Mine Own People

Chapter I

A LIGHT-HEARTED GIRL. ' Bear a lily in thy hand ; Gates of brass cannot withstand One touch of that magic wand. ' Bear through sorrow, wrong, and ruth, In thy heart the dew of youth, On thy lips the smile of truth." — Longfellow. ggteggTr was a great old room in an English castle — a room r Cl'W so t'iat '*• seeme(^ quite a journey from the jjyiJaAf' door to the fireplace, with curious dim tapestry clothing the walls beside the entrance, the others lined with books, except where, at one side, tall windows opened out on velvety green sward, moist with the fresh dampness of very early spring. At a writing-table near the fireplace sat a girl of eighteen, with her head bent over a half-finished letter, and an expression of thoughtful perplexity struggling with the natural brightness of her face.

She was not beautiful through any regularity of feature, but possessed a charm that is perhaps rarer, in a natural grace of posture and motion which made her very pleasant to look at ; a dark-eyed girl, tall and slim, with warm brown hair rippling low on her forehead, and a sweet flexible mouth. Her dress, in the extreme alike of fashion and simplicity, completed the pretty picture made by her youthful figure in the room all solemn and stately with memorials of past generations. A But as Marian Grant, pen in hand, looked up from the lines of her unfinished letter, the visions that rose before her were as great a contrast to her surroundings as could well be imagined. The present scene had indeed vanished from her eyes ; she had lost the sense of her OAvn identity; she Avas no longer the tall maiden in the library of Castle Ellersley, but a sickly little girl in a rusty black frock, shut up with three other children in a small, gloomy nursery, looking out on one of the narrow streets of a toAvn.

Here was a five-year-old boy, Avhose ideas of play Avere noise and mischief; a baby Avho was teething, and cried perpetually; and a girl, older than Marian, who tried hard to keep order, and only succeeded in making confusion Avorse. And in the midst of the tumult of angry reproaches and wail ings, there >vould sometimes come the sound of another voice, imploring the children to be quiet, and remember how ill their father Avas. But except Avhen she appeared for a minute on one of these dreary errands, Marian's memory could never picture her mother in that nursery at all ; and the impression of the noise and discomfort and lovelessness that reigned there seemed only intensified by the years that had passed since she herself had quitted it for ever. For a long time Marian had been wont to avoid such musings as she had fallen into just now, though it had been a sort of instinct rather than deliberate intention Avhich had made her try to forget the days of her early childhood.

There Avere so many causes of pain in these thoughts, and at eighteen years old pleasure is apt to appear the natural and reasonable, if not the only possible, condition of mind. But to-day, circumstances and a sense of duty had proved stronger than unconscious habit, and it Avas impossible for Marian to refuse admission to old recollections, Avhen she had betaken herself to. the library for the express purpose of Avriting such a letter as the one that lay before her. " My Dear Mamma, — We AA*ere so sorry to hear from Anna's letter that you had been so poorly, but we hope it was only because of the cold Aveather, and that you are quite Avell again noAv. But it is so long since I have seen any of you, I should like to go to Scotland for a visit soon, and Lady Ellersley thinks I ought, if it is quite convenient for you to have me.

I might come to you (if you Avould like it) Avhen the others go to tOAvn. There will be no lessons this year to be interrupted ; Miss Douglas leaves us in a week or two, and Constance will be too gay to do any work while she is in toAvn. It is almost fixed now that the wedding is to be this summer, and we scarcely talk about anything else. Will you write me what you think about my coming to you ? I shall be very glad — " In the midst of this sentence, Marian had paused to Avonder Avhether what she had been about to write Avas the truth or not. Could she honestly say that she would be very glad to see her long unknown relatives again, Avhen the memories of that dreary nursery life, and other recollections still more sad, were all she had in common Avith them ? The knotty point was still unsettled when the door of the library opened quickly, and a young man entered, at sight of whom Marian sprang forward Avith an exclamation of mingled pleasure and dismay : " Oh, Derwent ! and there's nobody at home but me !

" "Where are they all? Was I not expected?" he asked, as they clasped hands Avith familiar friendliness. " Yesterday, you were ; but to-day, not till evening. There must have been some mistake about the trains. Oh, I am so sorry ! Lady Ellersley and Constance will be so sorry ! They have gone out to drive, and Otto has gone Avith them ; everyone is out but Bertie and me. This is Wednesday, you know." " So it is," he said with a slight grimace. " I might have known they would be out of the Avay. But Avhy are you left all alone?" " It is Constance Avho is the coward on Wednesdays," said Marian, laughing ; " I am very courageous. And if any one very dreadful came, of course there is the schoolroom. But as long as I can help it, I had better not take refuge there, for I encourage trifling, Miss Douglas says.

Shall I bring Bertie to see you now? And don't you. want something to eat?" " All in good time," he answered. " Let me hear your news first. I am lucky in finding you at home. Never mind the small boy just now." While they talked, the two had been scanning each other ; he thinking that a few months could make a great improve ment in girls of Marian's age ; she watching eagerly for changes in his looks and manner, which might have come Avith new circumstances, and perhaps feeling a little disappointed that he appeared so very much like his old self. To be sure, he might have been considered good-looking enough to make any woman regard him Avith satisfaction — being a tall, straight, young fellow, Avith delicate, well-cut features, dark hair, and blue eyes. But according to Marian Grant's ideas, Derwent, the affianced lover, the hero of the coming Avedding, which was of such infinite importance in the family estimation — ought to have looked, at least, half-a-dozen years older, and had something of a stately air about him, Avhen he appeared in his new character in the house of his fathers.

His uncere monious arrival, which would have disturbed her very little if it had taken place a few months ago, grievously upset all Marian's notions of propriety Avhen it Avas the home-coming of a knight who had just parted from his lady-love. Marian felt that the whole household ought to have been assembled to bless and congratulate him ; but as it was, he had no better welcome than her OAvn, and the only member of his family she could bring to do him honour was his little brother from the schoolroom. " Bertie Avould be so pleased if I called him," said she. " As for news — why, Ave have none. You are expected to tell us interesting things." Lord Derwent coloured a little and smiled; and Marian, delighted by the signs that he Avas conscious of his own novel position, pursued the subject gleefully.

" We have talked of nothing but you and your affairs for the last month ! Or, if Miss Douglas does manage sometimes to start something else, Constance is sure to turn it your way in a very short time ; I never knew she Avas so ingenious before. But it is ahA'ays Denvent, first or last, and often both. I am quite sure now they have been talking about you all the time they have been out." " And you stayed at home, did you not, because you AA*ere tired of the subject?" " No," said Marian, shaking her head Avith sudden gravity ; " I stayed at home because I had a letter to write. My mother has not been strong for some time, and Lady Ellersley thinks I should offer to go to see her, and I think so too." " I am very sorry," said Derwent kindly. " The Inseparables are to be separated then at last.

What will Pet do without you ? " " Pet is going to be introduced to a new sister," said Marian, looking cheerfully into his eyes. " I saw the photo, of Lady Katharine you sent your mother, and I think she looks so pretty and so nice ; I am sure you will be happy. I Avish you very much joy ! " She held out her hand as she finished her congratulations, and he grasped it with a warm "Thank you, May," and a sudden bright look in his face, which the girl beside him knew Avell enough was not for her. But this forgetfulness of herself was thoroughly satisfactory to Marian, so genuine was her interest in the first love-affair she had ever come in contact Avith. She dismissed all her vague disapproval, and repented her inclination to tease ; her old playfellow was glorified into something like a hero after all, Avhen he Avore that proud and tender look.

At last she had come upon a piece of romance in real life, AA-hich reminded her of her favourite German ballads ; and Derwent's devotion seemed to elevate Lady Katharine Marjoribanks to almost equal rank with the lovely nun, whose convent Avindow Ritter Toggenburg patiently watched for years, or the little daughter of the Rhineland inn, Avhom the three Burschen mourned so tenderly. Marian had seen almost nothing of the world, and for a young woman of the nineteenth century was singularly ill read in novels ; she was indeed — if such a thing were possible — too innocent for her years, or she might have been less sentimental, and more incredulous, over the case of a young man in love at two-and-twenty. Experience does certainly show that knowledge of one's own mind is not invariable in youth, and that constancy is a rarer virtue than sincerity; things of which Marian had never dreamed when she read assurances of Derwent's good faith and good fortune in his own happy eyes.

But in after days, Avhen all was different, when Marian had learned much, and suffered much, and the world had widened around her, the impressions of that afternoon came back to her, fresh and vivid, bearing to her mind the stamp of truth as evidently as they had done at first. The only future that Marian thought of then, however, was a gay marriage-day only a few months before her, when she Avould see Derwent kneel at the altar Avith his chosen bride, while beautifully dressed attendant maidens clustered behind them — his own sister the fairest of them all. As she stood Avith her companion in the recess of one of the tall windows, Marian pictured a veiled, white-robed figure beside him, and anxious that her mental portrait should be correct in all its details, she was proceeding to put the well-pleased lover through his catechism, when the tete-a-tete was interrupted in a fashion that scattered sentiment to the winds.

The door opened wide, and Marian had just time to change her question about the colour of Lady Katharine's eyes, into a quick, explanatory whisper of, "Wednesday, remember!" Avhen the old housekeeper marshalled in a company of four strangers, who advanced a few steps into the room, and then stopped abruptly. The couple at the window moved away from each other involuntarily, Derwent turning to fix his eyes on the park outside, Avith as much apparent interest as if it had been quite new to him, and Marian moving back to the Avriting-table, where she sat facing the intruders with mischievous coolness. Tavo rather bloAvsy young women, with light hair, and some thing brilliantly blue in their hats, and a young man, bearded and spectacled, and dressed in semi-clerical costume, accompanied by a stout, middle-aged matron, presumably the mother of the party ; such was the group that Marian saw, and it did not strike her as particularly interesting.

But even as she turned again to her letter, she could not help being conscious that the feelings on the other side were very different from her own, and that no relic of the past seemed, to the female part at least of the visitors, so well worth examination, as did the living beings they had discovered in the library. In vain did good Mrs. Adams endeavour to attract their attention to the tapestry which made this one of the show rooms at Castle Ellersley; her lowvoiced story of the Countess who was said to have worked these amazing Scriptural scenes while her husband was at the Crusades, was powerless to prevent her audience turning round again and again, to stare at the figure of the young man by the window, and the pretty, amused face of the girl, bending over the table near the fire. It is true that the masculine member of the party was by no means indifferent to the quaint and grotesque representations of Samson and Delilah Avhich adorned the Avails above him, and the compre hensive glance he finally took of the room had something of embarrassed apology in it when it rested on the young lady of the house.

But it did not seem to occur to the others, that it Avas necessary even to make a feint of being interested in what they had been brought there to see ; if they kept their faces toAvards the tapestry at all, it was only that they might exchange looks and whispers Avith each other, which it needed no over- Aveening sense of personal importance to make Marian imagine had no connection with the Crusader and his lady. May had had considerable experience of being gazed at by Wednesday sight-seers in the Castle, and was justly proud of her OAvn powers of keeping her countenance under the infliction, but anything like this eager and persistent curiosity she had never encountered before. She found herself rejoicing in the absence of Constance, who would have turned away in blushing misery from such an ordeal ; and yet, all the while, she felt there was something delightfully ridiculous in the affair, especially Avhen she could steal a look at Derwent's erect, motionless figure, and grave impassive face.

The absurdity reached its climax in Marian's estimation Avhen Mrs. Adams had with apparent difficulty led away her charge, and a loud whisper, more audible in the silent room than an ordinary voice Avould have been, carried back an eager question, just before the door was shut. MINE OWN PEOPLE. "Is that Lady Katharine Marjoribanks?" Marian imagined rather than heard the ansAver. " Oh, no. Miss Grant, who always lives here — a friend of our young lady's." Then they had fairly gone, and it was safe to give way to her merriment, which burst forth in a gush of laughter. She looked to Derwent for sympathy, but when he Avheeled round from the windoAv in sudden abandonment of the rigid attitude he had maintained for the last few minutes, May saw that nothing of that sort was to be expected from him.

There was a frown on his handsome face, and an irritation about his manner Avhich made her try to compose herself, and reflect that lovers must have peculiar ways of regarding things, especially when they happen, however remotely, to concern each other. "This sort of thing is intolerable!" he said. "What can make my father allow it ?" " His great goodness, I suppose," answered Marian, a little defiantly; her deep-rooted respect and admiration for Lord Ellersley proving even stronger than her compassion for the lover who had heard his lady's sacred name spoken foolishly and inappropriately by vulgar lips. " Goodness may be abused though," said Derwent, which was a statement that could hardly be contradicted. "Did they stare at you, May?" he asked after a moment. " I think the ladies would knoAV me again," she answered, demurely.

To which Derwent only replied by repeating with infinite meaning the single Avord, " Ladies !" " There were three ladies," said Marian, taking no notice of his interjection ; " three ladies, and a clergyman." " I saw as much as that." " And they looked at you very hard, too." " I felt them !" " Through the back of your head ? O Derwent ! Well, I don't Avonder," said Marian, breaking into laughter again at the recollection of the scene. But her companion still seemed unable to see the ludicrous side of it, and looked so annoyed that she had once more to restrain her amusement in pity for his perturbation. "Don't mind them, Derwent," she said coaxingly. " I don't in the least," he answered, and perhaps he thought it was the truth he spoke. But, after that, Marian gave up in despair all attempts to make him join in her amusement, and decided that the joke which had struck her as being so good must be kept for the benefit of Constance, whose sympathy was not to be doubted.

The two girls had always long stories of their own adventures to tell each other, after such a rare thing as a few hours' separation, but it did not often happen that anything so exciting as the events of this afternoon was provided for their entertainment. Even as they occurred, Marian was mentally arranging their best points for Constance when they should be alone together in their own room at dressing-time ; well knowing how she Avould laugh over the description of Mrs. Adams' pitiful looks at her young master's back, and the idea of the visitors finding that only a less interesting object of study than the front view of May herself, supposed to be Lady Katharine. Nor Avould she forget to relate to Constance how her brother's face had lighted up at her own reference to his approaching marriage ; and Avith that thought Marian looked up at him suddenly, to see if there were any traces left of the pleasure she had been so proud of kindling.

To her surprise, she found him regarding her with a peculiar expression, half embarrassed and half-inquiring, Avhich she could not under stand in the least. The truth was, it had occurred to Lord Derwent, that in his vexation over what certainly concerned Marian as much as himself, he might have seemed discourteous to her ; and he was a young man who would not willingly have been discourteous to his sister, much less his sister's friend. He blushed ever so little when he caught her eye, and said Avith some hesitation, " This must have been a horribly unpleasant thing for you, though you behaved so pluckily!" " For me ? Oh, no ; why should it ? " asked Marian in MINE OAVN PEOPLE. 10 amazement. "I thought it great fun.. It was different for you, of course ; I quite see that," she added hastily.

" But / am not in love, you know. And then, remember, it could never be anything but a compliment for me to be mistaken for Lady Katharine." The utter absence of vanity, or even self-consciousness, in Marian's expressions of unselfish sympathy might have touched a much more sullen heart than Derwent's could ever be. Where her jokes had failed her naivete unexpectedly succeeded, and his ill-humour melted into laughter. " I hope other people will make as pretty speeches to me as you do," said he. " And next time you want to boast of your courage, you may depend upon me to back you. If you can stand these women, I don't think you are likely to find anything to frighten you — Wednesday, or any day." " Very well. I mean to boast to Constance whenever she comes home. Remember your promise." " They ought to be home soon," said Derwent, taking out his watch.

" I think I am almost sure to meet them in the avenue. Do you mind the window being open for one moment, May ? I don't want to risk meeting these people again." As he spoke, the heir of Ellersley pushed up the Avindow, and after a furtive look around, escaped through it rapidly and ignominiously from the house of his fathers. " You call yourself the descendant of Crusaders!" cried Marian, in gleeful triumph. "Aren't you afraid Dame Matilda's Samsons and Delilahs will turn their backs on you, up there on the Avail ? — I hope — oh, how much I hope — all these people will come out on their way to the gardens, and meet you just as you turn the corner ! " It was doubtful whether he heard her amiable wish, but he provided against its fulfilment by making a short cut across the park, so as to avoid passing the front of the house.

Marian stood Avatching him till he was out of sight, and then turned smilingly back to her letter. The gloomy thoughts it had called up before had vanished in the new interest of Derwent's return ; when she took up her pen again, it was with the feeling that the happy life of the present had for ever been, and would for ever be hers. Even the unfinished sentence seemed robbed of its difficulty. Would she be glad to go home to her own people for a visit of a week or two ? Most assuredly she ought to be so ; there AA-as no doubt then that she Avas ; the very con templation of any other possibility seemed almost wicked to Marian, now that her self-questioning mood had given place to the careless gladness of heart that was usual with her. A feAv polite wishes and questions, and an explanation that she had been interrupted, served to finish the letter ; the writer remembering with some satisfaction that it was almost post-time.

A few minutes after Derwent had left her, Marian, as she ascended the great stone staircase, heard voices above her, and knew that the fate she had invoked upon him was coming upon herself. The red-cheeked girls, and the plump mother and the benevolent-looking young clergyman with the spectacles, bore suddenly down upon her at a turning, on their way, Marian supposed, from the inspection of Lady Ellersley's room. The thought that they had not only looked at the quaintly carved furniture, but examined, and perhaps handled some of her beloved friend's personal possessions, roused Marian to a feeling of indignation Avhich made a new link with Derwent. " I was not afraid, but I was angry ! " she would have to confess to him Avhen she told of her second encounter Avith his betes noires. She could not help being a little provoked with Mrs. Adams, who might surely have saved her lady's room from the desecration of such curiosity as had been shown in the library.

To be sure it was one of the sights of the Castle, and Lady Ellersley Avas too good-natured and kind not to Avish any one who liked to visit it ; but a housekeeper who had been many years in the family might surely exercise discrimination enough to admit only nice people into the sanctum of her whom they all treated as a queen ! Marian met and passed the visitors with a dignified gravity which she felt suitable for the occasion, but Avhich was very nearly upset by the amused wonder which again came over her at sight of their eager and undisguised interest in herself. It was evident that this burning curiosity was not in the least abated by the discovery that she was not Lady Katharine MINE OWN PEOPLE. Marjoribanks, and Lord Denvent's betrothed bride. They all stopped, as it were instinctively, when they met her on the steps, and gazed ; it might be charitable to suppose that her sudden apparition had startled them, and it was true that the gentleman removed his hat and looked very much as if he felt himself out of place, but Marian was conscious of passing under an inspection from the other three which reached from her hair to her shoe-tips.

"They mean certainly to know me again," said she to herself, when she was beyond their eyes, and could change her composed walk for a bounding one, Avhich carried her rapidly to the safe shelter of her own room.

Chapter II. The Shadoav Of Sorrow

" Es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath, Dass man vom Liebsten was man hat, Muss scheiden. Wiewohl doch nichts im Lauf der Welt Dem Herzen aus so saner fallt Als Scheiden ! ja Scheiden." — Volkslied. @EH1HE rooms which Constance Wentworth and Marian i^^iS Grant occupied at Castle Ellersley were not among BslIgSEll the number open to the public ; a fact from which the young ladies themselves derived considerable and ever increasing satisfaction. Constance was firmly per suaded that no consideration of age or dignity would make her willing to exchange the cheerful quarters she had inhabited ever since she left the nursery, for any of the spacious, ancient, curiously-furnished, or haunted chambers which had made themselves known to fame. Let these be for visitors ; she would keep her own bedroom with its modern simplicity and sweet childhood's familiarity, and the apartment opening off it, which she and her friend called dressing-room or boudoir, as the fancy prompted them.

Eleven years ago, when a little stranger girl came to Ellersley to be school-companion and playfellow to the only daughter of the house, it Avas arranged that the children should sleep in adjoining rooms ; but Lady Constance would not be satisfied till the other little Avhite bed was put beside her own, and there it had remained ever since. Out of the room that should have been Marian's the t\A*o friends had meanwhile got a great deal of girlish pleasure, from the time it had been thoroughly stocked with dolls and dolls' properties, until noAv Avhen there Avas no place so suitable for the safe-keeping of their pet books and ornaments, or the display of their last experiments in needlework and painting. Times without number had Lady Ellersley been led upstairs to admire some new change in this favoured room, which was to give it a highly-improved, or, at least, very different character ; indeed, she had come to look forward to such a journey as the almost invariable end of every wet afternoon.

On that Wednesday when Lord Derwent came home so unexpectedly, and Marian wrote to Scotland offering a visit to her mother, the dressing-room fashion prevailed, but there was surely no reason to be surprised Avhen Constance, with suitable gravity, made the following proposal : — " Suppose we set to Avork in earnest, May ; and mother might let us get some things in toAvn, to make a really pretty sitting-room of this before Kitty Marjoribanks comes." Constance was standing before the pier-glass, fastening rose buds into her white evening-dress as she spoke, and Marian, standing behind her, another slim figure robed in creamy white, was playing briskly Avith a fan. She suddenly opened it out and concealed her face for a moment, then dropped it and laughed. The pang was over which had made her suddenly feel that she would rather see the red-faced girls Avith the blue feathers in their hats sitting excited and critical in Constance's boudoir, than Lady Katharine installed there, in all the freedom of sisterhood.

It had certainly been an absurd idea to strike a girl, Avho had of her OAvn accord recognised the future relationship with perfect courage and composure, Avhen she had told Lord Derwent that his bride could supply her place to his sister; and no one could be more conscious of its unreasonableness than Marian herself, as soon as she had time to collect her thoughts. Who indeed had a better right to be in that room, or any room in the house, than Lady Derwent ; and who could feel more interest in her, or her probable tastes, than Marian Grant ? "Then, for once, let this room be open on Wednesdays," THE SHADOAV OF SORROAV. 15 said she ; " put her on the new sofa, Avith her feet on a new footstool (both worked by you), and bring the public in to look at her. This will be a more popular place than the ghost's room."

There was no bitterness left in her heart when she made her little joke, at which Constance was greatly amused, as she ahvays was with Marian's jokes. " How pleased Derwent would be !" she said. " We'll propose it to him," said Marian. " But I expect he Avill either take her twenty miles off, or lock her up in the secret chamber every Wednesday she is here. How angry he was this afternoon ! " " Yes ; but do you know, mother was rather displeased when she heard how it was," said Constance. " She says Addy ought not to bring people into the rooms without letting us know beforehand." " Oh, it was not her fault !" said Marian eagerly ; " Denvent had never reported himself to her ; she did not know he had come. And then, how could she think that you had gone out, and I had stayed at home ?" " Hoav could she, indeed ?