For Love of Prue

Chapter I

" Bread and scrape, and no new frocks ! " The speaker's tone was pensive, and also petulant. Mr. Mayhew cleared his throat and summoned his patience. He sat in a small dingy back room which it pleased him to call his study, the room which is to be found in most London houses of a certain rental, thrust behind the dining-room and looking out upon a cat-haunted network of yards. It had in this case Uttle appearance of a study, though a " Whitaker's Almanack," a Red Book, and a Bradshaw leaned forlornly against each other on a shelf, and the dusty newspapers of a week were crowded carelessly into a bamboo rack ; but the occasion being one of much solemnity, the setting seemed appropriate. Mr. Mayhew, a fair, florid man, accustomed to take Hfe in an easy, unruffled way, looked worried. " Rosa, my dear girl, you really must try to understand " Miss Bower turned from the window out of which she had been gazing unseeingly at a yellow cat basking and blinking on the wall.

It was hot June, and a patch of sunlight to lie in was enough to make the cat happy, but the outer radiance only accentuated the girl's dull misery. " I think I do understand," she said tremulously. " Do you suppose I haven't been saying it over and over to myself, * Rosa, you are a beggar ; Rosa, you are a beggar.' Why," she said piteously, " the words keep ringing in my head, like a bell that never stops, till I think they will drive me crazy." Ti "No, no," said Prank Mayhew, hastily. "That's all nonsense, you know, Rosa. Of course you're upset — anybody would be— but it won't seem so bad — you'll get used to it in time." " As the eel gets used to being skinned," she said, with a half hysterical laugh. " Though how," he went on with more force, feeling the need of some vent for his emotion — "how the — hem — how your father, shrewd as we thought him, ever came to invest his money in that inf " " Don't," said Rosa, hotly.

" That's one thing I can't get used to, Prank. I can't let even you say a word against papa. He worked hard to leave me this money, and if you think he invested it badly, at least there were thousands of others who believed this society to be as safe as he did." " The more fools they ! " said Mayhew under his breath. He felt that the conversation was taking a wrong turn. There was nothing more profitless than to discuss business with women who could never be made to understand the immorality of risky investments, and who only required that a clergyman or two should figure among the directors of a company to be convinced that ten per cent, was a legitimate rate of interest. " It must be all right ! Isn't the Rev. Septimus Diddler on the Board, and dear Mr. Shepherd, the Vicar of St. Ermyntrude's, one of the largest shareholders ?

" Mayhew did not want to hear that argument over again, as he had heard it so often reiterated by his wife yesterday ; he wanted to guide the talk into quite a different channel, but he was not quick of resource, and he scarcely knew how to proceed. Rosa came to his aid. " You sent for me to discuss what I am to do, I suppose," she said, making a great effort to keep her voice steady, and to speak with unconcern. " Of course, when one has no money one must earn some. I've got the length of realizing that, only it's not quite so easy to choose a career. There are so many women who want openings, and," with a quiver she could not control, " if all the doors were set wide, I shouldn't feel that I had a right to creep in at any one of them. It's queer, you know, Frank, but when I come to think of it, I've never done anything but try to look nice and enjoy myself all my life."

" Your life hasn't been so very long," he said gruffly. "No, I've youth on my side, but then I have no experience. If I had experience I should be too old to use it. The world is very hard on women." " There is no necessity to think of any career at present," said Mayhew, speaking decidedly. " Of course I had to tell you at once of this scandalous failure, because " " Of course," echoed Rosa, indignantly. " Did you suppose I wished to be deceived ? " " Because you insisted on " — " chucking " was on the point of Mayhew's tongue, but he modified his language out of pity for Rosa's wounds ; she was Uke a sick child to be humoured gently — " sending a large cheque to that worthless old scamp — I mean to " " Never mind," said Rosa, magnanimously. " I quite com prehend that it isn't in my power to do even so poor a kindness as help my old teacher to a crust of bread.

I shaU want aU the crusts for myself." " How you women run away with a notion ! " he said testily. An appetizing smell of roast lamb assailed the room from the kitchen beneath, and seemed to mock Miss Bower's tragic allusion to crusts. He glanced furtively at his watch and saw that the dinner-hour was close at hand, and he had not even approached his point yet. What would Mary say when she waylaid him in his dressing-room ? "You can see nothing but the dark side," he went on masterfully. " What's the good of talking as if you were starving ? Yoa know nothing would please Mary and me better than that you should continue to live here till you leave us for a home of your own." " A home of your own ! " she repeated in a high key, uncertain for a moment whether to laugh or cry. " If you had eaid for a broomstick and a crossing " " I said what I meant," he broke out roughly, jumping up, and sweeping the papers massed on the desk in front of him with a ruthless hand into the open drawer beneath, " and you know what I mean too ; but for sheer, downright perversity give me a woman !

There, there, my good girl, I don't mean to be hard on you ; but, you see, it's very little use our going on misunderstanding each other. You talk the thing over with Mary, and you'll see daylight through this business in no time. As for crusts of bread, and situations and careers, she'll soon knock that nonsense out of your head." With that he turned the key with a snap in the lock of the desk, and left the room. He made as though he were in a great hurry, but he went upstairs slowly enough after all. There was another interview awaiting him, where he could not hope to get off with a few easy generalizations. Mary, his wife, had goaded him into " talking " to Rosa, as she called it, and pointing out to her how thoughtfully Providence had provided her with an eUgible suitor just when cruel fate had swept away her fortune.

Mary had a comfortable conviction that Provi dence was always on the side of her little schemes. " But don't, dear boy, whatever you say, don't whisper that Brander is coming here to-night. That would spoil everything." " What am I to say, then ? " " Oh, say how delighted we both are at the prospect of her happiness " " Don't you think that sounds a little brutal, just when she's lost every hahpenny she possesses ? " " What is loss of money ? " said Mary, superbly, " when love is left ? " " H'm," said Mayhew, doubts uUy. " Don't be cynical, Frank. You know we shouldn't care for each other one Uttle bit the less if all we possessed went down in the Regenerator to-morrow. Put it delicately. Don't let her get the notion into her silly Uttle head that we want to get rid of her. Get rid of her, indeed !

As if I'd let her go for any one or anything in the world but Charles Brander ! Oh, and just bring in what Sir Lucius said about him. That will please her, and make her think the more of him." Thus primed, Mayhew had set reluctantly about his task, and we have seen how inadequately he fulfilled it. Miss Bower remained in the little room, regardless of the dressing beU which the footman clanged outside. She turned again to the window, and something she saw there — not the ragged grass and scrubby bushes ; not the sandy cat stretching itself, all Hthe grace, before promenading with dehberate feet the neighbouring walls — not these, but the procession of her two and twenty years as it passed before her mental vision squeezed two tears out of her dark eyes. She dabbed them away angrily with her pocket-handkerchief.

She meant to be brave, she would not cry, this innocent victim of a hypocrite's frauds, one of a thousand waning, desolate women, whose sun went down in darkness on that bright June day, and who looked for no dawn. That she could not in her young, fierce self pity, realize as yet this feUowship in woe, was not to be wondered at. She had to work out her own suffering to some kind of salvation before she could think of the needs of other distracted mortals elbowing her on the hard way. The past behind her was so comfortable, the future so blank. Her mother had died when she was born ; her father was but a tender, childish memory : aU her growing, conscious Use had been passed with her friends and guardians, and it took on now the glamour that the ended and done with always wears. The Mayhews lived the easy care-free existence of weU-to-do Londoners, who make no pretensions to be in the front rank of fashion, but who move in a pleasant, fairly cultured, exceedingly wide-awake set of their own.

Frank Mayhew was " something in the city" — a comfortable something that even in times of trade depression allowed him to keep a victoria for his wife, and to furnish his big rooms in Redwood Square with modern pictures, and his ceUars with old wine. Miss Bower's own income provided her with a riding horse, and she shared a maid with Mary Mayhew. She shared the little winter trips_ to Cannes or Monte Carlo too, and summer visits to seaside and moor. She had taken no thought for anything but the pleasantness of her days and the charmingness of her frocks, and being young and slim and handsome, it was a point with her, as she remarked, to look nice. It was this pretty castle of air that came tumbling about her ears when the Regenerator shut its doors. " You'U wear your white, miss, won't you ?

" said the maid who was hers and -Mary's joint property, when at last she crawled wearily up the long stair to her room. " You look so nice in that. I've laid it out all ready, and I've told Andrew he must just keep back the dinner-bell five minutes since you're so late. Master won't mind for once." "The white if you like, Hannah." Miss Bower had a faint sense of humour, and it struggled to the surface even now. " Victims always wear white when they're led to the sacrifice." The sight of the dress gave her a pang, but she smothered it fiercely. That emotion, too, belonged to the life that was done with. A week ago she had worn it at a certain tea on the Terrace at Westminster. She shut her eyes while Hannah brushed and curled her hair. She saw it all again : the river afire with the smoky sunset glow, the opposite shore, the bridges, the shipping dim with the grey ravishing mystery of twilight ; she heard a voice, Ught and lively in her ear — yes, in her ear, for those tones, which ever and again f eU to such subtle cadences of tenderness, of intimacy, were meant for her alone.

"You'd better part my hair in the middle and smooth it back Uke a charity school-girl's, Hannah," said Miss Bower, suddenly opening her eyes,; " curls are distinctly out of keeping with the situation." But Hannah only tossed her own prim head. She had had her instructions. Her young mistress made no further protest. She surveyed herself in the long pier-glass critically. " I'm aU to match," she said, with a smile for her own pale cheeks. " The rubies, Hannah." " Lor', miss, not with them pearls ! " " Yes ; why not ? And that bangle I'm so fond of with the snake's head. Quick ; it's as much as Andrew's life is worth to grant me another second." She rustled out of the room, a very resplendent young person, her head with its charming frizzy curls held high. Her spirit carried her bravely into the big drawing-room, where Mr. Mayhew sat upright, watch in hand in an easy chair, and Mrs. Mayhew was hovering over a Sevres jardiniere, filled with gay flowers.

Dropping a curtsey that would have done her credit on the boards, Rosa said gaily — " The last appearance of Miss Bower on this stage." Mrs. Mayhew looked up sharply, in her agitation snipping off a rich cluster of pelargonium. " What have you got two necklaces on for ? " she demanded, careless of grammar in her flurry ; " and ever so many bracelets, and a high-necked dress ! " "I thought I might as well wear all my warpaint for the last time." " Nonsense ! such bad taste. Hand over those pearls this moment ; I'll take eare of them. See, I'll give you this flower instead. You want a touch of colour." " She wants a mouthful of food," said Mayhew, getting up, " and no wonder. Ten minutes past eight ! How much longer are we to be kept waiting ? " " Frank, you can think of nothing but dinner," said his wife, reproachfully.

She had not quite forgiven him his desertion. " Manage the thing yourself," he had said with horrid mascuUne brusqueness, when she made discovery of his failure ; "it's woman's work, aU that finessing. Or, if you're sure you can trust Brander, leave it to him to do his own business." Mrs. Mayhew had indignantly protested she was as sure of Mr. Brander's honour as she was of her own, and as for love, anybody could see he only required a fitting opportunity to press its claims. She had been far less sure of Rosa, but she began to think she might trust her also. Rosa bore herself through the long repast, from the soup to the hothouse grapes, with an exceUent courage : she talked and laughed, if she did not eat ; her colour came back. Could it be that she had already come to an understanding with that most rising young barrister and M.P., and was careless of the fortune that was lost in contemplation of the fortune gained ?

Had he spoken, or perhaps written ? But Rosa had come to no understanding, unless it were a compact with her pride. And pride, usually classed among the vices, becomes an excellent virtue when it keeps man or woman from whining under the blows of fate. Frank Mayhew, while he wondered, was grates ul to her for sparing him sighs or lamentations, and allowing him to eat his dinner without the miserable consciousness of a tear-stained, woe-begone counte nance to spoU its flavour. He only hoped his wife was right, and that Rosa's pluck would be rewarded by her lover's faith fulness. But it was more than he expected. It isn't every young fellow with his way to make who can afford to be quixotic and marry a woman who hasn't a halfpenny to her fortune, so ran his thoughts, and young Brander was nothing if he was not ambitious.

Yet in spite of Rosa's gay chatter, perhaps because of its forced note which his ear could not fail to detect, he felt sufficiently ill at ease to be glad of an excuse to depart to his club when the meal was over. There was a man he wanted to see — there always is a man one wants to see when one does not desire the company of the women at home. In the drawing-room Mrs. Mayhew displayed more than her usual restlessness. Miss Bower was accustomed to the vigorous energy which characterized aU the movements of this blooming, buxom matron, but it seemed to her to be distressingly accentuated on this occasion. She could not even remain seated long enough to drink her coffee. She must jump up in the middle to set a chair straight ; to re-arrange the silk petti coat that enveloped a palm pot, to peer and peep once more in fruitless search for a decayed leaf or a wilted blossom among her flowers.

"Do come and sit down," implored Rosa. "Those poor tormented geraniums can't have gone wrong since you examined them last, and oh, don't — don't waken Diavolo ! " she cried, putting both hands distractedly to her ears, for Mrs. Mayhew had now wandered to the gilt palace in which her parrot Uved, and was rewarded for the piece of cake she offered by a sharp dab at the hand that held it, accompanied by a harsh, sleepy croak. " You are always so hard on poor Diavolo, Rosa." Mrs. Mayhew plaintively examined her finger. " I am sure I let him do most of the talking, but it is my innings now ; I have something to say to you." " Have you — have you really something to tell me ? " Mrs. Mayhew came hurrying back and dropped breathlessly into an easy-chair. " Do you know, I thought you might have, Rosa dear.

It came upon me Uke a flash at dinner-time that there was something on your mind." "Something on my mind," repeated Miss Bower, looking stupified. " Do you mean to say you have got it off your mind already ? I have always heard that there is nothing in the world so easy to bear philosophically as other people's troubles ; but reaUy, Mary, I fancied your sympathy would be rather longer Uved." " Sympathy — I was hoping " Mrs. Mayhew's jaw fell ; the words were frozen on her lips as she encountered the amazed wrath in Rosa's eyes. Then, with a sudden ray of inspiration, " Oh, it is your money you mean ! Is that all ? " "All!" " Of course it is dreadful — horrible." Mrs. Mayhew tried to hide the relief in her voice by looking suitably solemn. " And to think we could have been so deceived. But," she concluded lamely, " there are worse things than the loss of money."

Rosa laughed drearily. " I should have been quite ready to endorse that sentiment a week ago, when my purse was full." " Hush ! wasn't that the bell ? " " I didn't hear it," the girl said with faint surprise. "Are you expecting any one ? " " I— I thought some one might drop in. We often do have friends in the evening." " We shall have none to-night. People shun trouble as if it were an infectious disease, and we may as well take the opportunity to talk things over once for all. Delay won't make it any pleasanter for either of us, so please give me an undivided mind." " An undivided fiddle-stick ! " said Mrs. Mayhew, petulantly. " Rosa dear, you really must not get into the habit of harping. A woman who harps is — well, you remember what King Solomon said about her being Uke the dropping of water that wears away a stone."

" Your scriptural knowledge is a Uttle weak. It was a contentious woman he spoke of." " My dearest girl," cried Mrs. Mayhew, not condescending to defend herself, " what does it matter ? I shaU call you a contentious woman if you go on wrangUng so. You have lost your money, but / haven't lost mine. We have always shared everything, and we shall continue to share everything, unless — until you marry. I don't suppose," she laughed, "you wfll exactly want to bring your husband here. But this is your home till you find one you like better." " Frank said I was to talk the situation over with you," said Miss Bower, calmly ignoring this outburst. " He didn't stop to explain what situation, but perhaps he has something in view. It's to be hoped he has, for my mind refuses to grapple with the problem.

If I were only a young woman in a novel, how easy it would all be. I should go out as a nursery governess, and marry the son and heir — that is always the happy fate of the governess of fiction ; but if I set myself up as a teacher of anything, I should be a very quickly detected fraud. Why wasn't I taught something more marketable than how to get in and out of a carriage, and to enter a room without sending my head in first ? It doesn't at all matter how you scramble into a 'bus so long as you secure a seat. You really ought to take warning by my woes, Mary, and learn a trade at once. Then if Frank fails " " It is some one — I was sure I heard a step ! Oh, only the post ! " Mrs. Mayhew's voice dropped to the deeps of woe, as the imperturbable Andrew advanced into the room with two letters on a salver, and handed one to each lady.

Rosa opened hers with an odd pang. " How queer it is," she thought, " to be afraid of a dressmaker's bill ! I am learn ing a great many new sensations. Ten pounds ! — last week I should have said only ten pounds for that little serge frock, and now, what a reckless sum it seems ! Well, fortunately I have saved my last quarter's aUo wanee from the jaws of the Regenerator. Mary, what is it ? You look stricken. Have you lost your all too ? " Mrs. Mayhew looked up with a shamed guilt upon her open countenance. She was a simple person, and she had no art to conceal her feeUngs. "It is — it's only a note from Mr. Brander," she faltered. Rosa's face hardened. " Have you been writing to him — about me ? " she de manded. "No — oh no. Frank met him days ago and told him, I beUeve. I — I asked him to come here to-night.

He said he would. I was sure he would. That's why I wanted you to look nice," she said with appaUing naivety. " And now he writes that an engagement he had overlooked prevents him. He might have remembered it a little sooner, and not kept me on tenter-hooks all night. You had better read his note." Rosa got up and put her hands behind her in emphatic repudiation. Her face was pale, but her dark eyes were blazing. " I wonder you dared," she said. " You asked him to come here, as if 1 wanted his compassion, his " She broke down. " Oh, how could you — you, a woman, shame me so, Mary ? You wanted to thrust me on him now — now when I should only be a burden. You made him think we should hold him to — Good Heavens ! don't you see how you have lowered yourself and me in his eyes — two scheming, shameless fortune-hunters, whom he is obUged to snub and shake off, without even troubling himself to invent an excuse !

Engaged ? He was no more engaged than you are. He only wanted to put an end to an awkward situation." , , "Rosa, are you mad ? " cried Mary, the tears dropping help lessly on her plump hands. She cried as easdy as a child. " Shameless !— a fortune-hunter ! Oh'.that I should hear such words from you ! " " You deserve them," said Rosa, stiU bitterly severe. " It is bad enough for me to have lost my money. You might have let me keep my self-respect." " But— you don't understand." Mary began a feeble defence. " All I said was, ' Won't you look in and cheer poor Rosa up ? ' I dare say he really had an engagement — men are so careless about their appointments — and he wiU come to-morrow. He's sure to come to-morrow." This was too maddening. Rosa felt the impotence of her own wrath, which shd off Mary as rain slides off the back of a duck.

Here was she smiling and beaming, and saying in her comfortable voice, " He is sure to come to-morrow ! " " If he came on twenty to-morrows I should never see him or speak to him again," she said, uttering the first words that occurred to her in her wounded, outraged dignity. " If he asked me a hundred times to marry him I would never be his wife. Never — do you understand, never ! Now perhaps you will not be so anxious to secure his company, and will spare me further humiUations for the short time I shall be with you." She turned and left the room. Her heart was hard, and not even the renewal of Mary's tears and protests had power to soften it. She had been wounded in her most vulnerable place ; her pride was laid low. If she had been affianced to Charles Brander she could have borne it ; it would then have been his duty to console her even while she released him from his promise.

But Brander had only paid her those assiduous attentions which generally precede a proposal ; for six months they had been drifting nearer each other, seeing visions, building aerial palaces ; it needed but a word to shake flirtation into love. But that word had not been spoken ; he was free as air, and that she should be supposed to hold him to some shadowy claim was intolerable to her. The loss of her money, hard as it was, had not so bitter a flavour in it as this.

Chapter II

Miss Bower kept her room the next day, making the usual feminine excuse of a headache. It was a needless piece of martyrdom as far as Mr. Brander was concerned, for that gentleman did not appear at Redwood Square ; but it served to place a barrier between herseff and Mrs. Mayhew, to whom she was not yet reconciled. That unhappy woman wandered about the house in an unenviable frame of mind. It was inconceivable to her that she was in disgrace, she who had meant so excellently. Even her husband refused her his sympathy. Like most easy-going florid men he preferred to keep out of argument. " I told you not to meddle," he said, when she poured out the stream of her grievances in theh* bedroom. " If Brander wants the girl he will come after her without any prompting — he knows his way here well enough ; if he means to cry off — and I for one can't blame him if he does — all your whistling won't bring him back again."

" Rosa won't see him if he comes." " Pooh ! " said Mr. Mayhew, with trenchant contempt, turning his head on the pillow. So Mary was left to make the best of the situation. She was afraid to go out lest Mr. Brander should call — afraid for the same reason to stay at home. She wandered disconsolately up and down, finding no rest. Rosa's door was resolutely locked, and all Mary's plaintive offers of food and drink met with a stern refusal. Towards afternoon, however, Rosa relented. It seemed absurd to keep up animosity against so -4 feeble, so invertebrate a creature as Mary, ready to grovel even before she understood the nature of her offence. She got up, and when she had put on a becoming tea-gown she exhibited few traces either of headache or of anger. Releasing herself from her self-imposed captivity, she discovered Mrs. Mayhew seated on the top step of the stairs, a tray containing food and wine at her side.

Rosa stared, and then burst out laughing. " Why are you camping out here ? " she asked. " Is it a new kind of picnic ? " " Oh, Rosa darUng ! " cried Mrs. Mayhew, jumping up, " you must be simply dying of hunger — you have had nothing to eat for days. You must be starving, famishing ! " "I don't think I am too weak to go downstairs," said Rosa, lightly. Nevertheless she bivouacked beside Mary, and aUowed herself to be tempted with a biscuit and a glass of claret, and between the sips they kissed and made their peace. It was a pity Mary was such a goose, was Rosa's reflection, since even geese may become harmful when they cackle indiscreetly, but her hours of retirement had given her time to plan an escape from future embarrassments. Of this she said no word to either of her friends, but she caught Frank after dinner and beguiled him into the dismal den where they had had their interview on the previous day.