V. Reproof falleth on the saucy as water.--FEEJEE PROVERB…

V. Reproof falleth on the saucy as water.--FEEJEE PROVERB

Considerate of the slender purses of her children, Honora had devoted her carriage to fetch them to St. Wulstan's on the Sunday morning, but her offer had been declined, on the ground that the Charteris conveyances were free to them, and that it was better to make use of an establishment to which Sunday was no object, than to cloud the honest face of the Hiltonbury coachman by depriving his horses of their day of rest. Owen would far rather take a cab than so affront Grey! Pleased with his bright manner, Honora had yet reason to fear that expense was too indifferent to both brother and sister, and that the Charteris household only encouraged recklessness. Wherever she went she heard of the extravagance of the family, and in the shops the most costly wares were recommended as the choice of Mrs. Charteris. Formerly, though Honor had equipped Lucilla handsomely for visits to Castle Blanch, she had always found her wardrobe increased by the gifts of her uncle and aunt. The girl had been of age more than a year, and in the present state of the family, it was impossible that her dress could be still provided at their expense, yet it was manifestly far beyond her means; and what could be the result? She would certainly brook no interference, and would cast advice to the winds. Poor Honor could only hope for a crash that would bring her to reason, and devise schemes for forcing her from the effects of her own imprudence without breaking into her small portion. The great fear was lost false pride, and Charteris influence, should lead her to pay her debts at the cost of a marriage with the millionaire; and Honor could take little comfort in Owen's assurance that the Calthorp had too much sense to think of Cilly Sandbrook, and only promoted and watched her vagaries for the sake of amusement and curiosity. There was small satisfaction to her well-wishers in hearing that no sensible man could think seriously of her.

Anxiously was that Sunday awaited in Woolstone-lane, the whole party feeling that this was the best chance of seeing Lucilla in a reasonable light, and coming to an understanding with her. Owen was often enough visible in the interim, and always extremely agreeable; but Lucilla never, and he only brought an account of her gaieties, shrugging his shoulders over them.

The day came; the bells began, they chimed, they changed, but still no Sandbrooks appeared. Mr. Parsons set off, and Robert made an excursion to the corner of the street. In vain Miss Charlecote still lingered; Mrs. Parsons, in despair, called Phoebe on with her as the single bell rang, and Honor and Robert presently started with heads turned over their shoulders, and lips laying all blame on Charteris' delays of breakfast. A last wistful look, and the church porch engulfed them; but even when enclosed in the polished square pew, they could not resign hope at every tread on the matted floor, and finally subsided into a trust that the truants might after service emerge from a seat near the door. There were only too many to choose from.

That hope baffled, Honora still manufactured excuses which Phoebe greedily seized and offered to her brother, but she read his rejection of them in his face, and to her conviction that it was all accident, he answered, as she took his arm, 'A small accident would suffice for Sandbrook.'

'You don't think he is hindering his sister!'

'I can't tell. I only know that he is one of the many stumbling-blocks in her way. He can do no good to any one with whom he associates intimately. I hate to see him reading poetry with you.'

'Why did you never tell me so?' asked the startled Phoebe.

'You are so much taken up with him that I can never get at you, when I am not devoured by that office.'

'I am sure I did not know it,' humbly answered Phoebe. 'He is very kind and amusing, and Miss Charlecote is so fond of him that, of course, we must be together; but I never meant to neglect you, Robin, dear.'

'No, no, nonsense, it is no paltry jealousy; only now I can speak to you, I must,' said Robert, who had been in vain craving for this opportunity of getting his sister alone, ever since the alarm excited by Lucilla's words.

'What is this harm, Robin?'

'Say not a word of it. Miss Charlecote's heart must not be broken before its time, and at any rate it shall not come through me.'

'What, Robert?'

'The knowledge of what he is. Don't say it is prejudice. I know I never liked him, but you shall hear why. You ought now--'

Robert's mind had often of late glanced back to the childish days when, with their present opinions reversed, he thought Owen a muff, and Owen thought him a reprobate. To his own blunt and reserved nature, the expressions, so charming to poor Miss Charlecote, had been painfully distasteful. Sentiment, profession, obtrusive reverence, and fault-finding scruples had revolted him, even when he thought it a proof of his own irreligion to be provoked. Afterwards, when both were schoolboys, Robert had yearly increased in conscientiousness under good discipline and training, but, in their holiday meetings, had found Owen's standard receding as his own advanced, and heard the once-deficient manly spirit asserted by boasts of exploits and deceptions repugnant to a well-conditioned lad. He saw Miss Charlecote's perfect confidence abused and trifled with, and the more he grew in a sense of honour, the more he disliked Owen Sandbrook.

At the University, where Robert's career had been respectable and commonplace, Owen was at once a man of mark. Mental and physical powers alike rendered him foremost among his compeers; he could compete with the fast, and surpass the slow on their own ground; and his talents, ready celerity, good-humoured audacity, and quick resource, had always borne him through with the authorities, though there was scarcely an excess or irregularity in which he was not a partaker; and stories of Sandbrook's daring were always circulating among the undergraduates. But though Robert could have scared Phoebe with many a history of lawless pranks, yet these were not his chief cause for dreading Owen's intimacy with her. It was that he was one of the youths on whom the spirit of the day had most influence, one of the most adventurous thinkers and boldest talkers: wild in habits, not merely from ebullition of spirits, but from want of faith in the restraining power.

All this Robert briefly expressed in the words, 'Phoebe, it is not that his habits are irregular and unsteady; many are so whose hearts are sound. But he is not sound--his opinions are loose, and he only respects and patronizes Divine Truth as what has approved itself to so many good, great, and beloved human creatures. It is not denial--it is patronage. It is the commonsense heresy--'

'I thought we all ought to learn common sense.'

'Yes, in things human, but in things Divine it is the subtle English form of rationalism. This is no time to explain, Phoebe; but human sense and intellect are made the test, and what surpasses them is only admired as long as its stringent rules do not fetter the practice.'

'I am sorry you told me,' said Phoebe, thoughtfully, 'for I always liked him; he is so kind to me.'

Had not Robert been full of his own troubles he would have been reassured, but he only gave a contemptuous groan.

'Does Lucy know this?' she asked.

'She told me herself what I well knew before. She does not reflect enough to take it seriously, and contrives to lay the blame upon the narrowness of Miss Charlecote's training.'

'Oh, Robin! When all our best knowledge came from the Holt!'

'She says, perhaps not unjustly, that Miss Charlecote overdid things with him, and that this is reaction. She observes keenly. If she would only think! She would have been perfect had her father lived, to work on her by affection.'

'The time for that is coming--'

Robert checked her, saying, 'Stay, Phoebe. The other night I was fooled by her engaging ways, but each day since I have become more convinced that I must learn whether she be only using me like the rest. I want you to be a witness of my resolution, lest I should be tempted to fail. I came to town, hesitating whether to enter the business for her sake. I found that this could not be done without a great sin. I look on myself as dedicated to the ministry, and thus bound to have a household suited to my vocation. All must turn on her willingness to conform to this standard. I shall lay it before her. I can bear the suspense no longer. My temper and resolution are going, and I am good for nothing. Let the touchstone be, whether she will resign her expedition to Ireland, and go quietly home with Miss Charlecote. If she will so do, there is surely that within her that will shine out brighter when removed from irritation on the one side, or folly on the other. If she will not, I have no weight with her; and it is due to the service I am to undertake, to force myself away from a pursuit that could only distract me. I have no right to be a clergyman and choose a hindrance not a help--one whose tastes would lead back to the world, instead of to my work!'

As he spoke, in stern, rigid resolution--only allowing himself one long, deep, heavy sigh at the end--he stood still at the gates of the court, which were opened as the rest of the party came up; and, as they crossed and entered the hall, they beheld, through the open door of the drawing-room, two figures in the window--one, a dark torso, perched outside on the sill; the other, in blue skirt and boy-like bodice, negligently reposing on one side of the window-seat, her dainty little boots on the other; her coarse straw bonnet, crossed with white, upon the floor; the wind playing tricks with the silky glory of her flaxen ringlets; her cheek flushed with lovely carnation, declining on her shoulder; her eyes veiled by their fair fringes.

'Hallo!' she cried, springing up, 'almost caught asleep!' And Owen, pocketing his pipe, spun his legs over the windowsill, while both began, in rattling, playful vindication and recrimination--

(he wouldn't.'

'It wasn't my fault (

(she wouldn't.'

'Indeed, I wasn't a wilful heathen; Mr. Parsons, it was he--'

'It was she who chose to take the by-ways, and make us late. Rush into church before a whole congregation, reeking from a six-miles walk! I've more respect for the Establishment.'

'You walked!' cried five voices.

'See her Sabbatarianism!'

'Nonsense! I should have driven Charlie's cab.'

'Charlie has some common sense where his horse is concerned.'

'He wanted it himself, you know.'

'She grew sulky, and victimized me to a walk.'

'I'm sure it was excellent fun.'

'Ay, and because poor Calthorp had proffered his cab for her to drive to Jericho, and welcome, she drags me into all sorts of streets of villainous savours, that he might not catch us up.'

'Horrid hard mouth that horse of his,' said Lucilla, by way of dashing the satisfaction on Miss Charlecote's face.

'I do not wonder you were late.'

'Oh! that was all Owen's doing. He vowed that he had not nerve to face the pew-opener!'

'The grim female in weeds--no, indeed!' said Owen. 'Indeed, I objected to entering in the guise of flaming meteors both on reverential and sanatory grounds.'

'Insanatory, methinks,' said Miss Charlecote; 'how could you let her sleep, so much heated, in this thorough draught!'

'Don't flatter yourself,' said Cilly, quaintly shaking her head; 'I'm not such a goose as to go and catch cold! Oh! Phoebe, my salmon-flies are loveliness itself; and I hereby give notice, that a fine of three pairs of thick boots has been proclaimed for every pun upon sisters of the angle and sisters of the angels! So beware, Robin!'--and the comical audacity with which she turned on him, won a smile from the grave lips that had lately seemed so remote from all peril of complimenting her whimsies. Even Mr. Parsons said 'the fun was tempting.'

'Come and get ready for luncheon,' said the less fascinated Honora, moving away.

'Come and catch it!' cried the elf, skipping up-stairs before her and facing round her 'Dear old Honeyseed.' 'I honour your motives; but wouldn't it be for the convenience of all parties, if you took Punch's celebrated advice--"don't"?'

'How am I to speak, Lucy,' said Honora, 'if you come with the avowed intention of disregarding what I say?'

'Then hadn't you better not?' murmured the girl, in the lowest tone, drooping her head, and peeping under her eyelashes, as she sat with a hand on each elbow of her arm-chair, as though in the stocks.

'I would not, my child,' was the mournful answer, 'if I could help caring for you.'

Lucilla sprang up and kissed her. 'Don't, then; I don't like anybody to be sorry,' she said. 'I'm sure I'm not worth it.'

'How can I help it, when I see you throwing away happiness--welfare--the good opinion of all your friends?'

'My dear Honora, you taught me yourself not to mind Mrs. Grundy! Come, never mind, the reasonable world has found out that women are less dependent than they used to be.'

'It is not what the world thinks, but what is really decorous.'

Lucilla laughed--though with some temper--'I wonder what we are going to do otherwise!'

'You are going beyond the ordinary restraints of women in your station; and a person who does so, can never tell to what she may expose herself. Liberties are taken when people come out to meet them.'

'That's as they choose!' cried Lucilla, with such a gesture of her hand, such a flash of her blue eyes, that she seemed trebly the woman, and it would have been boldness indeed to presume with her.

'Yes; but a person who has even had to protect herself from incivility, to which she has wilfully exposed herself, does not remain what she might be behind her screen.'

'Omne ignotum pro terribili,' laughed Lucilla, still not to be made serious. 'Now, I don't believe that the world is so flagrantly bent on annoying every pretty girl. People call me vain, but I never was so vain as that. I've always found them very civil; and Ireland is the land of civility. Now, seriously, my good cousin Honor, do you candidly expect any harm to befall us?'

'I do not think you likely to meet with absolute injury.' Lucilla clapped her hands, and cried, 'An admission, an admission! I told Rashe you were a sincere woman.' But Miss Charlecote went on, 'But there is harm to yourself in the affectation of masculine habits; it is a blunting of the delicacy suited to a Christian maiden, and not like the women whom St. Paul and St. Peter describe. You would find that you had forfeited the esteem, not only of ordinary society, but of persons whose opinions you do value; and in both these respects you would suffer harm. You, my poor child, who have no one to control you, or claim your obedience as a right, are doubly bound to be circumspect. I have no power over you; but if you have any regard for her to whom your father confided you--nay, if you consult what you know would have been his wishes--you will give up this project.'

The luncheon-bell had already rung, and consideration for the busy clergyman compelled her to go down with these last words, feeling as if there were a leaden weight at her heart.

Lucilla remained standing before the glass, arranging her wind-tossed hair; and, in her vehemence, tearing out combfuls, as she pulled petulantly against the tangled curls. 'Her old way--to come over me with my father! Ha!--I love him too well to let him be Miss Charlecote's engine for managing me!--her dernier ressort to play on my feelings. Nor will I have Robin set at me! Whether I go or not, shall be as I please, not as any one else does; and if I stay at home, Rashe shall own it is not for the sake of the conclave here. I told her she might trust me.'

Down she went, and at luncheon devoted herself to the captivation of Mr. Parsons; afterwards insisting on going to the schools--she, whose aversion to them was Honora's vexation at home. Strangers to make a sensation were contrary to the views of the Parsonses; but the wife found her husband inconsistent--'one lady, more or less, could make no difference on this first Sunday;' and, by and by, Mrs. Parsons found a set of little formal white-capped faces, so beaming with entertainment, at the young lady's stories, and the young lady herself looking so charming, that she, too, fell under the enchantment.

After church, Miss Charlecote proposed a few turns in the garden; dingy enough, but a marvel for the situation: and here the tacit object of herself and Phoebe was to afford Robert an opportunity for the interview on which so much depended. But it was like trying to catch a butterfly; Lucilla was here, there, everywhere; and an excuse was hardly made for leaving her beside the grave, silent young man, ere her merry tones were heard chattering to some one else. Perhaps Robert, heart-sick and oppressed with the importance of what trembled on his tongue, was not ready in seizing the moment; perhaps she would not let him speak; at any rate, she was aware of some design; since, baffling Phoebe's last attempt, she danced up to her bedroom after her, and throwing herself into a chair, in a paroxysm of laughter, cried, 'You abominable little pussycat of a manoeuvrer; I thought you were in a better school for the proprieties! No, don't make your round eyes, and look so dismayed, or you'll kill me with laughing! Cooking tete-a-tetes, Phoebe--I thought better of you. Oh, fie!' and holding up her finger, as if in displeasure, she hid her face in ecstasies of mirth at Phoebe's bewildered simplicity.

'Robert wanted to speak to you,' she said, with puzzled gravity.

'And you would have set us together by the ears! No, no, thank you, I've had enough of that sort of thing for one day. And what shallow excuses. Oh! what fun to hear your pretexts. Wanting to see what Mrs. Parsons was doing, when you knew perfectly well she was deep in a sermon, and wished you at the antipodes. And blushing all the time, like a full-blown poppy,' and off she went on a fresh score--but Phoebe, though disconcerted for a moment, was not to be put out of countenance when she understood her ground, and she continued with earnestness, undesired by her companion--'Very likely I managed badly, but I know you do not really think it improper to see Robert alone, and it is very important that you should do so. Indeed it is, Lucy,' she added--the youthful candour and seriousness of her pleading, in strong contrast to the flighty, mocking carelessness of Lucilla's manners; 'do pray see him; I know he would make you listen. Will you be so very kind? If you would go into the little cedar room, I could call him at once.'

'Point blank! Sitting in my cedar parlour! Phoebe, you'll be the death of me,' cried Cilly, between peals of merriment. 'Do you think I have nerves of brass?'

'You would not laugh, if you knew how much he feels.'

'A very good thing for people to feel! It saves them from torpor.'

'Lucy, it is not kind to laugh when I tell you he is miserable.'

'That's only proper, my dear,' said Lucilla, entertained by teasing.

'Not miserable from doubt,' answered Phoebe, disconcerting in her turn. 'We know you too well for that;' and as an expression, amused, indignant, but far from favourable, came over the fair face she was watching, she added in haste, 'It is this project, he thought you had said it was given up.'

'I am much indebted,' said Lucilla, haughtily, but again relapsing into laughter; 'but to find myself so easily disposed of . . . Oh! Phoebe, there's no scolding such a baby as you; but if it were not so absurd--'

'Lucy, Lucy, I beg your pardon; is it all a mistake, or have I said what was wrong? Poor Robin will be so unhappy.'

Phoebe's distress touched Lucilla.

'Nonsense, you little goose; aren't you woman enough yet to know that one flashes out at finding oneself labelled, and made over before one's time?'

'I'm glad if it was all my blundering,' said Phoebe. 'Dear Lucy, I was very wrong, but you see I always was so happy in believing it was understood!'

'How stupid,' cried Lucilla; 'one would never have any fun; no, you haven't tasted the sweets yet, or you would know one has no notion of being made sure of till one chooses! Yes, yes, I saw he was primed and cocked, but I'm not going to let him go off.'

'Lucy, have you no pity?'

'Not a bit! Don't talk commonplaces, my dear.'

'If you knew how much depends upon it.'

'My dear, I know that,' with an arch smile.

'No, you do not,' said Phoebe, so stoutly that Lucilla looked at her in some suspense.

'You think,' said honest Phoebe, in her extremity, 'that he only wants to make--to propose to you! Now, it is not only that, Lucilla,' and her voice sank, as she could hardly keep from crying; 'he will never do that if you go on as you are doing now; he does not think it would be right for a clergyman.'

'Oh! I dare say!' quoth Lucilla, and then a silence. 'Did Honor tell him so, Phoebe?'

'Never, never!' cried Phoebe; 'no one has said a word against you! only don't you know how quiet and good any one belonging to a clergyman should be?'

'Well, I've heard a great deal of news to-day, and it is all my own fault, for indulging in sentiment on Wednesday. I shall know better another time.'

'Then you don't care!' cried Phoebe, turning round, with eyes flashing as Lucilla did not know they could lighten. 'Very well! If you don't think Robert worth it, I suppose I ought not to grieve, for you can't be what I used to think you and it will be better for him when he once has settled his mind--than if--if afterwards you disappointed him and were a fine lady--but oh! he will be so unhappy,' her tears were coming fast; 'and, Lucy, I did like you so much!'

'Well, this is the funniest thing of all,' cried Lucilla, by way of braving her own emotion; 'little Miss Phoebe gone into the heroics!' and she caught her two hands, and holding her fast, kissed her on both cheeks; 'a gone coon, am I, Phoebe, no better than one of the wicked; and Robin, he grew angry, hopped upon a twig, did he! I beg your pardon, my dear, but it makes me laugh to think of his dignified settling of his mind. Oh! how soon it could be unsettled again! Come, I won't have any more of this; let it alone, Phoebe, and trust me that things will adjust themselves all the better for letting them have their swing. Don't you look prematurely uneasy, and don't go and make Robin think that I have immolated him at the altar of the salmon. Say nothing of all this; you will only make a mess in narrating it.'

'Very likely I may,' said Phoebe; 'but if you will not speak to him yourself, I shall tell him how you feel.'

'If you can,' laughed Lucilla.

'I mean, how you receive what I have told you of his views; I do not think it would be fair or kind to keep him in ignorance.'

'Much good may it do him,' said Lucy; 'but I fancy you will tell him, whether I give you leave or not, and it can't make much difference. I'll tackle him, as the old women say, when I please, and the madder he may choose to go, the better fun it will be.'

'I believe you are saying so to tease me' said Phoebe; 'but as I know you don't mean it, I shall wait till after the party; and then, unless you have had it out with him, I shall tell him what you have said.'

'Thank you,' said Lucilla, ironically conveying to Phoebe's mind the conviction that she did not believe that Robert's attachment could suffer from what had here passed. Either she meant to grant the decisive interview, or else she was too confident in her own power to believe that he could relinquish her; at all events, Phoebe had sagacity enough to infer that she was not indifferent to him, though as the provoking damsel ran down-stairs, Phoebe's loyal spirit first admitted a doubt whether the tricksy sprite might not prove as great a torment as a delight to Robin. 'However,' reflected she, 'I shall make the less mischief if I set it down while I remember it.'

Not much like romance, but practical sense was both native and cultivated in Miss Fennimore's pupil. Yet as she recorded the sentences, and read them over bereft of the speaker's caressing grace, she blamed herself as unkind, and making the worst of gay retorts which had been provoked by her own home thrusts. 'At least,' she thought, 'he will be glad to see that it was partly my fault, and he need never see it at all if Lucy will let him speak to her himself.'

Meantime, Honora had found from Owen that the young ladies had accepted an invitation to a very gay house in Cheshire, so that their movements would for a fortnight remain doubtful. She recurred to her view that the only measure to be taken was for him to follow them, so as to be able to interpose in any emergency, and she anxiously pressed on him the funds required.

'Shouldn't I catch it if they found me out!' said Owen, shrugging his shoulders. 'No, but indeed, Sweet Honey, I meant to have made up for this naughty girl's desertion. You and I would have had such rides and readings together: I want you to put me on good terms with myself.'

'My dear boy! But won't that best be done by minding your sister? She does want it, Owen; the less she will be prudent for herself, the more we must think for her!'

'She can do better for herself than you imagine,' said Owen. 'Men say, with all her free ways, they could not go the least bit farther with her than she pleases. You wouldn't suppose it, but she can keep out of scrapes better than Rashe can--never has been in one yet, and Rashe in twenty. Never mind, your Honor, there's sound stuff in the bonny scapegrace; all the better for being free and unconventional. The world owes a great deal to those who dare to act for themselves; though, I own, it is a trial when one's own domestic womankind take thereto.'

'Or one's mankind to encouraging it,' said Honor, smiling, but showing that she was hurt.

'I don't encourage it; I am only too wise to give it the zest of opposition. Was Lucy ever bent upon a naughty trick without being doubly incited by the pleasure of showing that she cared not for her younger brother?'

'I believe you are only too lazy! But, will you go? I don't think it can be a penance. You would see new country, and get plenty of sport.'

'Come with me, Honey,' said he with the most insinuating manner, which almost moved her. 'How jolly it would be!'

'Nonsense! an elderly spinster,' she said, really pleased, though knowing it impossible.

'Stuff!' he returned in the same tone. 'Make it as good as a honeymoon. Think of Killarney, Honor!'

'You silly boy, I can't. There's harvest at home; besides, it would only aggravate that mad girl doubly to have me coming after her.'

'Well, if you will not take care of me on a literal wild-goose chase,' said Owen, with playful disconsolateness, 'I'll not answer for the consequences.'

'But, you go?'

'Vacation rambles are too tempting to be resisted; but, mind, I don't promise to act good genius save at the last extremity, or else shall never get forgiven, and I shall keep some way in the rear.'

So closed the consultation; and after an evening which Lucilla perforce rendered lively, she and her brother took their leave. The next day they were to accompany the Charterises to Castle Blanch to prepare for the festivities; Honor and her two young friends following on the Wednesday afternoon.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

Chapter VI

He who sits by haunted well Is subject to the Nixie's spell; He who walks on lonely beach To the mermaid's charmed speech; He who walks round ring of green Offends the peevish Fairy Queen.--SCOTT

At the station nearest to Castle Blanch stood the tall form of Owen Sandbrook, telling Honor that he and his sister had brought the boat; the river was the longer way, but they would prefer it to the road; and so indeed they did, for Phoebe herself had had enough of the City to appreciate the cool verdure and calm stillness of the meadow pathway, by which they descended to the majestic river, smoothly sleeping in glassy quiet, or stealing along in complacently dimpling ripples.

On the opposite bank, shading off the sun, an oak copse sloped steeply towards the river, painting upon the surface a still shimmering likeness of the summit of the wood, every mass of foliage, every blushing spray receiving a perfect counterpart, and full in the midst of the magic mirror floated what might have been compared to the roseate queen lily of the waters on her leaf.

There, in the flat, shallow boat reclined the maiden, leaning over the gunwale, gazing into the summer wavelets with which one bare pinkly-tinted hand was toying, and her silken ringlets all but dipping in, from beneath the round black hat, archly looped up on one side by a carnation bow, and encircled by a series of the twin jetty curls of the mallard; while the fresh rose colour of the spreading muslin dress was enhanced by the black scarf that hung carelessly over it. There was a moment's pause, as if no one could break the spell; but Owen, striding on from behind, quickly dissolved the enchantment.

'You monkey, you've cast off. You may float on to Greenwich next!' he indignantly shouted.

She started, shaking her head saucily. ''Twas so slow there, and so broiling,' she called back, 'and I knew I should only drift down to meet you, and could put in when I pleased.'

Therewith she took the sculls and began rowing towards the bank, but without force sufficient to prevent herself from being borne farther down than she intended.

'I can't help it,' she exclaimed, fearlessly laughing as she passed them.

Robert was ready to plunge in to stem her progress, lest she should meet with some perilous eddy, but Owen laid hold on him, saying, 'Don't be nervous, she's all right; only giving trouble, after the nature of women. There; are you satisfied?' he called to her, as she came to a stop against a reed bed, with a tall fence interposed between boat and passengers. 'A nice ferry-woman you.'

'Come and get me up again,' was all her answer.

'Serve you right if I never picked you up till London-bridge,' he answered. 'Stand clear, Fulmort,' and with a run and a bound, he vaulted over the high hedge, and went crackling through the nodding bulrushes and reed-maces; while Lucy, having accomplished pulling up one of the latter, was pointing it lancewise at him, singing,

'With a bulrush for his spear, and a thimble for a hat, Wilt thou fight a traverse with the castle cat.'

'Come, come; 'tis too squashy here for larking,' he said authoritatively, stepping into the boat, and bringing it up with such absence of effort that when a few minutes after he had brought it to the landing-place, and the freight was seated, Robert had no sooner taken the other oar than he exclaimed at the force of the stream with which Owen had dealt so easily, and Lucilla so coolly.

'It really was a fearful risk,' he said reproachfully to her.

'Oh!' she said, 'I know my Thames, and my Thames knows me!'

'Now's the time to improve it,' said Owen; 'one or other should preach about young ladies getting loose, and not knowing where they may be brought up.'

'But you see I did know; besides, Phoebe's news from Paris will be better worth hearing,' said Lucilla, tickling her friend's face with the soft long point of her dark velvety mace.

'My news from Paris?'

'For shame, Phoebe! Your face betrays you.'

'Lucy; how could you know? I had not even told Miss Charlecote!'

'It's true! it's true!' cried Lucilla. 'That's just what I wanted to know!'

'Lucy, then it was not fair,' said Phoebe, much discomposed. 'I was desired to tell no one, and you should not have betrayed me into doing so.'

'Phoebe, you always were a green oasis in a wicked world!'

'And now, let me hear,' said Miss Charlecote. 'I can't flatter you, Phoebe; I thought you were labouring under a suppressed secret.'

'Only since this morning,' pleaded Phoebe, earnestly; 'and we were expressly forbidden to mention it; I cannot imagine how Lucy knows.'

'By telegraph!'

Phoebe's face assumed an expression of immeasurable wonder.

'I almost hope to find you at cross purposes, after all,' said Honora.

'No such good luck,' laughed Lucilla. 'Cinderella's seniors never could go off two at a time. Ah! there's the name. I beg your pardon, Phoebe.'

'But, Lucy, what can you mean? Who can have telegraphed about Augusta?'

'Ah! you knew not the important interests involved, nor Augusta how much depended on her keeping the worthy admiral in play. It was the nearest thing--had she only consented at the end of the evening instead of the beginning, poor Lord William would have had the five guineas that he wants so much more than Mr. Calthorp!'

'Lucy!'

'It was a bet that Sir Nicholas would take six calendar months to supply the place of Lady Bannerman. It was the very last day. If Augusta had only waited till twelve!'

'You don't mean that he has been married before. I thought he was such an excellent man!' said Phoebe, in a voice that set others besides Lucilla off into irresistible mirth.

'Once, twice, thrice!' cried Lucilla. 'Catch her, Honor, before she sinks into the river in disgust with this treacherous world.'

'Do you know him, Lucy?' earnestly said Phoebe.

'Yes, and two of the wives; we used to visit them because he was an old captain of Uncle Kit's.'

'I would not believe in number three, Phoebe, if I were you,' said Owen, consolingly; 'she wants confirmation.'

'Two are as bad as three,' sighed Phoebe; 'and Augusta did not even call him a widower.'

'Cupid bandaged! It was a case of love at first sight. Met at the Trois Freres Provencaux, heard each other's critical remarks, sought an introduction, compared notes; he discovered her foresight with regard to pale ale; each felt that here was a kindred soul!'

'That could not have been telegraphed!' said Phoebe, recovering spirit and incredulity.

'No; the telegram was simply "Bannerman, Fulmort. 8.30 p.m., July 10th." The other particulars followed by letter this morning.'

'How old is he?' asked Phoebe, with resignation.

'Any age above sixty. What, Phoebe, taking it to heart? I was prepared with congratulations. It is only second best, to be sure; but don't you see your own emancipation?'

'I believe that had never occurred to Phoebe,' said Owen.

'I beg your pardon, Lucy,' said Phoebe, thinking that she had appeared out of temper; 'only it had sounded so nice in Augusta's letter, and she was so kind, and somehow it jars that there should have been that sort of talk.'

Cilly was checked. In her utter want of thought it had not occurred to her that Augusta Fulmort could be other than a laughing-stock, or that any bright anticipations could have been spent by any reasonable person on her marriage. Perhaps the companionship of Rashe, and the satirical outspoken tone of her associates, had somewhat blunted her perception of what might be offensive to the sensitive delicacy of a young sister; but she instantly perceived her mistake, and the carnation deepened in her cheek, at having distressed Phoebe, and . . . Not that she had deigned any notice of Robert after the first cold shake of the hand, and he sat rowing with vigorous strokes, and a countenance of set gravity, more as if he were a boatman than one of the party; Lucilla could not even meet his eye when she peeped under her eyelashes to recover defiance by the sight of his displeasure.

It was a relief to all when Honora exclaimed, 'Wrapworth! how pretty it looks.'

It was, indeed, pretty, seen through the archway of the handsome stone bridge. The church tower and picturesque village were set off by the frame that closed them in; and though they lost somewhat of the enchantment when the boat shot from under the arch, they were still a fair and goodly English scene.

Lucilla steered towards the steps leading to a smooth shaven lawn, shaded by a weeping willow, well known to Honor.

'Here we land you and your bag, Robert,' said Owen, as he put in. 'Cilly, have a little sense, do.'

But Lucilla, to the alarm of all, was already on her feet, skipped like a chamois to the steps, and flew dancing up the sward. Ere Owen and Robert had helped the other two ladies to land in a more rational manner, she was shaking her mischievous head at a window, and thrusting in her sceptral reed-mace.

'Neighbour, oh, neighbour, I'm come to torment you! Yes, here we are in full force, ladies and all, and you must come out and behave pretty. Never mind your slippers; you ought to be proud of the only thing I ever worked. Come out, I say; here's your guest, and you must be civil to him.'

'I am very glad to see Mr. Fulmort,' said Mr. Prendergast, his only answer in words to all this, though while it was going on, as if she were pulling him by wires, as she imperiously waved her bulrush, he had stuck his pen into the inkstand, run his fingers in desperation through his hair, risen from his seat, gazed about in vain for his boots, and felt as fruitlessly on the back of the door for a coat to replace the loose alpaca article that hung on his shoulders.

'There. You've gone through all the motions,' said Cilly; 'that'll do; now, come out and receive them.'

Accordingly, he issued from the door, shy and slouching; rusty where he wore cloth, shiny where he wore alpaca, wild as to his hair, gay as to his feet, but, withal, the scholarly gentleman complete, and not a day older or younger, apparently, than when Honor had last seen him, nine years since, in bondage then to the child playing at coquetry, as now to the coquette playing at childhood. It was curious, Honor thought, to see how, though so much more uncouth and negligent than Robert, the indefinable signs of good blood made themselves visible, while they were wanting in one as truly the Christian gentleman in spirit and in education.

Mr. Prendergast bowed to Miss Charlecote, and shook hands with his guest, welcoming him kindly; but the two shy men grew more bashful by contact, and Honor found herself, Owen, and Lucilla sustaining the chief of the conversation, the curate apparently looking to the young lady to protect him and do the honours, as she did by making him pull down a cluster of his roses for her companions, and conducting them to eat his strawberries, which she treated as her own, flitting, butterfly like, over the beds, selecting the largest and ruddiest specimens, while her slave plodded diligently to fill cabbage leaves, and present them to the party in due gradation.

Owen stood by amused, and silencing the scruples of his companions.

'He is in Elysium,' he said; 'he had rather be plagued by Cilly than receive a mitre! Don't hinder him, Honey; it is his pride to treat us as if we were at home and he our guest.'

'Wrapworth has not been seen without Edna Murrell,' said Lucilla, flinging the stem of her last strawberry at her brother, 'and Miss Charlecote is a woman of schools. What, aren't we to go, Mr. Prendergast?'

'I beg your pardon. I did not know.'

'Well; what is it?'

'I do sometimes wish Miss Murrell were not such an attraction.'

'You did not think that of yourself.'

'Well, I don't know; Miss Murrell is a very nice young woman,' he hesitated, as Cilly seemed about to thrust him through with her reed; 'but couldn't you, Cilla, now, give her a hint that it would be better if she would associate more with Mrs. Jenkyns, and--'

'Couldn't Mr. Prendergast; I've more regard for doing as I would be done by. When you see Edna, Honor--'

'They are very respectable women,' said the curate, standing his ground; 'and it would be much better for her than letting it be said she gives herself airs.'

'That's all because we have had her up to the castle to sing.'

'Well, so it is, I believe. They do say, too--I don't know whether it is so--that the work has not been so well attended to, nor the children so orderly.'

'Spite, spite, Mr. Prendergast; I had a better opinion of you than to think you could be taken in by the tongues of Wrapworth.'

'Well, certainly I did hear a great noise the other day.'

'I see how it is! This is a systematic attempt to destroy the impression I wished to produce.'

He tried to argue that he thought very well of Miss Murrell, but she would not hear; and she went on with her pretty, saucy abuse, in her gayest tones, as she tripped along the churchyard path, now, doubtless, too familiar to renew the associations that might have tamed her spirits. Perhaps the shock her vivacity gave to the feeling of her friends was hardly reasonable, but it was not the less real; though, even in passing, Honora could not but note the improved condition of the two graves, now carefully tended, and with a lovely white rose budding between them.

A few more steps, and from the open window of the schoolhouse there was heard a buzz and hum, not outrageous, but which might have caused the item of discipline not to figure well in an inspector's report; but Mr. Prendergast and Lucilla appeared habituated to the like, for they proceeded without apology.

It was a handsome gable-ended building, Elizabethan enough to testify to the taste that had designed it, and with a deep porch, where Honor had advanced, under Lucilla's guidance, so as to have a moment's view of the whole scene before their arrival had disturbed it.

The children's backs were towards the door, as they sat on their forms at work. Close to the oriel window, the only person facing the door, with a table in front of her, there sat, in a slightly reclining attitude, a figure such as all reports of the new race of schoolmistresses had hardly led Honor to imagine to be the bona fide mistress. Yet the dress was perfectly quiet, merely lilac cotton, with no ornament save the small bow of the same colour at the throat, and the hair was simply folded round the head, but it was magnificent raven hair; the head and neck were grandly made; the form finely proportioned, on a large scale; the face really beautiful, in a pale, dark, Italian style; the complexion of the clearest olive, but as she became aware of the presence of the visitors it became overspread with a lovely hue of red; while the eyelids revealed a superb pair of eyes, liquid depths of rich brown, soft and languid, and befitting the calm dignity with which she rose, curtseyed, and signed to her scholars to do the same; the deepening colour alone betraying any sense of being taken by surprise.

Lucilla danced up to her, chattering with her usual familiar, airy grace. 'Well, Edna, how are you getting on? Have I brought a tremendous host to invade you? I wanted Miss Charlecote to see you, for she is a perfect connoisseur in schools.'

Edna's blush grew more carnation, and the fingers shook so visibly with which she held the work, that Honora was provoked with Lucy for embarrassing the poor young thing by treating her as an exhibition, especially as the two young gentlemen were present, Robert with his back against the door-post in a state of resignation, Owen drawing Phoebe's attention to the little ones whom he was puzzling with incomprehensible remarks and questions. Hoping to end the scene, Honor made a few commonplace inquiries as to the numbers and the habits of the school; but the mistress, though preserving her dignity of attitude, seemed hardly able to speak, and the curate replied for her.

'I see,' said Lucilla, 'your eye keeps roaming to the mischief my naughty brother is doing among the fry down there.'

'Oh, no! ma'am. I beg your pardon--'

'Never mind, I'll remove the whole concern in a moment, only we must have some singing first.'

'Don't, Lucy!' whispered Honor, looking up from an inspection of some not first-rate needlework; 'it is distressing her, and displays are contrary to all rules of discipline.'

'Oh! but you must,' cried Cilly. 'You have not seen Wrapworth without. Come, Edna, my bonnie-bell,' and she held out her hand in that semi-imperious, semi-caressing manner which very few had ever withstood.

'One song,' echoed Owen, turning towards the elder girls. 'I know you'll oblige me; eh, Fanny Blake?'

To the scholars the request was evidently not distasteful; the more tuneful were gathering together, and the mistress took her station among them, all as if the exhibition were no novelty. Lucilla, laying her hand on the victim's arm, said, 'Come, don't be nervous, or what will you do to-morrow? Come.'

'"Goddess of the Silver Bow,"' suggested Owen. 'Wasn't it that which your mother disapproved, Fanny, because it was worshipping idols to sing about great Diana of the Ephesians?'

'Yes, sir,' said rather a conceited voice from the prettiest of the elder girls; 'and you told us it was about Phoebe Bright, and gave her the blue and silver ribbon.'

'And please, sir,' said another less prepossessing damsel, 'Mrs. Jenkyns took it away, and I said I'd tell you.'

Owen shrugged up his shoulders with a comical look, saying, as he threw her a shilling, 'Never mind; there's a silver circle instead of a bow--that will do as well. Here's a rival goddess for you, Phoebe; two moons in a system.'

The girls were in a universal titter, the mistress with her eyes cast down, blushing more than ever. Lucilla muttered an amused but indignant, 'For shame, Owen!' and herself gave the key-note. The performance was not above the average of National School melody, but no sooner was it over, than Owen named, in an under-tone, another song, which was instantly commenced, and in which there joined a voice that had been still during the first, but which soon completely took the lead. And such a voice, coming as easily as the notes of the nightingale from the nobly-formed throat, and seeming to fill the room with its sweet power! Lucilla's triumph was complete; Honor's scruples were silenced by the admiring enjoyment, and Phoebe was in a state of rapture. The nervous reluctance had given way to the artistic delight in her own power, and she readily sang all that was asked for, latterly such pieces as needed little or no support from the children--the 'Three Fishers' Wives' coming last, and thrilling every one with the wondrous pathos and sadness of the tones that seemed to come from her very heart.

It seemed as if they would never have come away, had not Mr. Prendergast had pity on the restless movements of some of the younglings, who, taking no part in the display, had leisure to perceive that the clock had struck their hour of release, and at the close of 'The Fishers' Wives,' he signed to Lucilla to look at the hour.

'Poor little things!' said she, turning round to the gaping and discontented collection, 'have we used you so ill? Never mind.' Again using her bulrush to tickle the faces that looked most injured, and waken them into smiles--'Here's the prison house open,' and she sprang out. 'Now--come with a whoop and come with a call--I'll give my club to anybody that can catch me before I get down to the vicarage garden.'

Light as the wind, she went bounding flying across the churchyard like a butterfly, ever and anon pausing to look round, nod, and shake her sceptre, as the urchins tumbled confusedly after, far behind, till closing the gate, she turned, poised the reed javelin-wise in the air, and launched it among them.

'It is vain to try to collect them again,' sighed Mr. Prendergast; 'we must shut up. Good night, Miss Murrell;' and therewith he turned back to his garden, where the freakish sprite, feigning flight, took refuge in the boat, cowering down, and playfully hiding her face in deprecation of rebuke, but all she received was a meekly melancholy, 'O Cilla! prayers.'

'One day's less loathing of compulsory devotion,' was her answer in saucy defiance. 'I owed it to them for the weariness of listening for ten minutes to the "Three Fishers' Wives," which they appreciated as little as their pastor did!'

'I know nothing about songs, but when one wants them--poor things--to look to something better than sleep.'

'Oh, hush! Here are Miss Charlecote and Mr. Fulmort on your side, and I can't be crushed with united morality in revenge for the tears Edna caused you all to shed. There, help Miss Charlecote in; where can Owen be dawdling? You can't pull, Phoebe, or we would put off without him. Ah, there!' as he came bounding down, 'you intolerable loiterer, I was just going to leave you behind.'

'The train starting without the engine,' he said, getting into his place; 'yes, take an oar if you like, little gnat, and fancy yourself helping.'

The gay warfare, accompanied by a few perilous tricks on Lucilla's part, lasted through the further voyage. Honora guessed at a purpose of staving off graver remonstrance, but Phoebe looked on in astonishment. Seventeen is often a more serious time of life than two-and twenty, and the damsel could not comprehend the possibility of thoughtlessness when there was anything to think about. The ass's bridge was nothing compared with Lucy! Moreover the habits of persiflage of a lively family often are confusing to one not used to the tone of jest and repartee, and Phoebe had as little power as will to take part in what was passing between the brother and sister; she sat like the spectator of a farce in a foreign tongue, till the boat had arrived at the broad open extent of park gently sweeping down towards the river, the masses of trees kept on either side so as to leave the space open where the castle towered in pretentious grandeur, with a flag slowly swaying in the summer wind on the top of the tallest turret.

The trees made cool reaches of shade, varied by intervals of hot sunshine, and much longer did the way appear, creeping onward in the heat, than it had looked when the eye only took in the simple expanse of turf, from river to castle. Phoebe looked to her arrival there, and to bedroom conferences, as the moment of recovering a reasonable Lucy, but as they neared the house, there was a shout from the wire fence enclosing the shrubbery on the eastern side, and Horatia was seen standing at the gate calling them to come into the cloisters and have some sustenance.

Passing the screen of shrubs, a scene lay before them almost fit for the gardens of Seville. Three sides of an extensive square were enclosed by the semi-gothic buildings, floridly decorated with stone carving; one consisted of the main edifice, the lower windows tented with striped projecting blinds; a second of the wing containing the reception rooms, fronted by the imitative cloister, which was continued and faced with glass on the third side--each supporting column covered with climbing plants, the passion-flower, the tropaeolum, the trumpet honeysuckle, or even the pomegranate, opening their gay blooms on every side. The close-shaven turf was broken by small patches of gorgeously-tinted flower-beds, diversified by vases filled with trailing plants, and lines of orange trees and fuchsias, with here and there a deep-belled datura, all converging towards the central marble fountain, where the water played high, and tinkled coolly in sparkling jets. Between it and the house, there were placed in the shade some brightly-tinted cushions and draperies, lounging chairs, and a low table, bearing an oriental-looking service of tiny cups, of all kinds of bright and fantastic hues, no two alike. Near it reclined on her cushions a figure in perfect keeping with the scene, her jetty hair contrasting with her gold and coral net, her scarlet gold-embroidered slipper peeping out from her pale buff-coloured dress, deeply edged with rich purple, and partly concealed by a mantle of the unapproachable pink which suggests Persia, all as gorgeous in apparel as the blue and yellow macaw on his pole, and the green and scarlet lories in their cage. Owen made a motion of smoking with Honor's parasol, whispering, 'Fair Fatima! what more is wanting?'

'There! I've got Lolly out!' cried Horatia, advancing with her vehement cordiality, and grasping their hands with all her might; 'I would have come and pulled you up the river, Miss Charlecote, but for imperative claims. Here's some tea for you; I know you must be parched.'

And while Mrs. Charteris, scarcely rising, held out her ring encrusted fingers, and murmured a greeting, Ratia settled them all, pushed a chair behind Miss Charlecote, almost threw Phoebe on a cushion, handed tea, scolded Owen, and rattled away to Lucilla with an impetus that kept Phoebe in increased wonder. It was all about the arrangements for the morrow, full of the utmost good-nature and desire to secure every one's pleasure, but all discussed in a broad out-spoken way, with a liberal use of slang phrases, and of unprefaced surnames, a freedom of manner and jovial carelessness of voice that specially marked Rashe Charteris at home.

Phoebe had a good deal of opportunity for these observations, for as soon as her stream of information was exhausted, Rashe jumped up and insisted on conducting the guests round the hothouses and pleasure-grounds. She knew Miss Charlecote was a famous hand at such things. Lucilla remained on the grass, softly teasing Lolly about the exertions of the morrow, and Owen applying himself to the care of Honor, Rashe took possession of Phoebe with all the tyrannous good-nature that had in baby days rendered her hateful to Lucilla. She showed off the parrots and gold fish as to a child, she teased the sensitive plant, and explained curiosities down to the level of the youthful intellect; and Phoebe, scientific enough to know if she went wrong in botany or locality, began a word or two of modest suggestion, only to be patronizingly enlightened, and stopped short, in the fear of pedantry. Phoebe had yet to learn the ignorance of the world.

At last, with a huge torrent of explanations and excuses, Ratia consigned the two guests to share the same bedroom and dressing-room. The number of gentlemen visitors had necessitated close packing, and Cilly, she said, had come to sleep in her room. Another hope had failed! But at the moment when the door was shut, Phoebe could only sink into a chair, untie her bonnet, and fan herself. Such oppressive good-nature was more fatiguing than a ten miles' walk, or than the toughest lesson in political economy.

'If nature have her own ladies,' was Honora's comment on her young friend's exhaustion, 'she likewise has her own dairy-maids!'

'Miss Charteris is a lady,' said Phoebe, her sense of the intended kindness of her hostess calling her to speak in vindication.

'Yes,' said Honor, hesitating; 'it is station that emboldens her. If she had been a dairy-maid, she would have been a bouncing rude girl; if a farmer's daughter, she would be hearty and useful; if one of the boasters of gentility, she would think it worth while to restrain herself; as she is, her acknowledged birth and breeding enable her to follow her inclinations without fear of opinion.'

'I thought refinement was one great characteristic of a lady,' said Phoebe.

'So it is, but affectation and false shame are the contrary. Refinement was rather overworked, and there has been a reaction of late; simplicity and unconstraint have been the fashion, but unfortunately some dispositions are not made to be unconstrained.'

'Lucy is just as unrestrained as her cousin,' said Phoebe, 'but she never seems like her. She offends one's judgment sometimes, but never one's taste--at least hardly ever;' and Phoebe blushed as she thought of what had passed about her sister that day.

'Poor Lucy! it is one misfortune of pretty people, that they can seldom do what is taken amiss. She is small and feminine too, and essentially refined, whatever she can do. But I was very sorry for you to-day, Phoebe. Tell me all about your sister, my dear.'

'They knew more than I did, if all that is true,' said Phoebe. 'Augusta wrote--oh! so kindly--and seemed so glad, that it made me very happy. And papa gave his consent readily to Robert's doing as he pleased, and almost said something about his taking me to the wedding at Paris. If Lucy should--should accept Robin, I wonder if she would go too, and be bridesmaid!'

So they comforted themselves with a few pretty auguries, dressed, and went down to dinner, where Phoebe had made sure that, as before, Lucy would sit next Robin, and be subdued. Alas, no! Ladies were far too scarce articles for even the last but one to be the prize of a mere B.A. To know who were Phoebe's own neighbours would have been distraction to Juliana, but they were lost on one in whom the art of conversation was yet undeveloped, and who was chiefly intent on reading her brother's face, and catching what Lucy was saying. She had nearly given up listening in despair, when she heard, 'Pistols? oh, of course. Rashe has gone to the expense of a revolver, but I extracted grandpapa's from the family armoury--such little darlings. I'm strongly tempted to send a challenge, just to keep them in use--that's because you despise me--I'm a crack shot--we practised every day last winter--women shoot much better than men, because they don't make their hands unsteady--what can be better than the guidance of Ratia, the feminine of Ratio, reason, isn't it?'

It is not quite certain that this horrible Latinity did not shock Miss Fennimore's discreet pupil more than all the rest, as a wilful insult to Miss Charlecote's education!

She herself was not to escape 'the guidance of Ratia,' after dinner. Her silence had been an additional proof to the good-natured Rashe that she was a child to be protected and entertained, so she paraded her through the rooms, coaxed her to play when no one was listening, showed her illustrated books and new-fashioned puzzles, and domineered over her so closely, that she had not a moment in which to speak a word to her brother, whom she saw disconsolately watching the hedge of gentlemen round Lucy. Was it wrong to feel so ungrateful to a person exclusively devoted to her entertainment for that entire evening?

Phoebe had never known a room-mate nor the solace of a bed-time gossip, and by the time Miss Charlecote began to think of opening the door between their rooms, and discussing the disgusts of the day, the sounds of moving about had ceased. Honor looked in, and could not help advancing to the bedside to enjoy the sight of the rosy face in the sound healthful sleep, the lips unclosed, and the silken brown hair wound plainly across the round brow, the childish outline and expression of the features even sweeter in sleep than awake. It rested Honora's wearied anxious spirit to watch the perfect repose of that innocent young face, and she stood still for some minutes, breathing an ejaculation that the child might ever be as guileless and peaceful as now, and then sighing at the thought of other young sleepers, beside whose couches even fonder prayers had been uttered, only, as it seemed, to be blown aside.

She was turning away, when Phoebe suddenly awoke, and was for a moment startled, half rising, asking if anything were the matter.

'No, my dear; only I did not think you would have been in bed so quickly. I came to wish you good night, and found you asleep.' And with the strong tender impulse of a gentle wounded spirit, Honor hung over the maiden, recomposing the clothes, and fondling her, with a murmured blessing.

'Dear Miss Charlecote,' whispered Phoebe, 'how nice it is! I have so often wondered what it would be like, if any one came in to pet us at night, as they do in books; and oh! it is so nice! Say that again, please.'

That was the blessing which would have made Lucilla in angry reserve hide her head in the clothes!

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

Chapter VII

But, ah me! she's a heart of stone, Which Cupid uses for a hone, I verily believe; And on it sharpens those eye-darts, With which he wounds the simple hearts He bribes her to deceive.--A Coquette, by X.

Breakfast was late, and lengthened out by the greater lateness of many of the guests, and the superlative tardiness of the lady of the house, who had repudiated the cares of the hostess, and left the tea-equipage to her sister-in-law. Lucilla had been down-stairs among the first, and hurried away again after a rapid meal, forbidding any one to follow her, because she had so much to do, and on entering the drawing-room, she was found with a wilderness of flowers around her, filling vases and making last arrangements.

Honora and Phoebe were glad to be occupied, and Phoebe almost hoped to escape from Rashe. Speaking to Lucilla was not possible, for Eloisa had been placed by Rashe in a low chair, with a saucer before her, which she was directed to fill with verbenas, while the other four ladies, with Owen, whom his cousin had called to their aid, were putting last touches to wreaths, and giving the final festal air to the rooms.

Presently Robert made his appearance as the bearer of Mr. Prendergast's flowers, and setting his back against a shutter, in his favourite attitude, stood looking as if he wanted to help, but knew not how. Phoebe, at least, was vividly conscious of his presence, but she was supporting a long festoon with which Owen was adorning a pier-glass, and could hardly even turn her head to watch him.

'Oh, horrid!' cried Lucilla, retreating backwards to look at Ratia's performance; 'for love or money a bit of clematis!'

'Where shall I find one?' said Robert, unseeing the masses waving on the cloister, if, good youth, he even knew what clematis was.

'You there, Mr. Fulmort!' exclaimed Rashe; 'for goodness gracious sake, go out to tennis or something with the other men. I've ordered them all out, or there'll be no good to be got out of Cilly.'

Phoebe flashed out in his defence, 'You are letting Owen alone.'

'Ah! by the bye, that wreath of yours has taken an unconscionable time!' said Miss Charteris, beginning to laugh; but Phoebe's grave straightforward eyes met her with such a look, as absolutely silenced her merriment into a mere mutter of 'What a little chit it is!' Honora, who was about indignantly to assume the protection of her charge, recognized in her what was fully competent to take care of herself.

'Away with both of you,' said Lucilla; 'here is Edna come for a last rehearsal, and I won't have you making her nervous. Take away that Robin, will you, Owen?'

Horatia flew gustily to greet and reassure the schoolmistress as she entered, trembling, although moving with the dignity that seemed to be her form of embarrassment. Lucilla meanwhile sped to the others near the window. 'You must go,' she said, 'or I shall never screw her up; it is a sudden access of stage fright. She is as pale as death.'

Owen stepped back to judge of the paleness, and Robert contrived to say, 'Cannot you grant me a few words, Lucy?'

'The most impossible thing you could have asked,' she replied. 'There's Rashe's encouragement quite done for her now!'

She bounded back to the much-overcome Edna, while Phoebe herself, perceiving how ill-advised an opportunity Robert had chosen, stepped out with him into the cloister, saying, 'She can't help it, dear Robin; she cannot think, just now.'

'When can she?' he asked, almost with asperity.

'Think how full her hands are, how much excited she is,' pleaded Phoebe, feeling that this was no fair moment for the crisis.

'Ireland?' almost groaned Robert, but at the same moment grasped her roughly to hinder her from replying, for Owen was close upon them, and he was the person to whom Robert would have been most reluctant to display his feelings.

Catching intuitively at his meaning, Phoebe directed her attention to some clematis on the opposite side of the cloister, and called both her companions to gather it for her, glad to be with Robert and to relieve Miss Murrell of the presence of another spectator. Charles Charteris coming up, carried the two young men to inspect some of his doings out of doors, and Phoebe returned with her wreaths of creepers to find that the poor schoolmistress had become quite hysterical, and had been take away by Lucilla.

Rashe summoned her at the same time to the decoration of the music-room, and on entering, stopped in amusement, and made her a sign in silence to look into a large pier-glass, which stood so as to reflect through an open door what was passing in the little fanciful boudoir beyond, a place fitted like a tent, and full of quaint Dresden china and toys of bijouterie. There was a complete picture within the glass. Lucilla, her fair face seen in profile, more soft and gentle than she often allowed it to appear, was kneeling beside the couch where half reclined the tall, handsome Edna, whose raven hair, and pale, fine features made her like a heroine, as she nervously held the hands which Lucilla had placed within her grasp. There was a low murmur of voices, one soothing, the other half sobbing, but nothing reached the outer room distinctly, till, as Phoebe was holding a long wreath, which Ratia was tying up, she heard--'Oh! but it is so different with me from you young ladies who are used to company and all. I dare say that young lady would not be timid.'

'What young lady, Edna? Not the one with the auburn hair?'

Ratia made an ecstatic face which disgusted Phoebe.

'Oh, no!--the young lady whom Mr. Sandbrook was helping. I dare say she would not mind singing--or anything,' came amid sobs.

Ratia nodded, looked excessively arch, and formed a word with her lips, which Phoebe thought was 'jealous,' but could not imagine what she could mean by it.

'I don't know why you should think poor Phoebe Fulmort so brazen. She is a mere child, taking a holiday from her strict governess.'

Phoebe laughed back an answer to Rashe's pantomime, which in this case she understood.

'She has not had half your training in boldness, with your inspectors and examinations, and all those horrid things. Why, you never thought of taking fright before, even when you have sung to people here. Why should you now?'

'It is so different, now--so many more people. Oh, so different! I shall never be able.'

'Not at all. You will quite forget all about yourself and your fears when the time comes. You don't know the exhilaration of a room full of people, all lights and music! That symphony will lift you into another world, and you will feel quite ready for "Men must work and women must weep."'

'If I can only begin--but oh! Miss Sandbrook, shall you be far away from me?'

'No, I promise you not. I will bring you down, if you will come to Ratia's room when you are dressed. The black silk and the lilac ribbon Owen and I chose for you; I must see you in it.'

'Dear Miss Sandbrook, you are so kind! What shall I do when you have left?'

'You are going yourself for the holidays, silly puss!'

'Ah! but no one else sympathizes or enters into my feelings.'

'Feelings!' said Lucilla, lightly, yet sadly. 'Don't indulge in them, Edna; they are no end of a torment.'

'Ah! but if they prey on one, one cannot help it.'

Rashe made a face of great distaste. Phoebe felt as if it were becoming too confidential to permit of listening, all the more as she heard Lucilla's reply.

'That's what comes of being tall, and stately, and dignified! There's so much less of me that I can carry off my troubles twice as well.'

'Oh, dear Miss Sandbrook, you can have no troubles!'

'Haven't I? Oh, Edna, if you knew! You that have a mother can never know what it is to be like me! I'm keeping it all at bay, lest I should break down; but I'm in the horridest bother and trouble.'

Not knowing what might come next, ashamed of having listened to so much, yet with one gleam of renewed hope, Phoebe resolutely disobeyed Ratia's frowns and gestures, and made her presence known by decided movements and words spoken aloud.

She saw the immediate effect in Edna Murrell's violent start; but Lucilla, without moving, at once began to sing, straining her thin though sweet voice, as though to surmount a certain tremulousness. Edna joined, and the melody was lovely to hear; but Phoebe was longing all the time for Robert to be at hand for this softer moment, and she hoped all the more when, the practising being over, and Edna dismissed, Lucy came springing towards her, notifying her presence by a caress--to outward appearance merely playful, but in reality a convulsive clasp of vehement affection--and Phoebe was sure that there had been tears in those eyes that seemed to do nothing but laugh.

The security that this wild elf was true at heart was, however, not enough for Phoebe. There was the knowledge that each moment's delay would drive Robert farther aloof, and that it was a mere chance whether he should encounter this creature of impulse at a propitious instant. Nay, who could tell what was best for him after all? Even Phoebe's faithful acceptance of her on his word had undergone sundry severe shocks, and she had rising doubts whether Lucy, such as she saw her, could be what would make him happy.

If the secrets of every guest at a fete were told, would any be found unmixedly happy? Would there be no one devoid of cares of their own or of other people's, or if exempt from these, undisturbed by the absence of the right individual or by the presence of the wrong one, by mishaps of deportment, difficulties of dress, or want of notice? Perhaps, after all, it may be best to have some one abiding anxiety, strong enough to destroy tedium, and exclude the pettier distresses, which are harder to contend with, though less dignified; and most wholesome of all is it that this should be an interest entirely external. So, after all, Phoebe's enjoyment might hardly have been increased had her thoughts been more free from Robin's troubles, when she came down dressed for her first party, so like a lily of the valley in her delicate dress, that Owen acknowledged that it justified her choice, and murmured something of 'in vernal green and virgin white, her festal robes, arrayed.' Phoebe was only distressed at what she thought the profanation of quoting from such a source in compliment to her. Honora was gratified to find the lines in his memory upon any terms. Poor dear Honor, in one case at least believing all things, hoping all things!

Phoebe ought to have made the most of her compliment. It was all she obtained in that line. Juliana herself could not have taken umbrage at her success. Nobody imagined her come out, no one attempted to disturb her from under Miss Charlecote's wing, and she kept close to her the whole afternoon, sometimes sitting upon a haycock, sometimes walking in the shrubbery, listening to the band, or looking at the archery, in company with dignified clergyman, or elderly lady, astonished to meet Honor Charlecote in so unwonted a scene. Owen Sandbrook was never far off. He took them to eat ices, conducted them to good points of view, found seats for them, and told them who every one was, with droll comments or anecdotes which entertained them so much, that Phoebe almost wished that Robin had not made her sensible of the grain of irreverence that seasoned all Owen's most brilliant sallies.

They saw little of the others. Mr. and Mrs. Charteris walked about together, the one cordial, the other stately and gorgeous, and Miss Charlecote came in for her due and passing share of their politeness. Rashe once invited Phoebe to shoot, but had too many on her hands to be solicitous about one. Flirting no longer herself, Rashe's delight was in those who did flirt, and in any assembly her extreme and unscrupulous good-nature made her invaluable to all who wanted to have themselves taken off their own hands, or pushed into those of others. She ordered people about, started amusements, hunted gentlemen up, found partners, and shook up the bashful. Rashe Charteris was the life of everything. How little was wanting to make her kind-hearted activity admirable!

Lucilla never came in their way at all. She was only seen in full and eager occupation embellishing the archery, or forcing the 'decidedly pious' to be fascinated by her gracious self-adaptation. Robert was equally inaccessible, always watching her, but keeping aloof from his sister, and only consorting at times with Mr. Prendergast.

It was seven o'clock when this act of the drama was finally over, and the parties staying in the house met round a hurried meal. Rashe lounging and yawning, laughing and quizzing, in a way amazing to Phoebe; Lucilla in the very summit of spirits, rattling and laughing away in full swing. Thence the party dispersed to dress, but Honora had no sooner reached her room than she said, 'I must go and find Lucy. I must do my duty by her, little hope as I have. She has avoided me all day; I must seek her now.'

What a difference time and discipline had made in one formerly so timid and gentle as to be alarmed at the least encounter, and nervous at wandering about a strange house. Nervous and frightened, indeed, she still was, but self-control kept this in check, and her dislike was not allowed to hold her back from her duty. Humfrey's representative was seldom permitted to be weak. But there are times when the difference between man and woman is felt in their dealings with others. Strength can be mild, but what is strained can seldom be gentle, and when she knocked at Horatia Charteris's door, her face, from very unhappiness and effort, was sorrowfully reproachful, as she felt herself an unwelcome apparition to the two cousins, who lay on their bed still laughing over the day's events.

Rashe, who was still in her morning dress, at once gave way, saying she must go and speak to Lolly, and hastened out of the room. Lucy, in her dishabille, sat crouched upon the bed, her white bare shoulders and floating hair, together with the defiant glance of the blue eye, and the hand moodily compressing the lips, reminding Honor of the little creature who had been summarily carried into her house sixteen years since. She came towards her, but there was no invitation to give the caress that she yearned to bestow, and she leant against the bed, trembling, as she said, 'Lucy, my poor child, I am come that you may not throw away your last chance without knowing it. You do not realize what you are about. If you cast aside esteem and reliance, how can you expect to retain the affection you sometimes seem to prize?'

'If I am not trusted, what's the good of affection?'

'How can you expect trust when you go beyond the bounds of discretion?' said Honor, with voice scarcely steadied into her desired firmness.

'I can, I do!'

'Lucy, listen to me.' She gave way to her natural piteous, pleading tone: 'I verily believe that this is the very turn. Remember how often a moment has decided the fate of a life!' She saw the expression relax into some alarm, and continued: 'The Fulmorts do not say so, but I see by their manner that his final decision will be influenced by your present proceedings. You have trifled with him too long, and with his mind made up to the ministry, he cannot continue to think of one who persists in outraging decorum.'

Those words were effort enough, and had better have been unsaid. 'That is as people may think,' was all the answer.

'As he thinks?'

'How do I know what he thinks?'

Heartsick at such mere fencing, Honor was silent at first, then said, 'I, for one, shall rate your good opinion by your endeavour to deserve it. Who can suppose that you value what you are willing to risk for an unladylike bet, or an unfeminine sporting expedition!'

'You may tell him so,' said Lucilla, her voice quivering with passion.

'You think a look will bring him back, but you may find that a true man is no slave. Prove his affection misplaced, and he will tear it away.'

Had Honora been discreet as she was good, she would have left those words to settle down; but, woman that she was, she knew not when to stop, and coaxingly coming to the small bundle of perverseness, she touched the shoulder, and said, 'Now you won't make an object of yourself to-night?'

The shoulder shook in the old fashion.

'At least you will not go to Ireland.'

'Yes, I shall.'

'Miss Charlecote, I beg your pardon--' cried Rashe, bursting in--(oh! that she had been five seconds earlier)--'but dressing is imperative. People are beginning to come.'

Honora retreated in utter discomfiture.

'Rashe! Rashe! I'm in for it!' cried Lucilla, as the door shut, springing up with a look of terror.

'Proposed by deputy?' exclaimed Horatia, aghast.

'No, no!' gasped Lucilla; 'it's this Ireland of yours--that--that--' and she well-nigh sobbed.

'My bonny bell! I knew you would not be bullied into deserting.'

'Oh! Rashe, she was very hard on me. Every one is but you!' and Lucilla threw herself into her cousin's arms in a paroxysm of feeling; but their maid's knock brought her back to composure sooner than poor Honora, who shed many a tear over this last defeat, as, looking mournfully to Phoebe, she said, 'I have done, Phoebe. I can say no more to her. She will not hear anything from me. Oh! what have I done that my child should be hardened against me!'

Phoebe could offer nothing but caresses full of indignant sorrow, and there was evidently soothing in them, for Miss Charlecote's tears became softer, and she fondly smoothed Phoebe's fair hair, saying, as she drew the clinging arms closer round her: 'My little woodbine, you must twine round your brother and comfort him, but you can spare some sweetness for me too. There, I will dress. I will not keep you from the party.'

'I do not care for that; only to see Robin.'

'We must take our place in the crowd,' sighed Honora, beginning her toilet; 'and you will enjoy it when you are there. Your first quadrille is promised to Owen, is it not?'

'Yes,' said Phoebe, dreamily, and she would have gone back to Robin's sorrows, but Honora had learnt that there were subjects to be set aside when it was incumbent on her to be presentable, and directed the talk to speculations whether the poor schoolmistress would have nerve to sing; and somehow she talked up Phoebe's spirits to such a hopeful pitch, that the little maiden absolutely was crossed by a gleam of satisfaction from the ungrateful recollection that poor Miss Charlecote had done with the affair. Against her will, she had detected the antagonism between the two, and bad as it was of Lucy, was certain that she was more likely to be amenable where there was no interference from her best friend.

The music-room was already crowded when the two made their way into it, and Honora's inclination was to deposit herself on the nearest seat, but she owed something otherwise to her young charge, and Phoebe's eyes had already found a lonely black figure with arms crossed, and lowering brow. Simultaneously they moved towards him, and he towards them. 'Is she come down?' he asked.

Phoebe shook her head, but at the same moment another door near the orchestra admitted a small white butterfly figure, leading in a tall queenly apparition in black, whom she placed in a chair adjacent to the bejewelled prima donna of the night--a great contrast with her dust-coloured German hair and complexion, and good-natured plain face.

Robert's face cleared with relief; he evidently detected nothing outre in Lucilla's aspect, and was rejoicing in the concession. Woman's eyes saw further; a sigh from Honora, an amused murmur around him, caused him to bend his looks on Phoebe. She knew his eyes were interrogating her, but could not bear to let her own reply, and kept them on the ground.

He was moving towards Lucilla, who, having consigned her protegee to the good-humoured German, had come more among the guests, and was exchanging greetings and answering comments with all her most brilliant airs of saucy animation.

And who could quarrel with that fairy vision? Her rich double-skirted watered silk was bordered with exquisitely made and coloured flies, radiant with the hues of the peacock, the gold pheasant, the jay, parrots of all tints, everything rich and rare in plumage. A coronal of the same encircled her glossy hair, the tiny plumes contrasting with the blonde ringlets, and the bona fide hooks ostentatiously displayed; lesser and more innocuous flies edged the sleeves, corsage, shoes, and gloves; and her fan, which she used as skilfully as Jenny Wren, presented a Watteau-like picture of an angling scene. Anything more daintily, quaintly pretty could not be imagined, and the male part of the assembly would have unanimously concurred in Sir Harry Buller's 'three cheers for the queen of the anglers.'

But towards the party most concerned in her movements, Lucilla came not; and Phoebe, understanding a desire to keep as near as might be to Miss Murrell, tried to suggest it as the cause, and looking round, saw Owen standing by Miss Charlecote, with somewhat of an uneasy countenance.

'Terribly hot here,' he said, restlessly; 'suffocating, aren't you, Honor? Come and take a turn in the cloister; the fountain is stunning by moonlight.'

No proposal could have been more agreeable to Honora; and Phoebe was afraid of losing her chaperon, though she would rather have adhered to her brother, and the barbs of that wicked little angler were tearing him far too deeply to permit him to move out of sight of his tormentor.

But for this, the change would have been delicious. The white lights and deep shadows from the calm, grave moon contrasted with the long gleams of lamp-light from every window, reddened by the curtains within; the flowers shone out with a strange whiteness, the taller ones almost like spiritual shapes; the burnished orange leaves glistened, the water rose high in silvery spray, and fell back into the blackness of the basin made more visible by one trembling, shimmering reflection; the dark blue sky above seemed shut into a vault by the enclosing buildings, and one solitary planet shone out in the lustrous neighbourhood of the moon. So still, so solemn, so cool! Honora felt it as repose, and pensively began to admire--Owen chimed in with her. Feverish thoughts and perturbations were always gladly soothed away in her company. Phoebe alone stood barely confessing the beauty, and suppressing impatience at their making so much of it; not yet knowing enough of care or passion to seek repose, and much more absorbed in human than in any other form of nature.

The music was her first hope of deliverance from her namesake in the sky; but, behold, her companions chose to prefer hearing that grand instrumental piece softened by distance; and even Madame Hedwig's quivering notes did not bring them in. However, at the first sounds of the accompaniment to the 'Three Fishers' Wives,' Owen pulled back the curtain, and handed the two ladies back into the room, by a window much nearer to the orchestra than that by which they had gone out, not far from where Edna Murrell had just risen, her hands nervously clasped together, her colour rapidly varying, and her eyes roaming about as though in quest of something. Indeed, through all the music, the slight sounds of the entrance at the window did not escape her, and at the instant when she should have begun to sing, Phoebe felt those black eyes levelled on herself with a look that startled her; they were at once removed, the head turned away; there was an attempt at the first words, but they died away on her lips; there was a sudden whiteness, Lucilla and the German both tried to reseat her; but with readier judgment Owen made two long steps, gathered her up in his strong arms, and bore her through the curtains and out at the open window like a mere infant.

'Don't come, don't--it will only make more fuss--nobody has seen. Go to Madame Hedwig; tell her from me to go on to her next, and cover her retreat,' said Lucilla, as fast as the words would come, signing back Honora, and hastily disappearing between the curtains.

There was a command in Lucilla's gestures which always made obedience the first instinct even with Honora, and her impulse to assist thus counteracted, she had time to recollect that Lucy might be supposed to know best what to do with the schoolmistress, and that to dispose of her among her ladies' maid friends was doubtless the kindest measure.

'I must say I am glad,' she said; 'the poor thing cannot be quite so much spoilt as they wished.'

The concert proceeded, and in the next pause Honor fell into conversation with a pleasant lady who had brought one pair of young daughters in the morning, and now was doing the same duty by an elder pair.

Phoebe was standing near the window when a touch on her arm and a whispered 'Help! hush!' made her look round. Holding the curtain apart, so as to form the least possible aperture, and with one finger on her lip, was Lucy's face, the eyes brimming over with laughter, as she pointed to her head--three of the hooks had set their barbs deep into the crimson satin curtain, and held her a prisoner!

'Hush! I'll never forgive you if you betray me,' she whispered, drawing Phoebe by the arm behind the curtain; 'I should expire on the spot to be found in Absalom's case. All that little goose's fault--I never reckoned on having to rush about this way. Can't you do it? Don't spare scissors,' and Lucilla produced a pair from under her skirt. 'Rashe and I always go provided.'

'How is she?--where is she?' asked Phoebe.

'That's exactly what I can't tell. He took her out to the fountain; she was quite like a dead thing. Water wouldn't make her come to, and I ran for some salts; I wouldn't call anybody, for it was too romantic a condition to have Owen discovered in, with a fainting maiden in his arms. Such a rummage as I had. My own things are all jumbled up, I don't know how, and Rashe keeps nothing bigger than globules, only fit for fainting lady-birds, so I went to Lolly's, but her bottles have all gold heads, and are full of uncanny-looking compounds, and I made a raid at last on Sweet Honey's rational old dressing-case, poked out her keys from her pocket, and got in; wasting interminable time. Well, when I got back to my fainting damsel, non est inventus.'

'Inventa,' murmured the spirit of Miss Fennimore within Phoebe. 'But what? had she got well?'

'So I suppose. Gone off to the servants' rooms, no doubt; as there is no White Lady in the fountain to spirit them both away. What, haven't you done that, yet?'

'Oh! Lucy, stand still, please, or you'll get another hook in.'

'Give me the scissors; I know I could do it quicker. Never mind the curtain, I say; nobody will care.'

She put up her hand, and shook head and feet to the entanglement of a third hook; but Phoebe, decided damsel that she was, used her superior height to keep her mastery, held up the scissors, pressed the fidgety shoulder into quiescence, and kept her down while she extricated her, without fatal detriment to the satin, though with scanty thanks, for the liberation was no sooner accomplished than the sprite was off, throwing out a word about Rashe wanting her.

Phoebe emerged to find that she had not been missed, and presently the concert was over, and tea coming round, there was a change of places. Robert came towards her. 'I am going,' he said.

'Oh! Robert, when dancing would be one chance?'

'She does not mean to give me that chance; I would not ask it while she is in that dress. It is answer sufficient. Good night, Phoebe; enjoy yourself.'

Enjoy herself! A fine injunction, when her brother was going away in such a mood! Yet who would have suspected that rosy, honest apple face of any grievance, save that her partner was missing?

Honora was vexed and concerned at his neglect, but Phoebe appeased her by reporting what Lucy had said. 'Thoughtless! reckless!' sighed Honora; 'if Lucy would leave the poor girl on his hands, of course he is obliged to make some arrangement for getting her home! I never knew such people as they are here! Well, Phoebe, you shall have a partner next time!'

Phoebe had one, thanks chiefly to Rashe, and somehow the rapid motion shook her out of her troubles, and made her care much less for Robin's sorrows than she had done two minutes before. She was much more absorbed in hopes for another partner.

Alas! he did not come; neither then nor for the ensuing. Owen's value began to rise.

Miss Charlecote did not again bestir herself in the cause, partly from abstract hatred of waltzes, partly from the constant expectation of Owen's reappearance, and latterly from being occupied in a discussion with the excellent mother upon young girls reading novels.

At last, after a galoppe, at which Phoebe had looked on with wishful eyes, Lucilla dropped breathless into the chair which she relinquished to her.

'Well, Phoebe, how do you like it?'

'Oh! very much,' rather ruefully; 'at least it would be if--'

'If you had any partners, eh, poor child? Hasn't Owen turned up?

'It's that billiard-room; I tried to make Charlie shut it up. But we'll disinter him; I'll rush in like a sky-rocket, and scatter the gentlemen to all quarters.'

'No, no, don't!' cried Phoebe, alarmed, and catching hold of her. 'It is not that, but Robin is gone.'

'Atrocious,' returned Cilly, disconcerted, but resolved that Phoebe should not perceive it; 'so we are both under a severe infliction,--both ashamed of our brothers.'

'I am not ashamed of mine,' said Phoebe, in a tone of gravity.

'Ah! there's the truant,' said Lucilla, turning aside. 'Owen, where have you hidden yourself? I hope you are ready to sink into the earth with shame at hearing you have rubbed off the bloom from a young lady's first ball.'

'No! it was not he who did so,' stoutly replied Phoebe.

'Ah! it was all the consequence of the green and white; I told you it was a sinister omen,' said Owen, chasing away a shade of perplexity from his brow, and assuming a certain air that Phoebe had never seen before, and did not like. 'At least you will be merciful, and allow me to retrieve my character.'

'You had nothing to retrieve,' said Phoebe, in the most straightforward manner; 'it was very good in you to take care of poor Miss Murrell. What became of her? Lucy said you would know.'

'I--I?' he exclaimed, so vehemently as to startle her by the fear of having ignorantly committed some egregious blunder; 'I'm the last person to know.'

'The last to be seen with the murdered always falls under suspicion,' said Lucilla.

'Drowned in the fountain?' cried Owen, affecting horror.

'Then you must have done it,' said his sister, 'for when I came back, after ransacking the house for salts, you had both disappeared. Have you been washing your hands all this time after the murder?'

'Nothing can clear me but an appeal to the fountain,' said Owen; 'will you come and look in, Phoebe? It is more delicious than ever.'

But Phoebe had had enough of the moonlight, did not relish the subject, and was not pleased with Owen's manner; so she refused by a most decided 'No, thank you,' causing Lucy to laugh at her for thinking Owen dangerous.

'At least you will vouchsafe to trust yourself with me for the Lancers,' said Owen, as Cilla's partner came to claim her, and Phoebe rejoiced in anything to change the tone of the conversation; still, however, asking, as he led her off, what had become of the poor schoolmistress.

'Gone home, very sensibly,' said Owen; 'if she is wise she will know how to trust to Cilly's invitations! People that do everything at once never do anything well. It is quite a rest to turn to any one like you, Phoebe, who are content with one thing at a time! I wish--'

'Well, then, let us dance,' said Phoebe, abruptly; 'I can't do that well enough to talk too.'

It was not that Owen had not said the like things to her many times before; it was his eagerness and fervour that gave her an uncomfortable feeling. She was not sure that he was not laughing at her by putting on these devoted airs, and she felt herself grown up enough to put an end to being treated as a child. He made her a profound bow in a mockery of acquiescence, and preserved absolute silence during the first figures, but she caught his eye several times gazing on her with looks such as another might have interpreted into mingled regret and admiration, but which were to her simply discomfiting and disagreeable, and when he spoke again, it was not in banter, but half in sadness. 'Phoebe, how do you like all this?'

'I think I could like it very much.'

'I am almost sorry to hear you say so; anything that should tend to make you resemble others is detestable.'

'I should be very sorry not to be like other people.'

'Phoebe, you do not know how much of the pleasure of my life would be lost if you were to become a mere conventional young lady.'

Phoebe had no notion of being the pleasure of any one's life except Robin's and Maria's, and was rather affronted that Owen should profess to enjoy her childish ignorance and naivete.

'I believe,' she said, 'I was rude just now when I told you not to talk. I am sorry for it; I shall know better next time.'

'Your knowing better is exactly what I deprecate. But there it is; unconsciousness is the charm of simplicity. It is the very thing aimed at by Rashe and Cilly, and all their crew, with their eccentricities.'

'I am sorry for it,' seriously returned Phoebe, who had by this time, by quiet resistance, caused him to land her under the lee of Miss Charlecote, instead of promenading with her about the room. He wanted her to dance with him again, saying she owed it to him for having sacrificed the first to common humanity, but great as was the pleasure of a polka, she shrank from him in this complimentary mood, and declared she should dance no more that evening. He appealed to Honora, who, disliking to have her boy balked of even a polka, asked Phoebe if she were very tired, and considering her 'rather not' as equivalent to such a confession, proposed a retreat to their own room.

Phoebe was sorry to leave the brilliant scene, and no longer to be able to watch Lucilla, but she wanted to shake Owen off, and readily consented. She shut her door after one good night. She was too much grieved and disappointed to converse, and could not bear to discuss whether the last hope were indeed gone, and whether Lucilla had decided her lot without choosing to know it. Alas! how many turning-points may be missed by those who never watch!

How little did Phoebe herself perceive the shoal past which her self-respect had just safely guided her!

'I wonder if those were ball-room manners? What a pity if they were, for then I shall not like balls,' was all the thought that she had leisure to bestow on her own share in the night's diversions, as through the subsequent hours she dozed and dreamt, and mused and slept again, with the feverish limbs and cramp-tormented feet of one new to balls; sometimes teased by entangling fishing flies, sometimes interminably detained in the moonlight, sometimes with Miss Fennimore waiting for an exercise, and the words not to be found in the dictionary; and even this unpleasant counterfeit of sleep deserting her after her usual time for waking, and leaving her to construct various fabrics of possibilities for Robin and Lucy.

She was up in fair time, and had written a long and particular account to Bertha of everything in the festivities not recorded in this narrative, before Miss Charlecote awoke from the compensating morning slumber that had succeeded a sad and unrestful night. Late as they were, they were down-stairs before any one but the well-seasoned Rashe, who sat beguiling the time with a Bradshaw, and who did not tell them how intolerably cross Cilly had been all the morning.

Nor would any one have suspected it who had seen her, last of all, come down at a quarter to eleven, in the most exultant spirits, talking the height of rodomontade with the gentlemen guests, and dallying with her breakfast, while Phoebe's heart was throbbing at the sight of two grave figures, her brother and the curate, slowly marching up and down the cloister, in waiting till this was over.

And there sat Lucilla inventing adventures for an imaginary tour to be brought out on her return by the name of 'Girls in Galway'--'From the Soiree to the Salmon'--'Flirts and Fools-heads,' as Owen and Charles discontentedly muttered to each other, or, as Mr. Calthorp proposed, 'The Angels and the Anglers.' The ball was to be the opening chapter. Lord William entreated for her costume as the frontispiece, and Mr. Calthorp begged her to re-assume it, and let her cousin photograph her on the spot.

Lucilla objected to the impracticability of white silk, the inconvenience of unpacking the apparatus, the nuisance of dressing, the lack of time; but Rashe was delighted with the idea, and made light of all, and the gentlemen pressed her strongly, till with rather more of a consent than a refusal, she rose from her nearly untasted breakfast, and began to move away.

'Cilla,' said Mr. Prendergast, at the window, 'can I have a word with you?'

'At your service,' she answered, as she came out to him, and saw that Robert had left him. 'Only be quick; they want to photograph me in my ball-dress.'

'You won't let them do it, though,' said the curate.

'White comes out hideous,' said Lucilla; 'I suppose you would not have a copy, if I took one off for you?'

'No; I don't like those visitors of yours well enough to see you turned into a merry-andrew to please them.'

'So that's what Robert Fulmort told you I did last night,' said Lucilla, blushing at last, and thoroughly.

'No, indeed; you didn't?' he said, regarding her with an astonished glance.

'I did wear a dress trimmed with salmon-flies, because of a bet with Lord William,' said Lucilla, the suffusion deepening on brow, cheek, and throat, as the confiding esteem of her fatherly friend effected what nothing else could accomplish. She would have given the world to have justified his opinion of his late rector's little daughter, and her spirits seemed gone, though the worst he did was to shake his head at her.

'If you did not know it, why did you call me that?' she asked.

'A merry-andrew?' he answered; 'I never meant that you had been one. No; only an old friend like me doesn't like the notion of your going and dressing up in the morning to amuse a lot of scamps.'

'I won't,' said Lucilla, very low.

'Well, then,' began Mr. Prendergast, as in haste to proceed to his own subject; but she cut him short.

'It is not about Ireland?'

'No; I know nothing about young ladies; and if Mr. Charteris and your excellent friend there have nothing to say against it, I can't.'

'My excellent friend had so much to say against it, that I was pestered into vowing I would go! Tell me not, Mr. Prendergast,--I should not mind giving up to you;' and she looked full of hope.

'That would be beginning at the wrong end, Cilla; you are not my charge.'

'You are my clergyman,' she said, pettishly.

'You are not my parishioner,' he answered.

'Pish!' she said; 'when you know I want you to tell me.'

'Why, you say you have made the engagement.'

'So what I said when she fretted me past endurance must bind me!'

Be it observed that, like all who only knew Hiltonbury through Lucilla, Mr. Prendergast attributed any blemishes which he might detect in her to the injudicious training of an old maid; so he sympathized. 'Ah! ladies of a certain age never get on with young ones! But I thought it was all settled before with Miss Charteris.'

'I never quite said I would go, only we got ready for the sake of the fun of talking of it, and now Rashe has grown horridly eager about it. She did not care at first--only to please me.'

'Then wouldn't it be using her ill to disappoint her now? You couldn't do it, Cilla. Why, you have given your word, and she is quite old enough for anything. Wouldn't Miss Charlecote see it so?'

To regard Ratia as a mature personage robbed the project of romance, and to find herself bound in honour by her inconsiderate rattle was one of the rude shocks which often occur to the indiscriminate of tongue; but the curate had too much on his mind to dwell on what concerned him more remotely, and proceeded, 'I came to see whether you could help me about poor Miss Murrell. You made no arrangement for her getting home last night?'

'No!'

'Ah, you young people! But it is my fault; I should have recollected young heads. Then I am afraid it must have been--'

'What?'

'She was seen on the river very late last night with a stranger. He went up to the school with her, remained about a quarter of an hour, and then rowed up the river again. I am afraid it is not the first time she has been seen with him.'

'But, Mr. Prendergast, she was here till at least ten! She fainted away just as she was to have sung, and we carried her out into the cloister. When she recovered she went away to the housekeeper's room--' (a bold assertion, built on Owen's partially heard reply to Phoebe). 'I'll ask the maids.'

'It is of no use, Cilla; she allows it herself.'

'And pray,' cried Lucilla, rallying her sauciness, 'how do you propose ever to have banns to publish, if young men and maidens are never to meet by water nor by land?'

'Then you do know something?'

'No; only that such matters are not commonly blazoned in the commencement.'

'I don't wish her to blazon it, but if she would only act openly by me,' said the distressed curate. 'I wish nothing more than that she was safe married; and then if you ladies appoint another beauty, I'll give up the place, and live at --- college.'

'We'll advertise for the female Chimpanzee, and depend upon it she will marry at the end of six weeks. So you have attacked her in person. What did she say?'

'Nothing that she could help. She stood with those great eyes cast down, looking like a statue, and sometimes vouchsafing "yes, sir," or "no, sir." It was "no, sir," when I asked if her mother knew. I am afraid it must be something very unsatisfactory, Cilla; but she might say more to you if you were not going away.'

'Oh! Mr. Prendergast, why did you not come sooner?'

'I did come an hour ago, but you were not come down.'

'I'll walk on at once; the carriage can pick me up. I'll fetch my hat. Poor Edna! I'll soon make her satisfy your mind. Has any one surmised who it can be?'

'The notion is that it is one of your musicians--very dangerous, I am afraid; and I say, Cilla, did you ever do such a thing--you couldn't, I suppose--as lend her Shelley's poems?'

'I? No; certainly not.'

'There was a copy lying on the table in her little parlour, as if she had been writing something out from it. It is very odd, but it was in that peculiar olive-green morocco that some of the books in your father's library were bound in.'

'Not mine, certainly,' said Lucilla. 'Good Honor Charlecote would have run crazy if she thought I had touched a Shelley; a very odd study for Edna. But as to the olive-green, of course it was bound under the same star as ours.'

'Cilly, Cilly, now or never! photograph or not?' screamed Rashe, from behind her three-legged camera.

'Not!' was Lucilla's cavalier answer. 'Pack up; have done with it, Rashe. Pick me up at the school.'

Away she flew headlong, the patient and disconcerted Horatia following her to her room to extract hurried explanations, and worse than no answers as to the sundries to be packed at the last moment, while she hastily put on hat and mantle, and was flying down again, when her brother, with outspread arms, nearly caught her in her spring. 'Hollo! what's up?'

'Don't stop me, Owen! I'm going to walk on with Mr. Prendergast and be picked up. I must speak to Edna Murrell.'

'Nonsense! The carriage will be out in five minutes.'

'I must go, Owen. There's some story of a demon in human shape on the water with her last night, and Mr. Prendergast can't get a word out of her.'

'Is that any reason you should go ramping about, prying into people's affairs?'

'But, Owen, they will send her away. They will take away her character.'

'The--the--the more reason you should have nothing to do with it,' he exclaimed. 'It is no business for you, and I won't have you meddle in it.'

Such a strong and sudden assumption of fraternal authority took away her breath; and then, in terror lest he should know cause for this detention, she said--

'Owen! you don't guess who it was?'

'How should I?' he roughly answered. 'Some villainous slander, of course, there is, but it is no business of yours to be straking off to make it worse.'

'I should not make it worse.'

'Women always make things worse. Are you satisfied now?' as the carriage was seen coming round.

'That is only to be packed.'

'Packed with folly, yes! Look here! 11.20, and the train at 12.5!'

'I will miss the train, go up later, and sleep in London.'

'Stuff and nonsense! Who is going to take you? Not I.'

In Lucilla's desperation in the cause of her favourite Edna, she went through a rapid self-debate. Honor would gladly wait for her for such a cause; she could sleep at Woolstone-lane, and thence go on to join Horatia in Derbyshire, escorted by a Hiltonbury servant. But what would that entail? She would be at their mercy. Robert would obtain his advantage--it would be all over with her! Pride arose; Edna's cause sank. How many destinies were fixed in the few seconds while she stood with one foot forward, spinning her black hat by the elastic band!

'Too late, Mr. Prendergast; I cannot go,' she said, as she saw him waiting for her at the door. 'Don't be angry with me, and don't let the womankind prejudice you against poor Edna. You forgive me! It is really too late.'

'Forgive you?' smiled Mr. Prendergast, pressing her caressing hand in his great, lank grasp; 'what for?'

'Oh, because it is too late; and I can't help it. But don't be hard with her. Good-bye.'

Too late! Why did Lucilla repeat those words so often? Was it a relief to that irreflective nature to believe the die irrevocably cast, and the responsibility of decision over? Or why did she ask forgiveness of the only one whom she was not offending, but because there was a sense of need of pardon where she would not stoop to ask it.

Miss Charlecote and the Fulmorts, Rashe and Cilly, were to be transported to London by the same train, leaving Owen behind to help Charles Charteris entertain some guests still remaining, Honora promising him to wait in town until Lucilla should absolutely have started for Ireland, when she would supply him with the means of pursuit.

Lucilla's delay and change of mind made the final departure so late that it was needful to drive excessively fast, and the train was barely caught in time. The party were obliged to separate, and Robert took Phoebe into a different carriage from that where the other three found places.

In the ten minutes' transit by railway, Lucy, always softened by parting, was like another being towards Honor, and talked eagerly of 'coming home' for Christmas, sent messages to Hiltonbury friends, and did everything short of retractation to efface the painful impression she had left.

'Sweetest Honey!' she whispered, as they moved on after the tickets had been taken, thrusting her pretty head over into Honor's place. 'Nobody's looking, give me a kiss, and say you don't bear malice, though your kitten has been in a scratching humour.'

'Malice! no indeed!' said Honor, fondly; 'but, oh! remember, dear child, that frolics may be at too dear a price.'

She longed to say more, but the final stop was made, and their roads diverged. Honor thought that Lucy looked white and trembling, with an uneasy eye, as though she would have given much to have been going home with her.

Nor was the consoling fancy unfounded. Lucilla's nerves were not at their usual pitch, and an undefined sense of loss of a safeguard was coming over her. Moreover, the desire for a last word to Robert was growing every moment, and he would keep on hunting out those boxes, as if they mattered to anybody.

She turned round on his substitute, and said, 'I've not spoken to Robin all this time. No wonder his feathers are ruffled. Make my peace with him, Phoebe dear.'

On the very platform, in that moment of bustle, Phoebe conscientiously and reasonably began, 'Will you tell me how much you mean by that?'

'Cilly--King's-cross--1.15,' cried Ratia, snatching at her arm.

'Oh! the slave one is! Next time we meet, Phoebe, the redbreast will be in a white tie, I shall--'

Hurry and agitation were making her flippant, and Robert was nearer than she deemed. He was assisting her to her seat, and then held out his hand, but never raised his eyes. 'Goodbye, Robin,' she said; 'Reason herself shall meet you at the Holt at Christmas.'

'Good-bye,' he said, but without a word of augury, and loosed her hand. Her fingers clung one moment, but he drew his away, called 'King's-cross' to the coachman, and she was whirled off. Angler as she was, she no longer felt her prey answer her pull. Had the line snapped?

When Owen next appeared in Woolstone-lane he looked fagged and harassed, but talked of all things in sky, earth, or air, politics, literature, or gossip, took the bottom of the table, and treated the Parsonses as his guests. Honora, however, felt that something was amiss; perhaps Lucilla engaged to Lord William; and when, after luncheon, he followed her to the cedar room, she began with a desponding 'Well?'

'Well, she is off!'

'Alone with Rashe?'

'Alone with Rashe. Why, Sweet Honey, you look gratified!'

'I had begun to fear some fresh news,' said Honor, smiling with effort. 'I am sure that something is wrong. You do not look well, my dear. How flushed you are, and your forehead is so hot!' as she put her hand on his brow.

'Oh, nothing!' he said, caressingly, holding it there. 'I'm glad to have got away from the castle; Charlie and his set drink an intolerable lot of wine. I'll not be there again in a hurry.'

'I am glad of that. I wish you had come away with us.'

'I wish to heaven I had!' cried Owen; 'but it could not be helped! So now for my wild-goose chase. Cross to-morrow night; only you were good enough to say you would find ways and means.'

'There, that is what I intended, including your Midsummer quarter. Don't you think it enough?' as she detected a look of dissatisfaction.

'You are very good. It is a tremendous shame; but you see, Honor dear, when one is across the water, one may as well go the whole animal. If this wise sister of mine does not get into a mess, there is a good deal I could do--plenty of sport. Little Henniker and some Westminster fellows in the ---th are at Kilkenny.'

'You would like to spend the vacation in Ireland,' said Honor, with some disappointment. 'Well, if you go for my pleasure, it is but fair you should have your own. Shall I advance your September allowance?'

'Thank you. You do spoil one abominably, you concoction of honey and all things sweet. But the fact is, I've got uncommonly hard-up of late; no one would believe how ruinous it is being with the Charterises. I believe money evaporates in the atmosphere.'

'Betting?' asked Honor, gasping and aghast.

'On my honour, I assure you not there,' cried Owen, eagerly, 'I never did bet there but once, and that was Lolly's doing; and I could not get out of it. Jew that she is! I wonder what Uncle Kit would say to that house now.'

'You are out of it, and I shall not regret the purchase of your disgust at their ways, Owen. It may be better for you to be in Ireland than to be tempted to go to them for the shooting season. How much do you want? You know, my dear, if there be anything else, I had rather pay anything that is right than have you in debt.'

'You were always the sweetest, best Honey living!' cried Owen, with much agitation; 'and it is a shame--' but there he stopped, and ended in a more ordinary tone--'shame to prey on you, as we both do, and with no better return.'

'Never mind, dear Owen,' she said, with moisture in her eye; 'your real happiness is the only return I want. Come, tell me your difficulty; most likely I can help you.'

'I've nothing to tell,' said Owen, with alarmed impetuosity; 'only that I'm a fool, like every one else, and--and--if you would only double that--'

'Double that! Owen, things cannot be right.'

'I told you they were not right,' was the impatient answer, 'or I should not be vexing you and myself; and,' as though to smooth away his rough commencement, 'what a comfort to have a Honey that will have patience!'

She shook her head, perplexed. 'Owen, I wish you could tell me more. I do not like debts. You know, dear boy, I grudge nothing I can do for you in my lifetime; but for your own sake you must learn not to spend more than you will be able to afford. Indulgence now will be a penance to you by and by.'

Honora dreaded overdoing lectures to Owen. She knew that an old maid's advice to a young man was dangerous work, and her boy's submissive patience always excited her gratitude and forbearance, so she desisted, in hopes of a confession, looking at him with such tenderness that he was moved to exclaim--'Honor dear, you are the best and worst-used woman on earth! Would to heaven that we had requited you better!'

'I have no cause of complaint against you, Owen,' she said, fondly; 'you have always been the joy and comfort of my heart;' and as he turned aside, as though stricken by the words, 'whatever you may have to reproach yourself with, it is not with hurting me; I only wish to remind you of higher and more stringent duties than those to myself. If you have erred, as I cannot but fear, will you not let me try and smooth the way back?'

'Impossible,' murmured Owen; 'there are things that can never be undone.'

'Not undone, but repented,' said Honor, convinced that he had been led astray by his cousin Charles, and felt bound not to expose him; 'so repented as to become stepping-stones in our progress.'

He only shook his head with a groan.

'The more sorrow, the better hope,' she began; but the impatient movement of his foot warned her that she was only torturing him, and she proceeded,--'Well, I trust you implicitly; I can understand that there may be confidences that ought not to pass between us, and will give you what you require to help you out of your difficulty. I wish you had a father, or any one who could be of more use to you, my poor boy!' and she began to fill up the cheque to the utmost of his demand.

'It is too much--too much,' cried Owen. 'Honor, I must tell you at all costs. What will you think when--'

'I do not wish to purchase a confession, Owen,' she said; 'you know best whether it be a fit one to make to me, or whether for the sake of others you ought to withhold it.'

He was checked, and did not answer.

'I see how it is,' continued Honor; 'my boy, as far as I am concerned, I look on your confession as made. You will be much alone while thus hovering near your sister among the mountains and by the streams. Let it be a time of reflection, and of making your peace with Another. You may do so the more earnestly for not having cast off the burthen on me. You are no child now, to whom your poor Honey's pardon almost seems an absolution. I sometimes think we went on with that too long.'

'No fear of my ever being a boy again,' said Owen, heavily, as he put the draft into his purse, and then bent his tall person to kiss her with the caressing fondness of his childhood, almost compensating for what his sister caused her to undergo.

Then, at the door, he turned to say, 'Remember, you would not hear.' He was gone, having left a thorn with Honor, in the doubt whether she ought not to have accepted his confidence; but her abstinence had been such a mortification both of curiosity and of hostility to the Charterises that she could not but commend herself for it. She had strong faith in the efficacy of trust upon an honourable mind, and though it was evident that Owen had, in his own eyes, greatly transgressed, she reserved the hope that his error was magnified by his own consciousness, and admired the generosity that refused to betray another. She believed his present suffering to be the beginning of that growth in true religion which is often founded on some shock leading to self-distrust.

Alas! how many falls have been counted by mothers as the preludes to rising again, like the clearing showers of a stormy day.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

Chapter VIII

Fearless she had tracked his feet To this rocky, wild retreat, And when morning met his view, Her mild glances met it too. Ah! your saints have cruel hearts, Sternly from his bed he starts, And with rude, repulsive shock, Hurls her from the beetling rock.--T. MOORE

The deed was done. Conventionalities were defied, vaunts fulfilled, and Lucilla sat on a camp-stool on the deck of a steamer, watching the Welsh mountains rise, grow dim, and vanish gradually.

Horatia, in common with all the rest of the womankind, was prostrate on the cabin floor, treating Cilly's smiles and roses as aggravations of her misery. Had there been a sharer in her exultation, the gay pitching and dancing of the steamer would have been charming to Lucy, but when she retreated from the scene of wretchedness below, she felt herself lonely, and was conscious of some surprise among the surviving gentlemen at her reappearance.

She took out a book as a protection, and read more continuously than she had done since Vanity Fair had come to the Holt, and she had been pleased to mark Honora's annoyance at every page she turned.

But the July light faded, and only left her the poor amusement of looking over the side for the phosphorescence of the water, and watching the smoke of the funnel lose itself overhead. The silent stars and sparkling waves would have set Phoebe's dutiful science on the alert, or transported Honor's inward ear by the chant of creation, but to her they were of moderate interest, and her imagination fell a prey to the memory of the eyes averted, and hand withdrawn. 'I'll be exemplary when this is over,' said she to herself, and at length her head nodded till she dropped into a giddy doze, whence with a chilly start she awoke, as the monotonous jog and bounce of the steamer were exchanged for a snort of arrival, among mysterious lanes of sparkling lights apparently rising from the waters.

She had slept just long enough to lose the lovely entrance of Dublin Bay, stiffen her limbs, and confuse her brains, and she stood still as the stream of passengers began to rush trampling by her, feeling bewildered and forlorn. Her cousin's voice was welcome, though over-loud and somewhat piteous. 'Where are you, stewardess? where's the young lady? Oh! Cilly, there you are. To leave me alone all this time, and here's the stewardess saying we must go ashore at once, or lose the train. Oh! the luggage, and I've lost my plaid,' and ghastly in the lamplight, limp and tottering, Rashe Charteris clasped her arm for support, and made her feel doubly savage and bewildered. Her first movement was to enjoin silence, then to gaze about for the goods. A gentleman took pity on the two ladies, and told them not to be deluded into trying to catch the train; there would be another in an hour's time, and if they had any one to meet them, they would most easily be found where they were.

'We have no one--we are alone,' said Lucilla; and his chivalry was so far awakened that he handed them to the pier, and undertook to find their boxes. Rashe was absolutely subdued, and hung shivering and helpless on her cousin, who felt as though dreaming in the strange scene of darkness made visible by the bright circles round the lamps, across which rapidly flitted the cloaked forms of travellers presiding over queer, wild, caricature-like shapes, each bending low under the weight of trunk or bag, in a procession like a magic lantern, save for the Babel of shrieks, cries, and expostulations everywhere in light or gloom.

A bell rang, an engine roared and rattled off. 'The train!' sighed Horatia; 'we shall have to stay here all night.'

'Nonsense,' said Lucy, ready to shake her; 'there is another in an hour. Stay quiet, do, or he will never find us.'

'Porter, ma'am--porrterr--'

'No, no, thank you,' cried Lucilla, darting on her rod-case and carriage-bag to rescue them from a freckled countenance with claws attached.

'We shall lose everything, Cilla; that's your trusting to a stranger!'

'All right; thank you!' as she recognized her possessions, borne on various backs towards the station, whither the traveller escorted them, and where things looked more civilized. Ratia began to resume her senses, though weak and hungry. She was sorely discomfited at having to wait, and could not, like the seasoned voyagers, settle herself to repose on the long leathern couches of the waiting-room, but wandered, woebegone and impatient, scolding her cousin for choosing such an hour for their passage, for her desertion and general bad management. The merry, good-natured Rashe had disappeared in the sea-sick, cross, and weary wight, whose sole solace was grumbling, but her dolefulness only made Lucilla more mirthful. Here they were, and happen what would, it should only be 'such fun.' Recovered from the moment's bewilderment, Lucy announced that she felt as if she were at a ball, and whispered a proposal of astonishing the natives by a polka in the great empty boarded space. 'The suggestion would immortalize us; come!' And she threatened mischievously to seize the waist of the still giddy and aching-headed Horatia, who repulsed her with sufficient roughness and alarm to set her off laughing at having been supposed to be in earnest.

The hurry of the train came at last; they hastened down-stairs and found the train awaiting them, were told their luggage was safe, and after sitting till they were tired, shot onwards watching the beautiful glimpses of the lights in the ships off Kingstown. They would gladly have gone on all night without another disembarkation and scramble, but the Dublin station came only too soon; they were disgorged, and hastened after goods. Forth came trunk and portmanteau. Alas! none of theirs! Nothing with them but two carriage-bags and two rod-cases!

'It seems to be a common predicament,' said Lucilla; 'here are at least half-a-dozen in the same case.'

'Horrible management. We shall never see it more.'

'Nay, take comfort in the general lot. It will turn up to-morrow; and meantime sleep is not packed up in our boxes. Come, let's be off. What noises! How do these drivers keep from running over one another. Each seems ready to whip every one's beast but his own. Don't you feel yourself in Ireland, Rashe? Arrah! I shall begin to scream too if I stand here much longer.'

'We can't go in that thing--a fly!'

'Don't exist here, Rashe--vermin is unknown. Submit to your fate--' and ere another objection could be uttered, Cilly threw bags and rods into an inside car, and pushed her cousin after them, chattering all the time, to poor Horatia's distraction. 'Oh! delicious! A cross between a baker's cart and a Van Amburgh. A little more and it would overbalance and carry the horse head over heels! Take care, Rashe; you'll pound me into dust if you slip down over me.'

'I can't help it! Oh! the vilest thing in creation.'

'Such fun! To be taken when well shaken. Here we go up, up, up; and here we go down, down, down! Ha! ware fishing-rod! This is what it is to travel. No one ever described the experiences of an inside car!'

'Because no one in their senses would undergo such misery!'

'But you don't regard the beauties, Rashe, beauties of nature and art combined--see the lights reflected in the river--what a width. Oh! why don't they treat the Thames as they do the Liffey?'

'I can't see, I shall soon be dead! and getting to an inn without luggage, it's not respectable.'

'If you depart this life on the way, the want of luggage will concern me the most, my dear. Depend on it, other people have driven up in inside cars, minus luggage, in the memory of man, in this City of Dublin. Are you such a worldling base as to depend for your respectability on a paltry leathern trunk?'

Lucilla's confidence did not appear misplaced, for neither waiters nor chambermaids seemed surprised, but assured them that people usually missed their luggage by that train, and asseverated that it would appear next morning.

Lucilla awoke determined to be full of frolic and enjoyment, and Horatia, refreshed by her night's rest, was more easily able to detect 'such fun' than on the previous night; so the two cousins sat down amicably to breakfast on the Sunday morning, and inquired about church-services.

'My mallard's tail hat is odd "go to meeting" head-gear,' said Cilla, 'but one cannot lapse into heathenism; so where, Rashe?'

'Wouldn't it be fun to look into a Roman Catholic affair?'

'No,' said Cilly, decidedly; 'where I go it shall be the genuine article. I don't like curiosities in religion.'

'It's a curiosity to go to church at twelve o'clock! If you are so orthodox, let us wait for St. Patrick's this afternoon.'

'And in the meantime? It is but eleven this minute, and St. Patrick's is not till three. There's nothing to be done but to watch Irish nature in the street. Oh! I never before knew the perfection of Carleton's illustration. See that woman and her cap, and the man's round eyebrows and projecting lips with shillelagh written on them. Would it be Sabbath-breaking to perpetrate a sketch?'

But as Ratia was advancing to the window, Lucy suddenly started back, seized her and whirled her away, crying, 'The wretch! I know him now! I could not make him out last night.'

'Who?' exclaimed Rashe, starting determinedly to the window, but detained by the two small but resolute hands clasped round her waist.

'That black-whiskered valet of Mr. Calthorp's. If that man has the insolence to dog me and spy me, I'll not stay in Ireland another day.'

'Oh, what fun!' burst out Horatia. 'It becomes romantic!'

'Atrocious impertinence!' said Lucilla, passionately. 'Why do you stand there laughing?'

'At you, my dear,' gasped Ratia, sinking on the sofa in her spasm of mirth. 'At your reception of chivalrous devotion.'

'Pretty chivalry to come and spy and beset ladies alone.'

'He has not beset us yet. Don't flatter yourself!'

'What do you mean by that, Horatia?'

'Do you want to try your pistols on me? The waiter could show us the way to the Fifteen Acres, only you see it is Sunday.'

'I want,' said Lucy, all tragedy and no comedy, 'to know why you talk of my flattering myself that I am insulted, and my plans upset.'

'Why?' said Rashe, a little sneeringly. 'Why, a little professed beauty like you would be so disappointed not to be pursued, that she is obliged to be always seeing phantoms that give her no peace.'

'Thank you,' coolly returned Cilly. 'Very well, I'll say no more about it, but if I find that man to be in Ireland, the same day I go home!'

Horatia gave a loud, long, provoking laugh. Lucilla felt it was for her dignity to let the subject drop, and betook herself to the only volumes attainable, Bradshaw and her book of flies; while Miss Charteris repaired to the window to investigate for herself the question of the pursuer, and made enlivening remarks on the two congregations, the one returning from mass, the other going to church, but these were not appreciated. It seemed as though the young ladies had but one set of spirits between them, which were gained by the one as soon as lost by the other.

It was rather a dull day. Fast as they were, the two girls shrank from rambling alone in streets thronged with figures that they associated with ruffianly destitution. Sunday had brought all to light, and the large handsome streets were beset with barefooted children, elf-locked women, and lounging, beetle-browed men, such as Lucy had only seen in the purlieus of Whittingtonia, in alleys looked into, but never entered by the civilized. In reality 'rich and rare' was so true that they might have walked there more secure from insult than in many better regulated regions, but it was difficult to believe so, especially in attire then so novel as to be very remarkable, and the absence of protection lost its charm when there was no one to admire the bravado.

She did her best to embalm it for future appreciation by journalizing, making the voyage out a far better joke than she had found it, and describing the inside car in the true style of the facetious traveller. Nothing so drives away fun as the desire to be funny, and she began to grow weary of her work, and disgusted at her own lumbering attempts at pen-and-ink mirth; but they sufficed to make Rashe laugh, they would be quite good enough for Lord William, would grievously annoy Honora Charlecote, would be mentioned in all the periodicals, and give them the name of the Angel Anglers all the next season. Was not that enough to go to Ireland and write a witty tour for?

The outside car took them to St. Patrick's, and they had their first real enjoyment in the lazy liveliness of the vehicle, and the droll ciceroneship of the driver, who contrived to convey such compliments to their pretty faces as only an Irishman could have given without offence.

Lucilla sprang down with exhilarated spirits, and even wished for Honor to share her indignation at the slovenliness around the cathedral, and the absence of close or cloister; nay, though she had taken an aversion to Strafford as a hero of Honor's, she forgave him, and resolved to belabour the House of Cork handsomely in her journal, when she beheld the six-storied monument, and imagined it, as he had found it, in the Altar's very place. 'Would that he had created an absolute Boylean vacuum!' What a grand bon mot for her journal!

However, either the spirit of indignation at the sight of the unkneeling congregation, or else the familiar words of the beautiful musical service, made her more than usually devout, and stirred up something within her that could only be appeased by the resolution that the singing in Robert Fulmort's parish should be super-excellent. After the service, the carman persuaded them to drive in the Phoenix Park, where they enjoyed the beautiful broken ground, the picturesque thickets, the grass whose colour reminded them that they were in the Emerald Isle, the purple outlines of the Wicklow hills, whence they thought they detected a fresh mountain breeze. They only wondered to find this delightful place so little frequented. In England, a Sunday would have filled it with holiday strollers, whereas here they only encountered a very few, and those chiefly gentlefolks. The populace preferred sitting on the doorsteps, or lounging against the houses, as if they were making studies of themselves for caricatures; and were evidently so much struck with the young ladies' attire, that the shelter of the hotel was gladly welcomed.

Lucilla was alone in the sitting-room when the waiter came to lay the cloth. He looked round, as if to secure secrecy, and then remarked in a low confidential voice, 'There's been a gentleman inquiring for you, ma'am.'

'Who was it?' said Lucy, with feigned coolness.

'It was when you were at church, ma'am; he wished to know whether two ladies had arrived here, Miss Charteris and Miss Sandbrook.'

'Did he leave his card?'

'He did not, ma'am, his call was to be a secret; he said it was only to be sure whether you had arrived.'

'Then he did not give his name?'

'He did, ma'am, for he desired to be let know what route the young ladies took when they left,' quoth the man, with a comical look, as though he were imparting a most delightful secret.

'Was he Mr. Calthorp?'

'I said I'd not mention his name,' said the waiter, with, however, such decided assent, that, as at the same moment he quitted the room and Horatia entered it, Cilly exclaimed, 'There, Rashe, what do you say now to the phantom of my vanity? Here has he been asking for us, and what route we meant taking.'

'He! Who?'

'Who?--why, who should it be? The waiter has just told me.'

'You absurd girl!'

'Well, ask him yourself.'

So when the waiter came up, Miss Charteris demanded, 'Has Mr. Calthorp been calling here?'

'What was the name, ma'am, if you please?'

'Calthorp. Has Mr. Calthorp been calling here?'

'Cawthorne? Was it Colonel Cawthorne, of the Royal Hussars, ma'am? He was here yesterday, but not to-day.'

'I said Calthorp. Has a Mr. Calthorp been inquiring for us to-day?'

'I have not heard, ma'am, I'll inquire,' said he, looking alert, and again disappearing, while Horatia looked as proud of herself as Cilly had done just before.

He came back again while Lucilla was repeating his communication, and assured Miss Charteris that no such person had called.

'Then, what gentleman has been here, making inquiries about us?'

'Gentleman! Indeed, ma'am, I don't understand your meaning.'

'Have you not been telling this young lady that a gentleman has been asking after us, and desiring to be informed what route we intended to take?'

'Ah, sure!' said the waiter, as if recollecting himself, 'I did mention it. Some gentleman did just ask me in a careless sort of way who the two beautiful young ladies might be, and where they were going. Such young ladies always create a sensation, as you must be aware, ma'am, and I own I did speak of it to the young lady, because I thought she had seen the attraction of the gentleman's eyes.'

So perfectly assured did he look, that Lucilla felt a moment's doubt whether her memory served her as to his former words, but just as she raised her eyes and opened her lips in refutation, she met a glance from him full of ludicrous reassurance, evidently meaning that he was guarding his own secret and hers. He was gone the next moment, and Horatia turned upon her with exultant merriment.

'I always heard that Ireland was a mendacious country,' said Cilly.

'And a country where people lose the use of their eyes and ears,' laughed Rashe. 'O what a foundation for the second act of the drama!'

'Of which the third will be my going home by the next steamer.'

'Because a stranger asked who we were?'

Each had her own interpretation of the double-faced waiter's assertion, and it served them to dispute upon all the evening.

Lucilla was persuaded that he imagined her an injured beauty, reft from her faithful adorer by her stern aunt or duenna, and that he considered himself to be doing her a kindness by keeping her informed of her hero's vicinity, while he denied it to her companion; but she scorned to enter into an explanation, or make any disavowal, and found the few displeased words she spoke were received with compassion, as at the dictation of the stern monitress.

Horatia, on the other hand, could not easily resign the comical version that Lucilla's inordinate opinion of her own attractions had made her imagine Mr. Calthorp's valet in the street, and discover his master in the chance inquirer whom the waiter had mentioned; and as Cilly could not aver that the man had actually told her in so many words that it was Mr. Calthorp, Horatia had a right to her opinion, and though she knew she had been a young lady a good many years, she could not easily adopt the suggestion that she could pass for Cilly's cruel duenna.

Lucilla grew sullen, and talked of going home by the next steamer; Rashe, far from ready for another sea voyage, called herself ill used, and represented the absurdity of returning on a false alarm. Cilla was staggered, and thought what it would be, if Mr. Calthorp, smoking his cigar at his club, heard that she had fled from his imaginary pursuit. Besides, the luggage must be recovered, so she let Horatia go on arranging for an excursion for the Monday, only observing that it must not be in Dublin.

'No, bonnets are needful there. What do you think of Howth and Ireland's Eye, the place where Kirwan murdered his wife?' said Rashe, with great gusto, for she had a strong turn for the horrid murders in the newspaper.

'Too near, and too smart,' sulked Lucy.

'Well then, Glendalough, that is wild, and far off enough, and may be done in a day from Dublin. I'll ring and find out.'

'Not from that man.'

'Oh! we shall see Calthorps peopling the hill-sides! Well, let us have the landlord.'

It was found that both the Devil's Glen and the Seven Churches might be visited if they started by the seven o'clock train, and returned late at night, and Lucilla agreeing, the evening went off as best it might, the cousins being glad to get out of each other's company at nine, that they might be up early the next morning. Lucy had not liked Ratia so little since the days of her infantine tyranny.

The morning, however, raised their spirits, and sent them off in a more friendly humour, enjoying the bustle and excitement that was meat and drink to them, and exclaiming at the exquisite views of sea and rugged coast along beautiful Kilmeny Bay. When they left the train, they were delighted with their outside car, and reclined on their opposite sides in enchantment with the fern-bordered lanes, winding between noble trees, between which came inviting glimpses of exquisitely green meadows and hill-sides. They stopped at a park-looking gate, leading to the Devil's Glen, which they were to traverse on foot, meeting the car at the other end.

Here there was just enough life and adventure to charm them, as they gaily trod the path, winding picturesquely beside the dashing, dancing, foaming stream, now between bare salient bluffs of dark rock, now between glades of verdant thicket, or bold shouldering slopes of purple heath and soft bent grass. They were constantly crying out with delight, as they bounded from one point of view to another, sometimes climbing among loose stones, leading between ferns and hazel stems to a well-planted hermitage, sometimes springing across the streamlet upon stepping-stones. At the end of the wood another lodge-gate brought them beyond the private grounds, that showed care, even in their rusticity, and they came out on the open hill-side in true mountain air, soft turf beneath their feet, the stream rushing away at the bottom of the slope, and the view closed in with blue mountains, on which the clouds marked purple shadows. This was freedom! this was enjoyment! this was worth the journey! and Cilla's elastic feet sprang along as if she had been a young kid. How much was delight in the scenery, how much in the scramble, need not be analyzed.

There was plenty of scrambling before it was over. A woman who had been lying in wait for tourists at the gate, guided them to the bend of the glen, where they were to climb up to pay their respects to the waterfall. The ascent was not far from perpendicular, only rendered accessible by the slope of fallen debris at the base, and a few steps cut out from one projecting rock to another, up to a narrow shelf, whence the cascade was to be looked down on. The more adventurous spirits went on to a rock overhanging the fall, and with a curious chink or cranny, forming a window with a seat, and called King O'Toole's chair. Each girl perched herself there, and was complimented on her strong head and active limbs, and all their powers were needed in the long breathless pull up craggy stepping-stones, then over steep slippery turf, ere they gained the summit of the bank. Spent, though still gasping out, 'such fun!' they threw themselves on their backs upon the thymy grass, and lay still for several seconds ere they sat up to look back at the thickly-wooded ravine, winding crevice-like in and out between the overlapping skirts of the hills, whose rugged heads cut off the horizon. Then merrily sharing the first instalment of luncheon with their barefooted guide, they turned their faces onwards, where all their way seemed one bare gray moor, rising far off into the outline of Luggela, a peak overhanging the semblance of a crater.

Nothing afforded them much more mirth than a rude bridge, consisting of a single row of square-headed unconnected posts, along the heads of which Cilla three times hopped backwards and forwards for the mere drollery of the thing, with vigour unabated by the long walk over the dreary moorland fields with their stone walls.

By the side of the guide's cabin the car awaited them, and mile after mile they drove on through treeless wastes, the few houses with their thatch anchored down by stones, showing what winds must sweep along those unsheltered tracts. The desolate solitude began to weary the volatile pair into silence; ere the mountains rose closer to them, they crossed a bridge over a stony stream begirt with meadows, and following its course came into sight of their goal.

Here was Glendalough, a cul de sac between the mountains, that shelved down, enclosing it on all sides save the entrance, through which the river issued. Their summits were bare, of the gray stone that lay in fragments everywhere, but their sides were clothed with the lovely Irish green pasture-land, intermixed with brushwood and trees, and a beauteous meadow surrounded the white ring-like beach of pure white sand and pebbles bordering the outer lake, whose gray waters sparkled in the sun. Its twin lake, divided from it by so narrow a belt of ground, that the white beaches lay on their green setting, like the outline of a figure of 8, had a more wild and gloomy aspect, lying deeper within the hollow, and the hills coming sheer down on it at the further end in all their grayness unsoftened by any verdure. The gray was that of absolute black and white intermingled in the grain of the stone, and this was peculiarly gloomy, but in the summer sunshine it served but to set off the brilliance of the verdure, and the whole air of the valley was so bright that Cilly declared that it had been traduced, and that no skylark of sense need object thereto.

Losing sight of the lakes as they entered the shabby little town, they sprang off the car before a small inn, and ere their feet were on the ground were appropriated by one of a shoal of guides, in dress and speech an ultra Irishman, exaggerating his part as a sort of buffoon for the travellers. Rashe was diverted by his humours; Cilla thought them in bad taste, and would fain have escaped from his brogue and his antics, with some perception that the scene ought to be left to make its impression in peace.

Small peace, however, was there among the scores of men, women, and children within the rude walls containing the most noted relics; all beset the visitors with offers of stockings, lace, or stones from the hills; and the chatter of the guide was a lesser nuisance for which she was forced to compound for the sake of his protection. When he had cleared away his compatriots, she was able to see the remains of two of the Seven Churches, the Cathedral, and St. Kevin's Kitchen, both of enduring gray stone, covered with yellow lichen, which gave a remarkable golden tint to their extreme old age. Architecture there was next to none. St. Kevin's so-called kitchen had a cylindrical tower, crowned by an extinguisher, and within the roofless walls was a flat stone, once the altar, and still a station for pilgrims; and the cathedral contained two broken coffin-lids with floriated crosses, but it was merely four rude roofless walls, enclosing less space than a cottage kitchen, and less ornamental than many a barn. The whole space was encumbered with regular modern headstones, ugly as the worst that English graveyards could show, and alternating between the names of Byrne and O'Toole, families who, as the guide said, would come 'hundreds of miles to lie there.' It was a grand thought, that those two lines, in wealth or in poverty, had been constant to that one wild mountain burying-place, in splendour or in ruin, for more than twelve centuries.

Here, some steps from the cathedral on the top of the slope was the chief grandeur of the view. A noble old carved granite cross, eight or ten feet high, stood upon the brow, bending slightly to one side, and beyond lay the valley cherishing its treasure of the twin lakelets, girt in by the band across them, nestled in the soft lining of copsewood and meadow, and protected by the lofty massive hills above. In front, but below, and somewhat to the right, lay another enclosure, containing the ivied gable of St. Mary's Church, and the tall column-like Round Tower, both with the same peculiar golden hoariness. The sight struck Lucilla with admiration and wonder, but the next moment she heard the guide exhorting Rashe to embrace the stem of the cross, telling her that if she could clasp her arms round it, she would be sure of a handsome and rich husband within the year.

Half superstitious, and always eager for fun, Horatia spread her arms in the endeavour, but her hands could not have met without the aid of the guide, who dragged them together, and celebrated the exploit with a hurrah of congratulation, while she laughed triumphantly, and called on her companion to try her luck. But Lucy was disgusted, and bluntly refused, knowing her grasp to be far too small, unable to endure the touch of the guide, and maybe shrinking from the failure of the augury.

'Ah! to be shure, an' it's not such a purty young lady as yourself that need be taking the trouble,' did not fall pleasantly on her ears, and still less Ratia's laugh and exclamation, 'You make too sure, do you? Have a care. There were black looks at parting! But you need not be afraid, if handsome be a part of the spell.'

There was no answer, and Horatia saw that the outspoken raillery that Cilly had once courted now gave offence. She guessed that something was amiss, but did not know that what had once been secure had been wilfully imperilled, and that suspense was awakening new feelings of delicacy and tenderness.

The light words and vulgar forecasting had, in spite of herself, transported Lucilla from the rocky thicket where she was walking, even to the cedar room at Woolstone-lane, and conjured up before her that grave, massive brow, and the eye that would not meet her. She had hurried to these wilds to escape that influence, and it was holding her tighter than ever. To hasten home on account of Mr. Calthorp's pursuit would be the most effectual vindication of the feminine dignity that she might have impaired in Robert's eyes, but to do this on what Ratia insisted on believing a false alarm would be the height of absurdity. She was determined on extracting proofs sufficient to justify her return, and every moment seemed an hour until she could feel herself free to set her face homewards. A strange impatience seized her at every spot where the guide stopped them to admire, and Ratia's encouragement of his witticisms provoked her excessively.

With a kind of despair she found herself required, before taking boat for St. Kevin's Cave, to mount into a wood to admire another waterfall.

'See two waterfalls,' she muttered, 'and you have seen them all. There are only two kinds, one a bucket of water thrown down from the roof of a house, the other over a staircase. Either the water was a fiction, or you can't get at them for the wet!'

'That was a splendid fellow at the Devil's Glen.'

'There's as good a one any day at the lock on the canal at home! only we do not delude people into coming to see it. Up such places, too!'

'Cilly, for shame. What, tired and giving in?'

'Not tired in the least; only this place is not worth getting late for the train.'

'Will the young lady take my hand? I'd be proud to have the honour of helping her up,' said the guide. But Lucilla disdainfully rejected his aid, and climbed among the stones and brushwood aloof from the others, Ratia talking in high glee to the Irishman, and adventurously scrambling.

'Cilly, here it is,' she cried, from beneath a projecting elbow of rock; 'you look down on it. It's a delicious fall. I declare one can get into it;' and, by the aid of a tree, she lowered herself down on a flat stone, whence she could see the cascade better than above. 'This is stunning. I vow one can get right into the bed of the stream right across. Don't be slow, Cilly; this is the prime fun of all!'

'You care for the romp and nothing else,' grumbled Lucilla. That boisterous merriment was hateful to her, when feeling that the demeanour of gentlewomen must be their protection, and with all her high spirit, she was terrified lest insult or remark should be occasioned. Her signs of remonstrance were only received with a derisive outburst, as Rashe climbed down into the midst of the bed of the stream. 'Come, Cilla, or I shall indite a page in the diary, headed Faint heart--Ah!' as her foot slipped on the stones, and she fell backwards, but with instant efforts at rising, such as assured her cousin that no harm was done, 'Nay, Nonsensical clambering will be the word,' she said.

'Serves you right for getting into such places! What! hurt!' as Horatia, after resting in a sitting posture, tried to get up, but paused, with a cry.

'Nothing,' she said, 'I'll--' but another attempt ended in the same way. Cilla sprang to her, followed by the guide, imprecating bad luck to the slippery stones. Herself standing in the water, Lucilla drew her cousin upright, and with a good deal of help from the guide, and much suffering, brought her up the high bank, and down the rough steep descent through the wood.

She had given her back and side a severe twist, but she moved less painfully on more level ground, and, supported between Lucilla and the guide, whom the mischance had converted from a comedy clown to a delicately considerate assistant, she set out for the inn where the car had been left. The progress lasted for two doleful hours, every step worse than the last, and, much exhausted, she at length sank upon the sofa in the little sitting-room of the inn.

The landlady was urgent that the wet clothes should be taken off; and the back rubbed with whiskey, but Cilla stood agitating her small soaked foot, and insisting that the car should come round at once, since the wet had dried on them, and they had best lose no time in returning to Dublin, or at least to Bray.

But Rashe cried out that the car would be the death of her; she could not stir without a night's rest.

'And be all the stiffer to-morrow? Once on the car, you will be very comfortable--'

'Oh, no! I can't! This is a horrid place. Of all the unlucky things that could have happened--'

'Then,' said Cilla, fancying a little coercion would be wholesome, 'don't be faint-hearted. You will be glad to-morrow that I had the sense to make you move to-day. I shall order the car.'

'Indeed!' cried Horatia, her temper yielding to pain and annoyance; 'you seem to forget that this expedition is mine! I am paymaster, and have the only right to decide.'

Lucilla felt the taunt base, as recalling to her the dependent position into which she had carelessly rushed, relying on the family feeling that had hitherto made all things as one. 'Henceforth,' said she, 'I take my share of all that we spend. I will not sell my free will.'

'So you mean to leave me here alone?' said Horatia, with positive tears of pain, weariness, and vexation at the cruel unfriendliness of the girl she had petted.

'Nonsense! I must abide by your fate. I only hate to see people chicken-hearted, and thought you wanted shaking up. I stay so long as you own me an independent agent.'

The discussion was given up, when it was announced that a room was ready; and Rashe underwent so much in climbing the stairs, that Cilly thought she could not have been worse on the car.

The apartment was not much behind that at the village inn at Hiltonbury. In fact, it had gay curtains and a grand figured blind, but the door at the Charlecote Arms had no such independent habits of opening, the carpet would have been whole, and the chairs would not have creaked beneath Lucy's grasshopper weight; when down she sat in doleful resignation, having undressed her cousin, sent her chaussure to dry, and dismissed the car, with a sense of bidding farewell to the civilized world, and entering a desert island, devoid of the zest of Robinson Crusoe.

What an endless evening it was, and how the ladies detested each other! There lay Horatia, not hurt enough for alarm, but quite cross enough to silence pity, suffering at every move, and sore at Cilly's want of compassion; and here sat Lucilla, thoroughly disgusted with her cousin, her situation, and her expedition. Believing the strain a trifle, she not unjustly despised the want of resolution that had shrunk from so expedient an exertion as the journey, and felt injured by the selfish want of consideration that had condemned her to this awkward position in this forlorn little inn, without even the few toilette necessaries that they had with them at Dublin, and with no place to sit in, for the sitting-room below stairs served as a coffee-room, where sundry male tourists were imbibing whiskey, the fumes of which ascended to the young ladies above, long before they could obtain their own meal.

The chops were curiosities; and as to the tea, the grounds, apparently the peat of the valley, filled up nearly an eighth of the cup, causing Lucilla in lugubrious mirth to talk of 'That lake whose gloomy tea, ne'er saw Hyson nor Bohea,' when Rashe fretfully retorted, 'It is very unkind in you to grumble at everything, when you know I can't help it!'

'I was not grumbling, I only wanted to enliven you.'

'Queer enlivenment!'

Nor did Lucilla's attempts at body curing succeed better. Her rubbing only evoked screeches, and her advice was scornfully rejected. Horatia was a determined homoeopath, and sighed for the globules in her wandering box, and as whiskey and tobacco both became increasingly fragrant, averred again and again that nothing should induce her to stay here another night.

Nothing? Lucilla found her in the morning in all the aches and flushes of a feverish cold, her sprain severely painful, her eyes swollen, her throat so sore, that in alarm Cilly besought her to send for advice; but Rashe regarded a murderous allopathist as near akin to an executioner, and only bewailed the want of her minikin doses.

Giving up the hope of an immediate departure, Lucilla despatched a messenger to Bray, thence to telegraph for the luggage; and the day was spent in fears lest their landlord at Dublin might detain their goods as those of suspicious characters.

Other excitement there was none, not even in quarrelling, for Rashe was in a sleepy state, only roused by interludes of gloomy tea and greasy broth; and outside, the clouds had closed down, such clouds as she had never seen, blotting out lake and mountain with an impervious gray curtain, seeming to bathe rather than to rain on the place. She longed to dash out into it, but Ratia's example warned her against drenching her only garments, though indoors the dryness was only comparative. Everything she touched, herself included, seemed pervaded by a damp, limp rawness, that she vainly tried to dispel by ordering a fire. The turf smouldered, the smoke came into the room, and made their eyes water, and Rashe insisted that the fire should be put out.

Cilla almost envied her sleep, as she sat disconsolate in the window, watching the comparative density of the rain, and listening to the extraordinary howls and shrieks in the town, which kept her constantly expecting that a murder or a rebellion would come to relieve the monotony of the day, till she found that nothing ensued, and no one took any notice.

She tried to sketch from memory, but nothing would hinder that least pleasant of occupations--thought. Either she imagined every unpleasant chance of detention, she worried herself about Robert Fulmort, or marvelled what Mr. Prendergast and the censorious ladies would do with Edna Murrell. Many a time did she hold her watch to her ear, suspecting it of having stopped, so slowly did it loiter through the weary hours. Eleven o'clock when she hoped it was one--half-past two when it felt like five.

By real five, the mist was thinner, showing first nearer, then remoter objects; the coarse slates of the roofs opposite emerged polished and dripping, and the cloud finally took its leave, some heavy flakes, like cotton wool, hanging on the hill-side, and every rock shining, every leaf glistening. Verdure and rosy cheeks both resulted from a perpetual vapour-bath.

Lucilla rejoiced in her liberty, and hurried out of doors, but leaning out of the coffee-room window, loungers were seen who made her sensible of the awkwardness of her position, and she looked about for yesterday's guide as a friend, but he was not at hand, and her uneasy gaze brought round her numbers, begging or offering guidance. She wished to retreat, but would not, and walked briskly along the side of the valley opposite to that she had yesterday visited, in search of the other four churches. Two fragments were at the junction of the lakes, another was entirely destroyed, but the last, called the Abbey, stood in ruins within the same wall as the Round Tower, which rose straight, round, mysterious, defying inquiry, as it caught the evening light on its summit, even as it had done for so many centuries past.

Not that Cilla thought of the riddles of that tower, far less of the early Christianity of the isle of saints, of which these ruins and their wild legend were the only vestiges, nor of the mysticism that planted clusters of churches in sevens as analogous to the seven stars of the Apocalypse. Even the rugged glories of the landscape chiefly addressed themselves to her as good to sketch, her highest flight in admiration of the picturesque. In the state of mind ascribed to the ancients, she only felt the weird unhomelikeness of the place, as though she were at the ends of the earth, unable to return, and always depressed by solitude; she could have wept. Was it for this that she had risked the love that had been her own from childhood, and broken with the friend to whom her father had commended her? Was it worth while to defy their censures for this dreary spot, this weak-spirited, exacting, unrefined companion, and the insult of Mr. Calthorp's pursuit?

Naturally shrewd, well knowing the world, and guarded by a real attachment, Lucilla had never regarded the millionaire's attentions as more than idle amusement in watching the frolics of a beauty, and had suffered them as adding to her own diversion; but his secretly following her, no doubt to derive mirth from her proceedings, revealed to her that woman could not permit such terms without loss of dignity, and her cheek burnt at the thought of the ludicrous light in which he might place her present predicament before a conclave of gentlemen.

The thought was intolerable. To escape it by rapid motion, she turned hastily to leave the enclosure. A figure was climbing over the steps in the wall with outstretched hand, as if he expected her to cling to him, and Mr. Calthorp, springing forward, eagerly exclaimed in familiar, patronizing tones, 'Miss Sandbrook! They told me you were gone this way.' Then, in a very different voice at the unexpected look and bow that he encountered: 'I hope Miss Charteris's accident is not serious.'

'Thank you, not serious,' was the freezing reply.

'I am glad. How did it occur?'

'It was a fall.' He should have no good story wherewith to regale his friends.

'Going on well, I trust? Chancing to be at Dublin, I heard by accident you were here, and fearing that there might be a difficulty, I ran down in the hope of being of service to you.'

'Thank you,' in the least thankful of tones.

'Is there nothing I can do for you?'

'Thank you, nothing.'

'Could I not obtain some advice for Miss Charteris?'

'Thank you, she wishes for none.'

'I am sure'--he spoke eagerly--'that in some way I could be of use to you. I shall remain at hand. I cannot bear that you should be alone in this remote place.'

'Thank you, we will not put you to inconvenience. We intended to be alone.'

'I see you esteem it a great liberty,' said poor Mr. Calthorp; 'but you must forgive my impulse to see whether I could be of any assistance to you. I will do as you desire, but at least you will let me leave Stefano with you; he is a fellow full of resources, who would make you comfortable here, and me easy about you.'

'Thank you, we require no one.'

Those 'thank you's' were intolerable, but her defensive reserve and dignity attracted the gentleman more than all her dashing brilliancy, and he became more urgent. 'You cannot ask me to leave you entirely to yourselves under such circumstances.'

'I more than ask it, I insist upon it. Good morning.'

'Miss Sandbrook, do not go till you have heard and forgiven me.'

'I will not hear you, Mr. Calthorp. This is neither the time nor place,' said Lucilla, inly more and more perturbed, but moving along with slow, quiet steps, and betraying no emotion. 'The object of our journey was totally defeated by meeting any of our ordinary acquaintance, and but for this mischance I should have been on my way home to-day.'

'Oh! Miss Sandbrook, do you class me among your ordinary acquaintance?'

It was all she could do to hinder her walk from losing its calm slowness, and before she could divest her intended reply of undignified sharpness, he continued: 'Who could have betrayed my presence? But for this, I meant that you should never have been aware that I was hovering near to watch over you.'

'Yes, to collect good stories for your club.'

'This is injustice! Flagrant injustice, Miss Sandbrook! Will you not credit the anxiety that irresistibly impelled me to be ever at hand in case you should need a protector?'

'No,' was the point-blank reply.

'How shall I convince you?' he cried, vehemently. 'What have I done that you should refuse to believe in the feelings that prompted me?'

'What have you done?' said Lucilla, whose blood was up. 'You have taken a liberty, which is the best proof of what your feelings are, and every moment that you force your presence on me adds to the offence!'

She saw that she had succeeded. He stood still, bowed, and answered not, possibly deeming this the most effective means of recalling her; but from first to last he had not known Lucilla Sandbrook.

The eager, protecting familiarity of his first address had given her such a shock that she felt certain that she had no guard but herself from positively insulting advances; and though abstaining from all quickening of pace, her heart throbbed violently in the fear of hearing him following her, and the inn was a haven of refuge.

She flew up to her bedroom to tear about like a panther, as if by violence to work down the tumult in her breast. She had proved the truth of Honora's warning, that beyond the pale of ordinary convenances, a woman is exposed to insult, and however sufficient she may be for her own protection, the very fact of having to defend herself is well-nigh degradation. It was not owning the error. It was the agony of humiliation, not the meekness of humility, and she was as angry with Miss Charlecote for the prediction as with Mr. Calthorp for having fulfilled it, enraged with Horatia, and desperate at her present imprisoned condition, unable to escape, and liable to be still haunted by her enemy.

At last she saw the discomfited swain re-enter the inn, his car come round, and finally drive off with him; and then she felt what a blank was her victory. If she breathed freely, it was at the cost of an increased sense of solitude and severance from the habitable world.

Hitherto she had kept away from her cousin, trusting that the visit might remain a secret, too mortifying to both parties to be divulged, but she found Horatia in a state of eager anticipation, awakened from the torpor to watch for tidings of a happy conclusion to their difficulties, and preparing jests on the pettish ingratitude with which she expected Lucilla to requite the services that would be nevertheless accepted.

Gone! Sent away! Not even commissioned to find the boxes. Horatia's consternation and irritation knew no bounds. Lucilla was no less indignant that she could imagine it possible to become dependent on his good offices, or to permit him to remain in the neighbourhood. Rashe angrily scoffed at her newborn scruples, and complained of her want of consideration for herself. Cilla reproached her cousin with utter absence of any sense of propriety and decorum. Rashe talked of ingratitude, and her sore throat being by this time past conversation, she came to tears. Cilla, who could not bear to see any one unhappy, tried many a 'never mind,' many a 'didn't mean,' many a fair augury for the morrow, but all in vain, and night came down upon the Angel Anglers more forlorn and less friendly than ever; and with all the invalid's discomforts so much aggravated by the tears and the altercation, that escape from this gloomy shore appeared infinitely remote.

There was an essential difference of tone of mind between those brought up at Hiltonbury or at Castle Blanch, and though high spirits had long concealed the unlikeness, it had now been made bare, and Lucy could not conquer her disgust and disappointment.

Sunshine was on Luggela, and Horatia's ailments were abating, so, as her temper was not alleviated, Lucilla thought peace would be best preserved by sallying out to sketch. A drawing from behind the cross became so engrossing that she was sorry to find it time for the early dinner, and her artistic pride was only allayed by the conviction that she should always hate what recalled Glendalough.

Rashe was better, and was up and dressed. Hopes of departure produced amity, and they were almost lively over their veal broth, when sounds of arrival made Lucilla groan at the prospect of cockney tourists obstructing the completion of her drawing.

'There's a gentleman asking to see you, Miss.'

'I can see no one.'

'Cilla, now do.'

'Tell him I cannot see him,' repeated Lucy, imperiously.

'How can you be so silly? he may have heard of our boxes.'

'I would toss them into the lake rather than take them from him.'

'Eh! pray let me be present when you perform the ceremony! Cilla in the heroics! Whom is she expecting?' said a voice outside the door, ever ajar, a voice that made Lucilla clasp her hands in ecstasy.

'You, Owen! come in,' cried Horatia, writhing herself up.

'Owen, old Owen! that's right,' burst from Cilla, as she sprang to him.

'Right! Ah! that is not the greeting I expected; I was thinking how to guard my eyes. So, you have had enough of the unprotected dodge! What has Rashe been doing to herself? A desperate leap down the falls of Niagara.'

Horatia was diffuse in the narration; but, after the first, Lucy did not speak. She began by arming herself against her brother's derision, but presently felt perplexed by detecting on his countenance something unwontedly grave and preoccupied. She was sure that his attention was far away from Rashe's long story, and she abruptly interrupted it with, 'How came you here, Owen?'

He did not seem to hear, and she demanded, 'Is anything the matter? Are you come to fetch us because any one is ill?'

Starting, he said, 'No, oh no!'

'Then what brought you here? a family council, or Honor Charlecote?'

'Honor Charlecote,' he repeated mistily: then, making an effort, 'Yes, good old soul, she gave me a vacation tour on condition that I should keep an eye on you. Go on, Rashe; what were you saying?'

'Didn't you hear me, Owen? Why, Calthorp, the great Calthorp, is in our wake. Cilly is frantic.'

'Calthorp about!' exclaimed Owen, with a start of dismay. 'Where?'

'I've disposed of him,' quoth Lucilla; 'he'll not trouble us again.'

'Which way is he gone?'

'I would not tell you if I knew.'

'Don't be such an idiot,' he petulantly answered; 'I want nothing of the fellow, only to know whether he is clean gone. Are you sure whether he went by Bray?'

'I told you I neither knew nor cared.'

'Could you have believed, Owen,' said Rashe, plaintively, 'that she was so absurd as never even to tell him to inquire for our boxes?'

'Owen knows better;' but Lucilla stopped, surprised to see that his thoughts were again astray. Giving a constrained smile, he asked, 'Well, what next?'

'To find our boxes,' they answered in a breath.

'Your boxes? Didn't I tell you I've got them here?'

'Owen, you're a trump,' cried Rashe.

'How on earth did you know about them?' inquired his sister.

'Very simply; crossed from Liverpool yesterday, reconnoitred at your hotel, was shown your telegram, went to the luggage-office, routed out that the things were taking a gentle tour to Limerick, got them back this morning, and came on. And what are you after next?'

'Home,' jerked out Lucy, without looking up, thinking how welcome he would have been yesterday, without the goods.

'Yes, home,' said Horatia. 'This abominable sprain will hinder my throwing a line, or jolting on Irish roads, and if Cilla is to be in agonies when she sees a man on the horizon, we might as well never have come.'

'Will you help me to carry home this poor invalid warrior, Owen?' said Lucilla; 'she will permit you.'

'I'll put you into the steamer,' said Owen; 'but you see, I have made my arrangements for doing Killarney and the rest of it.'

'I declare,' said Rashe, recovering benevolence with comfort, 'if they would send Scott from the castle to meet me at Holyhead, Cilly might as well go on with you. You would be sufficient to keep off the Calthorps.'

'I'm afraid that's no go,' hesitated Owen. 'You see I had made my plans, trusting to your bold assertions that you would suffer no one to approach.'

'Oh! never mind. It was no proposal of mine. I've had enough of Ireland,' returned Lucy, somewhat aggrieved.

'How soon shall you be sufficiently repaired for a start, Ratia?' asked Owen, turning quickly round to her. 'To-morrow? No! Well, I'll come over and see.'

'Going away?' cried the ladies, by no means willing to part with their guardian.

'Yes, I must. Expecting that we should be parallels never meeting, I had to provide for myself.'

'I see,' said Rashe; 'he has a merry party at Newragh Bridge, and will sit up over whist and punch till midnight!'

'You don't pretend to put yourselves in competition,' said he, snatching at the idea hastily.

'Oh! no,' said his sister, with an annoyed gesture. 'I never expect you to prefer me and my comfort to any one.'

'Indeed, Cilla, I'm sorry,' he answered gently, but in perplexity, 'but I never reckoned on being wanted, and engagements are engagements.'

'I'm sure I don't want you when anything pleasanter is going forward,' she answered, with vexation in her tone.

'I'll be here by eleven or twelve,' he replied, avoiding the altercation; 'but I must get back now. I shall be waited for.'

'Who is it that can't wait?' asked Rashe.

'Oh! just an English acquaintance of mine. There, goodbye. I wish I had come in time to surprise the modern St. Kevin! Are you sure there was no drowning in the lake?'

'You know it was blessed to drown no one after Kathleen.'

'Reassuring! Only mind you put a chapter about it into the tour.' Under the cover of these words he was gone.

'I declare there's some mystery about his companion!' exclaimed Horatia. 'Suppose it were Calthorp himself?'

'Owen is not so lost to respect for his sister.'

'But did you not see how little he was surprised, and how much preoccupied?'

'Very likely; but no one but you could imagine him capable of such an outrage.'

'You have been crazy ever since you entered Ireland, and expect every one else to be the same. Seriously, what damage did you anticipate from a little civility?'

'If you begin upon that, I shall go out and finish my sketch, and not unpack one of the boxes.'

Nevertheless, Lucilla spent much fretting guesswork on her cousin's surmise. She relied too much on Owen's sense of propriety to entertain the idea that he could be forwarding a pursuit so obviously insolent, but a still wilder conjecture had been set afloat in her mind. Could the nameless one be Robert Fulmort? Though aware of the anonymous nature of brother's friends, the secrecy struck her as unusually guarded; and to one so used to devotion, it seemed no extraordinary homage that another admirer should be drawn along at a respectful distance, a satellite to her erratic course; nay, probably all had been concerted in Woolstone-lane, and therewith the naughty girl crested her head, and prepared to take offence. After all, it could not be, or why should Owen have been bent on returning, and be so independent of her? Far more probably he had met a college friend or a Westminster schoolfellow, some of whom were in regiments quartered in Ireland, and on the morrow would bring him to do the lions of Glendalough, among which might be reckoned the Angel Anglers!

That possibility might have added some grains to the satisfaction of making a respectable toilette next day. Certain it is that Miss Sandbrook's mountain costume was an exquisite feat of elaborate simplicity, and that the completion of her sketch was interrupted by many a backward look down the pass, and many a contradictory mood, sometimes boding almost as harsh a reception for Robert as for Mr. Calthorp, sometimes relenting in the thrill of hope, sometimes accusing herself of arrant folly, and expecting as a pis aller the diversion of dazzling and tormenting an Oxonian, or a soldier or two! Be the meeting what it might, she preferred that it should be out of Horatia's sight, and so drew on and on to the detriment of her distances.

Positively it was past twelve, and the desire to be surprised unconcernedly occupied could no longer obviate her restlessness, so she packed up her hair-pencil, and, walking back to the inn, found Rashe in solitary possession of the coffee-room.

'You have missed him, Cilly.'

'Owen? No one else?'

'No, not the Calthorp; I am sorry for you.'

'But who was here? tell me, Rashe.'

'Owen, I tell you,' repeated Horatia, playing with her impatience.

'Tell me; I will know whether he has any one with him.'

'Alack for your disappointment, for the waste of that blue bow; not a soul came here but himself.'

'And where is he? how did I miss him?' said Lucilla, forcibly repressing the mortification for which her cousin was watching.

'Gone. As I was not in travelling trim, and you not forthcoming, he could not wait; but we are to be off to-morrow at ten o'clock.'

'Why did he not come out to find me? Did you tell him I was close by?'

'He had to join his friend, and go to the Vale of Avoca. I've found out the man, Cilla. No, don't look so much on the qui vive; it's only Jack Hastings!'

'Jack Hastings!' said Lucilla, her looks fallen. 'No wonder he would not bring him here.'

'Why not, poor fellow? I used to know him very well before he was up the spout.'

'I wish Owen had not fallen in with him,' said the sister, gravely. 'Are you certain it is so, Rashe?'

'I taxed him with it, and he did not deny it; only put it from him, laughing. What's the harm? Poor Jack was always a good-natured, honourable fellow, uncommonly clever and amusing--a well-read man, too; and Owen is safe enough--no one could try to borrow of him.'

'What would Honor's feelings be?' said Lucilla, with more fellow-feeling for her than for months past. Lax as was the sister's tolerance, she was startled at his becoming the associate of an avowedly loose character under the stigma of the world, and with perilous abilities and agreeableness; and it was another of Horatia's offences against proper feeling, not only to regard such evil communications with indifference, but absolutely to wish to be brought into contact with a person of this description in their present isolated state. Displeased and uneasy, Lucilla assumed the role of petulance and quarrelsomeness for the rest of the day, and revenged herself to the best of her abilities upon Rashe and Owen, by refusing to go to inspect the scene of Kathleen's fatal repulse.

True to his appointment, Owen arrived alone on a car chosen with all regard to Horatia's comfort, and was most actively attentive in settling on it the ladies and their luggage, stretching himself out on the opposite side, his face raised to the clouds, as he whistled an air; but his eye was still restless, and his sister resolved on questioning him.

Opportunities were, however, rare; whether or not with the design of warding off a tete-a-tete, he devoted himself to his cousin's service in a manner rare to her since she had laid herself out to be treated as though her name were Horace instead of Horatia. However, Lucilla was not the woman to be balked of a settled purpose; and at their hotel, at Dublin, she nailed him fast by turning back on him when Horatia bade them good night. 'Well, what do you want?' he asked, annoyed.

'I want to speak to you.'

'I hope it is to beg me to write to ask Honor to receive you at home, and promise to behave like a decent and respectable person.'

'I want neither a judge nor an intercessor in you.'

'Come, Lucy, it really would be for every one's good if you would go and take care of poor Honor. You have been using her vilely, and I should think you'd had enough of Rashe for one while.'

'If I have used her vilely, at least I have dealt openly by her,' said Lucilla. 'She has always seen the worst of me on the surface. Can you bear to talk of her when you know how you are treating her?'

He coloured violently, and his furious gesture would have intimidated most sisters; but she stood her ground, and answered his stammering demand what she dared to imply.

'You may go into a passion, but you cannot hinder me from esteeming it shameful to make her mission a cover for associating with one whom she would regard with so much horror as Jack Hastings.'

'Jack Hastings!' cried Owen, to her amazement, bursting into a fit of laughter, loud, long, and explosive. 'Well done, Rashe!'

'You told her so!'

'She told me so, and one does not contradict a lady.'

'Something must have put it into her head.'

'Only to be accounted for by an unrequited attachment,' laughed Owen; 'depend on it, a comparison of dates would show Hastings's incarceration to have been the epoch of Rashe's taking to the high masculine line--

'"If e'er she loved, 'twas him alone Who lived within the jug of stone."'

'For shame, Owen; Rashe never was in love.'

But he went on laughing at Rashe's disappointment at his solitary arrival till she said, tartly, 'You cannot wonder at our thinking you must have some reason for neither mentioning your companion's name nor bringing him with you.'

'In fact, no man not under a cloud could abstain from paying homage to the queen of the anglers.'

It was so true as to raise an angry spot on her cheek, and provoke the hasty excuse, 'It would have been obvious to have brought your friend to see your cousin and sister.'

'One broken-backed, both unwashed! O, the sincerity of the resistance I overheard! No gentleman admitted, forsooth! O, for a lodge in some vast wilderness! Yes; St. Anthony would have found it a wilderness indeed without his temptations. What would St. Dunstan have been minus the black gentleman's nose, or St. Kevin but for Kathleen? It was a fortunate interposition that Calthorp turned up the day before I came, or I might have had to drag the lake for you.'

This personal attack only made her persist. 'It was very different when we were alone or with you; you know very well that there could have been no objection.'

'No objection on your side, certainly, so I perceive; but suppose there were no desire on the other?'

'Oh!' in a piqued voice, 'I know many men don't care for ladies' society, but I don't see why they should be nameless.'

'I thought you would deem such a name unworthy to be mentioned.'

'Well, but who is the shy man? Is it the little Henniker, who used to look as if he would dive under the table when you brought him from Westminster?'

'If I told you, you would remember it against the poor creature for life, as a deliberate insult and want of taste. Good night.'

He took his hat, and went out, leaving Lucy balancing her guesses between Ensign Henniker and him whom she could not mention. Her rejection of Mr. Calthorp might have occasioned the present secrecy, and she was content to leave herself the pleasant mystery, in the hope of having it dispelled by her last glance of Kingstown quay.

In that hope, she rocked herself to sleep, and next morning was so extra vivacious as to be a sore trial to poor Rashe, in the anticipation of the peine forte et dure of St. George's Channel. Owen was also in high spirits, but a pattern of consideration and kind attention, as he saw the ladies on board, and provided for their comfort, not leaving them till the last moment.

Lucilla's heart had beaten fast from the moment she had reached Kingstown; she was keeping her hand free to wave a most encouraging kiss, and as her eye roamed over the heads upon the quay without a recognition, she felt absolutely baffled and cheated; and gloriously as the Bay of Dublin spread itself before her, she was conscious only of wrath and mortification, and of a bitter sense of dreariness and desertion. Nobody cared for her, not even her brother!

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us