Chapter Eleven.

Chapter Eleven.Phoebe in a new character.“We mend broken china, torn lace we repair;But we sell broken hearts cheap in Vanity Fair.”“Didsheever love anybody?” came in a low voice from Rhoda, when Mrs Latrobe had withdrawn, “Oh, I don’t know!” sobbed Phoebe, who was crying violently, and might have seemed to a surface observer the more unhappy of the two.“Don’t weep so,” said Rhoda. “I’m sure you don’t need. Aunt Anne will never be angry long—she does not care enough about anything to keep it up.”“Oh, it is not for myself, Rhoda—poor Rhoda!”“For me? Surely not, Phoebe. I have never been so good to you as to warrant that.”“I don’t know whether you have been good to me or you have not, Cousin; but I am so sorry for you!”Phoebe was kneeling beside the bed. Rhoda came over to her, and kissed her forehead, and said—what was very much for Rhoda to say—“I scarce think I deserve you should weep for me, Phoebe.”“But I can’t help it!” said Phoebe.“Well! I reckon I should have known it,” said Rhoda, in a rather hard tone. “I suppose that is what all men are like. But I did think he was true—I did!”“I never did,” responded Phoebe.“Well!” sighed Rhoda again. “Let it pass. Perhaps Mrs Dorothy is right—’tis best to trust none of them.”“I don’t think Mrs Dorothy said that,” replied Phoebe, heaving a long sigh, as she sat up and pushed back her ruffled hair. “I do hope I wasn’t rude to Mother.”“Nothing she’ll care about,” said Rhoda. “I wondered he did not come, Phoebe.”“So did I, and I told him as much. But—Rhoda, I think perhaps we shall forgive him sooner if we don’t talk about it.”“Ah! I have not come to forgiving yet,” was Rhoda’s answer. “Perhaps I shall some time. Well! I shall be an old maid now, Phoebe, like Mrs Dorothy, I suppose you’ll be the one to marry.”“Thank you, I’d rather not!” said Phoebe, quickly. “I am not sure I should like it at all; and I am quite sure I don’t want to be married for my money, or for what people expect me to have.”“Oh, there’s nothing else in this world!” answered Rhoda, with an air of immense experience. “Don’t you expect it. Every man you come across is an avaricious, designing creature. Oh dear! ’tis a weary weary world, and ’tis no good living!”“Yes, Rhoda dear, there is one good in living, and ’tis always left to us, whatever we may lose,” said Phoebe, earnestly. “Don’t you remember what the Lord Jesus said to His disciples—‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me?’ There is always that, Rhoda.”“Ah, that is something I don’t know anything about,” said Rhoda, wearily. “And I always think ’tis right down shabby of people to turn religious, just because they have lost the world, and are disappointed and tired. And I was never cut out for a saint, Phoebe—’tis no use!”“Rhoda, dear, when people give all their days to Satan, and then turn religious, as you say, just at last, when they are going to die, or think they are—don’t you think that right down shabby? The longer you keep away from God, the less you have to give Him when you come. And as—”“I thought you Puritans always said we hadn’t anything to give to God, but He gave everything to us,” objected Rhoda, pettishly.Phoebe passed the tone by, and answered the words, “I think there are two things we can give to God, Cousin: our sins, that He may cast them into the depths of the sea; and ourselves, that He may save and train us. And the longer you stay away, the more sin you will have to bring; and the less time there will be for loving and serving Him. You will be sorry, when you do come, that you were not sooner.”“How do you know I shall? I tell you, I wasn’t cut out for a saint.”“I think you will, Cousin, because I have asked Him to bring you,” said Phoebe, simply; “and it must be His will to hear that; because He willeth not the death of a sinner.”“So you count me a sinner! I am sure I’m very much obliged to you!” said Rhoda, more in her old style than before.“Yes, dear Cousin, I count you a sinner; and so do I myself, and every body else,” said Phoebe, gently.“Oh, well, I suppose we are all sinners,” admitted Rhoda. “Don’t I keep telling you I am not made for a saint?”“But you were, Rhoda; God made you for Himself,” said Phoebe.“Oh, well ’tis no use talking!” and Rhoda got up, and began to pull down her elaborately-dressed hair, with hasty, uncareful fingers. “We’d better go to bed.”“Perhaps it isn’t much use talking,” said Phoebe, as she rose to help her. “But it is sure to be some praying, so I shall go on.”It was a few days later, and Phoebe was crossing the Park on her way to the Maidens’ Lodge, carrying a basket of fruit sent by Mrs Latrobe to Lady Betty. From all the Maidens, except Lady Betty, Mrs Latrobe held aloof. Mrs Jane was too sharp for her, Mrs Marcella too querulous, and Mrs Dorothy too dull. Mrs Clarissa she denounced as “poor vain flirt that could not see her time was passed,” and Mrs Eleanor, she declared, gave her the horrors only to look at. But Lady Betty she diligently cultivated. How much of her regard was due to her Ladyship’s title, Mrs Latrobe did not explain.Phoebe was nearing the Maidens’ Lodge, and had just entered the last glade on her way thither, when—very much to her disapprobation and dismay—from a belt of trees on her left hand, Mr Marcus Welles stepped out and stood before her.“Your most humble servant, Mrs Phoebe! I was very desirous to have the honour of waiting on you this fine morning; and thinking that I saw you at a little distance, I took the great liberty of accosting you.”If Phoebe had said just what she thought, she would have informed Mr Welles that he had taken a wholly unwarrantable liberty in so doing; for while she sagely counselled Rhoda to forgive the offender, she had by no means forgiven him herself. But being mindful of conventionalities, Phoebe courtesied stiffly, and left Mr Welles to explain himself at his leisure. Now, Mr Welles had come to that glade in the Park for the special purpose of making a communication, which he felt rather an awkward one to make with that amount of grace which beseemed him: nevertheless, being a very adroit young man, and much given to turning corners in a rapid and elegant manner, he determined to go through with the matter. If it had only been anyone but Phoebe!“Mrs Phoebe,” he began, “I cannot but flatter myself that you are not wholly ignorant of the high esteem I have long had for your deep merit.”“Cannot you, Sir?” responded Phoebe, by no means in a promising manner.Mr Welles felt the manner. He thought his web was scarcely fine-spun enough. He must begin again.“I trust that Madam is in good health, Mrs Phoebe?”“My mother is very well, I thank you, Sir.”“You are yourself in good health, I venture to hope, Madam?”“I am, Sir, I thank you.”The task which Mr Welles had set himself, as he perceived with chagrin, was proving harder than he had anticipated. Phoebe evidently intended to waste no more time on him than she could help.“The state of affairs at White-Ladies is of infinite concern to me, Madam.”“Is it, Sir?”“Undoubtedly, Madam. Your health and happiness—all of you—are extreme dear to me.”“Really, Sir!”“Especiallyyours, Madam.”Phoebe made no answer to this. Her silence encouraged Mr Welles to proceed. He thought his tactics had succeeded, and the creature was coming round by degrees. The only point now requiring care was not to startle her away again.“Allow me to assure you, Madam, that your welfare is in my eyes a matter of infinite concern.”“So you said, Sir,” was Phoebe’s cool reply, Mr Welles was very uncomfortable. Had he made any mistake? Was it possible that, after all, the creature was not coming round in an orthodox manner?“Madam, give me leave to assure you, moreover, that I am infinitely attached to you, and desire no higher happiness than to be permitted to offer you my service.”It was an instant before Phoebe recognised that Mr Marcus Welles was actually making her an offer. When she did, her answer was immediate and unmistakable.“Don’t you, Mr Welles?” said Phoebe. “Then I do!”“Madam, have you misapprehended me?” demanded her suitor, to whom the idea of any woman refusing him was an impossibility not to be entertained for a moment.“I should be glad if I had,” said Phoebe.“You must be labouring under some mistake, Madam. I have an estate which brings me in three thousand a year, and I am my own master. ’Tis not an opportunity a maid can look to meet with every day, nor is it every gentlewoman that I would ask to be my wife.”“No—only a golden one!” said Phoebe.“Madam!”Phoebe turned, and their eyes met.“Mr Welles, give me leave to tell you the truth: you do not hear it often. You do not wish to marry me. You wish to obtain White-Ladies. ’Tis of no consequence to you whether the woman that must needs come with it be Phoebe Latrobe or Rhoda Peveril. Mycousin would please you better than I; but you really care not a straw for either of us. You only want the estate. Allow me in my turn to assure you that, so far as I am concerned, you will not get it. The man who could use my cousin as you have done may keep away from endeavouring my favour. I wish you a very good morning, Mr Welles.”“I beg, Madam, that you will permit me to explain—” stammered Mr Welles, whose grace and tactics alike forsook him under the treatment to which he was subjected by Phoebe.“Sir, there is nothing to explain.”And with a courtesy which could be construed into nothing but final dismissal, Phoebe left her astonished suitor to stand and look after her with the air of a beaten general, while she turned the corner of the Maidens’ Lodge, and made her way to Lady Betty’s door.Lady Betty was at that moment giving an “at home” on the very minute scale permitted by the diminutive appointments of the Maidens’ Lodge. Mrs Jane Talbot and Mrs Dorothy Jennings were seated at her little tea-table.“Why, my dear Mrs Phoebe! what an unlooked-for pleasure!” exclaimed Lady Betty, coming forward cordially.If her cordiality had been a shade more distinct since Phoebe became heiress of Cressingham—well, she was only human. The other ladies present had sustained no such change.“The Lord bless thee, dear child!” was the warm greeting of Mrs Dolly; but it had been quite as warm long before.“Evening!” said Mrs Jane, with a sarcastic grin. “Got it over, has he? Saw you through the side window. Bless you, child, I know all about it—I expected that all along. Hope you let him catch it—the jackanapes!”“I did not let him catch me, Mrs Jane,” answered Phoebe, with some dignity.“That’s right!” said Mrs Jane, decidedly. “That bundle of velvet and braid would never have made any way with me, when I was your age, my dear. Why, any mantua-maker could cut him out of snips, and have some stuff left over.”“He is of very good family, my dear Mrs Jane,” observed Lady Betty; “at least, if I take you rightly in supposing you allude to Mr Welles.”“More pity for the family!” answered Mrs Jane. “Glad I’m not his mother. Ruin me to keep, him in order. Cost a fortune in whip-leather. How’s Mrs Rhoda?”“She is very well, I thank you, Madam.”“Is she crying out her eyes over that piece of fiddle-faddle?”“I think she has finished for the present,” replied Phoebe, rather drily.“Just you tell her he’s been making up to you. Best thing you can do. Cure her sooner than anything else.”“Mrs Phoebe, my dear, may I beg of you to do me the favour to let Madam know that my niece, my Lady Delawarr, is much disordered in her health?”“Certainly, my Lady Betty; I am grieved to hear it.”“Very much so, as ’tis feared; and Sir Richard hath asked me thither to visit her, and see after matters a little while she is laid by. I purpose to go thither this next week, but I would not do so without paying my respects to Madam, for which honour I trust to wait on her to-morrow. Indeed, my dear—and if you will mention it to Madam, you will do me a service—Sir Richard’s letter is not without some importunity that should my niece be laid aside for any time, as her physician fears, I would remove altogether, and make my home with them.”“Indeed, Madam, I will tell my mother all about it.”“I thank you, my dear; ’twill be a kindness. Of course, I would not like to leave without Madam’s concurrence.”“That you will have,” quietly said Mrs Dorothy.“Indeed, so I hope,” returned Lady Betty. “I dare say Mrs Phoebe here at least does not know that when my nephew Sir Richard was young, after his mother died—my poor sister Penelope—he was bred up wholly in my care, so that he looks on me rather as his mother than his aunt, and ’tis but natural that his thoughts should turn to me in this trouble.”“You must have been a young aunt, my Lady Betty,” remarked Mrs Dorothy.“Truly, but twelve years elder than my nephew,” said Lady Betty, with a smile.“Clarissa would have told us that, without waiting to be asked,” laughed Mrs Jane. “How are the girls, my Lady Betty?”“Very well, as I hear. You know, I guess, that Betty is engaged in marriage?”“So we heard. To Sir Charles Rich, is it not?”“The same. But maybe you have not heard of Molly’s conquest?” asked Lady Betty, with an amused little laugh.“What, is Mrs Molly in any body’s chains?”“Indeed, I guess not, Mrs Jane,” replied Lady Betty, still laughing. “I expect my friend Mr Thomas Mainwaring is in Molly’s chains, if chains there be.”“Eh, she’ll lead him a weary life!” said Mrs Jane.“Let us hope she will sober down,” answered Lady Betty. “I am not unwilling to allow there hath of late been room for improvement. Yet is there some good in Molly, as I think.”Phoebe remembered Molly’s assistance in the matter of Mr Edmundson, and thought it might be so.“Well, and what of Mrs Gatty?”“Ah, poor maid! She, at least, can scarce hope to be happy, her disfigurement is so unfortunate.”“I must needs ask your pardon, my Lady Betty, but I trust that is not the case,” said Mrs Dorothy, with a gentle smile. “Sure, happiness doth not depend on face nor figure?”“The world mostly reckons so, I believe,” answered Lady Betty, with a responsive smile. “Maybe, we pick up such words, and use them, in something too heedless a manner.”“I am mightily mistaken if Mrs Gatty do not prove the happiest of the three,” was Mrs Dorothy’s reply.Mrs Dorothy rose to go home, and Phoebe took leave at the same time. She felt tired and harassed, and longed for the rest of a little quiet talk with her old friend.“And how doth Mrs Rhoda take this, my dear?” was the old lady’s first question, when Phoebe had poured out her story.“She seemed very much troubled at first, and angry; but I fancy she is getting over it now.”“Which most?—troubled or angry?”“I think—after a few minutes, at least—more angry.”“Then she will quickly recover. I do not think she loved him, Phoebe. She liked him, I have no doubt: and she flattered herself that he loved her; but if she be more angry than hurt, that shows that her pride suffers rather than her love. At least,” said Mrs Dorothy, correcting herself, “I mean it looks so. Who am I, that I should judge her?”“I wanted it to do her some good, Mrs Dolly. It seems hard to have the suffering, and not get the good.”“’Tis not easy for men to tell what does good, and when. We cannot as concerns ourselves; how then shall we judge for others?”“I wonder what Rhoda will do now?” suggested Phoebe, after a minute’s silence.She looked up, and saw an expression, which was the mixture of pity and amusement, on Mrs Dorothy’s lips. The amusement died away, but the pity remained and grew deeper.“Can you guess, Mrs Dolly?”“‘Lord, and what shall this man do?’ You know the answer, Phoebe.”“Yes, I know: but— Mrs Dorothy, would you not like to know the future?”“Certainly not, dear child. I am very thankful for the mist which my Father hath cast as a veil over my eyes.”“But if you could see what would come, is it not very likely that there would not be some things which you would be glad and relieved to find absent?”“Very likely. The things of which we stand especially in fear often fail to come at all. But there would be other things, which I should be very sorry to find, and much astonished too.”“I wonder sometimes, what will be in my life,” said Phoebe, dreamily.“That which thou needest,” was the quiet answer.“What do I need?” asked Phoebe.“To have thy will moulded after God’s will.”“Do you think I don’t wish God’s will to be done, Mrs Dorothy?”Mrs Dorothy smiled. “I quite believe, dear child, thou art willing He should have His way with respect to all the things thou dost not care about.”“Mrs Dorothy!”“My dear, that is what most folks call being resigned to the will of God.”“Mrs Dolly, why do people always talk as though God’s will must be something dreadful? If somebody die, or if some accident happen, they say, ‘Ah, ’tis God’s will, and we must submit.’ But when something pleasant comes, they never say it then. Don’t you think the pleasant things are God’s will, as well as the disagreeable ones?”“More so, Phoebe. ‘In all our affliction, He is afflicted.’ ‘He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.’ Pleasant things are what He loves to give us; bitter things, what He needs must.”“Then why do people talk so?” repeated Phoebe.“Ah, why do they?” said Mrs Dorothy. “Man is always wronging God. Not one of us all is so cruelly misunderstood of his fellows as all of us misunderstand Him.”“Yet He forgives,” said Phoebe softly: “and sometimes we don’t.”“He is always forgiving, Phoebe. The inscription is graven not less over the throne in Heaven than over the cross on earth,—‘This Man receiveth sinners.’”There was a pause of some minutes; and as Phoebe rose to go, Mrs Dorothy said,—“I will tell you one thing I have noted, child, as I have gone through life. Very often there has been something looming, as it were, before me that I had to do, or thought I should have to bear,—and in the distance and the darkness it took a dread shape, and I looked forward to it with terror. And when it has come at last, it has often—I say not always, but often—proved to be at times a light and easy cross, even at times an absolute pleasure. Again, there hath often been something in the future that I have looked forward to as a great good and delight, which on its coming hath turned out a positive pain and evil. ’Tis better we should not know the future, dear Phoebe. Our Father knows every step of the way: is not that enough? Our Elder Brother hath trodden every step, and will go with us through the wilderness. Perfect wisdom and perfect love have prepared all things. Ah, child, thy fathers were wise men to sing as they sang—“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”“But, Mrs Dolly— I suppose it can’t be so, yet—it does seem as if there were some things in life which the Lord Jesus did not go through.”“What things, my dear?”“Well, we never read of His having any kind of sickness for one thing.”“Are you sure of that? ‘Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses,’ looks very like the opposite. You and I have no idea, Phoebe, how He spent thirty out of thirty-three years of His mortal life. He may—mind, I don’t say it was so, for I don’t know—but He may have spent much of them in a sick chamber. He was ‘inallpoints tempted like as we are.’ My father used to tell me that the word there rendered ‘tempted’ signifies not only temptations of Satan, but trials sent of God.”“But—He was never a woman, Mrs Dolly.”“And therefore cannot feel for a woman as though He had been,—is that thy meaning, dear? Nay, Phoebe, I believe He was the only creature that ever dwelt on earth in whom were the essential elements both of man and woman. He took His flesh of the woman only. The best part of each was in Him,—the strength and intelligence of the man, the love and tenderness of the woman. ’Tis modish to say women are tender, Phoebe; more modish than true. Many are soft, but few are tender. But He was tenderness itself.”“I don’t think women always are tender,” said Phoebe.“My dear,” said Mrs Dorothy, “you may laugh at me, but I am very much out of conceit with my own sex. A good woman is a very precious thing, Phoebe; the rather since ’tis so rare. But an empty, foolish, frivolous woman is a sad, sad sight to see. Methinks I could scarce bear with such, but for four words that I see, as it were, graven on their brows,—‘For whom Christ died.’”“Very good!” said Mrs Latrobe. “I will not conceal from you, Phoebe, that I am extreme gratified with this decision of Lady Betty. I trust she will carry it out.”Phoebe felt a good deal surprised. Lady Betty had been the only inmate of the Lodge whose society her mother had apparently cared to cultivate, and yet she expressed herself much pleased to hear of her probable departure. She remembered, too, that Mrs Dorothy had expected Mrs Latrobe’s assent. To herself it was a mystery.Mrs Latrobe gave no explanation at the time. She went at once to another part of the subject, informing Phoebe that she had asked Betty and Molly Delawarr on a visit. Gatty had been invited also, but had declined to leave her mother in her present condition. Phoebe received this news with some trepidation. Had it been Betty alone, she would not have minded; for she thought her very good-natured, and could not understand Rhoda’s expressed dislike to her. But Molly!—Phoebe tried to remember that Molly had done one kind action, and hoped she would be on her best behaviour at White-Ladies. Mrs Latrobe went on to say that she wished Phoebe to share her room with Betty, and would put Rhoda and Molly in another. But when Phoebe ventured to ask if Rhoda might not retain the room which she knew her to prefer, and Phoebe herself be the one to change, Mrs Latrobe refused to entertain the proposition.“No, my dear, certainly not. You forget your station, Phoebe. You are the daughter of this house, not your cousin. You must not be thinking of how things were. They have changed. I could not think of allowing Rhoda to have the best chamber. Besides, she has got to come down, and she had best know it at once.”“What do you mean, Madam, if you please?”“What do I mean? Why, surely you have some sense of what is proper. You don’t fancy she could continue to live here, do you? If she had married Mr Welles, I should have said nothing against her staying here till her marriage—of course, if it were a reasonable time; but now that is all over. She must go.”“Go!” gasped Phoebe. “Go whither, Madam?”“I shall offer her the choice of two things, my clear. She can either go to service, in which case I will not refuse to take the trouble to look out a service for her—I am wishful to let her down gently, and be very good to her; or, if she prefer that, she may have my Lady Betty’s house as soon as she is gone. Have you any idea which she will choose?”“Service! The Maidens’ Lodge! Rhoda!”“My dear Phoebe, how very absurd you are. What do you mean by such foolish ejaculations? Rhoda will be uncommonly well off. You forget she has the interest of her money, and she has some good jewellery; she may make a decent match yet, if she is wise. But in the meantime, she must live somehow. Of course I could not keep her here—it would spoil your prospects, simpleton! She has a better figure than you, and she has more to say for herself. You must not expect any body to look at you while she is here.”“Oh, never mind that!” came from the depth of Phoebe’s heart.“But, my dear, I do mind it. I must mind it. You do not understand these things, Phoebe. Why, I do believe, with a very little encouragement—which I mean him to have—Mr Welles himself would offer for you.”“That is over, Madam.”“What is over? Phoebe! what do you mean? Has Mr Welles really spoken to you?”“Yes, Madam.”“When, my dear?” asked Mrs Latrobe, in a tone of deep interest.“This afternoon, Madam!”“That is right! I am so pleased. I was afraid he would want a good deal of management. And you’ve no more notion how to manage a man than that parrot. I should have to do it all myself.”“I beg your pardon, Madam,” said Phoebe, with some dignity; “I gave him an answer.”“Of course, you did, my dear. I am only afraid—sometimes, my dear Phoebe, you let your shyness get the better of you till you seem quite silly—I am afraid, I say, that you would hardly speak with becoming warmth. Still—”“I think, Madam, I was as warm as you would have wished me,” said Phoebe, drily.“Oh, of course, there is a limit, my dear,” said Mrs Latrobe, bridling. “Well, I am so glad that it is settled. ’Tis just what I was wishing for you.”“I fear, Madam, you misconceive me,” said Phoebe, looking up, “and ’tis settled the other way from what you wished.”“Child, what can you mean?” asked Mrs Latrobe, with sudden sharpness. “You never can have refused such an excellent offer? What did you say to Mr Welles?”“I sent him away, and told him never to come near me again.” Phoebe spoke with warmth enough now.“Phoebe, you must be a lunatic!” burst from her mother. “I could not have believed you would be guilty of such supreme, unpardonable folly!”“Sure,” said Phoebe, looking up, “you would never have had me marry a man whom I despised in my heart?”“Despised! I protest, Phoebe, you are worse and worse. What do you mean by saying you despise Mr Welles? A man of excellent manners and faultless taste, of good family, with an estate of three thousand a year, and admirable prospects when his old uncle dies, who is nearly seventy now—why, Phoebe, you must be a perfect fool! I am amazed at you beyond words.”There was a light in Phoebe’s eyes which was beyond Mrs Latrobe’s comprehension.“Mother!” came from the girl’s lips, with a soft intonation—“Father would not have asked me to do that!”“Really, my dear, if you expect that I am to rule myself by your father’s notions, you expect a great deal too much. He was not a man of the world at all—”“He was not!”“Not in the least!—and he had not the faintest idea what would be required of you when you came to your present position. Don’t quote him, I beg of you!—Well, really, Phoebe—I don’t know what to do now. I wish I had known of it! Still I don’t see, if he were determined to speak to you, how I could have prevented you from making such a goose of yourself. I do wish he had asked me! I should have accepted him at once for you, and not given you the chance to refuse. What did you say to him? Is it quite hopeless to try and win him back?”“Quite,” said Phoebe, shortly.“But I want to know exactly what you said.”“I told him I believed he wanted the estate, and not me; and that after behaving to my cousin as he did, he did not need to expect to get either it or me.”“Phoebe! what preposterous folly!” said Mrs Latrobe. “Well, child, you are a fool—that’s as plain as a pikestaff; but—”“You’re a fool!” came in a screech from the parrot’s cage, followed by a burst of laughter.“But ’tis no use crying over spilt milk. If we have lost Mr Welles, we have lost him; and we must try for some one else. Oh dear, how hot it is! Phoebe, I wonder when you will have any sense. I do beseech you, my dear, never to play the same game with anyone else.”“I hope, Mother,” said Phoebe, gravely, “that I shall never have occasion.”“What a lot of geese!” said the parrot.

“We mend broken china, torn lace we repair;But we sell broken hearts cheap in Vanity Fair.”

“We mend broken china, torn lace we repair;But we sell broken hearts cheap in Vanity Fair.”

“Didsheever love anybody?” came in a low voice from Rhoda, when Mrs Latrobe had withdrawn, “Oh, I don’t know!” sobbed Phoebe, who was crying violently, and might have seemed to a surface observer the more unhappy of the two.

“Don’t weep so,” said Rhoda. “I’m sure you don’t need. Aunt Anne will never be angry long—she does not care enough about anything to keep it up.”

“Oh, it is not for myself, Rhoda—poor Rhoda!”

“For me? Surely not, Phoebe. I have never been so good to you as to warrant that.”

“I don’t know whether you have been good to me or you have not, Cousin; but I am so sorry for you!”

Phoebe was kneeling beside the bed. Rhoda came over to her, and kissed her forehead, and said—what was very much for Rhoda to say—“I scarce think I deserve you should weep for me, Phoebe.”

“But I can’t help it!” said Phoebe.

“Well! I reckon I should have known it,” said Rhoda, in a rather hard tone. “I suppose that is what all men are like. But I did think he was true—I did!”

“I never did,” responded Phoebe.

“Well!” sighed Rhoda again. “Let it pass. Perhaps Mrs Dorothy is right—’tis best to trust none of them.”

“I don’t think Mrs Dorothy said that,” replied Phoebe, heaving a long sigh, as she sat up and pushed back her ruffled hair. “I do hope I wasn’t rude to Mother.”

“Nothing she’ll care about,” said Rhoda. “I wondered he did not come, Phoebe.”

“So did I, and I told him as much. But—Rhoda, I think perhaps we shall forgive him sooner if we don’t talk about it.”

“Ah! I have not come to forgiving yet,” was Rhoda’s answer. “Perhaps I shall some time. Well! I shall be an old maid now, Phoebe, like Mrs Dorothy, I suppose you’ll be the one to marry.”

“Thank you, I’d rather not!” said Phoebe, quickly. “I am not sure I should like it at all; and I am quite sure I don’t want to be married for my money, or for what people expect me to have.”

“Oh, there’s nothing else in this world!” answered Rhoda, with an air of immense experience. “Don’t you expect it. Every man you come across is an avaricious, designing creature. Oh dear! ’tis a weary weary world, and ’tis no good living!”

“Yes, Rhoda dear, there is one good in living, and ’tis always left to us, whatever we may lose,” said Phoebe, earnestly. “Don’t you remember what the Lord Jesus said to His disciples—‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me?’ There is always that, Rhoda.”

“Ah, that is something I don’t know anything about,” said Rhoda, wearily. “And I always think ’tis right down shabby of people to turn religious, just because they have lost the world, and are disappointed and tired. And I was never cut out for a saint, Phoebe—’tis no use!”

“Rhoda, dear, when people give all their days to Satan, and then turn religious, as you say, just at last, when they are going to die, or think they are—don’t you think that right down shabby? The longer you keep away from God, the less you have to give Him when you come. And as—”

“I thought you Puritans always said we hadn’t anything to give to God, but He gave everything to us,” objected Rhoda, pettishly.

Phoebe passed the tone by, and answered the words, “I think there are two things we can give to God, Cousin: our sins, that He may cast them into the depths of the sea; and ourselves, that He may save and train us. And the longer you stay away, the more sin you will have to bring; and the less time there will be for loving and serving Him. You will be sorry, when you do come, that you were not sooner.”

“How do you know I shall? I tell you, I wasn’t cut out for a saint.”

“I think you will, Cousin, because I have asked Him to bring you,” said Phoebe, simply; “and it must be His will to hear that; because He willeth not the death of a sinner.”

“So you count me a sinner! I am sure I’m very much obliged to you!” said Rhoda, more in her old style than before.

“Yes, dear Cousin, I count you a sinner; and so do I myself, and every body else,” said Phoebe, gently.

“Oh, well, I suppose we are all sinners,” admitted Rhoda. “Don’t I keep telling you I am not made for a saint?”

“But you were, Rhoda; God made you for Himself,” said Phoebe.

“Oh, well ’tis no use talking!” and Rhoda got up, and began to pull down her elaborately-dressed hair, with hasty, uncareful fingers. “We’d better go to bed.”

“Perhaps it isn’t much use talking,” said Phoebe, as she rose to help her. “But it is sure to be some praying, so I shall go on.”

It was a few days later, and Phoebe was crossing the Park on her way to the Maidens’ Lodge, carrying a basket of fruit sent by Mrs Latrobe to Lady Betty. From all the Maidens, except Lady Betty, Mrs Latrobe held aloof. Mrs Jane was too sharp for her, Mrs Marcella too querulous, and Mrs Dorothy too dull. Mrs Clarissa she denounced as “poor vain flirt that could not see her time was passed,” and Mrs Eleanor, she declared, gave her the horrors only to look at. But Lady Betty she diligently cultivated. How much of her regard was due to her Ladyship’s title, Mrs Latrobe did not explain.

Phoebe was nearing the Maidens’ Lodge, and had just entered the last glade on her way thither, when—very much to her disapprobation and dismay—from a belt of trees on her left hand, Mr Marcus Welles stepped out and stood before her.

“Your most humble servant, Mrs Phoebe! I was very desirous to have the honour of waiting on you this fine morning; and thinking that I saw you at a little distance, I took the great liberty of accosting you.”

If Phoebe had said just what she thought, she would have informed Mr Welles that he had taken a wholly unwarrantable liberty in so doing; for while she sagely counselled Rhoda to forgive the offender, she had by no means forgiven him herself. But being mindful of conventionalities, Phoebe courtesied stiffly, and left Mr Welles to explain himself at his leisure. Now, Mr Welles had come to that glade in the Park for the special purpose of making a communication, which he felt rather an awkward one to make with that amount of grace which beseemed him: nevertheless, being a very adroit young man, and much given to turning corners in a rapid and elegant manner, he determined to go through with the matter. If it had only been anyone but Phoebe!

“Mrs Phoebe,” he began, “I cannot but flatter myself that you are not wholly ignorant of the high esteem I have long had for your deep merit.”

“Cannot you, Sir?” responded Phoebe, by no means in a promising manner.

Mr Welles felt the manner. He thought his web was scarcely fine-spun enough. He must begin again.

“I trust that Madam is in good health, Mrs Phoebe?”

“My mother is very well, I thank you, Sir.”

“You are yourself in good health, I venture to hope, Madam?”

“I am, Sir, I thank you.”

The task which Mr Welles had set himself, as he perceived with chagrin, was proving harder than he had anticipated. Phoebe evidently intended to waste no more time on him than she could help.

“The state of affairs at White-Ladies is of infinite concern to me, Madam.”

“Is it, Sir?”

“Undoubtedly, Madam. Your health and happiness—all of you—are extreme dear to me.”

“Really, Sir!”

“Especiallyyours, Madam.”

Phoebe made no answer to this. Her silence encouraged Mr Welles to proceed. He thought his tactics had succeeded, and the creature was coming round by degrees. The only point now requiring care was not to startle her away again.

“Allow me to assure you, Madam, that your welfare is in my eyes a matter of infinite concern.”

“So you said, Sir,” was Phoebe’s cool reply, Mr Welles was very uncomfortable. Had he made any mistake? Was it possible that, after all, the creature was not coming round in an orthodox manner?

“Madam, give me leave to assure you, moreover, that I am infinitely attached to you, and desire no higher happiness than to be permitted to offer you my service.”

It was an instant before Phoebe recognised that Mr Marcus Welles was actually making her an offer. When she did, her answer was immediate and unmistakable.

“Don’t you, Mr Welles?” said Phoebe. “Then I do!”

“Madam, have you misapprehended me?” demanded her suitor, to whom the idea of any woman refusing him was an impossibility not to be entertained for a moment.

“I should be glad if I had,” said Phoebe.

“You must be labouring under some mistake, Madam. I have an estate which brings me in three thousand a year, and I am my own master. ’Tis not an opportunity a maid can look to meet with every day, nor is it every gentlewoman that I would ask to be my wife.”

“No—only a golden one!” said Phoebe.

“Madam!”

Phoebe turned, and their eyes met.

“Mr Welles, give me leave to tell you the truth: you do not hear it often. You do not wish to marry me. You wish to obtain White-Ladies. ’Tis of no consequence to you whether the woman that must needs come with it be Phoebe Latrobe or Rhoda Peveril. Mycousin would please you better than I; but you really care not a straw for either of us. You only want the estate. Allow me in my turn to assure you that, so far as I am concerned, you will not get it. The man who could use my cousin as you have done may keep away from endeavouring my favour. I wish you a very good morning, Mr Welles.”

“I beg, Madam, that you will permit me to explain—” stammered Mr Welles, whose grace and tactics alike forsook him under the treatment to which he was subjected by Phoebe.

“Sir, there is nothing to explain.”

And with a courtesy which could be construed into nothing but final dismissal, Phoebe left her astonished suitor to stand and look after her with the air of a beaten general, while she turned the corner of the Maidens’ Lodge, and made her way to Lady Betty’s door.

Lady Betty was at that moment giving an “at home” on the very minute scale permitted by the diminutive appointments of the Maidens’ Lodge. Mrs Jane Talbot and Mrs Dorothy Jennings were seated at her little tea-table.

“Why, my dear Mrs Phoebe! what an unlooked-for pleasure!” exclaimed Lady Betty, coming forward cordially.

If her cordiality had been a shade more distinct since Phoebe became heiress of Cressingham—well, she was only human. The other ladies present had sustained no such change.

“The Lord bless thee, dear child!” was the warm greeting of Mrs Dolly; but it had been quite as warm long before.

“Evening!” said Mrs Jane, with a sarcastic grin. “Got it over, has he? Saw you through the side window. Bless you, child, I know all about it—I expected that all along. Hope you let him catch it—the jackanapes!”

“I did not let him catch me, Mrs Jane,” answered Phoebe, with some dignity.

“That’s right!” said Mrs Jane, decidedly. “That bundle of velvet and braid would never have made any way with me, when I was your age, my dear. Why, any mantua-maker could cut him out of snips, and have some stuff left over.”

“He is of very good family, my dear Mrs Jane,” observed Lady Betty; “at least, if I take you rightly in supposing you allude to Mr Welles.”

“More pity for the family!” answered Mrs Jane. “Glad I’m not his mother. Ruin me to keep, him in order. Cost a fortune in whip-leather. How’s Mrs Rhoda?”

“She is very well, I thank you, Madam.”

“Is she crying out her eyes over that piece of fiddle-faddle?”

“I think she has finished for the present,” replied Phoebe, rather drily.

“Just you tell her he’s been making up to you. Best thing you can do. Cure her sooner than anything else.”

“Mrs Phoebe, my dear, may I beg of you to do me the favour to let Madam know that my niece, my Lady Delawarr, is much disordered in her health?”

“Certainly, my Lady Betty; I am grieved to hear it.”

“Very much so, as ’tis feared; and Sir Richard hath asked me thither to visit her, and see after matters a little while she is laid by. I purpose to go thither this next week, but I would not do so without paying my respects to Madam, for which honour I trust to wait on her to-morrow. Indeed, my dear—and if you will mention it to Madam, you will do me a service—Sir Richard’s letter is not without some importunity that should my niece be laid aside for any time, as her physician fears, I would remove altogether, and make my home with them.”

“Indeed, Madam, I will tell my mother all about it.”

“I thank you, my dear; ’twill be a kindness. Of course, I would not like to leave without Madam’s concurrence.”

“That you will have,” quietly said Mrs Dorothy.

“Indeed, so I hope,” returned Lady Betty. “I dare say Mrs Phoebe here at least does not know that when my nephew Sir Richard was young, after his mother died—my poor sister Penelope—he was bred up wholly in my care, so that he looks on me rather as his mother than his aunt, and ’tis but natural that his thoughts should turn to me in this trouble.”

“You must have been a young aunt, my Lady Betty,” remarked Mrs Dorothy.

“Truly, but twelve years elder than my nephew,” said Lady Betty, with a smile.

“Clarissa would have told us that, without waiting to be asked,” laughed Mrs Jane. “How are the girls, my Lady Betty?”

“Very well, as I hear. You know, I guess, that Betty is engaged in marriage?”

“So we heard. To Sir Charles Rich, is it not?”

“The same. But maybe you have not heard of Molly’s conquest?” asked Lady Betty, with an amused little laugh.

“What, is Mrs Molly in any body’s chains?”

“Indeed, I guess not, Mrs Jane,” replied Lady Betty, still laughing. “I expect my friend Mr Thomas Mainwaring is in Molly’s chains, if chains there be.”

“Eh, she’ll lead him a weary life!” said Mrs Jane.

“Let us hope she will sober down,” answered Lady Betty. “I am not unwilling to allow there hath of late been room for improvement. Yet is there some good in Molly, as I think.”

Phoebe remembered Molly’s assistance in the matter of Mr Edmundson, and thought it might be so.

“Well, and what of Mrs Gatty?”

“Ah, poor maid! She, at least, can scarce hope to be happy, her disfigurement is so unfortunate.”

“I must needs ask your pardon, my Lady Betty, but I trust that is not the case,” said Mrs Dorothy, with a gentle smile. “Sure, happiness doth not depend on face nor figure?”

“The world mostly reckons so, I believe,” answered Lady Betty, with a responsive smile. “Maybe, we pick up such words, and use them, in something too heedless a manner.”

“I am mightily mistaken if Mrs Gatty do not prove the happiest of the three,” was Mrs Dorothy’s reply.

Mrs Dorothy rose to go home, and Phoebe took leave at the same time. She felt tired and harassed, and longed for the rest of a little quiet talk with her old friend.

“And how doth Mrs Rhoda take this, my dear?” was the old lady’s first question, when Phoebe had poured out her story.

“She seemed very much troubled at first, and angry; but I fancy she is getting over it now.”

“Which most?—troubled or angry?”

“I think—after a few minutes, at least—more angry.”

“Then she will quickly recover. I do not think she loved him, Phoebe. She liked him, I have no doubt: and she flattered herself that he loved her; but if she be more angry than hurt, that shows that her pride suffers rather than her love. At least,” said Mrs Dorothy, correcting herself, “I mean it looks so. Who am I, that I should judge her?”

“I wanted it to do her some good, Mrs Dolly. It seems hard to have the suffering, and not get the good.”

“’Tis not easy for men to tell what does good, and when. We cannot as concerns ourselves; how then shall we judge for others?”

“I wonder what Rhoda will do now?” suggested Phoebe, after a minute’s silence.

She looked up, and saw an expression, which was the mixture of pity and amusement, on Mrs Dorothy’s lips. The amusement died away, but the pity remained and grew deeper.

“Can you guess, Mrs Dolly?”

“‘Lord, and what shall this man do?’ You know the answer, Phoebe.”

“Yes, I know: but— Mrs Dorothy, would you not like to know the future?”

“Certainly not, dear child. I am very thankful for the mist which my Father hath cast as a veil over my eyes.”

“But if you could see what would come, is it not very likely that there would not be some things which you would be glad and relieved to find absent?”

“Very likely. The things of which we stand especially in fear often fail to come at all. But there would be other things, which I should be very sorry to find, and much astonished too.”

“I wonder sometimes, what will be in my life,” said Phoebe, dreamily.

“That which thou needest,” was the quiet answer.

“What do I need?” asked Phoebe.

“To have thy will moulded after God’s will.”

“Do you think I don’t wish God’s will to be done, Mrs Dorothy?”

Mrs Dorothy smiled. “I quite believe, dear child, thou art willing He should have His way with respect to all the things thou dost not care about.”

“Mrs Dorothy!”

“My dear, that is what most folks call being resigned to the will of God.”

“Mrs Dolly, why do people always talk as though God’s will must be something dreadful? If somebody die, or if some accident happen, they say, ‘Ah, ’tis God’s will, and we must submit.’ But when something pleasant comes, they never say it then. Don’t you think the pleasant things are God’s will, as well as the disagreeable ones?”

“More so, Phoebe. ‘In all our affliction, He is afflicted.’ ‘He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.’ Pleasant things are what He loves to give us; bitter things, what He needs must.”

“Then why do people talk so?” repeated Phoebe.

“Ah, why do they?” said Mrs Dorothy. “Man is always wronging God. Not one of us all is so cruelly misunderstood of his fellows as all of us misunderstand Him.”

“Yet He forgives,” said Phoebe softly: “and sometimes we don’t.”

“He is always forgiving, Phoebe. The inscription is graven not less over the throne in Heaven than over the cross on earth,—‘This Man receiveth sinners.’”

There was a pause of some minutes; and as Phoebe rose to go, Mrs Dorothy said,—

“I will tell you one thing I have noted, child, as I have gone through life. Very often there has been something looming, as it were, before me that I had to do, or thought I should have to bear,—and in the distance and the darkness it took a dread shape, and I looked forward to it with terror. And when it has come at last, it has often—I say not always, but often—proved to be at times a light and easy cross, even at times an absolute pleasure. Again, there hath often been something in the future that I have looked forward to as a great good and delight, which on its coming hath turned out a positive pain and evil. ’Tis better we should not know the future, dear Phoebe. Our Father knows every step of the way: is not that enough? Our Elder Brother hath trodden every step, and will go with us through the wilderness. Perfect wisdom and perfect love have prepared all things. Ah, child, thy fathers were wise men to sing as they sang—

“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”

“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”

“But, Mrs Dolly— I suppose it can’t be so, yet—it does seem as if there were some things in life which the Lord Jesus did not go through.”

“What things, my dear?”

“Well, we never read of His having any kind of sickness for one thing.”

“Are you sure of that? ‘Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses,’ looks very like the opposite. You and I have no idea, Phoebe, how He spent thirty out of thirty-three years of His mortal life. He may—mind, I don’t say it was so, for I don’t know—but He may have spent much of them in a sick chamber. He was ‘inallpoints tempted like as we are.’ My father used to tell me that the word there rendered ‘tempted’ signifies not only temptations of Satan, but trials sent of God.”

“But—He was never a woman, Mrs Dolly.”

“And therefore cannot feel for a woman as though He had been,—is that thy meaning, dear? Nay, Phoebe, I believe He was the only creature that ever dwelt on earth in whom were the essential elements both of man and woman. He took His flesh of the woman only. The best part of each was in Him,—the strength and intelligence of the man, the love and tenderness of the woman. ’Tis modish to say women are tender, Phoebe; more modish than true. Many are soft, but few are tender. But He was tenderness itself.”

“I don’t think women always are tender,” said Phoebe.

“My dear,” said Mrs Dorothy, “you may laugh at me, but I am very much out of conceit with my own sex. A good woman is a very precious thing, Phoebe; the rather since ’tis so rare. But an empty, foolish, frivolous woman is a sad, sad sight to see. Methinks I could scarce bear with such, but for four words that I see, as it were, graven on their brows,—‘For whom Christ died.’”

“Very good!” said Mrs Latrobe. “I will not conceal from you, Phoebe, that I am extreme gratified with this decision of Lady Betty. I trust she will carry it out.”

Phoebe felt a good deal surprised. Lady Betty had been the only inmate of the Lodge whose society her mother had apparently cared to cultivate, and yet she expressed herself much pleased to hear of her probable departure. She remembered, too, that Mrs Dorothy had expected Mrs Latrobe’s assent. To herself it was a mystery.

Mrs Latrobe gave no explanation at the time. She went at once to another part of the subject, informing Phoebe that she had asked Betty and Molly Delawarr on a visit. Gatty had been invited also, but had declined to leave her mother in her present condition. Phoebe received this news with some trepidation. Had it been Betty alone, she would not have minded; for she thought her very good-natured, and could not understand Rhoda’s expressed dislike to her. But Molly!—Phoebe tried to remember that Molly had done one kind action, and hoped she would be on her best behaviour at White-Ladies. Mrs Latrobe went on to say that she wished Phoebe to share her room with Betty, and would put Rhoda and Molly in another. But when Phoebe ventured to ask if Rhoda might not retain the room which she knew her to prefer, and Phoebe herself be the one to change, Mrs Latrobe refused to entertain the proposition.

“No, my dear, certainly not. You forget your station, Phoebe. You are the daughter of this house, not your cousin. You must not be thinking of how things were. They have changed. I could not think of allowing Rhoda to have the best chamber. Besides, she has got to come down, and she had best know it at once.”

“What do you mean, Madam, if you please?”

“What do I mean? Why, surely you have some sense of what is proper. You don’t fancy she could continue to live here, do you? If she had married Mr Welles, I should have said nothing against her staying here till her marriage—of course, if it were a reasonable time; but now that is all over. She must go.”

“Go!” gasped Phoebe. “Go whither, Madam?”

“I shall offer her the choice of two things, my clear. She can either go to service, in which case I will not refuse to take the trouble to look out a service for her—I am wishful to let her down gently, and be very good to her; or, if she prefer that, she may have my Lady Betty’s house as soon as she is gone. Have you any idea which she will choose?”

“Service! The Maidens’ Lodge! Rhoda!”

“My dear Phoebe, how very absurd you are. What do you mean by such foolish ejaculations? Rhoda will be uncommonly well off. You forget she has the interest of her money, and she has some good jewellery; she may make a decent match yet, if she is wise. But in the meantime, she must live somehow. Of course I could not keep her here—it would spoil your prospects, simpleton! She has a better figure than you, and she has more to say for herself. You must not expect any body to look at you while she is here.”

“Oh, never mind that!” came from the depth of Phoebe’s heart.

“But, my dear, I do mind it. I must mind it. You do not understand these things, Phoebe. Why, I do believe, with a very little encouragement—which I mean him to have—Mr Welles himself would offer for you.”

“That is over, Madam.”

“What is over? Phoebe! what do you mean? Has Mr Welles really spoken to you?”

“Yes, Madam.”

“When, my dear?” asked Mrs Latrobe, in a tone of deep interest.

“This afternoon, Madam!”

“That is right! I am so pleased. I was afraid he would want a good deal of management. And you’ve no more notion how to manage a man than that parrot. I should have to do it all myself.”

“I beg your pardon, Madam,” said Phoebe, with some dignity; “I gave him an answer.”

“Of course, you did, my dear. I am only afraid—sometimes, my dear Phoebe, you let your shyness get the better of you till you seem quite silly—I am afraid, I say, that you would hardly speak with becoming warmth. Still—”

“I think, Madam, I was as warm as you would have wished me,” said Phoebe, drily.

“Oh, of course, there is a limit, my dear,” said Mrs Latrobe, bridling. “Well, I am so glad that it is settled. ’Tis just what I was wishing for you.”

“I fear, Madam, you misconceive me,” said Phoebe, looking up, “and ’tis settled the other way from what you wished.”

“Child, what can you mean?” asked Mrs Latrobe, with sudden sharpness. “You never can have refused such an excellent offer? What did you say to Mr Welles?”

“I sent him away, and told him never to come near me again.” Phoebe spoke with warmth enough now.

“Phoebe, you must be a lunatic!” burst from her mother. “I could not have believed you would be guilty of such supreme, unpardonable folly!”

“Sure,” said Phoebe, looking up, “you would never have had me marry a man whom I despised in my heart?”

“Despised! I protest, Phoebe, you are worse and worse. What do you mean by saying you despise Mr Welles? A man of excellent manners and faultless taste, of good family, with an estate of three thousand a year, and admirable prospects when his old uncle dies, who is nearly seventy now—why, Phoebe, you must be a perfect fool! I am amazed at you beyond words.”

There was a light in Phoebe’s eyes which was beyond Mrs Latrobe’s comprehension.

“Mother!” came from the girl’s lips, with a soft intonation—“Father would not have asked me to do that!”

“Really, my dear, if you expect that I am to rule myself by your father’s notions, you expect a great deal too much. He was not a man of the world at all—”

“He was not!”

“Not in the least!—and he had not the faintest idea what would be required of you when you came to your present position. Don’t quote him, I beg of you!—Well, really, Phoebe—I don’t know what to do now. I wish I had known of it! Still I don’t see, if he were determined to speak to you, how I could have prevented you from making such a goose of yourself. I do wish he had asked me! I should have accepted him at once for you, and not given you the chance to refuse. What did you say to him? Is it quite hopeless to try and win him back?”

“Quite,” said Phoebe, shortly.

“But I want to know exactly what you said.”

“I told him I believed he wanted the estate, and not me; and that after behaving to my cousin as he did, he did not need to expect to get either it or me.”

“Phoebe! what preposterous folly!” said Mrs Latrobe. “Well, child, you are a fool—that’s as plain as a pikestaff; but—”

“You’re a fool!” came in a screech from the parrot’s cage, followed by a burst of laughter.

“But ’tis no use crying over spilt milk. If we have lost Mr Welles, we have lost him; and we must try for some one else. Oh dear, how hot it is! Phoebe, I wonder when you will have any sense. I do beseech you, my dear, never to play the same game with anyone else.”

“I hope, Mother,” said Phoebe, gravely, “that I shall never have occasion.”

“What a lot of geese!” said the parrot.

Chapter Twelve.Ends in the Maidens’ Lodge.“Mother, Mother, up in Heaven,Stand up on the jasper sea,And be witness I have givenAll the gifts required of me.”Elizabeth Barrett Browning.“Before these young gentlewomen come, Rhoda, I want a word with you.”“Yes, Madam.”“I am sure, my dear, that you have too much wit to object to what I am about to say.”Rhoda had learned to dread this beginning, as it was generally the prelude to something disagreeable. But she was learning, also, to submit to disagreeable things. She only said, meekly, “Yes, Madam.”“I suppose, my dear, you will have felt, like a maid of some parts and spirit as you are, that your dwelling any longer with me and Phoebe in this house would not be proper.”“Not be proper!” Rhoda’s cheek blanched. She had never recognised anything of the kind. Was she not only to lose her fortune, but to be turned out of her home? When would her calamities come to an end? “Not proper, Aunt Anne!—why not?”This was not altogether an easy question to answer with any reason but the real one, which last must not be told to Rhoda. Mrs Latrobe put on an air of injured astonishment.“My dear!—sure, you would not have me tell you that? No, no!—your own good parts, I am certain, must have assured you. Now, Rhoda, I wish, so far as is possible, to spare you all mortification. If you consider that it would be easier to you to support your altered fortunes elsewhere, I am very willing to put myself to some trouble to obtain for you a suitable service; or if, on the other hand, you have not this sensibility, then my Lady Betty’s cottage is at your disposal when she leaves it. The time that these young gentlewomen are here will be enough to think over the matter. When they go, I shall expect your answer.”Had Phoebe wished to tell out to Rhoda a recompense of distress equivalent to every annoyance which she had ever received from her, she could have wished for no revenge superior to that of this moment. For her, who had all her life, until lately, looked forward to dispensing her favours as the Queen of Cressingham, to be offered apartments in the Maidens’ Lodge as an indigent gentlewoman, was in her eyes about the last insult and degradation which could be inflicted on her. She went white and red by turns; she took up the hem of her apron, and began to plait it in folds, with as much diligence as though it had been a matter of serious importance that there should be a given number of plaits to an inch, and all of the same width to a thread. Still she did not speak.Mrs Latrobe required no words to inform her of what was passing in Rhoda’s mind. But she forestalled any words which might have come, by an affectation of misunderstanding her.“You see, my dear Rhoda,” she said, in a would-be affectionate tone, “I am bound to do all I can for my only sister’s only child. I would not do you so much injury as to suppose you insensible to the kindness I have shown you. Indeed, if you had been something younger, and had wished to learn any trade, I would willingly have paid the premium with you. And ’tis no slight matter, I can assure you. Eighty pounds would have been the least for which I could have put you with a milliner or mantua-maker, to learn her trade. But, however, ’tis no good talking of that, for you are a good nine years too old. So there is nothing before you but service, without you marry, or to take my Lady Betty’s house. Now, my dear, you may go and divert yourself; we will not talk of this matter again till the young gentlewomen have ended their visit.”And with a nod of dismissal, Mrs Latrobe rose and passed out of the room, evidently considering her duties exceeded by her merits, and leaving Rhoda too stunned for words.Trade, indeed! If there could be a deeper depth than the Maidens’ Lodge, it was trade, in Rhoda’s eyes. Domestic service was incomparably more respectable and honourable. As to matrimony, which her aunt had, as it were, flung into the scales as she passed, Rhoda’s heart was still too sore to think of it.An hour later brought Betty and Molly.“How do you, Rhoda, dear?” inquired the former, kindly.“Well!—got over it, Red Currants?” interrogated Molly.“Over what, I beg?” said Rhoda, rather haughtily.Molly sang her answer:—“‘I lost my looks, I lost my health,I lost my wit—my love kept true;But one fine day I lost my wealth,And, presto! off my lover flew.’“Isn’t that about it, old Tadpole?”“Your’s hasn’t,” retorted Rhoda, carrying the attack into the enemy’s country.“No; I haven’t lost my wealth yet,” said Molly, gravely for her.“Who told you?” whispered Phoebe.“O Gemini! isn’t that a good jest?” responded Molly, not at all in a whisper. “‘Who told me?’—just as if three hundred and sixty-five people hadn’t told me. Told me more jokes than one, too, Mrs Phoebe Latrobe; told me howyousent off Master Marcus with all the starch washed out of him. Got-up Marcus in the rough dry—O Gemini!” and Molly almost shrieked with laughter. “Poor wretch! Hasn’t had the heart to powder himself since. And she told him to his face he wanted the guineas.—Oh how jolly! Wouldn’t I have given a pretty penny to see his face! Phoebe, you’re tip-top.”“What on earth are you talking about?” asked Rhoda, with something of her old sharp manner.“Talking about your true and constant lover, my charmer,” said Molly. “His heart was broken to bits by losing—your money; so he picked up the pieces, and pasted them together, and offered the pretty little thing to your cousin, as the nearest person to you. But she, O cruel creature! instead of giving him an etiquet of admission to her heart, what does she but come down on the wretch’s corns with a blunderbuss, and crush his poor pasted heart into dust. Really—”“Molly, my dear!” said Betty, laughing. “Does a man’s heart lie in his corns?”“If you wish to know, Mrs Betty Delawarr, the conclusions to which I have come on that subject,” replied Molly, in her gravest mock manner, “they are these. Most men haven’t any hearts. They have pretty little ornaments, made of French paste, which do instead. They get smashed about once in six months, then they are pasted up, and nobody ever knows the difference. There isn’t much, when ’tis nicely done.”“Pray, Molly, how many women have hearts?”“Not one among ’em, present company excepted.”“Oh, Molly, Molly!” said Betty, still laughing. “I thank you, in the name of present company,” added Rhoda; but there was a glitter in her eyes which was not mirth.“Now, Red Gooseberries (rather sour just now), you listen to me,” said Molly. “If you have got a heart (leave that to you!) don’t you let it waste away for that piece of flummery. There’s Osmund Derwent breaking his for you, and I believe he has one. Take him—you’ll never do better; and if I tell you lies for the rest of my life, I’ve spoken truth this time.—Now, Fib, aren’t you going to show such distinguished visitors into the parlour?”“Oh, I beg your pardon!” exclaimed Phoebe; “I was listening to you.”“Madam, I thank you for the compliment,” and, with a low courtesy, Molly gave her sister a push before her into the presence of Mrs Latrobe.“Phoebe, come here!” cried Rhoda, in a hoarse whisper, drawing her cousin aside into one of the deep recessed windows of the old hall, once the refectory of the Abbey. “Tell me, did Marcus Welles offer to you?”“Yes,” said Phoebe, and said no more. “And you refused him?”“Why, Rhoda, dear! Yes, of course.”“Not for my sake, I hope. Phoebe, I would not marry him now, if he came with his hat full of diamonds.”“Make your mind easy, dear. I never would have done.”“Do you know, Phoebe, Aunt Anne has offered to put me in the Maidens’ Lodge?”“She talked of it,” said Phoebe, pitifully.“I am not going there,” responded Rhoda, in a decisive tone. “I’ll go to service first. Perhaps, I can come down so much, away from here; but to do it here, where I thought to be mistress!—no, I could not stand that, Phoebe.”“I am sorry you have to stand any of it, dear Rhoda.”“You are a good little thing, Fib; I could not bear you to pity me if you were not. If Aunt Anne had but half your—”“Phoebe, where are you? Really, my dear, I am quite shocked at your negligence! Carry the young gentlewomen up to their chambers, and let Rhoda wait on them. I take it extreme ill you should have left them so long. Do, my dear, remember your position!”Remember her position! Phoebe was beginning to wish heartily that she might now and then be permitted to forget it.The four girls went upstairs together.“I say, Fib, did you ever shoot a waterfall in a coble?” inquired Molly.Phoebe felt safe in a negative.“Because I’ve heard folks say who have, that ’tis infinitely pleasant, when you come alive out of it; but then, you see, there’s a little doubt about that.”“I don’t understand you, Mrs Molly.”“No, my dear, very like you don’t. Well, you’ll find out when you’ve shot ’em. You’re only a passenger; no blame to you if you don’t come out alive.”“Who’s rowing, Molly?” asked Rhoda.“Somebody that isn’t used to handling the oars,” said Molly. “And if she don’t get a hole stove in—Glad ’tis no concern of mine!”“How does Gatty now?” asked Rhoda.“O she is very well, I thank you,” replied Betty.“Is she promised yet?”“Dear, no,” said Betty, in a pitying tone.“Rank cruelty, only to think on it,” said Molly. “She’ll just come in, as pat as vinegar to lettuce, to keep you company in the Maidens’ Lodge, my beloved Rhoda.”Rhoda’s lip trembled slightly, but she asked, quietly enough—“Which is the vinegar?”Molly stood for a moment with her head on one side, contemplating Rhoda.“Been putting sugar to it, Fib, haven’t you? Well, ’tis mighty good stuff to cure a cough.”“Phoebe,” said her mother that evening, when prayers were over, “I wish to speak with you in my chamber before you go to yours.”Phoebe obeyed the order with a mixture of wonder and trepidation.“My dear, I have good news for you. I have chosen your husband.”“Mother!”“Pray, why not, my dear? ’Tis an ingenious young man, reasonable handsome, and very suitable for age and conditions. I have not yet broke the matter to him, but I cannot doubt of a favourable answer, for he hath no fortune to speak of, and is like to be the more manageable, seeing all the money will come from you. You met with him, I believe, at Delawarr Court. His name is Derwent. I shall not write to him while these young gentlewomen are here, but directly they are gone: yet I wish to give you time to become used to it, and I name it thus early.”Phoebe felt any reply impossible.“Good-night, my dear. I am sure you will like Mr Dement.”Phoebe went back along the gallery like one walking in a dream. How was this tangled skein ever to be unravelled? Had she any right to speak? had she any to keep silence? And a cry of “Teach me to doThywill!” went up beyond the stars. “I don’t know what is right,” said Phoebe, plaintively, to her own heart. “Lord, Thou knowest! Make Thy way plain before my face,” It seemed to her that, knowing what she did, there would be one thing more terrible than a refusal from Mr Derwent, and that would be acceptance. It seemed impossible to pray for either. She could only put the case into God’s hands, with the entreaty of Hezekiah: “O Lord, I am oppressed: undertake for me.”It did not make the matter any easier that, a few days later, Rhoda said suddenly, when she and Phoebe were alone, “Do you remember that Mr Derwent who was at Delawarr Court?”“Yes,” said Phoebe, and said no more.“Betty tells me she thought he had a liking for me.”Phoebe was silent. Would the actual question come?“I wonder if it was true,” said Rhoda.Still Phoebe went on knitting in silence, with downcast eyes.“I almost begin, Phoebe, to wish it had been, do you know? I liked him very well. And—I want somebody to care forme.”“Yes, poor dear,” said Phoebe, rising hurriedly. “Excuse me, I must fetch more wool.”And she did not seem to hear Rhoda call after her—“Why, Phoebe, here’s your wool—a whole ball!”“Pretty kettle of fish!” screamed the parrot.Betty and Molly had gone home. Mr Onslow had read prayers, the servants were filing out of the room, and Rhoda was lighting the candles.“Well, my dear,” asked Mrs Latrobe, looking up rather suddenly, “is your decision taken?”“It is, Madam,” readily answered her niece.“So much the better. What is it, my dear?”“I should prefer to go to service, if you please, Madam.”“You would!” Mrs Latrobe’s tone showed surprise. “Very well: I promised you your choice. As lady’s woman, I suppose?”“If you please, Madam.”“Certainly, my dear. It shall be as you wish. Then to-morrow I will begin to look out for you. I should think I shall hear of a place in a week or two.”Rhoda made no answer, but took up her candle, and departed with merely, “Good-night, Madam.”But as Phoebe went upstairs behind her, she noted Rhoda’s bowed head, her hand tightly grasping the banisters, her drowning, farewell look at the family portraits, as she passed them on her way up the corridor. At length she paused before three which hung together.In the midst stood their grandmother, a handsome, haughty figure, taken at about the age of thirty; and on either side a daughter, at about eighteen years of age. Rhoda lifted her light first to Madam’s face. She said nothing to indicate her thoughts there, but passed on, and paused for another minute before the pretty, sparkling face of Anne Latrobe. Then she came back, and raised the light, for a longer time than either, to the pale, regular, unexpressive features of Catherine Peveril. Phoebe waited for her to speak. It came at last.“I never knew her,” said Rhoda, in a choked voice. “I wonder iftheyknow what is happening on earth.”“I should not think so,” answered Phoebe, softly.“Well,—I hope not!”The hand which held the lifted light came down, and Rhoda passed into her own room, and at once knelt down to her prayers. Phoebe stood irresolute, her heart beating like a hammer. An idea had occurred to her which, if it could be carried into effect, would help Rhoda out of all her trouble. But in order to be so, it was necessary that she herself must commit—in her own eyes—an act of unparalleled audacity. Could she do it? The minute seemed an hour. Phoebe heard her mother go upstairs, and shut her door. A rapid prayer went to God for wisdom. Her resolution grew stronger. She took up her candle, stole softly downstairs, found the silver inkstand and the box of perfumed letter-paper. There were only a few words written when Phoebe had done.“Sir,—If you were now to come hither. I thinke you wou’d win my cosen. A verie few dayes may be too late. Forgive the liberty I take.“Yours to serve you, Phoebe Latrobe.”The letter was folded and directed to “Mr. Osmund Derwent, Esquire.” And then, for one minute, human nature had its way, and Phoebe’s head was bowed over the folded note. There was no one to see her, and she let her heart relieve itself in tears. Ay, there was One, who took note of the self-abnegation which had been learned from Him. Phoebe knew that Osmund Derwent did not love her. Yet was it the less hard on that account to resign him to Rhoda? For time and circumstances might have shown him the comparatively alloyed metal of the one, and the pure gold of the other. He might have loved Phoebe, even yet, as matters stood now. But Phoebe’s love was true. She was ready to secure his happiness at the cost of her own. It was not of that false, selfish kind which seeks merely its own happiness in the beloved one, and will give him leave to be happy only in its own way. Yet, after all, Phoebe was human; and some very sorrowful tears were shed, for a few minutes, over that gift laid on the altar. Though the drops were salt, they would not tarnish the gold.It was but for a few minutes that Phoebe dared to remain there. She wiped her eyes and forced back her tears. Then she went upstairs and tapped at Betty’s door.“There’s that worriting Sue,” she heard Betty say inside; and then the door was opened. “Mrs Phoebe, my dear, I ask twenty pardons; I thought ’twas that Sukey,—she always comes a-worriting. What can I do for you, my dear?”“I want you to get that letter off first thing in the morning, Betty.”Betty turned the letter all ways, scanned the address, and inspected the seal.“Mrs Phoebe, you’ll not bear me malice, I hope. You know you’re only young, my dear. Are you quite certain you’ll never be sorry for this here letter?”“’Tis not what you think, Betty,” said Phoebe with a smile on her pale lips which had a good deal of sadness in it. “You are sorry for my cousin, I know. ’Twill be a kind act towards her, Betty, if you will send that letter.”Betty looked into Phoebe’s face so earnestly that she dropped her eyes.“I see,” said Mrs Latrobe’s maid. “I’m not quiet a blind bat, Mrs Phoebe. The letter shall go, my dear. Make your mind easy.”Yet Betty did not see all there was to be seen.“Why, Phoebe!” exclaimed Rhoda, when she got back to the bedroom, “where have you been?”“Downstairs.”“What had you to go down for? You forgot something, I suppose. But what is the matter with your eyes?”“They burn a little to-night, dear,” said Phoebe, quietly.The days went on, and there was no reply to Phoebe’s audacious note, and there was a reply to Mrs Latrobe’s situation-hunting. She announced to Rhoda on the ninth morning at breakfast that she had heard of an excellent place for her. Lady Kitty Mainwaring the mother of Molly Delawarr’s future husband, was on the look-out for a “woman.” She had three daughters, the eldest of whom was the Kitty who had been at Delawarr Court. Rhoda would have to wait on these young ladies, as well as their mother. It was a most eligible situation. Mrs Latrobe, on Rhoda’s behalf, had accepted it at once.Rhoda sat playing with her tea-spoon, and making careful efforts to balance it on the edge of her cup.“Do they know who wants it?” she asked, in a husky voice.“Of course, my dear! You did not look I should make any secret of it, sure?”Rhoda’s colour grew deeper. It was evident that she was engaged in a most severe struggle with herself. She looked up at last.“Very good, Aunt Anne. I will go to Lady Kitty,” she said.“My dear, I accepted the place. Of course you will go,” returned Mrs Latrobe, in a voice of some astonishment.Rhoda got out of the room at the earliest opportunity, and Phoebe followed her as soon as she could. But she found her kneeling by her bed, and stole away again. Was chastening working the peaceable fruit of righteousness in Rhoda Peveril?Phoebe wandered out into the park, and bent her steps towards the ruins of the old church. She sat down at the foot of Saint Ursula’s image, and tried to disentangle her bewildered thoughts. Had she made a mistake in sending that letter, and did the Lord intend Rhoda to go to Lady Kitty Mainwaring? Phoebe had been trying to lift her cousin out of trouble. Was it God’s plan to plunge Rhoda more deeply into it, in order that she might learn her lesson the more thoroughly, and be the more truly happy afterwards? If so, Phoebe had made a stupid blunder. When would she learn that God did not need her bungling help? Yet, poor Rhoda! How miserable she was likely to be! Phoebe buried her face in her hands, and did not see that some one had come in by a ruined window, and was standing close beside her on the grass.“Mrs Phoebe, I owe you thanks unutterable,” said a voice that Phoebe knew only too well.Phoebe sprang up. “Have you seen her, Mr Derwent?”“I have seen no one but you,” said he, gravely.They walked up to the house together, but there Phoebe left him and sought refuge in her bed-chamber.“Phoebe, my dear, are you here?” said Mrs Latrobe, entering the room half an hour later. “Child, did you not hear me call? I could not think where you were, and I wished to have you come down. Why, only think!—all is changed about Rhoda, and she will not go to Lady Kitty. I am a little chagrined, I confess, on your account, my dear; however, it may be all for the best. ’Tis that same Mr Derwent I had heard of, and thought to obtain for you. Well! I am very pleased for Rhoda; ’tis quite as good, or better, than any thing she could expect; and I shall easily meet with something else for you. So now, my dear Phoebe, when she is married, and all settled—for of course, now, I shall let her stay till she marries—then, child, the coast will be clear for you. By the way, you did not care any thing for him, I suppose?—and if you had, you would soon have got over it—all good girls do. Fetch me my knotting, Phoebe—’tis above in my chamber; or, if you meet Rhoda, send her.”It was a subject of congratulation to Phoebe that one of Mrs Latrobe’s peculiarities was to ask questions, and assume, without waiting for it, that the answer was according to her wishes. So she escaped a reply.But there was one thing yet for Phoebe to bear, even worse than this.“Phoebe, dear, dear Phoebe! I am so happy!” and Rhoda twined her arms round her cousin, and hid her bright face on Phoebe’s shoulder. “He says he has loved me ever since we were at Delawarr. And I think I must have loved him, just a little bit, without knowing it, or I could not love him so much all at once now. I was trying very hard to make up my mind to Lady Kitty’s service—that seemed to be what God had ordered for me; and I did ask Him, Phoebe, to give me patience, and make me willing to do His will. And only think—all the while He was preparing this for me! And I don’t think, Phoebe, I should have cared for that—you know what I mean—but for you—the patient, loving way you bore with me; and I haven’t been kind to you, Fib—you know I haven’t. Then I dare say the troubles I’ve had helped a little. And Mr Derwent says he should not have dared to come but for a little letter that you writ him. I owe you all my happiness—my dear, good little Fib!”Was it all pain she had to bear? Phoebe gave thanks that night.Ten years had passed since Madam Furnival’s death, and over White-Ladies was a cloudless summer day. In the park, under the care of a governess and nurse, half a dozen children were playing; and under a spreading tree on the lawn, with a book in her hand, sat a lady, whose likeness to the children indicated her as their mother. In two of the cottages of the Maidens’ Lodge that evening, tea-parties were the order of the day. In Number Four, Mrs Eleanor Darcy was entertaining Mrs Marcella Talbot and Mrs Clarissa Vane.Mrs Marcella’s health had somewhat improved of late, but her disposition had not sustained a corresponding change. She was holding forth now to her two listeners on matters public and private, to the great satisfaction of Mrs Clarissa, but not altogether to that of Mrs Eleanor.“Well, so far as such a poor creature as I am can take any pleasure in any thing, I am glad to see Mrs Derwent back at White-Ladies. Mrs Phoebe would never have kept up the place properly. She hasn’t her poor mother’s spirit and working power—not a bit. The place would just have gone to wreck if she had remained mistress there; and I cannot but think she was sensible of it.”“Well, for my part,” put in Mrs Clarissa, “I feel absolutely certain something must have come to light about Madam’s will, you know—which positively obliged Mrs Phoebe to give up everything to Madam Derwent. ’Tis monstrous to suppose that she would have done any such thing without being obliged. I feel as sure as if I hadseenit.”“O my dear!” came in a gently deprecating tone from Mrs Eleanor.“Oh, I am positive!” repeated Mrs Clarissa, whose mind possessed the odd power of forcing conviction on itself by simple familiarity with an idea. “Everything discovers so many symptoms of it. I cannot but be infinitely certain. Down, Pug, down!” as Cupid’s successor, which was not a dog, but a very small monkey, endeavoured to jump into her lap.“Well, till I know the truth is otherwise, I shall give Mrs Phoebe credit for all,” observed Mrs Eleanor.“Indeed, I apprehend Clarissa has guessed rightly,” said Mrs Marcella, fanning herself. “’Tis so unlikely, you know, for any one to do such a thing as this, without it were either an obligation or a trick to win praise. And I can’t thinkthat,—’tis too much.”“Nay, but surely there is some love and generosity left in the world,” urged Mrs Eleanor.“Oh, if you had had my experience, my dear,” returned Mrs Marcella, working her fan more vigorously, “you would know there were no such things to be looked for inthisworld. I’ve looked for gratitude, I can assure you, till I am tired.”“Gratitude for what?” inquired Mrs Darcy, rather pertinently.“Oh, for all the things one does for people, you know. They are never thankful for them—not one bit.”Mrs Darcy felt and looked rather puzzled. During the fifty years of their acquaintance, she never could remember to have seen Marcella Talbot do one disinterested kindness to any mortal being.“They take all you give them,” pursued the last-named lady, “and then they just go and slander you behind your back. Oh, ’tis a miserable world, this!—full of malice, envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness, as the Prayer-Book says.”“The Prayer-Book does not exactly say that, I think,” suggested Mrs Eleanor; “it asks that we ourselves may be preserved from such evil passions.”“I am sure I wish people were preserved from them!” ejaculated Mrs Clarissa. “The uncharitableness, and misunderstanding, and unkind words that people will allow themselves to use! ’Tis perfectly heartrending to hear.”“Especially when one hears it of one’s self,” responded Mrs Eleanor a little drily; adding, for she wished to give a turn to the conversation, “Did you hear the news Dr Saunders was telling yesterday? The Czar of Muscovy offers to treat with King George, but as Elector of Hanover only.”“What, he has come thus far, has he?” replied Mrs Marcella. “Why, ’tis but five or six years since he was ready to marry his daughter to the Pretender, could they but have come to terms. Sure, King George will never accept of such a thing as that?”“I should think not, indeed!” added Mrs Clarissa. “Well, did he want a bit of sugar, then?”Pug held out his paw, and very decidedly intimated that he did.“Mrs Leighton wants Pug; I shall give him to her,” observed his mistress. “’Tis not quite so modish to keep monkeys as it was: I shall have a squirrel.”“A bit more sugar?” asked Mrs Eleanor, addressing the monkey. “Poor Pug!”Next door but one, in the cottage formerly occupied by Lady Betty Morehurst, were also seated three ladies at tea. Presiding at the table, in mourning dress, sat our old friend Phoebe. There was an expression of placid content upon her lips, and a peaceful light in her eyes, which showed that whatever else she might be, she was not unhappy. On her left sat Mrs Jane Talbot, a little older looking, a little more sharp and angular; and on the right, apparently unchanged beyond a slight increase of infirmity, little Mrs Dorothy Jennings.“What a pure snug (nice) room have you here!” said Mrs Jane, looking round.“’Tis very pleasant,” said Phoebe, “and just what I like.”“Now, my dear, do you really mean to say you like this—better than White-Ladies?”“Indeed I do, Mrs Jane. It may seem a strange thing to you, but I could never feel at home at the Abbey. It all seemed too big and grand for a little thing like me.”“Well! I don’t know,” responded Mrs Jane, in that tone which people use when they make that assertion as the prelude to the declaration of a very decisive opinion,—“Idon’t know, but I reckon there’s a pretty deal about you that’s big and grand, my dear; and I’m mightily mistaken if Mr Derwent and Mrs Rhoda don’t think the same.”“My dear Jane!” said Mrs Dorothy, with a twinkle of fun in her eyes. “Mr and Madam Derwent Furnival, if you please.”“Oh, deary me!” ejaculated Mrs Jane. “Leave that stuff to you. She can call herself Madam Peveril-Plantagenet, if she likes. Make no difference to me. Mrs Rhoda she was, and Mrs Rhoda I shall call her to the end of the chapter. Don’t mean any disrespect, you know—quite the contrary. Well, I’m sure I’m very glad to see her at White-Ladies; but, Mrs Phoebe, if it could have been managed, I should have liked you too.”“Thank you, Mrs Jane, but you see it couldn’t.”“Well, I don’t know. There was no need for you to come down to the Maidens’ Lodge, without you liked. Couldn’t you have kept rooms in the Abbey for yourself, and still have given all to your cousin?”“I’d rather have this,” said Phoebe, with a smile. “I am more independent, you see; and I have kept what my grandmother meant me to have, so that, please God, I trust I shall never want, and can still help my friends when they need it. I can walk in the park, and enjoy the gardens, just as well as ever; and Rhoda will be glad to see me, I know, any time when I want a chat with her.”“I should think so, indeed!” cried Mrs Jane. “Most thankless woman in the world if she wasn’t.”“Oh, don’t say that! You know I could not have done anything else, knowing what Madam intended, when things came to me.”“You did the right thing, dear child,” said Mrs Dorothy, quietly, “as God’s children should. He knew when to put the power in your hands. If Madam Derwent had come to White-Ladies ten years ago, she wouldn’t have made as good use of it as she will now. She was not ready for it. And I’m mistaken if you are not happier, Phoebe, in the Maidens’ Lodge, than you ever would have been if you had kept White-Ladies.”“I am sure of that,” said Phoebe. “Well, but she didn’t need have come down thus far!” reiterated Mrs Jane.“She is the servant of One who came down very far, dear Jane,” gently answered Mrs Dorothy, “that we through His poverty might be rich.”“Well, it looks like it,” replied Mrs Jane, with a little tell-tale huskiness in her voice. “Mrs Phoebe, my dear, do you remember my saying, when Madam died, to you and Mrs Rhoda, that I’d tell you ten years after, which I was sorry for?” Phoebe smiled an affirmative. “Well, I’m not over sorry for either of you; but, at any rate, not foryou.”“The light has come back to thine eyes; dear child, and the peace,” said old Mrs Dorothy. “Ah, folks don’t always know what is the hardest to give up.”And Phoebe, looking up with startled eyes, saw that Mrs Dorothy had guessed her secret. She went to the fire for fresh water from the kettle. Her face was as calm as usual when she returned. Softly she said,—“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”The End.

“Mother, Mother, up in Heaven,Stand up on the jasper sea,And be witness I have givenAll the gifts required of me.”Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

“Mother, Mother, up in Heaven,Stand up on the jasper sea,And be witness I have givenAll the gifts required of me.”Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

“Before these young gentlewomen come, Rhoda, I want a word with you.”

“Yes, Madam.”

“I am sure, my dear, that you have too much wit to object to what I am about to say.”

Rhoda had learned to dread this beginning, as it was generally the prelude to something disagreeable. But she was learning, also, to submit to disagreeable things. She only said, meekly, “Yes, Madam.”

“I suppose, my dear, you will have felt, like a maid of some parts and spirit as you are, that your dwelling any longer with me and Phoebe in this house would not be proper.”

“Not be proper!” Rhoda’s cheek blanched. She had never recognised anything of the kind. Was she not only to lose her fortune, but to be turned out of her home? When would her calamities come to an end? “Not proper, Aunt Anne!—why not?”

This was not altogether an easy question to answer with any reason but the real one, which last must not be told to Rhoda. Mrs Latrobe put on an air of injured astonishment.

“My dear!—sure, you would not have me tell you that? No, no!—your own good parts, I am certain, must have assured you. Now, Rhoda, I wish, so far as is possible, to spare you all mortification. If you consider that it would be easier to you to support your altered fortunes elsewhere, I am very willing to put myself to some trouble to obtain for you a suitable service; or if, on the other hand, you have not this sensibility, then my Lady Betty’s cottage is at your disposal when she leaves it. The time that these young gentlewomen are here will be enough to think over the matter. When they go, I shall expect your answer.”

Had Phoebe wished to tell out to Rhoda a recompense of distress equivalent to every annoyance which she had ever received from her, she could have wished for no revenge superior to that of this moment. For her, who had all her life, until lately, looked forward to dispensing her favours as the Queen of Cressingham, to be offered apartments in the Maidens’ Lodge as an indigent gentlewoman, was in her eyes about the last insult and degradation which could be inflicted on her. She went white and red by turns; she took up the hem of her apron, and began to plait it in folds, with as much diligence as though it had been a matter of serious importance that there should be a given number of plaits to an inch, and all of the same width to a thread. Still she did not speak.

Mrs Latrobe required no words to inform her of what was passing in Rhoda’s mind. But she forestalled any words which might have come, by an affectation of misunderstanding her.

“You see, my dear Rhoda,” she said, in a would-be affectionate tone, “I am bound to do all I can for my only sister’s only child. I would not do you so much injury as to suppose you insensible to the kindness I have shown you. Indeed, if you had been something younger, and had wished to learn any trade, I would willingly have paid the premium with you. And ’tis no slight matter, I can assure you. Eighty pounds would have been the least for which I could have put you with a milliner or mantua-maker, to learn her trade. But, however, ’tis no good talking of that, for you are a good nine years too old. So there is nothing before you but service, without you marry, or to take my Lady Betty’s house. Now, my dear, you may go and divert yourself; we will not talk of this matter again till the young gentlewomen have ended their visit.”

And with a nod of dismissal, Mrs Latrobe rose and passed out of the room, evidently considering her duties exceeded by her merits, and leaving Rhoda too stunned for words.

Trade, indeed! If there could be a deeper depth than the Maidens’ Lodge, it was trade, in Rhoda’s eyes. Domestic service was incomparably more respectable and honourable. As to matrimony, which her aunt had, as it were, flung into the scales as she passed, Rhoda’s heart was still too sore to think of it.

An hour later brought Betty and Molly.

“How do you, Rhoda, dear?” inquired the former, kindly.

“Well!—got over it, Red Currants?” interrogated Molly.

“Over what, I beg?” said Rhoda, rather haughtily.

Molly sang her answer:—

“‘I lost my looks, I lost my health,I lost my wit—my love kept true;But one fine day I lost my wealth,And, presto! off my lover flew.’

“‘I lost my looks, I lost my health,I lost my wit—my love kept true;But one fine day I lost my wealth,And, presto! off my lover flew.’

“Isn’t that about it, old Tadpole?”

“Your’s hasn’t,” retorted Rhoda, carrying the attack into the enemy’s country.

“No; I haven’t lost my wealth yet,” said Molly, gravely for her.

“Who told you?” whispered Phoebe.

“O Gemini! isn’t that a good jest?” responded Molly, not at all in a whisper. “‘Who told me?’—just as if three hundred and sixty-five people hadn’t told me. Told me more jokes than one, too, Mrs Phoebe Latrobe; told me howyousent off Master Marcus with all the starch washed out of him. Got-up Marcus in the rough dry—O Gemini!” and Molly almost shrieked with laughter. “Poor wretch! Hasn’t had the heart to powder himself since. And she told him to his face he wanted the guineas.—Oh how jolly! Wouldn’t I have given a pretty penny to see his face! Phoebe, you’re tip-top.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” asked Rhoda, with something of her old sharp manner.

“Talking about your true and constant lover, my charmer,” said Molly. “His heart was broken to bits by losing—your money; so he picked up the pieces, and pasted them together, and offered the pretty little thing to your cousin, as the nearest person to you. But she, O cruel creature! instead of giving him an etiquet of admission to her heart, what does she but come down on the wretch’s corns with a blunderbuss, and crush his poor pasted heart into dust. Really—”

“Molly, my dear!” said Betty, laughing. “Does a man’s heart lie in his corns?”

“If you wish to know, Mrs Betty Delawarr, the conclusions to which I have come on that subject,” replied Molly, in her gravest mock manner, “they are these. Most men haven’t any hearts. They have pretty little ornaments, made of French paste, which do instead. They get smashed about once in six months, then they are pasted up, and nobody ever knows the difference. There isn’t much, when ’tis nicely done.”

“Pray, Molly, how many women have hearts?”

“Not one among ’em, present company excepted.”

“Oh, Molly, Molly!” said Betty, still laughing. “I thank you, in the name of present company,” added Rhoda; but there was a glitter in her eyes which was not mirth.

“Now, Red Gooseberries (rather sour just now), you listen to me,” said Molly. “If you have got a heart (leave that to you!) don’t you let it waste away for that piece of flummery. There’s Osmund Derwent breaking his for you, and I believe he has one. Take him—you’ll never do better; and if I tell you lies for the rest of my life, I’ve spoken truth this time.—Now, Fib, aren’t you going to show such distinguished visitors into the parlour?”

“Oh, I beg your pardon!” exclaimed Phoebe; “I was listening to you.”

“Madam, I thank you for the compliment,” and, with a low courtesy, Molly gave her sister a push before her into the presence of Mrs Latrobe.

“Phoebe, come here!” cried Rhoda, in a hoarse whisper, drawing her cousin aside into one of the deep recessed windows of the old hall, once the refectory of the Abbey. “Tell me, did Marcus Welles offer to you?”

“Yes,” said Phoebe, and said no more. “And you refused him?”

“Why, Rhoda, dear! Yes, of course.”

“Not for my sake, I hope. Phoebe, I would not marry him now, if he came with his hat full of diamonds.”

“Make your mind easy, dear. I never would have done.”

“Do you know, Phoebe, Aunt Anne has offered to put me in the Maidens’ Lodge?”

“She talked of it,” said Phoebe, pitifully.

“I am not going there,” responded Rhoda, in a decisive tone. “I’ll go to service first. Perhaps, I can come down so much, away from here; but to do it here, where I thought to be mistress!—no, I could not stand that, Phoebe.”

“I am sorry you have to stand any of it, dear Rhoda.”

“You are a good little thing, Fib; I could not bear you to pity me if you were not. If Aunt Anne had but half your—”

“Phoebe, where are you? Really, my dear, I am quite shocked at your negligence! Carry the young gentlewomen up to their chambers, and let Rhoda wait on them. I take it extreme ill you should have left them so long. Do, my dear, remember your position!”

Remember her position! Phoebe was beginning to wish heartily that she might now and then be permitted to forget it.

The four girls went upstairs together.

“I say, Fib, did you ever shoot a waterfall in a coble?” inquired Molly.

Phoebe felt safe in a negative.

“Because I’ve heard folks say who have, that ’tis infinitely pleasant, when you come alive out of it; but then, you see, there’s a little doubt about that.”

“I don’t understand you, Mrs Molly.”

“No, my dear, very like you don’t. Well, you’ll find out when you’ve shot ’em. You’re only a passenger; no blame to you if you don’t come out alive.”

“Who’s rowing, Molly?” asked Rhoda.

“Somebody that isn’t used to handling the oars,” said Molly. “And if she don’t get a hole stove in—Glad ’tis no concern of mine!”

“How does Gatty now?” asked Rhoda.

“O she is very well, I thank you,” replied Betty.

“Is she promised yet?”

“Dear, no,” said Betty, in a pitying tone.

“Rank cruelty, only to think on it,” said Molly. “She’ll just come in, as pat as vinegar to lettuce, to keep you company in the Maidens’ Lodge, my beloved Rhoda.”

Rhoda’s lip trembled slightly, but she asked, quietly enough—

“Which is the vinegar?”

Molly stood for a moment with her head on one side, contemplating Rhoda.

“Been putting sugar to it, Fib, haven’t you? Well, ’tis mighty good stuff to cure a cough.”

“Phoebe,” said her mother that evening, when prayers were over, “I wish to speak with you in my chamber before you go to yours.”

Phoebe obeyed the order with a mixture of wonder and trepidation.

“My dear, I have good news for you. I have chosen your husband.”

“Mother!”

“Pray, why not, my dear? ’Tis an ingenious young man, reasonable handsome, and very suitable for age and conditions. I have not yet broke the matter to him, but I cannot doubt of a favourable answer, for he hath no fortune to speak of, and is like to be the more manageable, seeing all the money will come from you. You met with him, I believe, at Delawarr Court. His name is Derwent. I shall not write to him while these young gentlewomen are here, but directly they are gone: yet I wish to give you time to become used to it, and I name it thus early.”

Phoebe felt any reply impossible.

“Good-night, my dear. I am sure you will like Mr Dement.”

Phoebe went back along the gallery like one walking in a dream. How was this tangled skein ever to be unravelled? Had she any right to speak? had she any to keep silence? And a cry of “Teach me to doThywill!” went up beyond the stars. “I don’t know what is right,” said Phoebe, plaintively, to her own heart. “Lord, Thou knowest! Make Thy way plain before my face,” It seemed to her that, knowing what she did, there would be one thing more terrible than a refusal from Mr Derwent, and that would be acceptance. It seemed impossible to pray for either. She could only put the case into God’s hands, with the entreaty of Hezekiah: “O Lord, I am oppressed: undertake for me.”

It did not make the matter any easier that, a few days later, Rhoda said suddenly, when she and Phoebe were alone, “Do you remember that Mr Derwent who was at Delawarr Court?”

“Yes,” said Phoebe, and said no more.

“Betty tells me she thought he had a liking for me.”

Phoebe was silent. Would the actual question come?

“I wonder if it was true,” said Rhoda.

Still Phoebe went on knitting in silence, with downcast eyes.

“I almost begin, Phoebe, to wish it had been, do you know? I liked him very well. And—I want somebody to care forme.”

“Yes, poor dear,” said Phoebe, rising hurriedly. “Excuse me, I must fetch more wool.”

And she did not seem to hear Rhoda call after her—

“Why, Phoebe, here’s your wool—a whole ball!”

“Pretty kettle of fish!” screamed the parrot.

Betty and Molly had gone home. Mr Onslow had read prayers, the servants were filing out of the room, and Rhoda was lighting the candles.

“Well, my dear,” asked Mrs Latrobe, looking up rather suddenly, “is your decision taken?”

“It is, Madam,” readily answered her niece.

“So much the better. What is it, my dear?”

“I should prefer to go to service, if you please, Madam.”

“You would!” Mrs Latrobe’s tone showed surprise. “Very well: I promised you your choice. As lady’s woman, I suppose?”

“If you please, Madam.”

“Certainly, my dear. It shall be as you wish. Then to-morrow I will begin to look out for you. I should think I shall hear of a place in a week or two.”

Rhoda made no answer, but took up her candle, and departed with merely, “Good-night, Madam.”

But as Phoebe went upstairs behind her, she noted Rhoda’s bowed head, her hand tightly grasping the banisters, her drowning, farewell look at the family portraits, as she passed them on her way up the corridor. At length she paused before three which hung together.

In the midst stood their grandmother, a handsome, haughty figure, taken at about the age of thirty; and on either side a daughter, at about eighteen years of age. Rhoda lifted her light first to Madam’s face. She said nothing to indicate her thoughts there, but passed on, and paused for another minute before the pretty, sparkling face of Anne Latrobe. Then she came back, and raised the light, for a longer time than either, to the pale, regular, unexpressive features of Catherine Peveril. Phoebe waited for her to speak. It came at last.

“I never knew her,” said Rhoda, in a choked voice. “I wonder iftheyknow what is happening on earth.”

“I should not think so,” answered Phoebe, softly.

“Well,—I hope not!”

The hand which held the lifted light came down, and Rhoda passed into her own room, and at once knelt down to her prayers. Phoebe stood irresolute, her heart beating like a hammer. An idea had occurred to her which, if it could be carried into effect, would help Rhoda out of all her trouble. But in order to be so, it was necessary that she herself must commit—in her own eyes—an act of unparalleled audacity. Could she do it? The minute seemed an hour. Phoebe heard her mother go upstairs, and shut her door. A rapid prayer went to God for wisdom. Her resolution grew stronger. She took up her candle, stole softly downstairs, found the silver inkstand and the box of perfumed letter-paper. There were only a few words written when Phoebe had done.

“Sir,—If you were now to come hither. I thinke you wou’d win my cosen. A verie few dayes may be too late. Forgive the liberty I take.

“Yours to serve you, Phoebe Latrobe.”

The letter was folded and directed to “Mr. Osmund Derwent, Esquire.” And then, for one minute, human nature had its way, and Phoebe’s head was bowed over the folded note. There was no one to see her, and she let her heart relieve itself in tears. Ay, there was One, who took note of the self-abnegation which had been learned from Him. Phoebe knew that Osmund Derwent did not love her. Yet was it the less hard on that account to resign him to Rhoda? For time and circumstances might have shown him the comparatively alloyed metal of the one, and the pure gold of the other. He might have loved Phoebe, even yet, as matters stood now. But Phoebe’s love was true. She was ready to secure his happiness at the cost of her own. It was not of that false, selfish kind which seeks merely its own happiness in the beloved one, and will give him leave to be happy only in its own way. Yet, after all, Phoebe was human; and some very sorrowful tears were shed, for a few minutes, over that gift laid on the altar. Though the drops were salt, they would not tarnish the gold.

It was but for a few minutes that Phoebe dared to remain there. She wiped her eyes and forced back her tears. Then she went upstairs and tapped at Betty’s door.

“There’s that worriting Sue,” she heard Betty say inside; and then the door was opened. “Mrs Phoebe, my dear, I ask twenty pardons; I thought ’twas that Sukey,—she always comes a-worriting. What can I do for you, my dear?”

“I want you to get that letter off first thing in the morning, Betty.”

Betty turned the letter all ways, scanned the address, and inspected the seal.

“Mrs Phoebe, you’ll not bear me malice, I hope. You know you’re only young, my dear. Are you quite certain you’ll never be sorry for this here letter?”

“’Tis not what you think, Betty,” said Phoebe with a smile on her pale lips which had a good deal of sadness in it. “You are sorry for my cousin, I know. ’Twill be a kind act towards her, Betty, if you will send that letter.”

Betty looked into Phoebe’s face so earnestly that she dropped her eyes.

“I see,” said Mrs Latrobe’s maid. “I’m not quiet a blind bat, Mrs Phoebe. The letter shall go, my dear. Make your mind easy.”

Yet Betty did not see all there was to be seen.

“Why, Phoebe!” exclaimed Rhoda, when she got back to the bedroom, “where have you been?”

“Downstairs.”

“What had you to go down for? You forgot something, I suppose. But what is the matter with your eyes?”

“They burn a little to-night, dear,” said Phoebe, quietly.

The days went on, and there was no reply to Phoebe’s audacious note, and there was a reply to Mrs Latrobe’s situation-hunting. She announced to Rhoda on the ninth morning at breakfast that she had heard of an excellent place for her. Lady Kitty Mainwaring the mother of Molly Delawarr’s future husband, was on the look-out for a “woman.” She had three daughters, the eldest of whom was the Kitty who had been at Delawarr Court. Rhoda would have to wait on these young ladies, as well as their mother. It was a most eligible situation. Mrs Latrobe, on Rhoda’s behalf, had accepted it at once.

Rhoda sat playing with her tea-spoon, and making careful efforts to balance it on the edge of her cup.

“Do they know who wants it?” she asked, in a husky voice.

“Of course, my dear! You did not look I should make any secret of it, sure?”

Rhoda’s colour grew deeper. It was evident that she was engaged in a most severe struggle with herself. She looked up at last.

“Very good, Aunt Anne. I will go to Lady Kitty,” she said.

“My dear, I accepted the place. Of course you will go,” returned Mrs Latrobe, in a voice of some astonishment.

Rhoda got out of the room at the earliest opportunity, and Phoebe followed her as soon as she could. But she found her kneeling by her bed, and stole away again. Was chastening working the peaceable fruit of righteousness in Rhoda Peveril?

Phoebe wandered out into the park, and bent her steps towards the ruins of the old church. She sat down at the foot of Saint Ursula’s image, and tried to disentangle her bewildered thoughts. Had she made a mistake in sending that letter, and did the Lord intend Rhoda to go to Lady Kitty Mainwaring? Phoebe had been trying to lift her cousin out of trouble. Was it God’s plan to plunge Rhoda more deeply into it, in order that she might learn her lesson the more thoroughly, and be the more truly happy afterwards? If so, Phoebe had made a stupid blunder. When would she learn that God did not need her bungling help? Yet, poor Rhoda! How miserable she was likely to be! Phoebe buried her face in her hands, and did not see that some one had come in by a ruined window, and was standing close beside her on the grass.

“Mrs Phoebe, I owe you thanks unutterable,” said a voice that Phoebe knew only too well.

Phoebe sprang up. “Have you seen her, Mr Derwent?”

“I have seen no one but you,” said he, gravely.

They walked up to the house together, but there Phoebe left him and sought refuge in her bed-chamber.

“Phoebe, my dear, are you here?” said Mrs Latrobe, entering the room half an hour later. “Child, did you not hear me call? I could not think where you were, and I wished to have you come down. Why, only think!—all is changed about Rhoda, and she will not go to Lady Kitty. I am a little chagrined, I confess, on your account, my dear; however, it may be all for the best. ’Tis that same Mr Derwent I had heard of, and thought to obtain for you. Well! I am very pleased for Rhoda; ’tis quite as good, or better, than any thing she could expect; and I shall easily meet with something else for you. So now, my dear Phoebe, when she is married, and all settled—for of course, now, I shall let her stay till she marries—then, child, the coast will be clear for you. By the way, you did not care any thing for him, I suppose?—and if you had, you would soon have got over it—all good girls do. Fetch me my knotting, Phoebe—’tis above in my chamber; or, if you meet Rhoda, send her.”

It was a subject of congratulation to Phoebe that one of Mrs Latrobe’s peculiarities was to ask questions, and assume, without waiting for it, that the answer was according to her wishes. So she escaped a reply.

But there was one thing yet for Phoebe to bear, even worse than this.

“Phoebe, dear, dear Phoebe! I am so happy!” and Rhoda twined her arms round her cousin, and hid her bright face on Phoebe’s shoulder. “He says he has loved me ever since we were at Delawarr. And I think I must have loved him, just a little bit, without knowing it, or I could not love him so much all at once now. I was trying very hard to make up my mind to Lady Kitty’s service—that seemed to be what God had ordered for me; and I did ask Him, Phoebe, to give me patience, and make me willing to do His will. And only think—all the while He was preparing this for me! And I don’t think, Phoebe, I should have cared for that—you know what I mean—but for you—the patient, loving way you bore with me; and I haven’t been kind to you, Fib—you know I haven’t. Then I dare say the troubles I’ve had helped a little. And Mr Derwent says he should not have dared to come but for a little letter that you writ him. I owe you all my happiness—my dear, good little Fib!”

Was it all pain she had to bear? Phoebe gave thanks that night.

Ten years had passed since Madam Furnival’s death, and over White-Ladies was a cloudless summer day. In the park, under the care of a governess and nurse, half a dozen children were playing; and under a spreading tree on the lawn, with a book in her hand, sat a lady, whose likeness to the children indicated her as their mother. In two of the cottages of the Maidens’ Lodge that evening, tea-parties were the order of the day. In Number Four, Mrs Eleanor Darcy was entertaining Mrs Marcella Talbot and Mrs Clarissa Vane.

Mrs Marcella’s health had somewhat improved of late, but her disposition had not sustained a corresponding change. She was holding forth now to her two listeners on matters public and private, to the great satisfaction of Mrs Clarissa, but not altogether to that of Mrs Eleanor.

“Well, so far as such a poor creature as I am can take any pleasure in any thing, I am glad to see Mrs Derwent back at White-Ladies. Mrs Phoebe would never have kept up the place properly. She hasn’t her poor mother’s spirit and working power—not a bit. The place would just have gone to wreck if she had remained mistress there; and I cannot but think she was sensible of it.”

“Well, for my part,” put in Mrs Clarissa, “I feel absolutely certain something must have come to light about Madam’s will, you know—which positively obliged Mrs Phoebe to give up everything to Madam Derwent. ’Tis monstrous to suppose that she would have done any such thing without being obliged. I feel as sure as if I hadseenit.”

“O my dear!” came in a gently deprecating tone from Mrs Eleanor.

“Oh, I am positive!” repeated Mrs Clarissa, whose mind possessed the odd power of forcing conviction on itself by simple familiarity with an idea. “Everything discovers so many symptoms of it. I cannot but be infinitely certain. Down, Pug, down!” as Cupid’s successor, which was not a dog, but a very small monkey, endeavoured to jump into her lap.

“Well, till I know the truth is otherwise, I shall give Mrs Phoebe credit for all,” observed Mrs Eleanor.

“Indeed, I apprehend Clarissa has guessed rightly,” said Mrs Marcella, fanning herself. “’Tis so unlikely, you know, for any one to do such a thing as this, without it were either an obligation or a trick to win praise. And I can’t thinkthat,—’tis too much.”

“Nay, but surely there is some love and generosity left in the world,” urged Mrs Eleanor.

“Oh, if you had had my experience, my dear,” returned Mrs Marcella, working her fan more vigorously, “you would know there were no such things to be looked for inthisworld. I’ve looked for gratitude, I can assure you, till I am tired.”

“Gratitude for what?” inquired Mrs Darcy, rather pertinently.

“Oh, for all the things one does for people, you know. They are never thankful for them—not one bit.”

Mrs Darcy felt and looked rather puzzled. During the fifty years of their acquaintance, she never could remember to have seen Marcella Talbot do one disinterested kindness to any mortal being.

“They take all you give them,” pursued the last-named lady, “and then they just go and slander you behind your back. Oh, ’tis a miserable world, this!—full of malice, envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness, as the Prayer-Book says.”

“The Prayer-Book does not exactly say that, I think,” suggested Mrs Eleanor; “it asks that we ourselves may be preserved from such evil passions.”

“I am sure I wish people were preserved from them!” ejaculated Mrs Clarissa. “The uncharitableness, and misunderstanding, and unkind words that people will allow themselves to use! ’Tis perfectly heartrending to hear.”

“Especially when one hears it of one’s self,” responded Mrs Eleanor a little drily; adding, for she wished to give a turn to the conversation, “Did you hear the news Dr Saunders was telling yesterday? The Czar of Muscovy offers to treat with King George, but as Elector of Hanover only.”

“What, he has come thus far, has he?” replied Mrs Marcella. “Why, ’tis but five or six years since he was ready to marry his daughter to the Pretender, could they but have come to terms. Sure, King George will never accept of such a thing as that?”

“I should think not, indeed!” added Mrs Clarissa. “Well, did he want a bit of sugar, then?”

Pug held out his paw, and very decidedly intimated that he did.

“Mrs Leighton wants Pug; I shall give him to her,” observed his mistress. “’Tis not quite so modish to keep monkeys as it was: I shall have a squirrel.”

“A bit more sugar?” asked Mrs Eleanor, addressing the monkey. “Poor Pug!”

Next door but one, in the cottage formerly occupied by Lady Betty Morehurst, were also seated three ladies at tea. Presiding at the table, in mourning dress, sat our old friend Phoebe. There was an expression of placid content upon her lips, and a peaceful light in her eyes, which showed that whatever else she might be, she was not unhappy. On her left sat Mrs Jane Talbot, a little older looking, a little more sharp and angular; and on the right, apparently unchanged beyond a slight increase of infirmity, little Mrs Dorothy Jennings.

“What a pure snug (nice) room have you here!” said Mrs Jane, looking round.

“’Tis very pleasant,” said Phoebe, “and just what I like.”

“Now, my dear, do you really mean to say you like this—better than White-Ladies?”

“Indeed I do, Mrs Jane. It may seem a strange thing to you, but I could never feel at home at the Abbey. It all seemed too big and grand for a little thing like me.”

“Well! I don’t know,” responded Mrs Jane, in that tone which people use when they make that assertion as the prelude to the declaration of a very decisive opinion,—“Idon’t know, but I reckon there’s a pretty deal about you that’s big and grand, my dear; and I’m mightily mistaken if Mr Derwent and Mrs Rhoda don’t think the same.”

“My dear Jane!” said Mrs Dorothy, with a twinkle of fun in her eyes. “Mr and Madam Derwent Furnival, if you please.”

“Oh, deary me!” ejaculated Mrs Jane. “Leave that stuff to you. She can call herself Madam Peveril-Plantagenet, if she likes. Make no difference to me. Mrs Rhoda she was, and Mrs Rhoda I shall call her to the end of the chapter. Don’t mean any disrespect, you know—quite the contrary. Well, I’m sure I’m very glad to see her at White-Ladies; but, Mrs Phoebe, if it could have been managed, I should have liked you too.”

“Thank you, Mrs Jane, but you see it couldn’t.”

“Well, I don’t know. There was no need for you to come down to the Maidens’ Lodge, without you liked. Couldn’t you have kept rooms in the Abbey for yourself, and still have given all to your cousin?”

“I’d rather have this,” said Phoebe, with a smile. “I am more independent, you see; and I have kept what my grandmother meant me to have, so that, please God, I trust I shall never want, and can still help my friends when they need it. I can walk in the park, and enjoy the gardens, just as well as ever; and Rhoda will be glad to see me, I know, any time when I want a chat with her.”

“I should think so, indeed!” cried Mrs Jane. “Most thankless woman in the world if she wasn’t.”

“Oh, don’t say that! You know I could not have done anything else, knowing what Madam intended, when things came to me.”

“You did the right thing, dear child,” said Mrs Dorothy, quietly, “as God’s children should. He knew when to put the power in your hands. If Madam Derwent had come to White-Ladies ten years ago, she wouldn’t have made as good use of it as she will now. She was not ready for it. And I’m mistaken if you are not happier, Phoebe, in the Maidens’ Lodge, than you ever would have been if you had kept White-Ladies.”

“I am sure of that,” said Phoebe. “Well, but she didn’t need have come down thus far!” reiterated Mrs Jane.

“She is the servant of One who came down very far, dear Jane,” gently answered Mrs Dorothy, “that we through His poverty might be rich.”

“Well, it looks like it,” replied Mrs Jane, with a little tell-tale huskiness in her voice. “Mrs Phoebe, my dear, do you remember my saying, when Madam died, to you and Mrs Rhoda, that I’d tell you ten years after, which I was sorry for?” Phoebe smiled an affirmative. “Well, I’m not over sorry for either of you; but, at any rate, not foryou.”

“The light has come back to thine eyes; dear child, and the peace,” said old Mrs Dorothy. “Ah, folks don’t always know what is the hardest to give up.”

And Phoebe, looking up with startled eyes, saw that Mrs Dorothy had guessed her secret. She went to the fire for fresh water from the kettle. Her face was as calm as usual when she returned. Softly she said,—

“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”

“‘Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,Il est à désirer;Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,Car Dieu est mon Berger.’”

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