CHAPTER XIX.

"The firste vertue, sone, if thou wilt lerne,Is to restreine, and kepen wel thy tonge."—The Manciple's Tale—Chaucer.

—The Manciple's Tale—Chaucer.

Thedays have grown shorter and shorter. Daylight now is to be prized, not sported with, as in the gay and happy Summer. "The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time" has carried us from "Golden September" to bleakest Winter, and into that month which claims Christmas for its own.

At the hall, everything is very much the same as it was when last we saw it, if we except the fact that Roger is absent. He is abroad;somuch abroad, indeed, that nobody knows where he is. A week after his departure he had written to Sir Christopher, and the week after that again to Mark Gore; but, beyond these two meagre attempts at correspondence, no news has been heard of him. Whether, as Mr. Browne has elegantly expressed it, "he is up the Nile, or up the Spout," is a matter of speculation.

Sir Christopher is looking a little older, a little graver. He is not so testy as of yore, a change that fills Dulce's heart with misgivings. That he has fretted greatly over her broken engagement with Roger (who is to the old Baronet as dear as his own son should have been, and second only to Fabian in his affections) she well knows; she well knows, too, how magnanimously—to please her—he has tried to be civil to Stephen Gower, and to welcome him with cordiality as his future nephew. But the effort to do all this has aged and saddened him; and from time to time his mind wandersrestlessly to the young man who left his home full of anger and indignant grief.

As for Stephen, living in his "Fool's Paradise, he drinks delight," nor heeds how false is all the happiness that seems to surround him. Bitter is the fruit he feeds on, though he will not acknowledge it even to himself; and, looking on his dainty lady-love, he is still happy, and content to bear all things, and suffer all things, for the few grains of adulterated sweetness doled out by her every now and then with a niggard hand. He will see no cloud on his horizon, although it sits there heavily; nor will he notice aught but what is good and lovable in this girl, upon whom he has centred all his dearest hopes.

For the rest, there has been but little change amongst them. Julia Beaufort and the children had gone away for a month, but returned to the Hall a fortnight ago, and are now—that is, the children, at all events—anxiously awaiting Christmas Day with all its affectations of gaiety and goodwill, and its hideous paddings.

Sir Mark did pretty much the same as Julia. He went away, too, and came back again, thus filling up the measure of his days. Mr. Browne had declined to stir for any pretense whatever, and has been enjoying himself to the utmost, now at Portia's feet, now at Dulce's, and, when all things fail, at Julia's.

Perhaps to Fabian the days have seemed longest. He is silent, cold, self-contained as ever; but now there is something else, a settled melancholy, that yet has in it a mixture of extreme pride, that forbids any approach to it; a melancholy born of despair, and the knowledge that there is laid upon him "a burden greater than he can bear."

"Time, the subtle thief of youth," is stealing from him his best years; his life is going, and with it all chance of joy and gladness. Ever since that memorable evening in the garden, after the ball, a strange reserve has arisen between him and Portia. That morning, as the soft pink dawn came up from behind the hills—when passion, pale but triumphant, had held full sway—has never been forgiven by either. A sense of terror has possessed Portia ever since—the knowledge of a danger barely overcome; and with him there has been the memory of pain, and terrible self-restraint that has scathed him as it passed him by. And withal a settled coldnesshas fallen upon them, the greater because of the weakness that had characterised the hour of which I write.

He does not condemn her, but in his heart he does not forgive her want of faith, her almost openly avowed distrust. Of his own will he never lets his eyes rest upon the fair beauty of her face, and turns aside when unlucky chance has flung him in her path.

And she—a contempt for her own want of self-control, together with the miserable knowledge that her heart is irrevocably his, has rendered her almost repellent in her manner toward him. When he is near, her eyelids droop, her lips take a harder curve, she is dumb, silent, unsympathetic; and yet when he is gone, when the door has closed behind him, the fever of her blood runs high, and but for social training, she would gladly rise, and, in spite of all things, call to him and implore him to return to her side once more.

To a casual observer, of course, all this is not apparent; but to these two, between whom Fate sits relentless, the pain and sorrow of it is deep and cruel. More deep, more sorrowful for him, of course. His whole life is a ruin; he had thought of many things when first the blight fell upon him; but that he should fall in love, and because of this curse that has blasted his best days, should be compelled to turn aside from the love of his heart, had not occurred to him. His life has grown too bitter to be borne with fortitude, almost he is "half in love with easeful death." Oh, the joy—the rapture! to pass away from all the tortures of this "work-a-day world" to a land unknown, but surely full of rest. To die—to disappear! To court a glad forgetfulness! In this alone lies hope, and, that sweetest of all sweet things, indifference.

Not coward enough to compel death, he still longs for it; he would slip away from all and sink into oblivion, and gladly deem himself and his sad history forgotten. "To cease upon the midnight with no pain?" What sweeter, kinder fate could visit him than that for whichKeatslonged—not vainly.

Into his life, too, some smaller worries are thrown. The old man Slyme, the secretary, has been going rapidly from bad to worse, of late. His intemperate habits are growing on him, and now seldom comes the day when he is not discovered to be unfit for duty of any kind.

Naturally such conduct incenses Sir Christopher to the last degree. The old man has been for years in his service, buttime wears out all things, and even regard and use can be forgotten. Fabian, falling into the breach, seeks to mend it, although Slyme has never been a favorite of his, and although he is fully aware that he is very distasteful to the secretary for reasons unknown; still he pleads his cause, principally because the man is old and friendless; and this, too, he does secretly, the secretary being ignorant of the force brought to bear upon his delinquencies, a force that keeps a roof over his head, and leaves him a competence without which the world would be a barren spot to him indeed, with only the poor-house—that most degrading of all places—to which to turn.

To-day is melancholy, cold and bleak. The winds are sighing; the earth is bare and naked; no vestige of a fresh and coming life can yet be seen. Upon the gray sands, far away, the white waves dash themselves tumultuously, the sea birds shriek, and, "blasting keen and loud, roll the white surges to the sounding shore."

Indoors there is warmth and comfort. Julia, sitting over the fire, finding she cannot get Dulce to gossip with—Dulce, indeed, is not come-at-able of late—turns gratefully to Portia, who happens to come into the room at this moment.

"The fire is the only delicious thing in the house," she says, fretfully. "Docome here and enjoy it with me."

"Anything the matter with you?" asks Portia, gently, seating herself on a low lounging chair at her side.

"Oh! nothing, nothing. But Dulce is very strange of late, is she not? Ever since Roger's going, don't you think? And all that affair was quite absurd, according to my lights. Stephen won't suit her half as well. Fancy any woman throwing over the man she likes, for a mere chimera. Wrecking her entire happiness for the sake of a chocolate cream!"

"It sounds absurd," says Portia; "but I cannot believe such a paltry thing as that has separated them. There must have been something else."

"Well, perhaps so. Sir Christopher, one can see, is very distressed about it. He is unfortunate about them all, is he not? poor old man. Fabian's affair was so wretched, so unlooked for, too," says Julia, in the comfortably gossiping tone one knows so well, drawing her chair a little nearer to the fire. "I can't think what could have tempted him to do it."

Portia turns abruptly toward her.

"Do you, too, question his innocence?" she says, her breath coming quickly.

"Well—er—you see one doesn't like to talk about it," says Mrs. Beaufort with a faint yawn. "It seems pleasanter to look upon him as a suffering angel, but there are some who don't believe in him you know. Do come closer to the fire, Portia, and let us have a good chat."

"Go on," says Portia, "you were talking of Fabian, you were saying—"

"Yes, just so. Was I uncharitable? It doesn't make him a bit the worse in my eyes, you know, not a bit. It is all done and over years ago, and why remember nasty things. Really, do you know, Portia—it may be horrid of me—but really I think the whole story only makes him a degree more interesting."

Portia shivers, and ignores this suggestion.

"Do other people doubt him, too?" she asks in a strangely cold tone. Though she may disbelieve in him herself, yet it is agony to her that others should do the same.

"My dear, yes, of course; a great many; in fact, pretty nearly everybody but just those you see here—Sir Mark excepted, I think, and then Dicky Browne. But Dicky hasn't enough brains to believe or disbelieve in anybody."

"Ah!" says Portia. She leans back in her chair, and holds up a fan between her and the fire and Julia. She can hardly analyze her own thoughts; but, even at this moment, when all her finest feelings are ajar, she tells herself that surely—surely she cordially detests Julia Beaufort. She tells herself, too, that she loves Mark Gore.

"You see, in your doubt of him, you are not a solitary exception," says Julia, with elephantine playfulness. "Others think with you. It is the plainest case in the world, I think. I don't blame you."

"How do you know Idodoubt him?" asks Portia, suddenly, turning her large eyes upon her, that are glittering in the firelight. At this Julia recoils a little and looks somewhat uncomfortable.

"Your voice, your manner, led me to believe so," she says, slowly, and with hesitation. "If you don't, of course it is so much to your credit."

"You mean—" asks Portia.

"Well, his whole bearing would preclude the thought ofdishonor of any kind," says Julia, boldly, and with the utmost effrontery, considering all she had said a moment since. "Suspicion could hardly rest with such a man as Fabian. Of course, the whole thing is a wretched mistake, that will be cleared up sooner or later, let us hope sooner, as surely he has suffered enough already, poor dear fellow!"

She pauses; Portia puzzled, and secretly indignant, says nothing. Seeing she will not speak, Julia goes on again even more impressively than before.

"I never entertained a shadow of a doubt with regard to him," she says, nobly, "never! Who could? I was always one of his very warmest supporters."

This is too much! Portia murmuring something civil, but distinct, rises abruptly, and, going to the door, opens it, and is soon beyond call, and beyond hearing of the voice that has grown hateful to her.

Just at this moment, Julia's absurd shufflings, and equivocations, and barefaced changes from one asseveration to another fill her with wrath. She is distressed, and at war with her own heart; and so, crossing the hall, makes for the one room that is especially dear to allwomenwhen in trouble, namely, her own bedroom.

But passing by Dulce's door, and finding it open, she pauses before it, and finally, after some hesitation, she crosses the threshold only to find it empty.

The fire is burning brightly; a little crushed glove lies upon the hearth-rug, showing how its owner but lately had knelt before the fire, or stood near it to gaze into its depths, and call up fancied faces from its coals.

A little low chair attracts her attention; sinking into it, she lets her chin fall into the palm of her hands, and presently is lost in painful and half-angry reflection.

"Pretty nearly everybody." The words ring in her ears; does the whole county, then, look upon Fabian with averted eyes? And perhaps—who knows—the very people beneath the roof may distrust him, too; she had not known until this evening Julia's private opinion; the others may agree with her, but naturally shrink from saying so. Roger, perhaps, believed him guilty; and Dicky Browne, it may be, in his secret soul, regards him with contempt, and Sir Mark—

No,notSir Mark! She could not mistake him. However foolish it may be, certainly his belief in Fabian is genuine.And somehow of late, she has grown rather fond of Sir Mark; and here she sighs, and laying her hand upon her heart, presses it convulsively against it as though to still the pain that has sprung into life there, because of the agitation that has been hers for the past half hour.

Dulce, coming up-stairs, presently, finds her still sitting over the fire, in an attitude that betokens the very deepest dejection.

"You here,très chère, and alone," she says, gaily, stooping over her in caressing fashion. "Naughty girl. You should have told me you were going to honor me with your presence, and I would have made my room gay to receive you."

"I don't want you to make a stranger of me. I like your room as it is," says Portia, with a smile.

"Well, don't sit crouching over the fire; it will spoil your complexion; come over to the window and see what the storm has done, and how lovely nature can look even when robed in Winter's garb."

Portia, rising, follows her to the window, but as she reaches it she sinks again wearily into a lounging chair, with all the air of one whose limbs refuse obstinately to support her.

As both girls gaze out upon the chilly landscape, white here and there with the snow that fell last night, Fabian, coming from between the dark green branches of an ancient lauristinus, with two red setters at his heels, and a gun upon his shoulder, passes beneath the window, going in the direction of the home wood.

Leaning forward, Dulce taps lightly on the pane, and Fabian, heating the quick sound, stops short, and lifts his eyes to the window. As he sees his pretty sister, he nods to her, and a bright smile creeps round his lips, rendering his always handsome face actually beautiful for the moment.

Only for a moment; his gaze wandering, instinctively, falls on Portia, standing pale and calm beside her cousin. Their eyes meet, and, as if by magic, the smile dies, his lips grow straight and cold again, and, without another glance, he whistles to his dogs, and, turning the corner, is rapidly out of sight.

"Dear Fabian—poor darling," says Dulce, tenderly, who has noticed only the kindly smile vouchsafed to her. "How sad he always looks. Even his smile is more mournful thanthe tears of others. What a terrible pressure Fate has laid upon him. He——; how pale you are, Portia! What is it, dearest? I am sure you are not well to-day."

"I am quite well. I am only cold; go on," speaking with some difficulty; "you were saying something about—Fabian."

"Ithinkso much of him that it is a relief to talk sometimes; but I won't make you doleful. Come over to the fire if you are cold."

"No, I like being here; and—do go on, I like listening to you."

"Well, I wasn't going to say anything very particular, you know. It has all been said so often.Sooften, and to no use. What a little thing, Portia, gives rise to the most terrible consequences; the mere fact that two people wrote alike, and formed their capitals in the same fashion, has been the utter ruin of a man's life. It sounds dreadful—cruel! sometimes—often—I lie awake thinking of it all, and wondering can nothing be done, and no hope ever comes to me. That is the saddest part of it, it will go on like this forever, he will go to his grave," mournfully, "and his very memory will be associated with disgrace."

She pauses and sighs heavily, and folds her fingers tightly together. Not Stephen, nor Roger, but this dishonored brother, is the love of her life—as yet.

"Of course you heard a good deal about it in town," she says, sadly. "He had many friends there at one time. Fair-weather friends! They, as a rule, are cruellest when evil comes; and they never remember. You heard him often discussed?"

This is a downright question to which Portia is constrained to give an answer.

"Yes; often," she says, sorely against her will.

"Aunt Maud would enlarge upon it, of course," says Dulce, bitterly. "She likes whisperings and slanderous tongues. And you, when first you heard it, what did you think?"

Portia shrinks from her. Must she answer this question, too?

"Think?" she says, evasively.

"Yes; what did you think of Fabian?"

"Very little," says Portia, who has grown quite white;"why should I think at all? I did not know him then. It was most natural, was it not? He was a stranger to me."

"A stranger, yes. But still your cousin—your own blood. I should have thought much, I think. It was natural, I daresay, but eventhen—you must recollect—did you believe in him? Did you guess the truth?"

"I don't think I quite understand," said Portia, faintly.

Dulce, in a vague fashion, takes note of her confusion.

"Not understand! But it is such a simple matter," she says, in a changed tone. She looks puzzled, surprised, and a distressed look comes into her eyes. "I mean eventhen, did you believe him innocent?"

"How can I remember?" says Portia, drawing her breath quickly.

The distrust grows upon Dulce's tell-tale face. She comes a step nearer to her cousin.

"No," she says, slowly—her eyes are fixed attentively upon Portia—"it is some time ago. But you can at least tell methis. Now—now—that you know him—when you have been beneath the same roof with him for some months, how is it with you? Youfeelthat he is innocent?"

There is a terrible amount of almost agonized earnestness in her tone.

"How you catechise one," says Portia, with a painfully bald attempt at indifference that does not impose upon the slowly awakening suspicions of the other for one instant. "Let us change the subject."

"In one moment. I want an answer to my question first. Now that you have seen and known Fabian, do you believe him innocent?"

A most fatal silence follows. Had the question referred to any one else—had even any one else asked the question, she might have evaded it successfully, or even condescended to an actual misstatement of her real thoughts on the subject rather than give pain or be guilty of a social error. She would, in all probability, have smiled and said, "Yes, oh! yes; one must see that he is incapable of such an act," and so on. But just now she seems tongue-tied, unable to say one word to allay her companion's fears. A strange sense of oppression that weighs upon her breast grows heavier and more insupportable at each moment, and Dulce's greatgleaming eyes of blackest gray are reading her very soul, and scorching her with their reproachful fire.

"Speak," she cries at last, in a vehement tone, laying her hand on Portia's arm, and holding her with unconscious force. "Say—say," with a miserable attempt at entreaty, and a cruel sob, "that you do not believe him guilty of this cursed thing."

Portia's lips are so dry and parched that they absolutely refuse to give utterance to any words. In vain she tries to conquer the deadness that is overpowering her, but without avail. She lifts her eyes beseechingly, and then grows literally afraid of the girl leaning over her, so intense and bitter is the hatred and scorn that mar the beauty of her usually fair, childish face.

This upward, nervous glance, breaks the spell of silence, and gives voice to Dulce's wrath. It does more, it betrays to her the truth—the bitter fact—that in Portia's eyes her brother—her beloved—is neither more nor less than a successful criminal.

"No, do not trouble yourself to answer me," she says, in cold, cutting tones. "I want no lies, no pretty speeches. I thank you, at least, that you have spared me those. In your soul—I can see—you think him guilty of this shameful deed. Oh! it is horrible!" She covers her face with both her hands, and sways a little, as one might, who is, indeed, hurt to death. "And you, too," she says, faintly; "the only one of all ourfriends. And I so trusted you. I solovedyou!"

"Dulce!" cries poor Portia, in an agonized tone. "Hear me!" She springs to her feet, but Dulce, removing her hands from her face, holds them both towards her in such a repellant manner, that she dares not approach. In the last half hour, this girl, so pliant, so prone to laughter and childish petulance, has sprung from the happy insolence of youth into the sad gravity of womanhood.

"What a fool I was," she says, in a low concentrated tone. "I watched all, and I was sosure. I thought—the idea will make you laugh, no doubt—but I thought that youlovedhim. Yet why should you laugh," she says with a sudden passion of remembrance. "Many women have loved him, the best, the loveliest—nay, all the world loved him, till this false blight fell upon him. And even since—"

She hesitates. It may be emotion, it may be recollectionand a thought that he may not wish further disclosures, check her.

"Yes, and even since?" echoes Portia, bending eagerly forward. Some feeling even greater than the anguish of the moment compels her to ask the question. But it is never answered. Dulce, with quivering lips and flashing eyes, follows out her own train of thought.

"I congratulate you upon your complete success as a coquette," she says. "No doubt, a London season can develop talents of that sort. You at least deserve praise as an apt pupil. Step by step, day by day, you led him on to his destruction—nay, I am not blind—until at last he laid his whole heart at your feet; you made him adore you only to—"

"Dulce—Dulce," cries Portia, throwing out her arms in passionate protest. "It is not true, I—"

"Iwillspeak," says Dulce, pressing her back from her, "Iwilltell you what I think of you. Scorning him in your heart you still encouraged him, until his very soul was your own. Do you think I can't see how it is? Have you forgotten he is my own flesh and blood, and that I can read him as no one else can? He thinks you sweet and noble, and perfect, no doubt. Alas! how he has been deceived!"

"Listen to me."

"No, I will not listen. I have trusted you too far already. Oh!" piteously, "you who have seen him, and have noticed the beauty, the sweetness of his life, how could you have misjudged him? But," with vehement anger, "your narrow mind could not appreciate his! You lack generosity. You could not grasp the fact that there might be in this wide world such a thing as undiscovered wrong. You condemned without a hearing. Why," growing calmer, "there have beenhundredsof cases where the innocent have suffered for the guilty."

"I know it," says Portia, feverishly, taking Dulce's hand and trying to draw her towards her; but the girl recoils.

"Do not touch me," she says. "There is no longer any friendship between us."

"Oh! Dulce, do not say that," entreats Portia, painfully.

"I will say it. All is at an end as far as love between us is concerned. Fabian is part of me. I cannot separate myself from him. His friends are mine. His detractors aremine also. I will not forgive them. I believe him a saint, you believe him defiled, and tainted with the crime offorgery."

She draws her breath quickly; and Portia turns even whiter than before.

"Whereas I protest to you," goes on Dulce, rapidly losing all constraint, and letting her only half-suppressed passion have full sway. "I believe you to be less pure than him, less noble, less self-denying;hewould be slow to believe evil of anyone. And this one thing I am resolved on. He shall no longer be left in ignorance of your scorn; he shall not any more spend his affection upon one who regards him with disdain; he shall know the truth before the day dies."

"Have you no pity?" says Portia, faintly.

"Have you none? You condemned him willingly."

"Oh! not willingly!"

"I don't care, youhavecondemned him."

"If you will only think, you will see—"

"Don't speak to me, Ihateyou," says Miss Blount, growling undignified because of her deep grief and agitation. "And don't think you can turn me from my purpose. I shall tell him what you think of him before this evening passes, be sure of that."

"There is no need to tell him," says Portia, in so low a tone that Dulce can scarcely hear her. "He—he knows already!"

"What!" cries Dulce, aghast. But her rout only lasts for a moment. "I don't care," she says, recklessly, "that is only another reason why I should warn him to beware of you!"

Then, as though some cruel thought strikes her, she suddenly bursts into tears.

"Were there notothers?" she sobs, bitterly. "If a slave was indispensable to your happiness, was there not Roger, or Stephen, or Dicky Browne, or even Sir Mark, that you must needs claimhim?He was heart-whole when you came; if not happy, he had at least conquered the first awful pain; could there be greater wickedness than to add another grief to his life? He had suffered as no man ever yet suffered, and yet you came to add another pang, and to destroy him, body and soul! When I think of it all, and the deliberate cruelty of it," cries she, with a gesture of uncontrollable passion, "if I could lay you dead at my feet this moment by a word I would do it!"

"I wish you could do it," says Portia, quite calmly. The terrible grief of the poor child before her is almost more than she can bear. Her calmness that is born of despair, brings Dulce back to something that resembles quietude.

"I shall go now," she says; "you have had enough of me, no doubt; but remember I shall tell Fabian all that has passed. I warn you of this, honestly."

She moves towards the door. There is a moment'shesitation, and then Portia intercepts her, and placing her back against the door to bar egress, she says, in slow, determined tones:

"You shall tell him nothing. You shall not leave this room until you promise to keep secret all that has passed here. Do you understand?—you are to tell himnothing."

"Oh! yes, I shall," says Miss Blount, contemptuously, knowing herself much the stronger of the two. "And even sooner than I first intended. I shall go to meet him on his return from the wood, and tell him then."

She turns back; and, crossing the room again, goes towards another door; that opening discloses a large closet beyond, in which many dresses and other articles of feminine attire are hanging, like so many Blue Beard's wives. A little window, lattice-paned, illumines this tiny chamber.

Portia following her, lays her hand upon her arm. She has changed her tone completely, from command to entreaty.

"Donot speak to Fabian of this," she says. "Do not let him think we two have discussed the wretched subject."

"I shall tell him precisely what has happened," says Dulce, unsoftened. "That you think him nothing less than a commonfelon."

"Oh! do not put it into language," says Portia, sharp pain in her voice; she puts up her hands as she speaks, as, though to ward off a blow. "And I implore you, as youlovehim, to let things rest as they are."

"And so to give you scope to practise your wiles without hindrance," says Dulce, with a short, unlovely laugh. "No, I shall try my very utmost to lower you in his esteem, and so kill his fatal infatuation for you."

"You will fail," says Portia, hopelessly. "You will only succeed in hurting him."

"How sure you are of your power," says Dulce, angrily. "Yet I will not be disheartened. I will save him if I can."

"You are quite determined?"

"Quite."

"You will go now to meet him,nowwhen your anger is hot, and say to him what will surely grieve or wound him?"

"Let us talk sense," says Dulce, impatiently. "I shall simply warn him to have nothing more to do with a woman who looks upon him with scorn and contempt."

As she speaks she enters the closet that is nothing more than a big wardrobe, and, as she does so, Portia, quick as thought follows her, and, closing the door behind her, turns the key in the lock.

"You shall stay there until you promise me to tell nothing of this hour's conversation to Fabian," she says, with determination.

"Then I shall probably stay here forever," replies Dulce from within, with equal determination.

Portia going over to the fire seats herself by it. Dulce going to the latticed window inside seats herself byit. An hour goes by. The little clock up over the mantelpiece chimes five. A gun is fired off in the growing dark outside. There is a sound as of many voices in the hall far down below. A laugh that belongs to Dicky Browne floats upwards, and makes itself heard in the curious stillness of the room above where the jailer sits guarding her prisoner.

Then Portia, rising, goes to the door of the condemned cell, and speaks as follows:

"Dulce."

There is no answer.

"Dulce; you are unwise not to answer me."

Still no answer; whereupon Portia, going back to the fire, lets another half hour pass in silence. Then she says, "Dulce!" again, and again receives no reply.

Time flies!—and now at last the dressing bell rings loud and clear through the house, warning the inmates that the best time in the day draws on apace.

"Dulce," says Portia, in despair, rising for the third time. To tell the truth, she is growing a little frightened at the persistent silence, and begins to wonder nervously if Dulce could get smothered in the small room, because of all the clothes that surround her.

"Dulce!willyou promise?" she says. And now, to her relief, even though the words that come are unfavorable, Dulce answers.

"Never. Not if I stayed here till Doomsday," says Miss Blount, in uncompromising tones, and quite as unconcernedly as if she was sitting in the room outside instead of having been ignominiously incarcerated for the last two hours. "The very moment you open the door, I shall go down-stairs and tell him everything."

"Then I won't let you out," says Portia, feebly, because she knows that soon dinner will come, and then shemustlet her out willy-nilly.

"I didn't ask you," says the rebel. "Dress yourself now, I would advise you, and go down to dinner. I hope you will enjoy it. When they make inquiries about my non-appearance, I should think you will have to explain it later on."

"Come out," says Portia, with a sigh of utter weariness; and then she opens the door and the incarcerated one steps forth, and sails past her with the air of a haughty queen, and with an unlowered crest.

Miss Vibart is vanquished. Even to her own soul she confesses so much. Dulce, passing her in dignified silence, goes toward the bedroom that opens off the boudoir, where they have been carrying on this most civil (or ratheruncivil) war, and entering it, closes the door, and fastens it with unmistakable firmness behind her.

Conquered and subdued, and sick at heart, Portia traverses the corridor that divides her room from Dulce's, and prepares with languid interest to make her dinner toilette.

"We must live our lives, though the sun be set,Must meet in the masque, where parts we play,Must cross in the maze of Life's minuet;Our yea is yea, and our nay is nay:But while snows of Winter or flowers of May,Are the sad years' shroud or coronet,In the season of rose or of violet,I shall never forget till my dying day!"A. Lang.

A. Lang.

Dinnerto-night, so far as Dulce and Portia are concerned, is gone through in utter silence. Not a word escapes either. To Portia, even to say yes or no to the butler, is a wearying of the flesh; to Dulce, it is an open annoyance. Their positive determination to enter into no conversation might have been observed sooner or later by somebody, but for Dicky Browne. He talks for everybody, and is, indeed, in such a genial mood, that their unusual silence passes unnoticed.

Fabian, too, for a wonder, has risen above his usual taciturnity and is almost talkative. A change so delightful to Sir Christopher, that he, in his turn, brightens up, and grows more festive than he has been for many a day. In fact, for all but the two girls, the dinner may be counted a distinct success.

Portia, who is dressed in filmy black, is looking white and nervous, and has in her eyes an intense wrapt expression, such as one might have whose nerves are all unstrung, and who is in momentary expectation of something unpleasant, that may or may not happen. Dulce on the contrary is flushed and angry. Her eyes are brilliant, and round her generally soft lips lies a touch of determination foreign to them, and hardly becoming.

Presently dinner comes to an end, and then the three women rise and rustle away toward the drawing-room, where follows a dreary half hour, indeed.

Julia, who is always drowsy after her claret, sinks complacently into the embrace of the cosiest arm-chair she can find, and under pretence of saving her priceless complexion (it really does cost a good deal) from the fire, drops into a gentle slumber behind her fan.

This makes things even harder for Portia and Dulce. I need hardly say they are not on speaking terms—that has explained itself, I hope. Thrown now, therefore, upon their own resources, they look anxiously around for a chance of mitigating the awkwardness of the situation that has thrust itself upon them.

At such trying moments as these how blessed is the society of children. Even crusty old bachelors, educated to the belief that the young and innocent are only one gigantic fraud, have been known on occasions like the present to bestow upon them a careful, not to say artful, attention.

To-night, Portia, Jacky and the Boodie are having it all their own way. "Quite a bully time, don't you know," says Master Jacky, later, to the all-suffering nurse, whose duty it is to look after them and put them to bed. They are talked to and caressed and made much of by both girls, to their excessive surprise; surprise that later on mounts to distrust.

"Why may I have this album to-night when Imightn'tlastnight?" asks the Boodie, shrewdly, her big sapphire eyes bigger than usual. "You scolded me about it last night, and everyother time I touched it. And what's the matter with your eyes?" staring up at Portia, who has turned a page in the forbidden album, and is now gazing at a portrait of Fabian that is smiling calmly up at her.

It is a portrait taken in that happy time when all the world was fair to him, and when no "little rift" had come to make mute the music of his life. Portia is gazing at it intently. She has forgotten the child—the book—everything, even the fear of observation, and her eyes are heavy with unshed tears, and her hands are trembling.

Then the child's questioning voice comes to her; across the bridge of past years she has been vainly trying to travel, and perforce she gives up her impossible journey, and returns to the sure but sorry present.

Involuntarily she tightens her hand upon the Boodie's. There is entreaty in her pressure, and the child (children, as a rule, are very sympathetic), after a second stare at her, shorter than the first, understands, in a vague fashion, that silence is implored of her, and makes no further attempts at investigation.

After a little while the men come; all except Fabian. Their entrance is a relief to the girls, whatever it may be to Julia. She rouses herself by a supreme effort to meet the exigencies of the moment, and really succeeds in looking quite as if she has not been in the land of Nod for the past sweet thirty minutes.

"You have broken in upon a really delicious little bit of gossip," she says to Sir Mark, coquettishly; whereupon Sir Mark, as in duty bound, entreats her to retail it again to him.

She doesn't.

"I hope you have been miserable without us," says Dicky Browne, sinking into a chair beside Portia, and lifting the Boodie on to his knee. (It would be impossible to Dicky Browne to see a child anywhere without lifting it on to his knee). "We've been wretched in the dining-room; we thought Sir Christopher would never tip us the wink—I mean," correcting himself with assumed confusion, "give us the word to join you. What are you looking at? An album?"

"Yes; you may look at it, too," says Portia, pushing it anxiously towards him. She cannot talk to-night. There is a mental strain upon her brain that compels her to silence.If he would only amuse himself with the caricatures of his friends the book contains.

But he won't. Mr. Browne rises superior to the feeble amusements of the ordinary drawing-room.

"No, thank you," he says, promptly. "Nothing on earth offends me more than being asked to look at an album. Why look at paper beauties when there are living ones in the room?"

Here he tries to look sentimental, andsucceeds, at all events, in looking extremely funny. He has been having a good deal of champagne, and a generous amount of Burgundy, and is now as happy and contented as even his nearest and dearest could desire. Don't mistake me for a moment; nobody ever saw Mr. Browne in the very faintest degree as—well, as he ought not to be; but there is no denying that after dinner he is gaiety itself, and (as Dulce's governess used to say of him), "very excellent company indeed."

"I always feel," he goes on airily, still alluding to the despised album, "when any one asks me to look at a book of this kind, as if they thought I was a dummy and couldn't talk. And Icantalk, you know."

"You can—you can, indeed," says Sir Mark, feelingly. "Dulce, what was that we were reading yesterday? I remember, now, a quotation from itàproposof talking,not àproposof our friend Dicky, of course. 'Then he will talk. Good gods, how he will talk!' Wasn't that it?"

"Sing us something, Dicky, do. You used to sing long ago," says Julia, insinuatingly, who thinks she might be able to accomplish another surreptitious doze under cover of the music.

"I've rather given it up of late," says Mr. Browne, with a modest air, and a chuck to his shirt collar.

"You used to sing 'Ye banks and braes o' bonny Doon' sweetly," says Julia, when she has recovered from a vigorous yawn, got through quite safely behind her sheet anchor—I mean her fan.

"Well—er—such a lot of fellows go in for the sickly sentimental; I'm tired of it," says Dicky, vaguely.

"You didn't tire ofthatsong until that little girl of the Plunkets asked you what a 'brae' was and you couldn't tell her. She told me about it afterwards, and said you were a very amusing boy, but, she feared, uneducated. You gaveher the impression, I think," says Sir Mark, pleasantly, "that you believed the word had something to do with that noble (if tough) animal, the donkey!"

"I never told her anything of the kind," says Dicky, indignantly. "I never speak to her at all if I can help it. A most unpleasant girl, with a mouth from ear to ear and always laughing."

"What a fetching description," says Stephen Gower, with a smile.

"Youwillsing us something?" says Portia, almost entreatingly. She wants to be alone; she wants to get rid of Dicky and his artless prattle at any price.

"Certainly," says Mr. Browne, but with very becoming hesitation. "If I could only be sure what style of thing you prefer. I know a comic song or two, if you would like to hear them."

"Heavens and Earth!" murmurs Sir Mark, with a groan. He throws his handkerchief over his face, and places himself in an attitude suggestive of the deepest resignation.

"I'm afraid I shan't be able to rememberallthe words," says Dicky, regretfully. "There is any amount of verses, and all as funny as they can be. But I've a shocking memory."

"For small mercies—" says Sir Mark, mildly.

"Nevertheless I'll try," says Dicky, valiantly, moving toward the piano.

"No don't, Dicky," exclaims Sir Mark, with tearful entreaty. "It would break my heart if Portia were to hear you for the first time at a disadvantage. 'I had rather than forty shillings you had your book of songs and sonnets here,' but as you haven't, why, wait till you have. Now," says Sir Mark, casting a warning look upon the others; "I've donemypart—hold him tight, some of you, or he will certainly do it still."

"Oh! if you don'twantto hear me," returns Dicky, with unruffled good humor. "Why can't you say so at once, without so much beating about the bush. I don't want to sing."

"Thank you, Dicky," says Sir Mark, sweetly.

Stephen is sitting close to Dulce, and is saying something to her in a low tone. Her answers, to say the least of them, are somewhat irrelevant and disconnected. Now she rises,and, murmuring to him a little softly-spoken excuse, glides away from him to the door, opens it, and disappears.

At this Portia, who has never ceased to watch her, grows even paler than she was before, and closes one hand so tightly on her fan that part of the ivory breaks with a little click.

Five minutes pass; to her they might be five interminable hours; and then, when she has electrified Mr. Browne by saying "yes" twice and "no" three times in the wrong places, she, too, gets up from her seat and leaves the room.

Before the fire in his own room Fabian is standing, with Dulce crying her heart out upon his breast. He has one arm around her, but his eyes are looking into a sad futurity, and he is gently, absently, tapping her shoulder with his left hand. He is frowning, not angrily, but thoughtfully, and there is an expression in his dark eyes that suggests a weariness of the flesh, and a longing to flee away and be at rest.

"Do not take this thing so much to heart," he says, in a rather mechanical tone, addressing his little sister, who is grieving so bitterly because of the slight that has been cast upon him from so unexpected a quarter. "She told you the truth; the very first moment my eyes met hers I knew she had heard all, and—had condemned."

He sighs wearily.

"Who shall blame her?" he says, with deepest melancholy.

"I blame her," cries Dulce, passionately. "Nay, more, I hate and despise her. She has seen you, known you. She must, therefore, bemad—blind—to credit so vile a thing of you. And you, my saint, my darling, what have you not endured all this time! Knowing everything, bearing everything, without a murmur or reproach. Her scorn, her contempt. Oh, Fabian! at least you do not suffer alone, for I suffer with you."

"That only adds another drop to my cup," replies he, gently. "It does not comfort me. I had some faint pleasure in the thought that you and she were friends, and now, even that belief is denied me.Ihave severed you. What have I to do with either she or you? My misfortune is my own, letit be so. Your tears only aggravate my pain, my dear,dearlittle sister."

He draws her closer to him, and kisses her warmly. Is she not the one being who has clung to him, and loved him, and believed in him through good and evil report?

"Who could dream she was so deceitful?" says Dulce, tearfully, alluding to the unhappy Portia. "I never once even suspected the real truth. Why, over and over again she has spoken of you, has compelled me to discuss you, has seemed to court the subject of—"

"Spoken ofme!"

"Yes, often—often, hundreds of times. She seemed never to tire of you and your history; I thought she—"

Dulce hesitates.

"Go on; you thought she—"

"Well, then," recklessly, "I thought she was in love with you; I wassureof it."

"Dulce," sharply, "you forget yourself. What are you saying? Do you think your cousin would like you to speak like this?"

"I don't care what she likes," cries the rebel, angrily; "as I am speaking like this, I hope she wouldn't. When I think how good you have always been to her, how you gave her your friendship—your—" her voice fails her, and in a whisper, she adds, "your love."

"Do not let us discuss this subject any more," says Fabian; though he speaks quickly one can hear the keen anguish in his tone. "Why could I not give her my friendship? Is it her fault that she cannot believe?"

"You would defend her!"

"I would be just. Is she theonlyone who feels distrust, who only half credits my version of the miserable story? Here, in this very house, are there none who hesitate between faith and unfaith? You have faith in me, and Roger had."

"Oh, yes, yes,yes!" cries she, suddenly. "Hehad faith in you,heloved you." Without a word of warning she breaks again into a very tempest of tears, and sobs bitterly.

"I would you could have loved him," says Fabian, in a low tone, but she will not listen.

"Go on," she says, vehemently, "you were saying something about the people in this house."

"That, probably, after you and Roger, I have Dicky on my side," continues Fabian, obediently, a still deeper grief within his haggard eyes, "and, of course, Christopher and Mark Gore; but does Julia quite understand me? or Stephen Gower! Forgive me, dearest, for this last."

"Don't speak to me like that," entreats she, mournfully; "what is Stephen—what is anyone to me in comparison with you. Yet I will vouch for Stephen. But what is it you say of Julia—surely—"

"Yes—no doubt," impatiently. "But is her mind really satisfied? If to-morrow my innocence were shown up incontrovertibly to all the world, she would say triumphantly, 'I told you so.' And if my guilt were established, she would say just as triumphantly, 'I told you so,' in the very same tone."

"You wrong her, I think. She has lived with you in this house off and on for many months, and few have so mean a heart as Portia."

Someone, who a minute ago opened the door very gently, and is now standing irresolute upon the threshold, turns very pale at this last speech and lays her hand upon her heart, as though fearing, though longing, to go forward.

"Perhaps Idowrong Julia," says Fabian, indifferently. "It hardly matters. But you must not wrong Portia. Our suspicions, as our likes and dislikes, are not under our control; now, for example, there is old Slyme; he hates me, as all the world can see, yet he would swear to my innocence to-morrow."

"How do you know that?"

"Idoknow it; by instinct, I suppose; I am one of those unhappy people who can see through their neighbors. In spite of the hatred he entertains for me (why I know not) his eyes betray the fact that he thinks me guiltless of the crime imputed to me. So you see, vulgar prejudice has nothing to do with it, and Portia is not to be censured because she can not take me on trust."

"Oh, Fabian! how can you still love one who—"

"My dear, love and I are not to be named together, you forget that. I must live my life apart. You can only pray that my misery may be of short duration. But I would have you forgive Portia," he says, gently—nay, as her name falls from his lips, a certain tenderness characterises both his face and tone—"if only formysake."

At this, the silent figure in the doorway draws her breath, painfully, and catches hold of the lintel as though to steady herself. Her lips tremble, a momentary fear that she may be going to faint terrifies her; then a voice, cold and uncompromising falling on her ears, restores her to something like composure.

"Do not ask me that, anything but that;" it is Dulce who is speaking. "I cannot."

At this, the girl standing in the doorway, as though unable to endure more, comes slowly forward, and advances until she is within the full glare of the lamplight. It is Portia. She is deadly pale; and her black robes clinging round her render the pallor of her face even more ghastly. She has raised one hand, and is trifling nervously with the string of pearls that always lies round her white throat; she does not look at Fabian, not even for one instant does she permit her eyestoseek his, but lets them rest on Dulce, sadly, reproachfully.

"Why can you not forgive me?" she says; "is not your revenge complete? You have, indeed, kept your word. Now that I am sad at heart, why will you not try to forgive?"

"Yes—forgive." It is Fabian who says this; he lays his hand upon Dulce's arm, and regards her earnestly.

"Youask me to forgive—you!You would have me be kind to this traitress!" returns she, passionately, glancing back at Portia, over her shoulder, with angry eyes. "Do you forgive her yourself?"

"I am beyond the pale of forgiveness so far as he is concerned," says Portia, slowly. "It is to you I appeal. I have loved you well, that should count for something. As for your brother, I understand—I know that he will never forgive and never forget!"

"You are right," says Fabian, addressing her for the first time, yet without letting his glance meet hers, "I shallnever forget!"

A sob rises in Portia's throat; there is a terrible sadness in his tone, the more terrible because of the stern restraint he has laid upon himself.

"Go to her," he says to Dulce, and the girl who has never disobeyed a wish of his in all her life goes up to Portia and lays her hand in hers.

Palm to palm, slender hands clasped close together, they move toward the door; Dulce, with bent head, trying to stay the mournful tears that are falling silently, one by one, down her cheeks; Portia, with head erect, but with an anguish in her lovely eyes sadder than any tears.

Just as she reaches the door she turns her head, and, with a passionate eagerness that will not be repressed, looks at Fabian. Their eyes meet. He makes a step toward her; he has forgotten everything but that he loves her, and that she—dearest but most agonizing of certainties—loves him, and that she is near him, searching, as it were, into his very soul; then remembrance comes to him, and, with a smothered groan, he turns from her, and, leaning his arms on the chimney-piece, buries his face in them.

Portia, to check the sob that rises in her throat, tightens her clasp on Dulce's hand and draws the girl quickly from the room. Perhaps, too, she seeks to hide his grief from other eyes than hers. The unwonted sharpness of her pressure, however, rouses Dulce from her sad thoughts, and as they reach thecorridoroutside she stops short, and glances half resentfully, half with a question on her face, at Portia.

The extreme pain and grief she sees in Portia's eyes awakens her to the truth; she draws her breath a little quickly and lays her hand impulsively upon her cousin's bare white arm.

"You suffer too—you!" she says, in a whisper full of surprise; "Oh, Portia! is it that you love him?"

"Has it taken you so long to discover that," says Portia, reproachfully, who has grown somewhat reckless because of the misery of the past few hours. The self-contained, proud girl is gone; a woman sick at heart, to whom the best good of this world is as naught, has taken her place. There is so much genuine pain in her voice that Dulce is touched; she forgets all, condones all; to see a fellow-creature in pain is terrible to this hot-blooded little shrew. The anger and disdain die out of her eyes, and coming even closer to Portia, she looks long and earnestly at her beautiful face.

"Oh, that you could believe in him," she says, at last, the expression of her desire coming from her in the form of a sigh.

"If I could, I should be too deeply blessed. Yet is it that I do not believe, or that I dread the world's disbelief? That is the sting. To know that a stain lies on the man Ilove, to know that others distrust him, and willforeverpass him by on the other side. That is the horror. Dulce, I am ignoble, I fear many things; the future terrifies me; but yet, as I am so wretched, dear,dearDulce, take me back into your heart!"

She bursts into tears. They are so strange to her and have been so long denied, that by their very vehemence they frighten Dulce. She takes Portia in her arms, and clings to her; and, pressing her lips to her cheek, whispers to her fondly that she is forgiven, and that from her soul she pities her. Thus peace is restored between these two.


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