IX. THE THIRTEEN…

IX. THE THIRTEEN

'They closed around the fire, And all in turn essayed to paint The rival merits of their saint; A theme that ne'er can tire A holy maid, for be it known That their saint's honour is their own.' Scott.

The thirteen Underwoods did not meet again in the same house for many a long day, and when they did, it was on a grey misty morning in the Christmas week of the year following; and the blinds were down, and the notes of the knell clashing out overhead, as the door was opened to Edgar, Alda, and Clement, as they arrived together, having been summoned late on the previous night by a telegram with tidings that their mother had been struck by a paralysis. They knew what to expect when Felix, with one of the little ones on his arm, came quietly down the stairs and admitted them. All they had to ask, was 'when,' and 'how;' and to hear, that the long living death had ended in peaceful insensibility at last. Then they followed him upstairs to the room where the others sat, hushed, over their pen or their books, where Wilmet, her eyes gushing with quiet tears, held Alda in her embrace, and Geraldine, after her first eager kiss, gazed wistfully at Edgar as though there must be comfort in the very sight of him, if she could only feel it; while the very little ones opened their puzzled eyes on the new-comers as strangers.

And so they were: Clement had indeed been at home in September, but Alda not for a year and three-quarters, nor Edgar since he first left it three years before. The absence of the two latter was not by their own choice; a doctor who had ordered Mrs. Thomas Underwood to spend the summer months, year after year, at Spa was partly the cause; and moreover, during the autumn and winter of 1856 Bexley had been a perfect field of epidemics. Measles and whooping-cough had run riot in the schools, and lingered in the streets and alleys of the potteries, fastening on many who thought themselves secured by former attacks; and there had been a good many deaths, in especial Clement's chief friend, Harry Lamb. Nobody, excepting the invalid mother, throughout the Underwood household, had escaped one or other disorder; and both fell to the lot of the four little ones, and likewise of Mr. Audley, who was infinitely disgusted at himself, and at the guarded childhood for which he thus paid the penalty pretty severely. When matters were at the worst, and Felix was laid up, and Wilmet found herself succumbing, she had written in desperation to Sister Constance, whose presence in the house had made the next three weeks a time of very pleasant recollections. Finally she had carried off Geraldine, Angela, and Bernard, to the convalescent rooms at St. Faith's, where their happiness had been such that the favourite sport of the little ones had ever since been the acting of Sisters of Mercy nursing sick dolls. The quarantine had been indefinitely prolonged for the protégés of Kensington Palace Gardens; for the three at school, though kept away till all infection was thought to be over, had perversely caught the maladies as soon as they came home for the summer holidays; and indeed the whole town and neighbouring villages were so full of contagion, that Mrs. Thomas Underwood had not far to seek for a plea for avoiding Centry.

All this time, from day to day, the poor mother had been growing more feeble, and it had been fully purposed that on Edgar's return at Christmas, on the completion of his studies at Louvaine, he and Alda should make some stay at home; but the brother and sister were both so useful and ornamental that their adopted home could not spare them until after a series of Christmas entertainments; and Clement had been in like manner detained until the festival services at St. Matthew's no longer required him. Indeed, when he had been at home in the autumn, he had been scarcely recognized.

For the last week, however, Mrs. Underwood had been much clearer in mind, had enjoyed the presence of her holiday children, and had for a short time even given hopes that her constitution might yet rally, and her dormant faculties revive. She had even talked to Mr. Audley and Geraldine at different times as though she had some such presentiment herself, and had made some exertions which proved much increased activity of brain. Alas! though their coming had thus been rendered very happy, the brightening had been but the symptom and precursor of a sudden attack of paralysis, whence there was no symptom of recovery, and which in a few hours ended in death.

For the present, the hopes that had been entertained gave poignancy to the sudden disappointment and grief, and the home children could not acquiesce in the dispensation with the same quiet reasonableness as those who had been so long separated from them as not to miss the gentle countenance, or the 'sweet toils, sweet cares, for ever gone.' Indeed Wilmet was physically much exhausted by her long hours of anxiety, and went about pale-cheeked and tear-stained, quietly attending to all that was needful, but with the tears continually dropping; while Geraldine was fit for nothing but to lie still, unable to think, but feeling soothed as long as she could lay her hand upon Edgar and feel that he was near.

So the whole thirteen were together again; and in the hush of the orphaned house there was a certain wonder and curiosity in their mutual examination and comparison with one another and with the beings with whom they had parted three years ago, at the period of their first separation. All were at a time of life when such an interval could not fail to make a vast alteration in externals. Even Geraldine had gained in strength, and though still white, and with features too large for her face, startlingly searching grey eyes, and brows that looked strangely thick, dark, and straight, in contrast with the pencilled arches belonging to all the rest, she was less weird and elfin-like than when she had been three inches shorter, and dressed more childishly. As Edgar said, she was less Riquet with a tuft than the good fairy godmother, and her twin sisters might have been her princess-wards, so far did they tower above her--straight as fir-trees, oval faced, regular featured, fair skinned, blue eyed, and bright haired. During those long dreary hours, Edgar often beguiled the time with sketches of them, and the outlines--whether of chiselled profiles, shapely heads, or Cupid's-bow lips--were still almost exactly similar; yet it had become impossible to mistake one twin for the other, even when Alda had dressed the tresses on Wilmet's passive head in perfect conformity with her own. Looking at their figures, Alda's air of fashion made her appear the eldest, and Wilmet might have been a girl in the school-room; but comparing their faces, Wilmet's placid recollected countenance, and the soberness that sat so well on her white smooth forehead and steady blue eyes, might have befitted many more years than eighteen. There were not nearly so many lights and shades in her looks as in those of Alda and Geraldine. The one had both more smiles and more frowns, the other more gleams of joy and of pain; each was more animated and sensitive, but neither gave the same sense of confidence and repose.

As usually happens when the parents are of the same family, the inventory of the features of one of the progeny served for almost all the rest. The differences were only in degree, and the prime specimens were without doubt the two elder twins and Edgar, with like promise of little Bernard and Stella.

Edgar had grown very tall, and had inherited his father's advantages of grace and elegance of figure, to which was added a certain distinguished ease of carriage, and ready graciousness, too simple to be called either conceit or presumption, but which looked as if he were used to be admired and to confer favours. Athletics had been the fashion with him and his English companions, and his complexion was embrowned by sun and wind, his form upright and vigorous; and by force of contrast it was now perceived that Felix seemed to have almost ceased growing for the last three years, and that his in-door occupations had given his broad square shoulders a kind of slouch, and kept his colouring as pink and white as that of his sisters. Like Wilmet, he had something staid and responsible about him, that, even more than his fringe of light brown whiskers, gave the appearance of full-grown manhood; so that the first impression of all the new-comers was how completely he had left the boy behind him, making it an effort of memory to believe him only nineteen and a half. But they all knew him for their head, and leant themselves against him. And in the meantime, Edgar's appearance was a perfect feast of enjoyment, not only to little loving Geraldine, but to sage Felix. They recreated themselves with gazing at him, and when left alone together would discuss his charms in low confidential murmurs, quite aware that Wilmet would think them very silly; but Edgar was the great romance of both.

Edgar observed that Clement had done all the growth for both himself and Felix, and was doing his best to be a light of the Church by resembling nothing but an altar-taper. When they all repaired to the back of the cupboard door in Mr. Audley's room to be measured, his head was found far above Edgar's mark at fourteen, and therewith he was lank and thin, not yet accustomed to the length of his own legs and arms, and seeming as if he was not meant to be seen undraped by his surplice. His features and face were of the family type, but a little smaller, and with much less of the bright rosy tinting; indeed, when not excited he was decidedly pale, and his eyes and hair were a little lighter than those of the rest. It was a refined, delicate, thoughtful face, pretty rather than handsome, and its only fault was a certain melancholy superciliousness or benignant pity for every one who did not belong to the flock of St. Matthew's.

Regular features are always what most easily lose individuality, and become those of the owner's class; and if Clement was all chorister, Fulbert and Lancelot were all school-boy. The two little fellows were a long way apart in height, though there were only two years between them; for Lance was on a much smaller scale, but equally full of ruddy health and superabundant vigour; and while Fulbert was the more rough and independent, his countenance had not the fun and sweetness that rendered Lance's so winning. Their looks were repeated in Robina, who was much too square and sturdy for any attempt at beauty, and was comically like a boy and like her brothers, but with much frank honesty and determination in her big grey darkly-lashed eyes. Angela was one of the most altered of all; for her plump cherub cheeks had melted away under the glow of measles, and the whooping process had lengthened and narrowed her small person into a demure little thread-paper of six years old, omnivorous of books, a pet and pickle at school, and a romp at home--the sworn ally, offensive and defensive, of stout, rough-pated, unruly Bernard. Stella was the loveliest little bit of painted porcelain imaginable, quite capable of being his companion, and a perfect little fairy, for beauty, gracefulness, and quickness of all kinds. Alda was delighted with her pretty caressing ways and admiration of the wonderful new sister. She was of quieter, more docile mood than these two, though aspiring to their companionship; for it was startling to see how far she had left Theodore behind. He was still in arms, and speechless, a little pale inanimate creature, taking very little notice, and making no sound except a sort of low musical cooing of pleasure, and a sad whining moan of unhappiness, which always recurred when he was not in the arms of Sibby, Wilmet, or Felix. It was only when Felix held out his arms to take him that the sound of pleasure was heard; and once on that firm knee, with his shining head against that kind heart, he was satisfied, and Felix had accustomed himself to all sorts of occupations with his little brother in his left arm. Even at night, there was no rest for Theodore, unless Felix took him into his room. So often did the little fretting moan summon him, that soon the crib took up his regular abode beside his bed.

But Felix, though of course spared from the shop, could not be dispensed with from the printing-house, where he was sub-editor; and in his absence Theodore was always less contented; and his tearless moan went to his sister's heart, for the poor little fellow had been wont to lie day and night in his mother's bosom, and she had been as uneasy without him as he now was without her. All her other babes had grown past her helpless instinctive tenderness, and Theodore's continued passiveness had been hitherto an advantage, which had always been called his 'goodness and affection.'

Alda was the first to comment on the wonderful interval between the twins, when Wilmet accounted for it by Theodore's having been quite kept back for his mother's sake, and likewise by his having been more reduced by measles and whooping-cough than Stella had been; but to fresh observers it was impossible to think that all was thus explained, and Edgar and Alda discussed it in a low voice when they found themselves alone.

'The fact is plain,' said Edgar; 'but I suppose nothing can be done, and I see no use in forcing it on poor Wilmet.'

'I don't understand such blindness.'

'Not real blindness--certainly not on Felix's part. He knows that load is on his back for life. Heigh-ho! a stout old Atlas we have in Blunderbore; I wonder how long I shall be in plucking the golden apples, and taking a share.'

'I thought it was Atlas that gathered the apples.'

'Don't spoil a good simile with superfluous exactness, Alda! It is base enough to compare the gardens of the Hesperides to a merchant's office! I wonder how many years it will take to get out of the drudgery, and have some power of enjoying life and relieving Felix. One could tear one's hair to see him tied down by this large family till all his best days are gone.'

'Some of the others may get off his hands, and help.'

'Not they! Clem is too highly spiritualized to care for anything so material as his own flesh and blood; and it is not their fault if little Lance does not follow in his wake. Then if Ful has any brains, he is not come to the use of them; he is only less obnoxious than Tina in that he is a boy and not a church candle, but boys are certainly a mistake.'

If ever the mature age of seventeen could be excused for so regarding boyhood, it was under such circumstances. All were too old for any outbreaks, such as brought Angela and Bernard to disgrace, and disturbed the hush of those four sad days; but the actual loss had been so long previous, that the pressure of present grief was not so crushing as to prevent want of employment and confinement in that small silent house from being other than most irksome and tedious.

Clement would have done very well alone; he went to church, read, told Angela stories, and discoursed to Cherry on the ways of St. Matthew's; but, unfortunately, there was something about him that always incited the other boys to sparring, nor was he always guiltless of being the aggressor, for there was no keeping him in mind that comparisons are odious.

Church music might seem a suitable subject, but the London chorister could not abstain from criticising St. Oswald's and contemning the old-fashioned practices of the Cathedral, which of course Lance considered himself bound to defend, till the very names of Gregorians and Anglicans became terrible to Cherry as the watchwords of a wrangling match. Fulbert, meantime, made no secret of his contempt for both brothers as mere choristers instead of school-boys, and exalted himself whenever he detected their ignorance of any choice morceau of slang; while their superior knowledge on any other point was viewed as showing the new-fangled girlish nonsense of their education.

This Lance did not mind; but he was very sensitive as to the dignity of his Cathedral, and the perfections of his chosen friend, one Bill Harewood; and Fulbert was not slow to use the latter engine for 'getting a rise' out of him, while Clement as often, though with less design, offended by disparagement of his choir; nor could Edgar refuse himself the diversion of tormenting Clement by ironical questions and remarks on his standard of perfection, which mode of torture enchanted Fulbert, whenever he understood it. Thus these four brothers contrived to inflict a good amount of teasing on one another, all the more wearing and worrying because deprived of its only tolerable seasoning, mirth.

Clement had indeed a refuge in Mr. Audley's room, where he could find books, and willing ears for Mr. Fulmort's doings; but he availed himself of it less than might have been expected. Whether from inclination to his brothers' society, desire to do them good, or innate pugnacity, he was generally in the thick of the conflict; and before long he confided to Felix that he was seriously uneasy about Edgar's opinions.

'He is only chaffing you,' said Felix.

'Chaff, now!' said Clement.

'Well, Clem, you know you are enough to provoke a saint, you bore so intolerably about St. Matthew's.'

The much disgusted Clement retired into himself, but Felix was not satisfied at heart.

One was lacking on the cold misty New Year's morning, when even Geraldine could not be withheld from the Communion Feast of the living and departed. Each felt the disappointment when they found themselves only six instead of seven; but it was Clement who, as the boys were waiting for breakfast afterwards, began--

'Have not you been confirmed, Edgar?'

'How should I?'

'I am sure there are plenty of foreign Confirmations. I see them in the "British Catholic."'

'Foreign parts isn't all one,' said Edgar; and the younger boys sniggled.

'If one took any trouble,' persisted Clement.

'Yes, but one,' dwelling with emphasis on the awkward impersonal, 'one may have scruples about committing an act of schism by encouraging an intruding bishop performing episcopal functions in another man's diocese. Has not your spiritual father taught you that much, Tina?'

'I--I must find out about that,' said Clement thoughtfully; 'but, at any rate, the Lent Confirmations are coming on in London, and if I were to speak to the Vicar, I have no doubt he would gladly prepare you.'

'Nor I,' answered Edgar.

'Then shall I?' eagerly asked Clement.

'Not at present, thank you.'

Clement stood blank and open mouthed, and Fulbert laughed, secure that the joke, whatever it might be, was against him.

'Of course,' burst out Lance, 'Edgar does not want you to speak for him, Clem; he has got a tongue of his own, and a clergyman too, I suppose.'

Clement proceeded to a disquisition, topographical and censorial, upon the parish and district to which Edgar might be relegated, and finally exclaimed, 'Yes, he is not much amiss. He has some notions. He dines with us sometimes. You can go to him, Edgar, and I'll get the Vicar to speak to him.'

'Thank you, I had rather be excused.'

'You cannot miss another Confirmation.'

'I can't say I am fond of pledges, especially when no one can tell how much or how little they mean.'

Whether this were in earnest, or a mere thrust in return for Clement's pertinacity, was undecided, for Wilmet came in, looking so sad and depressed that the brothers felt rebuked for the tone in which they had been speaking.

Mr. Thomas Underwood soon arrived, having come to Centry the night before; and after a few words had passed between him and Edgar, the latter announced his intention of returning with him to London that evening.

'Very well,' said Felix, much disappointed at this repetition of Edgar's willingness to hurry from the house of mourning, 'but we have had very little of you; Clement must go on the day after Twelfth Day, and we shall have more room. It will be a great blow to Cherry.'

'Poor little Cherry! I'll come when I can see her in greater peace, but I must buckle to with the beginning of the year, Fee.'

There was no further disputing the point, but Edgar was always a great loss. To every one except Clement he was so gentle and considerate that it was impossible not to think that the strange things reported of him were not first evoked and then exaggerated by the zeal of the model chorister: and indeed he led Geraldine to that inference when he went to her in the sitting-room, where, as before, she had to remain at home.

'My Cherry, I find I must go back with old Tom. Don't be vexed, my White-heart, I am not going back to Belgium, you know: I can often run down, but my work ought to begin with the year.'

'You cannot even stay over the Epiphany!'

'Well, I would have made an effort, but I am really wanted; and then if I am long with that light of the church, Tina, he will get me into everybody's black books. Never mind, old girl. I'll be for ever running down. Is any one going to stay with you?'

'Bernard is coming presently; I must try to make him recollect something about it.'

'You don't mean that child Angel is going.'

'She wishes it, and it seems right.'

'Right to leave a black spot in her memory! If children could but believe people were sublimated away!'

'Children can believe in the Resurrection of the body as well as we,' said Cherry reverently.

'Better, too, by a long chalk,' he muttered; then perceiving her dismayed expression, he added, 'No, no--I'm not talking to Tina, only he has put me in the humour in which there is nothing he could not make me dispute--even my Cherry being the sweetest morsel in the world. There, good-bye for the present, only don't afflict that poor little Bernard and yourself into too great wretchedness, out of a sense of duty.'

'No, I do not really grieve,' said Cherry. 'Tears come for thankfulness. The real sorrow came long ago; we grew up in it, and it is over now.'

'Right, little one. The mortal coil was very heavy and painful these last years, and no one can help being relieved that the end has come. It is the conventionalities that are needlessly distressing. What earthly purpose can it serve, save the amusement of the maids and children of Bexley, that nine of us should present ourselves a pitiful spectacle all the way up to the cemetery in veils and hat-bands?'

'Don't talk so, Edgar; you do not know how it jars, though I know you mean no disrespect.'

'Well, it must be a blessed thing to end by drowning or blowing up, to save one's friends trouble.'

'Edgar, indeed I cannot bear this! Recollect what a treasure that dear shattered earthen vessel has held. What a wonderful life of patient silent resignation it was!'

'Indeed it was,' said Edgar, suddenly softened. 'No lips could tell what the resolution must have been that carried her through those years, never murmuring. What must she not have spared my father! Such devotion is the true woman's heritage.'

Cherry was soothed as she saw the dew on his eye-lashes, but just then Felix came in to fetch him, and, stooping down, kissed her, and said in his low and tender but strong voice, 'We leave her with him, dear child. Recollect--

'"The heart may ache, but may not burst; Heaven will not leave thee, nor forsake."'

Much as Geraldine had longed for Edgar, his words brought vague yearning and distress, while Felix's very tone gave support. How could Edgar say patient silent self-devotion was not to be found except in woman?

So the worn-out body that once had been bright smiling Mary Underwood was borne to the church she had not entered since she had knelt there with her husband; and then she was laid beside him in the hill-side cemetery, the graves marked by the simple cross, for which there had been long anxious saving, the last contribution having been a quarter of the Bishop's gift to Lancelot. The inscription was on the edges of the steps, from which the cross rose--

UNDER WODE, UNDER RODE.

EDWARD FULBERT UNDERWOOD,

Nine Years Curate of this Parish,

Epiphany, 1855,

AGED 40.

'Thy Rod and Thy Staff comfort me.'

There was room enough for the name of Mary Wilmet, his wife, to be added at the base of the Rood, that Cross which they had borne, the one so valiantly, the other so meekly, during their 'forty years in the wilderness.'

Many persons were present out of respect not only to the former Curate, but to his hard-working son and daughter, and not only the daughter's holly-wreath, but one of camellias sent by Sister Constance, lay upon the pall. When the mourners had turned away, Mr. Audley saw a slender lad standing by, waiting till the grave was smoothed to lay on it a wreath of delicate white roses and ferns. There was no mistaking the clear olive face; and indeed Mr. Audley had kept up a regular correspondence with Ferdinand Travis, and knew that the vows made two years ago had been so far persevered in, and without molestation from father or uncle. He had written an account of Mrs. Underwood's death, but had received no answer.

'This is kind, Ferdinand,' he said; 'it will gratify them.'

'May I see any of them?' the youth asked.

'Felix and Lance will be most glad.'

'I only received your letter yesterday evening. Dr. White forwarded it to me in London, and I persuaded my father to let me come down.'

'You are with your father?'

'Yes; he came home about a fortnight ago. I was going to write to you. O Mr. Audley, if you are not in haste, can you tell me whether I can see my dear Diego's grave?'

'The Roman Catholic burial-ground is on the other side of the town. I think you will have to go to Mr. Macnamara for admittance. Come home with me first, Fernan.'

'Home!' he said warmly. 'Yes, it has always seemed so to me! I have dreamt so often of her gentle loving face and tender weak voice. She was very kind to me;' and he raised his hat reverently, as he placed the flowers upon the now completed grave. 'I saw that all were here except the little ones and Geraldine,' he added. 'How is she?'

'As well as usual. Wilmet is a good deal worn and downcast, but all are calm and cheerful. The loss cannot be like what that of their father was.'

'Will they go on as they are doing now?'

'I trust so. I am going down to the family consultation. The London cousin is there.'

'Then perhaps I had better not come in,' said Ferdinand, looking rather blank. 'Shall I go down to Mr. Macnamara first?'

'Had you rather go alone, or shall I send Lance to show you the way?'

'Dear little Lance, pray let me have him!'

'It is a longish walk. Is your lameness quite gone?'

'Oh yes, I can walk a couple of miles very well, and when I give out it is not my leg, but my back. They say it is the old jar to the spine, and that it will wear off when I have done growing, if I get plenty of air and riding. This will not be too much for me, but I must be in time for the 3.30 train, I promised my father.'

'Is he here alone?'

'Yes, my uncle is in Brazil. My father is here for a month, and is very kind; he seems very fairly satisfied with me; and he wants me to get prepared for the commission in the Life Guards.'

'The Life Guards!'

'You see he is bent on my being an English gentleman, but he has some dislike to the University, fancies it too old-world or something; and, honestly, I cannot wish it myself. I can't take much to books, and Dr. White says I have begun too late, and shall never make much of them.'

'If you went into the Guards, my brother might be a friend to you.'

'My back is not fit for the infantry,' said Ferdinand, 'but I can ride anything; I always could. I care for nothing so much as horses.'

'Then why not some other cavalry regiment?'

'Well, my father knows a man with a son in the Life Guards, who has persuaded him that it is the thing, and I don't greatly care.'

'Is he prepared for the expensiveness?'

'I fancy it is the recommendation,' said Ferdinand, smiling with a little shame; 'but if you really see reason for some other choice perhaps you would represent it to him. I think he would attend to you in person.'

'Have you positively no choice, Fernan?'

'I never like the bother of consideration,' said Ferdinand; 'and in London I might have more chance of seeing you and other friends sometimes. I do know that it is not all my father supposes, but he thinks it is all my ignorance, and I have not much right to be particular.'

'Only take care that horses do not become your temptation,' said Mr. Audley.

'I know,' gravely replied Ferdinand. 'The fact is,' he added, as they turned down the street, 'that I do not want to go counter to my father if I can help it. I have not been able to avoid vexing him, and this is of no great consequence. I can exchange, if it should not suit me.'

'I believe you are right,' said the Curate; 'but I will inquire and write to you before the application is made. Wait, and I will send out Lance. But ought you not to call at the Rectory?'

'I will do so as I return,' said Ferdinand; and as Mr. Audley entered the house, he thought that the making the Cacique into an English gentleman seemed to have been attained as far as accent, mind, and manner went, and the air and gesture had always been natural in him. His tone rather than his words were conclusive to the Curate that his heart had never swerved from the purpose with which he had stood at the Font; but the languor and indolence of the voice indicated that the tropical indifference was far from conquered, and it was an anxious question whether the life destined for him might not be exceptionally perilous to his peculiar temperament of nonchalance and excitability.

Consideration was not possible just then, for when Mr. Audley opened the door, he found that he had been impatiently waited for, and barely time was allowed to him to send Lance to Ferdinand Travis, before he was summoned to immediate conference with Thomas Underwood, who, on coming in, had assumed the management of affairs, and on calling for the will, was rather displeased with Felix's protest against doing anything without Mr. Audley, whom he knew to have been named guardian by his father. The cousin seemed unable to credit the statement; and Wilmet had just found the long envelope with the black seal, exactly as it had lain in the desk, which had never been disturbed since the business on their father's death had been finished.

There was the old will made long before, leaving whatever there was to leave unconditionally to the wife, with the sole guardianship of the children; and there was the codicil dated the 16th of October, 1854, appointing Charles Somerville Audley, clerk, to the guardianship in case of the death of the mother, while they should all, or any of them, be under twenty-one, and directing that in that contingency the property should be placed in his hands as trustee, the interest to be employed for their maintenance, and the capital to be divided equally among them, each receiving his or her share on coming of age. All this was in Edward Underwood's own handwriting, and his signature was attested by the Rector and the doctor.

Thomas Underwood was more 'put out,' than the management of such an insignificant sum seemed to warrant. He was no doubt disappointed of his cousin's confidence, as well as of some liberal (if domineering) intentions; and he was only half appeased when Edgar pointed to the date, and showed that the arrangement had been made before the renewal of intercourse. 'It was hardly fair to thrust a charge upon a stranger when there was a relation to act. Poor Edward, he ought to have trusted,' he said. There was genuine kindness of heart in the desire to confer benefits, though perhaps in rather an overbearing spirit, as well as disappointment and hurt feeling that his cousin had acquiesced in his neglect without an appeal. However, after asking whether Mr. Audley meant to act, and hearing of his decided intention of doing so, he proceeded to state his own plans for them. The present state of things could not continue, and he proposed that Wilmet and Geraldine should go as half boarders to some school, to be prepared for governesses. Felix--could he write short-hand? 'Oh yes; but--' Then he knew of a capital opening for him; a few years, and he would be on the way to prosperity: the little ones might be boarded with their old nurse till fit for some clergy orphan schools; if the means would not provide for all, there need be no difficulty made on that score.

Mr. Audley saw Felix's start of dismay and glance at him, but knowing as he did that the lad was always more himself when not interfered with, and allowed to act for himself, he only said, 'It is very kind in you, sir, but I think Felix should be consulted.'

'It is impossible!' began Felix hastily.

'Impossible! It is quite impossible, I would have you to understand, that a lot of children like you should keep house together, and on such an income as that. Quite preposterous.'

'As for that,' said Felix, still unsubmissively, 'it is only what we have been doing, except for the name of the thing, for the last three years on the same means.'

'You don't mean to tell me that you have kept things going on such means without a debt?'

'Of course we have! We never let a bill run,' said Felix, slightly indignant.

'Now mind, I'm not insulting you, Felix, but I know what the women are and what they tell us. Are you sure of that? No debts--honour bright?'

'None at all!' said Felix, with an endeavour at calmness, but glowing hotly. 'I help my sister make up her books every Saturday night. We always pay ready money.'

'Humph,' said Mr. Underwood, still only half convinced. 'Living must be cheap at Bexley.'

'You had better explain a little, Felix,' said Mr. Audley.

Felix did bring himself to say, 'I am sub-editor now, and get £100 a year, besides being paid for any article I write. Wilmet has £25 a year and her dinner, and Angela's at school, so there are only five of us constantly dining at home, and with Mr. Audley's two guineas a week we can do very well.'

'What, you lodge here?'

'Did not you know that?' said Felix, surprised.

Mr. Underwood gave a whistle, and the Curate felt his cheeks growing redder and redder, as he perceived that seven-and-twenty was not considered as so very much older than eighteen. Edgar understood and smiled, but Felix only thought he was suspected of making a good thing of his lodger, and was beginning something awkward about, 'It is all kindness,' when Mr. Audley broke in--

'Of course nothing is settled yet, but--but I believe I shall change my quarters. A smaller house would be better for them; but I think the children should keep together. Indeed, my dear friend said he chiefly appointed me that Felix might be kept at their head.'

Thereupon Mr. Underwood began to expostulate against the sacrifice of position and talent that Felix was making for the sake of bearing the burthen of a family that would have pressed heavily on a man double his age. It was what Felix already knew, much better than when at sixteen he had made his first venture. He had experienced the effects of change of station, as well as of exertion, drudgery, and of the home hardship that no one except Mr. Audley had tried to sweeten. He saw how Edgar had acquired the nameless air and style that he was losing, how even Clement viewed him as left behind; and, on the other hand, he knew that with his own trained and tested ability and application, and his kinsman's patronage, there was every reasonable chance of his regaining a gentleman's position, away from that half-jealous, half-conceited foreman, who made every day a trial to him, and looked at him with an evil eye as a supplanter in the post of confidence. But therewith he thought of his father's words, that to him he left this heavy burthen; and he thought what it would be to have no central home, no place of holiday-meeting, no rallying-point for the boys and girls, and to cast off the little ones to hired service. This alternative never seriously occurred to him, for were they not all bound to him by the cords of love, and most closely the weakest and most helpless? Yet his first reply did not convey the weight of his determination. It was only 'Geraldine is too delicate.'

'Well, well, good advice and treatment might make a change. Or, if she be fit for nothing else, would not that Sisterhood at Dearport take her on reasonable terms? Not that I can away with such nonsense, but your father had his fancies.'

'My father wished us not to break up the home.'

'That was all very well when your poor mother was alive. You have been a good son to her, but it is impossible that you and your sister, mere children as you are, should set up housekeeping by yourselves. Mr. Audley must see it cannot be suffered; it is the bounden duty of your friends to interfere.'

Mr. Audley did not speak. He knew that Felix could reckon on his support; and, moreover, that the youth would show himself to greater advantage when not interfered with. So after pausing to see whether his guardian would speak, Felix said, 'Of course we are in Mr. Audley's power, but he knows that we have made some trial, and except in name, we have really stood alone for these three years. Wilmet can quite manage the house, and it would be misery for ever to us all to have no home. In short--' and Felix's face burnt, his voice choked, and his eyes brimmed over with hot indignant tears, as he concluded, 'it shall never be done with my good will.'

'And under the circumstances,' said Mr. Audley, 'I think Felix is right.'

'Very well,' said Thomas Underwood, much displeased. 'I have no power here, and if you and that lad think he can take charge of a house and a dozen children, you must have it your own way. Only, when they have all gone to rack and ruin, and he is sick of being a little tradesman in a country town, he will remember what I said.'

Felix forced back his resentful feelings, and contrived to say, 'Yes, sir, I know it is a great disadvantage, and that you only wish for our good; but I do not think anything would be so bad for the children as to be all cast about the world, with no place to go to, and becoming strangers to one another; and since there is this way of keeping them together, it seems right.'

The steadiness of his manner struck Mr. Underwood, and the reply was not unkind.

'You are a good boy at bottom, Felix, and mean well, and I am only sorry not to be able to hinder you from throwing yourself away for life by trying to do what is morally impossible, in a foolish spirit of independence. Do not interrupt. I warn you that I am not to be appealed to for getting you out of the difficulties you are plunging into; but of course your brother and sister will be mine, as before; and as I promised myself to do the same by your mother as by your father--my near cousins both--here is to cover necessary expenses.'

It was a cheque for £150, the same as he had given on the former occasion; and though Felix had rather not have taken it, he had little choice, and he brought himself to return cold but respectful thanks; and Mr. Underwood did not manifest any more displeasure, but showed himself very kind at the meal that was spread in Mr. Audley's sitting-room, and even invited Wilmet to accompany Alda, when she joined the family in a week's time at Brighton, so as to have sea air for the remainder of her holidays.

Nothing could be more reluctant than was Wilmet at first, but there was a chorus of persuasions and promises; and the thought of being a little longer in Alda's presence made her waver and almost consent.

Ferdinand Travis came in, but had only time for a greeting and a hasty meal, before Mr. Underwood's carriage came round; and, nothing loth, he gave a lift to the Mexican millionaire to the station with him and Edgar. So, for the last time, had all the thirteen been at home together.

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X. THE FAMILY COBWEB ON THE MOVE

'Oh! the auld house, the auld house, What though the rooms were wee; Oh! kind hearts were dwelling there, And bairnies full of glee.' Lady Nairn.

Every one except Edgar would, it was hoped, stay at home till after the Epiphany, that most marked anniversary of birth and death.

Clement at first declared it impossible, for St. Matthew's could not dispense with him on the great day; and Fulbert grinned, and nudged Lance at his crest-fallen looks, when he received full leave of absence for the next three weeks.

But Lance was bursting with reverse troubles. The same post had brought him a note from his organist; and that 'stupid old Dean,' as he irreverently called him, had maliciously demanded 'How beautiful are the feet,' with the chorus following, and nobody in the choir was available to execute the solo but Lance. He had sung it once or twice before; and if he had the music, and would practise at home, he need only come up by the earliest train on the Epiphany morning; if not, he must arrive in time for a practice on the 5th; he would be wanted at both the festival and Sunday services, but might return as early as he pleased on Monday the 9th.

Lance did not receive the summons in an exemplary spirit. It is not certain that he did not bite it. He rolled on the floor, and contorted himself in convulsions of vexation; he 'bothered' the Dean, he 'bothered' the Precentor, he 'bothered' the Organist, he 'bothered' Shapcote's sore throat, he 'bothered' Harewood's wool-gathering wits, he 'bothered' his own voice, and thereby caused Clement to rebuke him for foolish murmurs instead of joy in his gift.

'A fine gift to rejoice in, to make one be whipped off by an old fogey, when one most wants to be at home! I thank my stars I can't sing!' said Fulbert.

'I should thank mine if Bill Harewood had any sense,' said Lance, sitting up in a heap on the floor. 'He can go quite high enough when he pleases; only, unluckily, a goose of a jackdaw must needs get into the cathedral just as Bill had got to sing the solo in "As pants the hart;" and there he stood staring with his mouth wide open--and no wonder, for it was sitting on the old stone-king's head! Wasn't Miles in a rage; and didn't he vow he'd never trust a solo to Harewood again if he knew it! Oh, I say, Wilmet--Fee, I know! Do let me bring Bill back with me on Monday morning; and he could go by the six o'clock train. Oh, jolly!'

'But is he really a nice boy, Lance?' asked Wilmet, doubtfully.

'Oh, isn't he just? You'll see! His father is a Vicar-choral, you know, lives in our precincts; his private door just opposite ours, and 'tis the most delicious house you ever saw! You may make as much row as you please, and nobody minds!'

'I know who Mr. Harewood is. Librarian too, is he not?' said Felix. 'I have heard people laughing about his good-natured wife.'

'Aren't they the people who were so kind to you last year, Lance,' asked Cherry, 'when you could not come home because of the measles?'

'Of course. Do let me bring him, Fee,' entreated Lance; 'he is no end of a chap--captain of our form almost always--and such a brick at cricket! I told him I'd show him the potteries, and your press, and our organ, and everything--and it is such a chance when we are all at home! I shall get the fellows to believe now that my sisters beat all theirs to shivers.'

'Can you withstand that flattering compliment, Wilmet?' said Felix, laughing. 'I can't!'

'He is very welcome,' said Wilmet; 'only, Lance, he must not stay the night, for there really is not room for another mouse.'

The little girls had heard so much about Bill Harewood, that they were much excited; but their sympathy kindly compensated for the lack of that of the elder brothers. Fulbert pronounced that a cathedral chorister could never be any great shakes; and Clement could not forgive one who had been frivolous enough to be distracted by a jackdaw; but Lance, trusting to his friend's personal attractions to overcome all prejudice, trotted blithely off to the organist-schoolmaster, to beg the loan of the music, and received a promise of a practice in church in the evening. Meantime, he begged Clement to play the accompaniment for him on the old piano. Neither boy knew that it had been scarcely opened since their father's hand had last lingered fondly upon it. Music had been found to excite their mother to tears; Geraldine resembled Fulbert in unmusicalness, and Wilmet had depended on school, the brothers on their choir-practice, so that the sound was like a new thing in the house; nor was any one prepared either for the superiority of Clement's playing, or for the exceeding beauty and sweetness of Lance's singing. No one who appreciated the rare quality of his high notes wondered that he was indispensable; Geraldine could hardly believe that the clear exquisite proclamation, that came floating as from an angel voice, could really come from the little, slight, grubby, dusty urchin, who stood with clasped hands and uplifted face; and Clement himself--though deferring the communication till Lance was absent, lest it should make him vain--confided to Wilmet that they had no such voice at St Matthew's, and it was a shame to waste him on Anglicans.

Wilmet hardly entered into this enormity. She had made a discovery which interested her infinitely more. Little Theodore, hitherto so inanimate, had sat up, listened, looked with a dawning of expression in the eyes that had hitherto been clear and meaningless as blue porcelain, and as the music ceased, his inarticulate hummings continued the same tune. Could it be that the key to the dormant senses was found? His eyes turned to the piano, and his finger pointed to it as soon as he found himself in the room with it, and the airs he heard were continually reproduced in his murmuring sounds; that 'How beautiful!' which had first awakened the gleam--his own birth-day anthem--being sure to recur at sight of Lance; while a doleful Irish croon, Sibby's regular lullaby, always served for her, and the 'Hardy Norseman' for Felix, who had sometimes whistled it to him. Wilmet spent every available moment in awaking the smile on the little waxen face that had never responded before; it seemed to be just the cheering hope she needed to revive her spirits, only she was almost ready to renounce her journey with Alda for the sake of cultivating the new-found faculty.

No one would permit this; and indeed, so far from waiting to be exhibited to Lance's friend, the two sisters received their billet de route on the very day he was expected; and there was no appeal, since a housekeeper was to travel from Centry, who would take charge of them to London, whence they would go down with Mr. Underwood. Poor Wilmet was much dismayed at leaving Geraldine to what they both regarded as the unprecedented invasion of a strange boy; indeed, the whole charge made Cherry's heart quail, though she said little of her fears, knowing the importance of Wilmet's having and enjoying her holiday; and Mr. Audley promised extra aid in keeping order among the boys.

But as they came in that evening from the practice at the church, to which Clement had insisted on their coming to hear Lance, Mr. Audley beckoned Felix to his room with the words, 'There's a thing I want to talk over with you.'

Felix recollected those ominous words to Mr. Underwood, and stood warming his hands in dread of what might be coming. It was all he feared.

'I wanted to say--I wanted to tell you--' began Mr. Audley. 'I would not have chosen this time, but that I think it may save Wilmet something to be able to tell her friends that the present arrangement is to cease.'

'Wilmet!' exclaimed Felix; then bethinking himself. 'Was that what Tom Underwood meant? But you will not trouble yourself about such rubbish.'

'Well, you see,' began the Curate, with heightening colour, 'it can't be denied that your sister has grown up, and that things are changed.'

'Mrs. Froggatt did ask me if you were going on here,' said Felix, still unconvinced; 'but can't we leave people to be stoopid without interfering with us?'

'Felix, you ought to be a better protector to your sisters. You would not like to have my Lady remonstrating--nay, maybe writing to my mother: she is quite capable of it.'

Felix's cheeks were in a flame. 'If people would mind their own business,' he said; 'but if they will have it so--'

'They are right, Felix,' said the Curate quietly; 'appearances must be carefully heeded, and by you almost more than by any one. Your slowness to understand me makes me almost doubtful about my further design.'

'Not going away altogether!'

'Not immediately; but things stand thus--Dr. White, my old tutor, you know, and Fernan's, is nearly sure of the new Bishopric in Australia, and he wants me.'

Felix hardly repressed a groan.

'Any way I should not go immediately; but when your father spoke to me about the guardianship, he made me promise not to let it stand in the way of any other call. I fancied he had mission work in his mind, and it disposes me the more to think I ought not to hold back; but while your dear mother lived, I would not have gone.'

'Yes, you have been very good to us,' was all Felix could say. 'But when?'

'Not for some time; but I am not going this moment. Three months' notice Mr. Bevan must have, and if he requires it, six; I must spend some time at home, and very like shall not be off till you are of age--certainly not if I find there is any difficulty in handing the management of things over to you. How long I remain with you must depend on circumstances. How much notice must you give before leaving this house?'

'I do not know--half a year, I fancy. You think we ought to give it up? I suppose it is too large for us now.'

'And you could take no lodger but one of the old-lady type.'

'Horrid!' said Felix. 'Well, we will see; but it will be a great stroke on poor Cherry--she can remember nothing before this house.'

'It will be very good for her to have no old associations to sit brooding over.'

'My poor little Cherry! If I saw how to cheer up her life; but without your lessons it will be more dreary for her than ever!'

'Give her all you can to do, and do not be over-careful to keep your anxieties from her knowledge. She is very much of a woman, and if you leave her too much to herself, she will grow more introspective.'

'Wilmet and I have always wanted to shelter her; she never seems fit for trouble, and she is so young!'

'Compared with you two venerable people!' said Mr. Audley, smiling. 'But her mind is not young, and to treat her as a child is the way to make her prey upon herself. I wish her talent could be more cultivated; but meantime nothing is better for her than the care of Bernard and Stella. I hope you will not be in a hurry to promote them out of her hands.'

'Very well; but she will miss you sorely.'

'I hope to see her brightened before I am really gone, and I am not going to decamp from this house till some natural break comes. To do that would be absurd!'

There was a silence; and then Felix said with a sigh, 'Yes, a smaller house, and one servant. I will speak to Wilmet.'

'Perhaps you had better, so that she may have an answer in case she is attacked.'

Wilmet was aghast at first, but a hint from Alda made her acquiesce, not with blushing consciousness, but with the perception that the way of the world was against the retention of the lodger; and sorry as she was to lose Mr. Audley, her housewifely mind was not consoled, but distracted, by calculations on the difference of expenditure. Again she tried to beg herself off from her visit, in the dread that Felix would go and take some impracticable house in her absence--some place with thin walls, no cupboards, and no coal-hole; and she was only pacified by his solemn promise to decide on no house without her. She went away in an avalanche of kisses and tears, leaving Geraldine with a basketful of written instructions for every possible contingency, at which the anxious maiden sat gazing anxiously, trying to store her mind with its onerous directions.

'Shall I give you a piece of advice, Cherry?' said the Curate, as he saw the dark eye-brows drawn together.

'Oh, do!' she earnestly said.

'Put all that in the fire!'

'Mr. Audley!'

'And go by the light of nature! You have just as many senses as Wilmet, and almost as much experience; and as to oppressing yourself with the determination to do the very thing she would have done under all circumstances, it is a delusion. People must act according to their own nature, not some one else's.'

'Certainly,' said Geraldine, smiling. 'I could never walk stately in and say, "Now, boys!"--and much they would care for it if I did.'

'It seems to be a case for "Now, boys!" at this moment,' said Mr. Audley; 'what can all that row be?'

'Oh, it must be that dreadful strange boy, Lance's friend,' sighed Geraldine, almost turning pale. Then, trying to cheer up, 'But it is only for the day, and Lance wished it so much.'

As she spoke, the shout of 'Cherry, here's Bill!' came nearer, and the whole of the younger half of the family tumbled promiscuously into the room, introducing the visitor in the midst of them. To the elders, 'no end of a chap' appeared, as Mr. Audley said, to mean all ends of shock hair, and freckles up to the eyes; but when Fulbert and Lance had whirled him out again to see the lions of Bexley, Robina and Angela were overheard respectfully pronouncing that he was nice and spotty like the dear little frogs in the strawberry-beds at Catsacre, and that his hair was just the colour Cherry painted that of all the very best people in her 'holy pictures.'

The object of their admiration was seen no more till the middle of dinner, when all three appeared, immoderately dusty; and no wonder, for the organist had employed them to climb, sweep fashion, into the biggest organ-pipe to investigate the cause of a bronchial affection of long standing, which turned out to be a dead bat caught in a tenacious cobweb.

Shortly after, the guest was found assisting Angela in a tableau, where a pen-wiper doll in nun's costume was enacting the exorcism of the said bat, in a cave built of wooden bricks.

Clement was undecided whether to condemn or admire; and Geraldine, to whom Edgar had lent some volumes of Ruskin, meditated on the grotesque.

Before there had been time for the fanciful sport to become rough comedy, Lance had called off his friend to see the potteries; and to poor Cherry's horror, she found that Robina had been swept off in the torrent of boyhood. Clement, pitying her despair and self-reproach, magnanimously offered to follow, and either bring the little maid back, or keep her out of harm's way; and for some time Cherry reposed in the conviction that 'Tina was as good as a girl any day.'

But at about a quarter to six, a little tap came to Mr. Audley's door, and Angela stood there, saying, with a most serious face, 'Please, Mr. Audley, Cherry wants to know whether you don't think something must have happened.' And going upstairs, he found the poor young deputy in a nervous agony of despair at the non-return of any of the party, quite certain that some catastrophe had befallen them, and divided between self-reproach and dread of the consequences.

'The very first day Wilmet had gone!' as she said.

It was almost time for Harewood's train, which made it all the more strange. Mr. Audley tried to reassure her by the probability that the whole party were convoying him to the station, and would appear when he was gone; but time confuted this pleasing hypothesis, and Cherry's misery was renewed. She even almost hinted a wish that Mr. Audley would go out and look for them.

'And then,' he said, smiling, 'in an hour's time you would be sending Felix to look for me. No, no, Cherry, these waiting times are often hard, no doubt; but, as I fear you are one of those destined to "abide by the tents" instead of going out to battle, you had better learn to do your watching composedly.'

'O Mr. Audley! how can I? I know it must be very wrong, but how can I not care?' And verily the nervous sensitive girl was quivering with suspense.

'"He will not be afraid of any evil tidings, for his heart standeth fast and believeth in the Lord,"' answered Mr. Audley. 'I see that does not tell you how not to be afraid; but I imagine that a few trusting ejaculations in the heart, and then resolute attention to something else, may be found a help.'

Cherry would have sighed that attention was the most impossible thing in the world; but before she had time to do so, Mr. Audley had begun to expound to her his Australian scheme. It excited her extremely; and as a year and a half seemed an immense period of time to her imagination, the dread of losing him was not so immediate as to damp her enthusiasm. They had discussed his plans for nearly an hour before Cherry started at the sound of the door, and then it was only Felix who entered. He was irate, but not at all alarmed; and presently the welcome clatter of steps approached, and in dashed the whole crew, mired up to the eyes, but in as towering spirits as ever.

Their delay had, it appeared, been caused by a long walk that ensued upon the visit to the potteries, and a wild venture of Will Harewood upon impracticable ice, which had made him acquainted with the depths of a horse-pond. There was none of the dignity of danger, for the depths were shallows and the water only rose to his waist; but the mud was above his ankles, and he had floundered out with some difficulty. He wanted to walk back with no more ceremony than a water-dog; but the Underwoods had made common cause against him, and had dragged him to a cottage, where he had the pleasing alternative of an old woman's blankets and petticoats while his garments were drying. He was as nearly angry as a Harewood could be, Lance observed, declaring that they should never have got him into the cottage without fighting him, if Tina had not been so tall, and if Robin had not nearly cried; while he, throwing off all responsibility, ascribed all his lateness to his friend's 'maggots.' No more trains stopped at Bexley till after midnight; but as to his absence causing any uneasiness at home, he laughed at the notion, and was corroborated by Lance in averring that they had too much sense; listening with undisguised amazement to the elaborate explanations and apologies about Robina, which Clement was scrupulously pouring forth to his brother and sister, saying that he would have brought her home at once, but that he really did not like to trust those boys alone.

Whereat Lance held up his hands with a dumb show of amazement that convulsed Fulbert, Bill Harewood, and Robina herself, with agonies of half-suppressed merriment. The boy had come in, prepared to be grave and quiet, as knowing how lately affliction had come to the family, and having been warned by Lance, that 'as to going on as we do in the precincts, why it would make Cherry jump out of her skin.'

But by some extraordinary influence--whether it were the oddity of William Harewood's face, or the novelty of his perfect insouciance in the household whither care had come only too early--some infection seized on the young Underwoods, and before the end of the evening meal, if the 'goings on' were not equal to those in the precincts, they were, at any rate, not far short of it.

Lance presently incited his friend to show 'how he had mesmerized Lucy.' Clement made a horrified protest; and Geraldine looked alarmed at her eldest brother, who began, 'Indeed, Lance, we can have nothing of that sort here.'

'But, Felix, I do assure you there is no harm.'

'Upon my word and honour, there's not a spice of anything the Archbishop of Canterbury could stick at,' added Will Harewood.

'It is impossible there should not be harm,' interposed Clement; but the boys, including Fulbert, were in such fits of laughter, that Felix began to suspect the seriousness of the performance; and when Lance sprang at him, exclaiming, 'I'll go to Mr. Audley! Fee--Cherry--will you be satisfied if Mr. Audley says we may?' Felix and Cherry both consented; and Lance rushed off to make the appeal, and returned not only with full sanction, but with Mr. Audley himself, come to see the operation. This perfectly satisfied Felix, who even consented, on the entreaty of his brothers, to become the first subject; and Cherry knew that where the Curate and Felix had no scruples, she need have none; but, for all that, she was more than half frightened and uncomfortable--above all, when Clement, amid shouts of mirth from the three schoolboys, indignantly marched away to shut himself up in his cold bedroom.

By-and-by, after some unseen preparation--all the more mystifying because carried on in the kitchen, where Sibby always used to keep Theodore in a cradle till Felix was ready for him--Will Harewood caused Felix to stand exactly opposite to him and to the spectators, with a dinner-plate in his hand, and under injunctions to imitate the operator exactly. Armed with another plate, William rubbed his own finger first on the under side of the plate, and then, after some passes and flourishes, on his own forehead, entirely without effect so far as he himself was concerned; but his victim, standing meekly good-natured and unconscious, was seen by the ecstatic audience to be, at each pass, painting his own face with the soot from a flame over which his plate had been previously held. The shrieks of amusement redoubled at the perplexity they occasioned him, till they penetrated the upper rooms; and suddenly a cry of horror made all turn to the door and see a little white bare-footed figure standing there, transfixed with fright, which increased tenfold when Felix hurried towards it, not yet aware of the condition of his visage, until a universal shout warned him of it; while Lance, darting in pursuit, picked up Bernard, and by his wonderful caressing arts, and partly by his special gift of coaxing, partly as the object of the little fellow's most fervent adoration, made the scattered senses take in that it was 'all play,' and even carried back the little white bundle, heart throbbing and eyes staring, but still secure in his arms, to admire Felix all black, and then to be further relieved by beholding the restoration of the natural hue at the pump below stairs.

Then amid Sibby's scoldings and assurances that the child would catch his death of cold, Bernard was borne upstairs again by Felix, who found Clement in the nursery comforting the little girls, and preventing them from following the example of their valiant pioneer. Felix, now thoroughly entering into the spirit of the joke, entertained for a moment the hope of entrapping Clement; but of course Bernard could not be silenced from his bold and rather doubtful proclamation, that 'The funny boy made Felix black his own face, and I wasn't afraid.'

'Naughty boy!' commented Stella. 'Poor Fee!'--and she reared up to kiss him, and stroke the cheeks that had suffered such an indignity.

'What! It was only a trick?' said Clement slowly, as if half mystified.

'Of course,' said Felix; 'could not you trust to that?'

'I don't know. Cathedrals are very lax, and it had a questionable name.'

'O Clem! if it had not been in you before, I should wish you had never gone to St. Matthew's. Come down now, don't let us disturb the little ones any longer.--Good-night, Angel; good-night, little Star; we'll not make a row to wake you again.'

Clement, in a severe mood, followed Felix downstairs; but some wonderful spirit of frolic was on all the young people that night--a reaction, perhaps, from the melancholy that had so long necessarily reigned in that house, for though the fun was less loud, it was quite as merry: a course of riddles was going on; and Clement, who really was used to a great deal of mirth among the staff of St. Matthew's, absolutely unbent, and gloried in showing that even more conundrums were known there than by the house of Harewood. He was not strong in guessing them; but then Will Harewood made such undaunted and extraordinary shots at everything proposed, that the spirit of repartee was fairly awakened, and Cherry's bright delicate wit began to play, so that no one knew how to believe in the lateness of the hour, and still less that this was the same house that grave Wilmet had left that morning.

'Poor dear little Cherry!' said Felix to Mr. Audley, after helping her upstairs, 'she is quite spent with laughing; indeed my jaws ache, and she is ready to cry, as if it had been unfeeling.'

'Don't let her fancy that. We certainly were surprised into it to-night; but I only wish for her sake--for all your sakes--that you could keep the house merrier.'

Felix sighed. He too felt as if he had been betrayed into unbecoming levity; and though he would not dispute, his heart had only become the heavier. However, he did not forget; and when Cherry again breathed a little sigh as to what Wilmet would think of their first day, he stoutly averred that there was no use in drooping, and no harm in liveliness, and that no one had ever been so full of joyousness as their father.

She owned it. 'But--'

And that but meant the effects of the three years that she had spent as the companion of her mother's mournful widowhood, and of the cares of life on her elder brother and sister.

It was true, as Mr. Audley said, that the associations of the rooms were not good for her spirits in her many lonely hours and confined life; and this reconciled Felix more than anything else to the proposed change. He was keeping his promise to Wilmet of not seeking a house till her return, when Mr. and Mrs. Froggatt, whose minds had been much relieved by hearing that the lodger would consult the proprieties, communicated to him their own scheme of taking up their residence at a village named Marshlands, about two miles from Bexley, where they already spent great part of the summer in a pleasant cottage and garden which they had bought and adorned. Mr. Froggatt would drive in to attend to the business every day, but the charge of the house was the difficulty, as they did not wish to let the rooms; and they now proposed that the young Underwoods should inhabit them rent-free, merely keeping a bedroom and little parlour behind the shop for Mr. Froggatt, and providing firing in them. With much more diffidence, at his wife's earnest suggestion, the kindly modest old man asked whether Miss Underwood would object to his coming in to take a piece of bread and cheese when he was there in the middle of the day.

It was an excellent offer, and Felix had no hesitation in gratefully closing with it, even without consulting Wilmet. Her reply showed that a great weight was taken off her mind; and she was only longing to be at home again, contriving for the move, which was to take place at Lady Day. She was burning to study the new rooms; nevertheless, as by kind Marilda's contrivance, she was taking lessons in German every day from a superior Fraulein who had once been her cousin's governess, and was further allowed to inspect the working of a good school, her stay was extended, by Miss Pearson's entreaty, a full fortnight beyond what had been intended. Nor had anything gone wrong in her absence. Even the overlooking of the boys' linen, which she had believed impossible without her, was safely carried on by Cherry, and all were sent off in sound condition. No catastrophe occurred; and the continual occupation and responsibility drove away all the low spirits that so often had tried the home-keeping girl. She did enjoy those tête-à-tête evenings, when Felix opened to her more than he had ever done before; and yet it was an immense relief to have the day fixed for Wilmet's return, and how much more to have her walking into the room with all the children clinging about her in incoherent ecstacy, which had not subsided enough for much comprehension when Felix came joyously in. 'Hurrah, Wilmet! Mr. Froggatt sent me home a couple of hours before time!'

'How very good! I met him in the street just now. Really, he is the kindest old gentleman in the world!'

'I believe you dazzled him, Mettie; he says he did not know you till you spoke to him, and if he had realised what a beautiful and majestic young lady you were, he should hardly have ventured to propose your taking up your abode under his humble roof.'

'That must be the effect of living with Alda,' said Wilmet merrily; 'but, oh! I am glad to be at home again!'

'And I never was so glad of anything in my life,' said Geraldine eagerly.

'I am longing to go over the house, and know what to do about furniture,' continued Wilmet.

'There! now W. W. is herself again!' said Felix.

'Mrs. Froggatt came and called on me,' said Geraldine. 'She talked of leaving us the larger things that will not go into the cottage.'

'Which is well,' said Felix; 'for how much of ours will survive the shock of removing is doubtful.'

'All the things that came from Vale Leston are quite solid,' said Wilmet, bristling up.

'That carpet is solid darn,' said Felix. 'We tried one evening, and found that though the pattern of rose-leaves is a tradition, no one younger than Clem could remember having seen either design or colour.'

'You should not laugh at it, Felix,' said Wilmet, a little hurt; for indeed her mother's needle and her own were too well acquainted with the carpet for her to like to hear it contemned.

Felix and Cherry both felt somewhat called to order, as if their mistress had come home again; and Cherry was the first to break silence by inquiring after Wilmet's studies at Brighton.

'Oh yes,' said Wilmet, 'I do hope I am improved. That was all Marilda's kindness. She quite understood how I missed everybody and everything; and at last, one day, when I was wishing I could pronounce German like Alda, and that Alda had time to give me some lessons--'

'Alda hasn't time?'

'Oh, you don't know how useful she is! She writes all the notes. Marilda devised getting this Fraulein--such a good-natured woman! and when she heard what I wanted, she got leave for me to come every day to study the working of the school. I do believe I shall teach much better now, if only I were not so ignorant. I never had any notion before how little I knew!'

However, Wilmet's value had really risen so much in consequence of these instructions, that Miss Pearson arranged that she should lay the French and German foundations, and prepare the scholars, and should receive half a sovereign a half year from each girl whom she thus instructed, being the moiety of 'extra.' Moreover, the head teacher talked of retiring, and her succession was promised to Wilmet--a brilliant prospect, that the sight of Alda's grandeur did not make her contemn.

Wilmet's anxious mind was well satisfied by her inspection of the new quarters, which, among other conveniences, had that of shortening by ten minutes her walk to school. The family apartments were all upstairs, the space below being entirely taken up by the business, and the kitchens were under ground. The chief sitting-room upstairs was unfortunately towards the street, and had a northern aspect; it was a spacious room, with three large windows filled with boxes of flowers, and contained a big table and two sofas, which, with the carpet and curtains, would remain well covered up. Folding-doors led into a smaller room, with a south window towards the little garden, where Mrs. Froggatt generally sat, and which had been used for the dining-room. There were two bedrooms besides on the same floor, one of which would remain untouched for Mr. Froggatt; and above these, there was a large nursery, and more rooms than had been ever furnished. Rent, rates, taxes, and repairs, all off her mind! Wilmet felt as if prosperity were setting in; and she was the first to make the audacious statement that they need not part with Martha, and indeed, that the house could not be kept in order, nor dinners cooked fit for Mr. Froggatt, by Sibby single-handed. And Cherry made up her mind that they were like a family of caterpillars moving their cobweb tent; Angela, seeing such an establishment of young tortoise-shells, in their polished black, under their family web, had asked, 'Which was their brother Felix?' and the name was adopted.

So a time of much business and excitement set in; and the lengthening spring evenings were no sinecure to Wilmet, as the flitting day approached, being rather hurried on by the old bookseller, who wanted to be at Marshlands in time to admire his hyacinths and sow his annuals. Mr. Audley would take rooms at the Fortinbras Arms for the remainder of his stay at Bexley; and indeed, there was a good deal to break the old habit of constantly depending on him, for his brother's young wife was slowly dying in London, and the whole family seemed instinctively to turn to him for comfort and advice, so that he was obliged to be continually going backwards and forwards.

On the 24th of March, when he came down by an afternoon train, he found the house door open, the steps scattered with straw; and after looking in and seeing his own parlour intact, and with a cheerful fire, he pursued his way upstairs, and there found the sitting-room bare except for a sort of island consisting of the sofa, on which Geraldine lay rolled in cloaks and shawls, trying to amuse the twins by a feeble attempt to sing

'Weel may the boatie row,'

while making paper boats for Stella to drag by strings upon the smooth boards.

'Eh, Cherry, are you the Last Man, or the Last Rose of Summer?'

'The last of the caterpillars,' said Cherry, smiling, but with effort. 'Do you see Stella's fleet--just thirteen?'

'Making omens, foolish child!' but though Stella was eagerly pointing and explaining, 'Tat Tella's boat--tat Tedo's--tat brother's--tat Angel,' and so on, the word foolish was not directed to the little one, but to the grey eyes heavy with unshed tears, that rested wistfully upon a wreck that had caught upon a nail and lay rent and ragged.

'Pray don't look which it is,' said she.

'Certainly not; I hate auguries.'

'Do you think there is nothing in them?'

'I think there is nothing in this room but what ought to be in mine. Do you expect me to stand discussing superstition in this horrible raw emptiness? Here,' picking up Theodore, 'I'll come back for you.'

'Oh no, thank you, let me get down by myself; he cannot be left alone in a room.'

'Come, Stella, and take care of him.'

'That's worse; she leads him into mischief. We are fox, goose, and cabbage. Please give me my crutch; Wilmet put it out of reach because she said I was destroying myself.'

'You are tired to death.'

'Oh no; but one can't sit still when so much is going on. Oh, how delicious!' as after an interval she arrived, and found Mr. Audley winding up a musical-box, which Theodore was greeting with its own tunes, and Stella with a dance and chant of 'Sing box--sing box;' and then the two sat listening to the long cycle of tunes which would hold Theodore entranced for any length of time.

After a short inquiry and a reply as to the sister-in-law's state, and a few words on the progress of the flitting, there was a silence while Mr. Audley read the letters that had come for him in his absence, and Cherry's face became more and more pensive. At last, when Mr. Audley laid down his letters, and leant against the chimney-piece, she ventured to say, 'Is it wrong?'

'Is what wrong?' said the Curate, who had quite forgotten the subject.

'To care about omens.'

'That depends. To accept them is sometimes necessary; to look out for them is generally foolish and often wrong.'

'Sometimes necessary?' said Cherry eagerly.

'Sometimes experience seems to show that in good Providence a merciful preparation is sent not so much to lead to anticipations, as to bring the mind into keeping with what is coming, and, as it were, attune it.'

'So that little things may be constantly types of great future ones?'

'My dear Cherry, I said not constantly.'

'Just let me tell you. Sibby says that the very day we all came into this poor old house, just as the omnibus stopped, there was the knell ringing overhead, and a funeral coming up the street. She knew it was a token, and burst out crying; and dear Mamma, who you know never shed tears, turned as white as a corpse, as if she was struck to the heart.'

'And your father?'

'Oh! Sibby said he just stood in the doorway, lifted his hat as the funeral passed, and then well-nigh carried Mamma, with the baby (that was Fulbert) in her arms, over the threshold, and smiled at her, saying, "Well, mother, what better than to have found our home till death!" So you see he did believe in it.'

'I see he wanted to cheer her spirits, not by saying "stuff and nonsense," but reminding her that there are worse things than death. Have you an omen on your mind, Cherry? Have it out; don't let it sink in.'

'Only please don't laugh at me. Indeed, it was not my own doing, but Stella's fancy to have a boat for each of us, when she was launching them; and I could not help recollecting how we are all starting out and away from our first home.'

'Stella's was not a very perilous ocean.'

'That was a comfort at first; and Stella tried to draw all the thirteen lines together, but they tangled, and one thread broke, and that boat was left behind; and one poor crooked ill-made thing fell over, and was left at home because hindering all the rest, and even Stella knew that was me, and--' her voice quivered, 'one was caught on a nail, and torn into a wreck! Now, can I help thinking, though you'll just call them newspaper-boats, dragged by a baby on a dry dusty floor?'

'Watched by a weary fanciful damsel,' said Mr. Audley, sitting down by her, 'who does not know a bit more than she did before, that all are launching on a sea, and if it is a rougher one, there's a better Guiding Star than Stella Eudora to lead them, and they have compasses of their own--ay, and a Pilot. And if there are times when He seems to be asleep in the ship--why, even the owner of the unseaworthy boat left at home can show the Light, and pray on till the others are roused to awaken Him.'

'I wish there had not been that wreck,' she sighed.

'What seems a wreck need not be really one,' said Mr. Audley. 'It may be the very way of returning to the right course. And by and by we shall see our Master standing on the shore in the morning light.'

At that moment there was a sound at the door--Felix had accompanied Cherry's chair, to bring her and Theodore to the new home. There was too much haste for the wistful last looks she intended: she was deposited in the chair with Theodore on her knee, Stella trotting after, with Felix and Mr. Audley, who was coming to see the inauguration. St. Oswald's Buildings were left behind, and she was drawn up to the green private door, beside the shop window; Wilmet hurried down and took Theodore from her; Felix helped her out, and up the narrow steep staircase, which certainly was not a gain, but when landed in the drawing-room, the space seemed to her magnificent. And their own furniture, the two or three cherished portraits brought from Vale Leston, their father's chair, their mother's sofa, the silk patchwork table-cover that had been the girl's birth-day present to Mamma, the bookcase with Papa's precious books, made it seem home-like.

'The mantelpiece is just the same!' cried Cherry, delighted, as she recognised all the old ornaments.

The next moment her delight was great at the flower-stands, which Mr. Froggatt had kindly left full of primulas, squills, and crocuses; and when she looked out from the back room into the little garden, where Mr. Froggatt's horticultural tastes had long found their sole occupation, and saw turf, green laurels, and bunches of snowdrops and crocuses, she forgot all Stella's launch!

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

XI. THE CHORAL FESTIVAL

'And with ornaments and banners, As becomes gintale good manners, We made the loveliest Tay room upon Shannon shore.' Thackeray.

'Of course, after this,' said Lady Price, 'Miss Underwood did not expect to be visited.'

Otherwise the gain was great. The amusement of looking out of window into the High Street was alone a perpetual feast to the little ones, and saved Geraldine worlds of anxiety; and the garden where they could be turned out to play was prized as it only could be by those who had never had any outlet before. It was a pleasant little long narrow nook, between the printing-house on the west, and such another garden on the east, a like slip, with a wall masked by ivy and lilacs, and overshadowed by a horse-chestnut meeting it on the south. It was not smoky, and was quite quiet, save for the drone and stamp of the steam-press; there was grass, a gum-cistus and some flower-beds in the centre, and a gravel-walk all round, bordered by narrow edgings of flowers, and with fruit trees against the printing-house wall, and a Banksia and Wisteria against that of the house. Mr. Froggatt was quite touched at the reverence with which Angela and Stella regarded even the daisies that had eluded his perpetual spud; and when he found out the delight it was to Cherry to live with flowers for the first time in her life, he seldom failed to send her a bunch of violets or some other spring beauty as soon as he arrived in the morning, and kept the windows constantly supplied with plants.

The old bookseller was at first very much afraid of his new inmates. To Felix he was used, but he looked on the sisters as ladies, and to ladies except on business-terms he was much less accustomed than to gentlemen. Besides, being a thorough gentleman himself at heart, he had so much delicacy as to be afraid of hurting their feelings by seeming at home in his own house; and he avoided being there at luncheon for a whole week, until one afternoon Felix ran up to say that he was sure Mr. Froggatt had a cold, and would be glad if a cup of tea appeared in his parlour. Gratitude brought him in to face the enemy; and after he had been kept at home for a day or two by the cold, his wife's injunctions and Felix's entreaties brought him to the dinner.

It happened to be one of Wilmet's favourite economical stews; but these were always popular in the family, though chiefly composed of scraps, pot-liquor, rice, and vegetables; and both for its excellence and prudence it commanded Mr. Froggatt's unqualified approbation. All that distressed his kind heart was to see no liquor but water, except Cherry's thimbleful of port; he could not enjoy his glass of porter, and shook his head--perhaps not without reason--when he found that his young assistant's diet was on no more generous scale, and was not satisfied by Felix's laughing argument that it was impossible to be more than perfectly healthy and strong. 'False economy,' said the old man in private; but Felix was not to be persuaded into what he believed to be an unnecessary drain on the family-finances, and was still more stout against the hint that if Redstone discovered this prudential abstinence, it might make him 'disagreeable.' Felix had gone his way regardless of far too many sneers for poverty and so-called meanness to make any concession on their account, though the veiled jealousy and guarded insolence of that smart 'gent' the foreman had been for the last three years the greatest thorn in his side. And at least he made this advance, that the errand-boy cleaned the shoes!

Geraldine, though shy at first from the utter seclusion in which she had lived, put forth a pretty bashful graciousness that perfectly enchanted Mr. Froggatt, who was besides much touched by her patient helplessness. He became something between her grandfather and her knight, loading her with flowers, giving her the run of the circulating library, and whenever it was fine enough, taking her for a mile or two in his low basket-carriage either before or after his day's business in the shop. It was not exactly like being with her only other friend, Mr. Audley; but he was a thoroughly kind, polite, and by no means unlettered old man; and Geraldine enjoyed and was grateful, while the children were his darlings, and were encouraged to take all manner of liberties with him.

Among the advantages of the change was the having Felix always at hand; and though she really did not see him oftener in the course of the day than at St. Oswald's Buildings, still the knowing him to be within reach gave great contentment to Cherry. The only disadvantage was that he lost his four daily walks to and fro, and hardly ever had sufficient fresh air and exercise. He was indeed on his feet for the most of the day, but not exerting his muscles; and all taste for the active sports in which his kind old master begged him to join seemed to have passed away from him when care fell upon him. He tried not to hold his head above the young men of his adopted rank, many of whom had been his school-fellows; but, except with the members of the choir and choral society, he had no common ground, and there were none with whom he could form a friendship. Thus he never had any real relaxation, except music, and his Sunday walks, besides his evenings with his sisters and of play with the children. It was not a natural life for a youth, but it seemed to suit with his disposition; for though not given to outbursts of animal spirits, he was always full of a certain strong and supporting cheerfulness.

Indeed, though they did not like to own it to themselves, the young people had left behind them much of the mournfulness of the widowed household, which had borne down their youthful spirits; and though the three elders could never be as those who had grown up without care or grief, yet their sunshine could beam forth once more, and helped them through the parting with their best friend. For Mr. Audley's sister-in-law died in the beginning of June, and his father entreated him to go abroad with his brother, so that he was hurried away directly after midsummer, after having left his books in Felix's charge, and provided for the reception of the dividends in his absence.

His successor was a quiet amiable young Mr. Bisset, not at all disinclined to cultivate Felix as a link with the tradesfolk; only he had brought with him a mother, a very nice, prim, gentle-mannered, black-eyed lady, who viewed all damsels of small means as perilous to her son. Had she been aware that Bexley contained anything so white and carnation, so blue-eyed and straight-featured, so stately, and so penniless as Wilmet Underwood, he would never have taken the Curacy. She was a kind woman, who would have taken infinite pains to serve the orphan girls; and she often called on them; but when the Rector's wife had told her that such a set had been made at Mr. Audley that he could bear it no longer, it was but a natural instinct to cherish her son's bashfulness.

That autumn Wilmet came home elevated by the news that the head teacher was going to retire at Christmas, and that she was to be promoted to her place of forty pounds a year. Her successor was coming immediately to be trained, being in fact the daughter of Miss Pearson's sister, who had married an officer in the army. She had been dead about three years, and the girl had been living in London with her father, now on half pay, and had attended a day-school until he married again, and finding his means inadequate to his expenses, and his wife and daughter by no means comfortable together, he suddenly flitted to Jersey to retrench, and made over his daughter of seventeen to her aunts to be prepared for governess-ship.

This was the account Miss Pearson and Miss Maria gave to Wilmet, and Wilmet repeated to Geraldine, who watched with some interest for the first report of the new-comer.

'She is rather a nice-looking little thing,' was the first report, 'but I don't know whether we shall get on together.'

The next was, 'Miss Maria has been begging me to try to draw her out. They are quite distressed about her, she is so stiff and cold in her ways with them, and they think she cries in her own room.'

'Poor thing, how forlorn she must be! Cannot you comfort her, Mettie?'

'She will have nothing to say to me! She is civil and dry, just as she is to them.'

'I think she can talk,' said Angela.

'How do you know anything about it, little one?' said Wilmet.

'I heard her talking away to Lizzie Bruce in the arbour at dinner-time. Her face looked quite different then from what it does in school.'

'Then I hope she is settling down to be happier,' said Wilmet thoughtfully; but, having watched Angela out of hearing, she added, 'Not that I think Lizzie Bruce a good friend; she is rather a weak girl, and is flattered by Carry Price making a distinction between her and some of the others.'

'When is Carry Price ever going to leave school?'

'When she can play Mendelssohn well enough to satisfy Mr. Bevan. I wonder Lady Price does keep her on here; but in the meantime we can only make the best of her.'

A day or two later, Wilmet and Angela came in from school eager, indignant, and victorious.

'You did manage it well!' the younger was saying. 'I was so glad you saw for yourself.--Just fancy, Cherry, there were Carry Price and Lizzie Bruce turning out all the most secret corners of Miss Knevett's work-box, laughing at them, and asking horrid impertinent questions, and she was almost crying.'

'And you fetched Wilmet?'

'She was sitting out in the garden, showing some of the little ones how to do their crochet--it was the play-time after dinner--and I just went to her and whispered in her ear, so she strolled quietly by the window.'

'Yes,' added Wilmet, 'and before I came to it, Edith was saying to Jane Martin, on purpose for me to hear, that she thought it would be a good thing if Miss Underwood would look into the school-room. So Angel was not getting into a scrape.'

'I should not have minded if I had,' said Angel; 'it was such a shame, and she looks such a dear--'

'There she was,' said Wilmet, 'her fingers shaking, and her eyes full of tears, trying to do some work, while Carry Price went on in her scoffing voice, laughing over all the little treasures and jewels, and asking who gave them to her, and what they cost. All I could do was to put my hand on her shoulder and say I saw she did not like it; and then Lizzie Bruce looked ashamed, but Miss Price bristled up, and declared that Miss Knevett had unlocked the box herself. Then the poor child burst out that she had only said she would show her Maltese cross; she had never asked them to turn everything out, and meddle with it; and Carry tossed her head, just like my Lady, and said, "Oh, very well, they did not want to see her trumpery, since she was so cross about it. I suppose you mean to show the things one by one to the little girls! A fine exhibition!" She cried out, "Exhibit! I don't mean to exhibit at all; I only showed it to you as my friend!" Whereupon Carry Price flounced off with, "As if I were going to make a friend of an underteacher!" and she went into a tremendous fit of crying, like what you used to have, Cherry, except that it was more passionate!'

'I'm sure I never had anything like that to cry for. What did you do with her? How lucky she had you!'

'Why, when she went on sobbing, "I'll not stay here," "I won't be insulted." "I'll tell my aunts," my great object was to get her upstairs, and to silence her, for I was sure Miss Pearson would dislike nothing so much as having a regular complaint from her about Carry; and, besides that, all the girls, who pity her now, would be turned against her, and think her a mischief-maker. I did get her up at last, and, oh dear! what a scene we had! Poor thing, I suppose she has been a spoilt child, going to a lady's fashionable institute, as she calls it, where she was a great girl, and rather looked up to, for the indulgences she got from her father--very proud, too, of being a major's daughter. Then came the step-mother; what things she said about her, to be sure! No end of misery, and disputes--whose fault, I am sure I don't know; then a crisis of debts. She says it was all Mrs. Knevett's extravagance; but Miss Pearson told me before that she thought it had been going on a long time; and at last, when the father and his wife and her child go off to Jersey, this poor girl is turned over to the aunts she never saw since her mother died, twelve years ago.'

'I dare say it is the best thing for her.'

'If she can only think so; but she fancies the being a teacher the most horrid thing in the world.'

'Oh, Wilmet!' interrupted Angela; 'why, you like teaching: and Robin means to be a real governess, and so do I, if I am not a Sister!'

'Me too,' called out Stella.

'But you see this unlucky girl can't understand that teaching may be a real way of doing good; she fancies it a degradation. She says she and her friends at her institute hated and despised the teachers, and played all manner of tricks upon them.'

'How foolish the teachers must have been!'

'She did say something about their being low and mean. She did me the favour to say not like me, and that she was quite shocked to find I was one of this dreadful race. It was quite amazing to her when I told her how Robina's dear Miss Lyveson keeps school without necessity, only to be useful. You may imagine what it is to her to be plunged all on a sudden into this unhappy class. She began by trying to take her old place as an officer's daughter, and to consort with the girls; but I think if she and Carry Price were left to one another, she would very soon sink as low as any of the poor hounded teachers she describes.'

'She must be very silly and conceited.'

'No, I think she is sensible, and loving too, at the bottom,' said Wilmet, 'only every one is strange here: I think she will understand better soon; and in the meantime, she has quite forgiven me for being a teacher. She clung about me, and called me all sorts of pretty names--her only friend, and so forth.'

'Perhaps she can forgive you for being a teacher, in consideration of your being a twin,' said Cherry.

'There, Cherry, you understand her better already than I do! I'll bring her to you, I have not time for such a friendship.'

'Poor thing! I should like to try to comfort her, if she is strange and dreary; but I think she must be rather a goose. What's her name?'

'Alice; but in school Miss Pearson is very particular about having her called Miss Knevett. We have exchanged Christian names in private, of course.'

'You horrid old prosy thing of four U's,' said Geraldine. 'You are sitting up there, you great fair creature, you, for the poor child to worship and adore, and not reciprocating a bit!'

'Of course,' said Wilmet, 'if she can't be happy without being petted, I must pet her, and let her be nonsensical about me; but I think it is all great stuff, and that you will suit her much better than I ever shall.'

'Do you never mean to have a friend, Mettie?'

'Oh no, I haven't time; besides, I've got Alda.'

Geraldine had, however, many dreams about the charms of friendship. She read of it in the books that Felix selected for her; and Robina had a vehement affection for a schoolfellow whose hair and whose carte she treasured, and to whom she would have written daily during the holidays but for the cost of stamps. The equality and freedom of the letters she received always made Cherry long for the like. Since Edgar had left her, she had never been on those equal terms with any one; Wilmet was more like mother or aunt than sister; and though Felix had a certain air of confidence and ease when with her, and made her his chief playfellow, he could not meet all her tastes or all her needs; and there was a sort of craving within her for intimacy with a creature of her own species.

And though Wilmet's description of Alice Knevett did not sound particularly wise, Cherry, in her humility, deemed her the more secure of being on her own level, not so sensible and intolerant of little dreams, fancies, and delusions as those two sensible people, the twin sisters. So she watched impatiently for the introduction; and at last Wilmet said, 'Well, she is coming to tea to-morrow evening. Little ridiculous chit, she bridled and doubted, but as you were an invalid, she supposed she might, only it was not what she had been used to, and Papa "might object."'

'What? To the shop? Well, I really think she had better not come! I'll have nobody here that thinks it a favour, and looks down on Felix.'

'My dear, if she contrives to look down on Felix after she has seen him, she will deserve anything you please. Just now, I believe the foolishness is in her school, and not in herself.'

Nevertheless, Geraldine's eagerness underwent a great revulsion. Instead of looking forward to the visit, she expected it with dread, and dislike to the pert, conceited, flippant Londoner, who despised her noble brother, and aspired to the notice of Carry Price. Her nervous shrinking from strangers--the effect of her secluded life--increased on her every moment of that dull wet afternoon; her feet grew cold, her cheeks hot, and she could hardly find temper or patience for the many appeals of Bernard and Stella for her attention.

Her foolish little heart was palpitating as if a house-breaker were entering instead of Wilmet, conducting a dainty cloud of fresh lilac muslin, out of which appeared a shining black head, and a smiling sparkling face, with so much life and play about the mouth and eyes that there was no studying their form or colour, and it was only after a certain effort that it could be realised that Alice Knevett was a glowing brunette, with a saucy little nose, retroussé, though very pretty, a tiny mouth full of small pearls, and eyes of black diamond.

In spite of her gracious manner, and evident consciousness of her own condescension, the winsomeness of the dancing eyes fascinated Cherry at once. Indeed, the simplicity and transparency of her little dignities disarmed all displeasure, they were so childish; and they vanished in a moment in a game at play with Bernard and Stella. When Wilmet brought out Geraldine's portfolio, her admiration was enthusiastic if not critical.

A sketch of Wilmet and Alda enchanted her; she had never seen anything so lovely or so well done.

'No, no,' said Cherry, rather shocked, 'you must have seen the Royal Academy.'

'Oh, but I am sure this ought to be in the Royal Academy; I never saw anything there that I liked half so much. How clever you must be!'

Cherry could not but laugh at the extravagant compliment. 'My brother Edgar draws much better than that,' she said, producing a capital water-colour of a group of Flemish market-women.

'I shall always like yours best. Oh! and what is this?'

'I did not know it was there,' said Cherry, colouring, and trying to take it away.

'Oh, let me look. What! Is it a storm, or a regatta, or fishing boats? What is that odd light? What is written under? "The waves of this troublesome world." Why, that is in the Bible, is not it?'

'Thirteen boats, Cherry,' said Wilmet; 'is that a device of your own?'

'What, not copied? Oh dear! I wish I was so clever!'

'It is the sea of this life, isn't it?' said Angela, coming up. 'Is it ourselves, Cherry, all making for the golden light of Heaven, and the star of faith guiding them?'

'She reads it like a book,' exclaimed Alice. 'And those two close together--that means love, I suppose!'

'Love and help, the weak and the strong,' said Geraldine, in her earnest dreamy voice.

'Do pray make a picture of my boat on a nice smooth sea of light; I don't like rocks and breakers, such as you have done there.'

'There always must be a last long wave,' said Cherry.

'Oh, but don't let us think about horrid things. I like the summer sea. Aren't there some verses--

'"Youth at the prow, and pleasure at the helm?"'

'That would not be a pleasant augury,' said Cherry. 'Do you know what this is meant for, bad as it is? Longfellow's verses--'

'The phantom host that beleaguered the walls of Prague? How can you draw such things?'

'So I say,' observed Wilmet.

'They come and haunt me, and I feel as if I must.'

'Who is this kneeling on the wall? He looks like a knight watching his armour.'

'So he is,' said Cherry.

'But there is nothing about him in the poem. Did you make him for yourself?'

'Why, he is Ferdinand Travis!' exclaimed Wilmet.

'What, is it a real man? I thought it was somebody in a story.'

'I see!' said Angela quietly. 'He is watching his armour the night before he was baptized.'

For the child had never forgotten the adult baptism, though she had been little more than four years old at the time; but she was one of those little ones to whom allegory seems a natural element, with which they have more affinity than with the material world.

However, the mention of Ferdinand Travis led to the history of the fire at the hotel, and of his recovery; Alice declared that 'everything nice' seemed to happen at Bexley, and was laughed at for her peculiar ideas of niceness; but there was something in the feminine prattle that was wonderfully new and charming to Geraldine, while, on the other hand, the visitor was conscious of a stimulus and charm that she had never previously experienced; and the eager tongues never flagged till Felix came in. He had evidently taken pains with his toilette, in honour of the unusual event; and the measured grave politeness of his manners renewed Alice's scared punctilious dignity of demeanour, and entire consciousness that she was a major's daughter and he a bookseller.

But Felix had brought in some exciting Eastern news; and Alice put on an air capable, as one connected with India and the army, but she soon found out the deficiency of her geography, and was grateful for the full clear explanations, while her amour propre was gratified by finding that her familiarity with a few Indian terms was valuable. Before the end of the evening all were at ease, and she was singing with Felix and Wilmet at the old piano.

No sooner had the door shut on her when the maid came to fetch her, than a storm fell on Wilmet.

'So that's what you call rather nice-looking?'

'Well, she is under-sized and very brown, but I did think you would have allowed that she was rather pretty.'

'Rather!' exclaimed Cherry indignantly.

'That's what it is to be a handsome woman!' said Felix.

'Do you mean to say that you think her anything remarkable?' said Wilmet.

'Say no more, my dear W. W.,' laughed Felix. 'I never understood before why negroes don't admire white people.'

'I am sure I don't know what you are talking about,' said Wilmet, betaking herself to her darning with great good-humour. 'Alice Knevett is prettier than I thought she was when she was all tears and airs; but I can't see any remarkable beauty to rave about.'

'No, you can't,' said Geraldine merrily. 'You look much too high over her head, but you see I don't; and such a little sparkling diamond beetle is a real treat to me.'

And Geraldine often enjoyed the treat.

In a very short time the green door and steep stairs were as familiar to Alice as to the Underwoods themselves; for her aunts were thankful to have her happy and safe, and she was rapturously fond of Geraldine, reflecting and responding to most of her sentiments. Most of the Underwoods had the faculty of imprinting themselves upon the characters of their friends, by taking it for granted that they felt alike; and Alice Knevett had not spent six weeks at Bexley before she had come to think it incredible that she had thought either teaching or the Underwoods beneath her. She was taking pains to do her work well, and enjoying it, and was being moulded into a capital subordinate to Wilmet; while with Geraldine she read and talked over her books, obtained illustrations for the poetry she wrote out in her album, and brought in a wholesome air of chatter, which made Cherry much more girl-like than she had ever been before. It was an importation of something external, something lively and interesting, which was very refreshing to all; and even Felix, in his grave politeness and attention to his sister's friend, manifested that so far from being in his way, as they had feared, he found her a very agreeable element when she joined the home party or the Sunday walk.

Indeed, there was a certain tendency to expansion about the life of the young people; the pinch of poverty was less griping than previously, and their natural spirits rose. In January Lance was allowed to bring his friend Harewood to a concert of the choral society; and on the following evening Alice Knevett came to tea, and there was a series of wonderful charades, chiefly got up by Clement and Robina, and of comic songs by Lance and Bill Harewood--all with such success, that Alice declared that she had never seen anything so delightful in all her experience of London Christmases!

The young people really seemed to have recovered elasticity enough that year to think of modest treats and holidays as they had never ventured to do since that memorable sixteenth birth-day of Felix's. Here was his twenty-first not very far off; and when it was announced that this identical 3rd of July had been fixed on for a grand choral meeting at the Cathedral, at which the choir of Bexley was to assist, there was such a spirit of enterprise abroad in the family, that Geraldine suggested that Wilmet might take Robina to see the Cathedral and hear Lance.

'Lance will be just what will not be heard,' said Felix. 'They will not show off their solos; but the Robin ought to have the pleasure, if possible; and as I go in two capacities, press and choir, I hope we can manage it for her.'

He came in full early for the evening. 'All right,' he said. 'Two tickets are come for the Pursuivant, and Mr. Froggatt says he would not go at any price; and besides, each of the choir may take a friend--so that's three.'

'Am I to be reporter or friend?' asked Wilmet.

'Reporter, I think, for you will have to do audience.'

'Nay, Cherry ought to be the gentleman connected with the press,' said Wilmet, for in fact Geraldine did sometimes do copying and correcting work for her brother; 'and, indeed, I do not see why she should not. We could go home directly after morning service, and leave you there.'

'Oh no, impossible,' said Geraldine, 'it would never do; it would only spoil everybody's pleasure, and be too much for me.'

'I think you are wise,' said Felix; and somehow it struck her with a prick that he had rather the proposal had not been made. 'There is sure to be a great crush, and I may be obliged to be with the choir.'

'I am quite able to take care of her, I can always lift her,' said Wilmet, surprised.

'I would not go on any account,' protested Cherry. 'I should be like the old woman in that Servian proverb, who paid five dollars to go to the fair, and would have paid ten to be safe at home again.'

'There might be no getting a bench fit for you to sit upon,' added Felix, who, as a gentleman of the press, was not devoid of experience. 'I could not be easy about you, my dear; it is much safer not.'

'Perhaps so,' owned Wilmet, disappointed; 'but Angel is too little for such a long day, and Cherry is so much stronger, that I thought--'

'Oh, but could not Alice Knevett go?' put in Cherry.

'A very good suggestion,' said Felix. 'She hardly ever has any amusements. Well thought of, White-heart!'

I believe he thought of it from the first, felt Geraldine, angry with herself that this conviction gave a prick like the point of a needle. She threw her energies into the scheme, and was begging Wilmet to go and make the proposal, when there was a sudden peal of the bell, a headlong trampling rush, a dash open of the door--Theodore began to hum the anthem 'How beautiful,' the other three small ones hailed 'Lance' at the top of their voices, and his arms were round the neck of the first sister who came in his way.

'What, Lance! how came you here?'

'Our organ is tuning up its pipes--man comes to-morrow--Prayers in the Lady Chapel and not choral, and it's a holiday at school, so I got off by the 5.20, and need not go back till the 6.10 to-morrow. We are practising our throats out to lead you all on the 3rd. You know you are coming, the whole kit of you.'

'Do we?' said Wilmet. 'It is only for the last ten minutes that we have known that any of us were coming.'

'All right; that's what I'm come about. Robina must be got home.'

'She will be come. She comes on the 1st.'

'That's right; then there's to be a great spread in Bishop's Meads between services. Everybody sends provisions, and asks their friends; but Cherry is to go and rest at the Harewoods'. The governor will get her in through the library into the north transept as quiet as a lamb, no squash at all. It is only along the cloister--a hop, step, and jump; and Miles has promised me the snuggest little seat for her. Then the Harewood sofa--'

'It is too much, Lance,' began Cherry. 'Mrs. Harewood--'

'Don't be absurd; she wishes it with all her heart. She won't want a ticket if Mr. Harewood smuggles her in, but I can get as many as you want. How many--Wilmet, Cherry, Robin, Angel, and Miss Knevett. She'll come, won't she?'

'We were thinking of going to ask her.'

'I'll do it; I've brought my own ticket for a friend for her; here it is, with L. O. U. in the corner. I'll run down with it before any one else cuts in.'

'Hold hard,' said Felix; 'we shall not get her if you set about it in that wild way!'

'Oh, but I'll promise Wilmet shall take her in tow, and if anything will pacify the old girls, that will.'

'You had better let me come with you,' said Wilmet.

'Look sharp then. Is it a practising night? Yes, that's well; Miles is in a state of mind at the short notice, and has crammed me choke-full of messages; he says it will save his coming down; come along, then, W. W., and soft-sawder the venerable aunts.'

No more of this operation was necessary than the assurance that Miss Underwood was going, and that Mrs. Harewood would be a sort of chaperon. Alice Knevett was happy and grateful; and if anything were wanting to the universal enthusiasm of anticipation, it was supplied by Lance. The boy, with his musical talent, thorough trustworthiness and frank joyous manners, was a favourite with the organist, and was well versed in the programme; and his eagerness, and fulness of detail, were enough to infect every one. Geraldine thought it was great proof of his unspoilableness, that he took quite as much pleasure in bringing them to these services, where he would be but a unit in the hundreds, as if it had been one of the anthems, of which every one said, 'Have you heard little Underwood?' In the charm of the general welcome and the congratulation on Lance's arrangement, Geraldine had quite forgotten both her alarms and her tiny pang of surprise at not having been Felix's prime thought. Lance, by dint of a judicious mixture of hectoring and coaxing, obtained leave for Angela to be of the party, though against Wilmet's judgment; and Bernard and Stella were to spend the day with Mrs. Froggatt, which they regarded as an expedition quite as magnificent as that to St. Mary's Minster.

Mr. Froggatt was almost as eager about this pleasure for 'his young people,' as he called them, as they could be. He came in early to drive Geraldine to the station, and looked with grandfatherly complacency at the four sisters, who had ventured on the extravagance of white piqué and black ribbons, and in their freshness looked as well-dressed as any lady in the land.

He entertained Cherry all the way with his admiration of Wilmet's beauty and industry, and when arrived at the station, waited there with her till first the three girls came up with Alice Knevett, white with pink ribbons, and then the choir arrived, marching with the banner with the rood of St. Oswald before them, each with a blue satin bow in his button-hole, and the bag with his surplice under his arm, the organist, the schoolmaster, and the two curates, bringing up the rear. Mr. Bevan, my Lady, and Miss Price, whirled up in the carriage, the omnibus discharged the friends of the choir, and two waggon loads of musical talent from the villages came lumbering and cheering in! The very train roared and shrieked in with a sound of cheering from its vertebræ, and banners were projecting from the windows, amid nodding heads and waving handkerchiefs of all colours; the porters ran about distracted; and Geraldine began to be alarmed, and to think of the old woman of Servia, but behold, Felix had her on one side, Mr. Froggatt on the other, a solid guard held open the door, and protected her from the rush, and before she well knew what they were doing with her, she was lying on the seat of the carriage, with her sisters and Alice all in a row in front of her; the recently crowded platform was empty of all but a stray porter, the stationmaster, and Mr. Froggatt kissing his hand, and promising to come and fetch her on her return.

The train seemed hardly to have attained its full speed before it slackened again, and another merry load was disposed of within its joints. Another start, another arrival; and before the motion was over, a flash of sunny looks had glanced before the sisters' eyes. There was Lance, perfectly radiant, under his square trencher cap--hair, eyes, cheeks, blue bow, boots, and all, seeming to sparkle with delight as he snatched open the door. 'Hurrah! there they are. Give her out to me, Wilmet!' (as if she had been a parcel).

'Stay, wait for Felix. You can't---'

Felix rushed up from his colleagues of the choir, and Geraldine was set on her foot and crutch. 'Come along! I've got Ball's chair for you, and Bill Harewood is sitting in it for fear any one should bone it. Where's your ticket?'

'Lance, take care! Don't take her faster than she can go!' as he whisked her over the platform; and Wilmet was impeded by the seeking for Alice's parasol and Angela's cloak. They were quite out of sight when Lance had dragged Cherry through the crowd at the door, and brought her to the wheeled chair just in time to find Bill Harewood glaring out of it like the red planet Mars, and asseverating that he was the lame young lady it was hired for.

In went Geraldine, imploring to wait for Wilmet, but all in vain; off went the chair, owner and escort alike in haste, and she was swept along, with Lance and Will with a hand holding either side of the chair, imparting breathless scraps of information, and exchanging remarks: 'There goes the Archdeacon.' 'The Thorpe choir is not come, and Miles is mad about it.' 'That's the Town Hall.' 'There's where Jack licked a cad for bullying.' 'There's a cannon-ball of Oliver Cromwell's sticking out of that wall.' 'That's the only shop fit to get gingerbeer at!' 'That old horse in that cab was in the Crimea.' 'We come last in the procession, and if you see a fellow like a sheep in spectacles, that's Shapcote.' 'Hurrah! what a stunning lot! where is it from?' 'Bembury? My eyes, if that big fellow doesn't mean to bawl us all down. Down that way--that's the palace. Whose carriage is it stopping there? Now, here's the Close.'

'Is that the Cathedral? Oh!'

'You may well say so! No, not that way.' And on rattled poor amazed Geraldine through an archway, under some lime trees, round a corner, round another corner, to another arched doorway, with big doors studded with nails, with a little door for use cut out of one of the big ones.

'You must get out here,' said Lance, 'we are close by,' and he helped her out, and paid and thanked the man with the chair. 'Here's our domain,' he continued, as he introduced Cherry through the open doorway into a small flagged court, with two houses, grey and old-fashioned, forming one side, and on the other an equally old long low building with narrow latticed arched windows. Opposite to the entrance was a handsome buttressed Gothic-looking edifice, behind which rose the gable of the north transept of the Cathedral, beautiful with a rose window, and farther back, far, far above, the noble tower.

Already everything was very wonderful to Geraldine. 'That's our kennel,' said Lance, pointing to the low buildings to the right. 'School's behind; but we boarders are put up in one of the old monks' dormitories, between court and cloister.'

'Is it really?' exclaimed Geraldine.

'So my father says,' said Will. 'Here's our door.' Another stone-arched passage, almost dark, with doors opening on either side, seemed common to both houses; and Will was inviting them to enter, but Lance held back. 'No time,' he said; 'better call your father.'

'The others,' sighed Geraldine.

'Bother the others! That's right: here he is!'

'Halloo, Father!' cried Will; 'we've got Cherry.'

'By which unceremonious designation I imagine you to mean to introduce Miss Underwood,' said a figure, appearing from beneath the archway, in trencher cap, surplice, and hood, with white hair, and a sort of precision and blandness that did not at all agree with Cherry's preconceived notions of the Harewood household. 'I am very glad to see you. My ladies, as usual, are unready. Will you have a glass of wine? No?--What do you say, Lancelot?--Very well, we will take you in at once. You will not object to waiting there, and this is the quiet time.--Boys, you ought to be with the choir.'

'Oceans of time, Dad,' coolly answered Will; 'none of the fellows up there are under weigh.'

Mr. Harewood offered his arm, but perceived that Cherry preferred Lance and her crutch; advancing to the door opposite that by which they had entered, he unlocked it, and Geraldine found herself passing through a beauteous old lofty chamber, with a groined Tudor roof, all fans, and pendants, and shields; tall windows stained with armorial bearings, parchment charters and blazoned genealogies against the walls, and screens upon screens loaded with tomes of all ages, writing-tables and chairs here and there, and glass-topped tables containing illuminations and seals. 'Here is my paradise,' said the librarian, smiling.

'I think it must be,' said Geraldine, with a long breath of wonder and admiration.

'Ah! would you not like to have a good look, Cherry?' said Lance. 'That's Richard Coeur de Lion's seal in there.'

'Don't begin about it--don't set him on,' whispered Willie, with a sign of his head towards his father, who was fitting the key into the opposite door, 'or we shall all stay here for the rest of the day.'

This low door open, Mr. Harewood and the boys bared their heads as they entered, and Geraldine felt the strange solemn sensation of finding herself in a building of vast height and majesty, full of a wonderful stillness, as though the confusion of sounds she had been in so recently were far, far off.

'Where now, Lancelot?' asked Mr. Harewood, in a hushed voice; 'do you want me any further?'

'No, thank you, sir; I'll just take her across the choir to Mr. Miles, and then join the rest of us at the vestry.'

'Good-bye for the present, then,' said Mr. Harewood kindly. 'You are in safe hands. Your brother comes round every one. I could not do this.'

Through the side-screen, into the grandly beautiful choir, arching high above, with stall-work and graceful canopies below, and rich glass casting down beams of coloured light--all for 'glory and for beauty,' thought Geraldine.

'You must not stop; you must look when you are settled. That's my side,' pointing to one of the choristers' desks. 'It will be only we that sing in here; the congregation is in the nave--a perfect sea of chairs. I'll come for you when it is over. Here is Mr. Miles. My sister, sir.'

A pale gentleman in spectacles, with a surplice and beautiful blue hood, was here addressed. He too greeted Geraldine, very shyly but kindly, and she found herself expected to ascend some alarming-looking stone steps. The organ was on the choir-screen, and to the organist's little private gallery was she to ascend. It was a difficult matter, and she had in her trepidation despairingly recognised the difference between Lance's good will and Felix's practised strength; but at last she was landed in an admirable little cushioned nook, hidden by two tall painted carved canopies--exactly over the Dean's head, her brother told her--and where, as she sat sideways, she could see through the quatrefoils into the choir on the right hand, and the nave on the left. 'Delightful! Oh, thank you; how kind! If I am only not keeping any one out.'

'No,' said Lance, smiling, and whispering lower than ever, 'he has no one belonging to him. He hates women. Never a petticoat was here before in his reign. Have you a book?'

'They are robing, Underwood,' said the misogynist in the organ-loft; and Lance hurried away, leaving Geraldine alone, palpitating a good deal, but almost enjoying the solitude, in the vast structure, where the sanctity of a thousand years of worship seemed to fill the very air, as she gazed at the white vaultings and bosses carved with emblems above, at the vista of clustered columns terminating in the great jewelled west window, or at the crown-like loveliness that encompassed the sanctuary. All was still, except a deep low tone of the organ now and then. Mr. Miles looked in after the first, to hope she did not feel it uncomfortably, and to assure her that though she was too near his organ, she need not fear its putting forth its full powers; it was to be kept in subordination, and only guide the voices. This was great attention from a woman-hater, and Geraldine ventured to reiterate her thanks; at which he smiled, and said, 'When one has such a boy as your brother, there is pleasure in doing anything he wishes. You are musical?'

'I never was able to learn to play.'

'But you can read music?'

'Oh yes,' for she had often copied it.

So he brought her whole sheets of music, and put her in the way of following and understanding, perceiving, as he went, that she was full of intelligence and perception.

When he went back to his post, a few groups, looking very small, were creeping in by transept doors--by favour, like herself: then a little white figure flitted across to the desks, opened and marked the books, took up something, and disappeared; and in another moment Lance, in his broad white folds, was at her side. 'Here's the music. Oh, you have it! I've seen Fee,' he whispered; 'they are at Mrs. Harewood's, all right!' and he was gone.

Here she sat, her attention divided between the sacred impressions of the place, its exceeding beauty, and the advance of the multitude into the nave, as the doors were open, and they surged up the space left in the central aisle, and occupied the ranks of chairs prepared for them. Then came a long pause; she scanned each row in search of her sisters, and only was confused by the host of heads; felt lost and lonely, and turned her eyes and mind to the silent grandeur to the east, rather than the throng to the west.

At last there came the sweet floating sound of the chant, growing in power like the ocean swell as it approached, and the first bright banner appeared beneath the lofty pointed archway; and the double white file came flowing on like a snowy glacier, the chant becoming clear and high as the singers of each parish marched along to their places, each ranked under a bright banner with the symbol of their church's dedication. St. Oswald's rood helped Geraldine to make out that of Bexley better than their faces, though she did make out her eldest brother's fair face, and trace him to his seat. The cathedral singers came at last, and that kenspeckle red head of Will Harewood's directed her to the less conspicuous locks belonging to Lance, whose own clear thrush-like note she could catch as he passed beneath the screen. Then came the long train of parish clergy, the canons, the Dean, and lastly the Bishop, the sight of whom recalled so much.

The unsurpliced contribution had meantime been ushered in by the side doors, and filled seats in the rear of the others, so as to add their voices without marring the general effect--the perfection of which Geraldine enjoyed--of the white-robed multitude that seemed to fill the whole chancel.

The sight seemed to inspire her whole soul with a strange yearning joy, as though she were beholding a faint earthly reflex of the great vision of the Beloved Disciple; and far more was it so at the sound, which realised in a measure the words, 'As the voice of mighty waters, and as the voice of thunder.'

These were the very words that had been selected for the Second Lesson, and the First consisted of those verses in which we hear of David's commencement of the continual chant of psalms at the sanctuary; and both, unwonted as they were, gave a wonderful thrill to the audience, as though opening to them a new comprehension of their office as singers of the sanctuary.

There is no need to dwell on the wonderful and touching exhilaration derived from the harmony of vast numbers with one voice attuned to praise. It is a sensation which is so nearly a foretaste of eternity, that participation alone can give the most distant perception thereof. To the entirely unprepared and highly sensitive Geraldine it was most overpowering, all the more because she was entirely out of sight, and without power of taking part by either gesture or posture--she was passive and had no vent for her emotion.

Lance, who made his way to her round through the transept the moment he had disrobed, found her pale, panting, tearful, and trembling, with burning cheeks, so that his exaltation turned to alarm. 'Are you done up, Cherry? It is too hot up here? I'll try to find Felix or Wilmet, which?'

'Neither! I am quite well, only--O Lance, I did not know anything could be so heavenly. There seemed to be the sweeping of angels' wings all round and over me, and Papa's voice quite clear.'

'I know,' said Lance; 'it always does come in that Te Deum.'

The sister and brother were silent, not yet able for the critical discussion of single points; only, as he put his arm round her to help her to rise, she said, with a sigh, 'O Lance, it is a great thing to be one of them! Thank you. I think this is the greatest day of all my life.'

The getting her down, what with Lance's inexperience and want of height and strength, was anxious work; and just as it had been safely accomplished, the rest of their party were seen roaming the aisle in distress and perplexity. Geraldine was very glad of Felix's substantial arm, but she had rather he had omitted that rebuke for venturesomeness in dealing with her, which would have affronted Fulbert, but never seemed to trouble Lance, who was only triumphant in his success; and her perfect contentment charmed away the vexation which really arose from a slight sense of having neglected her.

The others had been perfectly happy in their several ways, and made eager comments on their way to the house of Harewood, whither Lance piloted them--this time by the front way, through the garden, which lay behind the close--entering, in spite of the mannerly demurs of the elder ones, through the open door, into a hall whence a voice of hearty greeting at once ensued. 'Here you are at last; and how's the poor darling your sister? not over-tired?'

And Cherry, before she was aware, found herself kissed, and almost snatched away from Felix, to be deposited on a sofa; and while the like kisses were bestowed on the two little girls, and hospitable offers showered on all, she was amused by perceiving that good Mrs. Harewood was endowed with exactly the same grotesque order of ugliness as her son William; but she was even more engaging, from an indescribably droll mixture of heedlessness, blundering, and tender motherliness.

'There, now, you'll just leave her to me, the poor dear; and Lance will take you down to the Mead, and find Papa and the girls for you.'

'Oh, thank you, I could not think of your staying. Now pray--'

'Now prays' were to no purpose; Mrs. Harewood professed only to want an excuse for staying at home--she did not want to be done up with running after her girls to the four ends of the Mead, when it was a long step for her to begin with. Off with them.

So when Wilmet was satisfied that Geraldine was comfortable, the five moved off--Felix and Alice, Angel in Wilmet's hand, and Lance's and Robina's tongues wagging so fast that the wonder was how either caught a word of what the other was saying.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Harewood, tossing her bonnet and gloves aside, in perfect indifference to the exposure of the curious structure of red and grey hair she thus revealed, lavished meats and drinks upon her guest, waiting on her with such kindness, that in spite of all weariness and craving for quiet after these deep and wonderful impressions, it was impossible not to enjoy that warmth of heart. There was exactly the tender motherliness that even Wilmet and Sister Constance could not give.

It was charming to hear how fond Mrs. Harewood was of Lance, and how the having such a companion had made it possible to keep her Willie at the cathedral school, where the mixture of lads was great, but the master first-rate. He thought highly of the promise of both; 'but, to tell the truth,' said Mrs. Harewood, as she sat and fanned herself with her husband's trencher cap, looking more than ever like a frog in a strawberry bed, 'though my Willie is the cleverest boy in the school, little good his cleverness would have done him, and he would have been harum-scarum Bill more than ever, if it were not for Lance. So say his father and brother Jack; so that they will not be for his going to a public school unless Lance were sure of it too.'

'Will not they be able to stay on here?'

Mrs. Harewood explained that the year that the barristers--choristers she meant--were sixteen, when their voices were usually unserviceable, they, together with those of like age in the school, were subjected to an examination, and the foremost scholar obtained an exhibition, in virtue of which he could remain free of expense for another two years, and then could try for one of the Minsterham scholarships at one of the colleges at Cambridge. Those who failed, either had to pay like the ordinary schoolboys, or left the school.

Dear Mrs. Harewood was a perfect Malaprop, and puzzled Geraldine by continually calling the present occasion the rural meeting, and other like slips, uncommonly comical in a well-educated woman with the words she knew best.

All this, and a great deal more--about the shy woman-hating organist, and the unluckiness of the dissenter--no, precentor--having a sick wife, and the legal difficulties that prevented building a better house for the boarders than the queer long room where they lodged, between the cloister and the Bailey--the proper name of the little court by which Geraldine had come--was poured out; and kind as it was, there was a certain sense of having been talked to death.

A whole flood of Harewoods, Underwoods, and untold numbers besides, swept into the room as the bell began to ring for Evensong. Most sincere were Cherry's entreaties that she might be left alone. She could not go back to her coign of vantage, 'it had been too beautiful for her to bear more,' she said; and she severally declined offers of companionship from three female Harewoods and two sisters, telling Wilmet at last that all she wanted was to be still and alone.

Alone she was, but not still, for there was nothing to hinder the magnificent volume of sound that surged around the Cathedral from coming to her; and she could trace the service all along--in chant, pealing mighty Amens, with the hush between, in anthem, and in jubilant hymn. She was more calmly happy than in the oppressive grandeur of the morning, as she lay there, in the cool drawing-room, with the open window veiled by loose sprays of untrimmed roses, and sacred prints looking down from the walls.

The solitude lasted rather too long, when she had heard the hum and buzz of the host pouring out of the Cathedral, and still no one came. They were to go home by the 5.10 train, and every time she counted the chimes she became more alarmed lest they should be too late. Minutes dragged on. Five! It was five! Was she forgotten? Should she be only missed and remembered at the station, too late? Tired, nervous, unused to oblivion, she found tears in her eyes, and was too sorrowful and angry with her own impatience even to think of the old woman of Servia. Hark! a trampling? Had they remembered her? But oh, it would be late for the train!

In burst Lance, in his cap and little short quaint black gown.

'O Lance, I shall be too late!'

'You don't go by this train.'

'Oh dear! oh dear! Mr. Froggatt was to meet me;' and the tears started from her eyes. 'How could Felix forget?'

'Never mind, there's sure to be a fly or something.'

'Yes, but Mr. Froggatt waiting!'

'Never mind,' repeated Lance, ''tis a fine evening to air the old boss.'

'Don't, Lance; you none of you have any proper regard for Mr. Froggatt;' which, as far as Lance was concerned, was unjust, and it was well for Cherry that it was not addressed to either of the brothers who better deserved it.

What Lance did was to execute one of his peculiar summersaults, and then, making up a dismal face, to say, 'Alas! I commiserate the venerable citizen disappointed of the pleasure of driving my Lady Geraldine home from the wash as well as hisself.'

She was past even appreciating the bathos. 'It is no laughing matter,' she said; 'it is so uncivil, when he is so kind. I can't imagine what Felix is thinking of?'

'Croquet,' said Lance briefly; then seeing the flushed, quivering, mortified face, he added, 'Wilmet has not forgotten you one bit, Cherry; but Alice Knevett and Robin did so want to see the fun in the mead--there's running in sacks, and all sorts of games--that there's no getting any one away; and the W's are in charge, and can't leave them to their own devices, so she said perhaps you would be more rested by lying still than rattling home.'

'Oh, I dare say Wilmet is as sorry as anybody,' said Cherry rather querulously, for the needle point was pricking her again.

'And as to your dear old Froggy,' continued Lance, 'she says he told her he did not in the least expect you back by this train, and if you did not come by it, he'll stay in town for the 8.50.'

'How very good of him!' said Cherry, beginning to be consoled. 'And Felix at croquet!'

'Alice is teaching him. You never did see such a joke as old Blunderbore screwing up his eyes at the balls, and making at them with his mallet like a sledge-hammer. He and Alice and Robin and that Bisset curate are playing against Bill, two of the girls, and Shapcote--Bexley against Minsterham; and little Bobbie's a real out-and-outer. She'll make her side win by sheer cool generalship.'

'And poor little Angel?' The needle point was a pang now.

'Oh, Angel is happier than ever she was in her life. The Bishop's daughter has a turn for little kids, and has got all the small ones together in the pleached alley, playing at all manner of things.'

'Run back, Lance, to the fun. I shall do very well,' said poor Geraldine.

'I should think so, when I get you so often!' scornfully ejaculated Lancelot, drawing a dilapidated brioche from under the sofa, and squatting on it, with his dancing eyes close to her sad ones.

An effusion of spirits prompted her to lay her hands on his shoulders, kiss him on each cheek, and cry, 'O Lance, you are the very sweetest boy!'

'Sweetest treble, you mean,' said Lance quaintly; 'if you had only heard me! You should see how the old ladies in the stalls peep and whisper, and how Bill Harewood opens his mouth rather wider than it will go, and they think it is he.'

'Not for fun, Lance?'

'Well, I believe all their jaws are hung on looser than other people's. But I say, ain't you dying of thirst?'

'Perhaps Mrs. Harewood will give us some tea when she comes in.'

'If you trust to that--'

'O Lance!' she cried, alarmed at seeing him coolly ring the bell.

'Bless you, she's forgotten all about you and tea and everything! They are drinking it by the gallon in the tents; and by and by she'll roll in, ready to cry that you've had none, and mad with herself and me for giving you none; and the fire will be out, and the kettle will boil about ten minutes after you are off by the train. We'll have some this minute.'

'But, Lance--'

'But, Cherry, ain't I a walking Sahara with roaring at the tip-top of my voice to lead the clod-hoppers? How they did bellow! I owe it as a duty to the Chapter to wet my whistle.'

'One comfort is, nobody knows your coolness. Nobody comes for all your ringing.'

'Reason good! Every living soul in the house is in the Bishop's meadow, barring the old cat; I seen 'em with their cap-strings flying. But that's nothing. I know where Mother Harewood keeps her tea and sugar;' and he pounced on a tea-caddy of Indian aspect.

'Lance, if you did that to Mettie--'

'Exactly so. I don't;' and he ran out of the room, while Cherry sat up on her sofa, her petulance quite banished between amusement and desperation at such proceedings in a strange house. He came back presently, with two cups, saucers, and plates, apparently picked up at hap-hazard, as no two were alike. 'My dear Lance, where have you been?'

'In the kitchen. Such a jolly arched old hole. Bill and I have done no end of Welsh rabbits there. Once when we were melting some lead, Bill let it drop into the pudding, and the Pater got it at dinner, and said it was the heaviest morsel he ever had to digest.'

'But wasn't it poison?'

'I suppose not, for you see he isn't dead. Another time, when we were melting glue, we upset a whole lot of fat, and the chimney caught fire; and wasn't that a go? Bill got a pistol out of Jack's room, and fired it up the chimney to bring the soot down; and down it came with a vengeance! He was regularly singed, and I do think the place would have been burned if it had not been too old! All the Shapcotes ran out into the court, hallooing Fire! and the engine came, but there was nothing for it to do. Oh, the face Wilmet would make to see that kitchen. Kettle's biling--I must run.'

He came back with an enormous metal tea-pot in one hand, and a boiling kettle in the other, a cloud of vapour about his head.

'You appear in a cloud, like a Greek divinity,' said Cherry, beginning to enter into the humour of the thing.

'Bringing nectar and ambrosia,' said Lance, depositing the kettle amid the furbelows of paper in the grate, and proceeding to brew the tea. 'Excuse the small trifles of milk and cream; and as to bread, I can't find it, but here are the cakes you had for luncheon, shunted off into the passage window. Sugar, Cherry? Fingers were made before tongs. Now I call this jolly.'

'I only hope this isn't a great liberty.'

'If you fired off a cannon under Mrs. Harewood's nose, she would not call it a liberty.'

'So it appears. But Mr. Harewood does not look--like that.'

'Oh, he's well broken in. He is the pink of orderliness in his own study and the library, but as long as no one meddles there, he minds nothing. It just keeps him alive; but I believe the Shapcotes think this house a mild lunatic asylum.'

'Who are the Shapcotes?'

'He's registrar. They live in the other half of this place--the old infirmary, Mr. Harewood calls it. Such a contrast! He is a tremendous old Turk in his house, and she is a little mincing woman; and they've made Gus--he's one of us, you know--a horrid sneak, and think it's all my bad company and Bill's. By-the-by, Cherry, Gus Shapcote asked me if my senior wasn't spoony about--'

'I hope you told him to mind his own business!' cried Geraldine, with a great start of indignation.

'I told him he was a sheep,' said Lance. 'But, I say, Cherry, I want to know what you think of it.'

'Think? I'm not so ready to think nonsense!'

'Well, when the old giant was getting some tea for her, I saw two ladies look at one another and wink.'

'Abominably ill-mannered,' she cried, growing ruddier than the cherry.

'But had you any notion of it?'

'Impossible!' she said breathlessly. 'He is only kind and civil to her, as he is to everybody. Think how young he is!'

'I'm sure I never thought old Blunderbore much younger than Methuselah. Twenty-one! Isn't it about the age one does such things?'

'Not when one has twelve brothers and sisters on one's back,' sighed Geraldine. 'Poor Felix! No, there can't be anything in it. Don't let us think of foolish nonsense this wonderful day. What a glorious hymn that was!'

Lance laid his head lovingly on the sofa-cushion, and discussed the enjoyment of the day with his skilled appreciation of music. Geraldine's receptive power was not inferior to his own, though she had none of that of expression, nor of the science in which he was trained. He was like another being from the merry rattle he was at other times; and she had more glimpses than she ever had before of the high nature and deep enthusiasm that were growing in him.

'Hark! there's somebody coming,' she cried, starting.

'Let him come. Oh, it is the Pater.--Here is some capital tea, Mr. Harewood. Have some? I'll get a cup.'

'You are taking care of your sister. That is right. A good colonist you would make.--Come in, Lee,' said Mr. Harewood, who, to Cherry's increased consternation, was followed by another clergyman. 'We are better off than I dared to expect, thanks to this young gentleman. Miss Geraldine Underwood--Mr. Lee.--You knew her father, I think.'

'Not poor Underwood of Bexley? Indeed! I knew him. I always wished I could have seen more of him,' said Mr. Lee, coming up and heartily shaking hands with Cherry, and asking whether she was staying there, &c.

Meantime Lance had fetched a blue china soup-plate, a white cup and pink spotted saucer; another plate labelled 'Nursery,' and a coffee-cup and saucer, one brown and the other blue; and as tidily as if he had been lady of the house or parlour-maid, presented his provisions, Mr. Harewood accepting with a certain quiet amusement. His remarkable trim neatness of appearance, and old-school precision of manner, made his quiet humorous acquiescence in the wild ways of his household all the more droll. After a little clerical talk, that reminded Cherry of the old times when she used to lie on her couch, supposed not to understand, but dreamily taking in much more than any one knew--it appeared that Mr. Lee wanted to see something in the Library, and Mr. Harewood asked her whether she would like to come and see Coeur de Lion's seal.

She was fully rested, and greatly pleased. Lance's arm was quite sufficient now, and she studied the Cathedral and its precincts in a superexcellent manner. Mr. Harewood, who had spent almost his whole life under its shadow, and knew the history of almost every stone or quarry of glass, was the best of lionizers, and gave her much attention when he perceived how intelligent and appreciative she was. He showed her the plan of the old conventual buildings, and she began to unravel the labyrinth through which she had been hurried. The Close and Deanery were modernized, but he valued the quaint old corner where he lived for its genuine age. The old house now divided between him and Mr. Shapcote had been the infirmary; and the long narrow building opposite, between the Bailey and the cloister, had been the lodgings either of lay-brothers or servants. There being few boarders at the Cathedral school, they had always been lodged in the long narrow room, with the second master in a little closet shut off from them. Cherry was favoured with a glance at Lance's little corner, with the old-fashioned black oak bedstead, solid but unsteady table and stool, the equally old press, and the book-case he had made himself with boards begged from his friend the carpenter. A photograph and drawing or two, and a bat, completed the plenishing. She thought it very uncomfortable, but Lance called it his castle; and Mr. Harewood, pointing to the washing apparatus, related that in his day the cock in the Bailey was the only provision for such purposes. The boys were safely locked in at eight every night when the curfew rang, and the Bailey door was shut, there being no other access to their rooms, except by the Cathedral, through the Library, and the private door that led into the passage common to the Harewoods and Shapcotes.

The loveliness of the Cloister, the noble vault of the Chapter-house, the various beauties and wonders of the Cathedral, and lastly the curiosities of the Library--where Mr. Harewood enthroned her in his own chair, unlocked the cases, brought her the treasures, and turned over the illuminated manuscripts for her as if she had been a princess--made Geraldine forget time, weariness, and anxiety, until, as the summer sun was at last taking leave, a voice called at the window, 'Here she is! I thought Papa would have her here!' and the freckled face of a Miss Harewood was seen peering in.

There the truants were, eager, hurried, afraid for the train, full of compunction for the long abandonment: Alice, most apologetic; Wilmet, most quiet; Felix, most attentive; Robina, still ecstatic; and Angela, tired out--there they all were. It was all one hasty scramble to the crowded station, and then one merry discussion and comparison of notes all the way home; Geraldine maintaining that she had enjoyed herself the best of all; and Alice incredulous of the pleasure of sitting in a musty old library with an old gentleman of at least sixty; while Felix was so much delighted to find that she had been so happy, that he almost believed that the delay had been solely out of consideration for her.

Mr. Froggatt was safe at the station in his basket, full of delight at the enjoyment of his young people, and of anecdotes of Bernard and Stella; and Geraldine found herself safely deposited at home, but with one last private apology from Wilmet as she was putting her to bed. 'I did not know how to help it,' she said; 'Alice was so wild with delight, that I could not get her away; and Felix was enjoying his holiday so thoroughly, I knew that you would be sorry it should be shortened.'

'Indeed I am very glad you stayed. It would be too bad to encumber you.'

'I wanted to come and see after you, but I had promised Miss Pearson not to lose sight of Alice. And then Lance offered to take care of you.'

'O Wilmet, I never half knew what a dear boy Lance is! What boy would have come, when all that was going on, to stay with a lame cross thing like me? And how nice for him to have such kind friends as the Harewoods!'

'They seem very fond of him,' said Wilmet; 'but I wish he had taken up with the Shapcotes. I never saw such a house. It is enough to ruin all sense of order! But they were very kind to us; and if you were well off, it was all right. I never saw Felix look so like his bright old self as to-day; and it is his birth-day, after all.'

So Wilmet was innocent of all suspicions--wise experienced Wilmet! That was enough to make Cherry forget that little thorn of jealousy, especially as things subsided into their usual course, and she had no more food for conjecture.

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

XII. GIANT DESPAIR'S CASTLE

'Who haplesse and eke hopelesse all in vaine, Did to him pace sad battle to darrayne; Disarmd, disgraste, and inwardly dismayde, And eke so faint in every ioynt and vayne, Through that fraile fountaine which him feeble made.' Spenser.

Felix's majority made no immediate difference. His thirteenth part of his father's small property remained with the rest, at any rate until his guardian should return from his travels in the East; but in the course of the winter his kind old godfather, Admiral Chester, died, and having no nearer relation, left him the result of his small savings out of his pay, which would, the lawyer wrote, amount to about a thousand pounds; but there was a good deal of business to be transacted, and it would be long before the sum was made over to him.

Wilmet and Geraldine thought it a perfect fortune, leading to the University, and release from trade; and they looked rather crestfallen when they heard that it only meant £30 per annum in the funds, or £50 in some risky investment. Mr. Froggatt's wish was that he should purchase such a share in the business as would really give him standing there; but Wilmet heard this with regret; she did not like his thus binding himself absolutely down to trade.

'You are thinking for Alda,' said Felix, smiling. 'You are considering how Froggatt and Underwood will sound in her ears.'

'In mine, too, Felix; I do not like it.'

'I would willingly endure it to become Redstone's master,' said Felix, quietly.

'Is he still so vexatious?' asked Geraldine; for not above once in six months did Felix speak of any trials from his companions in business.

'Not actively so; but things might be better done, and much ill blood saved. I cannot share W. W.'s peculiar pride in preferring to be an assistant instead of a partner.'

'Then this is what you mean to do with it?'

'Wait till it comes,' he said, oracularly. 'Seriously, though, I don't want to tie it all up. The boys may want a start in life.'

Neither sister thought of observing that the legacy was to one, not to all. Everybody regarded what belonged to Felix as common property; and the 'boys' were far enough into their teens to begin to make their future an anxious consideration. Clement was just seventeen, and though he had outgrown his voice, was lingering on as a sort of adopted child at St. Matthew's, helping in the parish school, and reading under one of the clergy in preparation for standing for a scholarship. He tried for one in the autumn, but failed, so much to his surprise and disgust, that he thought hostility to St. Matthew's must be at the bottom of his rejection; and came home with somewhat of his martyr-like complacency at Christmas, meaning to read so hard as to force his way in spite of prejudice. He was very tall, fair, and slight; and his features were the more infantine from a certain melancholy baby-like gravity, which music alone dispersed. He really played beautifully, and being entrusted with the organ during the schoolmaster's Christmas holidays, made practising his chief recreation. That Lance would often follow him into church for a study, and always made one of the group round the piano when Alice Knevett came to sing with them, was a great grievance to Fulbert, who never loved music, and hated it as a rival for Lance's attention.

These two were generally the closest companions, and were alike in having more boyishness, restlessness, and enterprise than their brothers. This winter their ambition was to be at all the meets within five miles, follow up the hunt, and be able to report the fox's death at the end of the day. Indeed, their appetite for whatever bore the name of sport was as ravenous as it was indiscriminate; and their rapturous communications could not be checked by Clement's manifest contempt, or the discouraging indifference of the rest--all but Robina, who loved whatever Lance loved, and was ready to go to a meet, if Wilmet had not interfered with a high hand.

Before long Felix wished that his authority over the male part of the family were as well established as that in her department.

One hunting day the two brothers came in splashed up to the eyes, recounting how they had found a boy of about their own age in a ditch, bruised and stunned, but not seriously hurt; how with consolation and schoolboy surgery they had cheered him, and found he was Harry Collis, whom they had known as a school-fellow at Bexley; how they had helped him home to Marshlands Hall, and had been amazed at the dreariness and want of all home comfort at the place, so that they did not like to leave him till his father came home; and how Captain Collis had not only thanked them warmly, but had asked them over to come and shoot rabbits the next day.

There was nothing to blame them for, but Felix had much rather it had never happened. Captain Collis was one of a race of squires who had never been very reputable, and had not risen greatly above the farmer. He had been in the army, and had the bearing of a gentleman; but ever since his wife's death, he had lived an unsatisfactory sort of life at the Hall, always forward in sport, but not well thought of, and believed to be a good deal in debt. His only child, this Harry Collis, had been sent somewhat fitfully to the St. Oswald's Grammar School, and had been rather a favourite companion of Lance's; but separation had put an end to the intimacy, and this renewal was not at all to the taste of their eldest brother.

'It can't be helped this time,' he said, when he heard of the invitation; 'I suppose you must go to-morrow, but I don't fancy the concern.'

Fulbert's bristles began to rise, but Lance chatted gaily on. 'But, Fee, you never saw such a place! Stables for nine hunters. Only think! And a horse entered for the Derby! We are to see him to-morrow. It is the jolliest place.'

'Nine hunters!' moralized Clement; 'they cost as much as three times nine orphans.'

'And they are worth a dozen times as much as the nasty little beggars!' said Fulbert.

On which Angela put in the trite remark that the orphans had souls.

'Precious rum ones,' muttered Fulbert; and in the clamour thus raised the subject dropped; but when next morning, in the openness of his heart, Lance invited Clement to go with them to share the untold joys of rabbit-shooting, he met with a decisive reply. 'Certainly not! I should think your Dean would be surprised at you.'

'Oh, the Dean is a kind old chap,' answered Lance, off-hand; 'whenever he has us to sing at a party, he tips us all round, thanks us, and tells us to enjoy ourselves in the supper-room, like a gentleman, as he is.'

'Do you know what this Collis's character is?'

'Hang his character! I want his rabbits.'

And Lance was off with Fulbert; while Clement remained, to make Geraldine unhappy with his opinion of the temptations of Marshlands Hall, returning to the charge when Felix came in before dinner.

'Yes,' said Felix briefly, 'Mr. Froggatt has been telling me. It must be stopped.'

'Have you heard of the mischief that--'

'Don't be such a girl, Tina. I am going to do the thing, and there is no use in keeping on about it.'

Felix had not called Clement Tina since he had been head of the family, and irritability in him was a token of great perplexity; for indeed his hardest task always was the dealing with Fulbert; and he was besides very sorry to balk the poor boys of one of their few chances of manly amusement.

He would have waited to utter his prohibition till the excitement should have worked off, but he knew that Clement would never hold his peace through the narrative of their adventures; so, as they had not come in when his work was over, he took Theodore on his arm, and retreated to the little parlour behind the shop, where he lay in wait, reading, and mechanically whistling tunes to Theodore, till he heard the bell, and went to open the door.

The gas showed them rosy, merry, glorious, and bespattered, one waving a couple of rabbits, and the other of pheasants, and trying to tickle Theodore's cheeks with the long tails of the latter, of course frightening him into a fretful wail.

'Take Theodore upstairs, if you please, Lance,' said Felix, 'and then come down; I want you.'

'The Captain was going to dine at Bowstead's,' said Fulbert, 'so he drove us in his dog-cart. If the frost holds, we are to go out and skate on Monday.'

Felix employed himself in putting away his papers, without answering.

'I had very good luck,' continued Fulbert, 'four out of six; wonderful for so new a hand, the Captain said.'

'Such a lovely animal you never saw,' said Lance, swinging himself downstairs. 'You must walk out and see it, Fee, for you'll have it in the Pursuivant some Saturday.'

'Lance, I am very sorry,' said Felix, standing upright, with his back to the exhausted grate. 'Just attend to me, both of you.'

'Oh!' said Lance, hastily, 'I know there's a lot of old women's gossip about Collis; but nobody minds such stuff. Harry is as good a lad as ever stepped; and there was no harm to be seen about the place;--was there, Ful?'

'The old Frog has been croaking,' hoarsely muttered Fulbert.

Boys of sixteen and fourteen were incapable of coercion by a youth of one-and-twenty, and the only appeal must be to conscience and reason; so Felix went on speaking, though he had seen from the first that Fulbert's antagonism rendered him stolid, deaf, and blind; and Lancelot's flushed cheeks, angry eyes, impatient attempts to interrupt, and scornful gestures told of scarcely-repressed passion.

'You may have seen no harm, I find no fault' (Fulbert scowled); 'but if I had known what I do now I should not have let you go to-day. My father would rather have cut off his right hand than have allowed you to begin an acquaintance which has been ruinous to almost all the young men who have been in that set.'

'But we are not young men,' cried Lance; 'it is only for the holidays; and we only want a little fun with poor Harry, he is so lonely--and just to go out rabbiting and skating. It is very hard we can't be let alone the first time anything worth doing has turned up in this abominable slow place.'

'It is very hard, Lance. No one is more concerned than I; but if this intimacy once begins, there is no guessing where it will lead; and I do not speak without grounds. Listen--'

'If it comes from old Frog, you may as well shut up,' said Lance. 'There's been no peace at Marshlands since he took that cottage--a regular old nuisance and mischief-maker, spiting the Captain because one of the dogs killed his old cock, and bothering Charlie to no end about him.'

'I have heard from others as well,' said Felix; and he briefly mentioned some facts as to the scandals of the dissipated household, some of the imputations under which Captain Collis lay, and named two or three of the young men whose unsatisfactory conduct was ascribed to his influence.

He saw that both lads were startled, and wound up with saying, 'Therefore it is not without reason that I desire that you do not go there again.'

With which words, he opened the door, turned off the gas, and walked upstairs, hearing on the way a growl of Fulbert's--'That's what comes of being cad to a stupid brute of an old tradesman;' and likewise a bouncing, rolling, and tumbling, and a very unchorister-like expletive from Lance; but he hurried up, like the conclave from the vault at Lindisfarn, only with a sinking heart, and looks that made his sisters say how tired he must be. The boys were seen no more, but sent word by Bernard that they were wet through, they should not dress, but should get some supper in the kitchen, and go to bed.

On Sunday Lance had recovered himself and his temper, but in the evening he made another attempt upon Felix in private. His heart was greatly set upon Marshlands, and he argued that there was no evil at all in what they had been doing, and entreated Felix to be content with the promise both were willing to make, to take no share in anything doubtful--not even to play at billiards, or cards--if that would satisfy him, said Lance, 'but we will promise anything you please against playing, or betting, or--'

'I know, Lance, you once made such a promise, and kept it. I trust you entirely. But before, it would have been cruel to keep you from that sick boy; now this would be mere running into temptation for your own amusement.'

'Harry is not much better off than Fernan was,' said Lancelot, wistfully.

'Poor fellow! very likely not; but it would be more certain harm to yourself than good to him. Any way, no respectable person would choose to be intimate there, or to let their boys resort there; and it is my duty not to consent.'

'Ful is in such an awful way,' said Lance, disconsolately. 'Fee, you don't know how hard it is, you always were such a muff.'

'That is true,' said Felix, not at all offended; 'and I had my father and Edgar; but indeed, Lance, nothing ever was so hard to me to do as this. I cannot say how sorry I am.'

'You do really order me not?' said Lance, looking straight up at him.

'I do. I forbid you to go into Captain Collis's grounds, or to do more than exchange a greeting, if you meet him.'

'I will not. There's my word and honour for it, since--since you are so intolerably led by the nose by old Frog;' and Lance flung away, with the remains of his passion worked up afresh, and was as glum as his nature allowed the rest of the evening; but Felix, though much annoyed, saw that the boy had set up voluntarily two barriers between himself and his tempted will--in the command and the promise.

But the command that was a guard to the one, was a goad to the other; for Fulbert had never accepted his eldest brother's authority, and could not brook interference. Still his school character was good, and there was a certain worth about him, which made him sometimes withdraw his resistance, though never submit; and Felix had some hope that it would be so in the present case, when, while speeding to church in the dark winter Monday morning, he overheard Lance say to Clement, 'I say, Clem, 'tis a jolly stinging frost. If you'll take your skates and give us a lesson, we'll be off for the lake at Centry.'

One of the Whittingtonian curates had taken the boys to the ice in the parks, and taught them so effectively, that Clement was one of the best skaters in Bexley; but he was too much inclined to the nayward not to reply, 'I have to practise that anthem for Wednesday.'

'Oh, bother the practice!'

(Which Felix mentally echoed.)

'I can play that anthem, if that's all,' said Lance; 'and I believe you know it perfectly well. Now, Clem, don't be savage; I think, if you will come, we might put that other thing out of Ful's head.'

'Well, if you think it is to be of use--'

'That's right! Thank you,' cried Lance. 'And you won't jaw us all the way? He can't stand that, you know.'

Clement winced; but in compensation, apparently, for this forbidden lecture, he observed, 'I am glad you at least take it properly, Lance, though it would be worse in you than in him, considering your--'

'Bother it!' unceremoniously broke in Lance; and the words of wisdom were silenced.

Lance did his best to organise his party, but it was a failure; Fulbert said he had made an engagement, and would not break it; he was not bound to toady old Froggy, nor in bondage to any old fogeys of a dean and chapter; and he walked off the faster for Clement's protest, leaving Lance to roll on the floor and climb the balusters backwards to exhale his desire to follow. He was too much upset even to follow Clement to the organ, or to settle to the drawing which Cherry was teaching him, and was a great torment to himself and his sisters till dinner-time, when Clement had done his organ and his Greek, and was ready for a rush for the ice; and Robina went joyously with them. 'Between two young ladies one can't well run into harm's way,' said Lance.

So things went on for a fortnight. Fulbert never shuffled, he went openly to Marshlands Hall; and though not boasting of his expeditions, did not treat them as a secret. Wilmet and Geraldine each tried persuasion, but were silenced rudely; and Felix, unable to enforce his authority, held his tongue, but was very unhappy, both for the present and for the future. He did not believe much harm was doing now, but the temptation would increase with every vacation as the boys came nearer to manhood; and he seemed to have lost all influence and moral power over Fulbert.

Good old Mrs. Froggatt gave a small children's party, to which, with many apologies, she invited the lesser Underwoods, under charge of Wilmet. They were to sleep at the cottage, and Wilmet having offered to help in dressing the Christmas-tree, they set out early in the day to walk, escorted by the three brothers. That the trio did not return to tea did not alarm Felix and Geraldine, who suspected that the dislike the two elder expressed to the whole house of Froggatt had melted before the pleasure of working at the tree.

The evening was taken up in the discussion of a letter of Edgar's, more than usually discontented with his employment; and another of Alda's, who had been laid under orders to write to her eldest brother, and desire him to remonstrate with Edgar on his inattention, laziness, and pleasure-seeking. The anxiety had long been growing up; Felix had come to write his difficult letter by the light of Geraldine's sympathy, and they were weighing what should be said, when the door-bell rang, some sounds puzzled them, and just as Felix was getting up to see what was the matter, Fulbert put his head in at the door, and said, low but earnestly, 'Step here, Felix, please.'

He thought there must have been some terrible accident; but when from the top of the stairs he beheld Clement's aspect under the gas in the passage, and heard the thick tones in which he was holding forth according to instinct, his consternation was almost greater than at any injury. Fulbert looked pale and astounded. 'I can't get him upstairs,' he said.

However, sense enough remained to Clement to give effect to his eldest brother's stern words, 'Be quiet, and come up;' and they dragged him stumbling upstairs without more words.

'Where's Lance?' then asked Felix.

'Stayed at the Froggatts'. I wish he hadn't. He will walk home by-and-by.'

'Now, Ful, run and tell Cherry that nobody is hurt. Do not let her get frightened.'

Felix spoke resolutely, but he felt so full of dismay and horror, that he hardly knew what he was doing till Fulbert had returned, and repressing all poor Clement's broken moralities, they had deposited him safely in bed, and shut the door on him. Then Fulbert gazed up at Felix with eyes full of regret and consternation, and he gathered breath to enter his own room, and say, 'What is the meaning of this?'

'His head must be ridiculously weak; or there was some beastly trick. Nobody else was the least queer!'

'Marshlands Hall?'

'Well, he had gone on at me so, that when Lance let himself be persuaded into staying to hang up the lamps, it struck me what a lark it would be to take Tina across the Hall lands, and then tell him he had been on the enemy's ground. So I told him of the old chantry that is turned into a barn, and of course he must go and see it, and take sketches of the windows for his clergy. While he was doing it, up comes young Jackman. You know young Jackman at the Potteries--a regular clever fellow that knows everything?'

'Yes, I know him.'

'Well, they got into early pointed, and late pointed, and billets and dog-tooths, and all the rest, and Clem went on like a house on fire; and by that time we had got to the big pond, where Collis and half a dozen more were, and he had got his skates, and I believe he did surprise them; they called it first rate.'

'Did he know where he was?'

'Not at the beginning of the skating. I only wanted to get him down from his altitudes, and never thought it would come to this. You believe that, Felix?'

'Yes, I do. Go on.'

'It was fine moonlight, and we stayed on ever so long, while Jackman and Clem and two more danced a quadrille on the ice; and when it was over everybody was horribly cold, and Captain Collis said we must all come in and have something hot; and Jackman said he was going to drive home to dinner at eight, and would take us, but every one got talking, and it was half-past eight before we started. It was all in such a scramble, that I had no notion there was anything amiss till Clem began to talk on the way home.'

'What were they drinking?'

'Various things--brandy-and-water chiefly. I don't like it, and had some ale; but I was playing with Harry's puppies, and not much noticing Clem.'

'Do you think it was a trick?'

'I can't tell. He is so innocent, he would have no notion how stiff to make it. If any one meant mischief, it was Jackman; and I did think once or twice he had found out Tina, and was playing him off. On the way home, when I was trying to hinder poor Clem from falling off, he went on chaffing so, that I longed to jump off, and lay the whip about his ears.'

'Poor Clem!' said Felix, more grieved and shocked than angry, and not insensible to Fulbert's being even more appalled, and quite frightened out of his sulkiness.

'It is a bad business,' he sighed. 'It was all Lance's fault for letting himself be lugged into that baby party.'

Even this was a great admission, and Felix would not blight it by a word.

'It is well the girls are not at home,' was all he said.

'I only told Cherry that Clem wasn't well. I can't face her; I shall go to bed. I would not have had this happen for the world.'

'I shall say nothing to her,' said Felix, dejectedly, turning to leave the room, under a horrible sense of disgrace and stain on the whole family; but at the door he was caught hold of by Fulbert, who looked up at him with a face quite unlike anything he had ever seen in the lad.

'Felix, I never was so sorry in my life. I wish you would give me a good rowing.'

Felix half smiled. 'I could not,' he said. 'You did not know what you were doing. Good-night.'

Fulbert gazed after him as he went downstairs, and went back, with a groan, to his own room.

Felix had never before felt so hopeful about Fulbert; but still he was too much overset to talk to Cherry, and hurried her off to bed, soon following her example, for he had not the heart to see Lance that night.

Of course, the first hours of the morning had to be spent in attending on the victim, whose misery, mental and bodily, was extreme, and was aggravated by his engagement to the organ. Lance could supply his place there, and was sent off to do so, but looking as subdued and guilty as if he had been making Fulbert's confession instead of hearing it, and stumbling uncomfortably over the explanation that Clement was not well, and that Felix could not leave him.

For there was a fragility about Clement's long lank frame that made any shock to it very severe, and he was ill enough to alarm his happily inexperienced brothers, and greatly increase Fulbert's penitence; but by the time Mr. Froggatt drove the sisters home, and Wilmet wondered that she could not go out for a night without some one being ill, he had arrived at a state which she could be left to attribute to Mrs. Froggatt's innocent mince-pies.

He burrowed under his blankets, and feigned sleep and discomfort beyond speech, whenever she came into the room, begging only that the light might be kept out, and that nobody would speak to him. He was too utterly miserable for anger with Fulbert, but only showed a sort of broken-hearted forgiveness, which made Fulbert say in desperation to Lance, 'I wish you would just fall upon me. I shall not be myself again till I've been blown up!'

'I suppose you are doing it for yourself, and that is worse,' said Lance.

'And you know it was all your doing, for going to that disgusting old Philistine's tea and cake.'

'What, you and Clem wanted me to lead you about, like two dogs in a string?' said Lance.

'No; Tina would have kept the baby-bunting out of harm's way.'

'More likely he would have bored me into going. Poor Tina! I should almost like to hear him jaw again! After all, you and he never promised, and I did.'

'I wish I had,' said Fulbert; 'I am awfully afraid they are getting hold of it in the town.'

'So am I. Mowbray Smith looked me all over, and asked me after Clement, when I met him just now in the street, as if he had some malice in his head.'

'What did you tell him?'

'I said he was in a state of collapse, and that serious fears were entertained for his life and reason; and then he warned me against the nineteenth-century manners, and I thanked him and made a bow, and now I suppose he is gone to tell my Lady.'

When Felix was free in the evening, he found Clement dressed, and sitting over the fire in his room--so well indeed, that he might have been downstairs, but that he shrank from every one; and that fire had been the fruit of such persevering battles of Wilmet and Sibby with the smoke and soot, that it would have been a waste of good labour to have deserted it.

'Well, Clem, you are better?'

'Yes, thank you.'

'Head-ache gone?'

'Nearly,' with a heavy sigh.

Felix drew an ancient straw-bottomed chair in front of the fire backwards, placed himself astride on it, laid his arms on the top and his forehead on them, and in this imposing Mentorial attitude began, 'After all, Clem, I don't see that you need be so desperately broken-hearted. It was mere innocence and ignorance. Water-drinkers at home are really not on a level with other people. I always have to be very guarded when I have to dine with the other reporters.'

'No,' said Clement, sadly; 'I do not regard the disgrace as the sin so much as the punishment.'

It was more sensible than Felix had expected. He was conscious of not understanding Clement, who always seemed to him like a girl, but if treated like one, was sure to show himself in an unexpected light.

'You did not know where you were going?'

'Not at first. I found out long before I came off the ice; and then, like an absurd fool as I was, I thought myself showing how to deal courteously and hold one's own with such people.'

'You are getting to the bottom of it,' said Felix.

'I have been thinking it over all day,' said Clement, mournfully. 'I see that such a fall could only be the consequence of long-continued error. Have I not been very conceited and uncharitable of late, Felix?'

'Not more than usual,' said Felix, intending to speak kindly.

'I see. I have been treating my advantages as if they were merits, condemning others, and lording it over them. Long ago I was warned that my danger was spiritual pride, but self-complacency blinded me.' And he hid his face and groaned.

Felix was surprised. He could not thus have discussed himself, even with his father; but he perceived that if Clement had no one else to preach to he would preach to himself, and that this anatomical examination was done in genuine sorrow.

'No humility!' continued Clement. 'That is what has brought me to this. If I had distrusted and watched myself, I should have perceived when I grew inflated by their flattery, and never--egregious fool that I was--have thought I was showing that one of our St. Matthew's choir could meet worldly men on their own ground.'

Felix was glad that his posture enabled him to conceal a smile; but perhaps Clement guessed at it, for he exclaimed, 'A fit consequence, to have made myself contemptible to everybody!'

'Come, Clem, that is too strong. Your censorious way was bad for yourself, and obnoxious to us all, and it was very silly to go to that place after what you had heard.'

'After telling Lance it was unworthy of a servant of the sanctuary,' moaned Clement.

'Very silly indeed,' continued the elder brother, 'very wrong; but as to what happened there, it is not reasonable to look at it as more than an accident. It will be forgotten in a week by all but Fulbert and yourself, and you will most likely be the wiser for it all your lives. I never got on so well with Ful before, or saw him really sorry.'

Clement only answered by a disconsolate noise; and Felix was becoming a little impatient, thinking the penitence overstrained, when he broke silence with, 'You must let me go up to St. Matthew's!'

'Really, Clement, it is hardly right to let you be always living upon Mr. Fulmort now your occupation is ended, and it would be braver not to run away.'

'I do not mean that!' cried Clement. 'I will not stay there. I would not burthen them; but see the Vicar I must! I will go third class, and walk from the station.'

'The fare of an omnibus will not quite break our backs,' said Felix, smiling. 'If this is needful to settle your mind, you had better go.'

'You do not know what this is to me,' said Clement, earnestly; 'I wish you did.' Then perceiving the recurrence to his old propensity, he sighed pitifully and hung his head, adding, 'It is of no use till Saturday, the Vicar is gone to his sisters.'

'Very well, you can get a return ticket on Saturday--that is, if the organist is come back.'

'Lance must play; I am not worthy.'

'You have no right to break an engagement for fancies about your own worthiness,' said Felix. 'Rouse yourself up, and don't exaggerate the thing, to alarm all the girls, and make them suspicious.'

'They ought to know. I felt myself a wicked hypocrite when Wilmet would come and read me the Psalms, and yet I could not tell her. Tell them, Felix; I cannot bear it without.'

'No, I shall not. You have no right to grieve and disgust them just because you "cannot bear it without." Cannot you bear up, instead of drooping and bemoaning in this way? It is not manly.'

'Manliness is the great temptation of this world.'

'You idiot!' Felix, in his provocation, broke out; then getting himself in hand again, 'Don't you know the difference between true and false manliness?'

'I know men of the world make the distinction,' said Clement; 'I am not meaning any censure, Felix. Circumstances have given you a different standard.'

Felix interrupted rather hotly: 'Only my father's. I have heard him say, that if one is not a man before one is a parson, one brings the ministry into contempt. The things the boys call you Tina for are not what make a good clergyman.'

'I don't feel as if I could presume to seek the priesthood after that.'

'Stuff and nonsense!' cried Felix. 'If no one was ordained who had ever made a fool of himself and repented, we should be badly off for clergy. You were conceited and provoking, and have let yourself be led into a nasty scrape--that's the long and short of the matter; but it is only hugging your own self-importance to sit honing and moaning up here. Come down, and behave like a reasonable being.'

'Let me stay here to-night, Felix, I do need it,' said Clement, with tears in his eyes; 'if I am alone now, I think I can bring myself to bear up outwardly as you wish.'

The affected tone had vanished, and Felix rose, and kindly put his hand on his shoulder, and said, 'Do, Clem. You know it is not only my worldliness--mere man of business as I am--that bids us to hide grief within, and "anoint the head and wash the face."'

Just then an exulting shout rang through the house, many feet scuttled upstairs, knocks hailed upon the door, and many voices shouted, 'Mr. Audley! Felix, Clem, Mr. Audley!'

'Won't you come, Clem?'

'Not to-night; I could not.'

Clement shut the door, and Felix hastened down among the dancing exulting little ones. 'I thought you were at Rome!' he said, as the hands met in an eager grasp.

'I was there on Christmas Day; but Dr. White's appointment is settled, and he wants me to go out with him in June. My brother is gone on to London, and I must join him there on Saturday.'

'I am glad it is to-day instead of yesterday,' said Wilmet. 'We were all out but Felix and Cherry, and poor Clement was so ill.'

'Clement ill? Is he better?'

'He will be all right to-morrow,' said Felix.

Mr. Audley detected a desire to elude inquiry, as well as a meaning look between the two younger boys, and he thought care sat heavier on the brow of the young master of the house than when they had parted eighteen months before.

His travels were related, his photographs admired, his lodging arranged in Mr. Froggatt's room, and after the general good-night, he drew his chair in to the fire, and prepared for a talk with his ex-ward.

'You look anxious, Felix. Have things gone on pretty well?'

'Pretty fairly, thank you, till just now, when there is rather an ugly scrape,'--and he proceeded to disburthen his mind of last night's misadventure; when it must be confessed that the narrative of Clement's overweening security having had a fall provoked a smile from his guardian, and an observation that it might do him a great deal of good.

'Yes,' said Felix, 'if his friends do not let him make much of his penitence, and think it very fine to have so important a thing to repent of.'

'I don't think they will do that. You must not take Clement as exactly the fruit of their teaching.'

'There's no humbug about him, at least,' said Felix. 'He is really cut up exceedingly. Indeed all I have been doing was to get him to moderate his dolefulness. I believe he thinks me a sort of heathen.'

'Well,' said Mr. Audley, laughing, 'you don't seem to have taken the line of the model head of the family.'

'The poor boys were both so wretched, that one could not say a word to make it worse,' said Felix. 'This satisfies me that Fulbert is all right in that way. He would not have been so shocked if he had ever seen anything like it before; but though he is very sorry now, I am afraid it will not cut the connection with those Collises.'

'You do not find him easier to manage?'

'No; that is the worst. He is not half a bad boy--nay, what is called a well-principled boy--only it is his principle not to mind me. I do not know whether I am donnish with him, or if I bullied him too much when he was little; but he is always counter to me. Then he is one of those boys who want an out-of-door life, and on whom the being shut up in a town falls hard. The giving up sporting is real privation to him and to Lance, and much the hardest on him, for he does not care for music or drawing, or anything of that sort.'

'How old is he?'

'Just sixteen.'

'Suppose I were to take him out to Australia?'

'Fulbert!'

'Yes; I always intended to take one if I went, but I waited till my return to see about it, and I thought Clement was of a more inconvenient age; but you must judge.'

'Poor Tina!' said Felix, smiling, 'he would hardly do in a colony. He is heart and soul a clergyman, and whether he will ever be more of a man I don't know; but I don't think he could rough it as a missionary.'

'Is he going to get a scholarship?'

'He has tried at Corpus, and failed. He is full young, and I suppose he ought to go to a tutor. I am afraid he learnt more music than classics up at that place.'

'Can the tutoring be managed?'

'I suppose a hundred out of that thousand will do it.'

'Is that thousand to go like the famous birth-day five?'

'Five hundred is to be put into the business; but the rest I meant to keep in reserve for such things as this.'

'If all are to be helped at this rate, your reserve will soon come to an end.'

'Perhaps so; but I have always looked on Clement as my own substitute. Indeed, I held that hope out to my father, when it distressed him that I should give it up. So Clem is pretty well settled, thank you. Besides I am not afraid of his not going on well here; but I do believe Fulbert will do the better for being more independent, only it seems to me too much to let you undertake for us.'

'They are all my charge,' said Mr. Audley; 'and as I am leaving you the whole burthen of the rest, and my poor little godson is not likely to want such care, you need have no scruple. One of the Somervilles is going out to a Government office at Albertstown, and perhaps may put me in the way of doing something for him.'

Felix mused a moment, then said, 'The only doubt in my mind would be whether, if it suited you equally, it might not be an opening for Edgar.'

'Edgar! Surely he is off your hands?'

'I am greatly afraid his present work will not last. He always hated it, and I believe he always had some fancy that he could persuade Tom Underwood into making a gentleman of him at once, sending him to the University or the like, and they petted and admired him enough to confirm the notion. Mrs. Underwood makes him escort her to all her parties; and you know what a brilliant fellow he is--sure to be wanted for all manner of diversions, concerts, private theatricals, and what not; and you can fancy how the counting-house looks to him after. Tom Underwood declares he requires nothing of him but what he would of his own son; and I believe it is true; but work is work with him, and he will not be trifled with. Here is a letter about it, one of many, I was trying to answer last night; only this affair of poor Clem's upset everything.'

'Six brothers are no sinecure, Felix.'

'They are wonderfully little trouble,' said Felix, standing on their defence. 'They are all good sound-hearted boys; and as to Lance, there's no saying the comfort that little fellow always is. He has that peculiar pleasantness about him--like my father and Edgar--that one feels the moment he is in the house; and he is so steady, with all his spirits. The other two both say all this could not have happened with him.'

'High testimony.'

'Yes, as both are inclined to look down on him. But think of that boy's consideration. He has never once asked me for pocket-money since he went to the Cathedral. He gets something when the Dean and Canons have the boys to sing, and makes that cover all little expenses.'

'What do you mean to do with him?'

'If he gets the scholarship, a year and a half hence, he will stay on two years free of expense. Unluckily, he says that young Harewood is cleverer than he, and always just before him: but I have some hope in the hare-brains of Master Bill. If he do not get it--well, we must see, but it will go hard if Lance cannot be kept on to be educated properly.'

Mr. Audley took the letters, and presently broke into an indignant exclamation; to which Felix replied--

'The work is not good enough for him, that is the fact.'

'If you are weak about any one, Felix, it is Edgar. I have no patience with him. His work not good enough, forsooth, considering what yours is!'

'Mine has much more interest and variety; and he is capable of much more than I am.'

'Then let him show it, instead of living in the lap of luxury, and murmuring at a few hours at the desk.'

'I ascribe that to his temperament, which certainly has a good deal of the artist; that desk-work is peculiarly irksome.'

'Very likely; but it is his plain duty to conquer his dislike. No, Felix; I wish I could take him away with me, for I am afraid he will be a source of trouble.'

'Never! Edgar is too considerate.'

'But he is exactly what Australia is over-stocked with already--a discontented clerk. If he be spoilt by luxury here, do you think he would bear with a rude colony? No. Fulbert is a gruff, obstinate boy, but not idle and self-indulgent; and I am not afraid to undertake him, but I should be of Edgar.'

Felix had flushed up a good deal, for his love for Edgar was less paternal and more sensitively keen than that for any of the others; but he was more reasonable, and had more control of temper now, than when Mr. Audley had last crossed him; and he made answer, 'I believe you are right, and that Edgar could not be happy in a colony. Any way, you are most kind to Fulbert. But I am afraid I must go now, or Theodore will wake.'

'Do you still have him at night?'

'He is not happy with any one else. You have not seen him yet? I am sure he is improving! There's his voice! Good-night.' And Felix hurried away, leaving Mr. Audley feeling that though here and there the young pillar of the house might be mistaken, the daily unselfishness of his life was a beautiful thing, and likewise impressed by his grave air of manly resolution and deliberation.

By the morning, Clement had recovered his tone, so as not to obtrude his penitence or to be much more subdued in manner than usual. Mr. Audley made him bring his books to the dining-room after breakfast, and the examination quite exonerated the authorities at Oxford from any prejudice except against inaccuracy, and showed that a thorough course of study was needful before he could even matriculate; and Clement in his present lowliness was not incredulous of any deficiency at St. Matthew's, but was only meek and mournful.

'What shall I do?' he asked. 'Perhaps some school would take me to teach and study at the same time. Or I might get an organist's place, and read so that I might be ordained as a literate at last. It would come when I was fit, I suppose.'

Mr. Audley only said he would inquire, and talk to Felix; and Clement pleased him by answering that he could not bear to be an expense to Felix. The good principle in the boys was quite to be traced, when presently after it was necessary to put Fulbert to a severe trial. On going to pay his respects at the Rectory, Mr. Audley found Mr. Mowbray Smith there, and after some preliminaries, he was asked whether he knew how the young Underwoods had been going on of late; of course, though, it would be concealed from him: but it was right, &c. Then Mr. Bevan feebly suggested that he did not believe there was any truth in it, and was sharply silenced; and Miss Caroline observed that she was always sure that Clement Underwood was a great humbug; whereupon, between the mother, daughter and curate, the popular version of the Marshlands Hall affair was narrated--or rather versions, for all were beautifully entangled and contradictory.

Some one had been in the street, and had seen poor Clement's exit from young Jackman's dog-cart, and reported indiscriminately that it was 'young Underwood.' Lance had not been able to put a sufficiently bold face on his morning's report of Clement's indisposition and Felix's absence; and this, together with the boys' hunting propensities, and Fulbert's visits to Marshlands, had all been concocted into a very serious accusation of the whole of the brothers, including Felix, of having entered into a dangerous friendship with Captain Collis, and underhand enjoying the dissipations of the Hall, which had been the bane of many a young man of Bexley.

There were different measures of indignation. Miss Price expected a grand series of denunciations--to Mr. Froggatt--to Miss Pearson, 'whose niece was always there--most imprudent;'--nay, perhaps to the Dean, and to the Vicar of St. Matthew's. The least excitement she expected, was Felix Underwood's expulsion from the choir.

Lady Price merely believed it all, and thought the friends ought to interfere, and save the poor young things while there was time for any of them. She would never mention it so as to injure them, but nothing else could be expected.

Mr. Mowbray Smith supposed there must be some exaggeration, but he had been surprised at Lancelot's manner, and he did not think Felix's absence accounted for; he did seem steady--but-- And there was something unnatural in the way of life at St. Matthew's, that would make him never trust a lad from thence.

Yes; and even Mr. Bevan did not like St. Matthew's (because it was not slack or easy), and he too could believe anything of Clement. No doubt poor Felix found those great brothers getting too much for him.

Mr. Audley was standing by the window. He saw Fulbert with Lance and little Bernard going down the street, and by one of the sudden dashes that had often puzzled the Rectory, he flew out at the door, and the next moment had his hand on Fulbert's shoulder.

'Fulbert, they have made a terrible scandal of this affair at Marshlands Hall. They fancy Felix had something to do with it.'

'Felix! I should like to punch their heads.'

'You can do better. You can contradict it.'

'But, Sir--'

However, Fulbert, while still following to plead with Mr. Audley, found himself where he never recollected to have been in his life before, among the cushions, arm-chairs, and tables covered with knick-knacks, of the Rectory drawing-room. Mr. Bevan in an easy-chair; Mr. Smith standing before the fire; Lady Price at work, looking supercilious; and her daughter writing notes at a davenport.

Mr. Bevan half rose and held out his hand, the others contented themselves with a nod, while the big, stout lad stood rather like a great dog under the same circumstances, very angry with everybody, and chiefly with Mr. Audley--to whom, nevertheless, he trusted for getting him safe out again.

'Fulbert,' said Mr. Audley, 'Mr. Bevan would be better satisfied if he could hear what intimacy there has been between your brothers and the Collises.'

'None at all,' said Fulbert, bluntly.

'My boy,' said the gentle Rector, deprecatingly, 'nobody ever suspected your eldest brother.'

'I should think not!' exclaimed Fulbert, with angry eyes. 'All he ever did was to warn us against going. More fools not to mind him!'

'Then,' said my Lady, 'it has been the insubordination and wilfulness of you younger boys that has nearly involved him in so grave an imputation.'

'Of nobody's but mine,' returned Fulbert. 'The others would have nothing to do with it.'

'That cannot be the literal fact,' said Mr. Smith, in a low voice, to Lady Price. 'There were certainly two of them.'

Fulbert heard, and turning to the Rector, as if he thought every one else beneath his notice, said, 'The long and short of it is this: Lance and I picked young Collis out of a ditch, and took him home. Then Captain Collis asked us rabbit-shooting. Lance never went again, because Felix did not choose it. I did; and, just by way of a joke, I took Clement there without his knowing what place it was. We fell in with them skating, and went into the house, the day before yesterday. That is,' said Fulbert, concluding as he had begun, 'the long and short of it. Whatever happened was my fault, and no one else's.'

'A very honest confession!' said kind Mr. Bevan, pleased to have something to praise.

'And I hope it will act as a warning,' said Lady Price.

'But,' said Mr. Smith, partly incited by Carry's looks, 'it was true that you--two of you were brought home by young Jackman.'

'Yes,' said Fulbert, growing crimson, 'he drove Clement and me home!'

'And,' said Mr. Audley, 'it was Clement's great distress that kept Felix at home the next morning.'

'Yes,' said Fulbert, 'there was nobody else but me, and Clem could hardly bear the sight of me, because I had led him into it. We thought no one in the house would know it--and I don't believe they do.'

'Ah!' said Lady Price, 'it is false kindness to attempt concealment.'

'From lawful authority it is,' said Mr. Audley; 'but in this case it was only from children and servants. However, Fulbert, I think you have fully satisfied Mr. Bevan as to the amount of intercourse between your brothers and Marshlands.'

'Entirely,' said Mr. Bevan; 'in fact, you may assure your brother that I never believed anything to his discredit.'

'I shall say nothing about it,' said Fulbert, not choosing to see the hand held out to him. 'I should be ashamed!--May I go now, Sir?' to Mr. Audley; and with an odd sort of circular bow, he made his escape; and Mr. Audley, having remained long enough to ascertain that the worst that could be said of him was that he was a cub, and that it was a terrible thing to see so many great hulking lads growing up under no control, took his leave, and presently came on the three boys again, consulting at the ironmonger's window over the knife on which Bernard was to spend a half-crown that Mrs. Froggatt had given him.

'Can Lance and Bernard settle that? I want you a moment, Fulbert. Not to confront the Rectory again,' he added, smiling. 'It was a horrid bore for you, but there was no helping it.'

'I suppose not,' said Fulbert, gloomily, as if he did not forgive the unpleasant moments.

'It was not about that I wanted to speak to you, though,' said Mr. Audley. 'I wanted to know whether you have any plans or wishes for the future.'

'I?' said Fulbert, looking up blank.

'Yes, you. You are growing up, Fulbert.'

'I suppose I must take what I can get,' said Fulbert, in the same sulky, passive voice.

'That may be a wise determination; but have you really no choice?'

'Well, when I was a little chap, and knew no better, I used to think I would be a soldier or a farmer--but that's all nonsense; and I suppose I must have some abominable little clerkship,' said Fulbert, with a certain steadiness for all the growl of his tone.

'Well, Fulbert, have you a mind to try whether the other side of the world would suit you better?'

Fulbert looked up. 'You don't mean that you would take me out?'

'Yes, I do, if you are inclined to come and try for work at Albertstown.'

Fulbert, instead of answering, quickened his pace to a walking run, dashed on, nearly upsetting half a dozen people, and was only checked by a collision with a perambulator. Then he stood still till Mr. Audley came up to him, and then again muttered under his breath, 'Go out to Albertstown!'

They walked on a little way, and then the boy said, 'Say it again, please.'

Mr. Audley did say it again, in more detail; and Fulbert this time exclaimed, 'It is the very thing! Thank you, Mr. Audley;' and his face clearing into a frank, open look, he added, 'I'll try to do my best there. I wonder I never thought of it before. I would have worked my way out as a cabin-boy if I had. Where is Lance? Does Felix know?'

There was no sentiment about Fulbert. He jumped at the offer as instinctively as a young swallow would prepare to migrate, seemed to brighten all over, and shake off his dull, defiant mood, and gave no sign of feeling about brother or sister--except that he said he believed Felix would get on better without him; and that he told Lance that they would have splendid fun together when he was big enough to come out and ride a buck-jumper.

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