Part 1, Chapter XXIII.

Part 1, Chapter XXIII.Clerical Difficulties.The Fullerton party proved triumphant in the struggle which ensued, and in spite of the Rector’s efforts to produce a better state of things at the boys’ school, Mr Humphrey Bone kept on teaching in his good old-fashioned way—good in the eyes of many of the Lawfordites—when he was sober, but breaking out with a week’s drinking fit from time to time, when the school would be either closed or carried on by the principal monitors, Sage Portlock going in from time to time at the Rector’s request when the noise became uproarious.Those who had been the most determined on Bone’s retention shut their eyes to these little weaknesses on the master’s part; and, if the boys were not well taught, the tradesmen’s accounts were written in a copperplate hand, while the length and amount of the bill was made less painful to its recipient by finding his name made to look quite handsome with a wonderful flourish which literally framed it in curves—a flourish which it had taken Mr Bone years to acquire.The Rector resigned himself in disgust to the state of things, and devoted his attention to the girls’ school.“It can’t be helped, Miss Portlock,” he said, with a smile; “if we cannot make good boys in the place we must make super-excellent girls, and by and by as they grow up they’ll exercise their influence on the young men.”He thought a great deal of his words as he went homewards, according to his custom, with his hands behind his back, holding his walking-cane as if it were a tail, thinking very deeply of his sons, and whether some day good, true women would have an influence upon their lives and make them better men.The Rector never knew why the boys laughed at him, setting it down entirely to their rudeness and Humphrey Bone’s bad teaching, for no one ever took the trouble to tell him it was on account of that thick black stick he was so fond of carrying, depending from his clasped hands behind.Upon the present occasion, as he walked homeward, and in fact as he would at any time when excited by his thoughts, he now and then gave the stick a toss up, or a wag sideways, ending with a regular flourish, after the manner of a cow in a summer pasture when much troubled by the flies, adding thereby greatly to the resemblance borne by the stick to a pendent tail.The Rector was more than usually excited on the morning of his remark to Sage Portlock. There had been something tender and paternal in his way of addressing her, and she had a good deal filled his thoughts of late. There were several reasons for this.He had had no right to plan out Sage’s future, but somehow he had thoroughly mapped it out long before.He knew of Luke Ross’s attachment to her, and from his position as spiritual head of the parish, it was only natural that he should think of the duty that so often fell to his lot—that of joining couples in the “holy estate of matrimony.”But a short time back and in Sage’s case it all came so natural and easy. Luke Ross had been trained, he was to have the boys’ school, he would soon marry her, the schoolhouses would be occupied, and the schools be as perfect under such guidance as schools could be.Everything had been gliding on beautifully towards a definite end, and then there had come stumbling-blocks. Luke Ross had gone back to town; the girls’ schoolhouse remained unoccupied, as Sage went home for the present; Humphrey Bone was faster than ever in his post, and likely to stay there, the opposition being so strong; and, worst problem of all to solve, there was Cyril.It was no wonder that the thick black stick was twitched and flourished and tossed up and down, for the Rector’s mind was greatly disturbed, especially upon the last question—that of his son.He had spoken severely without effect; he had tried appeal without better success. Cyril had not openly defied him, but had sat and listened quietly to all his father had said, and then gone and acted precisely as if nothing whatever had been spoken.“She is so good, and sweet, and innocent a girl; so true, too, in her attachment to Luke Ross, that I cannot speak to her,” he said to himself. “Besides, she has given me no opening. But it must be stopped. What shall I do?”The Reverend Eli Mallow went on for a few yards deeply thoughtful, and then the idea came. He knew what he would do: speak to Mrs Portlock first, or to the Churchwarden, and ask their advice and counsel upon the matter.“Yes,” he said to himself, “it will be the best. Such matters are better checked in their incipient state. I will go and see her at once.”He faced round, glanced at his watch, saw that it was only eleven, and walked sharply in the direction of Kilby Farm, to find the Churchwarden away from home, but Mrs Portlock ready to receive him with a most gracious smile.“I’m sure you must be tired after your walk, Mr Mallow,” she said. “Sit down by the fire. What cold weather we are having! You’ll take a glass of my home-made wine and a bit of cake?”The Rector would rather not, but Mrs Portlock insisted upon getting the refreshments out of the fireside cupboard, extolling the wine the while.“I’m sure you’d like it,” she said. “Your son had some only last night, and he said it was better than any sherry he had ever tasted.”“My son—last night?” said the Rector, quickly. “Which son?”“Mr Cyril; he drank four glasses of it, and praised it most highly.”She poured out a glass, and the Rector drew it to him, and sat gazing at the clear, amber liquid, hesitating as to how he should begin, while Mrs Portlock stole a glance at the mirror to see if her cap was straight, and wished she had known of her visitor’s coming, so that she might have put on a silk dress, and the cap with the maroon ribbons and the gold acorn.“Cyril said that he was down the town last night with Frank,” said the Rector to himself. “He fears my words, and he is playing false, or he would not have been ashamed to answer that he was here.”“How the time seems to fly, Mrs Portlock!” said the Rector at last, biting his lip with annoyance at the want of originality of the only idea he could set forth.“Dear me, yes. I was saying so only last week to Mr Cyril. ‘Four months,’ I said, ‘since you came back;’ and he looked up at Sage and said that the time seemed to go like lightning.”“By the way, Mrs Portlock,” said the Rector, hastily, “have you heard from Luke Ross lately?”“Oh, dear me, no,” said the lady, rather sharply. “I never call at the Ross’s now.”“I thought, perhaps, the young people might correspond.”“Oh, dear me, no; neither Mr Portlock nor myself could countenance such a thing as that.”The Rector was at a loss to see the impropriety of such an intercourse, but he said nothing—he merely bowed.“That was only a boy-and-girl sort of thing. Our Sage knew Luke Ross from a boy, but now they are grown up, and as Joseph—Mr Portlock—said they were too young to think about such things as that.”“But I understood that they were engaged,” said the Rector, who felt startled; and he gazed very anxiously in Mrs Portlock’s face for her reply.“Oh, dear me, no, sir, nothing of the kind.”For want of something to say, the Rector sipped his wine.“My husband very properly said that under the circumstances no engagement ought to take place, and it was not likely. For my part I don’t agree with the affair at all.”The Rector felt that his position was growing more unpleasant than ever. He had come to say something, but that something would not be said; and at last when he did speak his words were very different from what he had intended they should be.“My son, Cyril, has taken to coming here a good deal lately, Mrs Portlock,” he said.“Well, yes, sir,” she said, with a satisfied smile; “he has.”“I am sorry to have to speak so plainly about him, Mrs Portlock, but I hope you will not encourage his visits. Cyril has travelled a good deal, and has imbibed, I am afraid, a great deal of careless freedom.”“Indeed?” said the lady, stiffly.“I’m afraid that he is too ready to laugh and chat with any girl he meets, and I should be sorry if—er—if—”“If you mean by that, Mr Mallow, sir, that you don’t consider our niece good enough for your son,” said Mrs Portlock, tartly, “please say so downright.”“I did not wish to imply anything of the kind, Mrs Portlock,” replied the Rector, mildly. “I wish merely to warn you against his foolish, frivolous ways.”“If there’s a difference at all it’s on your side, Mr Mallow, sir,” continued the lady. “Mr Cyril has been a deal too idle and roving to suit me, while our Sage—”“Miss Portlock is a most estimable young lady, for whom I entertain the highest respect, Mrs Portlock,” said the Rector, warmly; “and it was on her behalf, knowing as I do how foolish Cyril can be, that I came to speak to you this morning.”“I don’t know anything about his foolishness, Mr Mallow,” said the lady, who was growing irate; “but I’ve got to say this, that he comes here just as if he means something, and if he does not mean anything he had better stop away, and not behave like his brother Frank.”“Exactly so, my dear madam,” cried the Rector, eagerly. “I am going to talk seriously to him.”This did not seem to meet the lady’s ideas, and she looked hot and annoyed, beginning to stir the fire with a good deal of noise, and setting the poker down more loudly.“I should be deeply grieved, I am sure, Mrs Portlock,” began the Rector; “it is far from my wish to—really, my dear madam, this is a very unpleasant interview.”The lady said nothing; but she was so evidently of the same opinion that the Rector was glad to rise and offer his hand in token of farewell.She shook hands, and the visitor left, to hurry home with his black stick hanging behind, and his soul hot within him as he mentally accused Cyril by his folly of getting him into the unpleasant predicament from which he had so lately escaped.

The Fullerton party proved triumphant in the struggle which ensued, and in spite of the Rector’s efforts to produce a better state of things at the boys’ school, Mr Humphrey Bone kept on teaching in his good old-fashioned way—good in the eyes of many of the Lawfordites—when he was sober, but breaking out with a week’s drinking fit from time to time, when the school would be either closed or carried on by the principal monitors, Sage Portlock going in from time to time at the Rector’s request when the noise became uproarious.

Those who had been the most determined on Bone’s retention shut their eyes to these little weaknesses on the master’s part; and, if the boys were not well taught, the tradesmen’s accounts were written in a copperplate hand, while the length and amount of the bill was made less painful to its recipient by finding his name made to look quite handsome with a wonderful flourish which literally framed it in curves—a flourish which it had taken Mr Bone years to acquire.

The Rector resigned himself in disgust to the state of things, and devoted his attention to the girls’ school.

“It can’t be helped, Miss Portlock,” he said, with a smile; “if we cannot make good boys in the place we must make super-excellent girls, and by and by as they grow up they’ll exercise their influence on the young men.”

He thought a great deal of his words as he went homewards, according to his custom, with his hands behind his back, holding his walking-cane as if it were a tail, thinking very deeply of his sons, and whether some day good, true women would have an influence upon their lives and make them better men.

The Rector never knew why the boys laughed at him, setting it down entirely to their rudeness and Humphrey Bone’s bad teaching, for no one ever took the trouble to tell him it was on account of that thick black stick he was so fond of carrying, depending from his clasped hands behind.

Upon the present occasion, as he walked homeward, and in fact as he would at any time when excited by his thoughts, he now and then gave the stick a toss up, or a wag sideways, ending with a regular flourish, after the manner of a cow in a summer pasture when much troubled by the flies, adding thereby greatly to the resemblance borne by the stick to a pendent tail.

The Rector was more than usually excited on the morning of his remark to Sage Portlock. There had been something tender and paternal in his way of addressing her, and she had a good deal filled his thoughts of late. There were several reasons for this.

He had had no right to plan out Sage’s future, but somehow he had thoroughly mapped it out long before.

He knew of Luke Ross’s attachment to her, and from his position as spiritual head of the parish, it was only natural that he should think of the duty that so often fell to his lot—that of joining couples in the “holy estate of matrimony.”

But a short time back and in Sage’s case it all came so natural and easy. Luke Ross had been trained, he was to have the boys’ school, he would soon marry her, the schoolhouses would be occupied, and the schools be as perfect under such guidance as schools could be.

Everything had been gliding on beautifully towards a definite end, and then there had come stumbling-blocks. Luke Ross had gone back to town; the girls’ schoolhouse remained unoccupied, as Sage went home for the present; Humphrey Bone was faster than ever in his post, and likely to stay there, the opposition being so strong; and, worst problem of all to solve, there was Cyril.

It was no wonder that the thick black stick was twitched and flourished and tossed up and down, for the Rector’s mind was greatly disturbed, especially upon the last question—that of his son.

He had spoken severely without effect; he had tried appeal without better success. Cyril had not openly defied him, but had sat and listened quietly to all his father had said, and then gone and acted precisely as if nothing whatever had been spoken.

“She is so good, and sweet, and innocent a girl; so true, too, in her attachment to Luke Ross, that I cannot speak to her,” he said to himself. “Besides, she has given me no opening. But it must be stopped. What shall I do?”

The Reverend Eli Mallow went on for a few yards deeply thoughtful, and then the idea came. He knew what he would do: speak to Mrs Portlock first, or to the Churchwarden, and ask their advice and counsel upon the matter.

“Yes,” he said to himself, “it will be the best. Such matters are better checked in their incipient state. I will go and see her at once.”

He faced round, glanced at his watch, saw that it was only eleven, and walked sharply in the direction of Kilby Farm, to find the Churchwarden away from home, but Mrs Portlock ready to receive him with a most gracious smile.

“I’m sure you must be tired after your walk, Mr Mallow,” she said. “Sit down by the fire. What cold weather we are having! You’ll take a glass of my home-made wine and a bit of cake?”

The Rector would rather not, but Mrs Portlock insisted upon getting the refreshments out of the fireside cupboard, extolling the wine the while.

“I’m sure you’d like it,” she said. “Your son had some only last night, and he said it was better than any sherry he had ever tasted.”

“My son—last night?” said the Rector, quickly. “Which son?”

“Mr Cyril; he drank four glasses of it, and praised it most highly.”

She poured out a glass, and the Rector drew it to him, and sat gazing at the clear, amber liquid, hesitating as to how he should begin, while Mrs Portlock stole a glance at the mirror to see if her cap was straight, and wished she had known of her visitor’s coming, so that she might have put on a silk dress, and the cap with the maroon ribbons and the gold acorn.

“Cyril said that he was down the town last night with Frank,” said the Rector to himself. “He fears my words, and he is playing false, or he would not have been ashamed to answer that he was here.”

“How the time seems to fly, Mrs Portlock!” said the Rector at last, biting his lip with annoyance at the want of originality of the only idea he could set forth.

“Dear me, yes. I was saying so only last week to Mr Cyril. ‘Four months,’ I said, ‘since you came back;’ and he looked up at Sage and said that the time seemed to go like lightning.”

“By the way, Mrs Portlock,” said the Rector, hastily, “have you heard from Luke Ross lately?”

“Oh, dear me, no,” said the lady, rather sharply. “I never call at the Ross’s now.”

“I thought, perhaps, the young people might correspond.”

“Oh, dear me, no; neither Mr Portlock nor myself could countenance such a thing as that.”

The Rector was at a loss to see the impropriety of such an intercourse, but he said nothing—he merely bowed.

“That was only a boy-and-girl sort of thing. Our Sage knew Luke Ross from a boy, but now they are grown up, and as Joseph—Mr Portlock—said they were too young to think about such things as that.”

“But I understood that they were engaged,” said the Rector, who felt startled; and he gazed very anxiously in Mrs Portlock’s face for her reply.

“Oh, dear me, no, sir, nothing of the kind.”

For want of something to say, the Rector sipped his wine.

“My husband very properly said that under the circumstances no engagement ought to take place, and it was not likely. For my part I don’t agree with the affair at all.”

The Rector felt that his position was growing more unpleasant than ever. He had come to say something, but that something would not be said; and at last when he did speak his words were very different from what he had intended they should be.

“My son, Cyril, has taken to coming here a good deal lately, Mrs Portlock,” he said.

“Well, yes, sir,” she said, with a satisfied smile; “he has.”

“I am sorry to have to speak so plainly about him, Mrs Portlock, but I hope you will not encourage his visits. Cyril has travelled a good deal, and has imbibed, I am afraid, a great deal of careless freedom.”

“Indeed?” said the lady, stiffly.

“I’m afraid that he is too ready to laugh and chat with any girl he meets, and I should be sorry if—er—if—”

“If you mean by that, Mr Mallow, sir, that you don’t consider our niece good enough for your son,” said Mrs Portlock, tartly, “please say so downright.”

“I did not wish to imply anything of the kind, Mrs Portlock,” replied the Rector, mildly. “I wish merely to warn you against his foolish, frivolous ways.”

“If there’s a difference at all it’s on your side, Mr Mallow, sir,” continued the lady. “Mr Cyril has been a deal too idle and roving to suit me, while our Sage—”

“Miss Portlock is a most estimable young lady, for whom I entertain the highest respect, Mrs Portlock,” said the Rector, warmly; “and it was on her behalf, knowing as I do how foolish Cyril can be, that I came to speak to you this morning.”

“I don’t know anything about his foolishness, Mr Mallow,” said the lady, who was growing irate; “but I’ve got to say this, that he comes here just as if he means something, and if he does not mean anything he had better stop away, and not behave like his brother Frank.”

“Exactly so, my dear madam,” cried the Rector, eagerly. “I am going to talk seriously to him.”

This did not seem to meet the lady’s ideas, and she looked hot and annoyed, beginning to stir the fire with a good deal of noise, and setting the poker down more loudly.

“I should be deeply grieved, I am sure, Mrs Portlock,” began the Rector; “it is far from my wish to—really, my dear madam, this is a very unpleasant interview.”

The lady said nothing; but she was so evidently of the same opinion that the Rector was glad to rise and offer his hand in token of farewell.

She shook hands, and the visitor left, to hurry home with his black stick hanging behind, and his soul hot within him as he mentally accused Cyril by his folly of getting him into the unpleasant predicament from which he had so lately escaped.

Part 1, Chapter XXIV.“A Row.”“Where are you going, Frank?”“Don’t know; perhaps as far as Lewby. John Berry said he would be glad to show me round his farm.”“Oh!” exclaimed Cyril, with a meaning look.“Well, what do you mean by ‘Oh’?” said Frank, roughly.“Nothing at all, my dear boy—nothing at all,” said Cyril.“I never grin like an idiot at you when you are going over to Kilby, do I?”“Oh, no: not at all. It’s all right, I suppose,” laughed Cyril. “But, I say, hadn’t you better be off amongst the blacks? You have grown rather uncivilised lately.”“Mind your own business,” growled Frank Mallow. “I say!”“Well?”“That blackguard regularly frightened Ju. She hasn’t looked the same girl since.”“No,” said Cyril. “Pity the shooting season’s over.”“Why?”“We might have peppered the blackguard by accident if he had shown himself here again.”“Master would like to see you, sir, in my mistress’s room,” said the butler, entering the study where the young men were smoking.“Oh, all right, I’ll come,” said Cyril, impatiently. “Hang it, Frank, if you were half a brother you’d go halves with me, and take me back to your place. I’m sick of this life. There’s a lecture about something, I suppose.”“Caning, I should think,” said Frank, with a sneering laugh. “There, go and get it over; and look here, I’ll give up Lewby to-day, and drive over with you to Gatley. Let’s get a game at billiards and dine with Artingale. It’s no use to have a lord after your sister if you don’t make use of him.”“All right. No. I’ve an engagement to-night.”“Go and keep it then, and be hanged. I shall go to Lewby,” growled Frank.“Blackberrying?” sneered Cyril. “I say, mind you don’t ‘Rue’ going.”“If you say that again, Cil, I’ll get up and kick you,” growled Frank. “Every fellow isn’t such a blackguard as you.”“Oh no,” laughed Cyril, “especially not dear brother Frank. There, I’m off.”“You’re a beauty, Cil!” growled Frank, and he lit a fresh cigar. “Share! Go halves with me! Ha, ha, ha! I dare say he would. How people do believe in stories of the gold mines. I wonder whether anything is to be made out of that poet fool.”“Want to talk to me, father?” said Cyril, entering the room where his mother lay upon the couch, with a terrible look of anxiety upon her pallid face. “Oh, let’s see; will my smoking worry you, mamma?”“Always so thoughtful for me,” said the fond mother to herself. Then aloud—“I don’t mind it, Cyril, but I don’t think your father—”She stopped short, for the Rector interrupted her, sternly.“Is an invalid lady’s room a suitable place for smoking pipes, Cyril?”“Don’t see that it matters what the place is so long as the invalid don’t mind. But there, don’t make a bother about it,” he cried, tapping the burning tobacco out on to the hob; “I can wait until I go down again.”“Shall we go down, papa?” said Julia, rising with Cynthia from where they sat in the window.“No, my dears; you must hear what I am going to say, so you may as well hear it now.”“Oh, no, Eli,” moaned the invalid.“Very well, my dears, you had better go,” said the Rector, and he led his daughters to the door, which he opened and closed after them with quiet dignity.“Row on!” muttered Cyril. “Well, ma, dear, how are you?”“Not—not quite so well, Cyril,” she said, fondly; and her voice trembled, as she dreaded a scene. “Will you come and sit down here by me?” she added, pointing to a chair.“Yes, I may as well,” he said, laughingly, “and you can take care of me, for I see somebody means mischief.”The Rector bit his lips, for his was a painful task. He wished to utter a severe reprimand, and to appeal to the young man’s sense of right and wrong, while here at the outset was the mother bird spreading her protecting wing before her errant chick, and ready, the Rector saw, to stand up boldly in his defence.“Let me punch up your pillow for you, dear,” said Cyril, bending over the couch, and raising the slight frame of the sick woman, whose arms closed softly round the young man’s neck, while he beat and turned the soft down pillow, lowering the invalid gently back into her former place, and kissing her tenderly upon the brow.“That’s better,” he said. “I hate a hot pillow, and it’s so comfortable when it’s turned.”Mrs Mallow clung fondly to her son for a few moments, smiling gratefully in his face; and the Rector sighed and again bit his lip as he saw how moment by moment his task was growing more difficult.“If he would only study her feelings in the broader things of life,” he said to himself; and he took a turn or two impatiently about the room.“Now, governor, I’m ready,” said Cyril, facing round suddenly, his mother holding his hand between hers. “What’s the last thing I’ve done amiss?”“Heaven knows,” cried the Rector, startling his wife by the way in which he suddenly flashed into anger. “The last thing that I have to complain of is that I cannot trust my own son.”“Ah, you mean with money, father,” said the young man, lightly. “Well, it does go rather fast.”“I mean my son’s word,” said the Rector, quickly. “Cyril, last night you told me a lie.”“Oh, no, no, no,” cried the mother, quickly. “It is some mistake, dear. Cyril would not tell you what was not true.”The Rector, after years of patience, was so thoroughly out of temper with the discovery of that day that he retorted hotly—“A lie—I say he told me a deliberate lie.”“Nonsense!” said the young man. “People tell lies when they are afraid to tell the truth. I’m not afraid to tell you anything.”“You told me last night, sir, that you had been down in the town with Frank, whereas I find this morning that you had been at Kilby Farm.”“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Cyril. “Why, what a discovery, father. You asked me where I had been, and I told you—‘down the town.’ So I had. You did not ask me whether I had been anywhere else, or I might have added, to the Churchwarden’s.”“And pray why did you go there, sir?” cried the Rector.“Come, father, don’t talk to me as if I were a naughty little boy about to be sent to bed without his supper.”“Pray be calm, dear,” cried Mrs Mallow. “Cyril gives a very good explanation. Surely it was natural that he should walk over to Kilby.”“I say why did you go over there, sir?”“To smoke a pipe with old Portlock, if you must know, and have a glass of his home brewed ale. It’s dull enough here with the girls.”“It is false, sir,” cried the Rector, excitedly.“Well,” said Cyril, coolly, “you may not find it dull, but I do.”“I say, sir, it is false that you merely went there to drink and smoke.”“Very well, father,” said Cyril, in the most nonchalant way, as he lay back in his chair and played with his mother’s rings. “Perhaps you know, then, why I went.”“Oh, hush, Cyril, my boy,” panted the invalid. “Eli, my dear, pray be calm. This hurts me—hurts me more than I can tell you.”“I am sorry, my dear, very sorry,” cried the Rector, excitedly; “but it must be stopped. I cannot allow matters to go on as they do. It is terrible. I feel at every turn as if I were being disgraced. I shiver as I go down the town or make a call, for fear that I should have to encounter some fresh disgrace brought upon us by our own boys.”“What’s the matter with the governor, ma, dear?” said the young man, mockingly. “Has Frank been up to some fresh games?”“Oh, hush, my dear boy,” cried the poor woman, imploringly.“I’ll be as quiet as I can, dear,” replied Cyril; “but there are bounds to everything. I am not a child.”“No, sir, but you act like one—like a disobedient child,” cried his father. “No matter what is done for you, back you come home to idle and lounge away your existence. The idea of the nobility of labour never seems to have dawned in your mind.”“Never,” replied Cyril, calmly. “Nobility of labour, indeed! Why, father, what’s the good of quoting stuff like that to me out of one of your old sermons?”“You are utterly wasting your life, sir.”“Not I, father,” retorted Cyril. “I am rather enjoying it. Let those work who are obliged. Why should I make myself a slave? I like my existence very well as it is, and don’t mean to bother.”“It is disgraceful,” cried the Rector, whose usually bland face was now fierce with anger.“Don’t see it. I don’t spend much, nor yet get into debt. You’ve got plenty of money, so why should I trouble myself about work?”“I’d forgive that,” cried the Rector—“I’d forgive your idleness, but when I find that you cannot be trusted, I am compelled to speak.”“But, my dear,” remonstrated the invalid, “what has poor Cyril done? He did not like the wretched slavery out in the colony, and he could not content himself with the drudgery of a clerk’s desk. Do not be so severe. Be patient, and he will succeed like Frank has done.”“What has he done?” cried the Rector. “What is he doing but leading such a life as must disgrace us all.”“Nonsense, father!” cried the young man. “It is no nonsense, sir. Months ago I spoke to you about your conduct, but it has been in vain. People in all directions are noticing your behaviour towards Miss Portlock. Just, too, when your sisters are about to make excellent matches.”“Miss Portlock!” cried Mrs Mallow, starting. “Oh, Cyril!”Cyril acted like an animal brought to bay. He began to fight. While there was a chance of his father not being aware of his proceedings, he fenced and parried. Now he spoke out sharply—“Well, what do people say about my behaviour with Miss Portlock? She’s a very nice ladylike girl, well educated, and sweet and clever, and if I like to chat with her, I shall.”“Oh, Cyril!” cried his mother again; and then she added, “Is this true?”“True? Is what true? That I have been to Kilby sometimes to have a chat with Sage Portlock? Of course it is. Why not?”“You own to it, then?” said his father. “Own to it, if you like to call it so, sir. And now, pray, where is the harm?”Mrs Mallow withdrew her hand from her son’s grasp, and looked in his face with a terribly pained expression, for, with all her gentleness of disposition, the sense of caste was in her very strongly; and with all his failings, she had looked upon Cyril as a noble representative of the mingled blood of the old family Mallows and the Heskeths from whom she sprang.“I am to understand, then,” said the Rector, “that you propose honouring us with a daughter chosen from the people here.”“I don’t say yes, and I don’t say no,” replied Cyril, cavalierly. “I think I have heard you say often that Sage was a very nice girl.”“Sage?”“Yes, Sage. I think you had the pleasure of baptising her by her herbaceous name, so you ought to know.”The Rector exchanged glances with his wife, whose face wore a very pitiable look.“I have—yes—certainly—often said that Miss Portlock was a very good, sensible girl,” he said at last.“Well, then, what more do you want, sir? I suppose you expect a man to think about such things at some time in his life?”“But have you proposed for her hand?” said his mother, faintly.“Proposed for her hand? Nonsense, mamma. People of their class don’t understand things in that light.”This was a false move, and the Rector took advantage of the slip.“People of that class, sir? Then you acknowledge that you are degrading yourself by these proceedings.”“Oh, I don’t know about degrading myself, sir. You know what they say. If a lady marries her groom she descends to his level. If a man marries his cook he raises her to his.”“But does Mr Portlock—my Churchwarden—know of your intentions?”“How can he,” said Cyril, coolly, “when I have none?”“But Mrs Portlock believes that you are paying your attentions to her niece.”“Yes, I s’pose so,” he replied. “Terribly silly woman.”“Oh, Cyril, Cyril,” said his mother, “this is very, very shocking.”“Stuff and nonsense, mamma. Why, what a tremendous fuss about a little bit of flirtation with a pretty little schoolmistress. You nearly had her sister for a daughter-in-law when Frank was after her.”“Frank saw the folly of his proceedings, and grew sensible,” said the Rector.“Oh, did he!” muttered Cyril.“The word flirtation, Cyril,” said the Rector firmly, “is a disgrace to our civilisation, and one that ought certainly to be heard from no decent lips.”“Matter of opinion, of course,” said Cyril; and he placed his hands under his head and stared straight out of the window, while the Rector and his wife exchanged glances.“Cyril,” said the former at last, after a struggle to keep down his anger, “I will not quarrel with you.”“That’s right, governor. I hate quarrelling.”“But while you are under my roof I must be obeyed.”“Don’t think any man has a more obedient son,” replied Cyril.“The time, however, has now come when some plan must be devised for you to make a fresh start in life upon your own account.”“’Pon my word, father, I don’t see it. I’m very comfortable as I am.”“But I am not, sir,” replied his father, firmly. “For years past it has been thrown in my teeth that I am rightly named Eli. You know why. It is time, now, sir, that we took care not to be ashamed of the enemy in the gate.”“Please don’t preach, father,” said the young man, in a tone of protestation.The Rector paid no attention to his words, but went on—“Let me ask you first,” he said, “one question.”“Go on,” said the young man, for his father had stopped.“Has Miss Portlock accepted your attentions?”There was a pause here. “I say, Cyril, has Miss Portlock accepted your attentions?”“Matter of confidence,” replied the young man. “Question I would rather not answer.”“Then she has not,” said the Rector, quickly, “and I am very, very glad.”“Why, father?”“Because, as I have told you before, she is receiving the attentions of Mr Luke Ross.”“Oh, nonsense!” cried Cyril, flushing. “That’s all off now.”“I heard something of the kind; but what do you mean? Have they quarrelled?”“Oh, no. Old Portlock wouldn’t have it: and quite right, too. Girl like that to be engaged to such a clod!”“Cyril,” said his father, angrily, “I would to heaven that I had as good a son.”“Complimentary to your boys, sir. Let’s see, he threw you over very shabbily about the school, didn’t he?”“He declined the post, certainly.”“Then even Mr Luke Ross is not perfect, sir.”“I am not going to criticise his conduct over that matter, sir, beyond saying that he had no doubt good reasons for declining the post. On further consideration I think he was right, for unless he felt his heart to be in his work, he would have been wrong to venture upon binding himself to the school.”“Most worthy young man, I’ve no doubt,” said Cyril, with a sneer.“A young man for whom I entertain a great respect,” retorted the Rector.“One of those highly respectable young men who push their way on in the world,” sneered Cyril.“And often become great with the poorest of means for pushing their way,” said the Rector, “while those well started miserably fail.”“Oh, yes; I know ’em,” said Cyril. “One reads of them in the nice books. Bah! I haven’t patience with the prigs; and as for this Luke Ross,” he cried, with the colour burning as two spots in his cheeks, “I look upon him as one of the most contemptible cads under the sun. You talk of wishing that you had such a son, father! Why the fellow is utterly beneath our notice.”“Why?” said his father, in a sharp, incisive tone.“Why?” replied Cyril. “Because he is.”“A pitiful reply,” said the Rector, angrily. “Can you give me a better reason for your dislike to Luke Ross?”“Not I. He is not worth it.”“Then I’ll give you one,” replied the Rector. “The true one, Cyril, though it cuts me to the heart to have to speak so to my son, and before the mother who has worshipped him from his birth.”“Oh, Eli, pray, pray spare me this,” cried Mrs Mallow, supplicatingly.“No,” he said, “I have been silent too long—I have given way too much. It is time I spoke out with no uncertain sound. Cyril, you hate this man because he is your rival in the affections of a good, true girl. Your anger has taught me so far, and I rejoice thereat. Your suit has been without success. You teach me, too, that you would stop at nothing, even blackening your rival’s character, to gain your ends; but this must not be. I look upon Sage Portlock as in my charge, and I tell you, once and for all, that you must stop this disgraceful pursuit. I say that it shall not go on.”“And how will you stop it, sir?” cried Cyril, springing to his feet, while the mother lay back with clasped hands.“I don’t know yet, but stop it I will,” cried Mr Mallow. “You shall disgrace your mother and sisters no longer—insult Miss Portlock no more by your pursuit.”“Insult her?”“Yes, sir, insult her. She is too good and pure-hearted a girl for her affections to be tampered with by such a heartless fellow as you.”“Eli, Eli,” moaned Mrs Mallow, but her cry was unnoticed by the angry men.“Tampered with! Heartless! Bah! You do not know what you are saying.”“I know, my son, that the time has come for me to strike. You must leave here, and at once. Sage Portlock is not for you. If you do not know your position in life and your duty to your class, you must be taught.”“Then hear me now,” cried the young man, defiantly. “Luke Ross is no rival of mine, for he has never won Sage Portlock’s heart. That belongs to me; and as to duty, caste, and the like, let them go to the devil. Have her I will, in spite of you all, and—”“Silence, sir!” cried the Rector, beside himself with passion—the rage kept down for years; and he caught his son by the throat. “Man grown—no, you are a boy—a child, whom I ought to soundly thrash for your disobedience and shame. Son? you are no son of mine.”“Loose me, father,” cried the young man. “I will not bear this. Loose me, I tell you.”Father and son had forgotten themselves, and in those brief moments of their struggle a strange blindness had come over them. They swayed to and fro, a little table covered with china was overset with a crash, and, at last, getting one hand free, Cyril clenched his fist and struck out fiercely, just as a wild and piercing scream rang through the room.

“Where are you going, Frank?”

“Don’t know; perhaps as far as Lewby. John Berry said he would be glad to show me round his farm.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Cyril, with a meaning look.

“Well, what do you mean by ‘Oh’?” said Frank, roughly.

“Nothing at all, my dear boy—nothing at all,” said Cyril.

“I never grin like an idiot at you when you are going over to Kilby, do I?”

“Oh, no: not at all. It’s all right, I suppose,” laughed Cyril. “But, I say, hadn’t you better be off amongst the blacks? You have grown rather uncivilised lately.”

“Mind your own business,” growled Frank Mallow. “I say!”

“Well?”

“That blackguard regularly frightened Ju. She hasn’t looked the same girl since.”

“No,” said Cyril. “Pity the shooting season’s over.”

“Why?”

“We might have peppered the blackguard by accident if he had shown himself here again.”

“Master would like to see you, sir, in my mistress’s room,” said the butler, entering the study where the young men were smoking.

“Oh, all right, I’ll come,” said Cyril, impatiently. “Hang it, Frank, if you were half a brother you’d go halves with me, and take me back to your place. I’m sick of this life. There’s a lecture about something, I suppose.”

“Caning, I should think,” said Frank, with a sneering laugh. “There, go and get it over; and look here, I’ll give up Lewby to-day, and drive over with you to Gatley. Let’s get a game at billiards and dine with Artingale. It’s no use to have a lord after your sister if you don’t make use of him.”

“All right. No. I’ve an engagement to-night.”

“Go and keep it then, and be hanged. I shall go to Lewby,” growled Frank.

“Blackberrying?” sneered Cyril. “I say, mind you don’t ‘Rue’ going.”

“If you say that again, Cil, I’ll get up and kick you,” growled Frank. “Every fellow isn’t such a blackguard as you.”

“Oh no,” laughed Cyril, “especially not dear brother Frank. There, I’m off.”

“You’re a beauty, Cil!” growled Frank, and he lit a fresh cigar. “Share! Go halves with me! Ha, ha, ha! I dare say he would. How people do believe in stories of the gold mines. I wonder whether anything is to be made out of that poet fool.”

“Want to talk to me, father?” said Cyril, entering the room where his mother lay upon the couch, with a terrible look of anxiety upon her pallid face. “Oh, let’s see; will my smoking worry you, mamma?”

“Always so thoughtful for me,” said the fond mother to herself. Then aloud—

“I don’t mind it, Cyril, but I don’t think your father—”

She stopped short, for the Rector interrupted her, sternly.

“Is an invalid lady’s room a suitable place for smoking pipes, Cyril?”

“Don’t see that it matters what the place is so long as the invalid don’t mind. But there, don’t make a bother about it,” he cried, tapping the burning tobacco out on to the hob; “I can wait until I go down again.”

“Shall we go down, papa?” said Julia, rising with Cynthia from where they sat in the window.

“No, my dears; you must hear what I am going to say, so you may as well hear it now.”

“Oh, no, Eli,” moaned the invalid.

“Very well, my dears, you had better go,” said the Rector, and he led his daughters to the door, which he opened and closed after them with quiet dignity.

“Row on!” muttered Cyril. “Well, ma, dear, how are you?”

“Not—not quite so well, Cyril,” she said, fondly; and her voice trembled, as she dreaded a scene. “Will you come and sit down here by me?” she added, pointing to a chair.

“Yes, I may as well,” he said, laughingly, “and you can take care of me, for I see somebody means mischief.”

The Rector bit his lips, for his was a painful task. He wished to utter a severe reprimand, and to appeal to the young man’s sense of right and wrong, while here at the outset was the mother bird spreading her protecting wing before her errant chick, and ready, the Rector saw, to stand up boldly in his defence.

“Let me punch up your pillow for you, dear,” said Cyril, bending over the couch, and raising the slight frame of the sick woman, whose arms closed softly round the young man’s neck, while he beat and turned the soft down pillow, lowering the invalid gently back into her former place, and kissing her tenderly upon the brow.

“That’s better,” he said. “I hate a hot pillow, and it’s so comfortable when it’s turned.”

Mrs Mallow clung fondly to her son for a few moments, smiling gratefully in his face; and the Rector sighed and again bit his lip as he saw how moment by moment his task was growing more difficult.

“If he would only study her feelings in the broader things of life,” he said to himself; and he took a turn or two impatiently about the room.

“Now, governor, I’m ready,” said Cyril, facing round suddenly, his mother holding his hand between hers. “What’s the last thing I’ve done amiss?”

“Heaven knows,” cried the Rector, startling his wife by the way in which he suddenly flashed into anger. “The last thing that I have to complain of is that I cannot trust my own son.”

“Ah, you mean with money, father,” said the young man, lightly. “Well, it does go rather fast.”

“I mean my son’s word,” said the Rector, quickly. “Cyril, last night you told me a lie.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” cried the mother, quickly. “It is some mistake, dear. Cyril would not tell you what was not true.”

The Rector, after years of patience, was so thoroughly out of temper with the discovery of that day that he retorted hotly—

“A lie—I say he told me a deliberate lie.”

“Nonsense!” said the young man. “People tell lies when they are afraid to tell the truth. I’m not afraid to tell you anything.”

“You told me last night, sir, that you had been down in the town with Frank, whereas I find this morning that you had been at Kilby Farm.”

“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Cyril. “Why, what a discovery, father. You asked me where I had been, and I told you—‘down the town.’ So I had. You did not ask me whether I had been anywhere else, or I might have added, to the Churchwarden’s.”

“And pray why did you go there, sir?” cried the Rector.

“Come, father, don’t talk to me as if I were a naughty little boy about to be sent to bed without his supper.”

“Pray be calm, dear,” cried Mrs Mallow. “Cyril gives a very good explanation. Surely it was natural that he should walk over to Kilby.”

“I say why did you go over there, sir?”

“To smoke a pipe with old Portlock, if you must know, and have a glass of his home brewed ale. It’s dull enough here with the girls.”

“It is false, sir,” cried the Rector, excitedly.

“Well,” said Cyril, coolly, “you may not find it dull, but I do.”

“I say, sir, it is false that you merely went there to drink and smoke.”

“Very well, father,” said Cyril, in the most nonchalant way, as he lay back in his chair and played with his mother’s rings. “Perhaps you know, then, why I went.”

“Oh, hush, Cyril, my boy,” panted the invalid. “Eli, my dear, pray be calm. This hurts me—hurts me more than I can tell you.”

“I am sorry, my dear, very sorry,” cried the Rector, excitedly; “but it must be stopped. I cannot allow matters to go on as they do. It is terrible. I feel at every turn as if I were being disgraced. I shiver as I go down the town or make a call, for fear that I should have to encounter some fresh disgrace brought upon us by our own boys.”

“What’s the matter with the governor, ma, dear?” said the young man, mockingly. “Has Frank been up to some fresh games?”

“Oh, hush, my dear boy,” cried the poor woman, imploringly.

“I’ll be as quiet as I can, dear,” replied Cyril; “but there are bounds to everything. I am not a child.”

“No, sir, but you act like one—like a disobedient child,” cried his father. “No matter what is done for you, back you come home to idle and lounge away your existence. The idea of the nobility of labour never seems to have dawned in your mind.”

“Never,” replied Cyril, calmly. “Nobility of labour, indeed! Why, father, what’s the good of quoting stuff like that to me out of one of your old sermons?”

“You are utterly wasting your life, sir.”

“Not I, father,” retorted Cyril. “I am rather enjoying it. Let those work who are obliged. Why should I make myself a slave? I like my existence very well as it is, and don’t mean to bother.”

“It is disgraceful,” cried the Rector, whose usually bland face was now fierce with anger.

“Don’t see it. I don’t spend much, nor yet get into debt. You’ve got plenty of money, so why should I trouble myself about work?”

“I’d forgive that,” cried the Rector—“I’d forgive your idleness, but when I find that you cannot be trusted, I am compelled to speak.”

“But, my dear,” remonstrated the invalid, “what has poor Cyril done? He did not like the wretched slavery out in the colony, and he could not content himself with the drudgery of a clerk’s desk. Do not be so severe. Be patient, and he will succeed like Frank has done.”

“What has he done?” cried the Rector. “What is he doing but leading such a life as must disgrace us all.”

“Nonsense, father!” cried the young man. “It is no nonsense, sir. Months ago I spoke to you about your conduct, but it has been in vain. People in all directions are noticing your behaviour towards Miss Portlock. Just, too, when your sisters are about to make excellent matches.”

“Miss Portlock!” cried Mrs Mallow, starting. “Oh, Cyril!”

Cyril acted like an animal brought to bay. He began to fight. While there was a chance of his father not being aware of his proceedings, he fenced and parried. Now he spoke out sharply—

“Well, what do people say about my behaviour with Miss Portlock? She’s a very nice ladylike girl, well educated, and sweet and clever, and if I like to chat with her, I shall.”

“Oh, Cyril!” cried his mother again; and then she added, “Is this true?”

“True? Is what true? That I have been to Kilby sometimes to have a chat with Sage Portlock? Of course it is. Why not?”

“You own to it, then?” said his father. “Own to it, if you like to call it so, sir. And now, pray, where is the harm?”

Mrs Mallow withdrew her hand from her son’s grasp, and looked in his face with a terribly pained expression, for, with all her gentleness of disposition, the sense of caste was in her very strongly; and with all his failings, she had looked upon Cyril as a noble representative of the mingled blood of the old family Mallows and the Heskeths from whom she sprang.

“I am to understand, then,” said the Rector, “that you propose honouring us with a daughter chosen from the people here.”

“I don’t say yes, and I don’t say no,” replied Cyril, cavalierly. “I think I have heard you say often that Sage was a very nice girl.”

“Sage?”

“Yes, Sage. I think you had the pleasure of baptising her by her herbaceous name, so you ought to know.”

The Rector exchanged glances with his wife, whose face wore a very pitiable look.

“I have—yes—certainly—often said that Miss Portlock was a very good, sensible girl,” he said at last.

“Well, then, what more do you want, sir? I suppose you expect a man to think about such things at some time in his life?”

“But have you proposed for her hand?” said his mother, faintly.

“Proposed for her hand? Nonsense, mamma. People of their class don’t understand things in that light.”

This was a false move, and the Rector took advantage of the slip.

“People of that class, sir? Then you acknowledge that you are degrading yourself by these proceedings.”

“Oh, I don’t know about degrading myself, sir. You know what they say. If a lady marries her groom she descends to his level. If a man marries his cook he raises her to his.”

“But does Mr Portlock—my Churchwarden—know of your intentions?”

“How can he,” said Cyril, coolly, “when I have none?”

“But Mrs Portlock believes that you are paying your attentions to her niece.”

“Yes, I s’pose so,” he replied. “Terribly silly woman.”

“Oh, Cyril, Cyril,” said his mother, “this is very, very shocking.”

“Stuff and nonsense, mamma. Why, what a tremendous fuss about a little bit of flirtation with a pretty little schoolmistress. You nearly had her sister for a daughter-in-law when Frank was after her.”

“Frank saw the folly of his proceedings, and grew sensible,” said the Rector.

“Oh, did he!” muttered Cyril.

“The word flirtation, Cyril,” said the Rector firmly, “is a disgrace to our civilisation, and one that ought certainly to be heard from no decent lips.”

“Matter of opinion, of course,” said Cyril; and he placed his hands under his head and stared straight out of the window, while the Rector and his wife exchanged glances.

“Cyril,” said the former at last, after a struggle to keep down his anger, “I will not quarrel with you.”

“That’s right, governor. I hate quarrelling.”

“But while you are under my roof I must be obeyed.”

“Don’t think any man has a more obedient son,” replied Cyril.

“The time, however, has now come when some plan must be devised for you to make a fresh start in life upon your own account.”

“’Pon my word, father, I don’t see it. I’m very comfortable as I am.”

“But I am not, sir,” replied his father, firmly. “For years past it has been thrown in my teeth that I am rightly named Eli. You know why. It is time, now, sir, that we took care not to be ashamed of the enemy in the gate.”

“Please don’t preach, father,” said the young man, in a tone of protestation.

The Rector paid no attention to his words, but went on—

“Let me ask you first,” he said, “one question.”

“Go on,” said the young man, for his father had stopped.

“Has Miss Portlock accepted your attentions?”

There was a pause here. “I say, Cyril, has Miss Portlock accepted your attentions?”

“Matter of confidence,” replied the young man. “Question I would rather not answer.”

“Then she has not,” said the Rector, quickly, “and I am very, very glad.”

“Why, father?”

“Because, as I have told you before, she is receiving the attentions of Mr Luke Ross.”

“Oh, nonsense!” cried Cyril, flushing. “That’s all off now.”

“I heard something of the kind; but what do you mean? Have they quarrelled?”

“Oh, no. Old Portlock wouldn’t have it: and quite right, too. Girl like that to be engaged to such a clod!”

“Cyril,” said his father, angrily, “I would to heaven that I had as good a son.”

“Complimentary to your boys, sir. Let’s see, he threw you over very shabbily about the school, didn’t he?”

“He declined the post, certainly.”

“Then even Mr Luke Ross is not perfect, sir.”

“I am not going to criticise his conduct over that matter, sir, beyond saying that he had no doubt good reasons for declining the post. On further consideration I think he was right, for unless he felt his heart to be in his work, he would have been wrong to venture upon binding himself to the school.”

“Most worthy young man, I’ve no doubt,” said Cyril, with a sneer.

“A young man for whom I entertain a great respect,” retorted the Rector.

“One of those highly respectable young men who push their way on in the world,” sneered Cyril.

“And often become great with the poorest of means for pushing their way,” said the Rector, “while those well started miserably fail.”

“Oh, yes; I know ’em,” said Cyril. “One reads of them in the nice books. Bah! I haven’t patience with the prigs; and as for this Luke Ross,” he cried, with the colour burning as two spots in his cheeks, “I look upon him as one of the most contemptible cads under the sun. You talk of wishing that you had such a son, father! Why the fellow is utterly beneath our notice.”

“Why?” said his father, in a sharp, incisive tone.

“Why?” replied Cyril. “Because he is.”

“A pitiful reply,” said the Rector, angrily. “Can you give me a better reason for your dislike to Luke Ross?”

“Not I. He is not worth it.”

“Then I’ll give you one,” replied the Rector. “The true one, Cyril, though it cuts me to the heart to have to speak so to my son, and before the mother who has worshipped him from his birth.”

“Oh, Eli, pray, pray spare me this,” cried Mrs Mallow, supplicatingly.

“No,” he said, “I have been silent too long—I have given way too much. It is time I spoke out with no uncertain sound. Cyril, you hate this man because he is your rival in the affections of a good, true girl. Your anger has taught me so far, and I rejoice thereat. Your suit has been without success. You teach me, too, that you would stop at nothing, even blackening your rival’s character, to gain your ends; but this must not be. I look upon Sage Portlock as in my charge, and I tell you, once and for all, that you must stop this disgraceful pursuit. I say that it shall not go on.”

“And how will you stop it, sir?” cried Cyril, springing to his feet, while the mother lay back with clasped hands.

“I don’t know yet, but stop it I will,” cried Mr Mallow. “You shall disgrace your mother and sisters no longer—insult Miss Portlock no more by your pursuit.”

“Insult her?”

“Yes, sir, insult her. She is too good and pure-hearted a girl for her affections to be tampered with by such a heartless fellow as you.”

“Eli, Eli,” moaned Mrs Mallow, but her cry was unnoticed by the angry men.

“Tampered with! Heartless! Bah! You do not know what you are saying.”

“I know, my son, that the time has come for me to strike. You must leave here, and at once. Sage Portlock is not for you. If you do not know your position in life and your duty to your class, you must be taught.”

“Then hear me now,” cried the young man, defiantly. “Luke Ross is no rival of mine, for he has never won Sage Portlock’s heart. That belongs to me; and as to duty, caste, and the like, let them go to the devil. Have her I will, in spite of you all, and—”

“Silence, sir!” cried the Rector, beside himself with passion—the rage kept down for years; and he caught his son by the throat. “Man grown—no, you are a boy—a child, whom I ought to soundly thrash for your disobedience and shame. Son? you are no son of mine.”

“Loose me, father,” cried the young man. “I will not bear this. Loose me, I tell you.”

Father and son had forgotten themselves, and in those brief moments of their struggle a strange blindness had come over them. They swayed to and fro, a little table covered with china was overset with a crash, and, at last, getting one hand free, Cyril clenched his fist and struck out fiercely, just as a wild and piercing scream rang through the room.

Part 1, Chapter XXV.Where Cyril Went.Mrs Mallow’s cry of horror as, after struggling for the first time for many years into an upright posture, she fell back, fainting, had the effect of bringing father and son back to their senses. Another second and Cyril’s clenched hand would have struck down the author of his birth; but at that cry his arm fell to his side, and he stood there trembling with excitement as the Rector quitted his hold, and flung himself upon his knees by the couch.He rose again on the instant to obtain water and the pungent salts which were close at hand, striving with all the skill born of so many years’ attendance in a sick room to restore the stricken woman to her senses.Frank had already left the house, but the cry brought Julia and Cynthia into the room.“Oh, mamma, mamma!” wailed Julia, and she too busied herself in trying to revive the stricken woman.Not so Cynthia, who took in the situation at a glance, and burst into a passion of sobs, which she checked directly, and with flushed face and flashing eyes she crossed to her brother.“This is your doing,” she cried; “you will kill mamma before you’ve done; and Harry might have been here and heard all this. Cyril, I hate you; you’re as wicked as Frank;” and to her brother’s utter astonishment she struck him sharply in the face.“Little fool!” he growled fiercely, as he caught her by the wrist, but only to fling her off with a contemptuous laugh. He made no motion to help, but stood with frowning brow and bitter vindictive eye watching his parents alternately; but though he went to and fro many times, and passed close to his son, the Rector never once looked at him, seeming quite to ignore his presence there.Constant efforts had their due effect at last, for the unhappy mother uttered a low wailing cry, and then, as her senses returned and she realised her position, she began to sob bitterly, clinging to her husband as he knelt by her, bending his face down upon her hands as he held them tightly in his own.From where Cyril stood he could see his father’s face, that it was deadly pale, and that his lips were moving rapidly as if in prayer, and thus all stayed for some little time, till the laboured sobbing of the invalid died off into an occasional catching sigh.At last she unclosed her eyes, to fix them appealingly upon her son, her lips moving, though no audible words followed; but the look of appeal and the direction of her pathetically expressive eyes told her wishes as she glanced from Cyril to the carpet beside her couch—told plainly enough her wishes, and the young man read them aright—that he should come there and kneel down at his father’s side.“Not I,” he muttered. “The old madman! How dare he raise his hand to me like that!”He thrust his hands in his pockets and remained there with a look mingled of contempt and pity upon his face as he watched the prostrate figure of his father, while, as his mother’s appealing eyes were directed to him again and again, he merely replied to the dumbly-uttered prayer by an impatient shake of the head.At last the Rector raised his eyes, and as he met his wife’s agonised look, he smiled gently, and then bent over her and kissed her brow.“It is passed, my love,” he whispered. “God forgive me, I did not think I could have sunk so low.”Julia passed her arm round her sister, and drew her to the window, to lay her head upon her shoulder and weep silently and long.“Cyril,” said the Rector, in a broken voice, as he rose and stood before his son, “you have tried me hard, but I have done wrong. My temper gained the better of me, and I have been praying for strength to keep us both from such a terrible scene again. Come down with me to the study, and let us talk of the future like sentient men. God forgive me, my boy; I must have been mad.”He held out his trembling hands, and Cyril saw that he was evidently labouring under great emotion, as he absolutely humiliated himself before his son, his every look seeming to ask the young man’s forgiveness for that which was past. But Cyril’s anger was, if not hotter, more lasting than his father’s, and rejecting the offer of peace between them, he swung round upon his heels and strode out of the room.For a few minutes there was absolute silence, as mother and father gazed at the door through which the son had passed. Then, with a piteous sob, Mrs Mallow exclaimed—“Oh, Eli, Eli, what have we done?”“Commenced the reaping of the crop of weeds that are springing up in our sons’ neglected soil. Laura, I have tried to be a good father to our boys, but my weakness seems to stare me now in the face. I have been fond and indulgent, and now, Heaven help me, I have been weaker than ever in trying to amend the past by an outbreak of foolish violence.”“Go to him; ask him to come back,” sobbed the mother.“Did I not humble myself to him enough?” said the Rector, with a pathetic look at his wife.“Yes, yes, you did,” she wailed; “but this is all so dreadful. Eli, it will break my heart.”“And yet I ought to be strong and stern now, sweet wife,” he said tenderly. “Authority has long been thrown to the winds. Had I not better strive hard to gather up the reins and curb his headlong course?”“It will break my heart,” the unhappy woman sobbed. “It is so dreadful—so horrible to me, love. Eli, husband—my patient, loving husband, bring him back to me or I shall die.”“I will fetch him back, Laura,” said the Rector, softly, as he bent down once more and kissed the cold, white forehead of his wife.Then, rising with a sigh, he softly moved towards the door, turning once to smile at the troubled face he left behind.As he turned, the suffering woman held out her arms, and he walked back quietly to sink upon his knees by her side.“Pray,” she said, softly. “Pray for help and guidance in this storm.” And once more there was silence in the room.“He is our boy,” whispered Mrs Mallow, as the Rector rose. “Be patient with him, Eli, and all will yet be well. Indeed, indeed, he is good and true of heart. See how tenderly he waits on me.”“Just for a minute, now and then,” the Rector thought; “and only when it does not clash with some selfish object of his own.” And then he fell to thinking of his own years upon years of constant watchfulness and care, and smiled sadly as he saw how that at times the little far outshone the great.But nothing in his countenance betokened aught but the tenderest sympathy and love for her he was leaving behind, as, once more going to the door, the Rector passed through, and descended to his study, leaving Mrs Mallow weeping in her daughters’ arms.Here he shut himself in for a few minutes, and rapidly paced the floor, holding his hands the while to his rugged brow.“It is too much—it is too much!” he groaned, panting with the great emotion to which his soul was prey. “If it was not for my girls! If it was not for my girls!”Then he threw himself into his chair, and sat leaning forward with his fingers seeming to be driven into the soft padding of the arms, which he clutched with fierce vehemence.But by degrees the gust of passion passed over, leaving him calm and cool as, once more rising, he smoothed his countenance, and went out of the room in search of Cyril.He was not in the dining-room, nor yet in the little room where he was in the habit of sitting to read and smoke, while the state of the garden was not such as to induce him to wander there.The Rector went up softly to his son’s room, but without finding him; and at last he went into the dining-room and rang the bell.“Where is Mr Cyril?” the Rector asked.“He went out about half-an-hour ago, sir.”“With Mr Frank?”“No, sir; Mr Frank went out before that.”“Did he say what time he would be back?”“No, sir; but Williams came in just now, sir, with Lord Artingale’s mare for Miss Cynthia.”“Yes?”“And said he met Mr Cyril in the lane leading to Kilby Farm.”“Indeed!”“Yes, sir; and he was walking up and down as if he expected somebody to come.”

Mrs Mallow’s cry of horror as, after struggling for the first time for many years into an upright posture, she fell back, fainting, had the effect of bringing father and son back to their senses. Another second and Cyril’s clenched hand would have struck down the author of his birth; but at that cry his arm fell to his side, and he stood there trembling with excitement as the Rector quitted his hold, and flung himself upon his knees by the couch.

He rose again on the instant to obtain water and the pungent salts which were close at hand, striving with all the skill born of so many years’ attendance in a sick room to restore the stricken woman to her senses.

Frank had already left the house, but the cry brought Julia and Cynthia into the room.

“Oh, mamma, mamma!” wailed Julia, and she too busied herself in trying to revive the stricken woman.

Not so Cynthia, who took in the situation at a glance, and burst into a passion of sobs, which she checked directly, and with flushed face and flashing eyes she crossed to her brother.

“This is your doing,” she cried; “you will kill mamma before you’ve done; and Harry might have been here and heard all this. Cyril, I hate you; you’re as wicked as Frank;” and to her brother’s utter astonishment she struck him sharply in the face.

“Little fool!” he growled fiercely, as he caught her by the wrist, but only to fling her off with a contemptuous laugh. He made no motion to help, but stood with frowning brow and bitter vindictive eye watching his parents alternately; but though he went to and fro many times, and passed close to his son, the Rector never once looked at him, seeming quite to ignore his presence there.

Constant efforts had their due effect at last, for the unhappy mother uttered a low wailing cry, and then, as her senses returned and she realised her position, she began to sob bitterly, clinging to her husband as he knelt by her, bending his face down upon her hands as he held them tightly in his own.

From where Cyril stood he could see his father’s face, that it was deadly pale, and that his lips were moving rapidly as if in prayer, and thus all stayed for some little time, till the laboured sobbing of the invalid died off into an occasional catching sigh.

At last she unclosed her eyes, to fix them appealingly upon her son, her lips moving, though no audible words followed; but the look of appeal and the direction of her pathetically expressive eyes told her wishes as she glanced from Cyril to the carpet beside her couch—told plainly enough her wishes, and the young man read them aright—that he should come there and kneel down at his father’s side.

“Not I,” he muttered. “The old madman! How dare he raise his hand to me like that!”

He thrust his hands in his pockets and remained there with a look mingled of contempt and pity upon his face as he watched the prostrate figure of his father, while, as his mother’s appealing eyes were directed to him again and again, he merely replied to the dumbly-uttered prayer by an impatient shake of the head.

At last the Rector raised his eyes, and as he met his wife’s agonised look, he smiled gently, and then bent over her and kissed her brow.

“It is passed, my love,” he whispered. “God forgive me, I did not think I could have sunk so low.”

Julia passed her arm round her sister, and drew her to the window, to lay her head upon her shoulder and weep silently and long.

“Cyril,” said the Rector, in a broken voice, as he rose and stood before his son, “you have tried me hard, but I have done wrong. My temper gained the better of me, and I have been praying for strength to keep us both from such a terrible scene again. Come down with me to the study, and let us talk of the future like sentient men. God forgive me, my boy; I must have been mad.”

He held out his trembling hands, and Cyril saw that he was evidently labouring under great emotion, as he absolutely humiliated himself before his son, his every look seeming to ask the young man’s forgiveness for that which was past. But Cyril’s anger was, if not hotter, more lasting than his father’s, and rejecting the offer of peace between them, he swung round upon his heels and strode out of the room.

For a few minutes there was absolute silence, as mother and father gazed at the door through which the son had passed. Then, with a piteous sob, Mrs Mallow exclaimed—

“Oh, Eli, Eli, what have we done?”

“Commenced the reaping of the crop of weeds that are springing up in our sons’ neglected soil. Laura, I have tried to be a good father to our boys, but my weakness seems to stare me now in the face. I have been fond and indulgent, and now, Heaven help me, I have been weaker than ever in trying to amend the past by an outbreak of foolish violence.”

“Go to him; ask him to come back,” sobbed the mother.

“Did I not humble myself to him enough?” said the Rector, with a pathetic look at his wife.

“Yes, yes, you did,” she wailed; “but this is all so dreadful. Eli, it will break my heart.”

“And yet I ought to be strong and stern now, sweet wife,” he said tenderly. “Authority has long been thrown to the winds. Had I not better strive hard to gather up the reins and curb his headlong course?”

“It will break my heart,” the unhappy woman sobbed. “It is so dreadful—so horrible to me, love. Eli, husband—my patient, loving husband, bring him back to me or I shall die.”

“I will fetch him back, Laura,” said the Rector, softly, as he bent down once more and kissed the cold, white forehead of his wife.

Then, rising with a sigh, he softly moved towards the door, turning once to smile at the troubled face he left behind.

As he turned, the suffering woman held out her arms, and he walked back quietly to sink upon his knees by her side.

“Pray,” she said, softly. “Pray for help and guidance in this storm.” And once more there was silence in the room.

“He is our boy,” whispered Mrs Mallow, as the Rector rose. “Be patient with him, Eli, and all will yet be well. Indeed, indeed, he is good and true of heart. See how tenderly he waits on me.”

“Just for a minute, now and then,” the Rector thought; “and only when it does not clash with some selfish object of his own.” And then he fell to thinking of his own years upon years of constant watchfulness and care, and smiled sadly as he saw how that at times the little far outshone the great.

But nothing in his countenance betokened aught but the tenderest sympathy and love for her he was leaving behind, as, once more going to the door, the Rector passed through, and descended to his study, leaving Mrs Mallow weeping in her daughters’ arms.

Here he shut himself in for a few minutes, and rapidly paced the floor, holding his hands the while to his rugged brow.

“It is too much—it is too much!” he groaned, panting with the great emotion to which his soul was prey. “If it was not for my girls! If it was not for my girls!”

Then he threw himself into his chair, and sat leaning forward with his fingers seeming to be driven into the soft padding of the arms, which he clutched with fierce vehemence.

But by degrees the gust of passion passed over, leaving him calm and cool as, once more rising, he smoothed his countenance, and went out of the room in search of Cyril.

He was not in the dining-room, nor yet in the little room where he was in the habit of sitting to read and smoke, while the state of the garden was not such as to induce him to wander there.

The Rector went up softly to his son’s room, but without finding him; and at last he went into the dining-room and rang the bell.

“Where is Mr Cyril?” the Rector asked.

“He went out about half-an-hour ago, sir.”

“With Mr Frank?”

“No, sir; Mr Frank went out before that.”

“Did he say what time he would be back?”

“No, sir; but Williams came in just now, sir, with Lord Artingale’s mare for Miss Cynthia.”

“Yes?”

“And said he met Mr Cyril in the lane leading to Kilby Farm.”

“Indeed!”

“Yes, sir; and he was walking up and down as if he expected somebody to come.”

Part 1, Chapter XXVI.An Interruption.From the way in which people talk of the tender passion it might be supposed to be one long dream of bliss; but a little examination of other people’s hearts, and the teachings of the knowledge thus obtained with the experience of years, will go far to show that it is as often as not very far from being a dream, being, in fact, a time of misery, disappointment, and oftentimes of despair.The earlier days of Sage Portlock’s maidenhood had glided peacefully away. She had had her troubles and annoyances like the rest of the world, but they were little, and barely ruffled the even current of her life.She had been troubled somewhat over her sister’s love affair with Frank Mallow, and had been Rue’s confidante. Now that stormy time had passed away, and she had smiled over the wedding with John Berry, and laughingly accepted her position of Aunt Sage to the two little children that were born.Luke Ross had been her playmate till a tenderer attachment had sprang up as girlhood passed into womanhood, and the boy became a thoughtful man. There was a thrill of pride ready to run through her, making the colour suffuse her cheeks, as she knew that she was loved; and with the thought came a proud elation that made her feel happier than she believed she had ever felt before.But that was all. She loved Luke, she told herself, very dearly, and some day she would be his wife; but she felt happy enough when he went away to London, and somehow, though she used to consider that she was the happiest of women, his calm, trusting letters did not seem to awaken any echoes in her heart; while hers to him were pleasant little bits of gossipping prattle, ending with “the dear love of yours very, very affectionately, Sage.”Yes, she was very fond of Luke, she used to say to herself, and by and by they would be so happy together; but she felt in no hurry for by and by to come. Existence was very pleasant as it was, and once she was back in Lawford from the training institution and engaged in the school, she seemed to wish for nothing more.Luke Ross wrote, and twice during his absence there he came home, and they had very pleasant walks and chats, and were very boy-and-girlish together, laughing away till a serious fit would come on, when they discussed the future, the cost of housekeeping, and she laughed merrily again at the idea of being Luke’s little housekeeper and wife.But there was no passionate attachment on her side—no tears at meeting or at parting. All was wonderfully matter-of-fact. She was very happy, she felt, and she could see that Luke was, and what more could she desire?Then came the change, and Sage was face to face with the fact that she had promised herself to a man for whom she had never entertained a warmer feeling than that of friendship, or the love of a sister for brother, and that at last she had found her fate.Was it a feeling of rapturous delight?Far from it; for from that day her nights were sleepless, and too often her pillow was wet with the hot tears of her misery and distress.On the day of the serious quarrel between father and son Sage was in better spirits than she had been in for some days. A letter had come from Luke telling her of his progress in London; of his father’s willingness to make him a sufficient allowance for the object he had in view, a matter which had been settled since he came up, and that he had taken what his landlord called “chambers” in a legal part of town.So light-hearted was Sage that day that she laughed over Luke’s merry description of his chambers as being so many square feet of emptiness, with a cupboard in which he had to sleep.He gave her a very graphic account of the way in which he had furnished his rooms, of how he walked into Fleet-street every day to have a chop for his dinner, and how the woman who made his bed prepared his breakfast and tea, and then followed a sentence which made Sage laugh merrily—a laugh that was repeated several times during school hours, to the great astonishment of the girls.“And it is wonderful what a very little while half-a-pound of tea seems to last.”That was the sentence which amused her, and for a time Cyril Mallow passed from her thoughts.“What a little time it lasts!” she said merrily, as soon as the school had been dismissed, and she was putting on her hat. “Poor boy! of course, he knows nothing at all about housekeeping; and only to think,” she mused, “how dreadful it must be to go on living every day upon chops.”She started for home, thinking a great deal of Luke, and telling herself that the fancies that had of late come into her head were as foolish as they were wicked, and that now they were dismissed for ever.What would Mr Mallow himself think of her? What would Mrs Mallow say? She shivered, and felt that unless she sternly determined never to think of Cyril again, she could not meet the Rector, who had always been so kind and fatherly in his ways.This had been a nasty dream—a day-dream that had come over her, fostered by Cyril Mallow’s looks and ways. For he had followed her about a great deal; watched for her so that they might meet, and had constantly been coming up to the farm of an evening, where, though ostensibly chatting with her uncle, she could not raise her eyes without encountering his.She could not have explained it to herself, but somehow Cyril Mallow had seemed to influence her life, being, as it were, the very embodiment of sin silently tempting her to break faith with Luke Ross, and think only of him who had come between.She told herself constantly, when the thoughts of Cyril Mallow intruded themselves, that she loved Luke better than ever, and that the coming of Cyril was hateful to her; but, all the same, there was a strange light in her eyes whenever she thought of him, and her cheeks would burn and her pulses flutter.It was a strange way of hating, but she told herself that it was hate, and on this particular day the coming of Luke’s letter had seemed to strengthen her, and she began planning what she would say in return; how she would give him good advice about his housekeeping, say words of encouragement to him about his studies, and praise his determination. For was he not striving with all his might; had he not determined upon this long struggle for position that he might win her?And how could she do anything but love him? Dear Luke! Indeed she would be true to him, and write him such encouraging letters—help him all she could. It was her duty now, for though they were not regularly affianced with her friends’ sanction, she told herself that her promise to him was sacred.“Yes,” she said, half aloud, as she walked thoughtfully on, “I love Luke very dearly, and that other was all a bad, feverish kind of dream, and I’ll never think about it more. It was wicked of Mr Cyril, knowing what he does, and weak of me, and never again—Oh!”“Did I make you jump, Sage?” said a low voice; and Cyril came from the gate over which he had been leaning, and jerked the stump of a cigar away.“I—I did not see you, Mr Cyril,” she said, faintly, and the tears sprang to her eyes.“And I frightened the poor little thing, did I? There, I’ll be more careful next time; but, oh, what a while you have been.”“Don’t stop me, Mr Cyril,” she said, with trembling voice; “I must hurry home.”“Well, you shall directly; but, Sage, don’t please be so hard and cruel to me. You know how humble and patient I have been, and yet you seem to be one day warm, the next day cold, and the third day hot and angry with me. What have I done?”“I do not understand you, Mr Cyril,” she said, trying to speak sternly, and walking on towards the farm.“Then I will speak more plainly,” he said, suddenly dropping the bantering tone in which he had addressed her for one full of impassioned meaning. “Sage, I love you with all my heart, and when you treat me with such cruel coldness, it makes me half mad, and I say to you as I say now, what have I done?”“Oh, hush! hush!” she panted. “You must not speak to me like that. Mr Cyril, I beg—I implore you—never to address me again. You know—you must know—that I am engaged to Mr Ross.”“Engaged to Mr Ross!” he said, bitterly. “It is not true. There is no engagement between you.”“It is true,” she panted, hurrying on, and trembling for her weakness, as she felt how strongly her heart was pleading for him, who kept pace with her, and twice had laid his hand, as if to stop her, upon her arm.“I have your aunt’s assurance that it is not true,” he continued; “and I have hoped, Sage, I have dared to believe, that you were not really fond of this man.”“Mr Cyril, I beg—I implore you to leave me,” she cried.“If I left you now,” he said, hoarsely, “feeling what I feel, knowing what I know, it would be to plunge into some miserable, reckless course that might end who can say how? What have I to live for if you refuse me your love?”“How can you be so cruel to me?” she cried, angrily. “You insult me by these words, Mr Cyril I am alone, and you take advantage of my position. You know I am engaged to Mr Ross.”“I do not,” he retorted, passionately. “I do not believe it; and I never will believe it till I see you his wife. His wife!” he continued. “It is absurd. You will never be Luke Ross’s wife. It is impossible.”“I will not—I cannot—talk to you,” she cried, increasing her pace. It was on her lips to add, “I dare not”; but she checked herself in time, as she glanced sidewise at him, for with a feeling of misery and despair, strangely mingled with pleasure, she felt that all her good resolutions were being swept away by her companion’s words, and, in an agony of shame and dread lest he should read her thoughts, she once more hurried her steps.“You cannot throw me off like that,” he said, bitterly. “I will not be pitched over in this contemptuous manner. Only the other day you looked kindly and tenderly at me.”“Oh no, no, no,” she cried, “it is not true.”“It is true enough,” he said, sadly, “and I mean to be patient. I cannot believe you care for this man. It is impossible, and I shall wait.”“No, no, Mr Cyril,” she pleaded. “I can never listen to such words again. Think of your father and your mother. Mr Mallow would never forgive me if he knew I had listened to you like this.”“Let him remain unforgiving, then,” cried Cyril. “As for my mother, she loves her son too well not to be ready to do anything to make him happy.”“Pray, pray go,” she moaned.“No,” he said, sternly, “I will not go. You torture me by your coldness, knowing what you do. Do you wish to drive me to despair?”“I wish you to go and forget me,” she cried, with spirit. “As a gentleman, Mr Cyril, I ask you, is such a course as this manly?”He was silent for a few moments, glancing at her sidewise the while.“No,” he said, “it is neither manly nor gentlemanly, but what can you expect from a miserable wretch against whom all the world seems to turn? Always unsuccessful—always hoping against hope, fighting against fate, I find, now I come home, that the little girl I always thought of when far away has blossomed into a beautiful woman. How, I know not, but I wake to the fact that she has made me love her—idolise her—think of her as the very essence of my being.”“Mr Cyril,” pleaded Sage; but he kept on.“A new life appears to open out to me, and my old recklessness and misery seem to drop away. I waken to the fact that there is something to live for—something to rouse me to new effort, and to work for as an earnest man should work. I did not seek her out; I did not strive to love her,” he continued, as if speaking to some one else; “but her love seemed to come to me, to enweave itself with my every thought.”“I will not listen,” panted Sage, but her heart whispered, “Luke never spoke to me like that.”“I fought against it for a time,” he went on, dreamily, “for I said to myself this would be wronging her. She is engaged to another, and I should only make her unhappy and disturb the even tenor of her ways.”“Which you have done,” she cried, in piteous tones.“Do not blame me,” he said, softly. “I fought hard. I swore I would not think of you, and I crushed down what I told myself was my mad love within my breast; but when, by accident, I found that I was wrong, and that no engagement existed between you and Luke Ross—”“But there is, there is,” she cried. “Once more, Mr Cyril, pray leave me.”“A few mere words of form, Sage. You do not love this man; and, besides, your relatives have not given their consent. Oh, listen to me. Why should you condemn me to a life of reckless misery? You know how I have been drifting for years without an anchor to stay me. You are that anchor now. Let me cling to you for my father’s, my mother’s sake; for if you cast me off, continue this cruel wrong, you drive me once more from home, to go floating aimlessly, without a chance of becoming a better man. You cannot be so harsh.”“I cannot listen to you,” she murmured. “I tell you,” he cried, “that if you cast me off you condemn me to a life of misery and despair. Sage, dear Sage,” he cried, catching her hand, “I have been wild and foolish, but I have the making in me of a better man. Help me to live aright. You are so good, and pure, and sweet—so wise and gentle. Be my guide and helpmate, and those at home will bless you. Am I always to plead in vain?”“How can I look Luke Ross in the eyes again if I listen to such words as these?”“Luke Ross? Am I to stand idly by and let Luke Ross, the cold, careless cynic, snatch you from my arms?”“How dare you speak of him like that?” she cried, angrily. “He is all that is wise and good.”“And worships you so dearly that he has gone away for three years, at least, to prove to you his love.”“It is a great act of noble forbearance,” she said, proudly, “and you slander him by your words.”“I hope I do,” he said; “but they were wrung from me by my misery and suffering. But no, I will not believe you can be so cruel to me. I know that I may hope.”They were nearing the gate leading into the great home field, and Sage, trembling and agitated to a terrible degree, hurried on, feeling that, once within sight of the house, Cyril Mallow would leave her. Her mind was confused, and the struggle going on between duty and inclination was terrible; while the knowledge that she was so weak and yielding towards her companion half maddened her for the time.“Why do you hurry on so?” he pleaded. “Am I to be driven away? Am I to leave home, and go anywhere that fate may drift me?”“Oh, no, no, no,” she moaned. “This is too cruel to me. Pray, pray leave me now.”“Then I may hope?”“No,” she cried, with a fresh accession of strength, as she laid her hand upon the gate; “I have promised to be Luke Ross’s wife.”“His you shall never be,” he said, in a hoarse whisper. “You do not love him, and you shall not fling yourself away. Sage, you shall be mine, and—”“Well, young man, are you obliged to whisper what you say to my niece? Come, Sage, my girl, it’s time you were indoors.”“Uncle!” cried Sage, joyously, as she sprang to his side with a sigh of relief.“Yes, my girl,” he said, coldly, “it is uncle;” and he stuck his thistle staff down into the soft earth, and leaned his hands upon the round top. “You can go on,” he continued; “I’m not coming home yet.”“But, uncle,” she cried, excitedly.“Go home, my lass,” he said, imperatively.“Yes, dear,” she half sobbed; “but you will not—”“I say go home!” he shouted; and, with a low wail, she turned off, and walked hurriedly towards the farm, her uncle standing watching her, while Cyril Mallow coolly took a cigar-case from his breast pocket, opened it, carefully selected a cigar, picking, choosing, and returning one after the other till he had found one to his fancy, when he snapped to the case once more and thrust it back in his pocket, afterwards biting off the cigar-end and proceeding to light it with a fusee that evinced a strong dislike to burst into sparks and then smoulder away.As he did this, however, he kept glancing furtively at the Churchwarden, who was watching the retiring form of Sage, her troubled mien winning a glance or two from Cyril as well.The cigar burned badly, and had to be lit again, this time being watched by the Churchwarden with a kind of good-humoured contempt for the man who could smoke those rolls of tobacco-leaf in place of an honest pipe.At last the cigar drew freely, and the eyes of the two men met.“I’m in for another row now,” said Cyril, to himself. “Awkward; very. Never mind; I don’t care.”“Now, young man,” said Portlock, at last, in a very short, blunt fashion, “it seems to me that you and I had better have a few words together of a sort.”“When and where you please,” said Cyril, carelessly.“Let’s walk along here, then,” said the Churchwarden, pointing down the lane with his thistle staff.“Away from the farm, eh?” thought Cyril. “All right, old friend.” Then aloud, “Whichever way you please, sir.”“I didn’t know things had gone so far as this,” continued the Churchwarden, leading the way. “People say that you are the idlest chap in these parts; but it seems to me that, with the work thou likest, thou canst be as busy as the best.”Cyril flushed a little, and bit his lip, for he told himself that he was a gentleman, and the farmer was making far too free in his way of address; but he checked his annoyance, and said quietly—“Perhaps, sir, you will kindly explain what you mean.” Then, after a furtive glance at the stern, angry-looking man, he muttered to himself—“You dare not strike me; and, as to your words, say what you like—little Sage is mine.”“Now, sir,” exclaimed Sage’s uncle, after a few moments’ pause, “will you have the goodness to explain the meaning of the scene I have just witnessed?”“Explain, sir?” said Cyril, coolly; “surely it needs no explanation. I am young, and of one sex; Miss Portlock is young and of the other sex, and a mutual attachment has sprung up.”“Mutual!”“Well, yes; I hope so, sir. Perhaps, though, I ought to be content with alluding to my own feelings.”“Humph! Your own feelings, eh? And pray does Mr Cyril Mallow mean to say that he has become attached to my niece?”“Certainly he does, sir. You are not surprised?”“But I am surprised,” said the farmer, angrily, “and I am very glad to have witnessed what I did before the mischief went further. Now, look here, Mr Cyril Mallow, I am a man of business, and when I have an unpleasant matter to tackle I go straight to it at once.”“A very good plan,” said Cyril, calmly.“I’m glad you think so, sir,” said the Churchwarden, ironically. “And now, if you please, we’ll walk straight up to the rectory.”“What for?” cried Cyril, who was startled by his words.“What for? Why to talk this matter over with your father.”“But suppose he does not approve of the engagement, Mr Portlock?” said Cyril, who was taken somewhat aback by this very prompt way of treating the affair.“Approve? Whoever thought he would approve, sir? Of course he does not, any more than I do. What I want is for you to be given to understand in a quiet way that it is time you gave up visiting at my place, and hanging about to catch sight of my little girl, when she is leaving or going to the school.”“Mr Portlock!” exclaimed Cyril, haughtily.“Mr Cyril Mallow!” cried the Churchwarden. “Now just look here, sir. If I were one of your set, should you be making approaches to my niece in the way you have? Not you: it would not be considered proper. Aunt’s and uncle’s consent would be asked first; but as I’m only a farmer, I’m hardly worth notice. It seems that my little lassie has taken your fancy, and so you come running after her; but not a word to me.”“But hear me a minute,” protested Cyril.“No, sir; nor yet half a minute. A farmer’s a man, if he is not what you call a gentleman, and thinks as much of his people as the highest in the land. I dare say, in your high and mighty way, as our rector’s son, and a gentleman who has been at college, you think you are stooping to notice my niece; so let me tell you, once for all, I don’t think you are; and, what’s more, it will be a far better man than you have shown yourself to be who gets my consent to make her his wife.”“I can assure you, Mr Portlock—” began Cyril; but the farmer would not hear him. He was thoroughly angry, and his face flushed up a deep red.“And I can assure you, sir, that I want no such reckless, idling fellow seeking after my niece. We had bother enough when your brother was after Sage’s sister. I tell you, then, plainly, once for all, that I won’t have it; so don’t show your face at my place again.”He turned sharply round and strode off, leaving Cyril mortified and angry; for, in his way, he had felt that he was stooping, and falling away from his position, in noticing the little schoolmistress, so that this sharp rebuff came like a rude shock to his feelings, and made the end at which he aimed seem less likely to be achieved.“Confound his insolence!” he cried, as he saw the broad back of the farmer disappearing through his own gate. “It is too bad to be borne.”But in a few minutes’ time, as he walked slowly homeward, he began to smile and think over his position.“Let him talk and speak loud,” he said. “I thought he was going to threaten me once. What does it matter? My father is dead against it, and he and Master Portlock will make common cause against me. But what does it matter when Aunt Portlock is on my side, and little Sage is as good as won? Then, as to madame, my poor mother? Pish! she will refuse me nothing. So, Master Churchwarden, I have three women on my side, and the game is mine, do what you like.”He walked on a little way, amusing himself the while by thinking of the divided sides, and how much stronger his must be.“Let them fight us,” he said, laughing. “We shall be four to two, and we must win; but stay, I had forgotten another enemy—Master Luke Ross. Poor fellow!” he said, contemptuously, “his chance against me is about the value ofnil.”

From the way in which people talk of the tender passion it might be supposed to be one long dream of bliss; but a little examination of other people’s hearts, and the teachings of the knowledge thus obtained with the experience of years, will go far to show that it is as often as not very far from being a dream, being, in fact, a time of misery, disappointment, and oftentimes of despair.

The earlier days of Sage Portlock’s maidenhood had glided peacefully away. She had had her troubles and annoyances like the rest of the world, but they were little, and barely ruffled the even current of her life.

She had been troubled somewhat over her sister’s love affair with Frank Mallow, and had been Rue’s confidante. Now that stormy time had passed away, and she had smiled over the wedding with John Berry, and laughingly accepted her position of Aunt Sage to the two little children that were born.

Luke Ross had been her playmate till a tenderer attachment had sprang up as girlhood passed into womanhood, and the boy became a thoughtful man. There was a thrill of pride ready to run through her, making the colour suffuse her cheeks, as she knew that she was loved; and with the thought came a proud elation that made her feel happier than she believed she had ever felt before.

But that was all. She loved Luke, she told herself, very dearly, and some day she would be his wife; but she felt happy enough when he went away to London, and somehow, though she used to consider that she was the happiest of women, his calm, trusting letters did not seem to awaken any echoes in her heart; while hers to him were pleasant little bits of gossipping prattle, ending with “the dear love of yours very, very affectionately, Sage.”

Yes, she was very fond of Luke, she used to say to herself, and by and by they would be so happy together; but she felt in no hurry for by and by to come. Existence was very pleasant as it was, and once she was back in Lawford from the training institution and engaged in the school, she seemed to wish for nothing more.

Luke Ross wrote, and twice during his absence there he came home, and they had very pleasant walks and chats, and were very boy-and-girlish together, laughing away till a serious fit would come on, when they discussed the future, the cost of housekeeping, and she laughed merrily again at the idea of being Luke’s little housekeeper and wife.

But there was no passionate attachment on her side—no tears at meeting or at parting. All was wonderfully matter-of-fact. She was very happy, she felt, and she could see that Luke was, and what more could she desire?

Then came the change, and Sage was face to face with the fact that she had promised herself to a man for whom she had never entertained a warmer feeling than that of friendship, or the love of a sister for brother, and that at last she had found her fate.

Was it a feeling of rapturous delight?

Far from it; for from that day her nights were sleepless, and too often her pillow was wet with the hot tears of her misery and distress.

On the day of the serious quarrel between father and son Sage was in better spirits than she had been in for some days. A letter had come from Luke telling her of his progress in London; of his father’s willingness to make him a sufficient allowance for the object he had in view, a matter which had been settled since he came up, and that he had taken what his landlord called “chambers” in a legal part of town.

So light-hearted was Sage that day that she laughed over Luke’s merry description of his chambers as being so many square feet of emptiness, with a cupboard in which he had to sleep.

He gave her a very graphic account of the way in which he had furnished his rooms, of how he walked into Fleet-street every day to have a chop for his dinner, and how the woman who made his bed prepared his breakfast and tea, and then followed a sentence which made Sage laugh merrily—a laugh that was repeated several times during school hours, to the great astonishment of the girls.

“And it is wonderful what a very little while half-a-pound of tea seems to last.”

That was the sentence which amused her, and for a time Cyril Mallow passed from her thoughts.

“What a little time it lasts!” she said merrily, as soon as the school had been dismissed, and she was putting on her hat. “Poor boy! of course, he knows nothing at all about housekeeping; and only to think,” she mused, “how dreadful it must be to go on living every day upon chops.”

She started for home, thinking a great deal of Luke, and telling herself that the fancies that had of late come into her head were as foolish as they were wicked, and that now they were dismissed for ever.

What would Mr Mallow himself think of her? What would Mrs Mallow say? She shivered, and felt that unless she sternly determined never to think of Cyril again, she could not meet the Rector, who had always been so kind and fatherly in his ways.

This had been a nasty dream—a day-dream that had come over her, fostered by Cyril Mallow’s looks and ways. For he had followed her about a great deal; watched for her so that they might meet, and had constantly been coming up to the farm of an evening, where, though ostensibly chatting with her uncle, she could not raise her eyes without encountering his.

She could not have explained it to herself, but somehow Cyril Mallow had seemed to influence her life, being, as it were, the very embodiment of sin silently tempting her to break faith with Luke Ross, and think only of him who had come between.

She told herself constantly, when the thoughts of Cyril Mallow intruded themselves, that she loved Luke better than ever, and that the coming of Cyril was hateful to her; but, all the same, there was a strange light in her eyes whenever she thought of him, and her cheeks would burn and her pulses flutter.

It was a strange way of hating, but she told herself that it was hate, and on this particular day the coming of Luke’s letter had seemed to strengthen her, and she began planning what she would say in return; how she would give him good advice about his housekeeping, say words of encouragement to him about his studies, and praise his determination. For was he not striving with all his might; had he not determined upon this long struggle for position that he might win her?

And how could she do anything but love him? Dear Luke! Indeed she would be true to him, and write him such encouraging letters—help him all she could. It was her duty now, for though they were not regularly affianced with her friends’ sanction, she told herself that her promise to him was sacred.

“Yes,” she said, half aloud, as she walked thoughtfully on, “I love Luke very dearly, and that other was all a bad, feverish kind of dream, and I’ll never think about it more. It was wicked of Mr Cyril, knowing what he does, and weak of me, and never again—Oh!”

“Did I make you jump, Sage?” said a low voice; and Cyril came from the gate over which he had been leaning, and jerked the stump of a cigar away.

“I—I did not see you, Mr Cyril,” she said, faintly, and the tears sprang to her eyes.

“And I frightened the poor little thing, did I? There, I’ll be more careful next time; but, oh, what a while you have been.”

“Don’t stop me, Mr Cyril,” she said, with trembling voice; “I must hurry home.”

“Well, you shall directly; but, Sage, don’t please be so hard and cruel to me. You know how humble and patient I have been, and yet you seem to be one day warm, the next day cold, and the third day hot and angry with me. What have I done?”

“I do not understand you, Mr Cyril,” she said, trying to speak sternly, and walking on towards the farm.

“Then I will speak more plainly,” he said, suddenly dropping the bantering tone in which he had addressed her for one full of impassioned meaning. “Sage, I love you with all my heart, and when you treat me with such cruel coldness, it makes me half mad, and I say to you as I say now, what have I done?”

“Oh, hush! hush!” she panted. “You must not speak to me like that. Mr Cyril, I beg—I implore you—never to address me again. You know—you must know—that I am engaged to Mr Ross.”

“Engaged to Mr Ross!” he said, bitterly. “It is not true. There is no engagement between you.”

“It is true,” she panted, hurrying on, and trembling for her weakness, as she felt how strongly her heart was pleading for him, who kept pace with her, and twice had laid his hand, as if to stop her, upon her arm.

“I have your aunt’s assurance that it is not true,” he continued; “and I have hoped, Sage, I have dared to believe, that you were not really fond of this man.”

“Mr Cyril, I beg—I implore you to leave me,” she cried.

“If I left you now,” he said, hoarsely, “feeling what I feel, knowing what I know, it would be to plunge into some miserable, reckless course that might end who can say how? What have I to live for if you refuse me your love?”

“How can you be so cruel to me?” she cried, angrily. “You insult me by these words, Mr Cyril I am alone, and you take advantage of my position. You know I am engaged to Mr Ross.”

“I do not,” he retorted, passionately. “I do not believe it; and I never will believe it till I see you his wife. His wife!” he continued. “It is absurd. You will never be Luke Ross’s wife. It is impossible.”

“I will not—I cannot—talk to you,” she cried, increasing her pace. It was on her lips to add, “I dare not”; but she checked herself in time, as she glanced sidewise at him, for with a feeling of misery and despair, strangely mingled with pleasure, she felt that all her good resolutions were being swept away by her companion’s words, and, in an agony of shame and dread lest he should read her thoughts, she once more hurried her steps.

“You cannot throw me off like that,” he said, bitterly. “I will not be pitched over in this contemptuous manner. Only the other day you looked kindly and tenderly at me.”

“Oh no, no, no,” she cried, “it is not true.”

“It is true enough,” he said, sadly, “and I mean to be patient. I cannot believe you care for this man. It is impossible, and I shall wait.”

“No, no, Mr Cyril,” she pleaded. “I can never listen to such words again. Think of your father and your mother. Mr Mallow would never forgive me if he knew I had listened to you like this.”

“Let him remain unforgiving, then,” cried Cyril. “As for my mother, she loves her son too well not to be ready to do anything to make him happy.”

“Pray, pray go,” she moaned.

“No,” he said, sternly, “I will not go. You torture me by your coldness, knowing what you do. Do you wish to drive me to despair?”

“I wish you to go and forget me,” she cried, with spirit. “As a gentleman, Mr Cyril, I ask you, is such a course as this manly?”

He was silent for a few moments, glancing at her sidewise the while.

“No,” he said, “it is neither manly nor gentlemanly, but what can you expect from a miserable wretch against whom all the world seems to turn? Always unsuccessful—always hoping against hope, fighting against fate, I find, now I come home, that the little girl I always thought of when far away has blossomed into a beautiful woman. How, I know not, but I wake to the fact that she has made me love her—idolise her—think of her as the very essence of my being.”

“Mr Cyril,” pleaded Sage; but he kept on.

“A new life appears to open out to me, and my old recklessness and misery seem to drop away. I waken to the fact that there is something to live for—something to rouse me to new effort, and to work for as an earnest man should work. I did not seek her out; I did not strive to love her,” he continued, as if speaking to some one else; “but her love seemed to come to me, to enweave itself with my every thought.”

“I will not listen,” panted Sage, but her heart whispered, “Luke never spoke to me like that.”

“I fought against it for a time,” he went on, dreamily, “for I said to myself this would be wronging her. She is engaged to another, and I should only make her unhappy and disturb the even tenor of her ways.”

“Which you have done,” she cried, in piteous tones.

“Do not blame me,” he said, softly. “I fought hard. I swore I would not think of you, and I crushed down what I told myself was my mad love within my breast; but when, by accident, I found that I was wrong, and that no engagement existed between you and Luke Ross—”

“But there is, there is,” she cried. “Once more, Mr Cyril, pray leave me.”

“A few mere words of form, Sage. You do not love this man; and, besides, your relatives have not given their consent. Oh, listen to me. Why should you condemn me to a life of reckless misery? You know how I have been drifting for years without an anchor to stay me. You are that anchor now. Let me cling to you for my father’s, my mother’s sake; for if you cast me off, continue this cruel wrong, you drive me once more from home, to go floating aimlessly, without a chance of becoming a better man. You cannot be so harsh.”

“I cannot listen to you,” she murmured. “I tell you,” he cried, “that if you cast me off you condemn me to a life of misery and despair. Sage, dear Sage,” he cried, catching her hand, “I have been wild and foolish, but I have the making in me of a better man. Help me to live aright. You are so good, and pure, and sweet—so wise and gentle. Be my guide and helpmate, and those at home will bless you. Am I always to plead in vain?”

“How can I look Luke Ross in the eyes again if I listen to such words as these?”

“Luke Ross? Am I to stand idly by and let Luke Ross, the cold, careless cynic, snatch you from my arms?”

“How dare you speak of him like that?” she cried, angrily. “He is all that is wise and good.”

“And worships you so dearly that he has gone away for three years, at least, to prove to you his love.”

“It is a great act of noble forbearance,” she said, proudly, “and you slander him by your words.”

“I hope I do,” he said; “but they were wrung from me by my misery and suffering. But no, I will not believe you can be so cruel to me. I know that I may hope.”

They were nearing the gate leading into the great home field, and Sage, trembling and agitated to a terrible degree, hurried on, feeling that, once within sight of the house, Cyril Mallow would leave her. Her mind was confused, and the struggle going on between duty and inclination was terrible; while the knowledge that she was so weak and yielding towards her companion half maddened her for the time.

“Why do you hurry on so?” he pleaded. “Am I to be driven away? Am I to leave home, and go anywhere that fate may drift me?”

“Oh, no, no, no,” she moaned. “This is too cruel to me. Pray, pray leave me now.”

“Then I may hope?”

“No,” she cried, with a fresh accession of strength, as she laid her hand upon the gate; “I have promised to be Luke Ross’s wife.”

“His you shall never be,” he said, in a hoarse whisper. “You do not love him, and you shall not fling yourself away. Sage, you shall be mine, and—”

“Well, young man, are you obliged to whisper what you say to my niece? Come, Sage, my girl, it’s time you were indoors.”

“Uncle!” cried Sage, joyously, as she sprang to his side with a sigh of relief.

“Yes, my girl,” he said, coldly, “it is uncle;” and he stuck his thistle staff down into the soft earth, and leaned his hands upon the round top. “You can go on,” he continued; “I’m not coming home yet.”

“But, uncle,” she cried, excitedly.

“Go home, my lass,” he said, imperatively.

“Yes, dear,” she half sobbed; “but you will not—”

“I say go home!” he shouted; and, with a low wail, she turned off, and walked hurriedly towards the farm, her uncle standing watching her, while Cyril Mallow coolly took a cigar-case from his breast pocket, opened it, carefully selected a cigar, picking, choosing, and returning one after the other till he had found one to his fancy, when he snapped to the case once more and thrust it back in his pocket, afterwards biting off the cigar-end and proceeding to light it with a fusee that evinced a strong dislike to burst into sparks and then smoulder away.

As he did this, however, he kept glancing furtively at the Churchwarden, who was watching the retiring form of Sage, her troubled mien winning a glance or two from Cyril as well.

The cigar burned badly, and had to be lit again, this time being watched by the Churchwarden with a kind of good-humoured contempt for the man who could smoke those rolls of tobacco-leaf in place of an honest pipe.

At last the cigar drew freely, and the eyes of the two men met.

“I’m in for another row now,” said Cyril, to himself. “Awkward; very. Never mind; I don’t care.”

“Now, young man,” said Portlock, at last, in a very short, blunt fashion, “it seems to me that you and I had better have a few words together of a sort.”

“When and where you please,” said Cyril, carelessly.

“Let’s walk along here, then,” said the Churchwarden, pointing down the lane with his thistle staff.

“Away from the farm, eh?” thought Cyril. “All right, old friend.” Then aloud, “Whichever way you please, sir.”

“I didn’t know things had gone so far as this,” continued the Churchwarden, leading the way. “People say that you are the idlest chap in these parts; but it seems to me that, with the work thou likest, thou canst be as busy as the best.”

Cyril flushed a little, and bit his lip, for he told himself that he was a gentleman, and the farmer was making far too free in his way of address; but he checked his annoyance, and said quietly—

“Perhaps, sir, you will kindly explain what you mean.” Then, after a furtive glance at the stern, angry-looking man, he muttered to himself—

“You dare not strike me; and, as to your words, say what you like—little Sage is mine.”

“Now, sir,” exclaimed Sage’s uncle, after a few moments’ pause, “will you have the goodness to explain the meaning of the scene I have just witnessed?”

“Explain, sir?” said Cyril, coolly; “surely it needs no explanation. I am young, and of one sex; Miss Portlock is young and of the other sex, and a mutual attachment has sprung up.”

“Mutual!”

“Well, yes; I hope so, sir. Perhaps, though, I ought to be content with alluding to my own feelings.”

“Humph! Your own feelings, eh? And pray does Mr Cyril Mallow mean to say that he has become attached to my niece?”

“Certainly he does, sir. You are not surprised?”

“But I am surprised,” said the farmer, angrily, “and I am very glad to have witnessed what I did before the mischief went further. Now, look here, Mr Cyril Mallow, I am a man of business, and when I have an unpleasant matter to tackle I go straight to it at once.”

“A very good plan,” said Cyril, calmly.

“I’m glad you think so, sir,” said the Churchwarden, ironically. “And now, if you please, we’ll walk straight up to the rectory.”

“What for?” cried Cyril, who was startled by his words.

“What for? Why to talk this matter over with your father.”

“But suppose he does not approve of the engagement, Mr Portlock?” said Cyril, who was taken somewhat aback by this very prompt way of treating the affair.

“Approve? Whoever thought he would approve, sir? Of course he does not, any more than I do. What I want is for you to be given to understand in a quiet way that it is time you gave up visiting at my place, and hanging about to catch sight of my little girl, when she is leaving or going to the school.”

“Mr Portlock!” exclaimed Cyril, haughtily.

“Mr Cyril Mallow!” cried the Churchwarden. “Now just look here, sir. If I were one of your set, should you be making approaches to my niece in the way you have? Not you: it would not be considered proper. Aunt’s and uncle’s consent would be asked first; but as I’m only a farmer, I’m hardly worth notice. It seems that my little lassie has taken your fancy, and so you come running after her; but not a word to me.”

“But hear me a minute,” protested Cyril.

“No, sir; nor yet half a minute. A farmer’s a man, if he is not what you call a gentleman, and thinks as much of his people as the highest in the land. I dare say, in your high and mighty way, as our rector’s son, and a gentleman who has been at college, you think you are stooping to notice my niece; so let me tell you, once for all, I don’t think you are; and, what’s more, it will be a far better man than you have shown yourself to be who gets my consent to make her his wife.”

“I can assure you, Mr Portlock—” began Cyril; but the farmer would not hear him. He was thoroughly angry, and his face flushed up a deep red.

“And I can assure you, sir, that I want no such reckless, idling fellow seeking after my niece. We had bother enough when your brother was after Sage’s sister. I tell you, then, plainly, once for all, that I won’t have it; so don’t show your face at my place again.”

He turned sharply round and strode off, leaving Cyril mortified and angry; for, in his way, he had felt that he was stooping, and falling away from his position, in noticing the little schoolmistress, so that this sharp rebuff came like a rude shock to his feelings, and made the end at which he aimed seem less likely to be achieved.

“Confound his insolence!” he cried, as he saw the broad back of the farmer disappearing through his own gate. “It is too bad to be borne.”

But in a few minutes’ time, as he walked slowly homeward, he began to smile and think over his position.

“Let him talk and speak loud,” he said. “I thought he was going to threaten me once. What does it matter? My father is dead against it, and he and Master Portlock will make common cause against me. But what does it matter when Aunt Portlock is on my side, and little Sage is as good as won? Then, as to madame, my poor mother? Pish! she will refuse me nothing. So, Master Churchwarden, I have three women on my side, and the game is mine, do what you like.”

He walked on a little way, amusing himself the while by thinking of the divided sides, and how much stronger his must be.

“Let them fight us,” he said, laughing. “We shall be four to two, and we must win; but stay, I had forgotten another enemy—Master Luke Ross. Poor fellow!” he said, contemptuously, “his chance against me is about the value ofnil.”

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