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  QUEENIE'S WHIM

  A Novel


  BY

  ROSA NOUCHETTE CAREY

  AUTHOR OF
  "NELLIE'S MEMORIES," "WOOED AND MARRIED,"
  ETC.



  IN THREE VOLUMES.

  VOL. III.



  LONDON
  RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON
  Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen
  1881

  [_Rights of Translation Reserved_]




  BUNGAY:
  CLAY AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS.




CONTENTS OF VOL. III.


CHAPTER I.

IN THE GLOAMING


CHAPTER II.

"DO YOU LIKE ME AS WELL AS YOU DID THEN?"


CHAPTER III.

"CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME"


CHAPTER IV.

THE SWING OF THE PENDULUM


CHAPTER V.

CHANGES AND CHANCES


CHAPTER VI.

THE TWO CONSPIRATORS


CHAPTER VII.

"YOU KNOW THIS IS A GREAT SECRET"


CHAPTER VIII.

CROSS PURPOSES


CHAPTER IX.

"TOO MANY COOKS"


CHAPTER X.

"HAVE YOU NOTHING TO SAY TO ME?"


CHAPTER XI.

"A GOLDEN-HAIRED CIRCE"


CHAPTER XII.

"HE BELONGS TO ME"


CHAPTER XIII.

"WHY DOES HE NOT COME AND SEE US?"


CHAPTER XIV.

"EMMIE'S LETTER"


CHAPTER XV.

GARTH'S WIFE




QUEENIE'S WHIM.



CHAPTER I.

IN THE GLOAMING.

  "So she loved, and she was happy,
    As if walking in Paradise;
  Nay, as heaven he seemed above her,
    This love of her own heart's choice.
  It was not his birth or riches,
    But that he was born to bless,
  With the treasure of his wisdom,
    And the wealth of his tenderness."
                                  _Isa Craig-Knox._


Dora's sleep was quite peaceful and unbroken, while Garth tossed
restlessly on his bed half the night, staring open-eyed into the
darkness.  She came down in the morning in her pretty travelling
dress looking as fresh and bright as possible.  She was not even pale
as she had been the previous evening; possibly the excitement of last
night had stimulated her, and roused her from her sadness.

She was thinking more of Flo than of Garth this morning.  With all
her coolness of judgment, and her disposition to meddle in all things
spiritual and material, Dora dearly loved her young sisters, and was
warmly beloved by them in return.  Beatrix was at times almost too
much for her, with her helplessness and impulsive ways, but Flo was
to her as the apple of her eye.

"My poor Flo, I hope they will not have cut off her hair, papa," she
observed, tenderly; "she has such pretty hair, though it is darker
than mine."

"Ah, Dorrie, my dear, it is a bad business I fear," returned her
father mournfully.  "I always said that I disliked those foreign
schools; and then those German doctors!"

"Now, papa, it is only Beattie's absurd letter has made you so
faint-hearted," replied Dora cheerfully, "as though girls of
seventeen are to be trusted, and Beattie especially!"

"I think Beatrix is remarkably sensible for her age," observed Garth
in a caustic tone.  "I cannot understand your always under-valuing
her; in my opinion she has twice the amount of common sense that
Florence has," he went on in a contradictory manner.

Garth had slept badly, a rare occurrence in his healthy,
well-regulated life, and one that he was likely to remember for a
long time with a sense of injury; and he was irritable in
consequence, and in a bad humor with himself and all the world.
Nothing would have pleased him better this morning than a downright
quarrel with Dora; but Dora's perfect temper was invulnerable.

"That only shows how men judge of girls' characters," she returned,
with a little shrug and an amused smile.  "Because Beattie is better
looking, and has a nice complexion, she is endowed with a double
portion of common sense.  Oh, you men!" shaking her head and laughing
in a pitying sort of way.

"We men are tolerably hard in our judgment sometimes," returned
Garth, looking at her with a gleam of anger in his eyes; but Dora
took no notice of the ill-concealed sarcasm.

It was so natural for him to feel sore, poor fellow, under the
circumstances.  She thought it would want a good deal of coaxing and
_finesse_ to charm him into good humor again.  She was very
considerate and mindful of his comfort throughout the whole of
breakfast-time, sweetening and preparing his coffee with extra care,
and even bringing him some favorite sauce with her own hands; but her
little overtures towards reconciliation were all rejected.  Garth put
the sauce away somewhat ostentatiously, and bore himself as though he
had received an injury for which there could be no forgiveness.  He
stood aloof as the servants crowded round the door and the young
mistress dispensed her parting injunction.  When the luggage was on
the carriage, and the Vicar had taken down his felt hat, he came
forward and handed Dora into the carriage with much dignity.

"I hope you will have a tolerably pleasant journey, and find the
invalid better," he said very gravely; "please give my love to
Beatrix."  He had not spoken more than a dozen words throughout the
whole of breakfast time, but he could not forbear this parting thrust.

"And not to Flo! not to poor darling Flo!" returned Dora, looking; at
him with reproachful sweetness.  "Oh, you poor fellow, I am so sorry
for you," her eyes seemed to say, as she waved her hand, and the
carriage disappeared down the village.

Garth threw his portmanteau into the dog-cart somewhat vehemently
when it came up to the door.  The old nurse put her hand on his arm
with the familiarity of a trusted friend, and tried to detain him,
but he was in no mood for her garrulity.

"Dear Miss Dora, she is a blessing to us all, is she not, Mr.
Clayton? such a pretty creature, and with such wise, womanly ways;
for all the world like her mother," cried nurse, with the ready tear
of old age trickling down her wrinkled cheek.  "The others are dear
girls, bless their sweet faces, but they are not equal to Miss Dora."

"Of course not, nurse; there could not be two such paragons in one
house," returned Garth, squeezing the old woman's hard hand, and
trying to whistle as he mounted to his seat and took the reins in
hand, but the whistle was a failure.  He looked up at the porch-room
somewhat bitterly as he drove off.  He was shaking off the dust of
the place from his feet, so he told himself, but there was a hard,
resentful pain at his heart as he did so.

No one knew what to make of the young master when he appeared hot and
dusty at the works.  Two or three of the men had been soundly rated
for some slight omission of duty, and one of the severest lectures
that he had ever received from his brother had been dinned into Ted's
astonished ear.

"I am sick of your laziness and want of punctuality; if you cannot
fulfil your duties properly you must find work elsewhere," stormed
the young master of Warstdale.  With all his sweet temper, Ted had
much ado not to flare up and get into a passion.

"Haven't we all caught it nicely at the works! there is a screw loose
somewhere," observed Ted confidentially to his sisters that evening,
as Garth drove the dog-cart round to the stables.

The brothers had driven home from the quarry in perfect silence, and
Ted, who was still a little sore over the rating he had received, had
made no attempt to promote cheerfulness.

"I hope there is nothing wrong between him and Dora," observed
Langley, dropping her work a little anxiously.

Poor soul, her own troubles had made her nervous; but on that point
Ted could not enlighten her.  Evidently Garth had attempted to
recover his temper, for he came in presently, and greeted his sisters
affectionately.

"I hope you have lost your headache, Langley?" he said, as he took up
the paper knife and the latest periodical, and withdrew with them to
the window.

"Did you see them off?  Have they had any better accounts of
Florence?  You look tired and done up, Garth," enquired his sister
anxiously.

"Yes; they went off all right.  Miss Cunningham sends her love to you
and Cathy.  They made me very comfortable as usual, and gave me my
old room."

Garth was trying to read by the evening light, and his face was
hidden.

"One is always comfortable at the Vicarage; Dora is such a capital
manager," returned Langley, feeling her way in feminine fashion.
"Poor girl, Florence's illness must be a sad trial to her."

"Humph! she takes it as coolly as she does most things.  When are the
lights coming, and what has become of tea?" demanded Garth, a little
irritably; and Langley knew that she was not to ask any more
questions.

A good night's rest did much towards restoring Garth's outward
equanimity, but he still chafed secretly under the mortification he
had undergone with a soreness that surprised himself.  The check he
had received had angered and embittered him.  He was not in love with
Dora, after the usual interpretation of the word; nevertheless, her
yoke lay heavy upon him.  The friendship between them had grown with
his growth; he had learned to see with her eyes, and read with her
judgment.  In a cool, temperate sort of way he had loved and wooed
her from his earliest manhood.  He had been a trifle indifferent to
women in general.  When the time came to take a wife, that wife
should be Dora.

But now the plan of his life was disarranged.  He had waited long
enough, and now he told himself that no more time should be given
her; he would shake off the dust of the place from his feet; he would
bear himself as a stranger towards her and her belongings; but even
while his indignation was hot within him, he knew that such
resolution would be vain.  Not even now had he wholly relinquished
all hopes of her.  True, she had sinned against him, and the gravity
of the offence demanded a fitting punishment.  Well, he would hold
aloof from her, and treat her on all occasions with studied coldness,
until she would rid herself of this womanish folly, and capitulate on
his own terms.  Then, and then only, would he forgive her, and raise
her to the former measure of his favor.  The surrender on her part
must be total.  There should be no softness, no half-measures, no
conciliating persuasion on his; for the future it should be yea, yea,
or at least nay, nay, between them.  Garth was just in that dangerous
mood when a straw might decide the current of his will, when a trifle
might widen the breach which a word at one time could have spanned.
Dora had little idea of the danger she risked when she sent her lover
from her discontented and dissatisfied.  "You may find it very
difficult to recall me, Dora," he had said to her, with some
instinctive prevision of the truth, but she had not believed him.

For the first time the young master of Warstdale found himself
restless and unhappy; his sleepless night still abided in his mind as
an undeserved and lasting injury.  The next day had set in wet and
stormy; heavy autumnal rains swept across the moors, and flooded the
country road, and the little straggling town of Hepshaw.  Garth had
driven himself and Ted in the same taciturn fashion from the quarry,
and both had entered the house, shivering and uncomfortable, in their
dripping garments.

"Oh you poor dear creatures," cried Cathy, flying out into the hall
to receive them; but Ted waved her off gravely, and shook himself
like a wet Newfoundland.

  "'Talk not of wasted young raindrops! these raindrops never
      are wasted.
  If they enrich not the coat of my brother, their waters returning
  Back to my hat, shall fill it full of brown moisture;
  For that which the Ulster sends forth returns again to the
      oil-cloth.
  Patience, accomplish thy labor; accomplish thy shaking, my
      brother;
  Broad-cloth and buckskin are strong, and patience and muscle
      are stronger."


"Bosh," growled Garth in a sulky undertone, as he pushed past him
somewhat curtly.

Ted shook his head mournfully.

  "'I knew a young man nice to see,'"

continued the incorrigible boy;

        "'Beware! beware!
  Trust him not, he will bully thee;
        Take care! take care!'"


"Whatever is the matter with him, Teddie dear?" asked his sister
coaxingly.

"Hush!" in a melodramatic tone; "meddle not with mysteries that
belong not to thy female province, Catherina mia.  How do you know
what dark deed fetters the conscience of that unhappy young man?  Did
you remark the gleam in his eye, the frown on his brow, as he rushed
past me just now? remorse only could have kindled that fury.  Dora
and despair speak in every feature."

"Oh do be quiet, you ridiculous boy, and give me a sensible answer."

But nothing was farther from Ted's purpose.  His aggravated feelings
needed some outlet.  And when Garth made his appearance, refreshed
and re-habited, he found Cathy sitting on the stairs in fits of
merriment, while Ted strutted to and fro spouting pages of nonsense.

He stopped and looked a little foolish at this sudden apparition; but
his brother took no notice of his confusion.

"If you keep your wet things on any longer you will have an attack of
rheumatism," he remarked coldly, as he made his way past them to the
hall door.  Both of them started as it slammed violently after him.

"Where has he gone in all this rain?" asked Cathy, in much distress,
but Ted only shrugged his shoulders, and tried not to look pleased.
For once his brother's absence was a relief.

Garth was in no mood to-night for his sisters' society and Ted's
ceaseless fire of puns.  The quiet home evening, with its work and
music, and gentle gossip, would have jarred on him in his present
state of mind.  It was true, Langley's tact was seldom at fault, and
the others could be chided and frowned into silence; but still he
would have been loath to mar their enjoyment.  He was jaded and
tired; the day's work had been done against the grain, and he needed
rest and refreshment sorely.  Some impulse, for which he could not
account, led him across to the cottage.

The rain was still-falling heavily as he plodded down the miry lane;
but a warm, welcoming gleam shone enticingly from one lattice window
across the road.  He would step in and surprise them, he thought, as
he gently lifted the latch.  He and Cathy often stole upon them in
this way; they liked to see Emmie's delighted clap of the hands and
Queenie's pleased start when they looked up and saw their friendly
intruder.

The door of the parlor stood open.  He was in full possession of the
pretty, homely picture long before they saw him standing on the
threshold.  Tea was on the little round table, but the candles were
still unlighted; Emmie was curled up on the rocking-chair, watching
Queenie, as she knelt on the rug with a plate of crisp white cakes in
her hand.

They were evidently some _chef-d'œuvre_ of her own.  She was still
girded with her cooking apron; the firelight shone on her white,
dimpled arms and flushed face; all sort of ruddy gleams touched her
brown hair.  She gave a little satisfied laugh as she regarded the
cakes.

"They are just as light as Mrs. Fawcett's, are they not, Emmie?"

"Yes, they are lovely; you are quite a genius, Queen; but do go on
with the story, we have just come to the interesting part.  Poor
Madeleine! you must make it end happily.  I never, never could bear a
sad finish."

"Those sort of stories never end happily," returned Queenie, in a
musing tone, shielding her face from the flame; "they are just like
life in that.  We have no King Cophetuas now-a-days to endow poor
maidens with their nobleness; it is all matter-of-fact prose now."

"Why did you make poor Madeleine love the squire then? the village
carpenter would have suited her much better; and then she and he, and
that dear little sister Kitty, could all have lived in that pretty
cottage under the chestnuts.  Can't you alter the story, Queen?"

Queenie shook her head remorselessly.  "It is a pity, but one can't
alter these sort of things, Emmie.  Poor Madeleine loved, and
suffered, and lost, as other women have done since this world began;
but she would not have been without her suffering for all that."

"I can't understand you," returned the child, with tears in her eyes.
"It was such a beautiful story, quite your best, and now you have
spoiled the ending."

"Life is full of these sad finishes," replied the young story-teller,
oracularly; "there is a fate in such things, I believe.  Don't be
unhappy, darling, poor Madeleine would have been miserable in that
cottage under the chestnuts; she would much rather have lived in her
attic with dear little Kitty, and watched the young squire riding by
on his grey horse.  Evening after evening, as they disappeared in the
distance, she would think of the lovely young wife that awaited him.
You may be sure that her heart was full of blessings for them both,
even though she felt a little sad and lonely sometimes."

"But she would not have been quite happy, even with Kitty," persisted
the child in a troubled tone; "and then poor little Kitty would have
been so sorry."

What was there in the child's artless words that made Queenie
suddenly flush and tremble?

"Hush, you must not say that; it is only a story we are telling, it
is not true, any of it.  No one is perfectly happy in this world;
there are always wishes unfulfilled, unsatisfied longings, troubles
everywhere."

"Yes, I know; but somehow it reminded me of you and me," interrupted
Emmie, with a little sob.  "If you were ever unhappy, Queen,--in that
way I mean,--I think I should break my heart."

"Oh, hush, my darling!" snatching the thin hands, and covering them
with kisses, "it is only a story; you must not fret.  Do you think
Madeleine would have been wicked and made herself miserable, just
because she loved the noblest man that ever lived?  No, no, my pet;
not when she had her own little sister to love and cherish."

"Do you always tell stories in the gloaming? that seems a very pretty
one.  I suppose I ought to apologize for being an uninvited auditor,"
observed Garth, as he quietly walked in and took possession of the
hearth.

Emmie gave a little shriek of surprise as her sister hurriedly
disengaged herself from her embrace.

"How long have you been standing there?  Did you mean to startle us?
You are very naughty; you have made Queenie look quite pale, and she
had such a color the minute before."

"Have I startled you? that was very wrong of me," returned Garth,
taking her hand.

Garth was speaking and looking in his usual way; but in reality he
was taken aback by Queenie's evident agitation.  She had always met
and greeted him brightly; why had she grown so strangely pale at the
sight of him this evening?  The brown eyes that had often haunted him
had not yet been lifted to his face.

"Have I startled you?" he persisted, still detaining her until she
should answer him.

"A little.  I am sorry you should have heard all that foolish talk,"
she stammered, growing suddenly hot over the remembrance, and not
venturing to encounter his candid glance.

What had possessed her to concoct such a story?  Would he read the
secret meaning?

"I must make the tea, the kettle has been singing for the last
half-hour," she observed hurriedly, glad of an excuse to move away
and recover herself.

Garth did not ask any more troublesome questions; he turned his
attention to Emmie, taking possession of the rocking-chair, while the
child took her little stool beside him.

Queenie left them to themselves for a long time.  All sorts of
preparations seemed needful before the meal was declared ready.  The
candles were still unlighted, and she made no attempt to kindle them.
Garth threw on another pine knot, and the warm ruddy light was soon
diffused through the little room.  As Queenie moved about, contriving
endless errands for herself, she had no idea that Garth was furtively
watching her.

"Why had she grown so pale? what was there in his sudden appearance
to confuse her?" the young man was asking himself with a little throb
of curious excitement.  Somehow this unusual agitation on Queenie's
part soothed and tranquillized him; he began to think less bitterly
of Dora; some subtle influence, half painful and half pleasurable,
seemed to steep his senses.

Garth was quite unconscious why he wanted Queenie to look at him.  He
watched her graceful movements about the room with quiet
satisfaction.  Two days before his fancy had been taken by the soft
whiteness of a dress that flowed smoothly and did not rustle, and by
the shining of golden hair in the lamp-light; and now a black serge
dress with snowy collars and cuffs charmed him with its nun-like
simplicity.

What was there in these two women, so utterly dissimilar, that
fascinated him?  As far as he knew he was not in love with either,
although he had given the preference to Dora--Dora, who allured and
yet repelled him, and for whom he now felt such bitterness of
resentment.

"Why are you so quiet, Mr. Garth? no one has been telling you sad
stories," cried Emmie, lifting her kitten on to his knee.  "I wish
you would speak to Queen, she always makes things end so badly."

"I am afraid your sister draws from life," he returned absently.  He
spoke without intention, but a shadow swept over Queenie's sensitive
face.

"You ought not to have listened," she said reproachfully.  "It was
only some nonsense to please Emmie.  I make up things, any rubbish
pleases her; sometimes it is a fairy story, or some odd bits one
picks out of books; nothing comes amiss," she went on, bent on
defending herself.

"And you think a girl can make herself happy with an unrequited love
preying on her?" he observed in a quizzical tone.  "I don't know what
women would say to such heresy.  I think Emmie was right, and that
little Kitty would have a great deal to bear."

Queenie was silent.

"Confess that you don't believe such a thing could be possible."

"As what?" looking up at him with varying color.

"That a girl, that Madeleine, for example, could make herself
comfortable under the circumstances."

"Did I say a word about comfort?" she returned with spirit.  "Of
course Madeleine thought her trouble a trouble, and never called it
by any other name."

"And of course she made herself and little Kitty miserable?" he
rejoined, enjoying the play of words, but watching her keenly all the
time.

"She did nothing of the kind," flaring up with sudden heat.  "You
have not heard half my story, or you would not say such a thing."

"Suppose you enlighten me," with some raillery in his tone.  "Your
heroine is not different from the ordinary run of women; and most of
them make themselves miserable under the circumstances."

"Not women like my Madeleine," with a sudden lighting-up of
earnestness in her face.  "I don't think men are quite like that;
they don't understand."

"What is it they don't understand?" he asked, somewhat puzzled.

"The blessedness of giving," she returned simply; "the privilege of
being able to see and love what is highest and best without hope or
thought of return.  Some women feel like that."

"But not many," he replied, touched by her earnestness, and conscious
again of that strange thrill.

"No, not many," looking at him gravely.  "The great number dread
suffering, and fear to enter into the cloud.  They let men spoil
their lives, and then the disappointment hardens and embitters them;
instead of which they ought to go on simply loving, and being sorry,
but not too sorry, about things."

"But suppose the object is not worthy?  You know how often that is
the case," he demanded gravely.

"Ah, that is the greatest pity of all.  There is no trouble like
that, to see the degradation of one we love; indeed, that must be
terrible!"

"Ah, your golden rule of giving will not hold there!"

"Why not?" she asked quietly.  "I heard a sad story once, when Emmie
and I were at Granite Lodge.  One of the governesses had had a
dreadful trouble.  She was engaged for some years to a man who
professed a great affection for her, and suddenly the news of his
marriage reached her."

"Well?"

"Well, she staggered under the blow, but she bore it somehow.  It
would have nearly killed some women.  She just took up her life and
did the best she could with it.  'I am keeping it all for him,' she
said to me once, with such a mournful smile; 'when he wants it, it
will be ready for him, but it will not be here.'"

"Keeping what?" asked Garth, somewhat absently.

"Why the love he had thrown away as worthless," she returned with
kindling eyes.  "Don't you think the faith of that poor German
governess had something noble in it?  She had forgotten her own
wrongs and his fickleness.  In the world to come it should be all
right between them."

"Wasn't that rather far-fetched?"

"Not at all," returned the girl warmly; "those who have sympathy here
must have sympathy there.  There will be no broken lives in heaven."

"No; of course not," feeling himself a little out of his element, but
strangely attracted by the eloquence of Queenie's eyes.

As for Queenie, she had almost forgotten to whom she was speaking.
She was wrapped up, absorbed in her subject; all sorts of deep
thoughts stirred within her.

These things were true to her, but she felt with a kind of wonder
that he did not understand.  Perhaps he felt with a young man's
reverence the mystery of the world to come.  Some men have a great
dread of touching sacred things with unconsecrated hands; but
Queenie's young eyes had the fearlessness of the eagle, they looked
unblenchingly up at the light.  What was the use of separating things
spiritual from things material in her creed?  Love was the ladder
that Jacob saw reaching from earth to heaven; evermore there were
angels ascending and descending.  The doctrine of the communion of
saints had infinite readings.

"Those that have sympathy here have sympathy there," she had asserted
with entire faith and simplicity.  Why did not he, why did not
everybody, understand?

As for Garth, he felt a little moved and excited, stirred by her
earnestness, yet not wholly comprehending it, and quite out of his
element.




CHAPTER II.

"DO YOU LIKE ME AS WELL AS YOU DID THEN?"

"The true one of youth's love, proving a faithful helpmate in those
years when the dream of life is over, and we live in its
realities."--_Southey._


Garth pondered somewhat heavily over Queenie's words that evening.
In spite of his warm human sympathies his imagination was still
undeveloped.  Under the margin of those brief sentences lay
unexplored meanings, whole worlds of thought and fancy that he only
dimly comprehended, and yet he felt himself stirred by the girl's
enthusiasm.

"You have done me good," he said to her, when tea was over and Emmie
had betaken herself to Patience.  He had risen to take leave, but he
still lingered, as though loath to break the tranquillity of the
scene.  "Something had worried me and put me into a bad humor with
myself and all the world, but now I feel better."

"I am glad I have done you good," she returned simply.

When he had left her she knelt down by the hearth again and shielded
her face from the flame.  All sorts of bright, visionary pictures
danced under the light of the spluttering fir-knots; thoughts almost
too great and beautiful to be grasped brushed past her like wings.

Queenie was only dreaming, as girls will sometimes, only somehow her
dreams were better than other women's realities.  She was thinking of
Garth, marvelling a little over his manner that evening.  He had been
kinder, gentler, and yet somehow different.

She was not quite so sure, after all, that he meant to marry Dora.
She had mentioned her name once, and he had answered her in a
constrained manner, and had then changed the subject.  Could Miss
Cunningham have given him cause for displeasure?

Queenie was not sufficiently experienced in the ways of the world to
know how quickly hearts are caught at the rebound.  She had no idea
of the real state of the case, and that Garth's first thought in his
mortification had been to seek solace in her friendship.  She only
knew that somehow Garth had been nicer, and she had done him good.

"What does it matter if one is disappointed here?" thought the young
visionary in that first sweet gush of satisfaction, "that it is all
giving and no return--at least, not the return that one wants? life
will not last for ever.  In that bright hereafter there will be no
marrying or giving in marriage, the Bible tells us that.  Nothing but
love, which, after all, is another name for life.  We are only hiding
our treasures now, heaping them up in silence and darkness, like that
poor Fraulein Heldrig.  By-and-by, up there, those whom we love will
call to us and stretch out their hands, and we shall come bearing our
sheaves with us."

Queenie was weaving all manner of pure womanish fancies as Garth went
back through the rain.  The young man's pulses still throbbed with
excitement.  His sluggish imagination had been quickened and stirred
within him; he felt with a curious, indefinable sensation that he had
drifted long enough down the tide of circumstance, and that his fate
approached a crisis.  Would it be different to what he had planned
all these years?

And that night he thought less of Dora.

How inexplicable are the ways of mankind, even the best of them.
Garth, with all his uprightness and integrity, failed to see that his
conduct lay open to questioning when, after this evening, he began to
haunt the cottage.  He was only seeking solace and forgetfulness, a
healing compensation for the hurt under which he still smarted at
intervals; but he had no idea that such self-indulgence might be
fraught with peril to another's peace!

Queenie could not tell him if the intercourse between them were too
pleasant to be perfectly harmless.  The fault lay with him, not her.
It was not for her to receive her benefactor coldly; and then if she
could do him good.

It was true Garth seldom came alone, either Cathy or Langley or Ted
were with him; but the invitations to Church-Stile House became more
frequent and pressing.

"Garth likes to see you and Emmie amongst us of an evening," Cathy
said to her more than once.  "You know what men are, my dear; they
get tired of their sisters' company, and then Dora is away.  I
suppose that makes him so discontented and restless.  Poor Florence
is worse, and there is no possibility of Dora's return at present."

"So your brother informed me," returned Queenie demurely; but not to
Cathy did she dare hint that Miss Cunningham's absence was a relief.
She was somewhat afraid of questioning her own feelings too closely
at this time.  The incubus that had weighed upon her spirits was
removed, at least temporarily.  Life was passing pleasantly with her
just now; she had work enough to occupy her; a pretty cottage where
she and Emmie lived like disguised princesses, and friends whom she
loved and trusted to brighten her leisure hours.

"Shall I ever be so happy again in my life?" she said once to Cathy.
"I think this summer is the sunniest I have ever known.  When one is
so thoroughly satisfied one dreads a change."

"I like change," returned Cathy, boldly.  "I think a long lease of
monotonous happiness would stupefy me.  Life is not a mere
table-land; there are mountains to ascend before one can see the
view, broad rivers to cross, and long deserts to traverse; he is a
poor traveller who fears either."

"You forget Emmie and I are already footsore with our rough
pilgrimage," rejoined Queenie, with her bright quaintness.  "We have
been through the Slough of Despond and the Valley of Humiliation."

"And the other valley that was worse," put in Emmie, who was
listening to them; "but you only stood at the entrance, Queen; it was
I who had to fight with all the hobgoblins."

"Hush, my sweet.  Yes, I know," hastily kissing her, for Queenie
could never bear to be reminded even by a word of Emmie's past
danger.  "Well, we are in our land of Beulah now, the land flowing
with milk and honey."

"It strikes me that you are very thankful for small mercies,"
observed Cathy, gruffly, who could never feel quite reconciled to her
friend's humble employment, and who was ready to quarrel with Dora
for her patronage and condescension.

"Supposing we were one day to spread golden wings and fly away,"
rejoined Queenie, gaily.  "Supposing some one were to leave us a
fortune, and Emmie and I suddenly became grand people, would you like
me better then, Cathy?"

"No; I should dislike to see you so spoiled," she returned, frowning
at the idea.  "I believe Garth and I have a monomania on that
subject, we hate rich people so.  I would not have you and Emmie a
bit different; but, Queen," changing her manner and speaking rather
nervously, "I can't help thinking that you are a little extravagant;
Langley said so the other day."

"Extravagant!" repeated Queenie, opening her eyes wide.

"Yes; I think Garth put it into her head, for Langley never notices
those sort of things.  He found out that you had hired that piano
from Carlisle, and then you are always ordering pretty things for
Emmie.  Garth has such a horror of debt, and, as he said, two hundred
a-year will not buy everything; and you have not got nearly that,
have you, Queen?"

"I must be more careful," returned Queenie, evading the question.  "I
am very much obliged to your brother for the hint; but there will be
no fear of my getting into debt, you may assure him of that.  I have
had a terror of that from a child, ever since I saw the misery it
involved."

"I am thankful to hear you say so," returned her friend, much
relieved.

She had been a little bewildered by Queenie's purchases.  The
_ménage_ of the cottage had been perfectly simple, and, with the
exception of that Gainsborough hat, Queenie had kept her own and
Emmie's dress strictly within bounds.  But the fifty-pound note had
burned a hole in her pocket, and she had begged Caleb to forward some
amusing books and games for the child's entertainment; and the
expensive selection made had caused dismay to her friends at
Church-Stile House when Emmie displayed her treasures.

Queenie laughed at her friend's lecture, but it caused her a little
anxiety.  What would they think of her playful deception? would they
consider themselves at all aggrieved at it?  Garth too, with his
horror of heiresses and his exaggerated notions of independence!  She
felt a little sinking of heart at the thought.

The autumn had set in cold and rainy, ceaseless down-pours still
flooded the country; the field path to the Vicarage was impassable,
and the lane almost a grey mire.  Garth and Ted plodded past the
cottage daily in their leathern gaiters, and Dr. Stewart shook his
head ruefully when he encountered Queenie in his rounds.

"Why don't you give your scholars a holiday, such constant wettings
are good for no one?" he asked; but Queenie only laughed, and drew
her old grey waterproof closer round her.  After Cathy's sermon she
dared not invest in a new one.  She looked so bright and
good-humored, there was such a fresh radiance about her, that Dr.
Stewart failed to notice the shabbiness of the garment.  He only
carried away with him an impression of youthful brightness that
lingered long with him.

"And Miss Faith used to look like that," he thought a little
bitterly, as he rode homeward in the darkness.

Dr. Stewart had by no means ceased his visits to the Evergreens.  He
still dropped in at odd times, and kept up a running fire of argument
with Miss Charity, and still maintained a rigid surveillance of the
books that lay on the table beside her.  There was not much
conversation between him and the younger sister; a hand shake and a
brief word was often all that passed between them.  His praises of
Jean, and the merits and demerits of her housekeeping, were all
retailed into Miss Hope's sympathizing ear; while to the somewhat
grim Miss Prudence belonged the privilege of pouring out his tea and
providing the crisp griddle cakes that his soul loved.  Faith felt
herself somewhat out in the cold; she was younger and more
attractive, but she had not Charity's wit and cleverness; in spite of
all those long hours of reading, she was often at a loss to
comprehend the subject which they were discussing.  She sat by a
little silent and heavy-hearted over her work; it was not for her to
speak if he had ceased caring to listen.

Faith was growing paler and more worn every day; the renewal of her
intercourse with Dr. Stewart had brought disappointment as well as
pleasure with it.  True, he had brightened her life in many ways, and
his brief visit was the chief event of the day, but it often left
behind it a strange restlessness and sadness.  In a vague sort of way
she began to understand that she had not fulfilled the promise of her
younger days; that he was disappointed in his ideal.  The old Faith
had been a brighter and more hopeful one; and at this thought the
sweet face grew more troubled and downcast.

"What's to do with you, Faith? you always seem in a maze about
something when Dr. Stewart is here," Miss Charity would say sharply,
when their visitor had taken himself off with a curt nod that
included the whole sisterhood.  It was Miss Prudence who generally
let him out now; Faith did not offer to stir from her corner.  How
did she know whether he wanted her.

"It seems so strange that a woman of your age should find so little
to say," continued Miss Charity, with a displeased jerk of her thin
ringlets.

"He only talks to you, Cara; you neither of you seem to want me,"
returned poor Faith, with the least possible trace of bitterness in
her tone.

She did not often retaliate, for hers was a quiet, peace-loving
nature, but to-day she felt chafed even to soreness.

Never had her sister's yoke oppressed her so bitterly; never had
those readings in that close hot room seemed so tedious.  The novels
had been replaced by biographies, all of Dr. Stewart's choice; but
the pure English and the nobility of the lives delineated were lost
upon Faith, chafing under a secret sense of injury, and longing to be
alone with her burthen.  How hard is enforced companionship, even to
the most patient of us.  Faith looked out wearily at the driving rain
that kept her a prisoner, and deprived her of the one thing she most
prized--a solitary walk.

But at night she had it out with her thoughts.  She would lie awake
for hours, covered round by the sacred darkness, thinking out the
problem of her life.

Why had Dr. Stewart crossed her path again? to what intent and
purpose?  She had become resigned to her life in a weary sort of way,
and that one bright summer had only lingered in her memory like a
dream of good to be prized.  True, it was her most precious
possession, the one thing that redeemed her life from blankness; but
still time had in a great measure healed the wound of her
disappointment.

But now they had met again as friends, who had once been something
closer to each other.  True, there had been no spoken understanding
between them; but there had been looks that had been as plain as
words, half sentences that conveyed whole meanings, glances of mutual
trust and sympathy.  Was all this to go for nothing? was he to be
free, to put away the past, and forget and come again, while she
alone had been faithful?

Dr. Stewart took no apparent notice of her changed looks; he came and
went in his blunt way, and left her alone in her quiet corner.
Sometimes his evenings were spent at Church-Stile House or the
Vicarage; now and then they heard of him at the cottage, making one
of a merry party, and welcomed warmly everywhere.

The day after Faith had uttered her little protest to her sister the
weather showed signs of breaking.  The rain had abated towards
afternoon, but the low grey skies and wet roads were very uninviting.
Faith looked out at the prospect a little disconsolately, it seemed
to her an emblem of her own life, and then she turned to her sister.

"The rain has stopped, I think I shall go out now, Cara; it will do
my head good."

"I thought Dr. Stewart was coming this afternoon," returned Miss
Charity, clicking her knitting-needles busily as she spoke; "he
promised to bring us more new books.  You heard him say so yourself,
Faith."

"Yes, I know; but he will not miss me; he has got you to talk to him,
Cara, and I feel I must have a walk.  I am sure he will understand,"
she returned deprecatingly.

"Well, if you like to be so ungracious it is not my business to
interfere," retorted Miss Charity in a displeased tone.  "If you are
only going to sit in the corner and not open your lips when he comes
in, you may just as well be out.  But he won't have a high opinion of
your politeness."

"I cannot help that," returned Faith, wearily.

Another afternoon of needle-work and her sister's sharp speeches was
not to be borne.  She began to feel a dread of these visits, they
made her so uncomfortable.

"Well, put on your waterproof, if you must go," snapped Miss Charity,
aggravated at Faith's unwonted resolution.  "The rain will only keep
off for an hour, and you will get nicely soaked."  And Faith meekly
acquiesced.

The waterproof was not a becoming garment, it was almost as shabby as
Queenie's; the shapeless folds quite disguised her neat figure.  She
had on her old brown hat too, that suited her less well than her
little Quaker bonnets; but Faith knew she would have one of Charity's
sharp lectures on extravagance if she got her nice bonnet ribbons
soiled, for, with their modest expenditure, even bonnet ribbons had
to be considered.

It was a severe shock to her womanly vanity when, a little way down
the road, she met Dr. Stewart.  The grey waterproof might be
considered fit raiment for such an uncertain afternoon, but the old
brown hat!  Faith smarted with mortified vanity down to her
finger-ends.

He was on foot, as it happened, and he turned back and walked with
her a little way, but he scanned the cloak and the hat rather
quizzically as he did so.

"So you went out to avoid me, did you, Miss Faith," he said
good-humoredly; but the sudden question grazed the truth so closely
that Faith's pale cheeks flamed up in a moment.

"I have not been out for three days, and then my head has been so
bad," she stammered.  She was not asking for his sympathy, but she
wished to defend herself from all charge of rudeness.

"Do you always suffer from these headaches?" he asked suddenly.

"No, not always; but they have been pretty bad lately," she returned
indifferently.  "I suppose the close room does it.  Cara is so afraid
of draughts, and so much reading does not suit me."

"I think the others ought to take their turn.  I mean to tell Miss
Charity so some day."

"Oh, no; pray do not," in much distress.  "It does not really hurt
me, not much; and Cara does so dislike Hope's reading, it is too loud
and fast for an invalid."

"She must be taught to read slower then."

"Oh, no; you must not say anything about it," imploringly.  "I have
nothing else to do but to wait upon Cara, it is right for me to do
it; and if it hurts me what does it matter?  We cannot live for our
own pleasure," continued Faith, walking fast and nervously, but he
checked her.

"Slower, please; I had no idea you were such an energetic walker.  I
want to talk to you, not that you ever honor me with many words.  I
am not to be included in the list of your duties, eh?" with a
sidelong glance of mingled fun and earnestness.

"I am afraid you have thought me very rude," in a subdued voice.

"No; I have only found you a little depressing.  What's been the
matter with you all this time, Miss Faith?  I am an old friend, and
you might be frank with me."

"There is nothing the matter," she returned in much confusion,
thereby burthening her conscience with a whole falsehood.  But how
could she hint to him the reason of her weariness?

Dr. Stewart pocketed the falsehood with perceptible distrust.

"You are growing thinner and more nervous every day and there is no
cause for it?  Do you expect me to believe that?" with an incredulous
laugh.  "I mean to put a stop to these pernicious readings, so look
out for yourself, Miss Faith."

"Oh, you must not; indeed you must not, Dr. Stewart," she implored,
with tears in her eyes.  "It is Cara's one pleasure, and I cannot
have it interfered with.  You have no right to interfere," she
continued, turning upon him with the fierceness of the dove.

Poor Miss Faith! she was trying to work herself up into anger against
her friendly tormentor, but somehow the anger failed to come.

"Have I no right? are you sure of that?" he demanded gravely.  "You
know better than I, Miss Faith; you must question your own heart and
memory on that point."

"What do you mean?" she asked, growing suddenly pale, but walking
still faster; but he put out his hand and stopped her.

"What do I mean?  Have you forgotten Carlisle?  It is ten years ago,
and we have both grown older since then; but I fancy we have neither
of us forgotten.  Do you like me as well as you did then, Miss Faith?
Do you think you could make up your mind to exchange the Evergreens
for Juniper Lodge?"

Faith gave a startled glance into his face, but what she saw there
left her in no doubt of his meaning.  It was as though an electric
shock had passed through her.  She had been accusing him in her own
mind of fickleness and forgetfulness, and all the time he had meant
this!

"I thought that it was you that did not care, that had forgotten,"
she gasped, not answering his very plain question in her first
dizziness of surprise.

"Then you thought wrong," he returned coolly.  "Women are not the
only faithful beings in creation, so you need not lay claim to that
extra virtue.  It was you who left me, remember that, Miss Faith."

"But you might have followed; you might have asked what had become of
me," she faltered.

"What was the use?" was the uncompromising answer, "I had a mother
and sister to maintain.  A wife is too expensive a luxury for a poor
man, and I was poor enough, in all conscience.  Well, so it is
settled, and we understand each other at last, Faith?"

"Yes, I suppose so," she returned, softly.

The wooing had been brief and matter-of-fact on Dr. Stewart's side;
but apparently he was quite satisfied with the result, for he walked
on in a brisk, contented sort of way.

Faith walked beside him, dizzy, and with her head throbbing with
nervous pain.  She had forgotten all about her old brown hat and her
waterproof.  The low, grey skies still foreboded rain, and the wet
pools shone under her feet; but if a miracle had transformed them
into rosy wine she would scarcely have been more astonished.  That he
should have meant this all that time!

"And I thought you had forgotten, Dr. Stewart," she said presently,
in the tone of one that craved forgiveness.

"Humph! you will find Angus more to your purpose," he returned,
curtly.  "How about Miss Charity and the readings now, Faith," with a
merry twinkle.

"Cara! oh, what shall we do with her?" she exclaimed, clasping her
hands in sudden despair.  "It is I who have forgotten now.  My poor
Cara!"

"Leave Cara to me," was Dr. Stewart's only answer, as they turned
their faces homeward.




CHAPTER III.

"CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME."

              "Beseech your Majesty,
  Forbear sharp speeches to her; she's a lady
  So tender of rebukes, that words are strokes,
  And strokes death to her."--_Shakespeare._

  "Kindness in women, not their beauteous looks,
  Shall win my love."--_Shakespeare._


Faith's nervous trepidation returned in full force when they came in
sight of the Evergreens.  She cast a piteous glance at the bay-window
and then at Dr. Stewart, which secretly moved him to inward laughter,
though not a muscle of his face betrayed amusement.

"There are no white slaves in England, leave Miss Charity to me," he
said again, and the masculine assurance of his voice gave her a
delicious sense of security.

The quiet way, too, in which he relieved her of her cloak in the
hall, and bade her lay aside her hat, brought with it a strange new
feeling of protection and care.  There had been on his part no
protestations, no vehement declaration of affection; but for a
matter-of-fact, middle-aged wooer, rather new to his duties, Dr.
Stewart was doing remarkably well.

Miss Charity was alone when they entered.  The other sisters were in
the habit of indulging in an afternoon nap, which they enjoyed in
strict seclusion; but Miss Charity's bright eyes never closed till
night, and not always then.  The poor lady could have published many
a volume of midnight meditations, when she and pain held their dreary
converse together during those ten long years of suffering.

She looked up rather sharply over her knitting-needles as the two
made their appearance.  She was still put out at Faith's unusual
manifestation of self-will, and an afternoon's lonely cogitations had
not sweetened her acerbity.

"So you have come back at last, Faith," she remarked ironically; "I
hope you have enjoyed your wet walk.  I wish you would cure Faith,
Dr. Stewart, of her absurd restlessness and love of wandering; she
goes out in all weathers, and that is such a ridiculous thing in a
woman of her age," finished Charity, who, in certain moods, was given
to remind her sister that she would never see thirty-five again.

But the taunt was lost for the first time on Faith, for had she not
received this afternoon a fresh lease of youth?

"What does it matter about age, we have had a beautiful walk,"
returned Faith, laughing a little nervously as she hung over the back
of her sister's sofa so that her face was hidden.  The conjunction,
so sweet to newly-engaged people, had slipped out by mistake.  Miss
Charity looked up testily.

"Who do you mean by we?  I wish you would speak plainly.  Has the
doctor joined you in your hunt after dripping hedges.  If one does
not learn common sense when one has turned thirty-five last March I
don't suppose it will ever be learned," grumbled the invalid, who,
with all her sharpness, had not an idea of the real state of the case.

Dr. Stewart's eyes began to twinkle wickedly; he was enjoying the
fun.  Miss Charity's humors always amused him.  He generally let her
fret and fume to her heart's content without attempting to contradict
her, but a glance at Faith's nervous face determined him to give her
a "clincher," as he called it.

"Yes; I met Faith, and we had a walk together," he commenced blandly,
but Miss Charity began to bridle.

"You met my sister, Dr. Stewart.  I suppose you did not mean--to say
what you did," she was about to finish, but the doctor interrupted
her cheerfully.

"Well, I call her Faith because we are old friends, and because we
have settled our little matters between ourselves this afternoon.
When two people have decided to become man and wife there is no
further need for formality, eh, Miss Charity."

"Man and wife!" responded Miss Charity with a faint shriek, and then
she covered her face with her hands.

"Yes; have we startled you?" he continued more gravely, for her
surprise and agitation were very great.  "Faith was unprepared for my
speaking, or she would have given you a hint.  It seems we have cared
for each other, in a sort of a way, for the last ten or eleven years;
there's constancy for you!  Why I have been all over the world, and
have yet come back to my old sweetheart."

"Where are you, Faith?  Why do you let Dr. Stewart do all the
talking?" demanded Miss Charity, uncovering her pale face, but
speaking in her old irritable manner.  "If you have accepted him, and
you are going to be what he said," shivering slightly, for the words
brought back a dreary past and void of her own, "there is nothing for
me or any one to say.  You're not a girl," with an hysterical laugh;
"I suppose you know your own mind."

"Oh, Cara!" cried poor Faith, with tears in her eyes, "I don't know
how I can be so selfish as to wish to leave you, but it is all true
that he says.  It was coming back to nurse you that put a stop to
everything ten years ago; and now he has come back, and it seems as
though we were meant for each other, and--and--" here she broke into
nervous sobbing.

"Pooh, pooh," returned the doctor, but his eyes glistened a little in
sympathy; "Juniper Lodge is only next door, you are not going to be
separated.  Come, Miss Charity, you are a kind soul, and have courage
enough for ten Faiths, say something comforting to your sister, to
give her a good heart over this."

Dr. Stewart knew how to treat Miss Charity.  Underneath the sharpness
and irritability there was the true metal of a good womanly nature,
and a courage few women could boast.  Years ago she had fought out
her own battle, and had laid herself down on her bed of pain with a
breaking heart but unmurmuring lips.  Had she ever forgotten poor
George since the day she had given him up? had she ever believed the
stories they had brought her of his unworthiness?

The small world of Hepshaw only saw in Miss Charity a little
bright-eyed woman, with a caustic tongue and a temper soured by
disappointment and suffering; but no one but Faith, and perhaps Dr.
Stewart, knew what the martyred body and nerves bore day and night.

"I feel sometimes like St. Lawrence on his gridiron; I wish it were a
bed of roses to me too," she said once grimly to her sister; but not
even to her did she speak of the slow agonies that consumed her.
What would be the use, she thought; pain is sent to be borne, not to
be talked about.

Neither to Faith did she speak of the strange thoughts and dreams
that haunted her nights.  Sometimes, half lulled by opiates, it would
seem to her as though the walls and roof of her chamber were thrown
down; through the room rushed the cold winds of heaven; above her was
the dark midnight sky seamed with glittering stars.  How they wavered
and shone!  Voices sounded through them sometimes.  Grey and white
shadows moved hither and thither, silent, but with grave, speaking
eyes pitying and full of love.  "Poor Charity!" they seemed to say,
"still fastened to the cross and waiting for the angel of peace and
rest.  Will he be long?"  And the echo seemed to be caught up and
passed on shuddering: "will he be long?"

Ah, yes; those were her parents! and poor George, how plainly she
could see him!  He had died a drunkard's death they had told her,
with a sorry attempt at comfort.  He had ridden after a night's
debauch, and his seat and hand had been unsteady; but she had shaken
her head incredulously.  What mattered how he died? he was at rest,
she knew that, she was sure of it; he could not have sinned as they
said he had--her poor George, on whom she had brought such misery!

And now, because her cup was not yet full, this farther sacrifice was
demanded of her.  She must give up Faith, the patient nurse and
companion of all these years of suffering.  True, she was often cross
and irritable, but could any one be to her what Faith was? could any
one replace that soft voice and gentle hand that had lulled and made
bearable many an hour when the pain threatened to be intolerable?
would any other bear her harsh humors with such patience and loving
resignation?  The thought of this new deprivation paled the poor
invalid's cheek and swelled in her throat as Dr. Stewart uttered his
persuasive protest.

"Oh, Cara!  I shall never have the heart to leave you when it comes
to the point," cried Faith, clinging to her with fresh tears.  What
did it matter that they were middle-aged women, and that Cara's hair,
at least, was streaked with grey, and that Dr. Stewart was regarding
them with eyes that alternately twinkled and glistened.  Had they not
their feelings? was not Cara her own sister?  "Oh, Cara!  I never
shall be able to leave you!"

"Nonsense," returned Miss Charity, pushing her away, but with tears
in her eyes too.  "Get up, Faith, do; what will Dr. Stewart think of
us?  Of course you must have him if you want him; and a good husband
at your age is not to be despised, let me tell you that."

"But what will you do without me? and Hope reads so badly," sighed
her sister.

Miss Charity winced a little over the idea, but she returned bravely,

"Oh, I shall get along somehow; Hope is not so bad if you put cotton
wool in one ear; and she always knows what she is reading," with an
accent of reproach to denote Faith's wandering attention.  "There,
there, it is all right," patting her shoulder kindly.  "Juniper Lodge
is not a hundred miles off, and I dare say Dr. Stewart will often
spare you to us; and all I have to say to him is, that a good sister
will make a good wife, and that he will soon find out for himself;"
and with that Miss Charity composed herself to her knitting again,
and shortly after that Dr. Stewart took his leave.

"Must you go yet?  I hoped you would have waited and seen Hope and
Prudence," faltered Faith timidly, as she followed her lover into the
little hall and watched him invest himself in his shaggy great coat;
but Dr. Stewart only smiled and shook his head.

"Not to-night; give my kind regards to them.  To-morrow afternoon if
it holds up we will have another walk together and discuss future
arrangements.  You will want this evening to get your thoughts in
order, eh, Faith?" with a look of such thorough understanding and
good-humor that her color rose.

"Miss Charity is enough for one afternoon, I could not quite stand
the other cardinal virtues," he said to himself as he sat down
contentedly to his solitary tea.

Jean, excellent woman, knowing his ways, had lighted the fire and
brought down his slippers to warm.  "I am not so badly off as a
bachelor that I need be in such a hurry to change my state," he went
on, stretching out his feet to the blaze; "but how is a man to enjoy
comfort and the pleasure of a good conscience knowing that a human
creature is dying by inches next door? and though that's rather
strong, I do believe she gets thinner every day, with all that worry
and reading nonsense.  When she is my wife no one can interfere with
her, and I can keep Miss Charity within bounds.  Poor soul!  one is
bound to pity her too.  I felt quite soft-hearted myself when Faith
was kneeling there looking so pitiful.  Well, she is a dear woman,
and I don't repent of what I have done; for, in spite of Jean's
excellent management, one feels a trifle dull sometimes now the old
mother's gone and Edie is married.  By-the-bye, I must write and tell
Edie about this, she will be so delighted."

Faith returned a little soberly to the parlor when Dr. Stewart had
taken his departure.  She would gladly have slipped away to her own
room to dream over this wonderful thing that had happened, but she
knew that would have been an offence in her sisters' eyes.  There
were Hope and Prudence to be enlightened, and a gauntlet of sisterly
criticism to be run.  Dr. Stewart was such a favorite with them all,
that she knew that in whatever light they might regard her acceptance
of his offer that it would not be unfavorable.

Miss Charity broke the ice herself in her usual trenchant fashion.

"A fine bit of news I've got for you two while you have been
napping," she began, knitting in an excited manner.  "Here's Faith,
who is old enough to know better, has gone and made a match of it
with Dr. Stewart."

"What!" ejaculated Miss Hope, and then she broke into one of her loud
hearty laughs that always jarred on the invalid's nerves.  "Well
done, Faith; so you don't mean to be an old maid like the rest of us.
Well, three in a family is enough to my mind, and plenty, and you
never had quite the proper cut.  So it is mistress of Juniper Lodge
you mean to be!  Well, well, this is a rare piece of news to be sure;
nothing has happened in the family worth mentioning since Charity
took up with poor George."

"Well, there will be one mouth less to feed," put in Prudence in her
usual strong fashion; "and with the present exorbitant price of meat
that's something for which to be thankful."

But though the speech was not sympathetic Miss Prudence's lean brown
hand trembled a little as she unlocked the tea-caddy and measured out
the scanty modicum of tea.  Poor Miss Prudence! there was still a
warm woman's heart beating under the harsh, unloving exterior, though
it seldom found utterance.  Her one object in life had been to eke
out a narrow income, and bring down her own and her sisters' wants to
the limits of penury.  A small saving constituted her chief joy; the
low standard had dwarfed her moral stature; petty cares had narrowed
and contracted her; the mote in her eye hindered the incoming of
heart sunshine, and made her life a hard, unlovely thing.

For it is a sad truth and a painful one to many of us, that in a
great measure we form our own lives.  The wide blanks, the vacuum
that nature abhors, are all self-created.  Outside the void, the
chaos, the central abyss of self, there wait all manner of patient
duties, joys, griefs, possible sufferings, a world of human beings to
be loved, to replenish emptiness and the waste of spent passion.

Miss Prudence was one of those unhappy beings who read the meanings
of life by the light of a farthing dip.  Within her secret sanctuary
the small god Economy dwelt as a favored deity.  She would sweep her
house like the woman in the parable for the smallest possible missing
coin, and go to bed in despair for the loss of it; but she left her
own inner chambers miserably unclean and full of dust and cobwebs.

And yet, as in many other persons, Miss Prudence's faults were only
caricatures of virtues.  She was miserly, but it was for her sisters'
sakes more than for her own.  To keep the little house bright and
respectable she toiled from morning till night; but I do not know
that any of them loved her better for it.  It was Prue's vocation,
her one taste.  If she could only have read to Miss Charity, and
taken her share in the nursing, Faith would have been more grateful
to her.

She fretted, as was natural, over that little speech of Miss
Prudence's, for she was faint with excessive happiness, and thirsted
for a pure draught of sisterly sympathy.

"Is that all you have to say to me, Prue?" she demanded in an injured
tone.

"What have I got to say," returned poor Miss Prudence, looking greyer
and grimmer, "except that it is a fine thing to be Dr. Stewart's wife
and the mistress of Juniper Lodge, and not be obliged to count your
pence till your eyes ache with trying to make out that five are equal
to six?  That's what I've been doing all my life, Faith, and no
thanks to me either; and it does not always agree with one."

"There, there, take your tea, Faith," interrupted Miss Charity,
testily; "we've wasted more than an hour already over this business
of yours, and we shall get through very little reading to-night."

"Nonsense, Charity; let Faith have her talk out," observed Hope, in
her good-humored way.  "We don't have weddings every day in the
family, and it is hard if we don't make much of them when they come.
Well, and is the day fixed, Faith?"

"No, indeed!  What are you thinking about?" returned Faith, quite
terrified at the idea.

She sat at the tea-table a little sad and confused as Miss Hope plied
her with good-natured jokes and questions.  Why did not Cara want her
to talk? why was Prudence so snapping and hard? and why could they
not all leave her alone with her thoughts?

"I think I will read now," she said, taking up the book and sinking
with a sigh into her usual seat.

As the soft harmonious voice made itself heard Miss Charity's eyes
filled with tears and her forehead contracted as though with pain.
"And she must lose this her one consolation," she thought.  Faith's
reading was to her as David's harp to the sick soul of Saul--it drove
away the evil spirit of despondency.  "It is giving the widow's
mite--all I have," thought Miss Charity, with a little thrill of
pathos.

As for Faith, she went through her allotted task with an outward
semblance of patience and much inward rebellion, reading
mechanically, without perceiving the drift of the sense.  "And he
meant this all the time," she said to herself.  "Oh, how little I
deserve him and my happiness."

Faith's evening, on the whole, had been disappointing, but before
many hours were over she found that things were not to be arranged to
her liking.  The moment it came to a clashing of wills she soon
discovered that Dr. Stewart's was to be paramount.

Faith had certain old-fashioned views on the subject of courtship and
matrimony.  The one must not be too brief or the other too sudden in
her opinion.  Dr. Stewart's views were in direct opposition.

"When a man gets on to middle age, and has knocked about the world as
much as I have done," he said to her the following afternoon as they
again plodded through the miry roads, only now a pale uncertain
sunshine followed them, "he finds courtship just a trifle difficult.
I am a plain man, and speak my mind plainly, Faith.  We've known each
other, or at least thought about each other, these ten years.  We are
neither of us young, and we are not likely to get younger; so if
you're ready I'm more than willing, and we will just say the middle
of November, and talk no more about it."

"But, Angus, that is only just six weeks!" faltered his _fiancée_.

"Yes, and that's a fortnight too much," he returned bluntly.  "Shall
we make it the end of October then?" at which alarming alternative
Faith had only just strength to gasp out a faint negative, and
subside into startled silence.  After all, was not this exchanging
one sort of tyranny for another?

She made known the news of her engagement to her friends at
Church-Stile House in a shame-faced manner that was quite new to her.
Cathy fairly danced round her with delight, and even Langley's wan
face brightened with sympathy.

"Dear Faith, I am so glad," she whispered.  "Such constancy deserves
its reward."

"A wedding at Hepshaw, and one of the cardinal virtues, of all
people!" crowed Cathy.  "What will the sisterhood do without you? in
such a household, loss of Faith must be terrible," finished the girl
solemnly.

"It is dreadful for Cara.  I lay awake half the night thinking what
she would do without me.  It does not matter so much for Hope and
Prudence; they will miss me, of course, but then they have each
other; but Cara!"

"Oh, Miss Charity will do well enough!" returned Cathy in her
off-hand manner.  "You must not think of any one but Dr. Stewart now."

"Of course I think of him; he--Angus--is so good; oh, you don't know
how good he is to me.  But all the same, six weeks, and he will not
hear of waiting any longer; and now he has talked Cara round to his
opinion, and she says the sooner the fuss is over the better!"
finished Miss Faith, in a tone between crying and laughing.

Poor bewildered Faith! she had taken refuge with her kind friends at
Church-Stile House to seek the sympathy that was not forthcoming at
home.  Langley's womanly intuition soon guessed the real state of the
case--that Faith was half afraid and half proud of her lover's
rough-and-ready wooing, and needed quiet and soothing.  She dismissed
Cathy and her overpowering liveliness as soon as possible, took off
Faith's bonnet, put her in the easy-chair in her favorite corner, and
petted and made much of her all the evening.  Before many hours were
over Faith had made her little confession, feeling sure that Langley
would understand her.  It was not that she was not happy, but she was
just a little bit disappointed.  Angus was very kind, just what he
ought to be; but he seemed to take everything as understood, and that
there was no need to say nice things to her.  Why he had been far
more lover-like ten years ago, when he had never said a word to her.
"But all that he and Cara think almost is to have it over quickly and
without fuss.  One ought not to call sacred things by that name,"
concluded Faith, with tears in her eyes.

"Dear Faith, men are so different to us!" returned her friend gently.
"I quite understand how you feel; but then Dr. Stewart thinks he has
given you an all-sufficient proof of his affection beyond any need of
words.  You are not going to marry a demonstrative man, you must
remember that; but I don't doubt for one moment that he means to make
you a happy woman."

"Things never come quite in the way one wants," replied Faith with a
little sigh; but she felt more than half comforted by Langley's
sympathy and wise common-sense?  When Dr. Stewart came in to fetch
her by-and-bye she had regained her old serenity of manner.

As for Dr. Stewart, after a few minutes' quiet observation of him
Langley was quite satisfied to trust her friend's happiness in his
keeping.  There was a watchful tenderness in his bearing towards her,
a quiet unobtrusiveness of attention, that spoke for itself without
need of words.  Faith would soon find out for herself that she was
warmly loved and cherished, though it might not occur to him to tell
her so.

He gave Langley a hint too of his reasons for hurrying on the
preparations for the wedding.

"She is almost worn out now, and the sooner some one takes care of
her the better," he said, in his straight-forward, sensible way, when
Faith had gone up-stairs to put on her bonnet.  "She has been taking
care of people the best part of her life, and now she wants rest and
a little comfort.  Miss Charity is a good woman, but she is awfully
trying at times; but she will have to ask my leave before she
tyrannizes over my wife."

"You have got a treasure, Dr. Stewart; you don't know how much we all
think of Faith, and how dearly we love her.  Garth says she is the
best woman he knows."

"I always knew she was a good creature," returned Dr. Stewart in a
provokingly matter-of-fact tone; but the gleam in his eyes
contradicted it, and Langley understood him, and was satisfied.

The six weeks' courtship was soon over, but not until Faith was
nearly harassed to death by the multiplicity of her labors.  The
slender resources of the sisters could only furnish a very modest
outfit for the bride.  The wedding silk of delicate fawn was
Langley's gift, and the rich black silk and handsome seal-skin
jacket, that were the glories of the whole, were anonymous presents
directed to Faith Palmer in an unknown hand.

Faith believed that she was indebted for them to her lover's
generosity, until he assured her very seriously that such an idea had
never entered his head.

"No, no, Faith; I am not a poor man now, but I am not as rich as
Croesus," he returned, shaking his head over the rich roll of silk.

"Why that must have cost seven-and-sixpence a yard if it cost a
penny, and the seal-skin is worth eighteen or twenty guineas!"
exclaimed Miss Prudence, eyeing Faith with profound astonishment not
unmixed with respect.  The future Mrs. Stewart was evidently a very
different person to the oft-snubbed younger sister.

"How I do long to know who sent them!" sighed Faith, bending over the
parcels with a flushed face, which recalled the Faith of old to Dr.
Stewart's eyes.

Queenie, who happened to be at the Evergreens, laughed over the
fervency of the wish.

"What does it matter? the donor does not want to be thanked
evidently.  If I were you I should rather enjoy the mystery.
People's thanks always seem like payment to me, they are delivered so
punctually and with such effort."

"All the same, I should like to know who has taken such kind interest
in me," returned Miss Faith, with a puzzled expression as she
fingered the sealskin.

This anonymous wedding-gift was the only little bit of romance about
the whole business.  Faith sat and sewed with her sisters day after
day, listening to long lectures on economy from Prudence, or read her
allotted task to Charity.  She did not dare to omit this duty even
the day before the wedding.  Dr. Stewart came in towards evening and
found her pale and half hysterical over Carlyle's 'French Revolution.'

"I think we need one too," he muttered, as he removed the book from
her hand.  "No more reading to-night, Miss Charity.  What do you say
to a game of chess with me?" and Faith gave him a grateful glance and
darted from the room.

It was a simple, unpretending wedding.  Faith looked very demure and
sweet in her fawn-colored silk and pretty white bonnet.  Dr. Stewart
paid her the first compliment she had received from him.

"We shall have the old Faith back by-and-bye," he said to her.  "I
mean to give you a week of sea breezes, and then we will settle down
into regular Darby and Joan ways, shall we, my wife?"

And Faith blushed and said, "Yes."

And it could not be denied that Mrs. Stewart was a far happier woman
than Faith Palmer had been.  Langley and Cathy were amused at the
brisk, matronly airs that soon replaced the soft melancholy that had
been Faith's habitual manner.  Angus was evidently perfection in his
wife's eyes; his opinions were the soundest, his views never to be
controverted, or his word questioned.

"Are you happy, Faith?" Langley asked her very tenderly when they
first met after her marriage.

"I am the happiest woman in the world; and Angus is everything that
he can be," returned the mistress of Juniper Lodge.  "Do you know, he
won't hear of our neglecting Cara.  I read to her every day for an
hour, and he often goes in and plays a game of chess with her; and he
has taught Hope besique and cribbage, and they play them together.
Ah, you don't know how dear and thoughtful he is for them as well as
for me!" finished Faith, with a look of infinite contentment.




CHAPTER IV.

THE SWING OF THE PENDULUM.

"A woman is more considerate in affairs of love than a man, because
love is more the study and business of her life."--_Washington
Irving._


It was about this time that Garth began to feel very uncomfortable.
Hitherto his quiet, well-assured life, with its eight-and-twenty
years of healthful work and activity, its moderate aims and small
ambitions, had been singularly free from conflict.  Mental
disturbance, the weariness of self-argument, the harass of stormy
passions, had been wholly unknown to him.  In his ordered existence
the pains and penalties of a lover's martyrdom had not vexed him.

He was still angry with Dora, but his discomfort did not proceed
wholly from his wrath; it lay rather in a concealed fear that he was
mistaken in his own feelings.

After all, was it Dora that he wanted?  Was the friendship between
them sufficient to warrant the assumption that they would be happy
together in a life-long union?  Was not her lukewarmness, her
procrastination, tolerably clear signs that she was, in reality, as
heart-whole as he?  Would it go hardly with either of them if that
dust-shaking movement of his should be carried out?

There was no engagement; the tacit understanding between them did not
even amount to a promise.  Dora had rejected his first attempt to
place things on a more satisfactory footing; in reality he was free
as air.  Why was her influence so strong over him then that he feared
to break the yoke of his subservience, and so stood, as it were, on
the comfortless borders of uncertainty, battling between two opinions?

Dora was still away at Brussels, but Mr. Cunningham had returned.
From him Garth learnt that they had found the invalid in a far more
precarious state than they had at first imagined.  The fever had
subsided, but had been followed by a serious attack on the lungs.  It
was impossible for her sister to leave her; and Mr. Cunningham feared
that a winter in the south of France would be imperatively needed.

Dora wrote a short letter soon after to the same effect.

The sight of the well-known characters moved Garth to a certain
impatience.  Why had she written to him? how did she know that his
anger was not still hot against her?

"It is grievous to see dear Flo's sufferings," she wrote.  "She is
such a patient creature, and does all she is told; but at one time we
hardly dared to hope that she would be spared to us.  Poor papa was
quite in despair; and as for Beatrix, she has been no use at all, she
quite upset us the first evening by the way she clung to us.  It is
sad to see a girl of her age so entirely without control.  The doctor
still looks very grave over darling Flo, and I fear we shall be
condemned to a winter in the south of France; in that case I shall
send Beattie home to papa, for her crying and fretting only harass
one.  I dare say Langley will look after her a little for me.

"I little thought I was saying good-bye to you for such a long time.
If you had known that, you would have been a little kinder, would you
not?  But I must not think of that.  I am afraid I think of you all a
great deal too much; the prospect of the long winter away from every
one makes me dreadfully homesick.  Write and tell me how dear papa
looks, and how every one is, and all about yourself, and believe me
always and ever your faithful friend,

"DORA."


Garth's answer was very cool and matter-of-fact.  It contained a full
description of Miss Palmer's wedding, with lengthy messages to
Beatrix and Florence, and a few formal words of condolence over her
prolonged absence.  "It must be such a bore to be exiled against
one's will," wrote Garth; but he did not say one word about himself.

Dora heaved a little sigh of regret as she folded up the letter.
"Poor fellow! he is still very angry with me," she thought to herself.

Garth took a long, solitary walk when he had finished his epistle; it
had taken him more than an hour to compose, and yet it had hardly
filled one sheet of note-paper.  He was heavy with discomfort, and
yet a feeling of triumph was uppermost.  "She will see that I am not
to be played with; that I regard myself as free, and mean to keep my
freedom," he said to himself, as he tramped through the country roads
in the starlight.

It was the beginning of November, and there was a keen, frosty
feeling in the air.  The fields that bordered the road on either side
looked black in the dim light; the trees looked gaunt and grotesque,
stretching out their unclothed limbs in the darkness; the grey stone
wails seemed dim and unsubstantial.  Garth walked on with long, even
strides.  The cold air, the exercise, stirred his young blood, and
drove away despondent fancies; in their place came pleasurable
images, faint, yet full of grace, making pulsation stronger within
him.

When did the thought first occur to him?  When and where? or was it a
thought at all, or only a feeling or sentiment?  A novel sensation
not to be described, and certainly not to be analyzed, had taken
possession of him the very night after his interview with Dora, when,
sore and angry, he had betaken himself to the cottage.

It was strange how that picture of the two sisters haunted him.
Sometimes, when he woke up in the middle of the night, he recalled it
vividly: the child curled up on the rocking-chair, the girl kneeling
on the rug with the plate of cakes in her hand, the firelight shining
on her round, dimpled arms and flushed face, and then her paleness,
and the startled brightness of her eyes when she turned to him.

Had Dora ever grown pale at the sight of him?  had she ever moved his
better nature by such sweet, strong words as those that greeted his
ear that night?

"What is it that men do not understand?" he had asked her in his
simple, straight-forward way.

"The blessedness of giving," she had answered him, without guile or
hesitation, "the privilege of being able to see and love what is
highest and best without hope or thought of return.  Some women feel
like that."

Good heavens! could she--was it a bare possibility that she could be
speaking of herself? and though, a moment after, he repelled this
thought with a blush of shame over the vanity of such a supposition,
other words conspired to haunt him.

"Those that have sympathy here must have sympathy there," she had
gravely assured him, and her earnestness had moved him to excitement.
What if this sympathy were between them two; between him, Garth
Clayton, and the young creature that he had befriended?

"Dolt, fool, idiot! that's what I've been for my pains," growled
Garth between his teeth, as he struck at a young sapling with his
stick; "as though one could map and trace out one's feeling and one's
life in that way.  What is Dora to me after all compared to this
girl, this stranger, whom I did not know six months ago; and yet,
like a blockhead, I must try to bind myself to her, and call her my
Fate."  And then he softened and grew pitiful.  "Poor Dora! poor dear
Dora!" he said, with a kindly memory of his old playmate, and all his
anger died out of him.

After all, there was a very true friendship between them none the
less that he did not deceive himself, and called it by its right name.

Garth meant to go home straight that night, like the good young man
he was; but, somehow, before he was aware he had unlatched the little
gate.  Perhaps it was the sound of Langley's voice in the porch that
determined him.  Of course it was the duty of an affectionate brother
to escort her home.

But Langley had only left her own warm fireside to visit an ailing
child in the village, and was carrying the report to the young
school-mistress.

She still wore her Sister-of-mercy's grey cloak, as Cathy called it,
which Queenie was half-coaxingly, half-playfully trying to unfasten.
She started at Langley's surprised exclamation, and again that
paleness was perceptible.

As for Garth, he flushed a little over the girl's evident surprise.

"I heard your voice, Langley, and so I followed you in," he said
gravely, looking at her and not at Queenie.  All at once he seemed
embarrassed and ill-at-ease, his usual assurance had left him.

"Now you have come you must both stay," replied Queenie brightly; she
had recovered from her momentary agitation.  "Langley has brought me
a very sad account of poor little Bessie.  I must go down there the
first thing in the morning."

"Where is Emmie?" asked Garth, looking longingly at the empty
rocking-chair, but not daring to take possession.

Langley's cloak still hung round her in straight long folds, she
stood quietly warming herself by the fire, looking down on the flame
with a thoughtful, intent face.

"Emmie is tired and has gone to bed.  Do you know," looking up at
Garth rather sorrowfully, "that I am afraid that she is not as strong
as she ought to be.  I have been telling Langley so.  I often find
her lying on the rug in the twilight, and yet she will have it she is
only tired."

"She is growing so fast; children are often languid at that age: you
must not be over-anxious," he returned kindly.

"How can I help it? she is all I have," replied the girl, turning
from him to hide the tears in her eyes.

The kindness of his tone had brought them there.  Garth looked after
her wistfully, but he said no more.

"Come, Garth, it is late, and we must not stay," exclaimed Langley,
rousing herself.  She put her hand on his arm and drew him gently on
without seeming to notice his reluctance.

Queenie stood in the porch and watched them till they were out of
sight.

"How kind he is to-night--kinder than usual," she thought, as she
fastened up the door and went in.

The brother and sister were somewhat silent as they walked up the
lane; Langley was taking counsel with herself.  When Garth entered
his study she followed him, somewhat to his surprise.

"Are you very busy to-night?" she said, pausing by the table, on
which lay several letters, Dora's amongst them.

"Not too busy to talk to you, if that is what you mean," returned
Garth pleasantly.

If the truth must be known he would rather have had his study to
himself to-night, but selfishness was not one of Garth's faults;
perhaps Langley needed his advice, so he stirred up the fire, drew
the easy-chair towards it, and then relieved his sister of her heavy
cloak.

"We have none of us heard from Brussels but you," she observed
absently, as she perused the envelope before her.  "Garth, I hope you
will not be vexed with me, but I think, as things are between you and
Dora, that you ought not to go so much to the cottage."

Garth nearly dropped the poker.  "Et tu, Brute!" he groaned.  "Is
that what you have to say to me to-night, Langley?" he asked in a
constrained voice, and Langley knew the matter of her speech
displeased him.

"You must not be hurt with me, my dear, if I say what I think," she
returned, following him to the rug.  "You are such a good, kind
creature, that it would never occur to you that your kindness could
hurt any one; but Miss Marriott's position amongst us is somewhat
peculiar."

"I thought she was Cathy's friend," he responded, a little crossly.

"Yes; and mine too, and yours, if you care to call her so.  You are
only a young man, Garth, though you are so steady and reliable, and
she is young and very attractive, and temptation comes when we least
expect it; and a friendship is not always a safe and a wise thing;
and--and I have long wanted to speak about this, my dear," went on
Langley in a motherly tone.  True, Garth was only two years younger,
but was she not older by years of suffering? could any sister love
him better than she?

"There are some things that need not be discussed between us," he
returned with a little dignity.  "I am quite aware of Miss Marriott's
position."

"Yes; but a sister is such a safe confidante," she responded softly,
not repelled by his loftiness.  "You and I have always been such
friends, Garth, and I cannot bear you to be so close.  I know you
would not do anything that is wrong; but, as things are between you
and Dora, I cannot but think these constant visits to the cottage are
a mistake.  If you knew how long I have wanted to say this to you,
ever since--"  But here Langley hesitated; she dared not hint that
her uneasiness was chiefly caused by Queenie herself.

With her warm affection and clear-sightedness she had arrived at the
conviction that this constant intercourse was fraught with danger to
the girl in whom they were so much interested.  It was for her sake
as well as Garth's that she was speaking now.

"Stop a moment, Langley," exclaimed her brother angrily.  "You have
twice made an observation; have I ever informed you that I was on the
eve of an engagement with Dora?"

"I thought it was understood between you.  I am quite sure Dora feels
that she belongs to you," was the serious reply.

"Then I beg to differ from you; Miss Cunningham feels nothing of the
sort," was the indignant retort.  "As far as I know, and I suppose I
am the best authority in the matter, things are at an end between us.
It is quite true," flushing at the remembrance, "that when I last
went to the Vicarage that I tried to put matters on a different
footing.  I had made up my mind that I owed Dora a duty, and I
thought then that I wished this thing; but it appears I made a
mistake.  Miss Cunningham," somewhat bitterly, "had no intention of
meeting my views."

"Garth, surely you are mistaken!" exclaimed his sister, much startled.

"I am not mistaken, Langley," in an offended voice.  "Miss Cunningham
is neither ready nor willing to enter into any engagement, she made
that perfectly clear to me.  She puts her father and sisters first,
and me last; but she will see that I am not one to be trifled with."

"Do you mean to tell me that Dora refused you?" was the incredulous
question.

"Not exactly; at least she would not let it come to that point
between us, but she made her meaning tolerably clear.  I am to go on
in this way until she pleases to consider herself unfettered; but I
have waited long enough."

"Did you tell her so?"

"Yes; I said that there must be no more backwardness on her part, no
pretence of insuperable obstacles where none existed; that it must be
yea, yea, or nay, nay, between us; that, in point of fact, she must
have me or lose me."

"Did you say all this?"

"Yes; but not in so many words."

"I think she has treated you badly, and deserved to be frightened;
there are no very real obstacles, as you say.  Beatrix is a dear good
girl, and will soon be old enough to look after her father and the
parish.  I always knew Dora's chief fault was a too great love of
power."

"I shall be sorry to interfere with her prerogative as mistress of
Crossgill Vicarage," he returned coldly.

"Now, Garth, that is hardly fair," rejoined his sister, smiling
affectionately in his face.  "Dora has behaved very badly, but she
has not sinned past forgiveness; she has never cared for any one but
you all her life.  I think that ought to soften your resentment."

"I dare say we shall always be good friends," was the indifferent
reply.

"The very best of friends.  Why this is sheer nonsense, Garth; Dora
would be miserable if she knew how she had hurt you.  Take my advice,
dear; sit down and write to her, she is lonely and unhappy, and full
of anxiety about her sister.  Tell her that you are serious in what
you said to her; that you are not patient, and do not mean to be;
that she must make up her mind to give you a decided answer, and see
what she says.  Do you think she would run the risk of losing you
altogether?"

"It does not matter, I shall not give her the chance of refusing me
again," he returned gloomily.  "Thank you for your advice, Langley,
but it has come too late; I have made up my mind that Dora and I will
be better friends apart."

"You have made up your mind after all these years," she said slowly
and regretfully.  "Poor Dora! whom we all loved for your sake, and
who is so good and faithful a sister and daughter, so thoroughly
trustworthy and intrinsic!  Oh, no, Garth, you could not be so
fickle!"

"You speak as though I have been in love with her all these years,"
returned Garth sullenly.  "You know very well, Langley, I have been
perfectly heart-whole all the time.  True, I always believed that we
should come together, but it is not my fault if my inclinations no
longer point that way."

"Ah!"  Langley uttered no more than that little monosyllable, but the
blood rushed to her brother's face; she knew now what he meant.
"Poor Dora!" she sighed, and then she put up her face and kissed him,
and said good night.

She had come to speak to him about Dora, not of the other one; that
was none of her business.  As far as she knew, his choice was not an
unwise one; no one could know Queenie and not love her.  She had
grown into all their hearts strangely; but the old friend of their
childhood, Dora!

She went away very sadly after that.  Garth made no effort to detain
her.  His purposes were not yet ripe enough for confidence; he was a
little shy of whispering them even to himself.

"You are not hurt with me because I ventured to say this to you?" she
asked him, as she was about to move away.

"No; I think I am relieved; it is always best to undeceive people,"
was his sole reply, and then she left him.

Garth enjoyed his solitude uninterruptedly after that, but he was not
quite at ease in his own conscience.  Langley's words, few and
temperate as they were, had troubled him.  It seemed so strange to
hear her pleading Dora's cause, the very girl whom all these years he
had intended to make his wife.

Should he give her this one chance more? should he write such a
letter that its very sternness should constrain her to answer him?
but no, she might repent and fling herself into his arms, and now his
heart had gone from her.

"It is well to be off with the old love before one is on with the
new," thought Garth, somewhat ruefully, but it was very clear that it
was not Dora now that he wanted.  "We are better apart; she will get
to see that in time herself," he said, as Langley's earnest pleading
rose uncomfortably to his mind.  "I don't believe she is a bit in
love with me."  And before he retired that night he made up his mind
that things must take their chance.  He would wait a little perhaps,
there was no hurry.  When the time for his wooing should come he
would carry it in far different fashion than he had done, and the
girl he should woo would not be Dora.




CHAPTER V.

CHANGES AND CHANCES.

    "One half our cares and woes
    Exist but in our thoughts;
  And lightly fall the rest on those
    Who with them wrestle not.
  The feather scarcely feels the gale
  Which bursts the seaman's strongest sail."
                                        _C. Wesley._


Things went on tranquilly for the next few days.  Garth looked a
little shame-faced when he next saw his sister, but he knew her too
well to fear that an unready confidence would be solicited.  Langley
never asked to know people's secrets.  If they reposed them in her
they found her trustworthy and sympathizing.  She had eased her
conscience by warning her brother, and now her duty was discharged
her heart was full of forebodings for their old friend Dora; and a
feeling that was almost akin to disappointment troubled her when she
thought of Garth's changed fealty.  "_Toujours fidele_" had been her
motto for him as well as for herself, and yet, of the two girls her
heart clave more to Queenie.  Garth had no intention of reposing
confidence in any one.  He hid his feelings as well as he could,
assuming at times an uneasy gravity that did not belong to him; but
the usual symptoms were not lacking.  He became enamored of his own
company, addicted to solitary walks and an over-much use of
meditation, was somewhat absent and desultory in his conversation,
and haunted the lane with his cigar at all manner of unseemly hours.
Queenie was not unmindful of this change in Garth.  It may be doubted
whether women are ever entirely unconscious of even a hidden passion;
trifles are significant in such cases.  A certain subtle change in
Garth's tone, a hesitation, nay, a reluctance in speaking her name, a
swift unguarded look, brought a sweet conviction to her mind: Dora
must be forgotten.  A rosy flush of hope, bright as her own youth,
dawned slowly upon her.

Queenie was sitting alone one evening, late in November, thinking
over these things.  It struck her with a little surprise that she had
not seen her friends at Church-Stile House for two days; such a thing
had never happened before.  She and Emmie had spent the previous
evening at Juniper Lodge; Cathy had been expected and had not made
her appearance, and she had also omitted her usual afternoon visit at
the cottage.  A fleeting glimpse of Garth as he drove by in his
dog-cart was all that was vouchsafed her.  Even Langley had been
invisible.  "If it were not so late I would run up the lane and see
what has become of them," thought Queenie, with a slight feeling of
uneasiness.

It was followed by a sensation of relief as the little gate unlatched
and footsteps came up the gravel walk; but it was only Miss Cosie,
with her grey shawl pinned over her curls, and a voluminous mass of
soft knitting in her hand.

"Dear Miss Cosie, to think of your coming out such a bitter night!
and I thought it was Cathy," exclaimed Queenie, pouncing on the
little woman with vehement hospitality, and depositing her, smiling
and breathless, on an easy-chair.

"There now, my dear, it was all Christopher's thought, at least he
put it into my head," began Miss Cosie, in her purring voice.  "There
I was going on, purl two, knit two together, knit plain, and so on,
and nothing but the wrong stitches coming uppermost; and Christopher,
poor fellow, couldn't stand it any longer.  'What's to do with you
to-night, Charlotte,' he says.  'I think the work has got into your
head; hadn't you better leave it for Miss Marriott to put right?' for
I just fussed him, you see, counting out loud and never getting any
farther."

"Do you mean that you could not get on with the new pattern I was
teaching you the other night?"

"Well, my memory's treacherous, that's what it is," returned Miss
Cosie, placidly regarding the pink and white tangle that Queenie was
rectifying.  "'Charlotte, my love, your head is just a sieve, and
your fingers are all thumbs,' as my poor dear mother used to say when
I took my work to her.  Dear, dear, I can hear her say it now; but
wasn't it clever of Christopher to pop the idea into my mind.  'I
will just run across to her, Kit my dear,' I replied, as pleased as
possible, and he gave quite a comfortable sigh of relief."

"Poor Mr. Logan!" laughed Queenie.  "You must learn to count to
yourself, Miss Cosie; knit one and purl two is not a very pleasant
running accompaniment to the leading article."

"Bless you, dearie, Christopher was not reading!" responded the
little woman with a sigh, "he was just staring at the fire and
groaning to himself in a quiet way.  Though he has said very little
about it he feels it terribly; he was as pale as a man could look
when he came home and told me last night.  'I feel it as much as
though it had happened to myself, Charlotte,' he said; and I believe,
poor fellow, he meant it."

"Dear Miss Cosie! what can you be talking about?" asked Queenie in a
perplexed voice.  "Is there any trouble in Hepshaw with which I am
unacquainted?"

"There, there, you don't mean to say they have not told you?" replied
Miss Cosie in an awe-stricken whisper, "and such friends as you are,
too.  Ill news fly apace, they say.  Well, the righteous are taken
away from the evil to come.  His poor mother would have fretted her
heart out to see him look as he does to-night, poor dear! and not a
wink of sleep and scarce a mouthful of food since he first heard it,
and that was yesterday morning, so Christopher says."

"Dear Miss Cosie! won't you please tell me what you mean?" begged
Queenie beseechingly.

Miss Cosie was apt to become incoherent and rambling under any strong
emotion, it would never do to hurry her into an explanation; but, all
the same, these vague hints were filling her with dismay.

"I have not heard of anything: is--is there any trouble at
Church-Stile House?" faltered the girl, growing a little pale over
her words.

"Dear, dear! who would have thought of such a thing? what could
Catherine have been thinking of?" cried Miss Cosie, patting her curls
nervously.  "Never mind, there, don't distress yourself, for there's
good come out of every kind of evil, so Christopher tells us; and
very beautiful his sermons are, my dear, and very comforting to sick
souls; and it showed great want of faith in me to burst out crying as
I did.  'Don't tell me that that poor young fellow has lost all his
money, Kit, my dear!' I said, 'for it breaks my heart to think of
such a thing;' and Christopher said--"

"Well, what did Mr. Logan say?" asked Queenie as calmly as she could,
while Miss Cosie wiped her eyes.

There was not an atom of color in her face.  Could it be Garth of
whom she was speaking?

"Christopher said," responded the little woman in a trembling voice,
"'I am afraid it is all true.  Charlotte,' he said, 'there has been a
run on the Bank, and things look as bad as they can look; and I
shouldn't be surprised if that poor fellow has lost every shilling he
has invested.'  That's what Kit said, my dear, and a great deal more
that I did not take in."

"Is it Mr. Clayton of whom you are speaking?" persisted Queenie, in a
set voice.

"Yes; that poor boy Garth.  He and Christopher have been together all
day looking into things.  Christopher says he is as cool and quiet as
possible, for all his haggard looks, only they can't get him to touch
his food; and when a fine young man like that won't eat, it shows
things have gone badly with him, as Christopher says."

"I must go and see Langley," exclaimed the girl, starting up.  "Dear
Miss Cosie, please don't think me rude; but I cannot stay away from
them now I know they are in trouble!  It is not so very late, is it?
but I could not sleep if I did not see them to-night."

"No, no; of course not, my dear.  I should have felt the same in your
case," replied Miss Cosie placidly.  She always agreed with every
one, and would break off contentedly in an engrossing conversation at
the slightest hint of weariness.  "If you have set my work right I
will just go back to Christopher, for he is very down, poor dear,
over all this, and will no more take his supper without me than a
baby would cut up its own food.  There, there, my dear, I won't keep
you," as Queenie hovered near her in feverish impatience; and the
girl accepted her dismissal thankfully.

She ran up the lane, regardless of the rain that beat down on her
uncovered head.  Her glossy hair was quite wet when she entered the
warm room where Langley and Cathy were sitting together.  Contrary to
their usual custom, the sisters were quite unoccupied: Langley was
lying back, as though wearied out, in her basket-chair; Cathy was
sitting on the rug staring into the fire.  Both of them looked up
with an exclamation of surprise when they saw Queenie.

"So late, and in this rain!" cried Langley, affectionately passing
her hand over the girl's wet hair as she spoke.

"What does it matter?--the rain I mean.  I have only just heard; Miss
Cosie has told me.  Do you think I could sleep until I heard more?
and Cathy has not been near me!" with a reproachful glance at her
friend.

"You must not blame Cathy; she wanted to come to you to-night, only
Garth and I would not let her.  One ought not to be in a hurry to
tell bad news; to-morrow would have been soon enough," replied
Langley in her tired, soft voice.

"Did not Mr. Clayton--did not your brother wish me to know?"
stammered Queenie, somewhat nervously.  Had she intruded herself
where she was not wanted? would they think her officious, interfering?

Langley's calmness was baffling.  Cathy, indeed, looked as if she had
been crying, but she kept her face averted and did not speak.

"I will go back if I am not wanted, if I am not to know," faltered
the girl, growing red and confused.

"Nonsense, Queen! as though the whole world won't know it by
to-morrow!" exclaimed Cathy sharply.  "Do you think it is a secret
when people are ruined?"

"Oh, it is not as bad as that!" shrinking at the idea.  "Miss Cosie
was so vague; she said he had lost money, that something had happened
to the Bank; you know her way.  It was impossible to understand; and
then I said I must go to Langley."

"Things are as bad as they can be," replied Langley sorrowfully,
while Cathy shivered a little, and drew closer to the fire.  "The
shock has been so bad for Garth; nothing could have been more sudden
and unexpected.  We were all as cheerful as possible yesterday
morning, and then the letter came from Garth's solicitor; and when
Garth went over to A---- to investigate the matter, it was all too
true.  There had been a panic, and run on the local Bank; the
thoroughfare was quite blocked up with people, farmers and
tradespeople, wanting to draw out their money.  Of course, with such
a run there was only one result, the Bank broke, and all Garth's
hard-earned savings are lost.  It was between two and three thousand
pounds that he had invested; not much of a fortune to some people,
but a large sum for so young a man to put by.  The worst is,"
continued Langley, sighing, "that Garth will blame himself for what
has happened.  Mr. Logan has always advised him to bank with a London
House, and he had made up his mind to do so; but for some reason he
has delayed the transfer of the money, and now it is too late; and he
will have it that his procrastination has ruined us."

Queenie pondered a little over Langley's account, and then her face
brightened.

"It is sad, very sad, of course, to lose so much money, but it is not
absolute ruin; there is the quarry, your brother has still got that."

"But Garth only rents it.  You see there is the rent to pay, and a
royalty besides, and all the workmen's wages; and just now there is a
dearth of orders, and the men are asking higher pay.  And now all
Garth's ready money is gone, and there is no one rich enough in
Hepshaw to advance him the few hundreds that are necessary to carry
on the works.  We are trying to make the best of it, Cathy and I, for
poor Ted is so utterly hopeless; but we do not see what is to be
done."

"Is there no one who could help you?" demanded Queenie in a low
voice, but Cathy struck in impatiently.

"Do you think money is to be picked up in Hepshaw for the asking?
there is not a friend we possess who could advance the loan, even if
Garth would accept it.  Captain Fawcett has only his pension and a
small annuity, and Mr. Logan is as poor as a church-mouse, though I
believe both he and Miss Cosie have expectations from some old aunt
or other, who objects to die.  We have not a relation in the world;
never were there such distressed orphans," continued Cathy, in a
droll, disconsolate voice, that at another time would have made
Queenie laugh.

"Cathy is right; I do not see who is to advance us the loan," added
her sister dejectedly.  "We do not quite understand the details, but
Ted assures us that it is absolutely necessary that two or three
hundred pounds should be forthcoming in the course of a week or two,
or Garth will be compelled to throw up the whole concern."

"Yes," broke in Cathy; "and when Ted said that Garth turned round
upon him quite angrily, and asked how he was to lay himself under
such heavy obligations that he would never be able to repay.  Then
they had almost a quarrel over it.  Poor Garth was so sore and
unhappy; he says he has never owed a penny in his life to any man."

"How large a sum do you think would clear him?" asked Queenie
casually, but two feverish spots burnt in her cheek.

"Ted said about six or seven hundred was required to put them on
their feet again.  There are some workmen's cottages Garth has been
building, and the architect's bill is not paid.  We have only Ted's
word to rely on, for we cannot get Garth to open his lips to us.  He
just says in a resigned, hard sort of voice, that it is all up with
us, and he and Ted must take situations; and then he looks at Langley
and me and goes out of the room."

"His work is the best part of his life; he is so proud of his
position," put in Langley.  "Garth's nature is so proud and
independent; he is so accustomed to be master of all his actions that
he would feel dreadfully at being placed in a subordinate position."

"Why will you aggravate me by saying such dreadful things,"
interrupted Cathy stormily, but the tears sprang to her eyes.  "I
won't think of Warstdale without Garth.  Why it would break his heart
to give up the quarry."

"Some one must lend him the money just to go on," observed Queenie in
a low voice.  "Surely there must be some friend who will assist him
in this matter."

"We do not know where such a friend is to be found," returned Cathy.
"One thing, I am determined to begin my hospital work without delay,
and if things come to their worst Langley must go out as a companion.
It seems hard breaking up the dear old home that we have lived in all
our lives.  Ted says if it ever comes to that Garth will never hold
up his head again."

"Ted seems a Job's comforter," returned Queenie, but her eyes
overflowed with sympathy, for the girl's voice was very sad.  "My
poor dears, what am I to say to you, it is all so sudden and
dreadful?"

"Ah, that it is."

"I don't see that it makes it any better to talk about it,"
interrupted Cathy, springing up in a fit of nervous impatience.  "We
are only making Queenie miserable, and it does no one any good.  I am
going to see if I cannot coax Garth to eat some supper.  I shall tell
him that it won't benefit the rest of the family for one member to
starve himself."

"Poor Cathy! she feels this terribly," sighed Langley, as the door
closed on her, "but she will not let Garth see how much she takes it
to heart.  If it were not for Cathy and Ted I think I could bear this
better, but it does seem so hard if we cannot keep the home for them."

"Langley, don't you think Mr. Chester could help your brother?"

Queenie was almost sorry that she spoke so abruptly when she saw how
the worn face flushed at the question.  The suggestion was evidently
a painful one.

"Hush! if you knew how I have dreaded some one proposing this! but
Garth will not, he respects me too much for that.  Harry is very
often embarrassed himself.  Gertrude is so extravagant, and then
there are such heavy doctor's bills; but if he knew of our difficulty
I am sure he would sell his land rather than not help us.  Oh,
Queenie," and here Langley's voice grew thin and husky with emotion,
"promise me that you will not hint at such a thing to any one."

"Dear Langley, of course I will promise, if you wish it," shocked at
the agitation she had caused.

"Yes; and you will go home now, and sleep quietly," folding the
girl's hand between her own.  "You must not take our troubles too
much to heart.  As Cathy says, that will do no one any good; perhaps
in a few days we may see our way a little clearer."

"I will go, if you wish it," replied Queenie gently.  And indeed what
more could she find to say to this patient creature who was looking
at her with such tired eyes.  "Dear, dear Langley, if you only knew
how sorry I am for you all!" she said, kissing her, and then she went
away.

But she was not able to leave the house unobserved; the door of
Garth's study was open as she passed.  As he caught sight of her, he
came forward slowly and, as it seemed to Queenie, a little
reluctantly.

"I did not know you were here; what brings you out so late?" he asked
with a little surprise, and then he mechanically stretched out his
hand and took down his felt hat to accompany her down the lane.

"There is no need for that, it is not so very late," returned Queenie
hurriedly.  "I only came to see Langley, and--and because I heard
there was some trouble."

Queenie hardly knew what she was saying in her confusion and
nervousness; now they were face to face what could she find to say to
him.

"All the same, that need not prevent my walking with you," he
returned quietly.  He spoke in his ordinary manner, but Queenie
noticed that his face was very pale and his eyes had dark lines under
them; he had avoided looking at her too, and his hand when it touched
hers had been cold and shook a little.  "It has left off raining, and
the stars are coming out overhead, so there is no fear of your
getting wet."

"I am not afraid of getting wet," she replied with a little nervous
laugh.  When they were outside the gate be slackened his steps a
little.

"So they have told you about everything?" he said in rather a forced
tone.

"Yes; they have told me everything," she returned simply, "and, Mr.
Clayton, I do not know what to say, except that I am more sorry than
I can tell you."

"I always knew we might count on your sympathy."

"It seems such a dreadful thing to have happened, so utterly
unexpected."

"You may well say that.  If an earthquake had yawned under my feet it
could not have been a greater shock.  I thought myself so safe, in
such absolute security, and now my foolhardiness has gone near to
ruin us."

"Ah, you must not say that."

"Why must I not say it?  A man must call himself names and speak
badly of himself if he has proved himself an utter fool.  Have I not
been a fool to procrastinate in the way I have done, and to neglect
the advice given me?"

"No; you ought not to be so hard on yourself.  You have worked all
these years, and all your hard-earned savings are lost; every one
must pity you for such a misfortune, there is no room for blame,
none."

"Ah, if I could only believe that.  Do you know, my remorse for my
carelessness has been such that I have scarcely eaten or slept since
the news came.  I cannot forgive myself for bringing all this trouble
upon them."

"Hush! this is worse than wrong; it is utterly morbid and wicked.  Do
not the wisest men in the world make mistakes sometimes?  Could you
know that the Bank was unsafe, and that there would be this run on
it?"

"But all the same, I am reaping the fruits of my imprudence," he
returned, but his tone was a little less gloomy.

The knowledge of this girl's sympathy was very precious to him.  A
little comfort dawned on him in his misery.

"It makes things so much worse when we blame ourselves," she went on.
"It seems to me you want all your strength for actual endurance, from
what Langley tells me.  Your difficulties are very great."

"I am ruined," he returned in a choked voice.  And then in a few
brief sentences he recapitulated much that his sisters had told her,
the absolute need of ready money for the architect's and builder's
account, as well as for the rent and workmen's wages.

"Things have never been at such a low ebb with us before.  We have
executed fewer orders this year than any previous years.  I had no
business to speculate on those cottages.  I don't see how matters are
to go on at all.  In a few weeks' time you will see my name on the
bankruptcy list, and then there will be nothing but for Ted and me to
look out for situations."

"Oh, Mr. Clayton, I cannot bear to hear you talk so; something must
turn up, some help must come," repeated the girl, earnestly.

Her face was flushed in the darkness, and her eyes full of tears, but
he could not see that; perhaps he detected it in her tone, for his
changed instantly.

"But I have no right to bother you with all this wretched business,
or to keep you out here in the cold," for they were standing now by
the little gate.  "Good night, Miss Marriott.  I know you are sorry
for us, but we must not burthen other people with our troubles."

"But I like to be burthened.  You must not treat me as a stranger,"
she replied, putting her hand in his.  "If I do not say much about
all this it is because I am so very sorry, and I do not know how to
comfort you; but, all the same, I believe something will turn up."

"Let us hope so," he returned, with a pretence at cheerfulness, and
then he left her and went back to the house.

He had made no unmanly moan over his misfortunes, but his heart was
sick within him as he thought of the future.  He had lost his money
and perhaps his home, and must he lose this sweet new hope that had
come to him?  If he were a poor man could he ever dare to trammel
himself with a wife? and the thought of shutting out this new-found
happiness was very bitter to him.

"There is enough to bear without thinking of that to-night," he said
to himself, with a sort of shudder, as he shut himself up in his
solitary room; but, all the same, Queenie's soft words haunted him
with strange persistence.

He would have marvelled greatly if he could have heard what she
whispered as he left her.

"Oh, how ungrateful I have been, how utterly foolish.  I can thank
heaven now that I have five thousand a-year."




CHAPTER VI.

THE TWO CONSPIRATORS.

  "'Now look you!' said my brother, 'you may talk
  Till weary of the talk.'  I answer, 'Ay,
  There's reason in your words; and you may talk
  Till I go on to say, This should be so.'"
                                        _Jean Ingelow._


"Thank heaven, I have five thousand a-year," repeated Queenie, as she
drew the rocking-chair to the hearth and sat down by her solitary
fireside.  "For the first time I am really glad in my heart to be
rich."

Any unseen spectator would have marvelled what thoughts possessed
this girl.  Queenie's brow was knitted as though with perplexity, and
yet a radiant smile hovered round her lips.

"It is difficult, far more difficult than I thought it at first," she
soliloquized.  "There is a complication that prevents me seeing my
way clear, but if I sit here until morning I will find out what is
the right thing to be done.

"I wonder what Langley must have thought of me," she went on.  "I
must have seemed so cold and unsympathizing.  How could they know
what kept me so silent?  Why, it needed all my strength of mind to
refrain from crying out, 'I am rich; I can give you all, and more
than you want, if you love me; let me share some of my good things
with you.'  I wanted to fall on her neck and say some such words as
these; but second thoughts are the best, and I knew I must be prudent.

"And then when he talked to me my secret seemed to choke me then.
Oh, how my cheeks burnt in the darkness! how I longed to say to him,
'Do not be unhappy; there is no cause for despair.  I have more than
I know how to spend; let me be your creditor and advance you the sum
you need.  What are a few hundreds to me who have five thousand
a-year?  Let me prove my friendship for you and yours by rendering
you this trifling service.'  That is what I should have liked to have
done, but I knew him too well.  Would he have taken it from me?
Alas, no!  He would have turned round with that high manner of his
and upbraided me for my foolish mystery.  In spite of his
wretchedness he would have taken me to task, and put things in such a
light that he would have made me ashamed of myself, and then he would
quietly refuse my offer.  Would he accept this thing from the girl
who a few months back was a stranger to him?  No; a thousand times,
no; but his embarrassment and discomfort would make him suspicious.
He would be vexed with me for my silence, mortified by my
importunity, and in his trouble I should be less to him than I am
now."

Queenie's secret predilection for Garth Clayton was making her timid.
It had come to this, that nothing on earth could have induced her to
offer him this money; she would have been as shame-faced and
tongue-tied in his presence as a child just discovered in a fault.
The silent understanding that was between them was too vague and
unsatisfactory a basis for her to presume on; the word that was to
give her the right and privilege of spoken sympathy had not yet been
uttered, might never be.  Mahomet's bridge is not more slender than
this vague connection between two hearts that beat in sympathy and
yet are asunder.  Over the sacred abyss of silence hangs the
invisible chain; it is strong enough to bear myriads of heavenly
visitants, but only the eye of the faithful may discern it.  To how
many remain only the void and the mystery!

When a sensible person makes a mistake they are almost sure to repent
it at some time or other.  Queenie, who was as healthy-minded and
straightforward as any pious, well-conducted young person could be,
had yet fallen into the error of supposing that she might deviate
into a by-path of romance and unreality without causing any great
disturbance in her little world, while, in point of fact, she was
only raising difficulties for herself.  If she had gone to Garth
Clayton and acknowledged the truth with all the eloquence of which
she had been capable he would have been charmed with her _naïveté_
and frankness, and treated the whole matter as a girlish whim.  Her
perfect honesty would in time have reconciled him to her
heiress-ship.  True, it was highly probable that he might have
rejected the loan, and given her plenty of trouble on that score.
She might have had to experience the grief of seeing him refuse her
aid and struggle on alone and single-handed: but such men as Garth
Clayton rarely get their heads under water for long.  He would have
moved heaven and earth rather than this girl to help him, and in the
end would have attained to some fair measure of success; and, while
things were at this low ebb with him, he would have vexed himself and
her by imposing a barrier of reserve and coldness on himself.
Queenie would have been made to suffer for those riches of hers.  He
would have pointedly assigned to her the place she must hold in the
future--a friendship not too close or intimate.  If the girl's
faithfulness could have served this rough apprenticeship, and she
could have meekly acceded to these hard conditions, his man's heart
must have spoken at last, and broken down all barriers between them.

After all, there is nothing like truth, pure, straightforward truth,
especially to men of Garth's calibre, who was a foe to all mystery,
and disposed to treat such things somewhat harshly.  But Queenie's
foolish whim had ensnared her, and there was no freeing her feet from
the meshes.  One thing was clear to her, Garth must have the money at
once.

And so the young intriguer set her brains to work.  How was she to
put this sum in his hands? how could she negotiate the loan so that
it could not fail of acceptance?  At first she proposed starting off
to Carlisle and seeking Caleb Runciman's aid; she could twist Caleb
round her little finger and make him do as she wanted.  Should she
concoct a letter and get the old man to copy it in his shaky
handwriting?  Only Emmie knew those crabbed, feeble characters, and
she was never likely to see the letter.  What could she say? and here
Queenie got a pencil and paper and scrawled a rough draft.

"Dear sir," it began, "I have long taken a great interest in your
work.  The reforms you have introduced among the quarrymen are not
only known at Hepshaw, they have reached further; and I have long
wished to express to you the respect and sympathy I entertain for
your labor.

"It is a good work, a noble work, and it would be grievous if
anything were to hinder or frustrate it.  I have heard with much
regret of the failure of the A---- Bank, and the difficulties in
which it has involved you.  Such difficulties, of course, are only
temporary, but still it is at such times that one requires a helping
hand.  I have more wealth than I need for my own use, and at present
there are a few hundreds for which I am wanting a safe investment;
permit me to take the liberty of an old friend and well-wisher, and
to place these hundreds to your account, to be repaid in quarterly or
half-yearly instalments, as you think best.  The sum is between eight
and nine hundred; and you will be doing me an immense service if you
will make use of this money instead of letting it lie by idly.

"I remain, sir, with profoundest respect and sympathy,

"AN UNKNOWN FRIEND AND WELL-WISHER."

"P.S. The instalments to be paid to Messrs. Withern & Smithers,
Carlisle."


"Will it do, I wonder?" asked Queenie with an anxious frown, as she
laid down the document.  "I hope Caleb will think it sounds
business-like.  That part about the quarterly or half-yearly
instalments was a very happy hit, I don't think Caleb could have done
it better.  I named Messrs. Withern and Smithers because Mr. Calcott
had no dealings with them.  The only thing I am afraid of is, that
Caleb is getting so old and dazed that he may make a mess of the
whole business; and then, on the other hand, will Mr. Clayton accept
anonymous aid? will he not ferret it out somehow?  Messrs. Withern
and Smithers know Caleb by sight, all the leading firms in Carlisle
do, and then it will be somehow traced to him.  Mr. Clayton will
leave no stone unturned; he always hunts mysteries to death, as he
says.  He will go over to Carlisle and set all manner of enquiries on
foot, and he will work it round to Caleb, and then there will be an
end to the whole business."

"No; I am afraid I must adopt the other course, much as I dislike it.
I must take Mr. Logan into my confidence, and make him my cat's-paw.
I should not wonder if we both get terribly burnt in the end; but
never mind, I must transpose Louis XIV.'s sayings for my own benefit,
_après nous le déluge_.  Once get the money in his hands, and the
quarry in working order, and I must bear the brunt of the rest; he
will not be so very angry with me when he knows--"  But Queenie left
the rest of the sentence unfinished.

And so it was that Mr. Logan got the following little missive the
next morning:


"Dear Mr. Logan,

"I have something very important to say to you.  Will you come round
to me at five, if it will not greatly inconvenience you?  Emmie will
be out, and I shall take care to be alone; please say nothing about
this to Miss Cosie.

  "Yours sincerely,
        "QUEENIE MARRIOTT."


Queenie had a great liking and respect for Mr. Logan.  She came
forward to meet him with a very frank blush when he entered the
cottage the following afternoon.  She was a trifle nervous at the
task that lay before her, but her determination lent her courage.

She had seen Garth go past that morning looking ill and weary, as
though from a sleepless night; and the memory of his pale, harassed
face was with her as she spoke.

"It is very good of you to come to me, Mr. Logan; I think my note
must have surprised you a little."

"Well, well, perhaps it did," he returned good-humoredly, putting
down his felt hat and placing himself near her.  He had laid aside
his spectacles, and his keen, near-sighted eyes beamed on her full of
benevolence and kindness.

"That part, I mean, about not telling Miss Cosie that you were coming
here," she continued in her straightforward way.  "The fact is, I am
in a difficulty, and want the advice and assistance"--laying stress
on the latter word--"of a friend."

"Then you were quite right to send for me; a vicar ought always to be
at the beck and call of his flock, and to be ready for any temporal
and spiritual emergency; the highest privilege we possess is the
power of helping others.  Now, supposing you tell me all about your
difficulty; I am prepared to listen for any indefinite time," with a
bright, persuasive smile, for, in spite of her assumed courage, the
girl's nervousness was not lost on him; and Queenie, nothing loath,
plunged boldly into her subject.

"Of course I know you will respect my secret; but, all the same, I am
afraid I shall shock you, for I have to acknowledge a little
deception on my part.  The fact is, Mr. Logan," continued Queenie
with the utmost frankness, "I am not what I seem."

This statement, to say the least of it, was slightly startling; for
the moment Mr. Logan looked taken aback, but a glance at the bright,
ingenuous face before him seemed to reassure him.

"You have all of you thought me poor," she went on, "and so I was
when I first came among you; but I am a rich woman now--I have five
thousand a-year," opening her eyes wide at the mention of this
surprising sum.

"My dear young lady, do you mean this?"

"Yes, indeed; and of course I knew how greatly I should surprise you.
It is a droll idea, that the school-mistress at Hepshaw should have
five thousand a-year, is it not?  I have hardly got used to the fact
myself; and then, you see, even Emmie does not know.  It was Emmie's
uncle, Mr. Calcott, who left me all that money.  But I know Cathy has
told you all the particulars of that sad story; he could not leave it
to Emmie, you see, and so it has all come to me; but I shall always
feel as though it belongs most to her."

"I must say I am extremely astonished!"

Queenie looked a little mischievous at that.

"I congratulate you most heartily on your good fortune; but, all the
same, I cannot understand your motives for secrecy.  Here you have
been for the last three months living in this cottage, and teaching
in our village school, while all the time you might have been
dwelling in ease and luxury."  And, with all his knowledge of human
nature, Mr. Logan looked extremely perplexed.

"You must not be too hard on a girl's whim," she replied, looking
down.

"Oh, it was a whim then!" with a dawning perception of the truth.

"Yes, it was just that," rather hastily.  "You see I did not want the
money, and it rather vexed me, coming in such quantities, and when
everything was so nicely arranged.  I had just been elected your
school-mistress, and the cottage was being furnished for us, and
Emmie was so looking forward to it, and I had grown to like you all
so; and it seemed so hard to give it all up, and go and live in a
grand house in Carlisle, as Caleb wanted us to do.  And so I
thought," with a little quiver of the lip she could not hide, "that I
would just put it all away for a little while, and be happy and enjoy
ourselves; and by-and-bye, when I had got tired of teaching, it would
come out, and you would all laugh with me, and think it a good joke
that Emmie and I had been living like disguised princesses."

"Ah, well! it is a pretty piece of girlish romance," smiling in spite
of himself; "but I must say I thought my schoolmistress was a very
different sort of person--far more staid and matter-of-fact."

"And you are disappointed in her?" a little piteously, for Queenie
had lately grown to distrust the wisdom of this freak of hers, and
was sensitive in consequence.

"Nay, it is no such heinous offence; it is very venial and girlish,"
but Queenie blushed hotly at his tone.  She was afraid Mr. Logan
thought her very romantic and silly, missish, in fact.

"I wanted to be liked for myself, and in spite of my poverty.  It was
not so very foolish," defending herself somewhat plaintively.

"Well, well, perhaps not; we will not say any more about that," he
continued soothingly, for the girl's cheeks were burning under his
implied reproof.  "One can carry out these sort of Quixotic schemes
for a little while; but I should think by this time you have had
enough teaching."

"No! oh no!" she cried, greatly alarmed at this.  "I must go on for
some time longer pretending to be poor, for months, perhaps a whole
year.  Emmie is so happy, and I am quite content.  Mr. Logan, you
will promise not to betray me?"

"But, my dear young lady, there can be no possible reason for this!"

"Ah, but there is a very important reason," and now her manner
changed, and became grave and anxious.  "Don't you know I must help
Mr. Clayton? and there is no means of doing that unless I go on
pretending to be poor."

"And what good would that do him?"

"Why," she returned, hesitating, "you know him better than I do.  If
I were to go to him and tell him that I was rich, as I am telling you
now, and offer to lend him money, he would put on his grand manner,
and talk about independence, and make me feel ashamed of myself in a
moment.  Do you think he would take money from a girl, even in the
shape of a loan? no; he would starve himself first, and bring them
all to misery, and he would call his conduct manly and
straightforward, and all sorts of fine names, instead of putting it
down to pride and sheer obstinacy."

"I must say I think you are right," watching her somewhat anxiously,
for a strange excitement seemed upon her.  "I think it very probable
that he would refuse the loan."

"Yes; and then Langley and Cathy will suffer, and who would help
them, Mr. Logan?  I have been thinking about this nearly all night,
and there is only one way of making him accept the loan--you must
offer it in your own name."

He had been expecting this, for his manner testified no surprise; she
had been leading up to this for the last ten minutes.  Queenie's
courage would have utterly failed if she had known how clearly those
mild, near-sighted eyes were reading her.  "Why it is the old
story--a girl's first innocent romance," he said to himself.

"I knew what you were going to say," he returned aloud.  "This is a
very clever scheme of yours, Miss Marriott; but how is it to be
carried out?  Garth Clayton is perfectly aware that I have no surplus
money lying by.  All Hepshaw knows that my living is hardly a rich
one."

"Why, I have thought of that too," she went on excitedly.  "But we
can easily get over that difficulty.  I will place nine hundred
pounds to your account,--that can be done in the next few days; I
have only to write to Caleb Runciman,--and you must go to Mr. Clayton
and tell him that that sum of money has just come into your
possession; that it is lying at the Carlisle Bank.  It will be no
falsehood, for I shall have made it over to you, entirely and solely
for their benefit.  And then you must insist on his using it as he
requires, and paying you back in half-yearly instalments.  You must
be very careful and business-like in what you say to him," she went
on, pointedly, "for he is so proud that he will not touch the money
unless he thinks he can repay it; and you can tell him that he can
pay you interest on the money, or do just as he pleases, so that we
get him to take it."

"My dear child," he returned, much startled, and not a little touched
at her earnestness, and, indeed, the brown glow of Queenie's eyes was
something pleasant to see, "this is a generous project of yours, and
I hardly know what to say about it, except that I foresee many
difficulties."

"But what of that?" she pleaded, "things are not always easy, we
know.  Surely you do not see any harm in my innocent little plot?
There is nothing untrue in saying that you have this sum of money
lying by, if I have given it into your own hands."

"Well, perhaps not; but I should be afraid of blundering on my part.
You see, we Hepshaw people are very simple and straightforward.  We
know each other's affairs almost to the lining of our purses.  We
have never dealt in romance and mystery as you have done, and I am
bound to confess that the piece of diplomacy you have entrusted to me
is far beyond my powers.  The ruse is so transparent that Garth would
see through it in a moment."

"Oh no," she returned, clasping her hands; "you must not fail me, Mr.
Logan; everything depends on you.  Why," she continued, with one of
her quick bursts of eloquence, "could you bear to see them leave
Church-Stile House, with Langley and Cathy breaking their hearts for
their old home, and Mr. Clayton looking ill and harassed and working
himself to death, and all for the sake of a few miserable hundreds,
for which I have no possible use, which, probably, I shall not need
at all?  What would it matter if he did find us out," she went on
boldly, but her words concealed a secret tremor, "so that he gets out
of his difficulties first?  One of these days, not now, but a long
time hence, when he has paid some of it back, you shall go to him and
tell him the truth, and, though he will pretend to be angry, I know
he will forgive us at last, and thank us for having saved him in
spite of himself."

Mr. Logan shook his head.  "I am not quite so sure about that.  I
think our deception would annoy him terribly."

"Perhaps so; but after a time he will forget his annoyance.  What
does it matter if he be angry if we only do him good in spite of
himself?  It is the end for which we are working.  We want to save
him and Langley and Cathy from being ruined.  It does not matter so
much for Ted, who is young and a man, and must work for himself.  It
is Langley and Cathy one must help," continued the girl, a little
artfully.  "I, for one, love them so dearly that I cannot bear to see
them turned out of their old home, and made to feel how hard and
bitter and cruel the world is, as Emmie and I have done."

That moved him, as she knew it would, for he got up and paced
restlessly about the room.  The muscles of his face twitched under
the influence of his emotion.  Queenie watched him anxiously, but did
not venture to disturb his reverie.  After a silence of some minutes
he came and stood before her.

"Well, Mr. Logan?"

"Well," he returned, but very gravely, "I suppose I must do as you
wish; I can't find it in my heart to resist your eloquence, or to see
such dear friends on the brink of ruin without stretching out a
helping hand.  As far as Charlotte and I am concerned, we would share
our last crust with them, but what was the use of flinging our mite
into the pit?  I am not without hopes that I may be able to refund
your money very soon, and to constitute myself their creditor, for,
by all accounts, our poor old Aunt Prue is failing rapidly, and her
death will make a tolerably rich man of me, that is to say, in a
Hepshaw point of view."

Queenie did not like this, but what could she do; she would be
ashamed to hint at her reluctance.  It pleased her to feel that the
secret bounty was from her hand, that she was repaying in this way a
little of her debt of gratitude and affection; but, after all, might
it not be well that Aunt Prue's money and not hers should be used.

"It is this that makes me less reluctant to undertake the business,"
he went on.  "In a few weeks or months I might myself be in
possession of ample means, though one never knows how long an aged
invalid may linger.  Still, as Garth's needs are so pressing, I will
try my best to induce him to accept the loan.  I am only afraid of
Charlotte or myself making some stupid blunder."

"Miss Cosie!" exclaimed Queenie, very much startled.  "Oh, Mr. Logan,
you do not think we need tell her?" for Miss Cosie's absence of mind
and mistakes were even more proverbial in Hepshaw than her brother's;
the extent of amiable blunders she had committed during the course of
her blameless existence were simply innumerable.

"Why, of course we must tell Charlotte," with a smile at her evident
discomfiture.  "Garth is sure to say something to her about the loan,
or else Miss Clayton or Miss Catherine will do so, and she must not
be left in ignorance.  Charlotte manages all the business at the
Vicarage, you know, and her first words would be sure to be, 'Dear
me, Christopher, we have not more than a hundred and fifty in the
Bank, how can you lend Garth eight or nine hundred pounds?'"

"Yes, I see; it was very stupid of me not to think of that," returned
Queenie, but her heart sank within her.  If Miss Cosie were admitted
to their council she could not long rely on secrecy.

"All, well, you have promised to carry this through for me," she
continued with a sigh; "but do pray urge upon Miss Cosie to be very
silent and discreet, a hint may spoil everything; at any rate you
must not speak to her until the money has been offered to Mr.
Clayton."

"Oh no, I will guarantee as much as that.  I am almost as anxious as
you are in this matter."  And then, after a few more words, he got up
and took his leave.




CHAPTER VII.

"YOU KNOW THIS IS A GREAT SECRET."

  "'And had he friends?'  'One friend perhaps,' said he,
  'And for the rest, I pray you let it be.'"--_Jean Ingelow._


Queenie was terribly restless during the next few days.  While the
important negotiation was impending she held aloof as much as
possible from her friends at Church-Stile House.  She could scarcely
look Garth in the face when she met him in the village, so heavily
did her secret weigh upon her.  She had been once to see Langley, and
had sat with her some time; but their talk had languished, and at
last degenerated into silence.  Langley had been too sad and
heavy-hearted to make any pretence of cheerfulness, and Queenie had
been so oppressed with secret consciousness that she had failed in
outward manifestations of sympathy.

"If talk would only mend matters you would have no reason to complain
of my silence," Langley said, by way of excuse for her
downheartedness, when Queenie rose to take leave.

"One cannot always talk; I wish I were only as patient as you," had
been Queenie's reply.  But she breathed more freely when she had
crossed the little bridge and was walking down the lane in the grey,
waning light.

But Cathy came to the cottage, and was so low-spirited, and drew such
dismal pictures of the future, that Emmie, who was weakly and
tender-hearted, burst out crying, and for a long time refused to be
comforted.

"Oh, Queen, if we were but rich!" sobbed the poor child, "how nice it
would be to help them.  I can't bear to think of Langley and Cathy
working as you used to work at Granite Lodge, and being hungry and
cold and miserable.  Cathy might come and live here, there is plenty
of room."

"Yes, yes, my sweet," returned Cathy, drying her eyes and kissing her
hurriedly, "I will promise to come to you if I am starving; but I am
going to nurse the sick people in the great London Hospital, you
know, and nurses are sure to get plenty to eat," and the warm-hearted
girl changed the subject, and began a ludicrous narration of Ted's
sayings and doings during the last few days.

But Emmie could not forget her friends' troubles; she brooded over
them silently, and at last made a little pilgrimage on her own
account.

Garth, sitting moody and listless in his study, was surprised by a
feeble tap, and then by the entrance of the child in her little
scarlet hood.

"Why, Emmie, my dear," he said kindly, "has your sister brought you
over to see us? surely you have not come alone this cold evening."

"Queenie and Cathy are talking so busily that they will not miss me;
they think I am with Patience.  I did not mind the cold a bit; I came
all by myself, because I wanted to see you, Mr. Garth."

"To see me!" in a surprised tone, for, in spite of their friendship,
Emmie had never before distinguished him in this way; her visits had
always been to Langley.  "Well, I am highly honored, and must make
much of my visitor.  Will this thing untie?" touching the red hood.
But Emmie took no notice of his question; she stood beside him with
her large blue eyes fixed gravely on his face, and then she put up
her hand and stroked his cheek, but very gently and timidly.

"Poor Mr. Garth, I am so sorry for you."

"Why, my dear?"  But he was touched in spite of himself, the little
thin hand spoke so eloquently.

"Because you have lost all your money, and are so dreadfully unhappy.
Was there a great deal, Mr. Garth?"

"Well, it was a tolerably large sum, at least for me," he replied
gravely.

"And God has taken it away from you; that is very sad, is it not?  I
don't like to think of you being poor, it makes me feel bad all over."

"Why, Emmie, I never expected you to feel it like this!  You must not
trouble your dear little head about my affairs."

"I am sorry, but not half so sorry as Queenie is, I know, though she
says so little about it.  She never talks now, at least hardly at
all, and she has not told me stories for ever so long; but she sits
and looks at the fire, and sometimes her eyes are full of tears,
though she thinks I do not see them."

He flushed at this, and a look of pain crossed his face.

"She may have troubles of her own; she will not like you to tell me
this," he began in an embarrassed tone; but Emmie was too much
engrossed with her subject to heed him.

"Shall you be very poor?" she persisted; "shall you be obliged to
leave this old house, where you and Langley were born, and go and
live in a poky little place in Warstdale, as Cathy says?"

"Cathy knows nothing about it; she ought not to tell you such
things," rather quickly.  "Of course we must leave this house, and of
course we shall have to work; but we are young, and that will not
hurt us.  Come, come, things are not as bad as you and Cathy make
them out; put all these sad thoughts out of your head.  How could
they have talked so before the child?" he muttered to himself.

But Emmie was not so easily comforted.  She stood silently by Garth a
minute, and then her eyes filled, and two large tears coursed slowly
down her cheeks.

"Now, Emmie, don't be silly; I can't have you crying over this!" but
his tone was kind; and as he spoke he drew the child gently to him.

"I can't help it," she whispered.  "Cathy says you eat nothing, and
that you are getting so thin and ill; and that frightens Queenie, and
makes her look grave."

"Why, this is too absurd!" he began, and then his tone changed.  The
child would make herself ill if she went on like this.  "Do you think
you could make me some tea and some hot buttered toast if I were to
promise to eat it?  Now I think about it I am rather faint, and hot
buttered toast is a favorite luxury of mine.  Langley will find you
the toasting-fork and things if you go and ask her."

In a moment Emmie's tears were dried by magic, and the little red
hood laid aside.  When, half-an-hour afterwards, Queenie entered the
house in some alarm to know what had become of Emmie, she found a
little scene that surprised her.

Garth and Emmie were seated with a little round table between them; a
choice pile of buttered toast, done to a nicety, lay on the young
man's plate.  Emmie's face was flushed with excitement and heat, her
hands were slightly blackened.

"He has promised to eat all that!" she cried out, pointing with the
teapot in the direction of Garth's plate; "and he says he feels
better already.  I have made the tea so strong, just as he likes it.
Langley let me go to the caddy myself!"

Garth rose with a droll expression and shook hands with Queenie.

"Emmie has played truant, I am afraid.  She has got it into her head
that I am starving myself to death as the best way of escaping my
difficulties.  I have had to eat and drink before her to dissipate
the unpleasant idea."

"Oh, Emmie! how could you think of running away like this?" exclaimed
her sister, fondly pressing the child's fair head between her hands;
but she said very little to either of them after that.  In the months
to come that little scene often recurred to her, and the strange,
embarrassed look on Garth's face as she entered.

More than a week had elapsed since the two conspirators had met in
the little parlor at Brierwood Cottage.  Queenie was just beginning
to feel that the suspense was becoming terrible, when one night, as
she was sitting alone after Emmie had gone to bed, she heard Mr.
Logan's voice in the entry, and in another moment he came in shaking
the raindrops off him.

"Well," he said, beaming on her through his spectacles, "I have not
kept you too long waiting, have I?  Of course you have been very
anxious, but a delicate matter like this required plenty of time and
management."

"Oh, yes, I know," she replied hastily; "but, all the same, my
suspense has been dreadful.  Tell me quickly, Mr. Logan.  Has he
taken it?"

"He has."

"Oh, thank heaven!" she exclaimed, and turned away lest the relief
and joy should be too legibly written on her face.

"It has been a difficult job," he went on, sitting down and spreading
his white, finely-shaped hands over the blaze.  "At one time I feared
whether I could carry it through.  He was so hard to manage; but I
timed it well, and spoke before Miss Clayton.  I knew I could count
on her common-sense to help me."

"But how did you begin?  Did you say the words I put into your mouth?
Tell me all about it, please," and Queenie tried to compose her
glowing face.

"I can hardly remember my words.  I said very little at first.  I
told Garth that a sum of money had lately come into my possession,
and was lying idle at the Carlisle Bank; that it was there, and that
I intended to make no use of it; and I entreated him, for his
sisters' sake, to lay aside his pride and accept the loan offered to
him."

"Well?"

"Well, he was very difficult at first.  He seemed cut up, poor
fellow, and very low over the whole business.  He would have it that
it was dishonest to help himself to another man's money unless he
could see his way clear to repay it in a fair time; that his
embarrassment was such that, even with this help, it might be two or
three years before he could perfectly right himself; that he had had
other losses lately; and that perhaps the wisest course would be to
throw up the Works and take a manager's place himself.  'We should
not starve on a hundred and fifty a-year, and Ted would earn
something,' he said more than once."

"Of course you did not give in to him?"

"No; I grew tremendously eloquent, and Langley helped me.  I talked
myself hoarse for nearly two hours before I could move him.  I hurled
all sorts of thunders at him.  I anathematized the Clayton pride as
an unholy thing.  I told him that it was a grievous sin against
charity to refuse the help of a friendly hand when it was stretched
out to save him.  What would have been thought of the conduct of the
poor traveller if he had refused the assistance of the good
Samaritan; if he had lain there in his obstinacy, declaring that no
such bindings up of oil and wine should be his?"

"Ah, you had him there."

"Well, he did look a little uneasy at that; and then I plied him with
arguments.  Did he think it a manly thing to let his sisters go out
into the world and work because he could not do as other men did
under such circumstances, and bend that pride of his?  I noticed he
winced at that.  And then I upbraided him with his want of
friendship.  What did Charlotte and I want with the money? we had
sufficient for our simple needs.  Buy books with it? for he actually
suggested that in a feeble sort of way.  Did he think we were such
lukewarm Christians that we should lay it out in luxuries while our
dearest friends were on the brink of ruin?"

"I can well imagine your eloquence."

"It was worse than preaching half-a-dozen sermons.  I was just
getting weary and out of breath when Langley came to my rescue, and
begged him, with tears in her eyes, not to grieve me; and then
between us we talked him into a better and more hopeful state of
mind."

"And he consented to accept it at last?"

"Yes; he is to draw two hundred and fifty to-morrow to meet some
bills that are pressing upon him, and next week he is to take three
hundred more, that will put him straight; but he will require the
remainder for current expenses.  It appears there will be little or
no profit coming in from the Works for the next six months.  His
great fear is that he may not be able to repay me for two or three
years."

"What does that matter?" exclaimed the girl, joyfully.  "Oh, Mr.
Logan, how shall I thank you for doing what you have done to-night?
How did he look? and what did Langley say to you?"

"Well, he looked very pale, poor fellow; but I think on the whole he
is very grateful and relieved.  I know he wrung my hand nearly off
when I took my leave.  I felt such a consummate hypocrite when Miss
Clayton burst into tears, and thanked me for saving her brother.  I
wonder what they would say if they knew the truth!"

"Hush! we will not say anything about that.  Have you come straight
from Church-Stile House? does Miss Cosie know yet?"

"No; but I must tell her directly I get home.  By-the-bye, where is
Miss Catherine, I missed her to-night?"

"She is spending the evening with Mrs. Stewart.  Dr. Stewart has gone
over to Karldale for the night.  Mrs. Chester is very ill, and there
is to be a consultation."

"Her days are numbered, poor soul, at least I greatly fear so," he
returned very gravely, and soon afterwards he took his leave.

Queenie could scarcely compose herself to sleep that night, her
relief was so intense; but in the morning the old fear obtruded
itself.  Could they rely with any degree of safety on Miss Cosie?

"Solomon tells us, that in the multitude of counsellors there is
wisdom," she thought to herself; "but I do not think it holds good in
the case of a dear fussy little old maid like Miss Cosie."  And then
she groaned in spirit, and finally decided to go then and there to
the vicarage, and threaten that harmless old maiden with all sorts of
pains and penalties if she did not keep that busy tongue of hers in
order.

She found her in an old wooden out-house, that went by the name of
the dairy, busily skimming a great bowl of yellow cream, with the
inevitable grey shawl pinned round her, and a little drawn grey hood
tied over her curls.

When she caught sight of her visitor she dropped her spoon, and came
clattering over the brick floor in her little clogs.

"Dear, dear, it is never you, Miss Marriott! and not a wink of sleep
have I got all night with thinking of you and those poor creatures at
Church-Stile House; but there, there, I must not upset you," went on
the little woman breathlessly, reaching up on tiptoe to kiss her.

"Dear Miss Cosie, I knew how glad you would be."

"Glad!  I couldn't coin the word that would express my feeling.  I
seem as though I were made of india-rubber, I feel so drawn out and
expanded with sheer happiness.  It is a mountain that is lifted off
me and Christopher, that's what it is," continued the soft-hearted
little creature, wiping her eyes, and dimpling all over her round
bright face.  "Dear, dear, to think that you are a rich woman, and
all the rest of it."

"Now, Miss Cosie, remember this is a great secret," began Queenie
solemnly.

"My dear, I wouldn't breathe a word to a soul not if it were to save
my life.  Didn't Christopher tell me all about it last night, sitting
there in his big chair, looking so good and beautiful, more fit to be
lifted straight up to heaven, as I always say, than to be down here
in father's big elbow chair, and with the tears all but running down
his cheeks, so that he had to take off his spectacles to wipe them."

"But, Miss Cosie--"

"And to begin in that joking way, too," went on Miss Cosie, too
intent on her reminiscences to heed the interruption.  "'Well,
Charlotte, my dear,'--I hardly thought I should be deceived at my
time of life in this bare-faced manner,--'what do you think this sly
little puss of a schoolmistress has been doing?' that's how he began."

"I wish I had been behind the door."

"Why, it was as good as a play, and he enjoying my fright, for I was
quite in a fuss and worry in a moment.  'Don't tell me that our Miss
Marriott could do anything wrong, for I won't believe it, Kit,' I
returned; 'for she is as good a girl as ever lived, and a better
sister to that poor little sickly child never breathed, and you may
take my word for it, as sure as my name is Charlotte Logan.'"

"Thank you for that, dear Miss Cosie."

"'Don't put yourself out, Charlotte, there is no reason for it,' he
answers, quite calmly.  'I am not saying a word against Miss
Marriott's goodness; but she is a sly little creature for all that,
for she is hiding from us all that she is a rich woman, with a tidy
little fortune of five thousand a-year.'  Dear, dear, the maze I was
in when he said that!"

"If only I had been there!" ejaculated Queenie feelingly.

"I wouldn't believe it for a long time, and then it seemed to come on
me like a flash.  'Why of course, Kit, my dear,' I said, as well as I
could speak for crying, for he had been telling me all about the
Brierwood Cottage conspiracy as he called it, and a more blessed deed
of charity never reached my ears; but it shall be restored four-fold,
pressed out and running over, and all that, my dear, you may rest
assured of that.  'Why it stands to reason, Kit, my dear,' I said,
'that a young lady like Miss Marriott, who has the carriage of a
duchess, and puts on her clothes well, and always holds her head
high, and looks you in the face, and moves about as though she knew
there was a barouche and pair waiting for her round every corner; why
it stands to reason that a noble young creature like that should turn
out to be somebody.'"

"But, Miss Cosie," exclaimed Queenie, trying not to laugh in the
little woman's face, "I am the same that I was before; it does not
make any difference in me, really, because Emmie's uncle chose to
leave me all his money."

"No, my dear, certainly not; and of course in church you will always
call yourself a miserable sinner, and all that, and of course that
will be right and proper; but if only you could have heard what
Christopher said about you! but I must not make you vain."

"Ah, Mr. Logan has been so good in helping me; he has managed
everything so cleverly," returned Queenie, thankful to turn Miss
Cosie's thoughts into a less embarrassing channel.

"My dear, you have no conception of Christopher's cleverness; he
ought to be the bishop of the diocese, or the prime minister, with
that head of his.  No one can hold a candle to him, that is what I
always say; he is the wisest and the best and the cleverest man I
ever knew, in spite of his never remembering to take a clean
handkerchief out of his drawers unless I put it ready for him.  Why
he actually ran after the bishop in that old patched dressing-gown of
his; but I have told you that story before," interrupting herself
just in time, and stopping to take breath.  Now was Queenie's
opportunity.

"Miss Cosie," she began, still more solemnly than before, "you know
this is a great secret, and that it must be only known to us three."

"Yes, yes; of course, my dear."

"If the truth were to leak out in any way the whole plan will be
spoilt.  Mr. Clayton would not touch the money if he knew it were
mine and not Mr. Logan's, and then he and Langley and Cathy would be
ruined."

"My dear, as though I would breathe a syllable!"

"No; you will not mean to say a word, but, all the same, a hint or a
moment's forgetfulness would betray us.  Ah, there is Langley coming
up the garden; she has come, of course, to thank you as well as Mr.
Logan.  Dear, dear Miss Cosie, do promise to be careful!"

"There, there, you are quite agitated, and no wonder; but you may
trust me; oh, you may trust me!" returned Miss Cosie with a soothing
pat and nod.

But she had no time to add more, for Langley was approaching them
with her pale face brightened with unwonted smiles.

"Dear Miss Cosie, I hardly know what I am to say to you and Mr.
Logan," she exclaimed, clasping the little woman in her arms with
unusual warmth, for Langley, in spite of her gentleness, was not a
demonstrative woman.

"There, there, say nothing at all about it," returned Miss Cosie
hurriedly and nervously; "that is by far the wisest plan, is it not,
Miss Marriott?" appealing in some alarm to her young companion.

"Yes; Miss Cosie would rather not be thanked," returned Queenie in a
low voice.

"Must I not tell you good dear people what I think of you both?"
continued Langley in her soft, persuasive manner.  "When one's heart
is brimming over with gratitude one cannot refrain from speaking.  I
always knew what unselfish Christians you were, but now you have
proved it without doubt."

"Oh, my dear, this is dreadful! pray, pray do not say any more, you
make me quite unhappy," exclaimed Miss Cosie, putting up her plump
hands in dismay.  "Miss Marriott, if you love me, ask this dear soul
not to say any more."

"I think it upsets her and Mr. Logan to be thanked," observed
Queenie, turning her face a little aside, for Miss Cosie's
helplessness and terror moved her to inward laughter.  "I think I
would let it be, Langley."

"Yes, do, there's a dear good creature," returned Miss Cosie,
breathing a little more freely; "it cuts one like a knife to hear
you, and then to know that one has nothing to do with the matter at
all."

"Miss Cosie means that she and Mr. Logan have no present use for the
money, that they did not intend to spend it," put in Queenie calmly;
"but she is so flurried and upset by the whole business that it is
kindest not to talk to her at all upon the subject.  It only
distresses her kind heart," went on the young girl with the utmost
calmness, though her heart sank over Miss Cosie's first blunder.

And Langley, with her usual tact, quietly changed the subject.

But Queenie returned home ill-at-ease.

"I feel as though I were walking over a mine that might explode at
any moment under my feet," she said to Mr. Logan when he came to her
the next day to inform her that Garth had paid that visit to the
Carlisle Bank.  "I hardly dare trust Miss Cosie out of my sight."

"Oh, it will be all right," he answered soothingly; "in a few days
the subject will have blown over, and she will have forgotten all
about it.  Don't trouble yourself.  This little plot of yours is
making you nervous."

"I think it is," she returned frankly; "my peace of mind is quite
gone, and I do nothing but anticipate difficulties; but, all the
same, I would not undo our work," smiling in her old bright manner.




CHAPTER VIII.

CROSS PURPOSES.

  "When love shall, pitying, call me home,
    To that sweet, sweet home that has long been hers,
  With yearning rapture my eyes will roam
    O'er throngs of the sainted worshippers.
  For I think the child with the starry eyes,
    Who vanished away to that far-off land,
  Will look from some window in Paradise,
    And beckon me in with her tiny hand."
                                _Helen Marion Burnside._


Queenie's forebodings were not verified, for, in spite of two
untoward circumstances, the greater part of the winter passed quietly
to the inhabitants of the cottage and Church-Stile House.

Only two things marred its perfect harmony.  Garth had not yet
spoken, and Cathy had bade good-bye to her friends at Hepshaw, and
had begun her London work in earnest.

Queenie felt the loss of her friend bitterly; every one missed the
bright, light-hearted girl.  Cathy's moods had of late been strangely
variable: fits of despondency had alternated with bursts of wild,
exuberant spirits; a certain sweet recklessness had tinged even her
farewell greetings.

They were all at the station to see her off, even Mr. Logan and Miss
Cosie, and at the last moment Dr. Stewart appeared.

Queenie seemed utterly quenched, and Langley looked depressed and
tearful; but Cathy looked at them all with her bright, resolute smile.

"Good-bye, dear friends; don't miss me too much, before long I shall
be amongst you again," she said, as she waved her hand gaily, and the
train moved slowly away.

A curiously sweet expression crossed Mr. Logan's face as he walked by
Queenie's side down the path bordered by plane trees that led from
the station to the Deerhound.

"Miss her! how can we help missing her?" cried the girl, appealing to
him with sorrowful eyes, as though to claim his sympathy.  "Langley
will be dreadfully lonely without her, and as for Emmie and me!  why
she was the only friend that we had at Granite Lodge, the dearest,
and the kindest, and the bravest."  But here Queenie's eulogy ended
in a little sob.

"Young things love to try their strength," replied Mr. Logan, softly.
"We would fain clip their wings, but they would be sure to grow
again.  When I think of Miss Catherine," he went on, his eyes
darkening strangely, "going out so bravely to her work in the heart
of the great city without a tear on her bright face, however much her
heart may be aching at leaving us all behind, I cannot help thinking
of the white dove flying all those days over those wastes of water,
with the olive branch in its mouth, and what Noah must have felt when
he pulled it into the ark.  It did not come to him even of its own
accord, the wild weary thing, but he must needs put out his hand and
draw it into its refuge."

Queenie looked up at him somewhat startled, but he did not seem to
notice her surprise; his eyes had a far-off, abstracted look in them,
and during the remainder of the walk he preserved an almost unbroken
silence.

Cathy wrote long cheery letters, full of amusing descriptions.  She
liked her work on the whole, she told them, and was not daunted by
the difficulties that beset the path of beginners.  "It was all in
the day's work," as she wrote; "and what was the good of possessing a
fount of endurance fit for a Spartan woman if there was nothing to
bear.  In fact, I am determined to serve my noviciate properly, and
to make the best of things.  I am no more inclined to see bugbears
now than I was to discern Emmie's favorite ghost in the old garret at
Granite Lodge; so make your mind easy, my precious old Queen, and do
not indulge in any more troublesome fancies on my account."

Queenie did not show these letters to any one but Emmie; but the two
gloated over them in private, and tried to imagine Cathy in her black
stuff dress and little white cap, moving among the dim wards with her
light springy step hushed so as not to disturb the sleepers, "looking
not a bit like our Cathy, but like any other ordinary person," as
Emmie observed with a sigh.  But if Queenie missed her friend now,
the time was to come when she would yearn for her out of the fulness
of an over-charged and wounded heart; when her first thought would
be, "If only Cathy were here."

Things were not quite satisfactory between herself and Garth Clayton.
The young man had grown strangely shy in his ways with her, and held
himself almost entirely aloof from the cottage.

The fact was, Garth was in a predicament.

He was more in love than ever; but in his present circumstances
marriage was out of the question.  How was he to bring home a wife to
the old home, entangled as he was by a load of debt and difficulties?

Garth was perfectly honest in his intentions.  He had made up his
mind that Queenie Marriott was the woman he loved; but he had a man's
horror of a long engagement.  "What's the good of telling a girl you
love her if you can't see your way clear to make her your wife?" he
always said; and he acted on this opinion so thoroughly that his
quiet withdrawal of attentions filled the girl's heart with dismay.

"Would he be so cold and distant with me if he really loved me?"
Queenie asked herself.  "He never comes to see me now, and if I go up
to Church-Stile House he is always so busy, and seems as if he fears
to be alone with me.  Does he think that I want him to pay me
attentions if he has ceased to care for me in the way he did?" asked
the girl, her breast heaving at the thought; and she mourned for the
loss of her friend, and in her secret soul refused to be comforted.

But she knew nothing of the conflict that went on under that assumed
coldness of manner that wounded her so greatly.

Garth found his life anything but easy just now; to be sure, ruin no
longer stared him in the face, but his debt was a secret torment to
him, and fretted his proud nature with a sense of positive injury.

He would fain have drawn out as little as possible of the sum placed
for his benefit, but his needs were pressing.  Scarcity of orders,
the rise in the men's wages, the heavily-freighted accounts of the
cottages he had so lavishly provided for his workmen, had obliged him
to expend already seven or eight hundred pounds of the money.  The
quarry was now in good working order again; and in a few months the
young master of Warstdale trusted that he would be enabled to repay
the first instalment of the debt; and then, and not till then, would
he open his lips to speak any words of love.

Garth was capable of keeping any resolution that he had formed.  It
was no fear of betraying himself that made him avoid Queenie; but the
girl's presence was so sweet to him, and the longing to tell what was
in his heart was so great, that the pain of such silence was
unendurable to him.

And so he quietly withdrew himself, and went on with his daily work
as though no such thoughts were his; and Queenie meekly accepted her
banishment and bore Langley's reproaches on her unsociability as
patiently as she could, until Langley discovered how matters were,
and held her peace ever afterward like a wise woman, and petted and
made much of the girl when she came down to the cottage.

And Queenie saw little of Garth, only lifting her brown eyes timidly
to his face when she met him in the village, and he stopped to
exchange a greeting with her and Emmie; but he never once said, "Why
do we see you so seldom at Church-Stile House?" but only asked kindly
after hers and the child's welfare, and bade her wrap up Emmie and
cherish her now the bitter winter weather had set in.

Queenie ate her Christmas dinner at the vicarage, with only Mr. Logan
and Miss Cosie; and her New Year's day was spent at Juniper Lodge.
The Claytons were not present on either of these occasions; Garth had
gone up to London to see Cathy, and Langley had spent both days at
Karldale Grange in Gertrude Chester's sick room.  A long season of
suffering that no skill could avert or tenderness alleviate had set
in for the unhappy lady, and Langley's services were in constant
requisition.

Now and then Mr. Chester came over to Hepshaw.  He always paid a
visit to the cottage, and would go up, as a matter of course, into
Emmie's little room, and sit for a long time by the empty bed where
his darling had slept her little life away, and then he would come
sorrowfully down again, and he and Queenie would talk softly of the
child and her endearing ways.

These visits always made Queenie feel very sad.  Time had not
mitigated the father's heavy loss.  He still mourned heavily for his
little Nan.  His florid face looked pale and haggard.  A few threads
of grey were clearly perceptible in the golden brown beard; but his
eyes always lighted up with a look of tenderness when Queenie
mentioned his wife.

"Ah, my poor Gertie," he would say, sorrowfully.  "You would scarcely
know her, Miss Marriott, she is so changed; she suffers so terribly.
Langley will have told you; and yet since the death of our little
darling there has never been a word or breath of complaint.  She
endures her worst agonies with fortitude; even Dr. Stewart marvels at
her, and says he had never witnessed greater stoicism.  It is only
'Hold my hand, Harry,' or 'I shall soon be relieved, dear husband,
when this attack has passed,' just that, and nothing more."

"Yes, indeed; Langley cannot say enough in her praise, she says her
self-control is wonderful."

"Poor soul, she's fighting away her life by inches.  You cannot tell
what a man feels when he sees his wife suffering and is helpless to
relieve it.  Sometimes I think that for her sake I shall be thankful
when it is over, and she is with the child.  I can't get it out of my
mind that she ought to have her mother or myself to take care of her;
she must feel so lost in that great glittering place."

"She is safer and better cared for there than even in your arms, dear
Mr. Chester."

"Yes, I know; and Gertie reproves me and says I am a sad heathen, and
so I am; but I am sure of one thing," speaking in a voice of
suppressed emotion: "that if I am ever good enough--God help me for
the sinner that I am,--but if I am ever helped to win an entrance in
heaven, that my little Nan will be the first to see me, and she will
come running to me, the darling, and I shall feel the clasp of her
sweet arms about me, and the softness of her baby face against mine;
and 'father's come,' she will say that first, I know," breaking off
hurriedly as the tears came into Queenie's eyes.

"And a little child shall lead them."  The words seemed to come to
her mind with sudden, irrepressible force.  What if he were right,
though he spoke only the language of love's fantasy?  Might not the
baby hand be stretched out to him through the darkness and silence
that lay between those two loving souls, ever beckoning him on to
possible good and high endeavour, through devious wanderings, past
yawning pitfalls, over the tumultuous sea of life, beckoning with
faint invisible touches, ever higher and higher.

"Father's come."  Fanciful, and yet what more probable in the mystery
of Providence and God's dealing with men than this, that amid the
shining crowds the form of his little Nan should softly glide towards
him; and even there in God's bright home a little child shall lead
them.

And so with all apparent quietness, but with many secret anxieties,
the winter wore softly away.

A week's holiday at Christmas had given the young school-mistress a
short reprieve from her duties, and she had taken advantage of it to
pay a three days' visit to her old friend Caleb Runciman.  Emmie had
pleaded hard to accompany her, but the weather was unusually
inclement, and Queenie shrank from exposing the child's delicacy to
such a test; so she remained under Mrs. Fawcett's charge, as Langley
was engrossed with continual visits to Karldale Grange.

Caleb and Molly made much of their visitor, but the old man grumbled
a good deal over his favorite's looks.

"Well, Miss Queenie, I don't believe school-keeping has agreed with
you after all," he began, shaking his head.  "She is thin, Molly, is
she not, and looks a bit graver than she used to look?"

"Now, Caleb, don't begin fancying such nonsense.  I was never better
in my life.  Think of this hearty meal I have just eaten; thin
indeed!" and Queenie opened her brown eyes and threw up her pretty
head with a movement of disdain.

"Of course you must be having your own way, Miss Queenie dear,"
returned the old man as he lighted his pipe; "but, all the same, I
don't believe that Hepshaw air agrees with you both.  There, why the
precious lamb has a cough, didn't you tell Molly so just now? and you
are ever so much thinner yourself, my pretty; and when is it all
going to end, this play-acting, the school-mistressing, I mean, and
you and the blessed lamb settle down comfortably, like
sensible-minded Christians, in a nice handsome home of your own, eh,
Miss Queenie?"

"Why, I don't know, Caleb," stammered the girl, rather startled at
this very direct question, "I don't know at all; I have not made up
my mind.  Not before the end of the summer; no, certainly not before
then."

Caleb laid down his pipe, with a dissatisfied look.

"I thought better of your common-sense, I did, indeed, Miss Queenie."

"Now, Caleb, if you are going to be cross I shall tell Molly to pack
up my bag, and I shall just take the next train home.  What is the
good of being an heiress if one is never to have one's own way?"

"You have had it for a pretty long spell, I'm thinking," returned the
old man with unusual pettishness, but the girl's whim fretted him
sorely.  "Mark my words, Miss Queenie, you will play at this thing a
bit too long."

"I shouldn't wonder if you were right," a touch of gravity replacing
her fun; "and I think myself that it would be as well to fix a limit,
for fear I should be tempted to put off the evil hour."

"Eh, eh! now you are going to be sensible."

"I must have six clear months.  Let me see, I will say the first of
August.  There, Caleb, on the first of August I will enter into
possession of my riches.  Will that content you?"

"Why not say May or June, Miss Queenie?"

"No; not a day, not an hour before," returned the girl resolutely.
"My dear old friend, this is not a whim only, it is real stern
necessity.  The dearest friends I possess have been in great trouble,
as you know, and my seeming poverty has enabled me to help them; it
is for their sake, not mine, that I am making this further delay.
There, it is decided; and now let us talk of something else," she
finished gaily.

But Caleb was only half-mollified.

"She is thinner, and looks different somehow," he said to his
faithful confidante, Molly, that night.  "There is a peaking look in
her brown eyes, like a half-fledged bird that sees its nest, but
can't find its way to it.  I doubt that she is not quite happy,
Molly."

"Nay; she is no differ from other young girls," returned Molly
shrewdly.  "Bless your dear heart, Mr. Runciman, they are all alike!
they fret a bit, and then cheer up.  It is the law of nature, that's
where it is; she will be as perky and chirping-like as ever
by-and-bye," and Molly, who knew the symptoms well, and had buried
her own sweetheart many years ago, changed the subject with womanly
tact and sympathy.




CHAPTER IX.

"TOO MANY COOKS."

"Make the doors upon a woman's wit, and it will out at the casement;
shut that, and 'twill out of the keyhole; stop that, 'twill fly with
the smoke out of the chimney."--_Shakespeare._


It was a mild day in February, and as Queenie closed the door of the
little school-house, and walked up the field that led to the
vicarage, it seemed to her as though the very air held a promise of
spring.  Now Queenie, like all healthy young creatures, dearly loved
the spring-time; to her imaginative temperament there could be
nothing more beautiful and satisfying than to watch this spectacle of
a faded and dead nature rising again into fresh life.

"How can people say there is no hereafter, when the miracle of the
resurrection is every year repeated before our eyes?" she said to
herself.  To her there was ever a fresh pleasure in seeing the brown,
lifeless limbs of the elms and sycamores gradually clothe themselves,
first with budding shoots, and then with fair, green leaves.  The
bursting hedgerows, the unfolding of the fronds of ferns, the first
peep of the fairy white bells of snowdrops, the pale glitter of
primroses, and the fragrance of violets, gave her a positive feeling
of happiness.

Everything so new, so fresh, so fair, soiled by no dust, scorched by
no burning sunshine; the whole world bright and unsullied as a baby
soul, to whom good and evil are unknown mysteries, and life means
nothing but perpetual satisfaction and content.

Queenie had a little errand to fulfil at the vicarage; one of her
scholars was ill, and she wanted Miss Cosie's recipe for a certain
compound that Miss Cosie judged to be highly efficacious in such
cases.

She entered the little parlor with her usual light step.  Miss Cosie
was engaged in her favorite occupation--knitting socks for her
brother.  She put down her work with a little flurry when she caught
sight of her visitor.

"There, there," exclaimed the little woman, turning very red,
"Christopher was right, as he always is, dear old fellow; and of
course you've come to scold me."

"To scold you, dear Miss Cosie!"

"Dear, dear, to think of my poor head getting into such a muddle, and
the words slipping out before I knew they were coming.  Why, I could
have bitten my troublesome tongue I was so vexed with myself; but
what was the use of crying over spilt milk, as my poor mother used to
say, and a secret is sure to be proclaimed on the house-top some time
or other, as I told Mr. Garth."

"Now, Miss Cosie, what does this mean?" asked Queenie, conscious of
an uncomfortable sensation creeping over her; little Janie's sore
throat was quite forgotten.  "Do you mean that, after all my
entreaties and warnings, you have betrayed me?"

"There, there, perhaps it is not so bad as you think," returned Miss
Cosie, patting her curls nervously, and prefacing her words with a
gentle cough; "it was only just a sentence or two that I let drop to
Mr. Garth when he came in here last night for a pleasant chat with
Christopher and me."

"Well?" somewhat sternly, for there was no denying that Queenie was a
trifle angry.

"Well, we were sitting as comfortably as possible; Christopher hadn't
come in, he had gone to baptize Wheeler Wilson's baby, and none too
soon, for it died this morning; and I took it its little burying
gown, and laid it out, the precious blossom, myself.  And very
touching it was, and the poor mother crying her eyes out, because it
looked so pretty; and well, if she does take a drop of spirits now
and then we are all miserable sinners, the very best of us, and
Wheeler Wilson is none too careful; and--where was I, dearie? for I
have just gone and muddled myself again, I believe."

"You said you were alone with Mr. Clayton," returned Queenie, with an
inward prayer for patience.  Miss Cosie's garrulity was terribly
trying.

"Yes; he was sitting there just where you are, and he was talking and
laughing and making believe to joke,--you know his way,--but all of a
sudden he turned serious.  'Miss Cosie,' he said, 'I have never
spoken to you about that money.  Langley tells me you don't like to
be thanked; but, all the same, you and your brother have earned my
gratitude for the rest of my life, and I must say, God bless you for
it!' flushing up to the roots of his hair, poor young fellow, what
with the heat of the fire and his feelings together."

Queenie's hands clasped each other rather tightly, but she made no
observation as Miss Cosie paused to take breath.

"Well, I was turning the heel of my stocking, and I don't believe I
rightly took in the meaning of his words.  'You have nothing to thank
us for,' I said, as innocently as possible.  'We would have lent it
you and welcome, over and over again, Mr. Garth,' I said; 'but Kit is
as poor as a church mouse, and we hadn't more than a matter of ninety
pounds or so in the Bank.'"

"Miss Cosie, were you in your senses?" burst from Queenie's indignant
lips.

"Well, I was a bit dazed, I believe, for turning the heel of a
stocking is rather a delicate job to do by the firelight, and Dolly
had forgotten to light the lamp; but I was frightened as soon as I
had said it, for there he was staring at me with his eyebrows lifted,
and making me all of a tremble.  'Ninety! you mean nine hundred
pounds, Miss Cosie!' he said, quite sharply, for he could not make me
out at all.  'No; ninety, Mr. Garth,' I returned, for I knew I had
gone too far.  and a lie is a thing I have never taken on my lips;
but I was all of a shake thinking about what Christopher and you
would say to me, and there he was forcing the truth out of me with
his eyes.  'What's the use of trying to deceive him?' I thought, 'I
am brought to book, and nothing but a heap of falsehoods can save
me,' and a falsehood has never come natural to me since I was a baby,
and poor mother read to me the story of Ananias and Sapphira,"
finished Miss Cosie in her innocent way.

"Go on; I am listening," sighed Queenie in a resigned voice.

"Well, I couldn't tell a direct story, as I said before, but I
thought just a tiny bit of deception wouldn't be wrong.  'There is
only ninety pounds now, Mr. Garth,' I went on; but that wouldn't do
at all.  'I don't like the look of this,' he muttered, and such a
frown came over his face, for he was getting put out with my
stammering and nervousness.  'Miss Cosie, tell me the truth, as you
are an honest woman; did you and Mr. Logan lend me these nine hundred
pounds?'  'Why no, Mr. Garth,' I answered, for there was no evading
such a direct question.  'Then, in the name of heaven, who did lend
me the money?' he asked, looking as cross and perplexed as possible.
Well, I didn't want to answer him till Christopher came in, for I
felt I had done enough mischief for one evening, so I let him guess
one person after another, till he jumped up and said he could bear it
no longer; he would go out and find Mr. Logan, or perhaps Miss
Marriott might be in the secret, and could give him an idea who his
secret benefactor was.  Yes; he would go and ask her first, for she
always spoke the truth, and would tell him at once if she knew who
had lent him the money."

"I wish he had come to me.  Yes; I wish he had spoken to me himself,"
murmured Queenie.

"Dear, dear, to think of that! and all I thought was to prevent his
coming.  'You must not go near her, Mr. Garth,' I said, 'for she is
so sensitive that she would half break her heart if you were to say
an angry word to her; and the poor child meant well when she lent you
the money.'  'The poor child! what do you mean, Miss Cosie?' for he
thought me daft, I could see that.  'I was talking of Miss Marriott,
what has she got to do with it, I should like to know?'  'Dear, dear,
this is dreadful, Mr. Garth,' I cried, for he was standing over me,
and wringing the truth out of me by inches.  'Why don't you go and
ask Christopher, he will tell you all about it?'  'I will,' he
answered, quite steadily, but there at the very moment was Kit
standing on the threshold looking at us, and I clapping my hands with
joy to see him."

"And what did Mr. Logan say?" asked Queenie with a proud flash upon
her face.

"Well, there was no keeping it back after that.  Kit told him
everything clearly out, and how you were a rich woman and all that,
and how you had begged and prayed him to lend the money in his name."

"Tell me, tell me quickly, for I can bear no more, did Mr. Clayton
seem very angry?"

"Angry! oh, dear no," returned Miss Cosie, soothingly.  "All his
fierceness died away, and he seemed quite lamb-like directly
Christopher spoke.  After the first exclamation of surprise he never
said a word, but just sat looking as pale and dazed as possible until
Kit had finished all he had to say, and then he got up and said that
he must tell Langley, and he shook hands with me and Christopher and
went away."

"And he said nothing more?"

"No; his eyes looked a little queer, and I noticed his hand felt
cold, but he would not listen to me when I pressed him to have some
hot elder wine.  I do believe he was quite in a maze with
astonishment and being taken so aback, poor young man."

"Thank you for telling me all," Queenie said very quietly, as she
stood up and drew on her gloves.  Little Jane's sore throat was quite
forgotten; she was rather pale, and her lips trembled slightly as she
spoke, but there was no trace of excitement in her manner.

"And you are not vexed with me, my dear."

"Oh, no, I am not vexed; it may all be for the best, you know."  Her
brief wrath had vanished.  Who could long be angry with Miss Cosie,
with her gentle little mouse-face and tender-hearted ways? she was
not to blame, surely, for this strange sinking of heart, for these
uneasy fears.

Something must have happened to the Spring sun-light, it was so much
less radiant as she crossed the threshold of the Vicarage, a little
of the glory and freshness had died out of it somehow.  "Can he
really be angry with me?  I feel I cannot bear this suspense a moment
longer, I must know the worst at once.  Ah! is it possible?" and a
slight trembling passed over the girl's frame, for there was Garth
Clayton coming up the Vicarage lane, and in another moment they would
meet face to face.

Miss Cosie had not been wrong in her account of Garth's utter
bewilderment the previous night, the news had simply stunned him.  He
had gathered up his scattered forces, and had wished them good night,
and then he had gone home straight to Langley.

A sudden craving for sisterly sympathy had taken possession of him;
he must find some outlet for the bitterness that was in him.  He was
battling bravely with untoward circumstance, but this fresh
misfortune that had overtaken him had deprived him temporarily of all
courage.  That the sweetness of the hope within him should be so
utterly quenched! oh, it was hard, terribly hard.

Langley looked up a little startled as he threw himself into his
easy-chair.  The old care-worn expression had returned again, he
looked pale and moody.

"Is there anything wrong; is it about Harry?" she faltered, for the
poor soul had been occupied that evening with her own troubles, and
was full of fears that needed tranquillizing.

"Wrong! oh, no!  Won't you sit down and write a note of
congratulation to Miss Marriott; and won't you say something very
nice and kind from us both, Langley?  One does not come into a
fortune every day, and of course she would wish to be congratulated,"
and then with a sort of enforced quietness he told her all that he
had lately heard at the Vicarage; and when he had finished Langley's
face wore a look of great perplexity.

"Stop a minute, Garth.  I don't think I quite understand.  Are you
sure that you have told me rightly; that Mr. Calcott has left all his
money to Miss Marriott, and that she and Emmie are rich, and have
secretly lent us all this money?"

"Emmie knows nothing about it.  I am sure I told you that,"
impatiently.

"Ah, she has kept it even from her.  Well, perhaps that was wisest
under the circumstances; and in her goodness of heart she had made
herself your creditor.  Yes, I understand; it is very strange.  I
cannot half believe it, but I think it is good news and need not make
you unhappy."

"Is that all you have to say about if?" with renewed bitterness.

"Oh, no; I have a great deal to say about it.  I am very fond of Miss
Marriott; I like her better every day.  I hope you do not mean to be
angry with her about this."

Then he was silent.

"I almost wish she had confided in us from the first," went on
Langley, thoughtfully.  "All disguises are perilous, however
well-intentioned; but she has planned this loan with the utmost
delicacy and consideration for your feelings.  As far as we are
concerned she has behaved with the truest generosity; I think you
must own that yourself."

"Truth is better than generosity," he answered gloomily.

"I never knew any one so thoroughly frank and honest," returned his
sister, eager to take up the defence of her favorite, but conscious
of the increasing gloom of his face.  "I do think in these sort of
matters you are a little hard."

Then his bitterness overflowed and burst forth.

"Look here, Langley, I am not a bit hard.  I have not a word to say
against Miss Marriott; in my opinion she has not perhaps adopted the
wisest course.  I hate all make-believes and mysteries, even if they
are in a good cause, and I think with you that it would have been far
better for her to have told us all about it; but that's not the
question.  The main point is, that I have gone and made a fool of
myself, and it is all no use."

Langley lifted her quiet eyes to his face, but she only smiled a
little at his excitement.

"Oh! it is no use your looking at me like that.  You don't believe
what I say, but it is true for all that.  Haven't I made a fool of
myself, and lost my heart to her, and given up Dora for her, and made
no end of plans for myself? and now this act of hers has sundered us
completely."

"Why so, dear Garth, when you know as well as I do that Queenie
Marriott has grown to care for you?" and Langley's voice was very
sweet in her brother's ears as she said this.

"Ah, she is young, she will get over that," but he shuddered slightly
at the sound of his own words.  "I have not spoken to her.  I have
been careful not to compromise her in the least, remember that,
Langley.  I am not to blame if she have discovered things for
herself."

"But why put yourself to the needless pain of saying all this when
you care for each other, and must surely, by the leading of a kind
Providence, come together in the end."

"Is there a Providence in such cases?" he retorted bitterly.  "I
thought people often met too late, or took wrong turnings in life;
half these affairs end crookedly."

"But not yours, my dear brother," her cheek turning pale at this
chance allusion.  How often, poor woman, a bow was drawn at a venture
and wounded her in this random way.

"Yes; mine.  Why not?  Am I better than other people?  Just look at
the bearings of my case: here I am, involved in debt and difficulty,
with years of hard work and harass before me, fighting inch by inch
for independence; what if I do care for this girl?" his voice
softening in spite of himself.  "Do you think I am such a mean,
poor-spirited fellow that I should throw myself and my poverty and my
family claims at her feet, and ask her to take me in spite of it all,
and endow me with her riches?"

"If she loves you her riches need be no obstacle to either of you,"
she returned firmly.

"Well, perhaps not, in your view of the case; I have hardly made up
my mind about that.  But what of this debt, Langley? do you think I
shall know peace until I have wiped it off?  To be a debtor to a
woman, and, worse than that, to the woman I love; is it within the
limits of possibility that I can entertain the thoughts at which you
still hint until I have at least paid back to her every farthing of
this money?"

"And how long will it take you to do that?"

"Two years, at the present rate of things; at the very best a year
and a half?"

"Two years of suspense.  Oh, Garth, how cruel!"

"Cruel to act like an honest man, and not take advantage of a simple,
inexperienced girl?  What does she know of life and men?" he went on;
"has she ever seen any worthy of her interest?  For shame, Langley!
you are thinking more of me than of her; you are not her best friend
by any means.  Let her leave us, let her quit Hepshaw, and assume her
proper station; let her have the opportunity of judging us fairly,
and comparing us with others.  How do you or I know that she will not
meet with some one far more worthy of her than ever I shall be?"

"Garth, my dear brother, this is truly generous; but I know Queenie,
she will stand your test, hard as it is, but she will suffer
terribly."

"She will not suffer as much as I, who am sending her from me.  Do
you think it is no suffering to have to alienate her by a coldness I
must assume, for her good as well as mine?  Do I not know her? am I
blind or without feeling?  If I were to say to her, 'I am poor, but I
love you; will you take pity on me?' I am sure--yes, I am sure of
what her answer would be; but, as I am an honest man, I will not take
such mean advantage of her."

"Is this your final decision, Garth--to leave her free for two years?"

"Yes, it is," he replied slowly, but his face was pale, and he
frowned heavily as he spoke.  "It must be two years, I am sure of
that, and then I will not speak to her unless I see my way clear
before me.  And now we had better finish with this, it is somehow
getting too painful for me; I suppose I may trust to you not to
betray me?"

"I must not give her a hint of your real intentions?" rather
pleadingly.

"Of course not," he returned sternly, "that would undo the good and
purpose of my sacrifice--to leave her freedom and scope for choice.
Promise me you will do nothing of the kind, Langley."

"Oh, I will promise to do and say nothing of which you would not
approve," she answered meekly.  Not for worlds would she add to his
trouble by even hinting that she was sorry for his decision, and
thought his generosity over-strained.  She knew well what he must be
enduring, and all the length and breadth and depth of that great
pain; but as she leant over him, silently smoothing out with her
fingers the lines and furrows of his forehead, and thinking what she
might say to comfort him, he suddenly drew her towards him, and
kissed her twice very hurriedly, and then got up with a sort of groan
and left the room.




CHAPTER X.

"HAVE YOU NOTHING TO SAY TO ME?"

            "Yet a princely man!--
  If hard to me, heroic for himself!"
                    _Mrs. Browning's 'Aurora Leigh.'_


When Queenie saw Garth coming towards her she shrank back for a
moment in natural trepidation and some little dismay, the meeting was
so utterly unexpected; but her self-possession soon returned.  "It is
better to get it over," she said to herself, "and to know the worst
at once."

They shook hands without looking at each other, and then Garth turned
back and walked by her side in silence.  Neither knew exactly how to
begin the conversation.

Garth was the more nervous of the two; he had passed a sleepless
night, and his condition of mind was truly wretched.  The bitter
impulse that had led him to unburthen his mind to his sister had by
this time passed away, but his resolve was still unaltered.  As he
lay awake in his restlessness he argued the whole matter with
himself; pride, and a certain stubbornness of will, may have had a
voice in his decision, but the more he thought about it the less he
felt that he could take advantage of the girl's evident affection and
secure her wealth for himself.

"How can I do this mean thing?" he repeated again and again to
himself.  "Even if Langley be right, and she has grown to care for
me, it may be only temporary, and she has seen no one else.  Ought we
not to urge her rather to leave Hepshaw and take her proper position
in the world!  It may be a dangerous test perhaps, as Langley says,
and it may end in my losing her altogether, for how can I give her
her freedom and expect her to be faithful? but at least my conscience
will be clear."  And then he swore to himself that, as far as he was
concerned, he would not coerce her movements.  If she went his
judgment would applaud her resolution; if she stayed his trouble
would be a hard thing to bear, for he must then wrap himself up in
reserve and coldness, and this would be difficult to him.  "She
cannot really misunderstand me, the thing is too evident," he said,
striving to comfort himself.  And indeed he was not without some
interior consolation; his very self-sacrifice and unselfishness,
constrained and unnecessary as they might appear to others, gave him
a certain feeling of strength and security.  His conscience was
clear, his independence assured and well-defined, while somewhere,
deep down in some hidden recess, lay a secret hope of Queenie's
steadfastness and fealty.  Langley's words still rang sweetly in his
ears: "She will stand the test, severe as it is, but she will suffer
terribly."  Ah! well, would he not suffer too?

But this meeting was painful to him.  What was he to say to her? and
how was he to bring himself to speak of what was in his mind without
betraying his hidden trouble, and perhaps hurting her feelings?

"Were you going to see Langley?" he asked, just when the silence was
becoming embarrassing.

"Yes; is she at home?" returned Queenie venturing to raise her eyes,
and then becoming conscious all at once of Garth's paleness, and
evident constraint of manner.

"She was sitting at her needlework when I left her just now, and was
lamenting that Cathy was not there to help her.  I think we miss
Cathy more and more every day."

"I know I do," sighed Queenie, and there came over her a sudden
yearning to unbosom herself to this faithful friend.  Langley was
good to her, but she was not Cathy.

Garth echoed the sigh, but scarcely for the same reason.  Cathy's
warm-hearted sympathy would not have helped him.

"I have just left Miss Cosie.  Mr. Clayton, have you nothing to say
to me, nothing special, I mean?"  Queenie was growing desperate,
while Garth was secretly marvelling at her boldness.  His paleness
and changed looks filled her with dismay.  "I think you must have
something to say to me," with a little sharpness in her voice.

That roused him in a moment.

"Yes; of course we have a great deal to say to you, Miss Marriott.  I
told Langley last night that she ought to write to you.  I need
hardly tell you, I suppose, that you have our warmest congratulations
on your good fortune?"

"I don't think I care much about congratulations."

"Nevertheless, you must put up with them," with a faint smile.  "You
must pay the penalty of being a rich woman."

"Were you very much surprised?" looking him full in the face; but he
did not return her glance.

"I am afraid I must own to a very fair amount of astonishment; such a
romantic story has never before been told in Hepshaw.  It savours a
little of Hans Andersen."

"Ah, I know you think me silly, and all that," she replied, in a
voice that was at the same time proud and pained.  "I shall never be
able to make any of you understand why I did it.  I begin to see a
grave ending to my little joke; and yet it made me so happy."

"I almost wish you had told us from the beginning."

"That would have spoiled everything.  You and Mr. Logan would have
made me resign my school at once, and my pleasant summer holiday
would have been at an end.  Perhaps it was cowardly; but I could not
bear being rich."

"That sounds strange."

"Ah, but it is true," she returned earnestly.  "Such a little would
have contented me; five hundred a-year would have made me a happy
woman; I told Mr. Logan so.  We would have taken a cottage, Emmie and
I, larger and prettier than the one we are in, and we should have
been as happy as the day is long; but now, what am I to do with it
all?" putting out her hands with a sudden gesture of repugnance and
helplessness.

He seemed struck with that, and hesitated for a moment before he
answered her; there was a certain forlornness in her words and aspect
that touched him.  They had reached the end of the lane; but now he
made a movement as though to retrace his steps, and she turned
obediently and walked on again by his side.  As she did so he stole a
swift glance at her.  Did she look any different in his eyes now she
was an heiress?  His survey took in the tall, slim figure in the
simple black dress.  That was the hat, surely, to which Dora had
objected, and yet how well it suited her.  He noted all the little
details--the indescribable air of finish that had always pleased his
fastidiousness, the set and poise of the pretty head, the mixture of
girlish frankness and modesty that gave such a charm to her manner;
and then again that inward voice made itself heard.  "Oh, if she were
only poor, and I dared speak to her!" and the struggle within him
gave a little hardness to his voice.

"I think you ought to look at it in quite another light," he began
gravely.  "It is a great responsibility that has come to you, a
talent for which you must account.  I don't think you ought to hide
it under a bushel in the way you are doing."

"You mean that Mr. Logan must find another mistress?  Brierwood
Cottage ought to have another tenant?" she returned huskily, speaking
out her greatest fear.

"I certainly do mean something of the kind; but there will be plenty
of time to discuss that.  You cannot decide on your future plans
without a good deal of consideration.  At present I have something
else to say, something for which I wish I could find adequate words.
I don't know," stammering and hesitating, "how I am to thank you for
your goodness, your generosity--"

"Mr. Clayton," stopping him, "will you do me one favor?"

"What is that?"

"I know what you are going to say, please let it be unsaid."

"But that is impossible."

"It need not be impossible.  Why should there be any talk of such
things between us?"

"Because it is right that there should be such talk.  Do you think
that I am to say nothing at all about my gratitude?"

"Not to me," raising her eyes with a pleading look in them that he
found difficult to resist.  "If we talk of gratitude you know it is I
that am your debtor.  Have you forgotten how good you were to us when
we were poor and friendless?"

"I have forgotten nothing," he returned, hastily; "but, all the same,
you must let me speak.  I am largely in your debt, Miss Marriott, and
for what is to me a very serious sum; but I do hope that in less than
two years' time I may be able to repay both interest and capital."

"As you will," she replied carelessly, but he saw that she was much
hurt.  What could this paltry sum matter to her?  Could he not
understand how great had been the privilege of helping him?

"You must try to comprehend how we business men feel about such
things," he said gently to her, for there were tears in her eyes, and
her face was averted from him.  "It is too late now, but I wish you
had given me the option of accepting or refusing the loan."

"How could I, when I knew you would have refused it from me?" walking
on quickly as though afraid of her emotion.

"If I had my refusal would not have hurt you, I would have made you
understand my feelings so thoroughly; but of course it is too late to
talk about that now.  I suppose I am very proud, but I cannot bear
the thought of this debt being between us; all my life I have had
such a horror of this sort of difficulty and being beholden to any
one."

"How can you, how can you be so proud with me?" burst forth from her
lips.  "Do you mean that this--this trifling act of kindness will
come between us and hinder us from being friends?"

"We must always be friends, I think," he returned, still more gently,
for he saw how sorely he was hurting her.  "Why should you say such
things? you are vexed with me or you would not say them.  I wish I
could make you understand how truly grateful Langley and I am."

"Langley will not talk to me about principal and interest," she
retorted with a little flash of indignation, "and--and I could not
have believed that you would have done it."

"Come, come, I cannot have you vexed with me like this," he said,
stopping her and taking her hand.  "You know I must go directly, and
I have wasted ever so much time already.  Won't you promise me to
think better of it, and not be hurt with me any longer?"

"I don't know," looking down, for his voice was rather too persuasive
in its eloquence.

"You know very well, do you not, that I would not say or do anything
to hurt you really? but my position is a difficult one.  I don't
think I ever before realized how difficult it was.  Things seem all
in a tangle somehow, and it is out of my power to right them."

"Why?" she asked timidly, and her brief indignation died away.
Something in his manner reassured her; he had not really turned
against her.

"That is just what I cannot tell you.  My affairs have all got
crooked, and there is no shaping them.  I suppose time and patience
are needed, but there's terribly hard work before me.  I don't want
to lose heart over it.  I could not bear you just now to say what you
did."

"About not being friends?"

"Yes; whatever happens we must be friends, dear friends, always.  I
think you might promise me as much as that."

"I do promise you that," she said, looking straight at him; and the
expression in her eyes haunted him long afterwards, it was so frank
and sorrowful.

"Then I am content," he replied, and then almost abruptly he lifted
his hat and moved away.  Had she understood him?  Could she follow
the meaning of those vague words?  Had she comprehended that it was
only friendship for which he asked, and with which he professed
himself content?  He could not make up his mind how far she had
understood him.

He would have been almost aghast at his success if he could have read
Queenie's thoughts as she went down the lane again, and strove with a
sick heart to piece together the fragments of talk in her memory.

How gentle he had been with her, and yet his very gentleness had been
inexorable.  Alas! she saw but too plainly that her riches and that
miserable debt were dividing them.  The pride and independence of the
man rose between them like a wall of rock.

"He loves me, but he never means to tell me so," she said to herself
in unutterable bitterness.  "He will break both our hearts first."

As she entered the drawing-room at Church-Stile House Langley put
down her work with a pleasant smile and word of greeting.

"Have you come to be congratulated, my dear?" she said, taking the
girl in her arms, and kissing her with more than usual affection.

Queenie suffered the caress passively, and then sat down by the fire,
shivering slightly as though she were cold.

"You have given us all a great surprise."

"Have I?"

"I was so startled when Garth told me last night that I could hardly
take in the sense of his words.  To think that it is you, and not Mr.
Logan, who has been our secret benefactor!"

"Don't, Langley; I feel as though I could not talk about it."

"Will you let me talk about it instead, dear Queenie; I feel as
though I can never love you enough for what you have done for us, and
Cathy will feel the same; it was such true friendship.  Ted was here
just now singing your praises.  I wish you could have heard him."

Queenie only sighed.  What was all this to her if Garth and she were
divided.

The heaviness of her aspect moved Langley to compassion.  What could
have happened to have quenched her brightness so entirely.

"Have you seen Garth?" she asked, taking up her work again, and
pretending not to notice her companion; a dull red flushed the girl's
face from cheek to brow at the question.

"Yes; I met him just now."

"He feels very much about all this."

"Does he?" looking at the fire.

"You must not misunderstand him if he feels the weight of his
gratitude rather a heavy burthen just now, he has been sorely tried,
poor fellow; and then men think so differently about these sort of
things."

"There is no need for you to make excuses for him," speaking with
difficulty, "he was very kind, and took great pains to show me he was
grateful.  Ah! if he only knew how I hate that word," with a little
burst of excitement.

Langley was silent; she understood too well the nature of the wound
that had been received.  And then what was she to say that would in
any degree comfort her?

"I have done nothing deserving of the word," went on Queenie
vehemently.  "I have given what literally has cost me nothing; it was
such a privilege and happiness to help you all."

"Yes, dear; I quite understand."

"I could scarcely sleep for happiness, and now it all seems spoiled
somehow.  I have grown to loathe my riches, and yet I was disposed to
love them; they hang like a millstone round my neck.  I must give up
my school now, and then I suppose Emmie and I must go away."

"For shame!  I will not have you talk in this miserable fashion."

"Where is it rich people are expected to live?  Caleb wanted me to
take a great house in Carlisle, and visit the Dean, and all the great
folk in the Close.  Fancy Emmie and I visiting at the Deanery!" and
the girl laughed half hysterically; "would any of you come over and
see me then, I wonder?"

"Wait and see," returned Langley with a quiet smile.  "Once friends
always friends, that's the Clayton motto.  Have you really made any
plans about your future, Queenie?"

"No, I have made no plans," she answered drearily; "there is plenty
of time for that.  I don't mean to leave Hepshaw yet, unless you all
drive me away.  I think I will go home now, Langley; I am not quite
myself, and all this talk troubles me.  I think I will go back to
Emmie."  And then Langley again took her in her arms, and kissed her
and let her go; she could find no words with which to comfort her,
and indeed the girl was very sore at heart.

When she entered her own little parlor she found Emmie lying on the
rug in the firelight, in a listless fashion that was habitual with
her now.  She crept up from the ground rather slowly when she saw her
sister; but for once the child's lassitude and evident weakness
escaped her notice.

"How late you are, Queen!"

"Yes, dear, very late; I have been sitting with Miss Cosie, and then
with Langley."

"Did you get the stuff for little Janie?  How tired you look; and how
cold your hands are!" as Queenie knelt down mechanically and warmed
them over the blaze.  "I was just feeling very dull, and wishing that
you would come in.  I have such dull, stupid thoughts sometimes."

"You shall tell me about them presently," returned her sister
hastily; "I want to speak to you now.  Emmie, I have often told you
stories, some of them very sad, and that made you cry; but I have a
real story to tell you to-night."

"Oh, not a sad one, Queen."

"Why not, my sweet?"

"I could not bear it to-night," answered the child with a shiver; "I
have been seeing pictures in the fire, and they are all the same
thing--sad, every one of them; and when I go to sleep at night I
always dream of Alice and little Nan, and think I am with them.  I
have woke up and cried often lately to think what you would do if it
were true, and I were obliged to leave you."

"Oh, Emmie, for pity's sake, hush!  I have had as much as I can bear
to-day."

"And then I ask God to let me stop a little longer, because I am sure
that you would be so lonely without me, unless--" and here the
childish face wore a wistful expression.  "I wish I were not so
young, and then, perhaps, I might help you."

"My darling," not understanding her in the least, "you always help
me!  You are the blessing of my life, and I could not do without you
at all.  Hush!  I will not have any more of this," as Emmie seemed
inclined to interrupt her.  "You must listen to my story first, it is
very interesting and exciting, and is all about Uncle Andrew."  And
then she narrated to her breathless auditor the whole history of the
will, and her whim and all its consequences.  "There," she said as
she finished, and speaking with an attempt at cheerfulness, "isn't
that the nicest fairy story I have ever told you?"

"I don't know," returned the child doubtfully.  "It is very
wonderful, and I do love Uncle Andrew very dearly for leaving you all
the money; but I don't like being so terribly rich, Queenie."

"No, darling; no more do I."

"It was a lovely thought of yours, lending them that money; and it
was dear of you to let me have my wish, and for us two to live in
this cottage.  We shall never be so happy anywhere else, Queen."

"Oh, Emmie, I know that too well!"  And then, to her own distress and
the child's, she suddenly broke down and burst into a fit of weeping.
"Never so happy again, little Emmie; never again!"




CHAPTER XI.

"A GOLDEN-HAIRED CIRCE."

  "We cannot fight for love as men may do;
  We should be woo'd, and were not made to woo."
                                        _Shakespeare._


When Garth returned from the Quarry that evening, sad and dispirited
from his interview with Queenie, he found a letter waiting for him; a
messenger had brought it over from Crossgill Vicarage.

"Did you know Dora was at home again?" Langley asked him in a little
surprise.

But he answered "No," very briefly, as he opened the envelope.

A curious vexed smile hovered around his lips as he read the note,
and then he handed it to his sister.

"Dear Mr. Clayton," it began, "do you know that we have returned from
our exile, and are settled at home again?  Dear Flo was so well that
I ventured on resisting the doctor's orders.  Doctors are such old
women sometimes; so, as she was quite strong and hearty, and in
boisterous spirits, and we were both getting terribly restless, I
just wrote to papa and Beattie to expect us, and here we are.

"It is so delicious being at home again, and everything looks so
beautiful.  Beattie has been a good girl, and has kept things in
tolerable order.  Tell Langley, with my love, that I shall come over
and see her very soon; and now I have a message for you from papa.
He wants to consult you again about that troublesome bit of business,
about which he talked to you in the summer.  No one helps him so
well, and he thinks so much of your advice; that is great praise from
a man of papa's age and experience, is it not?  The girls are longing
to see you; they are for ever talking about you.  Beattie was always
a great friend of yours, was she not? if I remember rightly, you were
rather inclined to snub poor Flo.  We all have so much to tell you;
so if you will pack up your bag and come over and dine with us
to-morrow, you will find your old quarters ready for you.  Please do
not disappoint us, the girls have set their hearts on seeing you.

  "Your faithful friend,
        "DORA."


"Shall you go?" asked Langley, very quietly, as she replaced the note
in the envelope.  "It is rather strange that she has not asked me as
well."

"Mr. Cunningham did not want to consult you, you see," returned her
brother, with an inscrutable smile.  "Yes; I suppose that I shall
have to go; there is no getting out of it," and then he sat down and
wrote off a brief note, with the gravest possible face, and gave it
himself to the messenger.

When he rose the next morning it was with a sense of having to
undergo some ordeal.  He had to rest his head that night under the
roof of Crossgill Vicarage; and before he sought his pillow he might
have to encounter some difficult passage of arms with Dora.  It was
some months since they had met, and he had still a kindly feeling for
his old playmate.  If friendship would satisfy her he could promise
her a tolerable amount; perhaps she had taken him at his word, and
there would be no attempt to draw him again under her influence;
perhaps she had grown reasonable.  Dora was always such a sensible
creature, and had begun to understand for herself that they would be
better apart.  If this were so he would eat his dinner with a light
heart, feeling that nothing was expected of him.

Above everything he desired that there might be peace between them;
he would never willingly make her his enemy.  Perhaps some suspicion
that she might prove a dangerous adversary at this time crossed his
mind; he had great kindness of heart also, and would have hated to
disappoint or grieve any woman, especially one for whom he had once
entertained a tenderness.  It was with somewhat dubious feelings,
therefore, that he drove himself up that evening to the Vicarage.

Dora was not as before in the porch to receive him, but the old nurse
met him at the door with a pleasant smile on her wrinkled face as she
led him into the hall, dusky and warm with fire-light.

"The young ladies were in the drawing-room," she told him as she
helped him off with his overcoat.

Garth stood and warmed himself after his long cold drive and
listened, nothing loath, to the old woman's prattle.  Nurse was a
great favorite of his.

There was quite a ruddy glow when the drawing-room door was opened;
the soft, harmonious light of the great white china lamps pervaded
the long low room.  In spite of his dubious feelings Garth could not
help admiring that pretty picture of domestic comfort.  Dora was in
her favorite carved chair working, with Flo curled up on the rug at
her feet; another girlish form was half hidden in the recesses of the
Vicar's great easy-chair.  The white dresses of the girls quite shone
in the fire-light.

As Dora advanced to meet him Garth was driven to confess to himself
that he had never seen her to such advantage.  The soft velvet gown
that she wore set off her golden hair and beautifully fair skin to
perfection.  As she gave him her hand with her prettiest smile a
rose-tint, very like a dawning blush, tinged her cheeks.

"You are very good to come to us to-night," she said in the lowest
possible voice.  "I was half afraid you would be proud and stay away
on purpose to punish me."

"Why should I wish to punish you?" he answered good-humoredly.  "So
these are your sisters.  The question is, which is Beatrix and which
is Flo?" and he shook hands with them both with a cordial word or two.

They were both taller than Dora, slim, graceful creatures.  Beatrix
was the handsomer of the two, with lively dark eyes and an expression
of great animation.  Flo was plainer, with an odd, piquante face and
fair hair like Dora's, which she wore cropped and curly like a boy's.

"Poor Flo has lost all her beautiful hair," observed her sister,
passing her hand regretfully over the curls.  "Is she not grown? and
Beattie too?  They make me look such a little thing beside them."

"Beatrix has grown such a fashionable young lady that I shall be half
afraid of her," returned Garth, looking at the girl with kindly
interest.

Beatrix's dark eyes shone with pleasure as she answered his smile.
The two had been great friends in old times, and many a game of romps
had been enacted by them in the Vicarage hall and garden.  He had
always cared less about Flo, who was somewhat spoiled by her sister,
and was in consequence rather pert and precocious.  He had ever taken
a mischievous delight in snubbing her, or putting her down, as he
called it; but Flo was grown up now, and wore long dresses, and had
the languid air of a _ci-devant_ invalid, and the snubbing must now
be a thing of the past.

Garth and Beatrix had so much to say to each other that Dora at last
grew dissatisfied, and bid him, with playful peremptoriness, break
off his chatter and get ready for dinner.  And then he took himself
off rather reluctantly to the porch-room, where he found nurse
coaxing his fire to a cheerful blaze.

"Isn't Miss Dora looking lovely to-night?" exclaimed the old woman
when she caught sight of him; "for all the world like a picture, in
her velvet gown.  I do think she is the prettiest creature in the
county."

"I think Miss Beatrix will be far handsomer," returned Garth, with a
little spice of malice and contradiction in his voice.  "She will
play havoc with a few hearts before many years are over, take my word
for it."

"Miss Beatrix!" in a tone of shrill scorn.  "Dear heart, just to
think of comparing her with our Miss Dora!  But you young gentlemen
will be poking your fun at an old woman.  Miss Beatrix indeed!"

"My fire is burning nicely now, Nurse," observed Garth rather
hastily.  "If you make me too comfortable I shall be afraid of coming
here."

"There's some folks would like to see you come oftener, sir; but it
is not for me to tell young ladies' secrets," and then nurse dropped
her ancient curtsey and took her comely old person out of the room,
while Garth, with a shrug and sigh, proceeded to dress himself.

"Oh, my golden-haired Circe!" was his inward ejaculation, and then he
wondered how Queenie would look in a velvet gown with some of that
fine old lace round her long white throat.  "She can have no end of
that sort of thing now," he said to himself.

After all the gong sounded before he was ready; but Mr. Cunningham
received his excuses with good-humor, and dinner passed off with
perfect tranquillity.  It struck Garth that Beatrix was rather quiet
and a trifle dull, and he had some difficulty in winning a look or
response from her, but he soon desisted from his attempts.  "Poor
child, she has been having a little sisterly lecture on forwardness,
I expect.  Dora is not likely to allow her to monopolize me," and he
bent with some secret amusement over his plate.  He was reading his
old friend Dora by a clearer light now.

But he soon forgot Beatrix when Dora began to talk in earnest.  Dora
was very brilliant and picturesque in her conversation when she
chose.  She gave Garth full descriptions of their places of sojourn
in the Pyrenees.  Now and then there were hints and touches of a
softer character: had he thought of her spending long anxious days
and nights in that great white-washed ward in Brussels! why had he
answered her letters so curtly, exiles were always so homesick and
longing: for news? did he remember her and Flo eating their solitary
Christmas dinner in their odd little room, looking out on the
snow-capped mountains.  They had chestnut soup, and a broiled fowl,
and a salad to follow, and Flo was longing all the time for a slice
of turkey and some English plum-pudding, and he had never taken the
trouble to tell her how they had passed the day at Church-Stile
House, and so on.

It was all very graphic and interesting, and Garth took himself to
task for a certain feeling of relief when Dora and her sisters had
withdrawn, and the Vicar and he had plunged into their business talk.

He was half disposed to prolong it when the coffee was brought in,
but, to his surprise, Flo made her appearance.  "Dora has sent me to
look after the fire while papa takes his nap," remarked Flo very
coolly, as she produced her knitting and planted herself comfortably
on the rug.  "Papa has had rheumatism very badly, and if the fire
goes out and he wakes up chilly there is no knowing what will
happen," finished Flo, with a toss of her curly head that reminded
him of Dora.

"My girls spoil me dreadfully," observed Mr. Cunningham fondly.
"Don't let me keep you, Garth, we shall be in to tea presently," and
there was nothing but for Garth to withdraw.

But his heart quailed within him when he entered the drawing-room,
and found Dora seated alone by the fire, apparently doing nothing but
toying with a little screen.

"What has become of Beatrix?" he asked at once, stopping half way and
looking round for his favorite.

"Beattie has a letter that she must finish to-night, and will be down
presently," returned Dora carelessly; "she is writing in the old
school-room.  You remember the school-room, do you not, and the cosy
teas we have had there? we still keep it for the girls' use.  I must
get papa to do it up prettily for them next summer."

"Couldn't she have left her letter until to-morrow?" asked Garth,
half laughing, but the little subterfuge secretly displeased him.
Why should his favorite be banished to that dreary schoolroom? and
why should Flo be set to watch her father's slumbers?  "I don't like
the look of this at all," he muttered to himself, and again that
allusion to Circe crossed his mind.

"Come and sit down," exclaimed Dora, with playful petulance.  "Never
mind Beattie's whim, girls will have their own way, and she does not
mean to be rude; and now tell me, sir, why you have been so cool all
this time, and treated me so shabbily?"

He was in for it now he saw, but he feigned to misunderstand her.

"How have I treated you shabbily?" he asked, with a tolerable
assumption of innocence.

There was an ominous flash in Dora's blue eyes, but she answered him
gently and plaintively.

"Why, in your letters, to be sure; they were as brief and cold as
possible, not a trace of the old friendship, not even a regret at my
long absence.  They deserved to be burnt, every one of them, but I
hadn't the heart," dropping her voice and looking at him with
dangerous sweetness.

"I wish you had," he returned coolly, for he was in no mood for this
sort of thing.  Another time all this might have pleased and allured
him; he might have been faithful in his allegiance to Queenie, and
yet have taken a certain pleasure in watching her and listening to
her reproaches.  She was such a picturesque little creature, and
there was something so sweetly seductive in her manners to him, that
he would not have been a man and not felt the power of her
fascination; but the memory of his past tenderness for her was now a
source of regret to him, and he was too much shattered by the storm
that had swept over him to amuse himself with aimless love-making.
"I wish you would destroy all my letters, Miss Cunningham," he went
on, gravely; and then he remembered that he had not yet told her
about the failure of his fortunes.

He touched on it now, but lightly, and she listened with the deepest
interest.

"Poor Mr. Clayton, how shocking to lose all that money!  I am so
grieved about it, and you never told me about that either!" with
reproachful tenderness, and the mistiness he had before noticed
gathered slowly to her eyes.

"There is something else I have not told you," he continued, taking
his resolution suddenly, and determined to put a stop, at all risks,
to this dangerous softness; "but then, to be sure, I have only just
known it myself.  Have you heard that our school-mistress, Miss
Marriott, has come into a large fortune?"

"Why no!" she returned, very much startled and becoming a little pale.

"It is a whim of hers hiding it from all of us as she has done.  Why,
she was a rich woman when you first made her acquaintance!  I call it
a tidy little fortune, five thousand a-year."

"Why has she hidden it?  What has been her purpose?" she inquired,
with a sudden sharpness in her tone that struck him directly, but he
answered her carelessly.

"Oh, I don't know; some girlish nonsense or other, nothing at all to
her discredit, rather the otherwise."  But he said no word about the
loan.  It was no business of Dora's; it was a matter simply between
themselves, so he told himself.

But Dora's cheek had paled visibly.  "I thought you hated money and
heiresses," she said at last, very slowly, and looking him full in
the face.

Garth flushed uneasily, the inference was too obvious.

"Did I say a word about hating or the reverse, Dora?" he asked, in
some displeasure.  In his vexation he had called her Dora.

"I feared you had made up your mind never to call me that again," she
said, looking at him very gently.  "I have thought since," hesitating
and dropping her eyes, "that I was wrong and foolish in what I said
to you that night, and you were perfectly right in being angry with
me.  Couldn't you--haven't you forgiven me yet, Mr. Garth?"

Then he jumped up from his seat, and his face was full of pain.  She
was still his old friend and playmate, and how was he to
misunderstand her?  Was it forgiveness only for which she was asking,
or was it a tacit permission for a renewal of his attentions?  Either
way, he must set things right between them now and for ever, for her
sake, for his, and for Queenie's.

"Why are you so hard to me?" she asked again, and her blue eyes were
still misty.

"Dora, my dear girl," he said, and there was a certain warmth and
affection in his tone, "I am not hard with you, and I have forgiven
you with all my heart.  Perhaps I was a little angry with you once,
men are such touchy creatures; but you did a very kind and wise thing
for us both that night, and I thank you for it most truly, for you
have saved us both, Dora, from a very great mistake."  And then he
walked away from her, and took up his position by the fireplace.

Dora's pale cheeks were flaming now, but she made no attempt to
answer him.

"I thought you were never coming, papa," she said petulantly, when
her father and Flo at that moment entered the room.

When Beatrix returned from her sojourn in the cold school-room she
had a rebuke ready for her tardiness.

"I do not know what Mr. Clayton will think of such manners," she said
rather severely; but Beatrix only shrugged her shoulders and
exchanged a droll glance with Flo.

"I am nearly starved with cold, and I should like some tea, Dorrie,"
she said very good-humoredly.

"I cannot have you sit in that cold school-room, my dear," observed
her father; "there was my study, or Dora's writing-table in the front
drawing-room, why could you not use that?"

"Never mind, this cup of tea will warm me," returned Beatrix, hugging
herself and shivering.

Garth stirred the fire unasked, and brought her a low chair, and made
her have a second cup of tea, waiting on her himself.

"And in that thin dress, too!" he remonstrated; "you ought to take
better care of yourself, Beatrix."

Beatrix looked up at him half grateful and half laughing.  She wished
she were not grown up, and she might ask him to chafe her cold hands
as he used to do when she was a little girl.  She remembered even now
the comforting warmth of those strong, brown hands.

"Never mind, one day he will be my brother, and that will be nice,"
thought Beatrix to herself.  "I wish he and Dorrie would settle it
quickly between themselves, and then there will be no more cold
school-rooms."

Garth did not find another opportunity to exchange a word with Dora
that night.  The girls played some duets, and their sister turned the
pages of their music for them, and left her father to entertain their
visitor.

Nevertheless, the sense of her displeasure pervaded the atmosphere
somehow, and drove all comfort from him.  When he said good night to
her, she gave him a very fleeting pressure of the fingers, and
scarcely lifted her eyes to his, but her mouth looked a little
scornful.

But it was not Garth this time that passed a sleepless night.  When
Dora brushed out her golden hair a pale, set face met her eyes in the
glass, with a very decided frown on the brow.

"He thinks to blind me, but I am not to be thrown aside in this sort
of way," she said to herself.  "He belongs to me, and she shall not
have him."  And before she slept Dora took her resolution.




CHAPTER XII.

"HE BELONGS TO ME."

    "_Lor_.  You loved and he did love?
    _Mar_.  To say he did
  Were to affirm what oft his eyes avouch'd,
  What many an action testified, and yet
  What wanted confirmation of his tongue."--_J. S. Knowles._


A few days after this Queenie was returning from afternoon school
when Emmie met her at the door of the cottage with her finger on her
lip and a general air of mystery about her.

"What is it, Emmie?" asked her sister somewhat wearily.  "Run in out
of the cold air, darling, it is making you cough, I see."

"Why is it so dreadfully cold, I wonder?" returned the child
shivering.  "The winter is over, and yet the wind seems to blow right
through one.  Who do you think is in there, Queen? actually Miss
Cunningham.  She has been sitting there nearly an hour, I believe."

"Miss Cunningham!" unable to believe her ears; for Langley, with
intentional kindness, had not informed her of her return.

"Yes; Miss Cunningham.  Oh!" dropping her voice to a whisper, "she
has tired me so.  She is nice and pretty, and has blue eyes like our
kitten's; but somehow I can't like her.  She asked me such lots of
questions all about Uncle Andrew and our being rich; but, do you
know, I don't think she quite liked your lending Mr. Garth that
money."

"Oh, Emmie, you never told her that?" in such a horrified voice that
the child looked frightened.

"Was it such a great secret?  I didn't know you would mind," faltered
Emmie; "and she was saying such nice things about Mr. Garth."

"Yes, it was a secret," returned Queenie more calmly.  "Don't you
remember we are not to let 'our left hand know what our right hand
doeth'?  But never mind, it is done now," for Emmie's eyes were
already filling with tears at the notion of Queenie's displeasure.
"Run and tell Patience to have her kettle boiling; I dare say Miss
Cunningham will like some tea."

"May I stay and help Patience? there are some muffins, and I meant to
toast them myself," and, as Queenie nodded assent, Emmie stole down
the little passage noiselessly and shut herself up safely with
Patience.

As Queenie walked into the room very erect and open-eyed she did not
fail to notice that Miss Cunningham had already made herself at home.
Her sealskin jacket lay on the chair beside her, and her little
furred gauntlets also.  Her golden hair shone under her beaver hat;
the dark close-fitting dress suited her to a nicety.  But as she came
forward, holding out her hand, it struck Queenie that she looked
somewhat pale, and that her smile was a little forced.

"What an age you have been," observed Dora lightly.  "I have been
sitting with Emmie nearly an hour I believe.  I thought you were
never coming in, and then my long drive would have been in vain.  I
suppose Langley told you of my return home?"

"No; I was not aware of it," rejoined Queenie; and now she felt a
little surprise at Langley's omission.

Dora's delicate eyebrows arched themselves slightly.

"How very strange! and her brother was dining with us last week.  He
was our first visitor, of course," with a meaning emphasis.  "The
girls are so fond of him, and papa can do nothing without him, which
makes it very pleasant for me.  By-the-bye," her manner changing
abruptly, "Mr. Clayton tells me that you have been only playing at
schoolmistress all this time, Miss Marriott, and that you are in
reality a woman of fortune."

"Mr. Calcott has been good to me and left me all his money.  I was
poor, very poor, when I met you first," her heart sinking strangely
at Dora's words.  Why had she begun to talk of Garth?

"When people do eccentric things they must expect to have all sorts
of motives imputed to them.  What will the world say, by-the-way, of
your lending all that money to Mr. Clayton?" fixing her eyes a little
too keenly on Queenie's face.

"It may say what it likes," with the proudest possible manner, for
she felt her spirit rising at this.  What did it matter what the
whole world said about her conduct, if only her conscience were
clear?  "The world does not believe in a disinterested friendship," a
faint color coming into her face; "it would sneer at such an
improbability."

"I generally find the world is right," returned Dora, with
aggravating calmness.  "Of course it will say you are in love with
Mr. Clayton, you are prepared for that, Miss Marriott."

A painful blush overspread the girl's face.

"Oh, this is too bad," she exclaimed, clasping her hands nervously.
"Cannot one do a little kindness in return for so much without having
unworthy motives imputed to one?  Why do you come and say such things
to me?" turning on her tormentor with sudden anger and impatience.
"It is no business of yours; it is nothing to you if people will say
untrue things of me."

"You are quite wrong there; it is my business," returned Dora
quietly.  She did not like her work, but, all the same, she must go
through with it.  "It is just this--that is my business," she
repeated, and her face looked worn and irritable in the firelight.
"Miss Marriott, you must know--you cannot have been so much with
Langley and Cathy and not know that Garth Clayton and I belong to
each other."

Then a sudden coldness crept over Queenie.

"You--you are not engaged to him," she said at length, and her voice
sounded strange to herself; the horror of such an announcement almost
took her breath away.  "But it could not be true!" she said to
herself, "it could not be true!"

"It is my own fault that we are not engaged," returned Dora, speaking
in a tone of plaintive regret.  "I have put him off time after time,
and would not allow him to settle it; the girls were too young, and I
could not leave papa, that was what I told him.  Why, just before I
went to Brussels last autumn he came to us, and wanted me then to
settle it, poor fellow, and I would not listen to him."

"He spoke to you, then?" the numbness creeping over her again.

"Yes; he said it must be yea, yea, or nay, nay, between us, I
remember his words quite well; and when I would not give him a
positive answer he got angry and left me.  He has never been himself
with me since, and has made me, oh, so unhappy; but I know the reason
for it now, Miss Marriott," fixing her blue eyes piteously on her.
"Why have you come between us and tried to steal away his heart from
poor me?"

"Miss Cunningham!" her cheeks burning at the accusation.

"Why have you lent him all that money, and tried to decoy his
affections?  He is not the same to me, and you are the cause.  We are
two women, and he cannot marry us both; and--and he belongs to me,"
finished Dora, with a genuine quiver in her voice.

Poor bewildered Queenie could make nothing of it.

"He cannot belong to you if you are not engaged, and if you have sent
him from you," she said, looking helplessly at Dora; and indeed she
was so heartsick and stupefied that she hardly knew what she said.
If he had spoken to Dora, as she averred, how could he have come and
looked at her the next night in the way he did, when she knelt on the
rug, with the plate of cakes in her hand, in the gloaming?

"It was duty, not I, that sent him away, he owns that," returned
Dora, sighing, but her conscience smote her as she uttered this
little fib.

Had he not striven to show her that her motives of duty had been
overstrained and false in his eyes?  "If you send me away you may
find it difficult to recall me, Dora," he had said to her.  Was not
that asserting his right to be free?

"I went too far that time," she went on, "and made him angry and
bitter; but that would not have mattered if you had not come between
us."

"I--I have done nothing.  What do you mean?"

"He was angry with me, and then he came to you; and, to be sure, how
can he help seeing that you care for him after all you have done?"

"Hush!  I will not hear another word; you are going too far.  How
dare you?" exclaimed Queenie passionately, moved to sudden anger at
this ungenerous thrust.  "You have no right to come here and say
these things to me."

"No right!" returned Dora meekly; she had quailed a little before the
brown fire of Queenie's eyes.  "Have I no right when I have known and
cared for him all my life?  I am nearly eight-and-twenty now, and I
was not more than sixteen--Flo's age--when this was first thought of
between us; why, we had been meant for each other ever since we were
children, and yet, after twelve years of thorough understanding, you
say I have no right to speak!"

"I--I do not understand," began Queenie vaguely, and her cheek turned
very white.

What if all this were true, and he had grown weary of this youthful
entanglement?  Might it not be possible that he and Dora had grown
apart, that the tie had loosened between them, and that, in reality,
his second love was the true one?  Alas! the instincts of her own
pure heart verified this view of the case; she understood him so
thoroughly, she was so sure of his integrity, but what proof or
evidence of her belief could she offer Dora?  He had never spoken to
her, his looks indeed had betrayed his secret, and hitherto their
eloquence had sufficed her; but, at a crisis like this, the sense of
his silence was dreadful; her faith was involuntarily built up on no
foundation.  After all Dora was right, and she had no claim to him.

"I was sure you did not understand," returned Dora, watching her, and
speaking with the utmost gentleness.  "You are too generous to take
him from me, who have loved him all these years.  I knew I had only
to speak to you and all would be right between us."

"Stop!" exclaimed Queenie in an unnatural voice.  "You may be
mistaken, Mr. Clayton has never spoken to me, it may not be as you
think; but, on the other hand," growing whiter still, "I would scorn
to deceive you, and I have thought--but I may be wrong--that he has
seemed to care for me.  I would not have said so much, but you have
more than once hinted of my forwardness."

"Yes; but it has been only seeming," replied Dora softly; "he could
not really have changed to me, you know.  If you would only go away
and leave us to come together it would soon be right again."

"You want me to go away?" asked Queenie slowly.

"Not for long--only for a few months, till he has got over his fancy,
and come back to me.  I don't want to hurt you, dear Miss Marriott,
or to make you angry again, but if you knew how soon men find out
these sort of things!  Of course you thought it was gratitude and
friendship, but he was wiser, and knew better than that; and when I
made him angry he thought it very likely that you would console him."

"You have said enough," replied Queenie in the same constrained tone.
"You will not have long to bear with my presence; I have already made
up my mind not to remain in Hepshaw."

"And when shall you leave?" asked Dora eagerly.

"I--I don't know; in another month or two.  I suppose there is
nothing to keep me here now."

But this vague promise was not sufficient for Dora.

"Why do you not go at once?" she persisted.  "You will think I am in
a hurry to get rid of you, but that is not the only reason,"
hesitating.

She was deliberately breaking Queenie's heart, and she knew it, in
spite of the girl's assumed quietness; but somehow she shrank from
imposing this fresh pain.

"Surely, my dear Miss Marriott, now that you have nothing to bind you
here you will not think of exposing that delicate little sister of
yours to our March winds?"

"What do you mean?" asked Queenie sharply, "you are talking about
yourself, not Emmie, What has Emmie to do with it," shivering again
as though some cold air had passed over her.  And, strange to say,
Dora grew suddenly soft-hearted over the effect of her words, for had
she not a young sister too, and had not Flo been given back to her
from the very grave itself?

"I wish you would not look so unhappy," she went on.  "I have not
seen her for some months, and of course the change struck me, growing
children often look thin; and then she is still weak from that long
illness.  Why don't you ask Dr. Stewart about her, he will tell you
what to do; but of course you have had some advice?"

"I have had no advice.  Emmie is not ill.  Why do you come here to
make me so miserable?" returned Queenie, fixing her large eyes on her
with such a mournful expression that Dora got quite uncomfortable.

"She only wants a tonic perhaps, but I should speak to Dr. Stewart;
and, indeed, a cold spring would be very bad for her," repeated Dora,
earnestly, as she drew on her furred gloves.  Her conscience was very
uncomfortable as she stood smoothing down the soft sealskin, trying
to find some word that she might say at parting.

Queenie did not help her.  She watched her with grave unsmiling eyes
as Dora made her little preparations.  When Dora again held out her
hand to her she touched it rather reluctantly.

"Good-bye; I hope you will not bear me malice, Miss Marriott."

"I never bear any one malice; but you have made me very unhappy about
Emmie," returned Queenie, but her voice was quite steady as she
spoke.  What if her heart were breaking within her, Dora should never
know it.

But when the door closed upon her visitor, and Emmie crept softly
back into the room, her fortitude suddenly gave way.

"Come to me, Emmie; come here, my darling," and as the child obeyed
her wonderingly, she held out her arms with a sudden sob.

"You are not ill, are you, Emmie?  What do they mean by making me so
unhappy?  They say you are thin and weak; but there is nothing the
matter, is there?"

"I don't know," faltered the child, resting her fair head on her
sister's shoulder.  "I think I am only tired, Queenie.  Ought people
to be so very, very tired, and to have their bones always aching?"

"That is because you are not strong, my precious."  But somehow, as
Queenie uttered the words, the conviction seized on her that Dora was
right, and the child was certainly thinner and lighter; and such an
intolerable feeling of agony came over her at the thought that she
could not bear it.

"Oh, my darling, forgive me!" she sobbed, kissing the little pale
face passionately.

"Forgive you!  What do you mean?  What makes you cry so bitterly,
Queen?"

"Forgive me.  I was too wrapped up in myself to notice.  I never
meant to neglect you, Emmie, never.  What does my happiness or
unhappiness matter if I can only keep you with me, my blessing?"

"Shall you want to keep me if I get too dreadfully tired?" she asked,
languidly.  "Don't cry any more, Queen, I will stop just as long as I
can."  But Queenie only shivered afresh and dried her eyes.

"Sit by the fire, darling," she said, trying to return to her usual
manner.  "Patience shall give you your tea.  I shall not be very
long, Emmie."

"Are you going out again?" in a disappointed tone.  "The muffins are
all ready, and I thought we should be so cosy this evening."

"I shall not be long," repeated her sister, hastily.

She knew she could not have swallowed food in her present state of
suspense, and before Emmie could again remonstrate she had left the
cottage, and was on the way to Juniper Lodge.

She found Dr. Stewart in his surgery.  She fancied he listened a
little gravely to her account.

"She has not come under my notice for the last six or seven weeks,"
he said, as he prepared, at Queenie's urgent request, to accompany
her.  "In my opinion she has always been a delicate child.  Such an
illness as you have described may leave its effects for years."

As they entered the parlor they found Emmie stretched on the rug as
usual, and this time Queenie's heart sank within her at the sight.

"Oh, Emmie, you are not tired again?" she said, almost impatiently,
for she feared that this would impress Dr. Stewart unfavorably; but
he apparently took no notice.  He watched the child with keen
attention as she roused herself somewhat feebly, and came towards
them.

"Has Queenie asked you to make me less tired?" she demanded gravely,
fixing her blue eyes on his face.

"Young creatures like you ought never to be tired," he answered
cheerfully.  "Do you often lie down in this fashion, eh?"

"I lie down because my bones ache, and I have such an odd, funny
feeling sometimes."

And then, as Dr. Stewart questioned her jokingly about the feelings,
she told him in her childish way of all manner of strange fancies and
dreams that troubled her, and of the queer faintness that came over
her at times; and how her cough began to hurt her: and how she got
more tired and good for nothing every day.

Dr. Stewart's face grew graver as he listened.  When he had finished
a most careful examination of the child he sat for a little while in
silence, while Queenie watched him anxiously.

"I am afraid he thinks Emmie very delicate," she said to herself.
But she little knew Dr. Stewart's thoughts at that moment.

"If she had called me in earlier I could have done nothing," he
thought.  "The child is in a rapid decline.  I wonder if it would be
more merciful to tell her so at once, or to let her find it out
gradually for herself?"  And being a very tender-hearted man, he
inclined to the latter course.

So when Emmie had been sent away on some errand, and Queenie began
her anxious questioning, he answered her evasively.

"Do you think her very ill? ought I to have sent for you before, Dr.
Stewart?"

"Well, no; I don't see what I could have done.  Of course the child
is very delicate--in a very bad state of health I should say; she is
very fanciful and morbid too, all these imaginative children are.
You must rouse her and keep her cheerful."

"But was Miss Cunningham right? will the cold Spring hurt her?"

"Ah, that is just what I was going to say.  I don't think our
northern climate agrees with her, it is too strong and bracing.  You
are your own mistress, why don't you take her south?  Any
watering-place would do--Torquay, or Bournemouth, or even St.
Leonards.  The change may give her a few more months," he said to
himself.

"Sea air! is that what she needs?" asked Queenie, with a sudden
dawning of hope in her face.

Dr. Stewart shifted uneasily on his seat, and did not look at her as
he answered.

"Well, one should always make use of every possible remedy; and of
course another month of these cold winds will kill her, there is no
doubt of that."

"I will go at once; we will start immediately," almost gasped Queenie.

"I should do so by all means.  If you like, I will speak to Mr. Logan
on my way home, and see if he cannot, temporarily at least, fill up
your place.  There was a young person Faith mentioned who would be
very likely to suit.  Shall I manage this for you, eh?"

"I shall be greatly obliged if you will," she answered gratefully.

"Then about the place, where will you decide on going?  There's a
friend of mine, a doctor, a sort of connection of ours, living at St.
Leonards; he and his wife are very good people.  If you thought of
going there I would write to Bennet, and he would look after Miss
Emmie."

"I think I would rather go there, then; it will feel less lonely if
Dr. Bennet is a friend of yours," a sudden terrible sense of
isolation and banishment coming over her.

"Very well, then, we will decide on St. Leonards, and I will ask them
to look out some cheerful apartments for you.  You are not particular
about price, I dare say; and I can rely on his wife's choice.  She is
a very good homely body, and will be a great comfort to you--when the
child gets worse," he added to himself.

"When ought we to go?" she asked in a low voice, feeling all at once
as though Fate were too strong for her.

"Humph! well, suppose we say in a week from now.  I will talk to Mr.
Logan, and I dare say we can find somebody to take the cottage off
your hands.  The less leave-taking and fuss the better in such a
case, don't you think so, eh?"

"If Mr. Logan releases me there will be no difficulty about anything
else," she returned quietly, and Dr. Stewart was charmed with her
good sense and reasonableness.  She forced herself into seeming
cheerfulness when the child returned, and they sat down at last to
their long-delayed meal.  When they had finished she beckoned Emmie
to the stool at her feet.

"Darling, are you glad?" she began.  "Dr. Stewart says that I must
take you away to the sea, nothing else will make you strong."

"Does he say the sea will make me strong?" asked Emmie curiously,
"are you sure that he said that, Queen?"

"He said these cold winds will kill you," returned Queenie
shuddering, "and that was enough for me.  You will not fret at going
away, Emmie, we shall be together, and do all sorts of nice things
all day long; and when the summer comes, and you are strong again, we
can come back here and see all our kind friends."

"I hope the summer will not be too long in coming, then," she
returned dubiously.  "Oh!  I wish we had not to leave this dear
place, it will be so sad parting with Langley and dear Mr. Garth, and
Captain Fawcett, and Miss Cosie, and every one."

"Yes; but it will only be for a little time," returned her sister,
persuasively, for the child's voice was full of sadness.  "Don't you
remember, darling, that happy summer at Morecombe Bay, when dear
father was alive, and how I helped you to erect great castles on the
sand; you were such a little child then, but so strong and merry."

"I think I remember a little bit of it, and how the waves used to
sing me to sleep."

"Yes; and we shall hear the grand old lullaby again.  Now listen to
me, Emmie, and I will tell you what we will do, you and I.  We will
go to a grand hotel in London,--we are rich people now, you
know,--and we will send for Cathy, and make her spend a long day with
us."

"Oh, that will be nice," exclaimed Emmie, clapping her hands in her
old way.  "And shall we have a bright sunny room with a great
bow-window looking over the sea, like the rich people we noticed at
Morecombe Bay? and shall we ever be able to drive out in a pony
carriage?"

"I will hire the prettiest pony carriage I can find," returned
Queenie, feeling now the value of riches.  "You shall have everything
you wish for, Emmie--books and toys, and all manner of good
things--if only you will be happy with me and not fret."

"Of course I shall be happy with you," exclaimed the child, throwing
herself into her sister's arms.  "What was it Ruth said?  'Whither
thou goest I will go.'  I always think of you when I read that.  We
have been playing at being poor, and now we must play at being rich.
Oh, it will be such fun!" finished Emmie rather wearily, and Queenie
kissed the heavy eyes and said no more.




CHAPTER XIII.

"WHY DOES HE NOT COME AND SEE US?"

                            "'It is not hard to die,'
  She said, with that fair smile, 'for God's sweet will
  Makes bitter things most sweet.  In my bright youth
  He calls me to His side.  It is not hard
  To go to Him.'"--'_Ezekiel and other Poems._'


Friends came around Queenie in her trouble.  In her letter to Cathy
she compared herself, somewhat quaintly, to Job when all his
acquaintance comforted him.  For after the first few hours of
stupefied misery that followed her conversation with Dr. Stewart and
Dora, her natural courage had returned; the pain was crushed
resolutely into the background.  Her every thought must be for Emmie;
her one care to retrieve the effects of her unintentional neglect.

The cottage all at once became the centre of interest to all the good
Hepshaw folks.

Captain Fawcett could scarcely bear the child out of his sight, and
his wife's sorrow at the impending parting was a grievous thing to
see; while Miss Cosie trotted in and out perpetually, on all manner
of self-invented errands.

And Langley came, saying little, but expressing a whole world of
silent tenderness in her face and manner; and Faith Stewart, with her
quiet, helpful ways, bringing an atmosphere of rest and peace to poor
harassed Queenie.

One day Mr. Chester came, but his visit was a sadly trying one.  He
wrung Queenie's hand for some moments without speaking, and for a
long time he could not bring himself to mention the subject of her
departure.

"You were so good to me when my darling died.  I wish I could do
something to help you," he said huskily; "but then my poor Gertie is
dying, and I cannot leave her for more than an hour or two," and the
sympathy of this open-hearted man almost broke Queenie down.

One afternoon she went to say good-bye to Miss Charity.  Miss Charity
looked up at her with her bright sharp eyes very keenly.

"Ah, well, being a rich woman doesn't seem to suit you," she said,
not unkindly.  "You are not half as blithe and bonny-looking as when
you first came to Hepshaw."

"I am so anxious about Emmie," replied Queenie, hastily, for any
comment on her changed looks made her uncomfortable.  "You see, Emmie
is all I have, Miss Charity."

"Ah, well, the widow's mite was worth all the rich men's offerings,"
returned the invalid with a sigh.  "Never hold what you have got with
both hands, because then it is harder to let go.  I thought I should
have died of sheer grief when my back got bad, and poor George had to
give me up; but I thought better of it, and here I am, and here I
shall be, till my lessons are all done, and I am perfect through
patience," finished Miss Charity, with a tear twinkling on her
eyelashes.

But the one friend for whose coming she looked daily, for whose voice
and presence and sympathy she craved with a longing that surprised
herself, never crossed the threshold of the cottage.

For some reason only known to himself Garth Clayton held himself
aloof.

It was not until after morning service on Sunday that Queenie found
herself face to face with him in the plane-tree walk.  He was with
Ted and Langley, but after a moment's hesitation he left them and
came up to her.

"You are leaving us, I hear," he said, rather abruptly, and Queenie
could see he was exceedingly nervous, "and I am much grieved at the
cause; but I have great faith in sea air.  I hope--at least I
trust--that Emmie may benefit by it."

"Dr. Stewart says it is the only thing for her.  Have you seen him?
Has he given you his opinion about her?" fixing her dark eyes rather
searchingly on his face.  Dr. Stewart's ambiguity was causing her
some uneasiness.  "I wish that he--that some one--would speak plainly
to me, and tell me what he really thinks about Emmie."

"Well, you see, doctors are rather difficult people to deal with,"
returned Garth evasively, but his tone was very gentle.  "You must
not lose heart about it, you know, children are often very ill.  This
cold wind is making you shiver, I must not keep you now; I will come
over to the cottage to bid you and Emmie 'good-bye,'" and then he
smiled at her and went back to his sister.

Queenie had arranged to go over to Carlisle the next day to pay a
parting visit to Caleb and Molly.  All her affairs were now arranged;
Mr. Logan had found a temporary mistress in a young widow, a
_protégée_ of Faith Stewart's, who was lodging in Hepshaw with her
little girl, and was in search of some employment.  And Emmie, who
had taken a fancy to Mrs. Henfrey's little girl, proposed that they
should live in the cottage, "at least take care of it until we come
back," to which Queenie, desirous of gratifying the child's most
trifling whim, willingly acceded.  A bitter disappointment awaited
Queenie on her return from Carlisle.

"Oh, dear, you will be so sorry!" Emmie exclaimed, running to her as
she entered the parlor, feeling weary and dispirited.  "Langley and
Mr. Garth have been here, and he has left you a message, because he
is going away and will not see you again; and he did seem so sorry
about it."

"Going away!" repeated Queenie in a low voice, and then she sat down.
She felt all at once so strangely tired.

"Yes; I heard him tell Langley that he must take the seven o'clock
train, so he has gone long ago now.  Some uncle of theirs is ill, I
think they said he lived at Perth; but anyhow he sent for Mr. Garth
in a great hurry."

"And what was his message, Emmie?" putting up her hand to her head,
as though conscious of some numb pain.

"Well, he told me to say how sorry he was to miss you and not to say
good-bye, and that you were not to lose heart about things; and
oh--yes, he told me that twice over, that he hoped if you were in any
trouble or perplexity that you would write to him or Langley, for
they would do anything to help you.  And he kissed me half-a-dozen
times I am sure!" with a triumphant air; "and then Langley said they
must go, and he got up very slowly and went away."

"Oh, it is too hard! it is more than I can bear!" broke from
Queenie's pale lips when she was alone with her thoughts that night.
"To leave for months, for ever, perhaps, and never to wish him
good-bye, not even a word or look to treasure up in my memory."  And
for a long time she wept bitterly.

But by-and-bye she became more reasonable.  "It is wrong of me, I
ought not to wish to see him if he belongs to Dora.  Perhaps it is
better so, after all."  But, nevertheless, the bitterness of that
disappointment abided with her for many a long day.

When Langley wrote to her brother she spoke very briefly of the
leave-taking.  "Ted and I saw them off, and Mr. Logan was with us.
Emmie clung to us and cried a good deal, but Miss Marriott was very
quiet, and scarcely spoke.  She begged me to thank you for your
message, and regretted that she had not seen you, that was all."

Garth sighed over this brief message, but he understood Queenie's
reticence perfectly.  "So they are gone, and the happy Brierwood
Cottage days are over," he said to himself, as he sat in the dim,
sick room, revolving many things in his mind.

Queenie had a dreary journey.  Emmie was so exhausted with excitement
and emotion that she slept the greater part of the way, and left her
sister in perfect freedom to indulge in all manner of sad thoughts.

Queenie never recalled that day without a shudder.  A sadness,
indescribable but profound, weighed down her spirits--a feeling of
intolerable desolation and loneliness as hour after hour passed on,
and the distance lengthened between her and the friends whom she had
grown to love.

"Who knows if it may not be good-bye for ever to that dear place?"
she thought, "for if he marries Dora I will never willingly see his
face again."

She was thankful when Emmie at last woke up, to find herself at their
journey's end.  Emmie, whose imagination had been vividly aroused by
the idea of the magnificence that awaited them, was rather
disappointed by the quiet, old-fashioned hotel to which Dr. Stewart
had recommended them.  It was just the reverse of grand, she thought,
but the sight of the bright, cheerful-looking room into which the
weary travellers were ushered speedily reconciled her, and she was
soon comfortably ensconced on the great couch, contentedly watching
Queenie as she cut up her chicken.

"Now, Emmie, you must eat that and then go to bed," said her sister
decisively, as she carried the tempting tray to the sofa, and Emmie
was far too weary and docile to resist.

They were to spend two days in London, but the first few hours hung
rather heavily on Queenie's hands.  Emmie was fit for nothing but
sleep, and could not rouse herself to take interest in anything, and
Queenie did not care to leave her or to encounter the crowded streets
alone.  She spent the greater part of the day sitting idly at the
window with her hands on her lap, watching the passers-by with vague,
unseeing eyes, and living over every episode of their Hepshaw life.

The next day was better, for Cathy came to them, and the sight of her
bright face roused Queenie from her despondency.

"What do you mean by misbehaving like this, Emmie," she said, as she
knelt down by the sofa, and took the child in her arms.  "Here you
are getting ill again and making every one unhappy."

"I couldn't help it, Cathy," returned the child earnestly.  "Oh, how
good it is to see your dear face again, and how nice you look in that
black stuff gown; and do you always wear a funny little close bonnet
like that?"

"This is nurse Catherine's costume," replied Cathy, laughing and
blushing and looking very handsome.  "What do you think Mr. Logan
would say to it? and oh, my dear Madam Dignity, how worn and pale you
are!"

"It is nothing, I am quite well.  Tell me about yourself," returned
Queenie, looking fondly at her old chum.  "Do you still like your
work? does it agree with you?"

"My work is making a woman of me.  Did you ever see me look better,
Queen?"  And indeed Queenie was driven to confess that she had never
seen Cathy look more restful and satisfied.

They had a long, quiet-toned conversation while Emmie dozed in the
afternoon.  Cathy did not talk much about Emmie.  "She was delicate
and needed the greatest care," that was all she would allow, but she
was voluble on the subject of the loan, and almost overwhelmed her
friend with her delighted gratitude.

"He will get on now, dear old fellow, and it is all owing to you,"
exclaimed the affectionate girl, and somehow Queenie's sore heart
felt a little lighter.  But on her own affairs Cathy was still very
reticent.  "I don't know what I am going to do, I have not made up my
mind.  I shall stay on here and work for a time, I suppose," and
then, her color deepened, and she broke off rather suddenly.

But later on, as the three sat cosily round the fire and talked of
their old feasts in the garret, and Emmie clapped her hands and
laughed feebly over many a droll reminiscence, Queenie noticed that
now and then the keen grey eyes were full of tears, and that she
would look at her and the child rather strangely.

"Good-bye, God bless you both; and keep up a good heart, Queen," was
all she said when she left them that night.  But when she re-entered
the hospital an hour later more than one patient noticed nurse
Catherine's eyes were red, as though she had been weeping.

It was somewhat late the following afternoon when they drove into St.
Leonards and took possession of their new abode.  Emmie uttered an
exclamation of delight as she looked round the large luxurious room
prepared for their reception.  A bright fire burnt cheerily, a trim
maid-servant was spreading a snowy cloth over the little round table;
the great crimson couch was drawn invitingly near the hearth, outside
the pier light twinkled, and a windy flicker flared from the
esplanade, while the deep wash and surge of the monotonous waves
broke softly on her ears.

"Oh, Queenie, how homelike and delicious it looks! and oh, what
beautiful flowers!"

"Mrs. Bennet must have sent these," returned Queenie gratefully, as
she carried the delicate spring bouquet of violets and snowdrops to
Emmie.  "I am so glad you are pleased with our new home, darling.
Look, there is the bay-window you wanted, and behind those folding
doors is our bed-room.  Mrs. Bennet thought it would be quiet and
snug, and there would be no tiresome stairs for you to climb."

"I am sure Mrs. Bennet must be very nice," was Emmie's answer, and
then, as she seemed exhausted and disposed to close her eyes, Queenie
prudently left her to repose.

Emmie's favorable opinion of their new acquaintance was soon
verified, for the Bennets called the next day, and quite won the
sisters' hearts by their geniality and unobtrusive kindness.  Dr.
Bennet was a little bluff and hasty in manner at first, but as this
wore off he and Emmie became excellent friends.  His wife was a
quiet, motherly-looking woman, and Emmie took a fancy to her on the
spot.

"Isn't she just like dear Miss Cosie, Queen, with those grey curls
and that comfortable soft voice; if she would only say 'There, there,
poor dear,' as Miss Cosie always does," finished the child with a
quaint smile.

It was a strange new life that began for Queenie.  The links that
united her to the old had been suddenly snapped asunder, and she had
drifted away into a quiet changeless existence, which seemed almost
as unreal as a dream.

It was as though she had no separate individuality or life of her
own; her only existence was Emmie, her one thought from morning to
night how to gratify the child's capricious whims.

When Emmie opened her eyes on waking she always saw her sister by her
bedside; she would stoop over and touch her lips with the fresh, dewy
flowers she had in her hand--violets or primroses, or, later on,
lilies of the valley and fragrant tea-roses.  Emmie loved the roses
best.

"I have been out for my morning walk, and look what I have brought
you!" Queenie would say.  It was always so, always the same surprise,
the same sweet morning greeting, the same loving smile; and so it was
through the day.

Strangers began to comment on the tall, graceful girl who drove out
her little sister day after day in the pony-carriage, or, as Emmie's
strength failed, walked by the side of the Bath chair, where the
little frail figure seemed to be lost and hidden.  How Emmie loved to
watch the ships and the little brown fishing-smacks!  The shifting
groups on the esplanade pleased and amused her; the music on the pier
charmed her.  As the daylight faded away, and the waves grew solemn
and grey in the twilight, she would lie on her couch contentedly for
hours, while Queenie read or sung to her and told her the simple
tales of her own production.

"I never dared to think; I just prayed, and so my little stock of
daily strength was recruited, like the widow's cruse," Queenie said
very simply long afterwards to one who questioned her of that sad
summer.  "Life just then meant Emmie to me, and nothing else."

It was true; she never dared to think.  Week by week and month by
month the brave-hearted girl crushed down the dull aching pain of
weary suspense and doubt; month by month she bore the loneliness of
that sad watching, with the end plainly before her, and yet no
complaint of her bitter load of trouble harassed the kind hearts of
the friends she had left.

Very brief and touching were her few letters to Langley; but they
told little save the record of their daily life--"Emmie was no
better, or a little weaker," and that was all.

One day, about two months after they had been settled at St.
Leonards, a letter came from Garth.  The sight of the handwriting
made Queenie tremble with sudden emotion; but her face soon paled and
saddened as she read it.

It was brief, but kind, and had evidently been written with great
care.  It spoke of the death of their uncle, who was almost a
stranger to his nephews and nieces, but who had taken a fancy to
Garth in his last illness and had left him his little all.

"It is not a great fortune," wrote Garth, "it is something less than
two or three thousand pounds; but it has quite replaced my
unfortunate Bank loss.  We are all more thankful than we can say.  It
makes me especially happy, because I can now repay you the loan you
have so generously advanced to me without any further delay.  As I am
anxious to settle this matter at once, I shall be glad if you will
let me know into whose hands I am to pay the money."  And then
followed a few kind enquiries after her and Emmie.

Poor Queenie, her answer was very stiff and cold.  "How pleased he is
to be quit of his obligation to me.  How the thought of this debt has
galled and harassed him," she thought, as she slowly and laboriously
penned those few words.  Garth's face grew puzzled and pained as he
read them.  It is not always easy to read between the lines.

But as the summer wore on Queenie grew graver and sadder, for even to
her loving eyes Emmie was slowly but surely fading away.

The change had come on imperceptibly: first the drives in the
pony-carriage were discontinued, then the Bath-chair was found too
fatiguing; by-and-bye Queenie lifted the child's light form and
carried it morning after morning to the couch in the bay-window.
There was no question of even walking from one room to another.  At
the smallest exertion there were long fainting fits that drove
Queenie almost frantic with alarm.

"Oh, if only Langley or Cathy could be with me now!" was her one
wish.  But, alas! there was no hope of this.

She knew there was a troubled household at Church-Stile House.
Langley was ill, and Cathy had been summoned home to tend her sister.
The long nursing at Karldale Grange had broken down her strength, and
as soon as Gertrude Chester had drawn her last breath there had been
a sudden collapse that had alarmed her brother.

"She was slightly better, but in a frightfully weak state," Cathy
wrote, "and likely to remain so for some time, Dr. Stewart said, and
so there was nothing for it but for her to relinquish her hospital
work and come home."

"Dr. Stewart calls us the model nurse and patient; and, indeed,
Langley is such a patient creature that it is a pleasure to fend for
her, as folk say," Cathy wrote.  "Poor old Garth took her illness
sadly to heart, but after Dr. Stewart's last visit he has seemed more
cheerful; and so, you see, why you must do without your Church-Stile
House friend, my dear Queenie, though I am longing from morning to
night for a peep at you and Emmie."

Queenie kept the contents of this letter to herself; it would never
do to harass the child's mind with any fresh anxiety, so she answered
all her questions cheerfully, though with some necessary evasion.
"Cathy had gone home, and Langley was overtired and far from strong,"
that was all she told her.

For Emmie's spirits were drooping with her strength.  All manner of
anxious thoughts seemed brooding in the childish brain.

"What ails you, darling?  What are you thinking about?" Queenie would
ask her, anxiously, but for many days she would not answer.

But one evening as she was lying on her couch, watching the rosy
gleam on the water fade into grey silvery streaks, while the soft
musical wash of the waves seemed to lull her restlessness for a
little, she suddenly stretched out her thin arm and drew her sister's
head down to the pillow.

"Rest there a few minutes, Queen, you are so tired, and I want to
talk to you.  Doesn't the moon look lovely shining through the
clouds?  How many evenings do you think you and I will have together?"

"Hush, Emmie; only God knows, not you nor I."

"When He says 'Come' I must go, mustn't I, Queen."

"Oh yes, my darling!"

"I am so tired that I shall not mind going.  I have almost forgotten
what it is to run about and play as other children do.  I think it
will be nice to lie down and go sliding through the clouds like that
girl in the picture, and then when I wake up there will be Nan and
Alice, and Uncle Andrew and mamma.  Oh, how nice to see mamma again!"

"Nice to leave me, darling?" trying to restrain a sob.

"Ah, that is the only sorrowful part," returned the child, pressing
Queenie's head between her weak arms.  "Oh, my Queen! my Queen!
whatever will you do without me?" and for a short time the sisters'
clung to each other, unable to speak.

Queenie was the first to recover herself.

"Never mind, Emmie; you must not fret; God will take care of me."

"Yes, I know, but I cannot help fretting.  You look so sad and
altered somehow, and all the light has gone out of your dear
beautiful eyes; you are so good to me, and you smile and try to be
cheerful, but I know--I know all about it, Queen."

"You know what, my precious?"

"Why, I know how lonely you are, and how you miss them all.  When I
go away," rather timidly, "won't Mr. Garth come and take care of you?"

"Emmie, my darling, what has put such a notion into your head?"

"Isn't it true then?" half crying.  "I thought you were fond of him,
and liked him better than any one else.  Wasn't he the prince in your
stories? he was always dark-haired, and tall, and strong, and that
made me think of Mr. Garth."

In the dim light a hot flush passed over Queenie's wan face; Emmie
softly stroked it with her trembling fingers.

"Ah, you will not answer; but I know all about it.  I am only a
child, but I love Mr. Garth dearly, dearly.  Why doesn't he come and
see us, Queen? haven't you told him I am ill?"

"Yes; he knows it," almost inaudibly.

"Then why does he not come?" she persisted.  "If I were not tired I
would write to him myself; do you think I could?"

"Not just now, by-and-bye," she replied, hardly thinking of what she
was saying, and trying only to quiet her; and Emmie, satisfied with
this vague permission, nestled against her sister contentedly, and
said no more.




CHAPTER XIV.

"EMMIE'S LETTER."

  "I cannot take that anguish'd look to wear
  On my calm heart in heaven, as my last,
  Last memory of thee until we meet.
  Nay, thou must smile on me; one little smile
  Cast like a wild-flower on my misty way
  Will make it brighter, and I cannot go
  In peace until thou bless me."
                              '_Ezekiel and other Poems._'


Emmie's closing remarks that night had left no distinct impression on
her sister's mind; but Queenie had little idea of the tenacity with
which the child brooded over the matter, or how the weary young brain
confused itself with endless plans and plotting.  That some one must
take care of Queenie, that was her one thought.

And so one morning, when Queenie had softly crept out of her room,
thinking Emmie's closed eyelids betokened sleep, and had started for
her fresh morning walk, the child painfully and slowly dragged
herself from her bed, and with failing breath, and hands that
trembled over their task, penned the pitiful little letter that wrung
Garth's heart as he read it.

Queenie found her on her return lying wan and exhausted on her
pillow, and bent over her with undisguised anxiety.

"Where is Harriet, darling?  She ought not to have neglected you in
this way," she exclaimed in distress, putting back the curls from the
child's damp forehead.

Emmie only closed her eyes in answer, but an odd little smile hovered
round her lips.  She knew that Harriet was that moment walking down
the Esplanade, towards the red pillar-box on the green.

And this was the letter that Garth read and handed to Langley with
undisguised emotion, and over which Langley cried until her feeble
strength was nearly exhausted.

"Dear Mr. Garth," it began, "you are such a long way off--you and
Langley and Cathy, and we never hear from you now; and Queenie has
left off talking about you, and has taken to sighing instead; and I
want so badly to see you, and have a long, long talk.  If you knew
how badly, I am sure you would come.

"I don't think people ever die without saying good-bye to their
friends, and I want to bid you good-bye, and ask you to take care of
Queenie.  Some one must take care of her, you know; and I like you so
much, dear Mr. Garth; and I think no one will be so good and kind to
her as you would be.

"Queenie does not know that I am writing this; she has gone out to
buy me some roses.  She is doing something for me from morning to
night, but I am sure it would make you sad to see her.  She never
smiles now, and her eyes are always full of tears.  She is thinking
of the time when she will be missing me.  It will be soon now, for I
get more tired every day.

"Do come, my dear, dear Mr. Garth.  I think I like you next best to
any one in the world but Queenie, except perhaps Langley and Cathy.
Do come, please, to

"Your loving and tired little Emmie."


Queenie was sadly disturbed by the child's restlessness during that
day and the next; all her sweet placidity seemed gone.  She was
feverish and eager; it was difficult to soothe her.  She started at
every sound; an opening door, even the stoppage of vehicles in the
street, would bring the flush to her white face, and she would sit up
among her pillows, palpitating and expectant.

"What is it, Emmie darling?  What is the matter?" Queenie would say
to her over and over again.

"Oh, it is nothing; I am only very silly," the child would answer,
sinking back with a disappointed face.  Of course her letter had not
reached him, it was such a long, long way off.  How was it possible
for him to come yet?  And then a new fear tormented her.  If he
delayed at all, if he took a long time to think about it, would he be
in time?

It was on the evening of the second day when this fresh thought began
to harass her.  The day had been hot and thundery, and she had
suffered much from the oppression of the atmosphere.

When Dr. Bennet saw her that night he let fall a word or two that
stirred Queenie's numb pain to sharp, positive agony.

"You think she is worse, Dr. Bennet?  I can read it in your face,"
she asked, her poor hands working with the effort to keep calm.

"I think there is a change of some sort; you must be prepared for
anything now, my dear Miss Marriott.  Poor little soul, one cannot
wish her to suffer," continued the warm-hearted doctor, who had
daughters of his own.

"No; I do not wish her to suffer, God forbid that I should be so
selfish; but oh, Emmie!" and then she turned away, lest the bitter
flood of her sorrow should overwhelm her.  There would be time enough
to weep when her work was finished, she needed all her strength for
Emmie now.

But that night there was no sleep for her eyes.  Hour after hour she
sat beside the failing child; fanning her softly, watching her
through her short intervals of sleep, and listening to the dull
lapping of the waves on the sand.

Once she dozed off and lost herself.  The shaded sick-room had
disappeared, the monotonous wash of the surge had lulled to sleep her
drowsy ear.  She was at Church-Stile House again.  There was the
plane-tree walk, and the church.  The little gate swung lightly on
its hinges; a dark, handsome face looked in at the window and smiled
at her; and she woke with a start to find raindrops pattering against
the window, and the night-lamp paling beside the grey dawn.

"I don't think that I shall get up to-day, so I shall not tire your
poor arms," was Emmie's plaintive remark that morning.

"Do you feel weaker, my darling? would you rather be spared the
trouble of dressing?"

"Yes; I would rather lie still and be quiet.  If you open the folding
doors I can see a little bit of the sea, and it does not sound so
loud here.  I think it is coming, Queen; and oh, I did want to be a
little longer with you!"

"What is coming, my pet?" for the child's voice was very sad, and the
tears were rolling down her cheeks.  "Oh, don't cry, Emmie!  I would
rather endure a lifetime of sorrow than see you shed a single tear,"
and Queenie trembled all over.

"But it is so hard," sobbed the child.  "I only wanted this, and then
I could have gone so happily; just to say good-bye, and to know that
he was taking care of you.  I have so prayed for it; and now he will
come too late.  Hush! what is that, Queen?  There are footsteps in
the next room, did you hear them?"

"It is only Dr. Bennet, my darling," returned her sister, marvelling
at her exceeding agitation.  Whom did she expect?  What impossible
arrival was she conjuring up in her sick brain?  "Hush! it is only
Dr. Bennet, he promised to come early, and we have no other visitor,
you know.  Lie down again, Emmie, and I will bring him to you."

The sunshine streamed through the bay window as she closed the
folding doors behind her softly.

"I am so thankful you have come, Dr. Bennet," she began breathlessly,
and then she stopped, and her heart seemed to cease beating for a
moment.

"I am not Dr. Bennet, but I trust you are not sorry to see me," said
a familiar voice in her ear, the voice that had vibrated through her
waking and sleeping dreams; and there was Garth looking at her, and
holding out his hand, with his old kind smile.

"You here? you, of all people in the world!" she gasped, for she was
dazed with want of sleep, and the sudden appearance of this dearest
friend seemed to her more dream-like than real; even the pressure of
his hand scarcely reassured her.  "I am so stupid, I don't seem to
believe it somehow," she said, wrinkling her brows, and looking at
him with such grave, unsmiling eyes that Garth grew almost as grave
as she.

"Emmie sent for me; she wrote such a sweet little childish letter
that I could not keep away.  Why did you not send for me if things
were as bad as this?" looking down at her pale face with mingled
feelings of pity and love.  Worn and jaded and weary as she looked,
with all her brightness quenched, he felt it was the dearest face in
the world to him.

"Emmie sent for you, and I never knew it! then it is you she has been
expecting these two days.  Oh, Mr. Clayton, do you know that she is
dying; that I shall soon be without her, the only thing that belongs
to me in the whole world?" and moved by the sympathy of his face,
Queenie sank down on the couch, and covered her face with her hands.

"Yes, I know all about it, and Langley and I are more sorry for you
than I can say.  Cathy wanted to come with me, but she could not
leave Langley."

"But you came.  Oh, it is so good of you; and this is such a poor
welcome," trying to smile at him through her tears.

"I could not expect otherwise," he returned, in an odd, constrained
voice, for he was just then restraining with difficulty the longing
to take her in his arms and comfort her like a child.  Did she
understand his feelings? he wondered, for there was a little flush in
her face as she moved away, saying that she would tell Emmie.

"May I come with you?" he asked; but he followed her without
permission, and so caught the child's first look of ecstasy.

"Oh, Mr. Garth, Mr. Garth!" was all she said, and then she nestled
down contentedly in his strong arms, and laid her head on his
shoulder, and the weak hands went up and stroked his face.

"You see I have come, dear Emmie," he said at last, very gently.  "I
have answered your letter in person.  You were sure of me, were you
not?"

"Yes, I was sure," she answered, doubtfully.  "But last night I got
unhappy, for I feared it would be too late.  And now you are going to
promise me to take care of Queenie?"

"Emmie, my dear one, hush!" exclaimed poor Queenie, for her cheeks
were flaming at this.

"Let the child speak," he returned very quietly, but firmly; "we must
not let her have anything on her mind.  And she wrote to me, you
know.  Emmie has always had faith in me," with an intonation that
made Queenie droop her head and be ashamed of her doubts.

"Yes; do let me speak, Queen; I have been so dreadfully unhappy, and
I have not much breath for this odd catching in my throat.  Mr.
Garth, I am not wrong; you do love Queenie, do you not?"

"Yes, dearly," was the unexpected response, very gravely made.

"Oh, I am so glad!" trying to clap her hands in her old way; but they
dropped heavily, and he caught them.  "And you will promise me to
take care of her, and try and make her happy all her life?"

"Yes, by God's help, and if she will have it so," in a low but very
distinct tone.  And now his hand sought hers, and kept it.

"Let him go now, my darling," exclaimed Queenie, wildly, and hardly
knowing what she would say, and only conscious of the strong pressure
of the hand that held hers.  "All this is making you worse."  And oh,
what would he think of them both?

"No; it makes me happy," returned the child, faintly.  "Now I am
quite ready to go to sleep as Nan did.  You have not kissed her, Mr.
Garth.  And is there not something else that people always do?" a
little restlessly.  "I thought they wore a ring, or something?"

He half smiled at that, and drew off the heavy seal ring from his
little finger.  "Let us humor her," his eyes seemed to say to
Queenie; and weak and confused, she hardly knew how to resist.  The
ring was on her finger before she knew it, and he had lightly touched
her cheek with his lips.  "What does it matter, dear? we understood
each other before this," she heard him say; "at least you must have
understood me."  And then he rose from his seat and placed the child
in her arms.

The rest of the day was a dream to Queenie; she never stirred from
Emmie's side.  Garth came in and out in a quiet, business-like way,
but he never stayed long.  Once or twice he brought some refreshment
to her, and remained beside her until she had taken it.  "You must
eat it, or you will be ill," he said, very gravely, when she would
have refused it.  After the first, Emmie seemed hardly conscious of
his presence; a fainting fit had followed the excitement of the
morning, and there had been only a partial rally.  She lay through
the remainder of the day motionless and speechless, with her hand in
her sister's, and a faint flicker of her old innocent smile round her
lips.  Once only she brightened visibly when Garth stooped and kissed
her.  "Now I am happy," Queenie heard her say.  "Dear Mr. Garth, I
know he will take care of her!"

It was late in the evening when she roused to full consciousness.
The day had been sultry, and the folding doors had been flung open,
and now a pleasant breeze swept from the sea and blew refreshingly
through the room.  Garth was pacing up and down on the balcony.  The
moon had already risen, and a broken pathway of light seemed to
stretch over the dark water.  By-and-bye a star trembled on the edge
of a long fleecy cloud.  Through the open window he could catch a
glimpse of the little fair form propped up with pillows, with the
patient figure beside it; now and then a low tone reached his ears.

"Are we alone, Queen?  Where is Mr. Garth?"

"He is out there, looking at the sea; it is so beautiful to-night.
Shall I call him, dear?"

"No; I like to feel that we are alone together once more, just you
and I.  We have always been so happy together, have we not, Queen?"

"Yes, yes, my darling."

"There will be so many waiting for me there--mamma and papa, and
Uncle Andrew, and Nan, and Captain Fawcett's little girl; but
sometimes I am afraid that I shall miss you very badly, dear.  I hope
it is not wicked to feel that."

"No, of course not, my pet; but God will take care of that; He will
not let you miss me too much."

"Never to be tired again, how strange that will be!" continued the
dying child.

Queenie softly repeated the words, "Come unto Me, all ye that are
weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

"Ah, that sounds nice.  You always say such comforting things.  I
know I have tired you dreadfully, Queen, and made you very unhappy,
but you will soon be better, will you not?"

"I will try," in a faint voice, striving to repress her agitation,
for a strange, indefinable expression seemed stealing over the
child's face.

"When you are sad you must say to yourself, 'Emmie likes me to be
happy,' and then you will feel better, you know; but I can't talk any
more, the sea sounds so close.  Kiss me and say good night, Queen."

A little while afterwards, when Garth stole softly to the door of the
sick room, the sisters were still clinging together; but going still
closer, he saw that Queenie was unconsciously rocking a dead face
upon her bosom.


He had taken the child from her arms, and then led her gently from
the room, and she had not resisted him; she only laid her face down
on the arm of the chair where he had placed her, and wept as though
the very flood-gates of her being were unloosed.

"Yes, cry, dear, it will do you good," was all he said to her, but
for a long time he stood beside her; just smoothing her soft hair
with his hand, but tenderly, as though she were a child, until the
first bitterness of her anguish was past, and then she said quietly
that she must go back to Emmie.

"But not to-night, dear, surely not to-night!" looking down with
infinite pity at her poor drowned face and half-extinguished eyes.

"Yes; to-night.  No one must do anything for her but me; it is only
putting her to bed for the last time, you know," in so pitiful a
voice that it broke his resolution.

"Ah, well, I must not hinder you, I suppose, but I only wish I knew
what was right in such a case.  If only Langley or Cathy were here!"

"I will not stay long, I will promise you that."

"Then I will trust you.  Remember you belong to me now, Emmie gave
you to me," and then he took her in his arms and kissed her forehead,
and let her go.

But he did not see her again for three whole days.  Her work was
finished, and the brave, bright spirit had given way at last.  The
next day she was too ill to rise, and lay looking at the flowers he
sent her, and some locks of fair hair that she had cut from Emmie's
head.  It was not until the evening of the second day that she crept
for an hour to Emmie's room.  Garth was out, but on his return they
showed him the results of her handiwork.

The child looked fair as a sculptured angel, laid under a perfect
quilt of flowers--roses white and creamy, and delicate
cape-jessamine.  A cross of frail white blossoms lay on her breast;
some half-opened rose-buds had been pushed into her dead hand, but on
the sweet lips lay Emmie's own smile.

"Never to be tired more!" could one look at that perfect rest, that
marble calm, and wish the worn-out child back to suffer again?
Queenie could not, though she wept, and wept as though her heart were
broken, though at night she stretched out her empty arms in the
darkness, and no light form nestled into them.  "It is well with my
darling now," she would sob.

It was in the evening of the third day when Garth saw her again; he
had sent her a little note, telling her of some necessary
arrangements that he had made, and she had come down to him in her
black dress, and with the palest face he had ever seen.

"How ill--how dreadfully ill you look," he said in a shocked voice,
as he sprang to meet her.  "My dear Queenie, this is not right; they
ought not to have permitted you to rise."

"Mrs. Bennet thought the change down-stairs might do me good," she
returned, in a weak, hollow voice that scarcely seemed to belong to
her; "and I--I wanted to see you, and thank you for what you have
done."

"And my arrangements have satisfied you?"

"Perfectly and entirely."

"That is well," smiling at her; "then I have not worked in vain.  And
you"--hesitating a little, "you will be guided by my advice about the
day after to-morrow."

"Oh no, I cannot," clasping her hands with a little sob.  "Dr. Bennet
says it will not really hurt me, if I have set my heart on going, and
I am stronger--much stronger now."

"But you will faint--something will surely happen to you; you are
unfit to move," he remonstrated.

"No, I will be very good, if you will only take me," she implored.
"If you refuse, I shall lose heart altogether, and then indeed I
shall be worse; please give way to me in this;" and he reluctantly
consented.

But he need not have feared for her.  Queenie went through the
painful ordeal with a calmness that surprised him.  True she trembled
a good deal, and the brown eyes looked cloudy with unshed tears, and
once she quitted his arm, and knelt down and kissed the sods that
covered her darling; but there was no undue manifestation of grief,
and he left her quiet and outwardly calm when he walked back to his
hotel.

But the next evening he found her looking worn and ill; she was
sitting by the window with a little old Bible of Emmie's in her lap.
She laid it aside as she greeted him.

"Do you know that I must be going back to Hepshaw, and that you and I
must have some conversation together?" he said in a meaning voice, as
he took the chair beside her.  She changed color at that, and then he
saw her nervously pulling off the seal ring from her finger.

"I must not forget that this is your property," she said, not looking
at him, but straight out of the window; and he saw that her face and
even her throat were suffused with crimson.  "I know how kindly you
meant it, and I ought to have given it back before."

"It is certainly a shabby old ring, but you might have kept it until
I had replaced it by another," taking possession of the hand and the
ring too.

"But--but it all meant nothing," she stammered.  "It was good of you
to quiet my darling, and give in to her fancy, but of course I
understood that it all meant nothing."

"Did it mean nothing when I took you in my arms and kissed you the
other night?"

"Oh, Mr. Clayton, how can you?" turning away and covering her face
with her hand; he had still possession of the other.

"Did it mean nothing that I told Emmie that I loved you dearly, and
would care for you, God helping me, all my life? did you say a
dissenting word then?"

"No; I was too stunned, too overwhelmed.  I could say or do nothing
at all."

"Do you mean to tell me now that you will have nothing to do with my
love? that it is valueless to you, Queenie?  Surely you can care for
me a little!" with such a loving glance that she could not meet it.

"It is not that--that I cannot care, I mean; you know that there are
other things in the way."

"Do you mean your money?  I have been thinking over that all these
months, and I have come to the conclusion that I have been a sorry
coward in the matter.  Things somehow look to me quite different.  If
we love each other--if you can care for me as your words seem to
imply--why should this trumpery money part us?  I would rather have
you without it," after a pause, during which she had not spoken.  "I
would prefer your being our schoolmistress still; but it can't be
helped.  Besides, I am in a better position myself, and business is
flourishing; and, whatever people say, I shall never need to live on
my wife's money.  You see I am speaking openly to you, dear, and as
though things were already settled between us."

"Yes; but Dora! how about Dora?" and now he felt the trembling of the
hand he held.

He became grave at that, all the more that he read the unspoken
anxiety in her eyes.

"I will tell you all about that if you are sure you can listen."  And
as she signified her assent, he told her briefly of his old
connection with Dora, and his intentions concerning her; and how she
had repulsed him and kept him at bay until he had risen against her
tyranny, and had at last freed himself.  "It was not love that I felt
for her at all; I found that out in time to save us from a life-time
of misery.  I never knew what love was till I came that night in the
gloaming and saw you kneeling on the hearth, my darling, with the
plate of cakes in your hand."

"Did you love me then?" very shyly.

"Then and ever afterwards.  Do not let Dora be mentioned again
between us, she is only my old playmate and friend.  She never has
been, she never can be, the one woman in the world to me; you only
can be that."

And Queenie believed him.  And so Garth replaced the old seal ring on
her finger.  "Only until I can find one more worthy of your
acceptance," as he said to her.

"But I never mean to part with this," she returned tearfully.  "You
put it on to please dear Emmie, and it made her happy to see it.  Oh,
Garth, was it not good of my darling to bring us together?"  And
Queenie hid her face on his arm and wept with mingled sorrow and joy.




CHAPTER XV.

GARTH'S WIFE.

  "Sole partner, and sole part of all these joys,
  Dearer thyself than all."--_Milton._


It cost Garth a severe struggle to leave his betrothed and go back to
his business at Hepshaw; but his presence was imperatively needed at
the quarry, and Queenie, with her usual unselfishness and good sense,
was the first to perceive the necessity.

"How can I find it in my heart to leave you just now?" he said the
next morning, when he had walked up from his hotel to spend an hour
or two with her.  Perhaps her deep mourning made her seem so thin and
pale; but there was certainly a wasted look about her, as though she
had passed through a long illness.

"But you must leave me," she replied gently.  "You are wanted at
Warstdale; and then Langley needs you.  I will not have you neglect
your duties for me; you have been here already ten days, have you
not?"

"Yes; but Langley has Cathy, and you are all alone," he remonstrated.
"Dear Queenie, could you not rouse yourself and come back with me?
and we would all nurse you well again."

She shook her head sadly.

"No, no; Cathy has enough on her hands, you do not want another
invalid at Church-Stile House; besides, I am not fit to travel just
now, Dr. Bennet said so only yesterday.  He told me I must have quiet
and rest."

"You know he and his wife have offered to take care of you.  What
good Samaritans they are!"

"Yes, indeed, they are everything that is kind; but, Garth,"
hesitating shyly over his name, "you will not ask me to do that.
They are very good, dear people, but they are comparative strangers.
I could not bear to leave this place; I am only just fit to lie and
look at the sea all day, and think of you and Emmie."

"I know it will be bad for you; but I don't see what else is to be
done," he returned despondingly.  "Warstdale won't do without me; but
I shall not have a moment's peace until I have you safely in my own
keeping.  Will you promise to be well in a fortnight, if I come back
and fetch you?"

"A fortnight is too short a time, I shall hardly be strong then,"
with a sigh of mental and bodily weakness that was sad to hear.

Dear as his presence was to her, and sweet the knowledge of their
mutual love, it taxed her over-wrought strength sorely to sit and
talk to him.

"Three weeks, then?  I cannot be longer without seeing you."

"I will try to be ready for you then," she answered, with one of her
rare, sweet smiles.  Then, as she read the unspoken anxiety in his
eyes, "Indeed, you must not be troubled about me; I will not fret
more than I can help, and I have such sweet, happy thoughts about my
darling; and then I cannot feel really lonely when I have you.  Oh,
Garth, if you only knew how different life looks to me now!" and for
a little while she clung to him.

But though she sent him away half comforted she knew that she never
needed him so sorely as during the miserable days of prostration and
nervous depression that followed his departure; and but for very
shame she would have recalled him.

For a little time she was utterly broken, and could only lie and
weep, and pray that strength might be given her to bear her trouble.
For ever through the lonely days and in the darkness of her sleepless
nights Emmie's plaintive voice seemed sounding in her ears--"We have
been so happy together, have we not, Queen?"  The last clasp of the
weak arms round her--she could feel their touch still; and the heavy
drop of the head that Garth had lifted so tenderly from her bosom.
Was she dead?  She had not known it; even now she never thought of
her as dead.  During the brief snatches of slumber that came to her
she was for ever carrying the light figure to and fro; there were the
fair curls, the great, solemn blue eyes, the innocent smile playing
round her mouth.  "Am I very heavy? do I tire your arms, Queen?  Oh,
it is so nice to be together, just you and I!"

But Queenie bravely battled with her sorrow; and she was not without
her consolation.  Letters came to her from Church-Stile House--sweet,
loving ones from Langley and Cathy, and others that she read with a
happy smile, and hid under her pillow.

Garth's letters were very short and kind.  They were not specially
lover-like, there was no protestation of affection in them; but the
whole breathed a spirit of quiet, watchful tenderness--the tenderness
that a good man gives to the woman who has entrusted her future to
him.

How Queenie loved these letters; they seemed to give fresh life to
her.

"You have had good news, I can see," Dr. Bennet would say to her when
he came in, and found her a little less languid, and with a faint
color in her cheeks.

He was very watchful over the girl, and almost fatherly in his manner
to her; he drove her himself to the cemetery when she craved for
another sight of the little green mound.  There was to be a marble
cross at the head, and the little garden ground was to be planted
with all the flowers that Emmie loved--her favorite roses, and in the
spring time snowdrops and violets and lilies of the valley.
Kind-hearted Mrs. Bennet promised to look after it when Queenie
should be away in her northern home.


Garth's secret source of uneasiness when he had reached Hepshaw, and
had received his sisters' delighted congratulations, was how he
should break the news to Dora, and how she would receive it?  He had
made a clean breast of the whole thing to Queenie, as in duty bound,
and then had bade her dismiss the matter from her mind.  Dora and he
were unsuited for each other; they were just old playmates and
friends, that was all.  He had no idea that Dora in her jealous
desperation had appealed to Queenie, nor was Queenie ever likely to
inform him.

Should he send Cathy over to Crossgill Vicarage to break the news, or
should he write a little note to the Vicar?  Somehow he shrank from
writing to the girl herself, but before he could make up his mind the
difficulty was solved for him.

One of those endless little notes, inviting him to a business
consultation with Mr. Cunningham, reached him about three days after
his arrival, but this time Flo had written it.  Dora had hurt her
hand, but she sent her kind regards to Mr. Clayton, and would he do
them the pleasure, as papa wanted him so badly, and so on?  Of course
Dora had dictated the clever little letter.

Garth winced and reddened over it, and something like "Confound these
clever women" sounded through his moustache; but, all the same, he
told himself that he must go.  "I have been a fool for my pains, and
I suppose I must pay the penalty for being a fool," he thought, with
a shrug of his shoulders; but the idea of that drawing-room at
Crossgill Vicarage was odious to him.

No one need have envied him when he got into his dog-cart and drove
along the familiar road.  He had resolved to brave it out, and had
written a very friendly and facetious answer to Flo.  Nevertheless,
he was very nervous and confused when he followed old nurse across
the little hall.

By some accident he was unusually late, and they were all in the
drawing-room, even Mr. Cunningham, who gently scolded him for his
want of punctuality.

"He is not so very late, papa; and cook can easily put back the
dinner a quarter of an hour," observed Dora, placidly.  She had met
Garth in a perfectly friendly manner.  "Mr. Clayton, will you go
up-stairs at once, please, it does not matter in the least, only papa
is so methodical in his ways.  Our dinner hour ought to have been
enrolled among the laws of the Medes and Persians."

"As I ought to have known by this time," returned Garth, with a
nervous laugh, and then he took himself off, and found old nurse
unpacking his portmanteau.

Dinner passed over pretty comfortably.  He could talk with the girls,
and, as he was a favorite with them, they found plenty to say to him.
Dora was rather quiet, but she was perfectly good-humored, though
perhaps a trifle dignified; but in her white dress she looked almost
as young and girlish as her sisters.

Still it was a relief when he and Mr. Cunningham were left to their
business _tête-à-tête_, and he could relax a little from his company
manners.  When they had disposed of their business the Vicar seemed
inclined to settle himself to his usual nap, but Garth began to
fidget.

"I won't keep you a moment, and I must go into the drawing-room.  But
you are such an old friend, Mr. Cunningham, that I thought--" and
then he managed to blurt it out.

The Vicar was wide awake enough now.

"Dear, dear," he observed, in a perplexed and slightly annoyed voice,
"who would have thought of this?  Does Dora--do the girls know?"

"Not at present; but I am going in to tell them."

"Do so, do so by all means," with a glance towards the door.  "They
will be surprised, of course; I am.  Who would have dreamed you were
such a deep fellow, Garth, and taking us all in like this?  And the
young woman has money, eh?"

"I am sorry to say Miss Marriott has a large fortune," returned
Garth, stiffly.  "Neither of us wanted it."

"Of course not; but, all the same, you have managed to do a good
thing for yourself.  Young and rich and good-looking.  Well, my dear
fellow, I congratulate you, though I own I never was more surprised
in my life."  And Mr. Cunningham sighed as he stretched out his white
hands to the fireless grate.  Evidently the news had not pleased him.

"I am in for it now," thought Garth, as he opened the drawing-room
door.  Of course Dora was alone, he expected that; but he could see
the slim figures of the girls passing to and fro between the
flower-beds.  To his surprise Dora bade him call them in.

"Unless you would like to go out and join them," she said, just
lifting her eyes from her work, but not inviting him by word or
gesture to sit down.

"I hope you don't mean to dismiss me like this," he returned lightly.
"We will go out to the girls by-and-bye, but just now I have
something I want to tell you."

"I thought you never wanted to tell me things now," she answered,
plaintively, and her bosom heaved a little, and her blue eyes began
to soften and gleam dangerously.

"Oh yes, I do; you must not say such unkind things to me, Dora.  I
hope I may tell my old playmate of a piece of good fortune that has
befallen me.  I wonder whether it will be news to you, or whether my
visit south will have enlightened you.  Do you know I am going to be
married?"

"To whom?" she asked.  But she did not flinch, neither did her voice
change in the least.

"To Miss Marriott."

"Of course I knew it," she returned, taking up her work and sewing
hurriedly.  "You know you told me on your last visit that Miss
Marriott had come into a large fortune.  I congratulate you, Mr.
Clayton, you have done exceedingly well for yourself."

If she had wished to mortify and exasperate him she had entirely
succeeded.

"Why do you and your father speak as though Miss Marriott's fortune
was any inducement?" he returned, hotly.  "Surely you know me better
than that!  It is the money that has been the stumbling-block all
these months.  I would marry her gladly and proudly if she had not a
penny, and were still the school-mistress of Hepshaw."

"Ah, you always were Quixotic," was the repressive answer.

Garth was silent.  He was inwardly provoked that she chose to
misunderstand him; and he had a sore feeling that, after all their
friendship, she should not have a kind word for him.  But, looking at
her, he saw that she had grown strangely pale, and that her hand was
trembling; and then his heart grew very soft.

"Don't let us quarrel," he implored.  "We have always been such good
friends, have we not, Dora?  You know there is no one except Miss
Marriott and my sisters whom I can compare with you, I have always so
trusted and respected you.  You will wish me God-speed in my new
life, will you not?"

"Yes, Mr. Clayton, I will wish you that," she returned, very calmly,
as she took up her work again.  "Now you must go and call in the
girls, as Flo is delicate and the dews are falling."

But Garth did a strange thing before he went, for, as he stood
looking at his old playmate a little sadly and tenderly, he suddenly
stooped over her and touched the little hands with his lips.  He had
had a sort of tenderness for her, and now the tie was broken between
them.  But whatever she thought of the liberty Dora never spoke or
raised her head, and for the rest of the evening she was very quiet.

Garth breathed more freely after this; but time hung heavily on his
hands until the stipulated three weeks were over, and he could start
for St. Leonards.  He and his sisters held long consultations
together about the future.  Queenie was to pay them a long, long
visit, and was to recover her strength; and early in the spring he
would persuade her, in spite of her deep mourning, to marry him
quietly.

"She is all alone, and there is plenty of room for us," as both he
and Langley agreed.

But he grumbled sadly over her looks when he saw her again: the
beautiful eyes had not regained their old brightness, though they
looked so lovingly at him.

"I have wanted you! how I have wanted you!" she whispered, as she
came, oh, so gladly, into his out-stretched arms.

"Not more than I have wanted you, my darling."

"Oh, yes; more, a great deal more; but now you are here all will be
well with me.  I am very weak still, but I know you will take care of
me, and be patient until I get bright again."

"My dearest, can you doubt it?" he returned very gravely.  And indeed
he was good to her, too good she sometimes thought.

But it needed all his support and tenderness to make the long journey
even bearable to her; and she was sadly exhausted when they drove
over the little bridge and under the dark plane-trees, and he lifted
her down and placed her in Langley's arms.

She and Cathy almost wept over the girl's altered looks.

"Oh, my dear, my dear, how shall we comfort you!" cried poor Cathy,
kneeling down beside her, and trying not to burst into tears.

"We must leave that to time and Garth, and only be as good to her as
we can," returned her sister gently, and then she took the tired face
between her hands and kissed it tenderly and laid it on her breast.

But it was not in human nature to resist all the sweet, wholesome
sympathy that surrounded her; and Queenie was young and beloved,
besides loving with all her heart.  As the days and weeks passed away
courage and strength returned to her.  It was not that Emmie was
forgotten,--deep in her inmost soul lay the image of that
dearly-loved sister,--but that her glorious young vitality asserted
itself.

"How can I remain so dreadfully unhappy when I have you?" she would
whisper to Garth when they paced up and down their favorite
plane-tree walk in the sunset; and indeed any girl might have been
proud of such a lover.

They had no reserves, these two.  Queenie would tell him all her
innocent thoughts--how lonely she had felt when she had seen him and
Dora together, and how she had watched, night after night, for the
red flicker of his cigar as he walked underneath the plane-trees; and
Garth listened to her, and though he said very little in reply
Queenie was perfectly content.

For day by day the sweet conviction came to her that she was growing
deeper into her lover's heart, that the sympathy between them was
ever greater; their delight in each other's presence was quiet but
intense; speech seemed unnecessary to them, they understood each
other without a word.

When two months had passed, and Queenie announced her intention of
going to Carlisle and taking up her abode for the present with Caleb
Runciman, he let her go almost without a word, though the sunshine
seemed to die out of the old house with her presence; and when
Langley would have remonstrated he silenced her at once.

"She thinks it will be best, and perhaps she is right.  Of course we
shall have a dull winter, but it will be worse for her, shut up with
that old man; but in the spring she has promised things shall be as I
wish."  And a flush crossed Garth's handsome face as he spoke, for
the thought of bringing home his wife was very sweet and sacred to
the young man.

So Queenie spent the long winter months in the narrow little house in
the High Street, with only Caleb and Molly.  But it was not such a
dull life after all.  Friends came over from Hepshaw to see
her--Faith Stewart, and Miss Cosie, and now and then Langley and
Cathy, and every week brought Garth.  Queenie and he would take long
walks together.  How she loved to show him her old
haunts--Granite-Lodge, and the Close, and her favorite nook in the
Cathedral!  Now and then they would walk over to the castle where
poor Mary Queen of Scots had been incarcerated, and gaze up at the
little window out of which Fergus Vich Ian Vohr used to look.  The
sentries would look after them as they strolled across the place--the
tall, good-looking fellow, with the slight girl wrapped in furs
beside him.

"What a color you have, my Queen! and how bright your eyes are!" he
would say, for, half in jest and half in loving reality, he often
called her "my Queen," and she would look up and smile, well pleased
that she had found favor in his eyes.

And so one day in the early spring, when the violets and crocuses
were growing on Emmie's grave, there was a quiet wedding at Carlisle,
and Queenie became Garth Clayton's wife.

It was a very quiet wedding, only Langley and Cathy and Ted were
there, and Mr. Logan came over to marry them.  She had worn
bridal-white, but after the ceremony she had resumed her mourning.

"Garth did not mind," she said, "and she was unwilling to put it off
unless he wished it."

Garth was too perfectly happy to find fault with anything.  A holiday
was a rare thing with him, and he and Queenie had planned it to the
best advantage, in a tour through Normandy.  Queenie had never been
abroad, and Garth had only once left England.  The change of scene
would be good for both of them.

When May was over they came back to Hepshaw, and settled down
quietly, "as sober married people," Garth would say, with a proud
look at his young wife.

It was a happy household at Church-Stile House.  Queenie's good sense
and sweetness of temper averted even the ordinary jars that are
liable to occur in the most united family.  In her husband's eyes she
was simply faultless.

"Where is my wife?" was always his first question if she were not in
the porch to meet him.  "My wife"--he seemed never weary of saying it.

"How can you spoil any man so, Mrs. Clayton," Dora said to her once,
on one of her rare visits to Church-Stile House.

Garth had taken his wife more than once to Crossgill Vicarage, but
Dora's ponies seldom drove now through the Hepshaw lanes.  "Beatrix
was going to be married, and she was so busy."  There was always some
excuse; but she was quite pleasant and friendly to Queenie when they
met, though there was no special sympathy between them.  But Queenie
could never rid herself of a secret feeling of embarrassment in
Dora's presence.  That conversation lay as a barrier between them;
she even felt a little self-reproach when Garth once hinted that Dora
looked older and more worn than she used to look.  Was it possible
that she had really cared for him so much after all?

If she had she kept her secret well and fulfilled all her duties
admirably.  She married both her sisters, becoming the most
inveterate match-maker for their sakes; and she soothed her father's
declining years with the utmost dutifulness.

When he was dead, and she was no longer young, she took a step that
surprised her friends considerably, for she married a wealthy widower
with three middle-aged daughters, who had come to live lately at a
grand old place called Dingle Hall.

"They are only _nouveaux richesses_, my dear," as an ill-natured
widow remarked, "and he has made all his money in trade; but Dora
Cunningham cannot live without managing somebody."

If she managed him she did it admirably, for he and her
step-daughters almost worshipped her.  She was a young-looking woman
still, and knew how to make the best of herself; and Dingle Hall was
soon famed for its hospitality and the good taste of its mistress.

But long before that time there had been many and great changes at
Church-Stile House.  First the new house had been built on the little
piece of sloping meadow-land looking over Hepshaw--Warstdale Manor,
as it was called, and the master of Warstdale had taken up his abode
there, but not until Langley had left them to become Harry Chester's
wife.

And by-and-bye there was another wedding.

"What do you think Cathy has told me?" exclaimed Garth one day, when
he found his wife sitting alone in their favorite room--a handsome
library, with a side window commanding a view of Church-Stile House
and the church.  "I really think the girl must be clean daft to dream
of such a thing, but she declares that with or without my consent she
means to marry Logan."

"Well?" and Queenie laid down her work and smiled placidly in his
face.

"Well, how can you sit there in that provokingly unconcerned way, you
very tiresome woman, and looking exactly as though it were no news to
you at all? our Cathy, too!"

"Because I have expected it all along," returned his wife calmly.  "I
knew, however much she might resist it, that in the end she would be
true to herself and him."

"Why, if this is not enough to try a man's patience," exclaimed
Garth, quite irritably for him.  "You talk as though you approve of
this monstrous match."

"So I do.  Mr. Logan is a good man; and then he loves Cathy so
dearly."

"But he is double her age; he is forty-five if he is a day, and Cathy
not more than three-and-twenty.  Why, they will look like a father
and daughter!  The very idea is absurd!"

"The discrepancy between their ages is a pity of course," returned
Queenie, with an admiring look at her own "gude-man."  Garth was
handsomer than ever, every one said so.  "But I know one thing, that
Cathy will never fancy any one else."  And, as usual, Garth soon
discovered that his wife's surmises were correct.

"So you are going to stand on tiptoe all your life, trying to get a
peep at your husband's excellences?" Queenie said to her, with a
lively recollection of a conversation between them.  "Oh, you foolish
Cathy!"

"No; I am the wise Catherine now," returned her friend.  "You see we
poor women can't escape our fate after all.  I am tired of running
away from myself and him, and pretending not to care for his liking
me; so I just told him that he must put up with me, faults and all,
for I won't promise to mend; but if I am not the better for being
with him--" and then she stopped suddenly, and her eyes were full of
tears.  "Oh, Queenie, don't laugh at me, and don't let Garth say a
word against it; for, though he were as old as my father, I love and
honor and venerate him, and I mean to take care of him, and make him
happy all his life long."

And Cathy kept her word.  Garth grumbled a good deal, and would not
be reconciled, and turned sulky when he met them strolling up the
lane together; but even he was driven at last to confess that it had
made a woman of Cathy, and that it had not turned out amiss after all.

Mr. Logan was no longer poor when they married, and it was by her
brother's advice that they left Miss Cosie to take care of the
vicarage, and came to live at Church-Stile House, where Ted was
holding solitary state.

But before that migration was accomplished, there was a new arrival
at Warstdale Manor.  Queenie's boy was now two years old, and this
time it was a small, fair girl that they placed in Garth's arms.

"Our little daughter," he whispered tenderly.  "What shall we call
her, my wife?"

But though no word crossed Queenie's lip the look in the brown eyes
were all-sufficient, and he hastened to answer--

"It shall be as you wish, Queenie dearest.  Of course I knew what you
would say; we will call our little darling Emmie."



FINIS.









*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 74807 ***