good enough for me; but all the same I don’t bear enmity against the church, and never would.”“But you did oppose the church rates, Fullerton,” said Tomlinson, with a chuckle.“On principle, neighbour, on principle; I couldn’t help that. But in this case what I say is, that though I’d be the last man in the world to oppose parson, it would be a disgrace to the town if we let poor Humphrey Bone be pitched out of the living, just because parson wants the place for Churchwarden Ross’s boy.”“Well, I don’t know what to say about it,” said Tomlinson, smoking meditatively at his pipe. “Michael Ross is a very good neighbour of mine, and brings his money to our bank regular. I should be sorry to hurt his feelings, ’specially as his boy has been to London on purpose to be trained.”“Let him get a school somewhere else. There’s always plenty on the way, I’ll be bound.”“Don’t seem to me as the boys’ll take to a lad as was brought up, as you may say, among ’em,” said Smithson. “Bless my soul, gentlemen, I made that boy his fust suit with three rows o’ brass buttons, with marigolds stamped on ’em. Bottle-green the suit was, and the trousers buttoned over the jacket. You know, Fullerton; I had the cloth of you.”“Oh, yes, I know,” said the draper suavely.“Well,” continued Smithson—“Excuse me, Smithson,” said Fullerton, “we’re just discussing the question of Mr Mallow carrying everything with a high hand, and turning out old Humphrey Bone without our consent.”Smithson, the tailor, jumped up, scowled round at the assembled company, stuck his hat upon his head with a bang, and walked straight out of the room.“He’s huffed,” said Fullerton, with a sidewise wag of the head, “but I can’t help his being offended. When a man becomes a public man, he’s got a public man’s dooty to do to his fellow townsfolk, and at times like this he’s bound to speak. So what I say, gentlemen, is this; will you all come to the meeting to-morrow, and back me up?”No one spoke, and it was remarkable that every man present just then seemed to feel his mouth dry, and reached out his hand for his glass.“I say again, gentlemen,” cried Fullerton, “will you all come and back me up?”Every man present seemed to consider that it was the duty of the others to speak out and tackle Fullerton—so they mentally put it—and each looked at the other in turn without avail, till the regards of all present seemed to be concentrated upon Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who after a little hesitation said—“I don’t think it was wise to upset Smithson. It’s like sending a man over to the enemy.”“I hope he hasn’t got a long bill against you for clothes, Fullerton,” said Warton, the saddler, with a chuckle. “You’ll have it in before it comes due.”“If I owed my tailor a bill I dare say I could pay it, Mr Warton,” said Fullerton, haughtily; “and I should be glad to know, gentlemen, whether you mean to discuss the question of the appointment of a new master, because if you don’t I shall throw the whole matter up.”“Oh, no, no, no,” came in a murmur; “don’t do that, Fullerton,” and an appealing look was directed at Tomlinson, who drew a long breath, refreshed himself, and went on.“You see I don’t think it would be wise to go and upset Mr Mallow if we could help it,” he said; “he’s a very good customer of mine, and very neighbourly. I don’t think he’s a bad sort of man.”“Not a bad sort of man!” cried Fullerton, indignantly; “why, it’s a burning shame for him to have charge of this parish at all. What’s a parson for?”“Well,” said Tomlinson, mildly, “I suppose to have the care of the parish.”“Yes, and to rule and manage it,” said Warton.“Yes,” cried Fullerton, “of course; and here’s a man who can’t manage his own household, which is the wastefullest in the place.”“Might keep your family on what they waste, eh, Fullerton?” said Warton, the saddler, with a chuckle, for he was a great friend of Smithson; and it was a fact often commented upon by neighbours, that Fullerton’s domestic economy was of the most parsimonious character.“I’m not the man to eat the parson’s leavings,” said Fullerton, angrily, “nor yet the man to go cringing and touching my hat to him in hopes of getting a harness-mending order.”Mr Warton refilled his pipe.“I say,” continued Fullerton, “that a man who can’t rule his own sons can’t properly rule a parish.”“Nay, nay, nay,” cried Tomlinson; “don’t be too hard upon him, man. He’s a very good sort of fellow is Mallow, and I should be very sorry to go against him.”“But you will go against him,” said Fullerton, triumphantly; and he looked very hard in the ironmonger’s face.Mr Tomlinson’s pipe needed seeing to just then, and he let his eyes rest upon the glowing fire therein, as he recalled certain little speculative money transactions that had taken place between him and Fullerton, and felt how awkward it might be if he offended his fellow-townsman.It would be very awkward to have to side against the Rector, but of two evils Tomlinson felt bound to choose the least.“I’m afraid that in this instance I must go against Mr Mallow,” said Tomlinson, deliberately; and Fullerton gave a triumphant glance round the room.“Hah!” he said to himself, “there’s a wonderful power in money, and one never knows what it will do.”

“What I say is this,” exclaimed Jabez Fullerton. “Justice is justice, and right is right.”

“Hear, hear!” murmured several voices, as Mr Fullerton glanced round the room, and drew himself up with the pride of a man who believed that he had said something original.

“I hope I’m too good a Christian to oppose the parson,” he continued, “and I wouldn’t if it had been Mr Paulby, but it’s time we stopped somewhere, gentlemen.”

“Hear, hear!” again; and several of the gentlemen addressed took their long pipes from their mouths to say it, and then, replacing them, continued to smoke.

“Ever since parson has been back he has been meddling and interfering. First he kills poor old Sammy Warmoth. Broke his heart, he did. Then he makes Joe Biggins saxon, a man most unfitted for the post, gentlemen. I say a man most unfitted for the post.”

“Hear, hear!”

“Chap as is always looking at you as if he wanted to measure you for a coffin,” said Smithson, the tailor.

“Natural enough,” said the Churchwarden, chuckling; “you always look at our clothes, Smithson, eh?”

“Ay, I do, Master Portlock, sir; but I don’t want you to die for it. I want you to live and grow stout, and want new suits, not a last one.”

“Stiff, hard suit o’ mourning, eh, Smithson, made o’ wood?”

“Yes, sir, well seasoned; ellum, eh?”

There was a general laugh at this lugubrious joking, and Fullerton tapped impatiently with his pipe-bowl upon the table.

“I say, gentlemen, a most unsuitable man,” he continued.

“Who would you have had then?” said Churchwarden Portlock.

“Why Thomas Morrison, the wheelwright,” said Fullerton, “if you must have a churchman.”

“Yes, a good man,” was murmured in assent.

“Then he must be pulling the church all to pieces, and quarrelling with the curate, and refusing to bury his dead. We wouldn’t have refused to bury our dead at chapel, gentlemen.”

“Not you,” chuckled Portlock. “You’d like to bury the lot of us, parson and all.”

“Gentlemen, this is begging the question,” said Fullerton, with plump dignity, and he settled his neck in his white cravat. “What I say is, that I have no enmity against the parson, nayther have you.”

“Nay, nay,” said Warton, the saddler, who had the rectory pair horse harness on his mind, the new double set, that he saw, by the name on the packing-case, came from Peak’s; “we only pity him. He has plenty of trouble wi’ those two boys of his. I hear the Bad Shilling’s come back now.”

“Ay, he’s back,” said Smithson. “I’ve got a pair of his trousers to mend. One never gets anything to make. Up at thy place last night, wasn’t he, Master Portlock?”

The Churchwarden nodded.

“Nice boys!” said Smithson. “Dessay the father was like ’em, for the girls really are nice, like their mother.”

“Then he was twice as hard as he need be on Jock Morrison,” continued Fullerton, who would finish. “Fancy sending a man to gaol for three months just when his brother’s got a death in the house.”

“Fair play,” cried Portlock. “The bairn died afterwards.”

“Well, maybe it did,” said Fullerton, “but he needn’t have been so hard on the poor bairn’s uncle. Why not give him another chance? He’s no worse in his way than the parson’s boys are in theirs.”

“Boys will be boys,” said Smithson, who wondered whether that pair of trousers to mend might result in an order for a suit.

Fullerton was impatient, and cut in almost before the tailor had finished.

“Clergymen’s all very well in their way, gentlemen, but the dismissing of old schoolmasters and appointing of new ones don’t seem to me to be in their way, especially where there’s governors to a school.”

“Parson’s a governor too,” said Warton, the saddler.

“Ex officio?” said Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who kept the bank.

“Of course, of course,” acquiesced Fullerton, who had not the least idea of whatex officiomeant; “but I said it before, and I said it to parson’s own face, just the same as I’m saying it here behind his back, and any man who likes can tell him what I said,” and he looked round defiantly as he spoke; “what I say is, that, whatever Humphrey Bone’s faults may be, he’s as good a land measurer as ever stepped.”

“Yes, heisthat,” said a broad farmer-looking man. “Joseph Portlock, you said the very same thing to me yesternight.”

“He’s a first-class penman.”

“Capital,” said Tomlinson.

“And if you know a man with a clearer head for figures,” continued Fullerton, “I should be glad to see him.”

“Capital man at ciphering,” said Smithson, the tailor, whose yearly accounts Humphrey Bone always made up.

“Then, what do you want?” said Fullerton, angrily. “We’ve all got our faults, and if Humphrey Bone does take a little too much sometimes, hasn’t he been master of Lawford school these thirty years?”

The latter part of Jabez Fullerton’s argument was not very clear to his fellow-townsmen assembled at their weekly social meeting at the King’s Head; but they all granted that they had their faults, and Jabez Fullerton waved the spoon with which he had been stirring his brandy-and-water in a very statesmanlike way.

“Look here,” he said, “I never go to church, for chapel’s good enough for me; but all the same I don’t bear enmity against the church, and never would.”

“But you did oppose the church rates, Fullerton,” said Tomlinson, with a chuckle.

“On principle, neighbour, on principle; I couldn’t help that. But in this case what I say is, that though I’d be the last man in the world to oppose parson, it would be a disgrace to the town if we let poor Humphrey Bone be pitched out of the living, just because parson wants the place for Churchwarden Ross’s boy.”

“Well, I don’t know what to say about it,” said Tomlinson, smoking meditatively at his pipe. “Michael Ross is a very good neighbour of mine, and brings his money to our bank regular. I should be sorry to hurt his feelings, ’specially as his boy has been to London on purpose to be trained.”

“Let him get a school somewhere else. There’s always plenty on the way, I’ll be bound.”

“Don’t seem to me as the boys’ll take to a lad as was brought up, as you may say, among ’em,” said Smithson. “Bless my soul, gentlemen, I made that boy his fust suit with three rows o’ brass buttons, with marigolds stamped on ’em. Bottle-green the suit was, and the trousers buttoned over the jacket. You know, Fullerton; I had the cloth of you.”

“Oh, yes, I know,” said the draper suavely.

“Well,” continued Smithson—

“Excuse me, Smithson,” said Fullerton, “we’re just discussing the question of Mr Mallow carrying everything with a high hand, and turning out old Humphrey Bone without our consent.”

Smithson, the tailor, jumped up, scowled round at the assembled company, stuck his hat upon his head with a bang, and walked straight out of the room.

“He’s huffed,” said Fullerton, with a sidewise wag of the head, “but I can’t help his being offended. When a man becomes a public man, he’s got a public man’s dooty to do to his fellow townsfolk, and at times like this he’s bound to speak. So what I say, gentlemen, is this; will you all come to the meeting to-morrow, and back me up?”

No one spoke, and it was remarkable that every man present just then seemed to feel his mouth dry, and reached out his hand for his glass.

“I say again, gentlemen,” cried Fullerton, “will you all come and back me up?”

Every man present seemed to consider that it was the duty of the others to speak out and tackle Fullerton—so they mentally put it—and each looked at the other in turn without avail, till the regards of all present seemed to be concentrated upon Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who after a little hesitation said—

“I don’t think it was wise to upset Smithson. It’s like sending a man over to the enemy.”

“I hope he hasn’t got a long bill against you for clothes, Fullerton,” said Warton, the saddler, with a chuckle. “You’ll have it in before it comes due.”

“If I owed my tailor a bill I dare say I could pay it, Mr Warton,” said Fullerton, haughtily; “and I should be glad to know, gentlemen, whether you mean to discuss the question of the appointment of a new master, because if you don’t I shall throw the whole matter up.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” came in a murmur; “don’t do that, Fullerton,” and an appealing look was directed at Tomlinson, who drew a long breath, refreshed himself, and went on.

“You see I don’t think it would be wise to go and upset Mr Mallow if we could help it,” he said; “he’s a very good customer of mine, and very neighbourly. I don’t think he’s a bad sort of man.”

“Not a bad sort of man!” cried Fullerton, indignantly; “why, it’s a burning shame for him to have charge of this parish at all. What’s a parson for?”

“Well,” said Tomlinson, mildly, “I suppose to have the care of the parish.”

“Yes, and to rule and manage it,” said Warton.

“Yes,” cried Fullerton, “of course; and here’s a man who can’t manage his own household, which is the wastefullest in the place.”

“Might keep your family on what they waste, eh, Fullerton?” said Warton, the saddler, with a chuckle, for he was a great friend of Smithson; and it was a fact often commented upon by neighbours, that Fullerton’s domestic economy was of the most parsimonious character.

“I’m not the man to eat the parson’s leavings,” said Fullerton, angrily, “nor yet the man to go cringing and touching my hat to him in hopes of getting a harness-mending order.”

Mr Warton refilled his pipe.

“I say,” continued Fullerton, “that a man who can’t rule his own sons can’t properly rule a parish.”

“Nay, nay, nay,” cried Tomlinson; “don’t be too hard upon him, man. He’s a very good sort of fellow is Mallow, and I should be very sorry to go against him.”

“But you will go against him,” said Fullerton, triumphantly; and he looked very hard in the ironmonger’s face.

Mr Tomlinson’s pipe needed seeing to just then, and he let his eyes rest upon the glowing fire therein, as he recalled certain little speculative money transactions that had taken place between him and Fullerton, and felt how awkward it might be if he offended his fellow-townsman.

It would be very awkward to have to side against the Rector, but of two evils Tomlinson felt bound to choose the least.

“I’m afraid that in this instance I must go against Mr Mallow,” said Tomlinson, deliberately; and Fullerton gave a triumphant glance round the room.

“Hah!” he said to himself, “there’s a wonderful power in money, and one never knows what it will do.”

Part 1, Chapter XVII.The Governors’ Meeting.Market morning again at Lawford, and the customary business going on. There were a few pigs in the pens; a larger amount of butter than usual at the cross, some of it holding a good two ounces of salt to the pound. A sale by auction of some old furniture was to take place, and gigs, cars, and carts were coming in.The rectory carriage, with Julia and Cynthia Mallow looking sweet and attractive enough to tempt the tradespeople who quarrelled with the father to touch their hats, came in quite early, setting down the Rector, who had to visit the bookseller’s and order a new volume for the society library, and soon after he was on his way to the chief point of attraction that morning, to wit, the special meeting of the governors of Lawford School, with the Rector in the chair.The meeting, according to custom, had been called for the vestry-room, which would only comfortably hold six, and then adjourned to the King’s Head, where the townspeople and those interested in the important event were gathered in force.Thirty years before, when Humphrey Bone obtained his appointment, only three people were present—to wit, the then rector of the parish and a couple of governors. But there was no opposition in those days. Dissent had not taken so strong a hold on the little town, and the disposition for making a party fight over every trifling matter had not grown into the ascendant.On this particular day, however, though to a man every one present, whether Nonconformist or supporter of Church and State, would have stoutly denied that party feeling or local politics had anything to do with his presence, it was very evident that there were two opposing sides, and that the meeting was pretty evenly divided between the supporters of the Rector, who believed in the time being come for the appointment of a new master, and those who nailed their colours to the mast old style, and openly declared that any change made must be for the worse.Humphrey Bone was there one of the first, making the boards echo with his thick boot, and it was noticed that the said boot had been thoroughly blacked, that Humphrey was well shaved, his hair had been cut, and that he had on a clean white shirt.Fullerton was there, too, talking to him aside, and Tomlinson, Smithson, and Warton soon put in an appearance, one and all looking as important and solemn as if the constitution of the country were at stake, in place of so mild a question as that which was to be settled—whether Humphrey Bone was to be superseded, or not.The room was growing pretty full. Michael Ross, the tanner, had entered, followed by his son, who looked very pale and determined, speaking in a quick, decided way to Portlock, the churchwarden, who came up and shook hands with both his father and him in turn.Then the Rector entered, followed by Cyril, who sauntered into the room with a careless air, nodding at first one and then another, till his eyes met those of Luke Ross, when he started slightly, but returned the keen fixed gaze with one full of angry resentment before looking down.Then there was a little bustle and settling down in seats as the Rector took the chair. The vestry clerk opened a big calf-skin covered book, stuck a new quill pen behind his ear, and drew the ink a little nearer to him, when there was a breathless pause, during which all who could looked from Luke Ross, the young, to Humphrey Bone, the old, as if they were the champions of the two causes assembled here, and as though they were expected to come forward in front of the Rector’s chair and do battle manfully for the post.Then the Rector quietly announced that the meeting that day was for the purpose of confirming the appointment of the new master to the boys’ school, and also to accept the resignation of the late master, Mr Humphrey Bone.“Never resigned,” shouted that individual; and he involuntarily wiped his mouth, as if to remove all traces of his having been seeking for support at the King’s Head bar.Mr Mallow frowned slightly, and there was a low buzz of satisfaction on one side of the room.“Didn’t resign, and don’t want to resign,” said Humphrey Bone more loudly, being encouraged by the looks of approbation he received.“And to confirm the dismissal of Mr Humphrey Bone from the office of master of the school,” said the Rector, firmly. “I beg pardon, gentlemen, I was under the impression that Mr Bone had resigned. I may add, gentlemen, that the preliminaries have been settled at the former meeting, and all that is requisite now is for a majority of the governors to sign the minute that the clerk to the vestry will prepare. If any gentleman has a remark or two he would like to make, we shall be most happy to hear him.”“Yes, that’s easy enough to say,” whispered Warton to Smithson. “He’s used to speaking in public. I always feel as if my heart’s getting into my mouth.”“Mr Fullerton, I think, wishes to address you, gentlemen,” said the Rector, smiling and sitting down.Mr Fullerton looked as if he would have liked to strangle the Rector for that smile. It was a perfectly innocent smile, in no wise directed at the would-be speaker, but it seemed to Fullerton that the Rector was ridiculing him, and it put him off his text for the moment, but he recovered himself, and in a very florid speech, full of wanderings from the point, opposed the appointment of a new master on the ground that Humphrey Bone having been duly nominated and appointed, unless he had in some special way become unfit for his post, the Rector had no right to dismiss him.Mr Bone uttered a very loud “Hear, hear!”Two more of the townsmen, followers of Fullerton, rose in turn to speak, but were silenced on the spot by the announcement of the Rector, that this was not an ordinary meeting of ratepayers, but of the governors of the school, who alone had a right to make any motion and speak to the proposition before the meeting.This being so, Tomlinson was forced into action by his neighbour, and in smooth tones regretted that he was compelled to go in opposition to “our worthy Rector,” but, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, he must object to the appointment of so young a man as Mr Luke Ross to so important a post, and after a long speech, in which he went round and round the subject a dozen times, he ended by declaring that he should vote against the appointment.To his annoyance, the Rector, as the meeting went on, found himself undoubtedly in the minority, and he felt bitterly the position in which Luke Ross had been placed.Just then, however, a couple of the governors, upon whom he knew that he could depend, entered the room, and the tables, he felt, were turned.Luke had been sitting, chafing at every word that had been said against his appointment, and every now and then, as he met Cyril Mallow’s eye, it seemed to him to be full of triumph at his discomfiture.Then, too, he kept glancing at Portlock, and as he did so the bluff, wealthy farmer’s words came back, mingled with the contempt he seemed to feel for the pittance that was to be the young master’s for the first few years.Five hundred a year—five hundred a year—seemed to keep repeating itself to Luke Ross, as his eyes once more met those of Cyril Mallow, whose countenance wore a decided sneer.“Then now, gentlemen, I think,” said the Rector, “we will proceed to vote.”“Stop!” cried Luke Ross.It was on the impulse of the moment. He had had no such thought when he entered the room.“We will hear you, Mr Ross, after the voting is over,” said the Rector, quietly.“No, sir,” replied Luke, “I must ask you to hear me first. I have decided not to accept the post.”There was a dead silence in the room for a few moments after Luke Ross’s decisive words, a silence broken by Humphrey Bone, who relieved the excitement under which he laboured by starting from his seat, and bringing his thick-soled boot down with a tremendous clump upon the floor.“Do I understand you to say, Mr Ross, that you decline the post?” exclaimed the Rector.“Yes, sir, definitely,” replied Luke. “I could not, under the circumstances, think of accepting the appointment.”There was another pause here, and then, led by Fullerton, the opposition party broke into a loud cheer.“Silence if you please, gentlemen,” exclaimed the Rector, with a greater show of indignation than any one present remembered him to have displayed. “This is no time for showing party feeling. Of course, as Mr Ross declines to accept the appointment—”“But he don’t,” cried old Michael Ross, “he wants time to think it over.”“Hush, father,” exclaimed the young man, firmly, “I know my own mind. Mr Mallow, I am sorry to have given all this trouble, and, as it were, placed you in a false position; but until a few minutes back I did not see this matter in the light I do now, and I definitely decline the post.”“Your action does you great credit, young man,” said Fullerton, pompously; “and I am glad to congratulate my fellow-townsman, Michael Ross, on the possession of such a son.”“Your compliment is misplaced, sir,” said Luke, coldly, “for my action in this matter is in nowise creditable to me. But that is my affair, and it need not be discussed.”Mr Fullerton scowled on receiving this snub, and he was about to make some angry retort, but the Rector said at once—“Then, gentlemen, we need say no more, unless you wish to discuss the question of Mr Bone’s dismissal.”“I claim,” said Fullerton, “that he cannot be dismissed.”“A majority of the school governors have the power to dismiss him, Mr Fullerton,” replied the Rector, with dignity; and after a few more words he left the chair, the meeting being declared adjourned until application had been made to one of the institutions for another master.“I am sorry to find that you have come to such a decision, Mr Ross,” said the Rector, as he encountered Luke outside the inn.“I was sorry to come to such a decision, sir,” replied Luke; “but, believe me that I have been in no way influenced by those who seem to be in opposition to you, and I hope that you will persist in Humphrey Bone’s dismissal, and the appointment of another man.”The Rector bowed and walked on with his son, who raised his hat slightly to Luke, that salute being returned as the young men’s eyes met once more, each reading in those of the other a growing dislike which must some day ripen into enmity.Then they passed on their several ways, both having the same object in view.

Market morning again at Lawford, and the customary business going on. There were a few pigs in the pens; a larger amount of butter than usual at the cross, some of it holding a good two ounces of salt to the pound. A sale by auction of some old furniture was to take place, and gigs, cars, and carts were coming in.

The rectory carriage, with Julia and Cynthia Mallow looking sweet and attractive enough to tempt the tradespeople who quarrelled with the father to touch their hats, came in quite early, setting down the Rector, who had to visit the bookseller’s and order a new volume for the society library, and soon after he was on his way to the chief point of attraction that morning, to wit, the special meeting of the governors of Lawford School, with the Rector in the chair.

The meeting, according to custom, had been called for the vestry-room, which would only comfortably hold six, and then adjourned to the King’s Head, where the townspeople and those interested in the important event were gathered in force.

Thirty years before, when Humphrey Bone obtained his appointment, only three people were present—to wit, the then rector of the parish and a couple of governors. But there was no opposition in those days. Dissent had not taken so strong a hold on the little town, and the disposition for making a party fight over every trifling matter had not grown into the ascendant.

On this particular day, however, though to a man every one present, whether Nonconformist or supporter of Church and State, would have stoutly denied that party feeling or local politics had anything to do with his presence, it was very evident that there were two opposing sides, and that the meeting was pretty evenly divided between the supporters of the Rector, who believed in the time being come for the appointment of a new master, and those who nailed their colours to the mast old style, and openly declared that any change made must be for the worse.

Humphrey Bone was there one of the first, making the boards echo with his thick boot, and it was noticed that the said boot had been thoroughly blacked, that Humphrey was well shaved, his hair had been cut, and that he had on a clean white shirt.

Fullerton was there, too, talking to him aside, and Tomlinson, Smithson, and Warton soon put in an appearance, one and all looking as important and solemn as if the constitution of the country were at stake, in place of so mild a question as that which was to be settled—whether Humphrey Bone was to be superseded, or not.

The room was growing pretty full. Michael Ross, the tanner, had entered, followed by his son, who looked very pale and determined, speaking in a quick, decided way to Portlock, the churchwarden, who came up and shook hands with both his father and him in turn.

Then the Rector entered, followed by Cyril, who sauntered into the room with a careless air, nodding at first one and then another, till his eyes met those of Luke Ross, when he started slightly, but returned the keen fixed gaze with one full of angry resentment before looking down.

Then there was a little bustle and settling down in seats as the Rector took the chair. The vestry clerk opened a big calf-skin covered book, stuck a new quill pen behind his ear, and drew the ink a little nearer to him, when there was a breathless pause, during which all who could looked from Luke Ross, the young, to Humphrey Bone, the old, as if they were the champions of the two causes assembled here, and as though they were expected to come forward in front of the Rector’s chair and do battle manfully for the post.

Then the Rector quietly announced that the meeting that day was for the purpose of confirming the appointment of the new master to the boys’ school, and also to accept the resignation of the late master, Mr Humphrey Bone.

“Never resigned,” shouted that individual; and he involuntarily wiped his mouth, as if to remove all traces of his having been seeking for support at the King’s Head bar.

Mr Mallow frowned slightly, and there was a low buzz of satisfaction on one side of the room.

“Didn’t resign, and don’t want to resign,” said Humphrey Bone more loudly, being encouraged by the looks of approbation he received.

“And to confirm the dismissal of Mr Humphrey Bone from the office of master of the school,” said the Rector, firmly. “I beg pardon, gentlemen, I was under the impression that Mr Bone had resigned. I may add, gentlemen, that the preliminaries have been settled at the former meeting, and all that is requisite now is for a majority of the governors to sign the minute that the clerk to the vestry will prepare. If any gentleman has a remark or two he would like to make, we shall be most happy to hear him.”

“Yes, that’s easy enough to say,” whispered Warton to Smithson. “He’s used to speaking in public. I always feel as if my heart’s getting into my mouth.”

“Mr Fullerton, I think, wishes to address you, gentlemen,” said the Rector, smiling and sitting down.

Mr Fullerton looked as if he would have liked to strangle the Rector for that smile. It was a perfectly innocent smile, in no wise directed at the would-be speaker, but it seemed to Fullerton that the Rector was ridiculing him, and it put him off his text for the moment, but he recovered himself, and in a very florid speech, full of wanderings from the point, opposed the appointment of a new master on the ground that Humphrey Bone having been duly nominated and appointed, unless he had in some special way become unfit for his post, the Rector had no right to dismiss him.

Mr Bone uttered a very loud “Hear, hear!”

Two more of the townsmen, followers of Fullerton, rose in turn to speak, but were silenced on the spot by the announcement of the Rector, that this was not an ordinary meeting of ratepayers, but of the governors of the school, who alone had a right to make any motion and speak to the proposition before the meeting.

This being so, Tomlinson was forced into action by his neighbour, and in smooth tones regretted that he was compelled to go in opposition to “our worthy Rector,” but, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, he must object to the appointment of so young a man as Mr Luke Ross to so important a post, and after a long speech, in which he went round and round the subject a dozen times, he ended by declaring that he should vote against the appointment.

To his annoyance, the Rector, as the meeting went on, found himself undoubtedly in the minority, and he felt bitterly the position in which Luke Ross had been placed.

Just then, however, a couple of the governors, upon whom he knew that he could depend, entered the room, and the tables, he felt, were turned.

Luke had been sitting, chafing at every word that had been said against his appointment, and every now and then, as he met Cyril Mallow’s eye, it seemed to him to be full of triumph at his discomfiture.

Then, too, he kept glancing at Portlock, and as he did so the bluff, wealthy farmer’s words came back, mingled with the contempt he seemed to feel for the pittance that was to be the young master’s for the first few years.

Five hundred a year—five hundred a year—seemed to keep repeating itself to Luke Ross, as his eyes once more met those of Cyril Mallow, whose countenance wore a decided sneer.

“Then now, gentlemen, I think,” said the Rector, “we will proceed to vote.”

“Stop!” cried Luke Ross.

It was on the impulse of the moment. He had had no such thought when he entered the room.

“We will hear you, Mr Ross, after the voting is over,” said the Rector, quietly.

“No, sir,” replied Luke, “I must ask you to hear me first. I have decided not to accept the post.”

There was a dead silence in the room for a few moments after Luke Ross’s decisive words, a silence broken by Humphrey Bone, who relieved the excitement under which he laboured by starting from his seat, and bringing his thick-soled boot down with a tremendous clump upon the floor.

“Do I understand you to say, Mr Ross, that you decline the post?” exclaimed the Rector.

“Yes, sir, definitely,” replied Luke. “I could not, under the circumstances, think of accepting the appointment.”

There was another pause here, and then, led by Fullerton, the opposition party broke into a loud cheer.

“Silence if you please, gentlemen,” exclaimed the Rector, with a greater show of indignation than any one present remembered him to have displayed. “This is no time for showing party feeling. Of course, as Mr Ross declines to accept the appointment—”

“But he don’t,” cried old Michael Ross, “he wants time to think it over.”

“Hush, father,” exclaimed the young man, firmly, “I know my own mind. Mr Mallow, I am sorry to have given all this trouble, and, as it were, placed you in a false position; but until a few minutes back I did not see this matter in the light I do now, and I definitely decline the post.”

“Your action does you great credit, young man,” said Fullerton, pompously; “and I am glad to congratulate my fellow-townsman, Michael Ross, on the possession of such a son.”

“Your compliment is misplaced, sir,” said Luke, coldly, “for my action in this matter is in nowise creditable to me. But that is my affair, and it need not be discussed.”

Mr Fullerton scowled on receiving this snub, and he was about to make some angry retort, but the Rector said at once—

“Then, gentlemen, we need say no more, unless you wish to discuss the question of Mr Bone’s dismissal.”

“I claim,” said Fullerton, “that he cannot be dismissed.”

“A majority of the school governors have the power to dismiss him, Mr Fullerton,” replied the Rector, with dignity; and after a few more words he left the chair, the meeting being declared adjourned until application had been made to one of the institutions for another master.

“I am sorry to find that you have come to such a decision, Mr Ross,” said the Rector, as he encountered Luke outside the inn.

“I was sorry to come to such a decision, sir,” replied Luke; “but, believe me that I have been in no way influenced by those who seem to be in opposition to you, and I hope that you will persist in Humphrey Bone’s dismissal, and the appointment of another man.”

The Rector bowed and walked on with his son, who raised his hat slightly to Luke, that salute being returned as the young men’s eyes met once more, each reading in those of the other a growing dislike which must some day ripen into enmity.

Then they passed on their several ways, both having the same object in view.

Part 1, Chapter XVIII.Doubts.It was nearly twelve o’clock, and in spite of her efforts, Sage Portlock’s thoughts had wandered a good deal from the work she had in hand. It was the morning upon which Luke Ross’s appointment was to be confirmed, and her face flushed as she thought of the time when he would be conducting the next school, and the future looked very rosy and bright, for she told herself that in secret she was very fond of Luke.Julia and Cynthia Mallow had been there to take a class and chat with her for a few minutes, Cynthia being ready with a sly allusion to the business upon which papa had been left.“We are going to pick up papa after he has fastened your schoolmaster, Sage,” she said; “but first of all we are going to drive over to the farm and see Mrs Berry and the little ones. When does she go away?”“To-morrow, Miss Cynthia,” said Sage, turning rather white, “and—and she is not very well. Would you mind not calling, Miss Julia?”“Oh, no, certainly not,” said Julia; “but I am sorry. Give our kind love to her, Sage, and say we will drive over to Lewby some day and see her there.”“Thank you, Miss Julia,” said Sage, and she gladly saw the school visitors depart, with the intention of going on to the ford.Sage sighed as she stood at the door and saw the sisters get into the handsomely appointed carriage that was waiting, and then she wished that she had asked them when they were going back to London, for it seemed to her that both she and Rue would feel happier and more at ease if the Mallow family were gone.Then she recalled her last meeting with Luke at home, and his words upon learning—short conversation interrupted by her aunt—that there was to be no engagement until he had realised a better income than would accrue from the schools.“That does not matter,” she said, brightening up. “Luke is so brave and determined, and has such spirit, that he will soon become rich enough for us to marry, and, of course, we can wait.”There was no impatience in Sage’s love for Luke Ross. She told herself that she was very fond of him, and some day they would be man and wife, but when did not seem to her to matter, and she busied herself once more, light-hearted enough, with the children.Then came the beginning of another train of thought, and there was once more a slight flush in her cheeks as her mind turned to Cyril Mallow, his coming to the school with his father, his meeting and speaking to her once or twice when she was leaving school, and then, too, of his coming to the farm to sit, and smoke, and talk with her uncle.The colour deepened in her cheeks a little more as she thought of all this; but, directly after, she drove these thoughts away, and busied herself with the conclusion of the morning lessons.Twelve o’clock, and the buzz and hurry of the dismissal, and then the pleasant scent of the cool outer air as the windows were thrown open, and again the bright elasticity of feeling as, well wrapped in warm furry jacket and with her natty little, not-too-fashionable hat setting off the freshness of her complexion and youthful looks, she started for her brisk walk along the lane and across the field to the farm.She had to pass Mrs Searby’s cottage on her way, where that worthy woman with upturned sleeves was standing at the open door in converse with another of the mothers whose children attended the school.“Good-morning,” said Sage, as she passed them, and the second woman returned the salutation; but Miss Searby’s mamma replied by giving her an uncompromising stare, and saying aloud before the young mistress was out of hearing—“Ah, she’s going to meet young Cyril Mallow. Nice goings on, indeed, for one like her.”Sage’s cheeks turned scarlet as she hurried on, and a strange feeling of shame and confusion troubled her. It was nothing that she was perfectly innocent of any such intent, she felt horribly guilty all the same, and it was only by a great effort that she kept back the hot tears of indignation.Then her conscience smote her with the recollection that she had thought a good deal of Cyril Mallow lately, and she asked herself whether she was turning traitorous to Luke Ross, but only to indignantly repel the self-inflicted charge.It was monstrous, she told herself. She was sure that she loved Luke very dearly, as she always had from a child, when he had been like a brother to her. Some day when he had climbed higher she would be his wife, for she was sure her uncle never meant all that he had said. He was too fond of her, and too eager to do all he could to make her happy.“Such a shameful thing to say! A wicked woman!” exclaimed Sage then; “as if I ever thought—Oh!”She quickened her steps with her face growing scarlet once more, the red flush having died out to leave it pale, for there were footsteps behind her coming on quickly, and it was Cyril Mallow, she felt, hurrying to catch her; and that was why the spiteful woman had spoken in that bitter way.The steps were coming nearer in spite of Sage’s efforts to get home before she was overtaken.Pat, pat, pat, pat! just as her heart was beating with excitement. She felt frightened, she hardly knew why, and dreaded being overtaken by Cyril, who seemed to have obtained some power over her that she could not understand.He was very pleasant spoken, and frank, and manly-looking, but she did not like him nor his ways, for she was sure that he was a bad son.“I wonder whether he would try to improve if I asked him, and pointed out how wrong it is of him to be so much trouble to his parents,” thought Sage; and then she shivered with a strange kind of dread.Why had she thought all that? What was Cyril Mallow to her? It was only out of civility that he had spoken to her as he had, but she felt that it was out of place, and that Mr Mallow would not have approved of it at all, and—and it was very dreadful.As a rule, Sage Portlock was a firm, determined girl, full of decision and strength of character, but the words of the spiteful woman seemed to have quite unnerved her, and with the sense of being very guilty, and of having behaved treacherously to Luke Ross, she had hard work to keep from starting off, and breaking into a run.“And he is coming on so quickly,” she thought. “He will overtake me before I get to the gate. How dare he follow me about like this, and why is not Luke here to protect me!”Sage Portlock’s excitement had thoroughly mastered her, and she uttered quite a hysterical little cry, as the steps drew quite near now, and a voice exclaimed—“Why, Sage, I almost had to run.”“Luke!”“Yes; Luke,” he replied, smiling, as he took her hand in his. “Who did you think it was?”“I—I—didn’t know; I wanted to get home quickly,” she faltered. “I did not know it was you.”“I know that,” he said, drawing her hand through his arm, “or else you would have stopped, wouldn’t you?”“Why, of course, Luke,” she said, smiling in his face, and with a calm feeling of rest and protection coming over her disturbed spirit.“I’m glad I caught you,” he said. “Let’s walk slowly, for I’ve a great deal to say to you before you go in.”“But, first of all, tell me, Luke, dear,” she cried eagerly, “is the appointment confirmed?”“No.”“No? Not confirmed? Then, that wicked old Bone—”“That wicked old Bone of contention,” he said, laughingly taking her up, “has had very little to do with it. At one time I thought that it would be very cruel to take his post, but I do not think so now.”“But not confirmed, Luke?” she cried, stopping short and clinging to his arm, the picture of bitter disappointment. “Why, this is the meaning, then, of the opposition uncle spoke of yesterday. Who has dared to stop you from having the school?”“You,” said Luke, as he gazed admiringly in her animated face.“I, Luke? I?” she exclaimed, in a puzzled way.“Well, it is through you, dear,” he said, smiling.“But I have done nothing, Luke,” she cried. “You are teasing me! Has the meeting taken place?”“Yes; I have just come from it.”“Well? Mr Bone was there I know, for he gave the boys a holiday, so that he might come.”“Yes, he was there, evidently looking upon me as the greatest enemy he had in the world till he heard me decline the post.”“You?—you declined the post, Luke?”“Yes, I declined the post.”“And you told me you loved me,” she said, reproachfully, as she drew back.“As I do with all my heart,” he cried, taking her hand, and drawing it through his arm once more. “Sage, dear, it is because I love you so well that I have declined to take the school.”“When it was so near,” she cried; and her tears seemed to have stolen into her voice. “And now you will go and take a school ever so far away. Oh, Luke,” she cried, piteously, “it is too bad!”“Hush, little one,” he said, firmly. “It is not like you to talk like that. I shall not take a school far away, though I shall have to leave you. Sage, dear, I have felt that I must give up present pleasure for a future joy.”“I—I—don’t understand you,” she cried; “your talk is all a puzzle to me.”“Is it, dear? There, it shall not be long. You know what your uncle said to me the other day?”“Oh, yes, Luke; but I don’t think he quite meant it.”“I am sure he did mean it,” he replied; “and he is quite right. For the past year I have been learning lessons of self-denial, and been taught to place the schoolmaster’s duty above questions of a pecuniary kind; but your uncle has placed my position in a practical light, and, Sage, dear, it is as if all the past teaching has been undone.”“Oh, Luke, Luke,” she cried, “don’t talk like that!”“I must. I have had another talk with your uncle. This morning I overtook him, and he asked me, as a man, whom he says he can trust, to set aside all love-making, as he called it in his homely Saxon-English, and to treat you only as a friend! ‘Let matters stand for the present, and see what a couple of years bring forth, if you are doing well,’ he said, ‘in your new position.’”“In your new position, Luke? Why, what do you mean?”“Sage, dear, I have decided to set aside the idea of being the master of a school.”“Oh, Luke!”“And to read for the bar.”“Read for the bar?”“Yes, read for the bar: become a barrister; and I shall work hard to win a name.”“But the school, Luke—the training college. It is not honest to take advantage of their teaching, gain all you can, and then take to some other career.”“You think that?” he said, smiling. “Yes, of course,” she said, indignantly. “The principal at Westminster spoke very warmly about two of the students giving up their schools directly, and taking situations as governesses in good families.”“I quite agree with her,” said Luke, quietly; “and I have appraised the cost to the institution at fifty pounds. That sum I feel bound to send. It is quite as much as so bad a master as I should have turned out is worth.”“Oh, Luke, that is nonsense,” she cried, as she looked proudly in his face.“Nay,” he said, “it is truth. And now listen to me. This has all been very sudden.”“Yes, and you never said a word to me.”“I came and told you as soon as I knew,” retorted Luke, firmly. “And now I say once more this has been very sudden, but it is irrevocably in obedience to your uncle’s wishes. I shall exact no promises from you, tie you down in no way, but go away in perfect faith that in a few years as the reward of my hard struggle, and when I can go and say to your uncle, ‘See, here, I can command the income you said that I ought to have!’ you will be my little wife.”“But must you go away, Luke?” she said, with a pitiful look in her eyes.“Yes, it is absolutely certain. How could I climb up in the world if I stayed here?”“But I don’t want you to go,” she cried, excitedly.“And I don’t want to leave you,” he said, fondly.“I want you to stop and protect me, and take care of me and keep me for yours, Luke.”“Don’t—don’t talk like that,” he cried, speaking hoarsely, “or you will make me forget my promise to your uncle. Let us be firm and true, and look the matter seriously in the face. It is for our future, and I pray and believe that I am acting wisely here.”“But you will be away,” she said, with a piteous look in her eyes. “There will be no one to take care of me when you are gone.”“Nonsense, little one,” he exclaimed. “There is your uncle. What have you to fear? Only be true to me.”“Oh, yes, yes,” she sobbed; “but you do not know, Luke. I might be tempted, I might be led away from you—I might—”“Might!” he said, with scorn in his voice. “My little Sage, whom I have known from the day when she gave me first her innocent sisterly love, could not be untrue to the man she has promised to wed. Sage, dear,” he continued, holding her hands in his, and gazing in her agitated, tearful face, “look at me—look me fully in the eyes.”“Yes, Luke,” she said, hesitatingly; and her pretty, troubled face looked so winning that it was all he could do to keep from clasping her in his arms tightly to his own trusting breast.“Now,” he said, smiling, “you see me. Can you doubt, dear, that I should ever be untrue to you?”“No, no! oh, no, Luke,” she cried.“Neither could I, dearest,” he said, softly. “I am a very plain, unimpulsive man, wanting, perhaps, in the soft speech and ways that are said to please women; but I think my heart is right, and that in spite of my quiet ways I love you very, very dearly.”“I know, I know you do,” sobbed the girl.“Yes, and I trust you, my dear,” he said. “I know that you could never give look or word to another that would cause me pain.”“No, no, dear Luke, I could not,” she sobbed; “but I want you with me. I cannot bear for you to leave me helpless here.”“Nonsense, my little pet,” he said, tenderly. “The years will soon slip by, and then all will be well. There, we understand each other, do we not?”“Yes, yes, Luke, I think so,” she sobbed.“One kiss, then, darling, the last I shall take, perhaps, for years, and then—”“Oh, no, not now—not now,” she cried, hastily, as he sought to take her in his arms in the sheltered lane. “Uncle is coming with Mr Cyril Mallow;” and then she moaned passionately to herself, “Him again! Oh, Luke, Luke, I wish that I was dead.”

It was nearly twelve o’clock, and in spite of her efforts, Sage Portlock’s thoughts had wandered a good deal from the work she had in hand. It was the morning upon which Luke Ross’s appointment was to be confirmed, and her face flushed as she thought of the time when he would be conducting the next school, and the future looked very rosy and bright, for she told herself that in secret she was very fond of Luke.

Julia and Cynthia Mallow had been there to take a class and chat with her for a few minutes, Cynthia being ready with a sly allusion to the business upon which papa had been left.

“We are going to pick up papa after he has fastened your schoolmaster, Sage,” she said; “but first of all we are going to drive over to the farm and see Mrs Berry and the little ones. When does she go away?”

“To-morrow, Miss Cynthia,” said Sage, turning rather white, “and—and she is not very well. Would you mind not calling, Miss Julia?”

“Oh, no, certainly not,” said Julia; “but I am sorry. Give our kind love to her, Sage, and say we will drive over to Lewby some day and see her there.”

“Thank you, Miss Julia,” said Sage, and she gladly saw the school visitors depart, with the intention of going on to the ford.

Sage sighed as she stood at the door and saw the sisters get into the handsomely appointed carriage that was waiting, and then she wished that she had asked them when they were going back to London, for it seemed to her that both she and Rue would feel happier and more at ease if the Mallow family were gone.

Then she recalled her last meeting with Luke at home, and his words upon learning—short conversation interrupted by her aunt—that there was to be no engagement until he had realised a better income than would accrue from the schools.

“That does not matter,” she said, brightening up. “Luke is so brave and determined, and has such spirit, that he will soon become rich enough for us to marry, and, of course, we can wait.”

There was no impatience in Sage’s love for Luke Ross. She told herself that she was very fond of him, and some day they would be man and wife, but when did not seem to her to matter, and she busied herself once more, light-hearted enough, with the children.

Then came the beginning of another train of thought, and there was once more a slight flush in her cheeks as her mind turned to Cyril Mallow, his coming to the school with his father, his meeting and speaking to her once or twice when she was leaving school, and then, too, of his coming to the farm to sit, and smoke, and talk with her uncle.

The colour deepened in her cheeks a little more as she thought of all this; but, directly after, she drove these thoughts away, and busied herself with the conclusion of the morning lessons.

Twelve o’clock, and the buzz and hurry of the dismissal, and then the pleasant scent of the cool outer air as the windows were thrown open, and again the bright elasticity of feeling as, well wrapped in warm furry jacket and with her natty little, not-too-fashionable hat setting off the freshness of her complexion and youthful looks, she started for her brisk walk along the lane and across the field to the farm.

She had to pass Mrs Searby’s cottage on her way, where that worthy woman with upturned sleeves was standing at the open door in converse with another of the mothers whose children attended the school.

“Good-morning,” said Sage, as she passed them, and the second woman returned the salutation; but Miss Searby’s mamma replied by giving her an uncompromising stare, and saying aloud before the young mistress was out of hearing—

“Ah, she’s going to meet young Cyril Mallow. Nice goings on, indeed, for one like her.”

Sage’s cheeks turned scarlet as she hurried on, and a strange feeling of shame and confusion troubled her. It was nothing that she was perfectly innocent of any such intent, she felt horribly guilty all the same, and it was only by a great effort that she kept back the hot tears of indignation.

Then her conscience smote her with the recollection that she had thought a good deal of Cyril Mallow lately, and she asked herself whether she was turning traitorous to Luke Ross, but only to indignantly repel the self-inflicted charge.

It was monstrous, she told herself. She was sure that she loved Luke very dearly, as she always had from a child, when he had been like a brother to her. Some day when he had climbed higher she would be his wife, for she was sure her uncle never meant all that he had said. He was too fond of her, and too eager to do all he could to make her happy.

“Such a shameful thing to say! A wicked woman!” exclaimed Sage then; “as if I ever thought—Oh!”

She quickened her steps with her face growing scarlet once more, the red flush having died out to leave it pale, for there were footsteps behind her coming on quickly, and it was Cyril Mallow, she felt, hurrying to catch her; and that was why the spiteful woman had spoken in that bitter way.

The steps were coming nearer in spite of Sage’s efforts to get home before she was overtaken.Pat, pat, pat, pat! just as her heart was beating with excitement. She felt frightened, she hardly knew why, and dreaded being overtaken by Cyril, who seemed to have obtained some power over her that she could not understand.

He was very pleasant spoken, and frank, and manly-looking, but she did not like him nor his ways, for she was sure that he was a bad son.

“I wonder whether he would try to improve if I asked him, and pointed out how wrong it is of him to be so much trouble to his parents,” thought Sage; and then she shivered with a strange kind of dread.

Why had she thought all that? What was Cyril Mallow to her? It was only out of civility that he had spoken to her as he had, but she felt that it was out of place, and that Mr Mallow would not have approved of it at all, and—and it was very dreadful.

As a rule, Sage Portlock was a firm, determined girl, full of decision and strength of character, but the words of the spiteful woman seemed to have quite unnerved her, and with the sense of being very guilty, and of having behaved treacherously to Luke Ross, she had hard work to keep from starting off, and breaking into a run.

“And he is coming on so quickly,” she thought. “He will overtake me before I get to the gate. How dare he follow me about like this, and why is not Luke here to protect me!”

Sage Portlock’s excitement had thoroughly mastered her, and she uttered quite a hysterical little cry, as the steps drew quite near now, and a voice exclaimed—

“Why, Sage, I almost had to run.”

“Luke!”

“Yes; Luke,” he replied, smiling, as he took her hand in his. “Who did you think it was?”

“I—I—didn’t know; I wanted to get home quickly,” she faltered. “I did not know it was you.”

“I know that,” he said, drawing her hand through his arm, “or else you would have stopped, wouldn’t you?”

“Why, of course, Luke,” she said, smiling in his face, and with a calm feeling of rest and protection coming over her disturbed spirit.

“I’m glad I caught you,” he said. “Let’s walk slowly, for I’ve a great deal to say to you before you go in.”

“But, first of all, tell me, Luke, dear,” she cried eagerly, “is the appointment confirmed?”

“No.”

“No? Not confirmed? Then, that wicked old Bone—”

“That wicked old Bone of contention,” he said, laughingly taking her up, “has had very little to do with it. At one time I thought that it would be very cruel to take his post, but I do not think so now.”

“But not confirmed, Luke?” she cried, stopping short and clinging to his arm, the picture of bitter disappointment. “Why, this is the meaning, then, of the opposition uncle spoke of yesterday. Who has dared to stop you from having the school?”

“You,” said Luke, as he gazed admiringly in her animated face.

“I, Luke? I?” she exclaimed, in a puzzled way.

“Well, it is through you, dear,” he said, smiling.

“But I have done nothing, Luke,” she cried. “You are teasing me! Has the meeting taken place?”

“Yes; I have just come from it.”

“Well? Mr Bone was there I know, for he gave the boys a holiday, so that he might come.”

“Yes, he was there, evidently looking upon me as the greatest enemy he had in the world till he heard me decline the post.”

“You?—you declined the post, Luke?”

“Yes, I declined the post.”

“And you told me you loved me,” she said, reproachfully, as she drew back.

“As I do with all my heart,” he cried, taking her hand, and drawing it through his arm once more. “Sage, dear, it is because I love you so well that I have declined to take the school.”

“When it was so near,” she cried; and her tears seemed to have stolen into her voice. “And now you will go and take a school ever so far away. Oh, Luke,” she cried, piteously, “it is too bad!”

“Hush, little one,” he said, firmly. “It is not like you to talk like that. I shall not take a school far away, though I shall have to leave you. Sage, dear, I have felt that I must give up present pleasure for a future joy.”

“I—I—don’t understand you,” she cried; “your talk is all a puzzle to me.”

“Is it, dear? There, it shall not be long. You know what your uncle said to me the other day?”

“Oh, yes, Luke; but I don’t think he quite meant it.”

“I am sure he did mean it,” he replied; “and he is quite right. For the past year I have been learning lessons of self-denial, and been taught to place the schoolmaster’s duty above questions of a pecuniary kind; but your uncle has placed my position in a practical light, and, Sage, dear, it is as if all the past teaching has been undone.”

“Oh, Luke, Luke,” she cried, “don’t talk like that!”

“I must. I have had another talk with your uncle. This morning I overtook him, and he asked me, as a man, whom he says he can trust, to set aside all love-making, as he called it in his homely Saxon-English, and to treat you only as a friend! ‘Let matters stand for the present, and see what a couple of years bring forth, if you are doing well,’ he said, ‘in your new position.’”

“In your new position, Luke? Why, what do you mean?”

“Sage, dear, I have decided to set aside the idea of being the master of a school.”

“Oh, Luke!”

“And to read for the bar.”

“Read for the bar?”

“Yes, read for the bar: become a barrister; and I shall work hard to win a name.”

“But the school, Luke—the training college. It is not honest to take advantage of their teaching, gain all you can, and then take to some other career.”

“You think that?” he said, smiling. “Yes, of course,” she said, indignantly. “The principal at Westminster spoke very warmly about two of the students giving up their schools directly, and taking situations as governesses in good families.”

“I quite agree with her,” said Luke, quietly; “and I have appraised the cost to the institution at fifty pounds. That sum I feel bound to send. It is quite as much as so bad a master as I should have turned out is worth.”

“Oh, Luke, that is nonsense,” she cried, as she looked proudly in his face.

“Nay,” he said, “it is truth. And now listen to me. This has all been very sudden.”

“Yes, and you never said a word to me.”

“I came and told you as soon as I knew,” retorted Luke, firmly. “And now I say once more this has been very sudden, but it is irrevocably in obedience to your uncle’s wishes. I shall exact no promises from you, tie you down in no way, but go away in perfect faith that in a few years as the reward of my hard struggle, and when I can go and say to your uncle, ‘See, here, I can command the income you said that I ought to have!’ you will be my little wife.”

“But must you go away, Luke?” she said, with a pitiful look in her eyes.

“Yes, it is absolutely certain. How could I climb up in the world if I stayed here?”

“But I don’t want you to go,” she cried, excitedly.

“And I don’t want to leave you,” he said, fondly.

“I want you to stop and protect me, and take care of me and keep me for yours, Luke.”

“Don’t—don’t talk like that,” he cried, speaking hoarsely, “or you will make me forget my promise to your uncle. Let us be firm and true, and look the matter seriously in the face. It is for our future, and I pray and believe that I am acting wisely here.”

“But you will be away,” she said, with a piteous look in her eyes. “There will be no one to take care of me when you are gone.”

“Nonsense, little one,” he exclaimed. “There is your uncle. What have you to fear? Only be true to me.”

“Oh, yes, yes,” she sobbed; “but you do not know, Luke. I might be tempted, I might be led away from you—I might—”

“Might!” he said, with scorn in his voice. “My little Sage, whom I have known from the day when she gave me first her innocent sisterly love, could not be untrue to the man she has promised to wed. Sage, dear,” he continued, holding her hands in his, and gazing in her agitated, tearful face, “look at me—look me fully in the eyes.”

“Yes, Luke,” she said, hesitatingly; and her pretty, troubled face looked so winning that it was all he could do to keep from clasping her in his arms tightly to his own trusting breast.

“Now,” he said, smiling, “you see me. Can you doubt, dear, that I should ever be untrue to you?”

“No, no! oh, no, Luke,” she cried.

“Neither could I, dearest,” he said, softly. “I am a very plain, unimpulsive man, wanting, perhaps, in the soft speech and ways that are said to please women; but I think my heart is right, and that in spite of my quiet ways I love you very, very dearly.”

“I know, I know you do,” sobbed the girl.

“Yes, and I trust you, my dear,” he said. “I know that you could never give look or word to another that would cause me pain.”

“No, no, dear Luke, I could not,” she sobbed; “but I want you with me. I cannot bear for you to leave me helpless here.”

“Nonsense, my little pet,” he said, tenderly. “The years will soon slip by, and then all will be well. There, we understand each other, do we not?”

“Yes, yes, Luke, I think so,” she sobbed.

“One kiss, then, darling, the last I shall take, perhaps, for years, and then—”

“Oh, no, not now—not now,” she cried, hastily, as he sought to take her in his arms in the sheltered lane. “Uncle is coming with Mr Cyril Mallow;” and then she moaned passionately to herself, “Him again! Oh, Luke, Luke, I wish that I was dead.”

Back to IndexNext