"Dear Hartledon,"I think I have at last found some trace of Gorton. There's a man of that name in the criminal calendar here, down for trial to-morrow; I shall see then whether it is the same, but the description tallies. Should it be our Gorton, I think the better plan will be to leave him entirely alone: a man undergoing a criminal sentence—and this man is sure of a long period of it—has neither the means nor the motive to be dangerous. He cannot molest you whilst he is working on Portland Island; and, so far, you may live a little eased from fear. I wish—"
"Dear Hartledon,
"I think I have at last found some trace of Gorton. There's a man of that name in the criminal calendar here, down for trial to-morrow; I shall see then whether it is the same, but the description tallies. Should it be our Gorton, I think the better plan will be to leave him entirely alone: a man undergoing a criminal sentence—and this man is sure of a long period of it—has neither the means nor the motive to be dangerous. He cannot molest you whilst he is working on Portland Island; and, so far, you may live a little eased from fear. I wish—"
Mr. Carr's was a close handwriting, and this concluded the first page. She was turning it over, when Lord Hartledon's voice on the stairs caught her ear. He seemed to be coming up.
Ay, and he would have caught her at her work but for the accidental circumstance of the old dowager's happening to look out of the drawing-room and detaining him, as he was hastening onwards up the stairs. She did her daughter good service that moment, if she had never done it before. Maude had time to fold the letter, put it back, lock the cabinet, and escape. Had she been a nervous woman, given to being flurried and to losing her presence of mind, she might not have succeeded; but she was cool and quick in emergency, her brain and fingers steady.
Nevertheless her heart beat a little as she stood within the other room, the door not latched behind her. She did not stir, lest he should hear her; and she hoped to remain unseen until he went down again. A ready excuse was on her lips, if he happened to look in, which was not probable: that she fancied she heard baby cry, and was listening.
Lord Hartledon was walking about his dressing-room, pacing it restlessly, and she very distinctly heard suppressed groans of mortal anguish breaking from his lips. How he had got rid of his visitor, and what the visitor came for, she knew not. He seemed to halt before the washhand-stand, pour out some water, and dash his face into it.
"God help me! God help Maude!" he ejaculated, as he went down again to the drawing-room.
And Lady Hartledon went down also, for the interruption had frightened her, and she did not attempt to open the cabinet again. She never knew more of the contents of Mr. Carr's letter; and only the substance of the other, as communicated to her by her husband.
Not until the Sunday morning did Lady Hartledon speak to her husband of the stranger's visit. There seemed to have been no previous opportunity. Mr. Carr had arrived late on the Friday night; indeed it was Saturday morning, for the trains were all detained; and he and Hartledon sat up together to an unconscionable hour. For this short visit he was Lord Hartledon's guest. Saturday seemed to have been given to preparation, to gaiety, and to nothing else. Perhaps also Lady Hartledon did not wish to mar that day by an unpleasant word. The little child was christened; the names given him being Edward Kirton: the countess-dowager, who was in a chronic state of dissatisfaction with everything and every one, angrily exclaimed at the last moment, that she thought at least her family name might have been given to the child; and Lord Hartledon interposed, and said, give it. Lord and Lady Hartledon, and Mr. Carr, were the sponsors: and it would afford food for weeks of grumbling to the old dowager. Hilarity reigned, and toasts were given to the new heir of Hartledon; and the only one who seemed not to enter into the spirit of the thing, but on the contrary to be subdued, absent, nervous, was the heir's father.
And so it went on to the Sunday morning. A cold, bleak, bitter morning, the wind howling, the snow flying in drifts. Mr. Carr went to church, and he was the only one of the party in the house who did go. The countess-dowager the previous night had proclaimed the fact thatshemeant to go—as a sort of reproach to any who meant to keep away. However, when the church-bells began, she was turning round in her warm bed for another nap.
Maude did not go down early; had not yet taken to doing so. She breakfasted in her room, remained toying with her baby for some time, and then went into her own sitting-room; a small cosy apartment on the drawing-room floor, into which visitors did not intrude. It looked on to Hyde Park, and a very white and dreary park it was on that particular day.
Drawing a chair to the window, she sat looking out. That is, her eyes were given to the outer world, but she was so deep in thought as to see nothing of it. For two nights and a day, burning with curiosity, she had been putting this and that together in her own mind, and drawing conclusions according to her own light. First, there was the advent of the visitor; secondly, there was the letter she had dipped into. She connected the two with each other and wondered WHAT the secret care could be that had such telling effect upon her husband.
Gorton. The name had struck upon her memory, even whilst she read it, as one associated with that terrible time—the late Lord Hartledon's death. Gradually the floodgates of recollection opened, and she knew him for the witness at the inquest about whom some speculation had arisen as to who he was, and what his business at Calne might have been with Lord Hartledon and his brother, Val Elster.
Why should her husband be afraid of this man?—as it seemed hewasafraid, by Mr. Carr's letter. What power had he of injuring Lord Hartledon?—what secret did he possess of his, that might be used against him? Turning it about in her mind, and turning it again, searching her imagination for a solution, Lady Hartledon at length arrived at one, in default of others. She thought this man must know some untoward fact by which the present Lord Hartledon's succession was imperilled. Possibly the late Lord Hartledon had made some covert and degrading marriage; leaving an obscure child who possessed legal rights, and might yet claim them. A romantic, far-fetched idea, you will say; but she could think of no other that was in the least feasible. And she remembered some faint idea having arisen in her mind at the time, that the visit of the man Gorton was in some way connected with trouble, though she did not know with which brother.
Val came in and shut the door. He stirred the fire into a blaze, making some remark about the snow, and wondering how Carr would get down to the country again. Maude gave a slight answer, and then there was silence. Each was considering how best to say something to the other. She was the quicker.
"Lord Hartledon, what did that man want on Friday?"
"What man?" he rejoined, rather wincing—for he knew well enough to what she alluded.
"The man—gentleman, or whatever he is—who had you called down to him in the library."
"By the way, Maude—yes—you should not dart in when I am engaged with visitors on business."
"Well, I thought it was Mr. Carr," she replied, glancing at his heightened colour. "What did he want?"
"Only to say a word to me on a matter of business."
"It was the same person who upset you so when he called last autumn. You have never been the same man since."
"Don't take fancies into your head, Maude."
"Fancies! you know quite well there is no fancy about it. That man holds some unpleasant secret of yours, I am certain."
"Maude!"
"Will you tell it me?"
"I have nothing to tell."
"Ah, well; I expected you wouldn't speak," she answered, with subdued bitterness; as much as to say, that she made a merit of resigning herself to an injustice she could not help. "You have been keeping things from me a long time."
"I have kept nothing from you it would give you pleasure to know. It is not—Maude, pray hear me—it is not always expedient for a man to make known to his wife the jars and rubs he has himself to encounter. A hundred trifles may arise that are best spared to her. That gentleman's business concerned others as well as myself, and I am not at liberty to speak of it."
"You refuse, then, to admit me to your confidence?"
"In this I do. I am the best judge—and you must allow me to be so—of what ought, and what ought not, to be spoken of to you. You may always rely upon my acting for your best happiness, as far as lies in my power."
He had been pacing the room whilst he spoke. Lady Hartledon was in too resentful a mood to answer. Glancing at her, he stood by the mantelpiece and leaned his elbow upon it.
"I want to make known to you another matter, Maude. If I have kept it from you—"
"Does it concern this secret business of yours?" she interrupted.
"No."
"Then let us have done with this first, if you please. Who is Gorton?"
"Who is—Gorton?" he repeated, after a dumbfounded pause. "What Gorton?"
"Well, I don't know; unless it's that man who gave evidence at the inquest on your brother."
Lord Hartledon stared at her, as well he might; and gulped down his breath, which seemed choking him. "But what about Gorton? Why do you ask me the question?"
"Because I fancy he is connected with this trouble. I—I thought I heard you and Mr. Carr mention the name yesterday when you were whispering together. I'm sure I did—there!"
As far as Lord Hartledon remembered, he and Mr. Carr had not been whispering together yesterday; had not mentioned the name of Gorton. They had done with the subject at that late sitting, the night of the barrister's arrival; who had brought news that the Gorton, that morning tried for a great crime, wasnotthe Gorton of whom they were in search. Lord Hartledon gazed at his wife with questioning eyes, but she persisted in her assertion. It was sinfully untrue; but how else could she account for knowing the name?
"Do you suppose I dreamed it, Lord Hartledon?"
"I don't know whether you dreamed it or not, Maude. Mr. Carr has certainly spoken to me since he came of a man of that name; but as certainly not in your hearing. One Gorton was tried for his life on Friday—or almost for his life—and he mentioned to me the circumstances of the case: housebreaking, accompanied by violence, which ended in death. I cannot understand you, Maude, or the fancies you seem to be taking up."
She saw how it was—he would admit nothing: and she looked straight out across the dreary park, a certain obstinate defiance veiled in her eyes. By the help of Heaven or earth, she would find out this secret that he refused to disclose to her.
"Almost every action of your life bespeaks concealment," she resumed. "Look at those letters you received in your dressing-room on Friday night: you just opened them and thrust them unread into your pocket, because I happened to be there. And yet you talk of caring for me! I know those letters contained some secret or other you dare not tell me."
She rose in some temper, and gave the fire a fierce stir.
Lord Hartledon kept her by him.
"One of those letters was from Mr. Carr; and I presume you can make no objection to my hearing from him. The other—Maude, I have waited until now to disclose its contents to you; I would not mar your happiness yesterday."
She looked up at him. Something in his voice, a sad pitying tenderness, caused her heart to beat a shade quicker. "It was a foreign letter, Maude. I think you observed that. It bore the French postmark."
A light broke upon her. "Oh, Percival, it is about Robert! Surely he is not worse!"
He drew her closer to him: not speaking.
"He is not dead?" she said, with a rush of tears. "Ah, you need not tell me; I see it. Robert! Robert!"
"It has been a happy death, Maude, and he is better off. He was quite ready to go. I wish we were as ready!"
Lord Hartledon took out the letter and read the chief portion of it to her. One little part he dexterously omitted, describing the cause of death—disease of the heart.
"But I thought he was getting so much better. What has killed him in this sudden manner?"
"Well, there was no great hope from the first. I confess I have entertained none. Mr. Hillary, you know, warned us it might end either way."
"Was it decline?" she asked, her tears falling.
"He has been declining gradually, no doubt."
"Oh, Percival! Why did you not tell me at once? It seems so cruel to have had all that entertainment yesterday! This is why you did not wish us to dance!"
"And if I had told you, and stopped the entertainment, allowing the poor little fellow to be christened in gloom and sorrow, you would have been the first to reproach me; you might have said it augured ill-luck for the child."
"Well, perhaps I should; yes, I am sure I should. You have acted rightly, after all, Val." And it was a candid admission, considering what she had been previously saying. He bent towards her with a smile, his voice quite unsteady with its earnestness.
"You see now with what motive I kept the letter from you. Maude! cannot this be an earnest that you should trust me for the rest? In all I do, as Heaven is my witness, I place your comfort first and foremost."
"Don't be angry with me," she cried, softening at the words.
He laid his hand on his wife's bent head, thinking how far he was from anger. Anger? He would have died for her then, at that moment, if it might have saved her from the sin and shame that she must share with him.
"Have you told mamma, Percival?"
"Not yet. It would not have been kept from you long had she known it. She is not up yet, I think."
"Who has written?"
"The doctor who attended him."
"You'll let me read the letter?"
"I have written to desire that full particulars may be sent to you: you shall read that one."
The tacit refusal did not strike her. She only supposed the future letter would be more explanatory. He was always anxious for her; and he had written off on the Friday night to ask for a letter giving fuller particulars, whilst avoiding mention of the cause of death.
Thus harmony for the hour was restored between them; and Lord Hartledon stood the dowager's loud reproaches with equanimity. In possession of the news of that darling angel's death ever since Friday night, and to have bottled it up within him till Sunday! She wondered what he thought of himself!
After all, Val had not quite "bottled it up." He had made it known to his brother-in-law, Lord Kirton, and also to Mr. Carr. Both had agreed that nothing had better be said until the christening-day was over.
But there came a reaction. When Lady Hartledon had got over her first grief, the other annoyance returned to her, and she fell again to brooding over it in a very disturbing fashion. She merited blame for this in a degree; but not so much as appears on the surface. If that idea, which she was taking up very seriously, were correct—that her husband's succession was imperilled—it would be the greatest misfortune that could happen to her in life. What had she married for but position?—rank, wealth, her title? any earthly misfortune would be less keen than this. Any earthly misfortune! Poor Maude!
It was a sombre dinner that evening; the news of Captain Kirton's death making it so. Besides relatives, very few guests were staying in the house; and the large and elaborate dinner-party of the previous day was reduced to a small one on this. The first to come into the drawing-room afterwards, following pretty closely on the ladies, was Mr. Carr. The dowager, who rarely paid attention to appearances, or to anything else, except her own comfort, had her feet up on a sofa, and was fast asleep; two ladies were standing in front of the fire, talking in undertones; Lady Hartledon sat on a sofa a little apart, her baby on her knee; and her sister-in-law, Lady Kirton, a fragile and rather cross-looking young woman, who looked as if a breath would blow her away, was standing over her, studying the infant's face. The latter lady moved away and joined the group at the fire as Mr. Carr approached Lady Hartledon.
"You have your little charge here, I see!"
"Please excuse it; I meant to have sent him away before any of you came up," she said, quite pleadingly. "Sarah took upon herself to proclaim aloud that his eyes were not straight, and I could not help having him brought down to refute her words. Not straight, indeed! She's only envious of him."
Sarah was Lady Kirton. Mr. Carr smiled.
"She has no children herself. I think you might be proud of your godson, Mr. Carr. But he ought not to have been here to receive you, for all that."
"I have come up soon to say good-bye, Lady Hartledon. In ten minutes I must be gone."
"In all this snow! What a night to travel in!"
"Necessity has no law. So, sir, you'd imprison my finger, would you!"
He had touched the child's hand, and in a moment it was clasped round his finger. Lady Hartledon laughed.
"Lady Kirton—the most superstitious woman in the world—would say that was an omen: you are destined to be his friend through life."
"As I will be," said the barrister, his tone more earnest than the occasion seemed to call for.
Lady Hartledon, with a graciousness she was little in the habit of showing to Mr. Carr, made room for him beside her, and he sat down. The baby lay on his back, his wide-open eyes looking upwards, good as gold.
"How quiet he is! How he stares!" reiterated the barrister, who did not understand much about babies, except for a shadowy idea that they lived in a state of crying for the first six months.
"He is the best child in the world; every one says so," she returned. "He is not the least—Hey-day! what do you mean by contradicting mamma like that? Behave yourself, sir."
For the infant, as if to deny his goodness, set up a sudden cry. Mr. Carr laughed. He put down his finger again, and the little fingers clasped round it, and the cry ceased.
"He does not like to lose his friend, you see, Lady Hartledon."
"I wish you would be my friend as well as his," she rejoined; and the low meaning tones struck on Mr. Carr's ear.
"I trust I am your friend," he answered.
She was still for a few moments; her pale beautiful face inclining towards the child's; her large dark eyes bent upon him. She turned them on Mr. Carr.
"This has been a sad day."
"Yes, for you. It is grievous to lose a brother."
"And to lose him without the opportunity of a last look, a last farewell. Robert was my best and favourite brother. But the day has been marked as unhappy for other causes than that."
Was it an uncomfortable prevision of what was coming that caused Mr. Carr not to answer her? He talked to the unconscious baby, and played with its cheeks.
"What secret is this that you and my husband have between you, Mr. Carr?" she asked abruptly.
He ceased his laughing with the baby, said something about its soft face, was altogether easy and careless in his manner, and then answered in half-jesting tones:
"Which one, Lady Hartledon?"
"Which one! Have you more than one?" she continued, taking the words literally.
"We might count up half-a-dozen, I daresay. I cannot tell you how many things I have not confided to him. We are quite—"
"I mean the secret that affectshim" she interrupted, in aggrieved tones, feeling that Mr. Carr was playing with her.
"There is some dread upon him that's wearing him to a shadow, poisoning his happiness, making his days and nights one long restlessness. Do you think it right to keep it from me, Mr. Carr? Is it what you and he are both doing—and are in league with each other to do?"
"Iam not keeping any secret from you, Lady Hartledon."
"You know you are. Nonsense! Do you think I have forgotten that evening that was the beginning of it, when a tall strange man dressed as a clergyman, came here, and you both were shut up with him for I can't tell how long, and Lord Hartledon came out from it looking like a ghost? You and he both misled me, causing me to believe that the Ashtons were entering an action against him for breach of promise; laying the damages at ten thousand pounds. I meanthatsecret, Mr. Carr," she added with emphasis. "The same man was here on Friday night again; and when you came to the house afterwards, you and Lord Hartledon sat up until nearly daylight."
Mr. Carr, who had his eyes on the exacting baby, shook his head, and intimated that he was really unable to understand her.
"When you are in town he is always at your chambers; when you are away he receives long letters from you that I may not read."
"Yes, we have been on terms of close friendship for years. And Lord Hartledon is an idle man, you know, and looks me up."
"He said you were arranging some business for him last autumn."
"Last autumn? Let me see. Yes, I think I was."
"Mr. Carr, is it of any use playing with me? Do you think it right or kind to do so?"
His manner changed at once; he turned to her with eyes as earnest as her own.
"Lady Hartledon, I would tell you anything that I could and ought to tell you. That your husband has been engaged in some complicated business, which I have been—which I have taken upon myself to arrange for him, is very true. I know that he does not wish it mentioned, and therefore my lips are sealed: but it is as well you did not know it, for it would give you no satisfaction."
"Does it involve anything very frightful?"
"It might involve the—the loss of a large sum of money," he answered, making the best reply he could.
Lady Hartledon sank her voice to a whisper. "Does it involve the possible loss of his title?—of Hartledon?"
"No," said Mr. Carr, looking at her with surprise.
"You are sure?"
"Certain. I give you my word. What can have got into your head, Lady Hartledon?"
She gave a sigh of relief. "I thought it just possible—but I will not tell you why I thought it—that some claimant might be springing up to the title and property."
Mr. Carr laughed. "That would be a calamity. Hartledon is as surely your husband's as this watch"—taking it out to look at the time—"is mine. When his brother died, he succeeded to him of indisputable right. And now I must go, for my time is up; and when next I see you, young gentleman, I shall expect a good account of your behaviour. Why, sir, the finger's mine, not yours. Good-bye, Lady Hartledon."
She gave him her hand coolly, for she was not pleased. The baby began to cry, and was sent away with its nurse.
And then Lady Hartledon sat on alone, feeling that if she were ever to arrive at the solution of the mystery, it would not be by the help of Mr. Carr. Other questions had been upon her lips—who the stranger was—what he wanted—five hundred of them: but she saw that she might as well have put them to the moon.
And Lord Hartledon went out with Mr. Carr in the inclement night, and saw him off by a Great-Western train.
Again the months went on, it may almost be said the years, and little took place worthy of record. Time obliterates as well as soothes; and Lady Hartledon had almost forgotten the circumstances which had perplexed and troubled her, for nothing more had come of them.
And Lord Hartledon? But for a certain restlessness, a hectic flush and a worn frame, betraying that the inward fever was not quenched, a startled movement if approached or spoken to unexpectedly, it might be thought that he also was at rest. There were no more anxious visits to Thomas Carr's chambers; he went about his ordinary duties, sat out his hours in the House of Lords, and did as other men. There was nothing very obvious to betray mental apprehension; and Maude had certainly dismissed the past, so far, from her mind.
Not again had Val gone down to Hartledon. With the exception of that short visit of a day or two, already recorded, he had not been there since his marriage. He would not go: his wife, though she had her way in most things, could not induce him to go. She went once or twice, in a spirit of defiance, it may be said, and meanwhile he remained in London, or took a short trip to the Continent, as the whim prompted him. Once they had gone abroad together, and remained for some months; taking servants and the children, for there were two children now; and the little fellow who had clasped the finger of Mr. Carr was a sturdy boy of three years old.
Lady Hartledon's health was beginning to fail. The doctors told her she must be more quiet; she went out a great deal, and seemed to live only in the world. Her husband remonstrated with her on the score of health; but she laughed, and said she was not going to give up pleasure just yet. Of course these gay habits are more easily acquired than relinquished. Lady Hartledon had fainting-fits; she felt occasional pain and palpitation in the region of the heart; and she grew thin without apparent cause. She said nothing about it, lest it should be made a plea for living more quietly; never dreaming of danger. Had she known what caused her brother's death her fears might possibly have been awakened. Lord Hartledon suspected mischief might be arising, and cautiously questioned her; she denied that anything was the matter, and he felt reassured. His chief care was to keep her free from excitement; and in this hope he gave way to her more than he would otherwise have done. But alas! the moment was approaching when all his care would be in vain; when the built-up security of years was destroyed by a single act of wilful disobedience to him. The sword so long suspended over his head, was to fall on hers at last.
One spring afternoon, in London, he was in his wife's sitting-room; the little room where you have seen her before, looking upon the Park. The children were playing on the carpet—two pretty little things; the girl eighteen months old.
"Take care!" suddenly called out Lady Hartledon.
Some one was opening the door, and the little Maude was too near to it. She ran and picked up the child, and Hedges came in with a card for his master, saying at the same time that the gentleman was waiting. Lord Hartledon held it to the fire to read the name.
"Who is it?" asked Lady Hartledon, putting the little girl down by the window, and approaching her husband. But there came no answer.
Whether the silence aroused her suspicions—whether any look in her husband's face recalled that evening of terror long ago—or whether some malicious instinct whispered the truth, can never be known. Certain it was that the past rose up as in a mirror before Lady Hartledon's imagination, and she connected this visitor with the former. She bent over his shoulder to peep at the card; and her husband, startled out of his presence of mind, tore it in two and threw the pieces into the fire.
"Oh, very well!" she exclaimed, mortally offended. "But you cannot blind me: it is your mysterious visitor again."
"I don't know what you mean, Maude. It is only someone on business."
"Then I will go and ask him his business," she said, moving to the door with angry resolve.
Val was too quick for her. He placed his back against the door, and lifted his hands in agitation. It was a great fault of his, or perhaps a misfortune—for he could not help it—this want of self-control in moments of emergency.
"Maude, I forbid you to interfere in this; you must not. For Heaven's sake, sit down and remain quiet."
"I'll see your visitor, and know, at last, what this strange trouble is. I will, Lord Hartledon."
"You must not: do you hear me?" he reiterated with deep emotion, for she was trying to force her way out of the room. "Maude—listen—I do not mean to be harsh, but for your own good I conjure you to be still. I forbid you, by the obedience you promised me before God, to inquire into or stir in this matter. It is a private affair of my own, and not yours. Stay here until I return."
Maude drew back, as if in compliance; and Lord Hartledon, supposing he had prevailed, quitted the room and closed the door. He was quite mistaken. Never had her solemn vows of obedience been so utterly despised; never had the temptation to evil been so rife in her heart.
She unlatched the door and listened. Lord Hartledon went downstairs and into the library, just as he had done the evening before the christening. And Lady Hartledon was certain the same man awaited him there. Ringing the nursery-bell, she took off her slippers, unseen, and hid them under a chair.
"Remain here with the children," was her order to the nurse who appeared, as she shut the woman into the room.
Creeping down softly she opened the door of the room behind the library, and glided in. It was a small room, used exclusively by Lord Hartledon, where he kept a heterogeneous collection of things—papers, books, cigars, pipes, guns, scientific models, anything—and which no one but himself ever attempted to enter. The intervening door between that and the library was not quite closed; and Lady Hartledon, cautiously pushed it a little further open. Wilful, unpardonable disobedience! when he had so strongly forbidden her! It was the same tall stranger. He was speaking in low tones, and Lord Hartledon leaned against the wall with a blank expression of face.
She saw; and heard. But how she controlled her feelings, how she remained and made no sign, she never knew. But that the instinct of self-esteem was one of her strongest passions, the dread of detection in proportion to it, she never had remained. There she was, and she could not get away again. The subtle dexterity which had served her in coming might desert her in returning. Had their senses been on the alert they might have heard her poor heart beating.
The interview did not last long—about twenty minutes; and whilst Lord Hartledon was attending his visitor to the door she escaped upstairs again, motioned away the nurse, and resumed her shoes. But what did she look like? Not like Maude Hartledon. Her face was as that of one upon whom some awful doom has fallen; her breath was coming painfully; and she kneeled down on the carpet and clasped her children to her beating heart with an action of wild despair.
"Oh, my boy! my boy! Oh, my little Maude!"
Suddenly she heard her husband's step approaching, and pushing them from her, rose and stood at the window, apparently looking out on the darkening world.
Lord Hartledon came in, gaily and cheerily, his manner lighter than it had been for years.
"Well, Maude, I have not been long, you see. Why don't you have lights?"
She did not answer: only stared straight out. Her husband approached her. "What are you looking at, Maude?"
"Nothing," she answered: "my head aches. I think I shall lie down until dinner-time. Eddie, open the door, and call Nurse, as loud as you can call."
The little boy obeyed, and the nurse returned, and was ordered to take the children. Lady Hartledon was following them to go to her own room, when she fell into a chair and went off in a dead faint.
"It's that excitement," said Val. "I do wish Maude would be reasonable!"
The illness, however, appeared to be more serious than an ordinary fainting-fit; and Lord Hartledon, remembering the suspicion of heart-disease, sent for the family doctor Sir Alexander Pepps, an oracle in the fashionable world.
A different result showed itself—equally caused by excitement—and the countess-dowager arrived in a day or two in hot haste. Lady Hartledon lay in bed, and did not attempt to get up or to get better. She lay almost as one without life, taking no notice of any one, turning her head from her husband when he entered, refusing to answer her mother, keeping the children away from the room.
"Why doesn't she get up, Pepps?" demanded the dowager, wrathfully, pouncing upon the physician one day, when he was leaving the house.
Sir Alexander, who might have been supposed to have received his baronetcy for his skill, but that titles, like kissing, go by favour, stopped short, took off his hat, and presumed that Lady Hartledon felt more comfortable in bed.
"Rubbish! We might all lie in bed if we studied comfort. Is there any earthly reason why she should stay there, Pepps?"
"Not any, except weakness."
"Except idleness, you mean. Why don't you order her to get up?"
"I have advised Lady Hartledon to do so, and she does not attend to me," replied Sir Alexander.
"Oh," said the dowager. "She was always wilful. What about her heart?"
"Her heart!" echoed Sir Alexander, looking up now as if a little aroused.
"Dear me, yes; her heart; I didn't say her liver. Is it sound, Pepps?"
"It's sound, for anything I know to the contrary. I never suspected anything the matter with her heart."
"Then you are a fool!" retorted the complimentary dowager.
Sir Alexander's temperament was remarkably calm. Nothing could rouse him out of his tame civility, which had been taken more than once for obsequiousness. The countess-dowager had patronized him in earlier years, when he was not a great man, or had begun to dream of becoming one.
"Don't you recollect I once consulted you on the subject—what's your memory good for? She was a girl then, of fourteen or so; and you were worth fifty of what you are now, in point of discernment."
The oracle carried his thoughts back, and really could not recollect it. "Ahem! yes; and the result was—was—"
"The result was that you said the heart had nothing the matter with it, and I said it had," broke in the impatient dowager.
"Ah, yes, madam, I remember. Pray, have you reason to suspect anything wrong now?"
"That's what you ought to have ascertained, Pepps, not me. What d'you mean by your neglect? What, I ask, does she lie in bed for? If her heart's right, there's nothing more the matter with her than there is with you."
"Perhaps your ladyship can persuade Lady Hartledon to exert herself," suggested the bland doctor. "I can't; and I confess I think that she only wants rousing."
With a flourish of his hat and his small gold-headed black cane the doctor bowed himself out from the formidable dowager. That lady turned her back upon him, and betook herself on the spur of the moment to Maude's room, determined to "have it out."
Curious sounds greeted her, as of some one in hysterical pain. On the bed, clasped to his mother in nervous agony, was the wondering child, little Lord Elster: words of distress, nay, of despair, breaking from her. It seemed, the little boy, who was rather self-willed and rebellious on occasion, had escaped from the nursery, and stolen to his mother's room. The dowager halted at the door, and looked out from her astonished eyes.
"Oh, Edward, if we were but dead! Oh, my darling, if it would only please Heaven to take us both! I couldn't send for you, child; I couldn't see you; the sight of you kills me. You don't know; my babies, you don't know!"
"What on earth does all this mean?" interrupted the dowager, stepping forward. And Lady Hartledon dropped the boy, and fell back on the bed, exhausted.
"What have you done to your mamma, sir?"
The child, conscious that he had not done anything, but frightened on the whole, repented of his disobedience, and escaped from the chamber more quickly than he had entered it. The dowager hated to be puzzled, and went wrathfully up to her daughter.
"Perhaps you'll tell me what's the matter, Maude."
Lady Hartledon grew calm. The countess-dowager pressed the question.
"There's nothing the matter," came the tardy and rather sullen reply.
"Why do you wish yourself dead, then?"
"Because I do."
"How dare you answer me so?"
"It's the truth. I should be spared suffering."
The countess-dowager paused. "Spared suffering!" she mentally repeated; and being a woman given to arriving at rapid conclusions without rhyme or reason, she bethought herself that Maude must have become acquainted with the suspicion regarding her heart.
"Who told you that?" shrieked the dowager. "It was that fool Hartledon."
"He has told me nothing," said Maude, in an access of resentment, all too visible. "Told me what?"
"Why, about your heart. That's what I suppose it is."
Maude raised herself upon her elbow, her wan face fixed on her mother's. "Is there anything the matter with my heart?" she calmly asked.
And then the old woman found that she had made a grievous mistake, and hastened to repair it.
"I thought there might be, and asked Pepps. I've just asked him now; and he's says there's nothing the matter with it."
"I wish there were!" said Maude.
"You wish there were! That's a pretty wish for a reasonable Christian," cried the tart dowager. "You want your husband to lecture you; saying such things."
"I wish he were hanged!" cried Maude, showing her glistening teeth.
"My gracious!" exclaimed the wondering old lady, after a pause. "What has he done?"
"Why did you urge me to marry him? Oh, mother, can't you see that I am dying—dying of horror—and shame—and grief? You had better have buried me instead."
For once in her selfish and vulgar mind the countess-dowager felt a feeling akin to fear. In her astonishment she thought Maude must be going mad.
"You'd do well to get some sleep, dear," she said in a subdued tone; "and to-morrow you must get up; Pepps says so; he thinks you want rousing."
"I have not slept since; it's not sleep, it's a dead stupor, in which I dream things as horrible as the reality," murmured Maude, unconscious perhaps that she spoke aloud. "I shall never sleep again."
"Not slept since when?"
"I don't know."
"Can't you say what you mean?" cried the puzzled dowager. "If you've any grievance, tell it out; if you've not, don't talk nonsense."
But Lady Hartledon, though thus sweetly allured to confession, held her tongue. Her half-scattered senses came back to her, and with them a reticence she would not break. The countess-dowager hardly knew whether she deserved pitying or shaking, and went off in a fit of exasperation, breaking in upon her son-in-law as he was busy looking over some accounts in the library.
"I want to know what is the matter with Maude."
He turned round in his chair, and met the dowager's flaxen wig and crimson face. Val did not know what was the matter with his wife any more than the questioner did. He supposed she would be all right when she grew stronger.
"She says it'syou" said the gentle dowager, improving upon her information. "She has just been wishing you were hanged."
"Ah, you have been teasing her," he returned, with composure. "Maude says all sorts of things when she's put out."
"Perhaps she does," was the retort; "but she meant this, for she showed her teeth when she said it. You can't blind me; and I have seen ever since I came here that there was something wrong between you and Maude."
For that matter, Val had seen it too. Since the night of his wife's fainting-fit she had scarcely spoken a word to him; had appeared as if she could not tolerate his presence for an instant in her room. Lord Hartledon felt persuaded that it arose from resentment at his having refused to allow her to see the stranger. He rose from his seat.
"There's nothing wrong between me and Maude, Lady Kirton. If there were, you must pardon me for saying that I could not suffer any interference in it. But there is not."
"Something's wrong somewhere. I found her just now sobbing and moaning over Eddie, wishing they were both dead, and all the rest of it. If she goes on like this for nothing, she's losing her senses, that's all."
"She'll be all right when she's stronger. Pray don't worry her. She'll be well soon, I daresay. And now I shall be glad if you'll leave me, for I am very busy."
She did not leave him any the quicker for the request, but stayed to worry him, as it was in her nature to worry every one. Getting rid of her at last, he turned the key of the door, and wished her a hundred miles away.
The wish bore fruit. In a few days some news she heard regarding her eldest son—who was a widower now—took the dowager to Ireland, and Lord Hartledon wished he could as easily turn the key of the house upon her as he had turned that of the room.
Summer dust was in the London streets, summer weather in the air, and the carriage of that fashionable practitioner, Sir Alexander Pepps, still waited before Lord Hartledon's house. It had waited there more frequently in these later weeks than of old.
The great world—herworld—wondered what was the matter with her: Sir Alexander wondered also. Perhaps had he been a less courtly man he might have rapped out "obstinacy," if questioned upon the point; as it was, he murmured of "weakness." Weak she undoubtedly was; and she did not seem to try in the least to grow strong again. She did not go into society now; she dressed as usual, and sat in her drawing-room, and received visitors if the whim took her; but she was usually denied to all; and said she was not well enough to go out. From her husband she remained bitterly estranged. If he attempted to be friendly with her, to ask what was ailing her, she either sharply refused to say, or maintained a persistent silence. Lord Hartledon could not account for her behaviour, and was growing tired of it.
Poor Maude! That some grievous blow had fallen upon her was all too evident. Resentment, anguish, bitter despair alternated within her breast, and she seemed really not to care whether she lived or died. Was it forthisthat she had schemed, and so successfully, to wrest Lord Hartledon from his promised bride Anne Ashton? She would lie back in her chair and ask it. No labour of hers could by any possibility have brought forth a result by which Miss Ashton could be so well avenged. Heaven is true to itself, and Dr. Ashton had left vengeance with it. Lady Hartledon looked back on her fleeting triumph; a triumph at the time certainly, but a short one. It had not fulfilled its golden promises: that sort of triumph perhaps never does. It had been followed by ennui, repentance, dissatisfaction with her husband, and it had resulted in a very moonlight sort of happiness, which had at length centred only in the children. The children! Maude gave a cry of anguish as she thought of them. No; take it altogether, the play from the first had not been worth the candle. And now? She clasped her thin hands in a frenzy of impotent rage—with Anne Ashton had lain the real triumph, with herself the sacrifice. Too well Maude understood a remark her husband once made in answer to a reproach of hers in the first year of their marriage—that he was thankful not to have wedded Anne.
One morning Sir Alexander Pepps, on his way from the drawing-room to his chariot—a very old-fashioned chariot that all the world knew well—paused midway in the hall, with his cane to his nose, and condescended to address the man with the powdered wig who was escorting him.
"Is his lordship at home?"
"Yes, sir."
"I wish to see him."
So the wig changed its course, and Sir Alexander was bowed into the presence. His lordship rose with what the French would callempressement, to receive the great man.
"Thank you, I have not time to sit," said he, declining the offered chair and standing, cane in hand. "I have three consultations to-day, and some urgent cases. I grieve to have a painful duty to fulfil; but I must inform you that Lady Hartledon's health gives me uneasiness."
Lord Hartledon did not immediately reply; but it was not from want of genuine concern.
"What is really the matter with her?"
"Debility; nothing else," replied Sir Alexander. "But these cases of extreme debility cause so much perplexity. Where there is no particular disease to treat, and the patient does not rally, why—"
He understood the doctor's pause to mean something ominous. "What can be done?" he asked. "I have remarked, with pain, that she does not gain strength. Change of air? The seaside—"
"She says she won't go," interrupted the physician. "In fact, her ladyship objects to everything I can suggest or propose."
"It's very strange," said Lord Hartledon.
"At times it has occurred to me that she has something on her mind," continued Sir Alexander. "Upon my delicately hinting this opinion to Lady Hartledon, she denied it with a vehemence which caused me to suspect that I was correct. Does your lordship know of anything likely to—to torment her?"
"Not anything," replied Lord Hartledon, confidently. "I think I can assure you that there is nothing of the sort."
And he spoke according to his belief; for he knew of nothing. He would have supposed it simply impossible that Lady Hartledon had been made privy to the dreadful secret which had weighed on him; and he never gave that a thought.
Sir Alexander nodded, reassured on the point.
"I should wish for a consultation, if your lordship has no objection."
"Then pray call it without delay. Have anything, do anything, that may conduce to Lady Hartledon's recovery. You do not suspect heart-disease?"
"The symptoms are not those of any heart-disease known to me. Lady Kirton spoke to me of this; but I see nothing to apprehend at present on that score. If there's any latent affection, it has not yet shown itself. Then we'll arrange the consultation for to-morrow."
Sir Alexander Pepps was bowed out; and the consultation took place; which left the matter just where it was before. The wise doctors thought there was nothing radically wrong; but strongly recommended change of air. Sir Alexander confidently mentioned Torbay; he had great faith in Torbay; perhaps his lordship could induce Lady Hartledon to try it? She had flatly told the consultation that she wouldnottry it.
Lady Hartledon was seated in the drawing-room when he went in, willing to do what he could; any urging of his had not gone far with her of late. A white silk shawl covered her dress of green check silk; she wore a shawl constantly now, having a perpetual tendency to shiver; her handsome features were white and attenuated, but her eyes were brilliant still, and her dark hair was dressed in elaborate braids.
"So you have had the doctors here, Maude," he remarked, cheerfully.
She nodded a reply, and began to fidget with the body of her gown. It seemed that she had to do something or other always to her attire whenever he spoke to her—which partially took away her attention.
"Sir Alexander tells me they have been recommending you Torbay."
"I am not going to Torbay."
"Oh yes, you are, Maude," he soothingly said. "It will be a change for us all. The children will benefit by it as much as you, and so shall I."
"I tell you I shall not go to Torbay."
"Would you prefer any other place?"
"I will not go anywhere; I have told them so."
"Then I declare that I'll carry you off by force!" he cried, rather sharply. "Why do you vex me like this? You know you must go?"
She made no reply. He drew a chair close to her and sat down.
"Maude," he said, speaking all the more gently for his recent outbreak, "you must be aware that you do not recover as quickly as we could wish—"
"I do not recover at all," she interrupted. "I don't want to recover."
"My dear, how can you talk so? There is nothing the matter with you but weakness, and that will soon be overcome if you exert yourself."
"No, it won't. I shall not leave home."
"Somewhere you must go, for the workmen are coming into the house; and for the next two months it will not be habitable."
"Who is bringing them in?" she asked, with flashing eyes.
"You know it was decided long ago that the house should be done up this summer. It wants it badly enough. Torbay—"
"I will not go to Torbay, Lord Hartledon. If I am to be turned out of this house, I'll go to the other."
"What other?"
"Hartledon."
"Not to Hartledon," said he, quickly, for his dislike to the place had grown with time, and the word grated on his ear.
"Then I remain where I am."
"Maude," he resumed in quiet tones, "I will not urge you to try sea-air for my sake, because you do what you can to show me I am of little moment to you; but I will say try it for the sake of the children. Surely, they are dear to you!"
A subdued sound of pain broke from her lips, as if she could not bear to hear them named.
"It's of no use prolonging this discussion," she said. "An invalid's fancies may generally be trusted, and mine point to Hartledon—if I am to be disturbed at all. I should not so much mind going there."
A pause ensued. Lord Hartledon had taken her hand, and was mechanically turning round her wedding-ring, his thoughts far away; it hung sufficiently loosely now on the wasted finger. She lay back in her chair, looking on with apathy, too indifferent to withdraw her hand.
"Why did you put it on?" she asked, abruptly.
"Why indeed?" returned his lordship, deep in his abstraction. "What did you say, Maude?" he added, awaking in a flurry. "Put what on?"
"My wedding-ring."
"My dear! But about Hartledon—if you fancy that, and nowhere else, I suppose we must go there."
"You also?"
"Of course."
"Ah! when your wife's chord of life is loosening what model husbands you men become!" she uttered. "You have never gone to Hartledon with me; you have suffered me to be there alone, through a ridiculous reminiscence; but now that you are about to lose me you will go!"
"Why do you encourage these gloomy thoughts about yourself, Maude?" he asked, passing over the Hartledon question. "One would think you wished to die."
"I do not know," she replied in tones of deliberation. "Of course, no one, at my age, can be tired of the world, and for some things I wish to live; but for others, I shall be glad to die."
"Maude! Maude! It is wrong to say this. You are not likely to die."
"I can't tell. All I say is, I shall be glad for some things, if I do."
"What is all this?" he exclaimed, after a bewildered pause. "Is there anything on your mind, Maude? Are you grieving after that little infant?"
"No," she answered, "not for him. I grieve for the two who remain."
Lord Hartledon looked at her. A dread, which he strove to throw from him, struggling to his conscience.
"I think you are deceived in my state of health. And if I object to going to the seaside, it is chiefly because I would not die in a strange place. If I am to die, I should like to die at Hartledon."
His hair seemed to rise up in horror at the words. "Maude! have you any disease you are concealing from me?"
"Not any. But the belief has been upon me for some time that I should not get over this. You must have seen how I appear to be sinking."
"And with no disease upon you! I don't understand it."
"No particular physical disease."
"You are weak, dispirited—I cannot pursue these questions," he broke off. "Tell me in a word: is there any cause for this?"
"Yes."
Percival gathered up his breath. "What is it?"
"What is it!" her eyes ablaze with sudden light. "What has weighedyoudown, not to the grave, for men are strong, but to terror, and shame, and sin? What secret is it, Lord Hartledon?"
His lips were whitening. "But it—even allowing that I have a secret—need not weigh you down."
"Not weigh me down!—to terror deeper than yours; to shame more abject? Suppose I know the secret?"
"You cannot know it," he gasped. "It would have killed you."
"And whathasit done? Look at me."
"Oh, Maude!" he wailed, "what is it that you do, or do not know? How did you learn anything about it?"
"I learnt it through my own folly. I am sorry for it now. My knowing it can make the fact neither better nor worse; and perhaps I might have been spared the knowledge to the end."
"But what is it that you know?" he asked, rather wishing at the moment he was dead himself.
"All."
"It is impossible."
"It is true."
And he felt that it was true; here was the solution to the conduct which had puzzled him, puzzled the doctors, puzzled the household and the countess-dowager.
"And how—and how?" he gasped.
"When that stranger was here last, I heard what he said to you," she replied, avowing the fact without shame in the moment's terrible anguish. "I made the third at the interview."
He looked at her in utter disbelief.
"You refused to let me go down. I followed you, and stood at the little door of the library. It was open, and I—heard—every word."
The last words were spoken with an hysterical sobbing. "Oh, Maude!" broke from the lips of Lord Hartledon.
"You will reproach me for disobedience, of course; for meanness, perhaps; but Iknewthere was some awful secret, and you would not tell me. I earned my punishment, if that will be any satisfaction to you; I have never since enjoyed an instant's peace, night or day."
He hid his face in his pain. This was the moment he had dreaded for years; anything, so that it might be kept from her, he had prayed in his never-ceasing fear.
"Forgive, forgive me! Oh, Maude, forgive me!"
She did not respond; she did not attempt to soothe him; if ever looks expressed reproach and aversion, hers did then.
"Have compassion upon me, Maude! I was more sinned against than sinning."
"What compassion had you for me? How dared you marry me? you, bound with crime?"
"The worst is over, Maude; the worst is over."
"It can never be over: you are guilty of wilful sophistry. The crime remains; and—Lord Hartledon—its fruits remain."
He interrupted her excited words by voice and gesture; he took her hands in his. She snatched them from him, and burst into a fit of hysterical crying, which ended in a faintness almost as of death. He did not dare to call assistance; an unguarded word might have slipped out unawares.
Shut them in; shut them in! they had need to be alone in a scene such as that.
Lord and Lady Hartledon went down to Calne, as she wished. But not immediately; some two or three weeks elapsed, and during that time Mr. Carr was a good deal with both of them. Their sole friend: the only man cognizant of the trouble they had yet to battle with; who alone might whisper a word of something like consolation.
Lady Hartledon seemed to improve. Whether it was the country, or the sort of patched-up peace that reigned between her and her husband, she grew stronger and better, and began to go out again and enjoy life as usual. But in saying life, it must not be thought that gaiety is implied; none could shun that as Lady Hartledon now seemed to shun it. And he, for the first time since his marriage, began to take some interest in his native place, and in his own home. The old sensitive feeling in regard to meeting the Ashtons lingered still; was almost as strong as ever; and he had the good sense to see that this must be overcome, if possible, if he made Hartledon his home for the future, as his wife now talked of doing.
As a preliminary step to it, he appeared at church; one, two, three Sundays. On the second Sunday his wife went with him. Anne was in her pew, with her younger brother, but not Mrs. Ashton: she, as Lord Hartledon knew by report, was too ill now to go out. Each day Dr. Ashton did the whole duty; his curate, Mr. Graves, was taking a holiday. Lord Hartledon heard another report, that the curate had been wanting to press his attentions on Miss Ashton. The truth was, as none had known better than Val Elster, Mr. Graves had wanted to press them years and years ago. He had at length made her an offer, and she had angrily refused him. A foolish girl! said indignant Mrs. Graves, reproachfully. Her son was a model son, and would make a model husband; and he would be a wealthy man, as Anne knew, for he must sooner or later come into the entailed property of his uncle. It was not at all pleasant to Lord Hartledon to stand there in his pew, with recollection upon him, and the gaze of the Ashtons studiously turned from him, and Jabez Gum looking out at him from the corners of his eyes as he made his sonorous responses. A wish for reconciliation took strong possession of Lord Hartledon, and he wondered whether he could not bring himself to sue for it. He wanted besides to stay for the after-service, which he had not done since he was a young man—never since his marriage. Maude had stayed occasionally, as was the fashion; but he never. I beg you not to quarrel with me for the word; some of the partakers in that after-service remain from no higher motive. Certainly poor Maude had not.
On the third Sunday, Lord Hartledon went to church in the evening—alone; and when service was over he waited until the church had emptied itself, and then made his way into the vestry. Jabez was passing out of it, and the Rector was coming out behind him. Lord Hartledon stopped the latter, and craved a minute's conversation. Dr. Ashton bowed rather stiffly, put his hat down, and Jabez shut them in.
"Is there any service you require of me?" inquired the Rector, coldly.
It was the impulsive Val Elster of old days who answered; his hand held out pleadingly, his ingenuous soul shining forth from his blue eyes.
"Yes, there is, Doctor Ashton; I have come to pray for it—your forgiveness."
"My Christian forgiveness you have had already," returned the clergyman, after a pause.
"But I want something else. I want your pardon as a man; I want you to look at me and speak to me as you used to do. I want to hear you call me 'Val' again; to take my hand in yours, and not coldly; in short, I want you to help me to forgive myself."
In that moment—and Dr. Ashton, minister of the gospel though he was, could not have explained it—all the old love for Val Elster rose bubbling in his heart. A stubborn heart withal, as all hearts are since Adam sinned; he did not respond to the offered hand, nor did his features relax their sternness in spite of the pleading look.
"You must be aware, Lord Hartledon, that your conduct does not merit pardon. As to friendship—which is what you ask for—it would be incompatible with the distance you and I must observe towards each other."
"Why need we observe it—if you accord me your true forgiveness?"
The question was one not easy to respond to candidly. The doctor could not say, Your intercourse with us might still be dangerous to the peace of one heart; and in his inner conviction he believed that it might be. He only looked at Val; the yearning face, the tearful eyes; and in that moment it occurred to the doctor that something more than the ordinary wear and tear of life had worn the once smooth brow, brought streaks of silver to the still luxuriant hair.
"Do you know that you nearly killed her?" he asked, his voice softening.
"I have known that it might be so. Hadanyatonement lain in my power; any means by which her grief might have been soothed; I would have gone to the ends of the earth to accomplish it. I would even have died if it could have done good. But, of all the world, I alone might attempt nothing. For myself I have spent the years in misery; not on that score," he hastened to add in his truth, and a thought crossed Dr. Ashton that he must allude to unhappiness with his wife—"on another. If it will be any consolation to know it—if you might accept it as even the faintest shadow of atonement—I can truly say that few have gone through the care that I have, and lived. Anne has been amply avenged."
The Rector laid his hand on the slender fingers, hot with fever, whiter than they ought to be, betraying life's inward care. He forgave him from that moment; and forgiveness with Dr. Ashton meant the full meaning of the word.
"You were always your own enemy, Val."
"Ay. Heaven alone knows the extent of my folly; and of my punishment."
From that hour Lord Hartledon and the Rectory were not total strangers to each other. He called there once in a way, rarely seeing any one but the doctor; now and then Mrs. Ashton; by chance, Anne. Times and again was it on Val's lips to confide to Dr. Ashton the nature of the sin upon his conscience; but his innate sensitiveness, the shame it would reflect upon him, stepped in and sealed the secret.
Meanwhile, perhaps he and his wife had never lived on terms of truer cordiality.There were no secrets between them: and let me tell you that is one of the keys to happiness in married life. Whatever the past had been, Lady Hartledon appeared to condone it; at least she no longer openly resented it to her husband. It is just possible that a shadow of the future, a prevision of the severing of the tie, very near now, might have been unconsciously upon her, guiding her spirit to meekness, if not yet quite to peace. Lord Hartledon thought she was growing strong; and, save that she would rather often go into a passion of hysterical tears as she clasped her children to her, particularly the boy, her days passed calmly enough. She indulged the children beyond all reason, and it was of no use for their father to interfere. Once when he stepped in to prevent it, she flew out almost like a tigress, asking what business it was of his, that he should dare to come between her and them. The lesson was an effectual one; and he never interfered again. But the indulgence was telling on the boy's naturally haughty disposition; and not for good.